Uploaded: June 2013, Issue 23

 

Kenneth Gergen

The Taos Institute, info@taosinstitute.net

Abstract

“I offer here an alternative to psychodynamic accounts of inherent psychic conflict, one that views all human meaning as the outcome of relational process. Thus, as adults we carry the residues of multiple relationships, and with these potentials continue with others to generate meaning. In effect, we relate with others as multi-beings, harboring enormous – but simultaneously useful - potentials for personal conflict. Therapists also enter therapy with multiple potentials for relating. However, traditional training often reduces their ability to access such potentials in relating to clients.

To demonstrate the desirability of opening therapists to these multiplicities, I consider three forms of client anguish: 1) social isolation, 2) debilitating practices of relating, and 3) the incapacity to escape painful memories.

Each requires a different therapist self in relationship.