Transactional Analysis Counselling in Action, Third Edition meets a demand from counselors and therapists in practice and in training, and from training institutes, for a clearly-written step-by-step account of the process, and practice of using transactional analysis to promote personal change. This book retains the successful overall structure and organization of the popular earlier editions, but has been fully revised.
Ian Stewart is the Co-Director of the Berne Institute, has been a practising Transactional Analysis psychotherapist for over 30 years, and has presented Transactional Analysis trainings worldwide.
I picked this book up hoping to get an in depth look at the structure and theory behind transactional analysis, but this book looks more at the practice of TA. It starts with the initial session and goes through all the way to termination.
While it wasn't the book I was looking for, I enjoyed being able to see the similarities in TA and other theories (some similarities to solution focused and reality therapy--perhaps TA was Berne's way of making psychoanalysis more short term?).
If you are thinking that TA might be your theory of choice, this would be a great book to pick up. But if you are looking to understand the ego stages and games of TA...this isn't it.
Although his was of doing it seems a bit mechanical and robotic, the books does a great job of presenting most of TA concepts and basic theory in a very accessible and clear way. I'm most impressed with his presentation of impasse theory (which seemed very complicated and unclear before). A useful read.
For practitioners, probably not a great role model. I feel like it lacks the human element, though I'm not sure why and how I got this feeling. Probably the exact reciting of certain words (like for contracting or closing escape hutches) as if they were "magical". Also the obsessive focus on contracting every single element of a conversation, which gets annoying really fast. Everything turned around at the end when he elaborately explains that even after re-decision (the most complex, in-depth therapy-work one can do), all of the progress can easily go down the drain because "in Child, the person still has many motivations to go back to the familiar strategies" and because the people in the client's life don't change so they will invite them back to "scripty" behaviors. So, is it all a matter of having a "strong will"?!? Not a good look.