The role of the analyst's inadvertent self‐revelations

Abstract

Although the technique of countertransference‐disclosure has received increasing attention, interest in the role of the analyst's inadvertent self‐revelations has remained quite limited. Yet the analyst's inadvertent self‐revelations are at the heart of the distinction between monadic and two‐person views of the psychoanalytic situation. This paper extends the logical implications of a two‐person perspective on the psychoanalytic situation. Because the analyst's inadvertent self‐revelations are inevitable and continuous, they significantly shape the patient's experience of the relationship. The analytic process at times can be enhanced, therefore, by collaborative efforts to make explicit the inadvertent expressions of the analyst. Aspects of the analyst's individuality thereby become clarified, rather than obscured as in classical views. Dealing with the analyst's inadvertent self‐revelations in an active, collaborative manner that is tempered by asymmetry elucidates the integration of interpersonal with intrapsychic aspects of transference and heightens the immediacy and directness of the analytic interaction. This approach also embraces the significance of the analyst's personal participation, authenticity, and interaction, which though crucial in two‐person models, have been obscured by concerns with maintaining neutrality, anonymity, and abstinence, which epitomize the analyst's stance from the one‐person perspective.