Psychotherapy and the Structure of Personal Revolutions

Abstract

It is perhaps not uncommon to feel uncomfortable about discussing something when one is sorely aware of the incompleteness of one's understanding. At the same time, there is more than a kernel of truth in the notion that one's ignorance—or at least one's awareness of it—may be an important element in furthering theoretical developments. New insights may lead to better understanding, and they also tend to reveal new challenges and whole panoramas of unexplored issues. In preparing this chapter, I have struggled with a variety of questions and dilemmas that relate to my own limited understanding. Should I remain conservatively close to the data and focus on assertions of which I am confident, or should I freely expand on some emerging and more speculative conjectures? For better or for worse, the editor of this volume influenced my decision by requesting "think pieces" and encouraging contributors to ramble freely in their thoughts and impressions of therapeutic process and procedure. At his insistence, I shall therefore offer some speculations about several issues. In accord with the request to emphasize conceptual over empirical issues, I have attempted to free my remarks as much as possible from the bondage of extant data. This has led me, at several places, to offer conjectures that I would usually reserve for the kinds of informal communication that are often associated with elevated blood alcohol. Likewise, as is already apparent, I have taken the liberty of employing personal pronouns somewhat liberally—perhaps to communicate that my remarks are personal conjectures rather than adamant pronouncements.