Countertransference in the broad sense means all your thoughts, feelings and fantasies during a psychotherapy session. It’s a useful tool for understanding your clients, especially those suffering from depression where anger and rage are an unconscious issue.
Countertransference Issues in Treating Depression Read More »
A discussion of the most fundamental of all defense mechanisms — repression — and how you may encounter resistance in your clinical practice when you try to probe it with your clients.
Defense Mechanisms VI: Repression (and Resistance) Read More »
In early infantile development, the baby projects unbearable experience into its caretakers who, by responding appropriately to what is needed, function as a kind of external container for that experience, gradually helping the infant to develop a mind of its own.
The Development of Mind and Meaning (Part I) Read More »
Many people — clients and therapists alike — idealize psychotherapists, expecting them to transcend normal human needs and limitations; they’re supposed to achieve some level of bounty, emotional and financial, where they can sacrifice their income to the financial needs of their clients.
The Mythical Therapist Read More »
In the psychotherapy relationship, the therapy itself is about the client’s needs while the fee concerns the therapist’s need to earn a living. When the fee is reduced due to financial hardship, the client still receives what he or she needs but the therapist must make do with less.
The Question of Sliding Scale Payment in Psychodynamic Therapy Read More »
An example of dream interpretation with a client in psychotherapy, with some thoughts about Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams.
The Interpretation of a Dream Read More »
In order to empathize with another person, you have to recognize that he or she actually exists apart from and without specific reference to you. Our ability to tolerate separateness largely determines how well we are able to empathize with others.
What experience has taught me about borderline personality disorder — in my work with clients from my practice as well as managing the volatile and difficult man who lives inside me.
Working with Borderline Personality Disorder Read More »
Like all defense mechanisms, denial has its normal and constructive uses: by denying the awareness of unavoidable death, for instance, we’re able to continue with our daily lives.
Defense Mechanisms II: Denial Read More »
Sympathy usually means entering into and sharing feelings that another person has verbally and intentionally expressed; empathy involves intuiting something unspoken, of which the other person may sometimes be entirely unaware. A psychotherapist’s ability to empathize with and understand unconscious parts of a client’s communication depends in large part upon feeling comfortable with those parts within him- or herself. Personal psychotherapy must therefore play a central part in training.
Empathy vs Sympathy in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy Read More »