The Other in Clinical Practice

Abstract

ABSTRACT How does “the other” emerge in our clinical practice? “The other” is something which is neither experienced nor perceived by you as yourself, in contrast to “I,” the center of a sense of continuity and cohesion of experiences. Psychoanalysis has tried to capture “the other” in many forms; it may be referred to as unconscious, an internal object, or another person. In this article, I examine “the other” from the perspectives of intersubjective system theories and the Ethical Turn in psychoanalysis, and illustrate that this theme is linked to discrimination, persecution, prejudice and defamation. We, as therapists, cannot escape judging and discriminating a patient because we are trained to distinguish the world with names. We create a difference between “I” and “the other,” which cannot be distinguished. I suggest that we be ready to put ourselves into the moment without context, in which the patient can be us and we can be the patient. We are always both “I” and “the other,” a player-witness.