First, I look for someone with a spirit of openness—by which I mean someone with whom I could feel truly comfortable with, and feel comfortable enough with to open up my patients to, without fear of judgment or rejection (which is very similar to what my patients look for from me).

This openness leads me to the next thing I hope to find in a supervisor: recognition, both for my patients and myself, and our accompanying interactions (however colorful they may become). Recognition is one of the most important aspects in being supervised on a patient case, because it allows for exposure of both triumphs and failures in therapy, both of which are necessary to the therapeutic process. In fact, without exposure of these processes, a patient’s therapy might never make progress. Recognition from a supervisor can validate the work between a patient and myself, and provide necessary insight for improvement of shared expectations, known hurdles, and my own feelings, as a therapist and person.

I feel that supervision should provide a nesting place for my relationship with my patients—a place of familiarity, of warmth, where the relationships can gestate under a careful gaze. For me, supervision goes

Beyond basic ideas about the setting and its boundaries … what needs to be learned is not a list of steadfast rules, but an introspective and empathetic sensitivity to the actual sources and actual impact of our actions and non-actions. This is a most personal learning process that requires considerable personal exposure and is strongly influenced by the supervisory climate. (Berman, 2000, p. 275)

Supervisors can model for me a deep sense of empathic attunement to my patients’ needs, especially when my patients are take seriously, with a non-dismissive attitude of their thoughts, feelings and actions. A supervisor’s presence can be a comfort, bring an evenly hovering attention to the process of my work, all the while being supportive and nonintrusive. My best supervisors have not been prying eyes critical of every misdeed, but guiding hands on what could have easily been treacherous paths, which have welcomed the meanderings of my relationships with patients, even honored and respected them. In essence, supervision has provided a ‘m’othering presence that comforted me, and comforted my patients through me.

Another aspect I find comforting about supervision is the ability and willingness to be transparent in thought processes about the work between my patients and myself. At times (and perhaps at best), insights and observations have not been premeditated, but rather a genuine response to what I shared either verbally or to what is heard in audiotaped sessions. (I sometimes choose to record my sessions because I do not want to forget the most important things that occurred between my patients and me). A non-omniscient supervisor makes room for grace—that is to say, gives me permission to fail and fall without fear of shame. Without the worry about how my expression of self will be taken; with no judgment of my method, of me as a analyst, and most importantly, of me as a person, I have found the space to flourish with my patients. Knowing intrinsically of a supervisor’s support, I feel recognized and valued, and almost by proxy, so do my patients.

Jessica Benjamin (2004a), gives an example of her work as a supervisor, which I would like to note:

I often find myself helping the analyst create a space in which it is possible to accept the inevitability of causing or suffering pain, being ‘bad,’ without destroying the third … both members become involved in a symmetrical dance, each trying not to be the bad one … yet whichever side the analyst takes in this dance, taking sides itself simply perpetuates complementary relations. (p. 27)

Great supervisors have been crucial in helping me understand this point. It is not a matter of patient vs. me (the analyst); such polarization destroys and tears us down, rather than build us up. Benjamin likens it to a dance. I would add that, for some of my patients and myself, it can become more the dance of two boxers, each trying to knock the other off center, and possibly out completely, in order to “win.” A good supervisor’s careful observations can, and have, shown me that if this dance continued, and my patient and I indeed knocked one another out, no one would win; and in fact, winning isn’t the point. Winning only helps one of us, and therapy and analysis, to me, strives to find a way to help each other if any headway is going to be made.

In fact, in those times when this “dance” has turned my therapy room into a boxing ring, supervision has allowed me to realize the mistake on my own without intrusion, but with continual glances in that direction. It has also helped me redeem myself and restore the relationship with my patients by witnessing compassion to them, our relationship, and myself. Benjamin (2004a), would have analysts “fostering a dyadic system based on taking responsibility, rather than disowning it or evading it under the guise of neutrality … that clinical practice … be founded in certain values, such as the acceptance of uncertainty, humility, and compassion …” (p. 34).

