About Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Psychoanalytic Perspective (psychoanalytic approach): The psychoanalytic approach focuses on the importance of the unconscious mind (not the conscious mind). In other words, psychoanalytic perspective dictates that behavior originates and is determined by your past experiences in the unconscious mind (people are unaware of them). The places where these unconscious understandings are in play are in relationships, dreams and free associations. The perspective is still based on Freud's psychoanalytic perspective about early experiences being so influential on current behavior, it is about development which often includes sexual components. The Session Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy is derived from psychoanalysis and is a practice of speech. It involves two partners, the psychotherapist and the client/patient, brought together into the session. The client speaks about what brings her/him there, their suffering, their symptom. This symptom is linked into the materiality of the unconscious, made out of experiences, hurts, and things that are sometimes impossible to say and cause suffering. The psychotherapist punctuates the words of the client/patient and enable her/him to weave the thread of their unconscious. The metaphore that I often use is about painting a picture, we share the thoughts about the elements of the picture, define the objects and then colour in the picture. Sometimes it happens quickly and sometimes it takes longer. There is no standard treatment, no general procedure by which psychotherapy is governed. Freud used the metaphor of chess to indicate that there were only rules and typical moves at the beginning and the end of a game. Far from being able to be reduced to a technical procedure, the experience of psychotherapy is a journey on which the rules are determined by what is taking place in the session(s). Although the general knowlege about behaviour and the human condition is knowable the precise theory of who we are and how we came to be that way is a unique theory that belongs to only one person. The duration of a treatment and the unfolding of sessions cannot be standardized. The duration of the work is varied, depending on what outcome is desired. Sometimes people are looking to solve a problem or change their lives in a significant way. This can provide the focus for short term work that can have a defined duration. The presenting issue may not be the problem or there may be complexity that requires more time to work through the experience that have formed the client/patients defences so the work continues for a long time ending with an agreement to stop when both participants have a sense of ending the sessions is ok. Being a Professional Being a psychoanalytic psychotherapist includes contradictory components. It requires an academic, university or equivalent, training, deriving from a recognised authority. It also requires clinical experience that is gained under the supervision of peers. And it requires the radically singular experience of being in analysis. The levels of the general, the particular and the singular become one as the psychoanalytic psychotherpist has their own analysis before, during and often post training . A psychotherapist is never alone, he depends on 'an other' who recognizes him. The process of continual professional development is essential to be a good enough practitioner. Belong to a group of professionals from whom knowlege and inspiration are drawn is essential. At the moment professional organisations are responsible for protecting the public by providing complaints processes and standards of education and conduct. Contact me for more info