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Beginning January 15th, 2009 Dr. Olsson will be opening a private practice in Keene, New Hampshire. The office will be located at: 151 West Street, Keene, New Hampshire, (603) 352-5075.
"A painfull past understood, is less likely to be repeated."
"Inner strengths discovered, have enduring value."
Many problems can be resolved by psychotherapy without medication. Psychotherapy can compliment medication use;
Dr. Olsson will be offering: Psychoanalytic Consultation & Psychotherapy, Individual Psychotherapy, Supervision of Psychotherapy, Couples Therapy, Men's Group Therapy, Collegial Supervision & Support Groups for therapists or healthcare providers, Second opinion Consultation regarding Therapy Impasses or problems (with therapist, the client,or both)
Services strictly confidentail and by appointment only.
Fes at time of visit: Initial evaluation (one hour) $250.00; Individual Psychotherapy or supervision session (50 minutes) $150.00; Group Therapy or supervision (90 minutes) $50.00 per session, per member; Group Therapy Supervision $30.00 per session, per member.
Don't miss Dr. Olsson in the History Channels presentation of:
Click on the link above to check the History Channel web-site for the current show times.
BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT---Dr. Olsson's new book is currently available on Amazon.com thru this link http://www.amazon.com/Cult-Osama-Psychoanalyzing-Magnetism-Muslim/dp/0275999890/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1197337915&sr=1-1
CULT OF OSAMA: Psychoanalyzing Bin Laden and His Magnetism for Muslim Youth.
Publisher: Praeger of The Greenwood Publishing Group
In CULT OF OSAMA, Dr. Peter Olsson approaches Osama bin Laden et. al. from an applied psychoanalytic and psychodynamic perspective. He applies psychological and social psychological observations from his 25-year study of destructive cults and cult leaders to try to understand the mind of Osama bin Laden. There are many journalistic, political, military and intelligence books about bin Laden and terror groups. But, Olsson’s study offers a purely psychological, psychobiographical, and social psychological perspective on Osama. Dr. Olsson is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst and the author of Malignant Pied Pipers of Our Time, a 2005 study of destructive cults and cult leaders.
Dr. Olsson locates and traces the psychological threads of narcissistic wounds and unresolved grief resulting from Osama’s childhood losses and separations. (Including the death of his father when he was 10 years old; separation from his mother even earlier via his parents’ separation; the related loss of his childhood “best friend”; and the humiliation Osama experienced as the “Son of a Slave” in his father’s household.)
Olsson explores Osama’s lifelong search for surrogate older brother and father figures among radical Islamist teachers and mentors. Olsson also presents evidence to support the idea that Osama experienced young adult “dark epiphanies” that further magnified and focused his unresolved disappointments and narcissistic rage. Many of these narcissistic problems are common among radical Islamist leaders.
Osama’s psychobiography resonates with the psychological wounds and narcissistic injuries that reverberate among many Arab and Muslim youths in their search for meaning, identity, and heroes. Osama’s Malignant Pied Piper appeal stems from this peculiar but profoundly important synchrony of shared trauma and pain between Osama and Arab/Muslim youth.
Osama has underlying ambivalence toward his father and the millions of dollars he inherited from his father. Many people in the Arab and Muslim world see Osama as a generous, unselfish, Robinhood-like benefactor and hero. In the author’s view, Osama acts out his inner, unresolved disappointments in his father through a violent jihad of revenge against Saudi ruler father figures and their American friends. At a conscious level, Osama sees himself as revering and honoring his father’s devotion to Wahhabism. At an unconscious level, he acts out his profoundly ambivalent feelings of shame, grief, and disappointment in the western materialistic basis for his father’s Saudi oil money and power.
Bin Laden’s psychology has important implications for American foreign policy, foreign aid, and our formal and informal diplomatic efforts. The application of concepts such as group self, groupthink, and “prolonged adolescence” helps explain key issues in bin Laden’s life and the lives of terror cult recruits. American efforts to deal with terrorism can benefit from being informed about these issues.
Check back for information and links for information on how to purchase this book once available.
A psychological Study of Destructive Cult Leaders from Rev. Jim Jones to Osama bin Laden
By Peter A. Olsson, M.D.
Brief Description of the Book:
In this book, psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Dr. Peter A. Olsson examines the phenomena of destructive and apocalyptic cults, revealing the psychological roots of both leaders and cult members. Dr. Olsson calls the leaders — Rev. Jim Jones, David Koresh, Shoko Ashahara, Osama bin Laden, and others — Malignant Pied Pipers for the way they lure followers to their deaths. He uses the tenets of psychology to analyze the lives of the cult leaders and the source of their powerful attraction to vulnerable converts. Most important in this age of global terrorism, Dr. Olsson offers his vision for the book:
“It is my hope that this in-depth psychological study of destructive cult leaders of the last 30 years — Malignant Pied Pipers — illuminates the roots of their malevolence and their power, a condition that has invariably led to murder, mass suicide, the destruction of families, and to the terrorist acts that dominate our headlines. By understanding them and their appeal, we increase our chance of averting future disasters.”
As a psychoanalyst, Dr. Olsson has helped victims and relatives of cult members. As an experienced researcher, he has listened to and evaluated countless tapes of apocalyptic charismatics and read their literature.
