Today, we have cracked the code of love. We now know what a good love relationship looks and feels like. Even better, we can shape it. For the first time, we have a map that can guide us in creating, healing and sustaining love.

Books

Hold Me Tight

Hold Me Tight offers a revolutionary way to see and shape your relationships. The stories, ideas, and exercises, based on the science of love and the wisdom of Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy (EFT), walk the reader through seven conversations that can define a love relationship. Learn to shape these crucial relationship moments and create a secure bond that will last for a lifetime.

Dr. Sue Johnson has finally written the indispensable book for every couple in love. – THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF FAMILY THERAPY
At last, a road map through Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy with its creator. Dr. Johnson’s superb science, humor, and clinical wisdom are finally accessible to all of us. I couldn’t pick a smarter, warmer, and more real guide for this journey. – DR. JOHN GOTTMAN, AUTHOR OF THE SEVEN PRINCIPLES FOR MAKING MARRIAGE WORK
A truly revolutionary, breakthrough book… the most important, valuable book for couples published in the 21st century. – BARRY MCCARTHY, PH.D., AUTHOR OF GETTING IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME
Wonderful…. Hold Me Tight blends the best in research findings with practical suggestions from a caring and compassionate clinician. This fabulous book will be of great benefit… to couples trying to find their way to better communication and deeper, more fulfilling ways of being with each other. Bravo! – DR. DAN SIEGEL, AUTHOR OF MINDSIGHT: THE NEW SCIENCE OF PERSONAL TRANSFORMATION
A much needed message to all couples and therapists and I recommend it to all. – HARVILLE HENDRIX, PH.D., AUTHOR OF GETTING THE LOVE YOU WANT AND RECEIVING LOVE

The Hold Me Tight Workbook

A companion workbook to Dr. Sue Johnson’s million-copy bestseller Hold Me Tight, packed with exercises, conversation prompts, and activities to help couples strengthen their bond, deepen their intimacy, and cultivate a lifetime of love.

Dr. Sue Johnson’s landmark book Hold Me Tight has helped more than 1 million readers strengthen and repair their romantic relationships. Now, finally, comes a companion workbook designed to help couples open up, reestablish safe emotional connection, and renew their bond.

Drawing on the latest developments in Emotionally Focused Therapy, The Hold Me Tight Workbook is packed with sage wisdom and science-backed advice, as well as compelling conversation prompts, exercises, activities, and resources to help couples work through conflict and achieve greater levels of intimacy. Whether you’re celebrating your 50th anniversary or your first, The Hold Me Tight Workbook is an invaluable guide to cultivating a deeper connection — and more fulfilling relationship — with the person you love most.


Edgar and Elouise

A saga tells of a heroic journey where characters find out who they are, face fear and peril, and with comrades, fight to save their world. The whimsical tales of Edgar and Elouise make up two such sagas. 

But how do we know – and even change – how we see ourselves? A strangely wise and wordy porcupine seems to be able to tell us! And after all, he says, “We all need new stories – new ways to see.”

There is also, as in most sagas, a monster to defeat. But first, to even turn and face a monster, there are key questions: How do we face our fear? What can we do in the face of overwhelming odds? 

Sagas are about being human in an uncertain and dangerous world. How do we sculpt an inner strength and strong connections with others, and how can we protect what we love – our frail and magical world? 

Stories are like magic – they help us survive.


Love Sense

Love Sense (2014) draws on groundbreaking research and reveals that romantic love is an attachment bond, just like that between mother and child, and by understanding this concept, it’s possible to develop “love sense” — the ability to build long-lasting relationships. Learning how to enhance or repair the bond with your partner no longer has to be a matter of guesswork. This book will change the way you think about love!

