Proposed necessary and sufficient conditions for optimal psychotherapeutic change

Abstract

The original concepts of psychological hurt and therapeutic catharsis are proposed as possible necessary and sufficient conditions for optimal psychotherapeutic change. The basic meaning of psychological hurt is any nonorganic, residual interference with psychological functioning that resulted from an event the person experienced. The irreducible source of such interference is a registration in the brain of sensory input from hurtful events, which when sufficiently activated is manifested in affective, cognitive, behavioral, and physiological symptomatology. Accordingly, unresolved psychological hurt is considered as the most productive target for intervention. Therapeutic catharsis, a fundamental reconceptualization of how catharsis has been traditionally understood, is the process by which the nervous system heals itself of residual interference. Therapeutic catharsis is assumed, therefore, to have the most potential for resolving psychological hurt. Optimal therapeutic change occurs when unresolved psychological hurt is resolved through a therapeutic cathartic release.