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This article presents the history of one until now unknown case of C.G. Jung: Maggy Reichstein. Born in Indonesia in 1894 in a very aristocratic family, she brought her sister to Zurich to be treated by Jung in 1919, and later she herself was in analysis with him. Jung used her case as example in his lecture in 1937 on the realities of practical psychotherapy, relating it to the process of transference and countertransference. Jung deepened his studies in Eastern psychology after a series of dreams she had, which culminated in the Yoga Kundalini Seminars. She was also the case presented in his article of 1951 on the concept of synchronicity. Jung wrote that her case, concerning synchronicity, remained unique in his experience. Jung also published some of her mandalas. He considered her able to understand his ideas in depth. Reichstein was for Jung an important case, which challenged and triggered his interests in different subjects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article was written in response to receiving the 2012 Eric Berne Memorial Award for the author’s work on supervision. It underscores the value of theoretical knowledge of supervision for all practitioners, even those not directly involved in offering supervision. It also provides a practical approach to the analysis of the relational dynamics in both supervision and clinical practice through three questions practitioners might ask themselves: What am I feeling during the session? Why do I feel what I am feeling? Why does the other person want (unconsciously) me to feel what I am feeling? The use of these questions is described and illustrated through two case studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The concepts of transference and countertransference developed within psychodynamic paradigms. While there is an increasing interest by cognitive therapists in the therapeutic relationship, there is less discussion of the relevance of transference and countertransference. Understanding these concepts may be useful to cognitive therapists as part of reflective practice, especially in regard to understanding and managing countertransference responses. Methods: This article briefly examines the concepts of transference from a number of different perspectives, including social-cognitive, attachment, cognitive analytic therapy, and schema perspectives. Two aspects of countertransference that are sometimes termed 'subjective' and 'objective' are also examined. A case example is given to illustrate a cognitive conceptualisation of countertransference. Results: There is some evidence that therapists' countertransference responses can provide insight into clients' experiences and patterns of relating to others. Cognitive therapists may therefore benefit from applying psychodynamic perspectives of countertransference in reflective practice. Conclusions: Transference and countertransference can be understood using cognitive perspectives. These concepts may be helpful for cognitive therapists to consider during reflective practice in self-supervision and in clinical supervision. It seems important that cognitive therapists do not dismiss these concepts because of their origins but rather investigate the potential applications of these concepts within cognitive frameworks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

My purpose in this article is to provide an example—through one person's psychoanalytic treatment—of how transference–countertransference enactments reflect significant and traumatic elements of a person's experience in one's community and society. I will use the term enactment to include system-level dynamic patterns as they are played out unconsciously among individuals or groups. I will offer a glimpse into one female-to-male transgendered person's individual psychoanalytic treatment. I believe that his analysis—during a difficult time when he was struggling to inhabit a fully male life—will provide a useful example of how we analyze community dynamics in analytic work. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

When trauma enters into the reality of the analyst and of the analysand, when it attacks the setting, what becomes of the analyst's role? How can transformations be brought about? With reference to three clinical situations, the author attempts to explore how the articulation between transference and countertransference - the inter-relation - structures the situation; the analyst must remain in his or her role as analyst through managing to create and to reflect upon the clinical aspects of that situation when faced with the unpredictability of what war brings in its wake. It then becomes possible to see how the work of the negative can be confined to the outer limits of the setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper highlights some key features of a Jungian approach to transference and countertransference and suggests that a Jungian model has crucial aspects in common with contemporary views in attachment theory on the nature of the analytic relationship. The analytic relationship is examined in terms of the fundamental processes of psychic development described in attachment theory and affective neuroscience, namely affect regulation and development of reflective function and of self-agency. The relative value of three analytic techniques, those of interpretation, new relational experience and regression, are discussed in relation to these processes. I suggest that each of the traditional psychoanalytic and Jungian analytic models concentrates on differing aspects of these psychic processes and analytic techniques. I construct