Communication in Psychoanalysis and in the Creative Process: A Parallel1

This inquiry is an attempt to place in sharper focus the question: how are changes effected in psychoanalysis which lead to the acceptance of insight into unconscious processes? What fosters the acceptance by the patient of the interpretations and constructions which appear in the course of the analysis? Later developments in psychoanalytic thought have modified the sanguine comment Freud made in 1910 that "the mechanism of our curative method is indeed quite easy to understand; we give the patient the conscious idea of what he may expect to find (bewusste Erwartungs-vorstellung), and the similarity of this with the repressed unconscious one leads him to come upon the latter himself" (13). In a later paper Freud (17) said: "Instead of inquiring how analysis effects a cure (a point which in my opinion has been sufficiently elucidated) we should ask what are the obstacles which this cure encounters." Also in 1937 Freud (18), speaking of "the way in which our conjecture is transformed into the patient's conviction, " said that "it is hardly worthwhile describing how this occurs in the process of analysis …" All this may be true at the level of pragmatic experience, but if one seeks an answer in deeper terms of process, the problem is still an open one. It is to one aspect of this problem that I propose to direct my scrutiny. I shall limit myself specifically to indicating a parallel between psychoanalysis and the creative process and describing the role of communication in both. I shall then attempt to demonstrate the part that communication has in leading to insight and conviction. I