Compassion? Humility? Uncertainty? These are the elements of great supervisors, who have ensconced and embodied all of these things; and these honest revelations of themselves in our interactions have shown me vividly and personally how I could, someday, and maybe even someday soon, interact with my patients in the same manner.

I see you/Walking through a dream/I see you/My light in darkness breathing hope of new life /Now I live through you and you through me/Enchanting/I pray in my heart that this dream never ends/I see me through your eyes…/I live through your love/You teach me how to see…/Now I give my hope to you/I surrender/I pray in my heart that this world never ends/ I see me through your eyes.

Intersubjective theorist Jessica Benjamin defines recognition as “that response from the other which makes meaningful the feelings, intentions, and actions of the self. It allows the self to realize its agency and authorship in a tangible way. But such recognition can only come from an other whom we, in turn, recognize as a person in his or her own right (p. 12).” There is no doubt that intersubjectivity will result in an encountering of others who are distinctly different, and some who are similar. Benjamin (1988) goes on to explain that “to recognize is to affirm, validate, acknowledge, know, accept, understand, empathize, take in, tolerate, appreciate, see, identify with, find familiar…love [and] includes …a number of experiences…emotional attunement, mutual influence, affection mutuality, sharing states of mind” (p. 15-16). But, she notes that, “the need for recognition gives rise to a paradox… [and] the inability to sustain the paradox in that interaction can, and often does, convert the exchange of recognition into domination and submission” (p. 12).

This is exactly what happened in Avatar. Audiences were introduced to a beautiful world called Pandora, and to a beautiful race of people called the Na’Vi, a ten-foot-tall, blue-skinned species of sapient humanoids who live in harmony with nature. The film depicted a very real, multidimensional need to be seen and understood, and reified the concept and need for mutual recognition in a tangible way. To the Na’Vi, the idea of seeing others is not just an act. “I see you” doesn’t just mean a cerebral acknowledgement of an other; it’s one person saying to another, “my soul recognizes yours.”

The idea of seeing oneself through the eyes of an other is of particular importance to the idea of mutual recognition because it is being able to see yourself as an other sees you. Without this other, that self-recognition would not be able to exist. It is the other’s thoughts that color how we see ourselves, and often serve to confirm or combat, and challenge our concept of our self.

The plot of the film itself also serves as a manifestation of the concept of mutual recognition. It centers on humans trying to mine a rare mineral on Pandora. In order to understand Pandora and its biosphere, they place Jake Sully into an ‘avatar’ of a Na’Vi. While his mission is to learn about them and their culture, he eventually finds that he identifies with them, both through his personal connection with Neytiri, a female Na’Vi, and the education he receives from them about what it means to be a Na’Vi. Now able to see his human counterparts through the eyes of his teachers, he understands that their machinations are not only destructive to Pandora and the Na’Vi, but self-destructive in how they represent humanity. Instead of seeing humans as compassionate and empathic beings, the Na’Vi experience them as beings unable and unwilling to recognize any existence except their own.

While I maintain that this movie tangibly manifests the concept of mutual recognition in its plot, I do note that it is an imperfect manifestation, because instead of maintaining a sense of ‘self’ while recognizing his ‘others,’ James Sully leaves self completely and chooses instead to live the life of the ‘other.’ Thus, while mutual recognition occurs beautifully in the film, it falls short of correctly holding the tension between the main character’s self and the other selves introduced in the film.

The important aspect of this character’s experience, however, is that it is through incarnation that his recognition of others becomes possible. Marie Hoffman (2010) notes, “discovery proceeds through an incarnational or lived interaction with the patient, made possible through the development of a safe and authentic alliance” (p. 2). This is something that I feel is crucial to my work with my patients. Without that safe and authentic alliance; without a sense of nurturing and seeing another’s perspective, I believe patients won’t be able to trust their therapists. I strive to make this alliance with all of my patients, and feel it is my duty, and joy, to see things from where they stand, so that they will be able to trust me, and our work together.

The Christian tradition contains an interesting basic analogy with the object relations theory … God can love man or hate him … He can demand obedience from man or forgive him. Correspondingly, man can also love or hate God. He can submit to God’s will or rebel against it … trust in God or deny even his existence (Hyrck, 1997).

