in the middle of the thicket
blossoming plum

Matsuo Basho
Narrow Road to the Interior
and other writings.

————–

In a spontaneous instant, caught off guard … the moment happens. It comes upon us, not only with itself; but with the evocation of something within us – something that seemingly had been unattended.

What is the miracle of these moments?

There is a growing conversation in the therapeutic literature about the power and use of mindfulness. It has a strong reference to Eastern philosophies that seek the experience of self transcendent states and teach methods to release oneself from preoccupation and concern. For example, Wherever you go, there you are, by Jon Kabat-Zinn, presents exercises and meditations designed to enhance mental health. Although, after Freud, it may have been called ‘free floating attention’, the value of mindfulness on the part of the therapist has been at the core of psychoanalytic therapies from the very beginning. Out of this fundamental attitude evolved our comprehending the power of our unconscious levels of communication with each other; thus the concepts of transference and counter-transference. Christopher Bollas, for example, describes entering into a meditative state as a means of accessing this level of communication between himself and his clients.

Psychoanalytic therapies are basically methods of modeling mindfulness. These more contemporary approaches actively attempt to teach it.

There is a paradox here. Mindfulness is rooted in the capacity for allowance … one can’t do it. Mindfulness in a therapeutic context can never be a technique. So how can it be taught?

Isn’t that the basic dilemma we experience when clients come to us for help? Understandably, they expect us to do something with them and for them. It certainly looks like we do something; after all, that’s what we get paid for … isn’t it?

We strive together with our clients for conditions of allowance … and out of the vicissitudes of our ‘doings’, it occurs: a moment of mutual mindfulness …

… as spontaneous as being caught by a flower dancing in the wind.

that of the patient and that of the therapist.

If the therapist cannot play,

he is not suitable for the work.

If the patient cannot play,

something needs to be done to enable the patient to play

after which psychotherapy may begin.

Playing is essential:

in playing the patient is being creative.

More than anything else

creative apperception

makes the individual feel that life is worth living.

Contrasted with this

is a relationship of compliance,

the world and its details recognized

only

as something to befitted in with or demanding adaptation.

Compliance carries with it

a sense of futility for the individual

associated with the idea that nothing matters

and life is not worth living.

After D. W. Winnicott

Playing and Reality

Play is the exultation of the possible

After Martin Buber

Pointing the Way

Co-dependence often gets a bad rap. Working with couples, one always has a sharp eye out for so called ‘co-dependant’ relationships. You must behave in prescribed ways in order for me to moderate my feelings… that’s the formula. At the point when many couples come for therapy, each usually holds that formula for the other … complete with lists of infractions: the wounds of broken promises and disregarded entitlements.

The formula, of course, is unspoken and assumed. Co-dependence, as stated above, is a common misunderstanding of intimacy.

Essentially, this understanding of co-dependence is the over defined and un-negotiated use of each other to manage our emotional reality.

The quality of presence in such relationships is deadly serious.

However, the fact is that in all our relationships, we do depend on each other for the management of our emotions. All our intimate relationships are co-dependent.

The idea that we are ‘responsible’ for our feelings without relying on each other is a fiction equally as deadening as the limited notion of co-dependence described above. The issue isn’t that we use each other to manage our emotions; the issue is how we use each other.

That is the pertinent question.

Although a healthy co-dependence is marked by an absence of entitlement and a willingness to present and negotiate the meaning of our feelings, there is another, perhaps more radical indicator of a healthy co-dependence. The telling difference between these two qualities of co-dependence is manifest in the presence or absence of our capacity and willingness to play with each other.

Play is the most fundamental realization of undefined mutuality possible in our relationships. It is the realization of the joy of simply being-together and is a release from all use and purpose – without denying their necessity. Play is the mutual and spontaneous presentation of our reality into an undefined space wherein the possibility of mutual discovery lies; it is the revelation of the generative power of mutuality and our inherent dependence upon each other.

Whatever the frame or context of our ’therapeutic’ endeavors, the fundamental purpose of all therapeutic encounters is the realization and/or rediscovery of play; play as the fountain of our mutuality.