On turning light into laser...
The actual metaphor should be, on turning flame - wobbly, hot, all over the place - into a welding arc.
Pure poetry!
Not!!
Except an arc uses electricity, not deconstructing, catabolic oxidation.
Oxidation - yes!
On turning oxy-acetylene into a welding flame
fail!
I felt as if I was reading a post from The 3lack 3ox rewritten by Barbara Cartland.
A romantic fantasy.
So, GG MBACP. An integrative therapist working in private practice. My apologies for what my hotter than the arc light laser, deceptively incandescent, words may bring you. Because I can't, won't play nice. The one thing we don't need more of when talking about erotic transfer, or therapy at all is, soupy nonsense.
Not sorry, said it.
A romance.
So, flaccid fantasy then?
Yes indeed.
But portrayed as a possibility, as a true account. Well sure. I've seen people believe things that genuinely have not happened and watched that belief become a contagion.
A part of this phenomenon is social hierarchy...
What?
Because there are insiders and outsiders. When a want-to-be insider hears about an insider's experience or belief in a magical thing, the want-to-be insider's mind conjures up validations for the experience. They really start to believe, and this means that they will also believe that they have experienced it.
It is totally amazing what a person can believe.
I got used to it in the end. And the ritual rules and explanations. I think the word is habitus. Anyway this describes a part of how people bond and form groups. It brings me back to my SFBT research into the phenomenon of people believing completely untrue things simply because they sound implausible. Dogs can't look up...the more unbelievable you make the narrative - reported as fact - the more powerful the perception management.
In fact, people will edit their memory to bring it in line with consensus reality. So a person can have memories that contradict what they are experiencing, and believe the narrative over their own heart, and gut intuition. Not surprising, but it will always be amazing! [+]
I have no hope for humanity!
Me, I love narratives, a lot of the time they are the lies we tell ourselves, or other people's imported theory, the compelling explanations. The point is, GG MBACP has told one version of the client falls for therapist story, and I tell another. But as mine is based on recordings of what was actually said, and I'm not going to spin a yarn of personal transformation through the actions of a kindly and wise therapist, and as I'm an insider already - not looking up to anyone actually! I think that you can trust me.
The gist of GG's theory is that having a sexless and deliciously (my word) erotic relationship with a man who only talks to you for fifty minutes if you pay him to, can be more transformational than...?
Than what?
Well GG writes like a Romance writer, so romance is her thing. This is a problem. Here is where we differ, My thing is raw naked honesty. Being caught up in a fantasy can be transformational - that was my work about post traumatic growth - but this, this is very different. I don't hear raw, naked honesty in her words, I hear someone towing the party line. I'd go so far as to guess that is her Factor X - but I'm really wobbly about my Factor X theory, so... Anyhoo, I will paraphrase from her account, and hope in so doing I don't trample it beyond all recognition:
When she tells her therapist how she feels - and she is in love with him - after posting him her revelation, he says <pause for dramatic effect> that he doesn't think that her feelings are about him. He says this to her in a soft and gentle way. He holds his gaze,no signal of shame or withdrawal, he is steady, he is not dismissive (Wa, has Kit written this!?)
Pray continue!
The therapist is thoughtful, it is like he is holding something precious (my word) delicate (GG's word). Then He speaks, He says - even more gently - ‘I think this is about your feelings for yourself,’
Is he mad?
I'm happy to argue that the cup of coffee I want right now is about my feelings about myself. My need is for water. So should I now interpret my coffee preference as little more than adjunctive behaviour? Oh, this is such fun! Let's continue, let's pathologize my naked shameless longing for good coffee as an addiction. Someone please tell me 'You only need the water'! But I think we all agree that some coffees are better than others, and coffee can be better than water. So if in this scenario I'm allowed to have desires (!) my desire is for a cup of freshly brewed Valias, or Terras Altas.
What, are you now telling me that I'm imagining that my preferences are valid? OK, sure I imagine I enjoy them more than a cup of instant, more than water. I'm curious about you now, what difference does the object of my desire make to you?
What is the difference or even significance between real and imagined water, coffee, add olives, wine and fresh bread if it is my preference and not yours that we are discussing?
I'm happily ego syntonic and not ego dystonic about my coffee, I don't feel any internal conflict over my preferences.
OK, yeah, you are so right, I really should feel uncomfortable about being ego syntonic, let's face it I'm a terrible client. And then you can tell me I'm not, and we can explore who this voice belongs to?!
