Psychotherapy: When not doing is doing it best

It ’s hard to sit with someone who is crying or angry or yearning or silent for long periods and not want to do something to make them feel better, to break the tension in the room. But most of the time if that desire to do something is acted upon, the outcome is not what we hope. For me, this is a l esson I have had to learn again and again.I have been thinking about this a lot lately. What comes to me is the image of an infant in the throes of colic. You try everything to make them stop because that cry is distressing, because it makes you feel impotent and frustrated and even angry. Rock the baby. Pat the baby. Sing. Take her for a ride in the car. Anything and everything that you hope will soothe her and end that crying. Really none of those things is magic — she stops when she stops. Eventually, as a parent,  you just have to be able to be with the baby, to be a steady presence without acting out your own distress. You have to be with her, hold her and hold the feelings. I remember coming to that place with my babies and then recognize that really that is what I need to do with my distressed patients. I can’t make the hurt go away. I can’t give them the magic interpretation that will solve everything. I can’t make it all better. I have to sit with them in their feelings, be with them in those feelings.And when those feelings are painfully projected onto me, I have to hold them.  Kenneth Lambert’s (1981) “Analysis, Repair and Individuation” describes how...
Source: Jung At Heart - Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Source Type: blogs