a grid to illustrate this and to demonstrate how attachment theory and developmental neuroscience offer a theoretical basis on which we can develop an integrated model of the nature of the analytic relationship and tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the development of object relations theory which, in Britain, was developed as an extension of Freudian psychoanalysis by such thinkers as Melanie Klein, Fairbairn, Winnicott and their followers and later supported by research from attachment theorists like Bowlby. Object relations theorists made a shift from the conception of a drive-based psyche to one that was primarily motivated towards relationships. Contemporary object relations theory acknowledges the primacy of relationships, which results in the close attention and utilisation of the constantly active system of transference, countertransference, and protective identification in the space between therapist and client. This paper examines object relations in the context of its unique challenges for gay male therapists working with gay male clients in the gay therapeutic dyad. This paper reviews the legacy of homo-negativity in the therapeutic process. It then explores how knowledge of object relations theory can be useful for therapists working within a gay therapeutic dyad. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Changes in the therapeutic environment can elicit intense and unpredictable responses from patients, who then react to the new elements with their own unique thoughts, fantasies, emotions and behaviours. When the change is very specific, and when it entails implications for the treatment itself, these patient responses can coalesce around more profound experiences of the transference as well as of the countertransference. The author, as a candidate or analyst-in-training, purchased an analytic couch for his office and observed the unfolding of what this new couch meant for existing treatments. Using clinical examples, he describes the three most common patient responses that occurred: rejecting, ambivalent, and embracing. The richly variant ideas and fantasies related to the analytic couch are described, and the couch's history within Freudian and Jungian contexts is reviewed. Personal determinants that could lead to the decision of whether to use a couch as part of analysis are considered from the standpoint of the analyst's preferences and own experience with the couch. The couch is discussed as a signifier of the analytic process with cultural meanings alluding not only to familiar stereotypes, but also to psychological healing and self-development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Generally a distinction is made between the disclosure of personal information and the disclosure of countertransference feelings to a patient. While this may be a necessary distinction to make in the interest of carrying on a coherent conversation on this question, I argue that there is a sort of vanishing point where the difference between "facts" and "feelings" merges. What I wish to suggest here is that, to a certain and necessary degree, the context and the framing of the question of self-disclosure determines what we define as a disclosure. I propose that thinking about a dialectical relationship between sameness and difference is a particularly useful way into the question of self-disclosures in contemporary clinical work. The question of disclosing personal information to patients became a pressing one for me when I found that in some cases it felt necessary to disclose my HIV seropositive status. Here is an example of a fact that is particularly laden with feelings, confounding the distinction between a factual and a countertransferential disclosure. As might be expected in considering the disclosure of personal medical information, I felt there were a variety of reasons to do so, each with specific context. In a long psychotherapy treatment with an HIV-negative man I found that tracking each of our senses of sameness and difference offered a way of understanding the changing meanings of the disclosure of my HIV seropositivity. But more importantly it became clear that it was the process of disclosure rather than the content that exerted the greatest influence on our work, ultimately contributing to a transformative experience for the patient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses Gilbert Cole's book, "Infecting the Treatment: Being an HIV-Positive Analyst." The author provides some personal reflections on the outbreak of AIDS and the impact it had upon his work as a psychotherapist. The paper addresses the importance of the cognitive schemata Cole provides to psychotherapists working with seropositive patients. This paper then addresses a powerful technique, a therapist's self disclosure to a patient, upon which Cole's work focuses. Using the example of psychoanalytic strictures regarding self-disclosure, the author argues that self-disclosure is more likely to be adhered to in theory than it is in practice. The author agrees with Cole that non-disclosure is often a technique used by analysts to hide, rather than provide a therapeutic field of action. The specific case of therapists hiding their antihomosexuality when working with lesbians and gay men is used to illustrate the author's perspective. A specific case presented by Cole in his book is then used to both compare and contrast Cole and this paper's author's use of self-disclosure. The paper commends Cole's study for opening a debate on how to use countertransference and self-disclosure as tools which widen and enrich the therapeutic relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]