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Self Improvement
This classic book has a uniquely rich history of helping people learn how to recognize -- and eliminate -- common obstacles to their spiritual development. In this groundbreaking work, Dr. Rudolf Allers, a pioneer psychologist and a contemporary of Freud, proves the importance of religion -- and Catholicism in particular -- by arguing that only the Catholic view of man can explain abnormalities and produce positive personality changes. Among all the psychologists of his time, Allers alone linked moral and spiritual growth to mental health. In this gem of a book, you will find an in-depth yet accessible explanation of how character is shaped in childhood and afterward. This trusty guide will help you in rooting out character defects, curing (and preventing) developmental problems, strengthening virtues, and recognizing dormant potential in both children and adults. You will discover keys to spiritual growth that is steady and lasting,
Do you, or does your child, have a faulty "character ideal"? If so, you will learn how this can cause misdirection and poor decision-making. You will also find out character differences between males and females and discover why the formation of character is linked with the nature of moral and religious life. Dr. Allers, an esteemed friend of Edith Stein and mentor of Hans Urs von Balthasar and Viktor E. Frankl, also unpacks how a widely held Protestant belief about man's nature -- shared by some Catholics -- can stunt psychological growth. He specifies mistakes to avoid in child-rearing (early childhood and adolescence) and the proper family environment in which to foster high achievement in children. Additionally, he explores leniency versus severity in child-rearing, what to do about "difficult" children, and the essential ingredient of effective punishment. Central to Allers's unique approach is his certainty that dramatic character transformation comes despite fixed habits and past mistakes. He proves this, placing the highest value on the Church's accumulated wisdom about human nature and drawing freely from Scripture, the lives and writings of the saints, and the teachings of great theologians. Significantly, you will grasp the root causes of common problems such as anxiety, bed-wetting, compulsiveness, daydreaming, defiance, discouragement, disillusionment, effeminacy, gossip, homosexuality, impulsiveness, indecisiveness, insecurity, loneliness, dishonesty, oversensitivity, pridefulness, scrupulosity, promiscuity, speech impediments, suicidal tendencies, superstition, vengefulness, and weakness of will.
Do you, or does your child, have a faulty "character ideal"? If so, you will learn how this can cause misdirection and poor decision-making. You will also find out character differences between males and females and discover why the formation of character is linked with the nature of moral and religious life. Dr. Allers, an esteemed friend of Edith Stein and mentor of Hans Urs von Balthasar and Viktor E. Frankl, also unpacks how a widely held Protestant belief about man's nature -- shared by some Catholics -- can stunt psychological growth. He specifies mistakes to avoid in child-rearing (early childhood and adolescence) and the proper family environment in which to foster high achievement in children. Additionally, he explores leniency versus severity in child-rearing, what to do about "difficult" children, and the essential ingredient of effective punishment. Central to Allers's unique approach is his certainty that dramatic character transformation comes despite fixed habits and past mistakes. He proves this, placing the highest value on the Church's accumulated wisdom about human nature and drawing freely from Scripture, the lives and writings of the saints, and the teachings of great theologians. Significantly, you will grasp the root causes of common problems such as anxiety, bed-wetting, compulsiveness, daydreaming, defiance, discouragement, disillusionment, effeminacy, gossip, homosexuality, impulsiveness, indecisiveness, insecurity, loneliness, dishonesty, oversensitivity, pridefulness, scrupulosity, promiscuity, speech impediments, suicidal tendencies, superstition, vengefulness, and weakness of will.
- GenresPsychology
256 pages, Paperback
Published November 21, 2023
2 people are currently reading
35 people want to read
About the author
Rudolf Allers
30 books11 followersHe was a disciple of Sigmund Freud. He worked with Alfred Adler for 13 years until he decided to part away. Victor Frankl, the creator of the Logotherapy, was thrown out of Adler’s group because he was a disciple of Allers and shared his ideas.
He wrote and published around 600 books and papers, and had a great influence in his time. Why we know so little about him remains a mystery. Might this be a result of the so called Totschweigetaktik (the silent tactic)? This page tries to make up a little for that ungratefulness or silencing tactic.
Rudolf Allers was a physician, psychologist and philosopher. He was born in Vienna (Austria), in 1883. He received his MD in 1906, from the University of Vienna. After practicing medicine for two years, he studied to be a psychiatrist. He began to get interested in Sigmund Freud’s work, and belonged to his last class. Allers did not agree with what he describes as unscientific ideas of Freud (1). He worked in mental clinics in Munich (Germany). We find him in 1913 as instructor of psychiatry at the University of Munich. In World War I he worked as a surgeon in the Austrian Army. Afterwards he wrote a book about bullet wounds in the head. He also had worked in a biochemistry lab and wrote several papers on his experiments.
From 1918 to 1938 he specialized in psychiatry. He taught and did research in the Medical School in Vienna. He was also Director of the School of Medical Psychology. From 1920 he also worked in private psychotherapeutic consultation.
In between these occupations he went to the Sacro Cuore University in Milan (Italy), invited by the famous Father Agostino Gemelli, one of the founders of the great Catholic University in northern Italy, where he earned his doctoral degree in Philosophy (1934). Allers was fully convinced that one should understand very well the anthropological and philosophical issues at stake in the views or fundamentals of psychology and psychiatry.
