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The mechanism of projective and introjective identification has been re-evaluated in modern analysis. It is no longer just about the transference of mental content to an other, rather it addresses also the deepest psycho-organic sensations and vibrations, which in turn become the basis for interpersonal and family dialogues. The goal of this article is also to lay out the fundamental dynamics of body language as understood by the relational family paradigm. It is a novel analytical perspective on the individual, who is always part of any relational family configuration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Jehovah's Witnesses are a Fundamentalist Christian religious group well known for their door-to-door proselytism. As a result of their belief in spreading the word of god and converting others, Jehovah's Witness populations are growing across the globe. A primary element of Jehovah's Witness doctrine and other Fundamentalist groups is a mandate to not develop associations with people outside of the religion. As a result of this isolationism, many Fundamentalists who experience psychological distress may hesitate to obtain help from the mental health community. Their belief system and cultural values, including the practice of 'disfellowshipping' or shunning members, influence the types of problems Jehovah's Witnesses and other Fundamentalists present with in therapy, obstacles to treatment, and issues that may arise within the therapeutic relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Lubavitch Chassidim are one of several ultra-orthodox groups within Judaism. Their central focus is on their leader or Rebbe, who is seen as not only the possessor of all wisdom but also having supernatural powers. In working therapeutically with Lubavitch, one needs to distinguish if the beliefs of the individual are unique to them or reflect the belief system of the community. If the former, then it obviously needs to be analyzed. If the latter, then it is seen as an identification with the group and reflective of the need for group cohesion and often a regulator of self-esteem. The following article demonstrates these factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eros is like a huge spark that ignites our passion and then confronts us with the problem of living out this fire in ordinary space and time. What do we each know of this spark, this flame? Who or what was it’s object? Where have we felt this force for unity in ourselves, with another person, with life itself? Where are we unlived erotically? Where are the chinks in our erotic life? In focusing on the erotic in clinical work, we usually begin with the analysand’s transference. I want to explore eros in the life of the analyst for our relation to eros influences the clinical work we do. When eros is constellated, two possibilities of relationship present themselves: to an actual other who must be reckoned with as real, and to a psychic content, equally real, which we do not invent or control. How do we experience this electricity? What is our desire like? What does it take us back to, and toward what unseen purpose does it propel us? Eros brings with it a sense of purpose, of going somewhere important, something that enlists body, soul, and spirit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a disquisition, Apologia Pro Intermundia Sua discusses a study of seven members of the clergy who have made or are making the transition out of parish ministry to engage the world as part of mainstream culture and their experience of being between worlds, or intermundia. This paper traces a path of using an imaginal approach by means of an alchemical hermeneutic methodology and transference dialogues to extend beneath the complexity of our knowledge and the knowledge of our complexity enfolded by reverie and fantasy. This paper also offers for consideration a proposal for an interventionless approach to the intermundia of clergy transitioning out of parish ministry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kohut proposed that the narcissistic personality could be transformed in the therapeutic environment by an empathic approach on the part of the analyst. Within the analytic setting, specific transference phenomena arise spontaneously, allowing the analysand to confront infantile grandiose fantasies and unresolved narcissistic wounds. Using the story of the life of St. Francis of Assisi, this paper illustrates how religious experience––specifically the ongoing encounter with a transcendent other––can provide the “therapeutic” milieu in which the mirroring, idealizing, and twinship transferences described by Kohut can arise, and within which pathological narcissism can be transformed into the “cosmic narcissism” of the healthy personality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On November 6, 2002, Dr. James Fosshage delivered the following talk at a Clinical Training Conference held at the Blanton-Peale Institute. The Clinical Training Conference at Blanton-Peale provides experiential and conceptual resources to support the therapist-in-training in the context of his/her professional identity. The training conference is attended by candidates of all phases of the Psychoanalytic Program, the Pastoral Psychotherapy Program, and the Marriage and Family Program, as well as faculty members, administrators, staff, and interns of the institute. The residents were asked to review three articles written by Dr. Fosshage in preparation for his presentation: “Toward Reconceptualising Transference: Theoretical and Clinical Considerations,” International Journal of Psycho-Analysis (1994) 75 (2): 265–280; “Countertransference as the Analyst's Experience of the Analysand: Influence of Listening Perspectives,” Psychoanalytic Psychology (1995) 12 (3): 375–391; and “Listening/Experiencing Perspectives and the Quest for a Facilitating Responsiveness,” Conversations in Self Psychology: Progress in Self Psychology , (1997) 13: 33–55. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]