Ok so if I suddenly decide that actually I prefer a cup of Fazenda Reis right now, I imagine that you will now say that I don't - because I said that I like Valias, or Terras Altas? Or would you call my previous preference more authentic?
To be honest the line was (to stick with coffee) "I think your feelings of preference for certain types of coffee is about your feelings for yourself"
Nope, can't unpack further. I mean where does this end?
How about we deconstruct every wish or want and just be happy with...well with what?
Water.
Plain.
Obviously!
Stop believing your preference. Be happy With something, or someone I don't want?
Or is this 'its really feelings about your self' refering to some mysterious other me? So really I don't actually want what I want because really I want something I don't want?
No, I took the Buddhist trip... the outcome is I can deconstruct reality in seven different ways. And no matter how well I deconstruct my belief that if I jump off a cliff minus external modification I will not fly, I will always fall.
Ego syntonic means that I believe what I think I think, this is is what humans do. And curiosity means that ultimately I don't believe anything, whilst believing everything at the same time. Because this makes me prize honesty and open hearted dialogue. More than this it allows me to hear the most heart-breaking stories from my clients and let the words and images wash over and through me so I can sift out the gold.
And if Kit had simply been honest, this blog would not have been written.
Anyway, back to GG. Ultimately our heroine understands that she has created a story of rejection. She believes this because he hasn't rejected her, she says - he has transformed her interpretation of what she thinks is happening - and through this discounting (shush!) the therapeutic relationship develops into something more intimate and transformative.
I'm going to keep saying it, as long as he doesn't talk about himself and she continues to pay him. As long as he is willing to be a fantasy object, all is fine and dandy. I mean I'm willing to be proved wrong - I'm very uncomfortable about being objectified by the way, but at the moment...all I can say is...
More intimate and transformative than what?
In fact, what is it you are trying to express?
I will read...OK, GG you want people to consider your theory that
Therapy offers a unique relational structure. One where the client is deeply attuned to and emotionally contained, without being required to offer care in return...Could this seemingly ‘selfish’ space allow those, especially women socialised into self-sacrificing roles, to finally connect with their erotic self?
No, this is a horrible view - that's my first thought. Why on earth would anyone want that? Better off with AI. How could you feel OK about treating another human being in this way?
He has feelings.
But OK, you are not me, so yes - if, if you are a person who is OK in objectifying others, and being objectified in return...
Because the truth is this therapist can't be a therapist and all of himself with you, and this relationship lasts only so long as you pay cash.
I'm not saying its prostitution. The idea never entered my mind.
And if you are happy with this, if you can swallow the codswallop I think that what you want, or what you are happy to agree to, is a safe affair. There is a lot of energy in this idea. The desire for safe, consequence free, eternal Eros. Read Erica Jong's first book 'Fear of Flying' (yes plane metaphors again!) The protagonist longs for the zipless f**k. And zipless is impossible actually means, no mess, no chaos, no risk. No blood, no fire - no sublimation. Nothing about the zipless f is possible, let alone authentic, human or real.
The bloodless relationship is frustrating for we are beings of blood, flesh, bone, soul and spirit. If you want to practice transforming frustration there are many and many better ways.
In saying yes to this travesty of relationship you will wallow in the luxury of avoiding. Therefore I have zero comprehension of what you hope to achieve.
Shrink wrapped, supermarket fresh, and fake.
Taking without giving back - oh no - sorry, you give him money.
Yeah it exists for only so long as you pay him.
And, you told me that your desired outcome is?
Connecting with your erotic self.
Enlighten me.
Seriously.
I've heard this story since I first began studying alchemy, Jung, the occult - how many years is that? Fifty plus. I can honestly tell you that there is nothing new in this fantasy of painless conjunctions. The narrative of thwarted Eros as an agent of transformation goes back centuries. For yourself, check out fin'amor, read Mercia Eliade, the Vajrayana is an oral tradition so you wont get far with that, but basically this is a concept of Nei tan (inner alchemy) which was brought into and now belongs to Jungian therapy, oh and of course read Hillman and Couliano.
And think about all those poor Cathars...
Whatever.
Here is something I wrote months ago, on this subject. [*]
God, I so wish I hadn't read that article. It actually hurts! Now I tune into my body I realise that I'm feeling physically sick.
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