The Conscious Therapeutic Alliance gives therapists something the field has long needed but rarely provided: a concrete, step-by-step map for building the kind of therapeutic relationship where substantive change actually happens.

Most training leaves therapists with only a vague sense of what a strong alliance looks like without ever defining what a conscious alliance truly is, how to create and sustain one, or recover when it breaks down. Michelle M. May changes that by drawing on intensive psychodynamic concepts and applying them across modalities. She identifies the six core elements of the conscious alliance and uncovers the unconscious dynamics that can undermine it, showing therapists exactly how to work with all six components, moment-by-moment. With extensive case vignettes and hands-on exercises, this book bridges the gap between theory and the live, sometimes messy, reality of sitting across from a fellow human being yearning for relief.

For any therapist who has ever sensed that their work lacked the depth needed to bring about real change or felt that something in the room was off but didn't know how to name it or fix it, this book is the resource for which the field has been waiting.

Michelle M. May, LPC, is a psychotherapist, author of What I Couldn't Tell My Therapist, and chair of the ISTDP core training program at the New Washington School of Psychiatry. She maintains a private practice in Arlington, Virginia; Washington, DC; and Sedona, Arizona.