According to Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, religion was created by humankind as a coping mechanism to deal with an individual’s infantile wishes. Religion was an immature form of neurosis, an illusion, and a type of wish fulfillment (St. Clair, 1994).

There are many varying theories on how the image of God is formed. Many contend that early experiences with primary and significant caregivers not only help in formulating images of oneself, but also his/her image of God. As such, watching, learning, and doing form one’s image of God. DW Winnicott, a British pediatrician and psychoanalyst, in his book Playing and Reality (1971), argues that God is not necessarily created out of thin air, and is not solely created by the infant. Therefore, according to Winnicott, God exists in ‘the third space,’ “an intermediate area of experiencing to which inner reality and external life both contribute…a resting-placed for the individual engaged in the perpetual human task of keeping inner and outer reality separate yet inter-related” (Winnicott, 1951, p. 230).

In her work The Birth of the Living God, psychoanalyst Ana-Maria Rizzuto (1979) affirms Winnicott’s sentiments, and states that, “no child arrives at the house of God without his pet god under his arm” (p. 8,). In fact, her central thesis asserts that the idea of God is created by the child and resides in the transitional or third space. God cannot be fully repressed and the child can do what he or she will: accept or reject.

Rizzuto further goes on to state that “this psychic process of creating and finding God . . . never ceases in the course of human life” (p. 177-179). God’s existence in the transitional space is difficult to grasp because in that space, he can be either seen or unseen, heard or unheard, but is consistently present. One’s conflict arises in allowing Him to be whoever He seems or needs to be on any given day, in any given session. Mutual recognition arises when God is noticed in the space, whether He is talked to (or about) or not.

It is my belief in a transcendent and immanent other that keeps me hopeful in my work with my patients. I hope they can transcend their current circumstances, both tangible and emotional, and reach a place of peace within themselves, in our relationship, and with their own transcendent gods.

I often hear patients express their belief that God loves them, but believes that God is disappointed in, and angry with, them and not blessing then a result. They simultaneously believe in God’s love for them, but focus on their perception that He is somehow displeased with them. Many attribute these feelings to their experiences with the church, which to them was punitive and exacting. In their thoughts, all that matters is how God experiences them. God experiences them in a way that leaves them feeling “less than,” shameful, unworthy and undeserving of anything good. Their God is not “shoring them up.”

Making space for respective experiences of God is crucially important in my work with patients. It could be that our mental and emotional images of God are diametrically opposed. Some seem to have primarily an autocratic and distant God, while some have more reflective of an immanent and experiential God.

My work with my patients offers hope that mutual space for both is possible, not belonging to either of us individually, but belongs to both of us together. Often, while different God-images exist, many faith systems agree that God is not either transcendent or immanent, but rather both transcendent and immanent. This paradox must be kept in mind in psychoanalytic work, otherwise my patients and I will exist at an impasse, which leaves no room for establishing a connection between each other.

It allows you to see your potential and limitations; to build on your hopes and express your fears.

It provides a connection, a chance to be seen, heard, understood, and validated.

It’s also learning about how to trust another so completely as to let all of yourself, or every side of yourself, out in the open to be faced and dealt with—leaving no stone unturned, as it were.

Psychoanalysis is looking into the mirror our selves, smudges and all, and accepting who we see looking back at us; realizing that we have the power to change the parts of the reflection we don’t much care for; and enacting the help to do just that.

Psychoanalysis means accepting personal responsibility, without negating our personal histories.

It’s looking back while keeping an eye on our future and learning to live in the present.

It’s asking for help when you need it, not necessarily when you want it; being open to change while resolving to find who you truly are, and embracing that, without regret or guilt.

“There must be something wrong with me. I’m not praying enough, not in the Word enough. I’m sure He’s mad at me. I’m afraid that I’m idolizing you and idealizing you. I should only do that with God.”

