Lacanian Psychoanalysis
People often ask what the difference is between psychoanalysis and other approaches to the treatment of psychical symptoms. Here are some introductory responses.
- People come to psychoanalysis for many reasons. Often, they bring a pain or difficulty from which they want release and from which they cannot release themselves. Psychoanalysis supposes that this pain or difficulty has unconscious foundations, foundations that are evident in the repeating pattern of behaviour or thought that someone suffers from. Through the work of free association, these patterns are worked through in an analysis, and the analysand’s relationship to them can be apprehended differently. In focussing in this way on unconscious and conscious processes, psychoanalysis differs from most other approaches in psychological and psychiatric practice.
- Psychoanalysis does not aim to show anyone the best or right way to live, and it does not presuppose that the analyst can or should function as a model in these things. Instead, psychoanalysis is a process in which you speak to and, through your speech and the analyst’s interpretations, you develop a way to live that is different from the way you were living when you began analysis. It is this process that provides the therapeutic effect of psychoanalysis, an effect sometimes referred to as ‘the talking cure’. It is in talking in this very particular way and particular setting that a person in analysis (the analysand) comes to work out how s/he can live more fully and less burdened by the tendency to automatically repeat those behaviours and beliefs that cause pain.
- Every Lacanian psychoanalyst has been in analysis. A personal analysis is a necessary component of developing an understanding of the theory and clinical practice of psychoanalysis: it is one component of the process of ‘formation’ through which someone becomes an analyst.
What kind of psychoanalysis do I practise?
How is psychoanalysis conducted?
How often are the sessions?
Is it confidential?
What kind of psychoanalysis do I practise?
My psychoanalytic orientation is Lacanian: that is, my theoretical base and clinical practice is drawn from the work of French psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan who, in his reworking of the work of Sigmund Freud, not only radically rewrote that work but in the process formulated a distinct and original way of thinking and working psychoanalytically.
I chose Lacanian psychoanalysis for several reasons:
- It is non-normative. In its fidelity to the principle of working with each analysand one-by-one, the analysand is invited to work through the unconscious foundations of one’s suffering. The analyst does not offer, or presume to know, the right way for the analysand to live. Because it does not elevate the analyst to an ideal or a model for life, Lacanian psychoanalysis represents an ethical approach to treatment: it offers each analysand the opportunity to find, work on and transform their position in life.
- Because it is non-normative, Lacanian psychoanalysis does not interpret people and their symptoms against social ideals. Because it is non-normative, Lacanian analysis provides a theoretical and clinical framework for working ethically, constructively and non-judgementally with any person. The analyst works for and with each analysand to discover and work through the analysand’s own difficulties.
- The work of sustaining and building this ethical practice, for me, has been vitally supported by fields of thought other than psychoanalysis. Those that have been and continue to be crucial to me in my formation are feminist and queer theory, gender and sexuality studies, critical race theory and postcolonialism, and post-structuralist and literary theory. The problem of difference is as crucial to these fields as to psychoanalysis: living in a culture whose difficulty with difference is devastating on so many levels for individuals and society, I have found it important as an analyst aiming for ‘absolute difference’ to engage with all these fields. To aim at ‘the desire for difference’ as a position from which to practise analysis means, for me, a continued investigation of the barriers in our culture(s) to honouring difference and enabling it to flourish.
How is psychoanalysis conducted?
There is one fundamental rule to psychoanalytic work: that the analysand speaks whatever is on his or her mind. This is the rule of ‘free association’: the continuous attempt to speak one’s thoughts, and to try to resist censoring oneself, so as to make one’s speech available to the encounter between analyst and analysand in the clinical setting.
How often are the sessions?
Session frequency can be discussed during the preliminary interviews. Psychoanalysis is usually a medium to long-term process, and attending regularly and consistently is important.
Is it confidential?
Identifying information about an analysand is never shared with any other person. Any discussions in supervision do not involve the use of names, and any information that may enable the analysand to be identified is changed or deleted.
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