Many people come to therapy expecting us to tell them what to do. However, psychoanalytic psychotherapists do not give guidelines to our patients. Find out why.
The psychotherapists of psychoanalytic orientation We do not give guidelines because we do not want the person to imitate a way of being or being in the world that may have nothing to do with them, with their history and with what gives meaning to their life.
We want the person to think, ask questions and reach an honest and deep understanding of themselves. We want the patient to be autonomous, to express what is unique and authentic about him, and to make his own decisions, taking charge of them. In other words, we recognize the subject who came to our consultation as an adult human being, unprecedented and original.
Give guidelines, or telling someone what to do radically impedes the purposes we have mentioned, since the guidelines are commands that come from an external agent alien to the subject, who – in addition – is placed in a position of supposed knowledge. That is, the patient can fall into a dynamic childish to “do what you’re told” because someone who knows has told you so. In other words, the opposite of what we intend to achieve.
From the psychoanalytic perspective we understand that what makes it possible for these objectives to be carried out is not the guidelines, but listening. A very particular listen: analytical listening
Listening analytically implies being attentive, not only to the conscious speech of the person, but also to the unconscious speech, that is, what the patient may not know what he is saying. So that? To return it to him like a mirror and make it easier for him to become aware of what his desires and fears are, his hates and his loves, his conflicts, his anxieties and his ambitions… so that he can better understand who he is, give a name to his desire and manage to channel your action.