This is something that I hear from people when they start getting deeper into their therapy/analysis, when they become aware an attachment that goes beyond a professional relationship. When I hear these sentiments, I second-guess myself, wondering if I’m really helping my patients; wondering if therapy/analysis is doing harm or good; and anxious about whether I am negatively impacting my patients’ relationships with God. As a therapist/analyst who actively takes into consideration the faith systems of my patients, and how my faith intersects with theirs, I think to myself: How do I make room for both of our otherness in this realm? How can I help them have a loving God—one who not only forgives, but forgets?

Working from a psychodynamic/relational perspective, I try to guard myself against dismissing my patients’ sentiments as “transference,” which is the internal world of the patient that is evoked or elicited on a constant basis with each interaction. Often in therapy, the therapist might unwittingly say or do something that resembles or reminds a patient of painful incidents in the past. In other words, experiences with primary caregivers get internalized and can be triggered in day-to-day relationships. My training in psychoanalysis has helped me take into consideration not just transference, but the transference-countertransference matrix (Mitchell ‘88, ‘93, ‘97). While transference refers to internalized feelings that get evoked in the patient, countertransference refers to the internalized feelings the patient evokes in the therapist. So, from my relational perspective, I exist as another an other in the room with my patient. My emotional reactions to what a patient does or says or believes is not only important for me to monitor, but also will inform treatment (McWilliams, 18).

This is important to remember, especially when it comes to interactions and relationships I have with patients who express their faiths, and struggles with that faith. After all, “no child arrives at the house of God without his pet god under his arm” (Rizzuto, 8). Inevitably, this results in ruptures in therapy; the differences between gods (mine and my patients’) can, and has, led to strife and resentment. These ruptures are not to be fear or ignored; they are to be embraced as differences between to equally subjective people, both with valid viewpoints and feelings of their own. We both should strive, not for negation of each other, but for healthy respect for our own vulnerabilities.

Some clients like to talk about their faith openly, about their questions and concerns on how their faith is affecting their lives. Some talk openly about their spiritual struggles, and ask for advice on how to manage their actions while seeking spiritual renewal and forgiveness from others.

And for some, faith isn’t something that comes up at all in session. They feel that the faith part of their life isn’t something that needs to be brought up, since they are primarily there to talk about their feelings, thoughts, and relationships with parents, spouses, significant others, children, etc.

For me personally, my faith informs how I interact with every client. I strive to practice compassion and empathy, and have a listening heart, to give clients the room they need to be angry, sad, joyful, and everything in-between. I feel that God or a Higher Power is big enough to handle all of our humanity (good, bad, and ugly), which often in distress, pain and trauma gets distorted, like our reflections in fun-house mirrors. If my clients desire part of their therapy to be focused on these issues, then I am willing to help them work through it.

In a therapy session, learning how to be open with each other about hurts and frustrations is going to happen.

Once the feeling all come tumbling out, the next step will be learning to negotiate those feelings: learning how to express them constructively, learning how to deal with the feelings when they happen, and just as important, listening to others’ feelings when they have them.

Families are individuals, all with separate needs and desires, who have to learn to function together.

It’s a vital lesson to learn that navigating together as a family means listening to each other, communicating effectively with each other, and as I already said, learning to function together, without invalidating anyone’s feelings.

Some spiritual and religious leaders will tell you that true counseling comes from God or a Higher Power, and that seeking help elsewhere is futile.

Having personally experienced spiritual/religious comfort, I’ve also noticed that this comfort comes through people we’re in relationships with.

And having a relationship with an analyst/therapist, someone who is qualified and trained to handle human emotions, thought processes, and personality issues is no different.

Think of it in terms of medical doctors: many believe God or a Higher Power heals. But when you are sick, you still seek out a medical professional; someone trained to heal the human body, to help you get better.

This in no way takes away from God or a Higher Power as the Healer; it’s a mere reflection of the kind of healing he/it can provide. I feel the same logic holds true for analysts/therapists.

There are people out there who need to heal emotionally and spiritually; and they can come to an analyst/therapist, a professional trained to deal with those issues, to help them.

Analysts/therapists don’t minimize the healing that comes from above; we reflect it in our relationships with our clients.