In 1938 he foresaw the peril for him and his family by Hitler’s takeover of Austria, so he decided to accept an invitation to go to USA to teach psychology in The Catholic University of America.
Allers was and remained Catholic all his life. In 1948 he was appointed professor of philosophy in Georgetown University in Washington, DC. In 1960 he received a Doctor of Laws, honoris causa. He was President of the Washington Philosophical Club and also of the Metaphysical Society of America. The Catholic Philosophical Association granted him the famous Thomas Aquinas Medal. He also was a Fullbright lecturer in France, Austria and Switzerland in 1955 and 1956.
Even though he became a professor Emeritus in 1957, he taught almost until his last days on earth. Georgetown University sent him students to the nursing home at Carroll Manor Archdiocesan House where the scholar of international reputation gave classes to them in the solarium of the house, specially conditioned for that purpose by the Carmelite sisters who took care of the house. Allers said of them: "These nuns are full of love for God and for the souls and bodies of those under their care. They must be very dear to God".
Father Brian A. McGrath wrote: To his students Professor Allers was a scholar and a gentleman. Quick, erudite, open, he valued the questioning mind, the new insights while he cherished the best of the ancient and medieval traditions; he was also patient but demanding, stirring and encouraging, attentive to both the novice and the candidate. With his colleagues he was generous and cooperative without cant or pretense. He could not be categorized because he was never bound in a narrow system. Plato and Aristotle, Thomas and Kant, Marx, Russell and Whitehead were respected for their contributions. He felt free to agree or disagree with their solutions as he explored the reality in his search for truth". One would have to add the names of Saint Augustine, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Scheler, Jame
He wrote and published around 600 books and papers, and had a great influence in his time. Why we know so little about him remains a mystery. Might this be a result of the so called Totschweigetaktik (the silent tactic)? This page tries to make up a little for that ungratefulness or silencing tactic.
Rudolf Allers was a physician, psychologist and philosopher. He was born in Vienna (Austria), in 1883. He received his MD in 1906, from the University of Vienna. After practicing medicine for two years, he studied to be a psychiatrist. He began to get interested in Sigmund Freud’s work, and belonged to his last class. Allers did not agree with what he describes as unscientific ideas of Freud (1). He worked in mental clinics in Munich (Germany). We find him in 1913 as instructor of psychiatry at the University of Munich. In World War I he worked as a surgeon in the Austrian Army. Afterwards he wrote a book about bullet wounds in the head. He also had worked in a biochemistry lab and wrote several papers on his experiments.
From 1918 to 1938 he specialized in psychiatry. He taught and did research in the Medical School in Vienna. He was also Director of the School of Medical Psychology. From 1920 he also worked in private psychotherapeutic consultation.
In between these occupations he went to the Sacro Cuore University in Milan (Italy), invited by the famous Father Agostino Gemelli, one of the founders of the great Catholic University in northern Italy, where he earned his doctoral degree in Philosophy (1934). Allers was fully convinced that one should understand very well the anthropological and philosophical issues at stake in the views or fundamentals of psychology and psychiatry.
In 1938 he foresaw the peril for him and his family by Hitler’s takeover of Austria, so he decided to accept an invitation to go to USA to teach psychology in The Catholic University of America.
Allers was and remained Catholic all his life. In 1948 he was appointed professor of philosophy in Georgetown University in Washington, DC. In 1960 he received a Doctor of Laws, honoris causa. He was President of the Washington Philosophical Club and also of the Metaphysical Society of America. The Catholic Philosophical Association granted him the famous Thomas Aquinas Medal. He also was a Fullbright lecturer in France, Austria and Switzerland in 1955 and 1956.
Even though he became a professor Emeritus in 1957, he taught almost until his last days on earth. Georgetown University sent him students to the nursing home at Carroll Manor Archdiocesan House where the scholar of international reputation gave classes to them in the solarium of the house, specially conditioned for that purpose by the Carmelite sisters who took care of the house. Allers said of them: "These nuns are full of love for God and for the souls and bodies of those under their care. They must be very dear to God".
Father Brian A. McGrath wrote: To his students Professor Allers was a scholar and a gentleman. Quick, erudite, open, he valued the questioning mind, the new insights while he cherished the best of the ancient and medieval traditions; he was also patient but demanding, stirring and encouraging, attentive to both the novice and the candidate. With his colleagues he was generous and cooperative without cant or pretense. He could not be categorized because he was never bound in a narrow system. Plato and Aristotle, Thomas and Kant, Marx, Russell and Whitehead were respected for their contributions. He felt free to agree or disagree with their solutions as he explored the reality in his search for truth". One would have to add the names of Saint Augustine, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Scheler, Jame
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 6, 2026
A phenomenal book by a Catholic psychologist - dissecting real problems that people face and offering guidance and insight. His Catholicity permeates every bit of understanding that he reveals, evidenced by this quote.
“To man is given the task not of creating values or of attributing them to things originally indifferent as to value, but the task of discovering values existing in the world wherein he lives and of becoming aware of values as yet not real which he has to bring into existence.”
“To man is given the task not of creating values or of attributing them to things originally indifferent as to value, but the task of discovering values existing in the world wherein he lives and of becoming aware of values as yet not real which he has to bring into existence.”
January 3, 2015
Probably one of my favorite books. It really helped me understand a lot of my problems. Very insightful.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews