Sublime

the analyst has to be able to play as well. It is in the overlap, the transitional space between analyst and patient, that communication takes place.

Most of us did not have parent-figures who were able to identify, let alone regulate, their feelings.

When the environment provides a secure sense of holding and containment (such as provided through boundaries and rules), this also feels like love.

Often an undermothered adult child will have a great need to feel that the therapist is not just providing care because it’s his or her job (like Mom) but that this time the caring is personal.

what you see on the surface is a child’s behavior and that what you don’t see is the child’s legitimate need for our shared support and regulation of those needs.

What was the analyst’s desire vis à vis the patient, what was the analyst using the patient for, how did the patient figure in the analyst’s own developmental project?

No one does well without “and”; every heart is still seeking the love it was born to know.