Saul Rosenthal, PhD
Boston Area Health Psychologist
Doubt and Hope in Hadestown
*Spoilers ahead for the musical Hadestown*
I was fortunate enough to see Hadestown when it played in Boston. Anaïs Mitchell’s musical intertwines two classical myths. The main story focuses on Orpheus, a “poor boy” with the gift of music, and Eurydice, the “hungry young girl” who was a “a runaway from everywhere she’d ever been,” until the two meet. Their journey through life, death, and afterlife take place in the context of the conflicted relationship between Hades, King of the Underworld, and Persephone, part-time Goddess of the Spring and Summer, and part-time Queen of the Underworld.
I’m not the first to consider Hadestown (let alone the mythological figures involved) from a psychological perspective. Alisa Hurwitz writes about the play from a cognitive behavioral therapy perspective, while Fletcher Wortmann looks at the role that uncertainty plays in the many iterations of the Orpheus story. I urge you to read their analyses (after reading this one, of course!).
(more…)Saul R December 11th, 2021
Posted In: Movies, Television, and Theater, Musings, Psychology
How to Train Your Dragon is All Our Journey
I was lucky enough to attend an early viewing of How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World. I watched with a real mixture of responses; sad that it is the last movie in the trilogy, excited to see how the filmmakers deal with some of my favorite characters, blown away by the amazing look of the film. I left the movie with the urge to write about it. Not a review, which would be two words: SEE IT! Rather, I found myself mulling over the parallels between Hiccup’s and Toothless’s journey and our own development from childhood to adulthood. The curse of my decades trying to understand what makes us tick!
First, I, along with my daughter, have a long history with How to Train Your Dragon. We started with the books. I picked up the first and read it to her as part of my not-so-covert attempt to raise her with stories that were both atypical for girls and that I would enjoy. And enjoy them we did. Cressida Cowell draws you in with goofy characters and fantastic storytelling. Of course, Vikings and dragons right away make it worthwhile. But her real gift is allowing the characters to grow more complex, to face dilemmas without clear or simple answers, and to make mistakes. Good characters do bad things and bad characters do good things. Over the course of twelve novels (and a few companion books), Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III grows from a scrawny boy who does not have a place in the Viking world into a true leader and the conduit from one age to the next. Toothless grows from a tiny, naughty, vain, and sub-par dragon into a brave, someday-to-be Seadragonus Giganticus Maximus and one of the important King’s Lost Things (he insists the most important) that will unite the Vikings under a single leader. The films, while very different from the books, chart a similar evolution for both characters.
I can’t help but look back across the story and see parallels in how we develop as people. I think this is the “Hero’s Journey,” which narrates the growth of an individual through a series of crises. The protagonist transforms into a hero by discovering hidden strengths and developing new talents. By the end, they are fundamentally changed. Older, wiser, and perhaps sadder.
(more…)Saul R February 3rd, 2019
Posted In: Development, Movies, Television, and Theater
Psychotherapy Metrics. Helpful or a Waste?
In the article What your therapist doesn’t know, author and psychologist Tony Rousmaniere argues that therapists should incorporate psychotherapy metrics into our practice. In general, I very much agree with him, although it’s a complex topic with no easy answers. Rousmaniere, while advocating for metric-based treatment, does a good job laying out both pros and cons. On the one hand, more and more fields are utilizing metrics as feedback to alter and improve performance. On the other hand, psychotherapy is an extraordinarily complex and individualized piece of work that might not lend itself to influence by statistical analysis.
While there are plenty of reasons to praise and criticize the article (just read through the article’s comments to get a sense), there are a couple of points that really stick out to me.
Speaking as a dataphile, the idea of utilizing objective information to improve my clinical work is fantastic. However, I’m not quite diving into the world of metric-based treatment right away. There are a couple of problems I have with it, particularly in the context of psychotherapy.
(more…)Saul R March 21st, 2017
Posted In: Psychotherapy