The timeliness of the topic is evident on the front page of the daily newspaper, which explodes with descriptions of the latest terrorist victims, cult suicides, or bombings by religious fanatics. Throughout the world, people are starving for information on ways they can protect themselves, their children, and their friends from falling prey to extremists.
Table of Contents
Introduction.
The author relates the medieval legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin, whose rage at mistreatment by the citizens of Hamelin provoked him into a terrible act of revenge when he enticed the children of the town to follow him to their doom. Dr. Olsson uses the tale as a metaphor for the book. He describes his personal and professional motivations for his decades-long study of destructive cults, and gives a brief explanation of the psychological dynamics at work in both cult leaders and converts.
Chapter One. Understanding the Malignant Pied Piper
How do charismatic/messianic personalities like Jim Jones or Osama bin Laden develop? What enables them to play a godlike, parental role for their followers? Each of the Malignant Pied Pipers studied in this book has two key aspects to his aberrant personality development — a traumatic childhood characterized by neglect, humiliation, and rejection; and later experiences termed “dark epiphanies” that intensify an already malformed personality. All of the destructive cult leaders fit the diagnosis for Narcissistic Personality Disorder as well as Malignant Narcissism.
In addition to setting out the parameters for his discussion of the cult leaders, Dr. Olsson discusses his methodology for the book, defines both benign and destructive cults, and shows how the Malignant Pied Piper invariably exploits and abuses cult members and leads them toward a violent, apocalyptic end.
Chapter Two: Rev. Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple of Jonestown
A natural leader, Jim Jones used his charisma as a preacher and social activist to attract a wide following of idealistic young people in the 1960s and 1970s. As he sank deeper into the grandiosity and paranoia of his self-appointed role, rumors of brutality, sexual and financial exploitation, and brainwashing caused the authorities to begin investigating the cult. The murders and mass suicides in Jonestown in 1978 were the culmination of Jones’s twisted apocalyptic vision. The once neglected, abused leader had become the all-powerful abuser and abandoner.
Chapter Three: David Koresh and the Branch Davidians of Waco, Texas
Like the section on Jim Jones, this biographical chapter will begin with a factual summary of Koresh’s life and the events that culminated in the mass deaths at Waco in 1993. Dr. Olsson’s psychological analysis of Koresh and his followers will focus on Koresh’s dark epiphanies and apocalyptic vision, and how they played out so tragically in the lives of his cult members. Koresh, like Jones, reenacted his boyhood pain and suffering by controlling, exploiting, and bullying others.
Chapter Four: Charles Manson, the Helter Skelter Killer; and Shoko Asahara, Bizarre Messiah of Aum Shinrikyo
Psychobiographies of these two destructive cult leaders will show how they fit the definition and pattern of Malignant Pied Pipers. (On February 27, 2004, Asahara was sentenced to death in Japan for directing the deadly sarin gas attacks in the Tokyo subway in 1995.)
Chapter Five: Marshal Applewhite of Heaven’s Gate; Luc Jouret and Joseph DeMambro of the Suicidal Solar Temple
Psychobiographies of two more Malignant Pied Pipers. Applewhite, an Elmer-Gantry-like guru, convinced cult members to commit suicide to that they could join extraterrestrials in the tail of the Halle-Bopp comet. Jouret and DeMambro, paranoid mystics, espoused group suicide to draw attention to urgent environmental issues, luring idealistic followers to their deaths.
Chapter Six: The Siren Song of Destructive Cults
Who is vulnerable to the call of a Malignant Pied Piper? The author describes the four core cult indoctrination techniques and how they affect the minds of followers and feed into the delusions of the Malignant Pied Piper in a deadly symbiosis. Through case histories and analysis, the author suggests who might be most vulnerable to the psychological coercion of cults. He lists the typical cult-leader tactics and tip-offs.
Chapter Seven: The Mind of Osama bin Laden — The Ultimate Malignant Pied Piper
In this chapter, Dr. Olsson applies his 20-plus years of research about destructive and apocalyptic cults and their leaders to studying bin Laden and his Al Qaeda terror cult. Bin Laden’s childhood psychological deformities and later “dark epiphany” experiences put him clearly in the mold of the other Malignant Pied Pipers. There are also uncanny similarities in “follower psychology” between Al Qaeda recruits and members of other destructive cults. The author shows how the humiliation and devastation of refugee camps, war zones, and religious strife in the Middle East has created a generation of “wounded sheep” who find bin Laden’s Pied Piper music profound and compelling.
Chapter Eight: Fighting Back
What to do if someone you know joins a destructive cult — what works, what doesn’t, what might be effective. Illustrated by case studies. What can we as a society do to change the conditions that make people more vulnerable to cults and apocalyptic scenarios?
Can Malignant Pied Pipers be recognized early enough for treatment? Are their psychological conditions treatable? How can we identify them before they hurt people?
Malignant Pied Pipers of Our time can be purchased online at
Publish America and enter code #1-4137-7668-X , Amazon.com , and at
Also available by Dr. Olsson:
"Poems Behind a Psychiatrists Couch"
Dr. Olsson's book of poems is available thru amazon.com.
Or thru Red Lead Press at 1-800-834-1803