She outlines a practical approach to building relationship bonds and repairing broken relationships that is relevant to couple and family psychologists. – THE FAMILY PSYCHOLOGIST
Love Sense draws on biology, neuroscience, and clinical psychology, delving into the chemistry of love, including the function of the hormone oxytocin…. there is much in “Love Sense” that any couple who has ever felt out of tune will relate to, and good advice for building harmony for the long haul. – LAURA LANDRO FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
With this book, Sue reveals that love is scientifically understandable. She emerges not only as a world authority on love’s repair, but also on its underlying, neural, physiological and psychological structure. – DR. JAMES COAN, DIRECTOR OF THE VIRGINIA AFFECTIVE NEUROSCIENCE LABORATORY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
An absolute must for anyone who wants to understand how Love Makes Sense. Sue Johnson has led the scientific field in helping us understand love and how to repair relationships. The book is a real page-turner that will enlighten all who want to build lasting bonds filled with romance and passion. We need no longer wander in the darkness, stumbling from one disastrous relationship to another. Read this book and learn how to create a life that is a safe haven for love. – DR. JOHN GOTTMAN, AUTHOR OF WHAT MAKES LOVE LAST?
Dr. Sue Johnson creates fascinating connections between cutting-edge research and therapeutic applications, and provides scores of engaging cases and exercises. With enthusiasm and clarity, she shows how we can heal troubled relationships while benefiting society. A wonderful, uplifting, energizing book. – PHILLIP R. SHAVER, PHD, DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF PSYCHOLOGY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS
This is a fascinating, paradigm-shifting book, impressive in its scope and depth and staggering in its implications for us all. It is a giant leap forward. It is also a great, fun read – enjoy! – DR. DREW PINSKY, HOST OF HLN’S DR. DREW ON CALL AND LOVELINE
Dr. Sue Johnson has written a powerful book on the science of securely bonded marriages. Her very human and inspiring approach will keep the reader mesmerized. – BARRY MCCARTHY, PHD, AUTHOR OF REKINDLING DESIRE
A lucid treatise on psychotherapy that will prove useful to students as well as experienced practitioners. (…) Johnson has written an outstanding work that will have an impact on our field for a great many years. – IRVIN YALOM, MD, PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF PSYCHIATRY, STANFORD UNIVERSITY

Created for Connection

“Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” — 1 John 4:8

Are you looking to enrich a healthy relationship, revitalize a tired one, or rescue one gone awry? Do you yearn to grow closer to God, and to further incorporate Him and His teachings into your marriage? We all want a lifetime of love, support, and faith. But sometimes we need a little help.

Enter Dr. Sue Johnson, developer of Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) and “the best couple therapist in the world,” according to bestselling relationship expert Dr. John Gottman. In Created For Connection, Dr. Johnson and Kenneth Sanderfer, a leading EFT practitioner in the Christian community, share Johnson’s groundbreaking and remarkably successful program for creating stronger, more secure relationships not only between partners, but between us and God.

The message of Created For Connection is simple: Forget about learning how to argue better, analyzing your early childhood, or making grand romantic gestures. Instead, get to the emotional underpinnings of your relationship by recognizing that you are attached to and dependent on your partner in much the same way that a child is on a parent, and we are on the Heavenly Father, for nurturing, soothing, and protection. The way to enhance or save our relationships with each other and with God is to be open, attuned, responsive, and to reestablish safe emotional connection. Filled with Bible verses, inspiring real-life stories, and guidance, Created For Connection will ensure a lifetime of love.


Attachment Theory in Practice

For mental health professionals and EFT practitioners.

Drawing on cutting-edge research on adult attachment—and providing an innovative roadmap for clinical practice—Susan M. Johnson argues that psychotherapy is most effective when it focuses on the healing power of emotional connection. The primary developer of emotionally focused therapy (EFT) for couples, Johnson now extends her attachment-based approach to individuals and families. The volume shows how EFT aligns perfectly with attachment theory as it provides proven techniques for treating anxiety, depression, and relationship problems. Each modality (individual, couple, and family therapy) is covered in paired chapters that respectively introduce key concepts and present an in-depth case example. Special features include instructive end-of-chapter exercises and reflection questions.

Buy Now

A Primer for Emotionally Focused Therapy

For mental health professionals and EFT practitioners.

From best-selling author, Susan M. Johnson, with over 1 million books sold worldwide!

This essential text from the leading authority on Emotionally Focused Therapy, Susan M. Johnson, and her colleague T. Leanne Campbell, applies the key interventions of EFT to work with individuals, providing an overview and clinical guide to treating clients with depression, anxiety, and traumatic stress.

Designed for therapists at all levels of expertise, Johnson and Campbell focus on introducing clinicians to EFIT interventions, techniques, and change processes in a highly accessible and practical format. The book begins by summarizing attachment theory and science – the theoretical basis of this model – together with the experiential approach to change in psychotherapy. Chapters describe the three stages of EFIT, macro-interventions, such as the EFIT Tango, and various micro-interventions through clinical exercises, case studies, and transcripts to demonstrate this model in practice with individuals, highlighting the unique benefits of EFT as a cross-modality approach for treating emotional disorders. With exercises interwoven throughout the text, this book is built to accompany in-person and online training, helping the practicing clinician offer targeted and empirically tested interventions that not only alleviate symptoms of distress but expand the client’s emotional balance, agency, and sense of self.

As the next major extension of the EFT approach, this book will appeal to therapists already working with couples and families as well as those just beginning their professional journey. Psychotherapists, psychologists, counselors, social workers, and mental health workers will also find this book invaluable.