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Mona Barbera Ph.D.
Mona Barbera Quick Facts
MONA BARBERA, PH.D is a licensed psychologist practicing in Boston, MA and Providence, RI. She specializes in couples therapy, and provides workshops for couples and couples therapy training workshops for psychotherapists. She is an Assistant Trainer for Internal Family Systems. After a few years as a struggling actress, she received her B.A in psychology from Antioch West, her M.Ed. from the University of Vermont, and her Ph.D. from New York University. She has written academic articles on couples for publications including The Journal of Imago Relationship Therapy and for The Journal of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy, and a chapter in Imago Relationship Therapy: Perspectives on Theory, by Luquet, Hannah and Hunt. She is past chair of the program committee and past board member of the New England Society for the Study and Treatment of Trauma and Dissociative Disorders. She lives in Boston with her husband.
For more information about Mona Barbera’s tapes, workshops, and teaching schedule, please contact:
Dos Monos Press, PO Box 300469, Boston, MA 02130
http://www.monabarbera.com
Other Programs & Highlights
Couples Workshops: http://www.loving-relationship-information.com/Couples-Workshops.html
Favorite Quotes & Thoughts from Mona Barbera
I love you – I hate you – I miss you
A minute ago I loved you and I knew you were my chosen mate. But you (misunderstood, disrespected, ignored, controlled) me, and I needed to (argue, attack, lecture, pressure, distance). It didn’t help. Now I’m just (angry, alone, hopeless, guilty). How can I get off this merry-go-round?
Using the popular Internal Family Systems model, Barbera tells partners that all their responses – angry, hurt, controlling, unworthy – belong in their relationship. They don’t have to change anything, get rid of anything, or learn new verbal skills. The solution is to have a productive relationship with their own intense feelings first, and then share them with their partner with natural calm, confidence, and connection.
Barbera teaches readers how to do this, using vivid examples from both her own marriage and from the couples she works with. There are eleven easy to follow exercises that will take partners from blaming and shaming to spacious new possibilities, surprising solutions, and tender, vast love.
What about feedback? Don’t partners need to tell each other what they see? Barbera tells us that feedback keeps love alive and vibrant, but that partners must give it only when they feel moderately disturbed. She tells partners how to give effective feedback, and—most importantly—what to do after they give it.
Mona Barbera’s clear little gem of a book is a gift to anyone struggling to make their partnership work…Deftly avoiding psychobabble and self-righteous cant, it provides a truly useful guide to improving intimate life.”
--Michael Elkin, author of Families Under the Influence
Getting Started With Mona Barbera
Visit loving-relationship-information.com to learn about relationship advice, secrets of happy long-term relationships, using the Internal Family Systems model to help your couples relationships, communication, and more!
