Contents
- 1. Lawrence LeShan “If there is war tomorrow? Psychology of War»
- 2. Mikhail Reshetnikov «Psychology of War»
- 3. Ursula Wirtz, Joerg Zobeli “The thirst for meaning. Man in extreme situations. The Limits of Psychotherapy»
- 4. Peter Levine Waking the Tiger — Healing Trauma
- 5. Otto Van der Hart, Ellert R.S. Nienhayus, Cathy Steele Ghosts of the Past. Structural dissociation and therapy of the consequences of chronic psychic trauma”
“A holiday with tears in the eyes” — this line from the song has become a capacious formula expressing the attitude of Russians to the Victory in the Great Patriotic War. However, in addition to tears, the experience of participating in the war — on the battlefield, as a victim or in the rear — leaves deep wounds on the soul. In psychology, such wounds are most commonly referred to as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We are talking about five books that will help you understand the psychological nature of war, the peculiarities of the injuries that such a tragedy inflicts on people, and ways to heal them.
1. Lawrence LeShan “If there is war tomorrow? Psychology of War»
In this book, an American psychologist (prone to excessive mysticism in his other works) reflects on why wars have been an integral companion of mankind for centuries — and why neither the Middle Ages with its religious worldview, nor the New Age with its enlightenment could stop the bloodshed.
“From the information we have on the timing, frequency, and popularity of wars, we can conclude that war gives people hope to solve their problems or even a whole range of problems that can be recognized as global,” notes LeShan. In other words, wars are designed to satisfy the needs of individuals — and, according to LeShan’s hypothesis, we are talking about fundamental psychological needs, and not about economic ones. No war actually gave anyone the opportunity to «cash in»: the roots of bloodshed are not in the economy.
2. Mikhail Reshetnikov «Psychology of War»
Psychologist Mikhail Reshetnikov at the turn of 1970–1980 was engaged in the psychological selection of candidates for training at the aviation school of pilots and studied the behavior of people in the centers of natural disasters, wars and catastrophes. In particular, the objects of his analysis were the war in Afghanistan, the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (1986), the Spitak earthquake in Armenia (1988) and other events. Mikhail Reshetnikov’s doctoral dissertation received the stamp «Top Secret» — it was removed only in 2008, when the researcher decided to collect his achievements in one book.
Written in a dry scientific language, this work will be of interest primarily to psychotherapists and psychiatrists who work with people who have survived disasters or who are participating in hostilities. The role of the «human factor» in war, in natural disasters and in rescue operations is central to the study: the author develops very specific recommendations for overcoming it. Professor Reshetnikov also pays great attention to how Afghan veterans adapted to civilian life after the war. Given the high activity of that entire generation of men, the psychologist’s observations can also shed light on the features of the psychological climate in modern Russia.
3. Ursula Wirtz, Joerg Zobeli “The thirst for meaning. Man in extreme situations. The Limits of Psychotherapy»
This book is only a quarter of a century old, but is already considered the golden classic of coping literature. The authors, a Jungian and a neo-Freudian, tried to clarify in their work several aspects of working with psychological trauma at once: meaning and the crisis of meaning, limitations and ways to overcome them, attempts to formulate general approaches to healing from trauma. They draw on extensive material collected during the work with the participants and victims of the war in Yugoslavia, and show what happens in the inner world of a person at the moment of ultimate experience, a face-to-face encounter with death.
According to the approach of Wirtz and Zobeli, the basis of overcoming trauma is the search for and generation of a new meaning and the construction of a new identity around this meaning. Here they converge with the theories of Viktor Frankl and Alfried Lenglet, and it’s not just about placing meaning at the forefront. Like the great Frankl and Lenglet, the authors of this book bridge the gap between a purely scientific approach to psychology and an almost religious idea of the soul and spirituality, bringing skeptics and believers closer together. Perhaps the main value of this edition is the conciliatory mood that pervades every page.
4. Peter Levine Waking the Tiger — Healing Trauma
Psychotherapist Peter Levin, describing the process of healing trauma, first dissects the very concept of traumatization, gets to the bottom of the trauma. For example, when talking about war veterans and victims of violence (and it’s no coincidence that they are next to him on his list!), Professor Levin notes that they often fail to pass the “immobilization reaction” — in other words, they get stuck in a terrible experience for months and years. and talk about the suffering over and over again, continuing to experience anger, fear and pain.
“Immobilization of consciousness” is one of the important steps towards a normal life. But very few people can do it on their own, so the role of psychologists, friends and relatives in this process is invaluable. Which, in fact, makes the book useful not only for professionals: if one of your loved ones was a victim of violence, a disaster, or returned from hostilities, your actions and words can help them come back to life.
5. Otto Van der Hart, Ellert R.S. Nienhayus, Cathy Steele Ghosts of the Past. Structural dissociation and therapy of the consequences of chronic psychic trauma”
This book deals with such a consequence of a traumatic experience as dissociation, or the feeling that the connection of your consciousness with reality is lost — and the events around you are not happening to you, but to someone else.
As the authors note, for the first time dissociation was described in detail by the British psychologist and psychiatrist of the First World War, Charles Samuel Myers: he noticed that the soldiers who took part in the hostilities of 1914-1918 coexisted and alternated with each other outwardly normal personality (ANP) and affective personality (AL). If the first of these parts sought to participate in ordinary life, longed for integration, then the second was dominated by destructive emotions. To reconcile ANP and EP, making the latter less destructive, is the main task of a specialist working with PTSD.
The research of the next century, based on Myers’s observations, made it possible to figure out how to reassemble a traumatized and fractured personality — this process is by no means easy, but the joint efforts of therapists and loved ones can be carried through it.