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Siblings play an integral and essential part in our psychic development. Traditionally in psychoanalytic thinking, sibling relationships are regarded as secondary in developmental importance to the relationships with the parents. The authors in this book challenge this view and explore the impact of sibling relationships on internal psychic structures, family and social relationships. They suggest that siblings play a primary part in psychic development, even for an only child, and that infants are born with an expectation of siblings, an innate pre-conception similar to those relating to the breast and parental couple. Through infant observations and psychoanalytic treatment, the authors in this book examine sibling relationships from the most profoundly close, as in conjoined twins, through other twin and sibling relationships and deliberate on the wider context of social and tribal brotherhood and sisterhood.

This volume is a much-needed exploration of contemporary theories on psychotherapy and spirituality, moving away from the more traditional, non-spiritual aspects of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. The book consists of a dialogue between the opposing sides; most of the papers have responses from the'other'side. This dialogue mirrors the early communication between Freud and Jung regarding spirituality, and opens up doors for continuing collaboration between psychoanalysis as a pure science and the spiritual and religious dimensions within. This inspiring collection of papers grew from the lectures held in 2002 at the London Centre for Psychotherapy. In the time of increased interest in more scientific schools of psychoanalysis such as neuropsycho-analysis, there is also a surge of interest in spirituality within psychoanalysis, as demonstrated by the great interest in these lectures.