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"WHEN (PSYCHOANALYSIS) BECOMES AN institution, when it is applied to so-called 'normal subjects, ' it utterly ceases to be a conception that can be justified or discussed on the basis of cases: it no longer cures, it persuades; it shapes for itself subjects who conform to its own interpretation of man. It has its converts and perhaps its rebels; it can no longer convince. Beyond the true and the false, it is a myth, and Freudianism thus degraded is no longer an interpretation, but a variant of the Oedipus Myth." (Lévi-Strauss, 1963)
My most consistent interest has been the perplexing relationship between what the psychoanalyst formulates about what he does and what he actually does in therapy (Levenson, 1972). And, if the process of therapy does not follow straightforwardly, as I suspect it does not, from the theory, how does the therapist know how to do what he does, when he does it? Certainly it must be agreed that therapists of different persuasions all get results they deem satisfactory. Are they doing different things, or the same thing in different ways? Are there different cures? If the treatment depends on the metapsychology of the therapist, is it not just an ideological conversion? Then, what one therapist calls "cure" is nothing more than a successful proselytization, i.e., the patient is now fine according to the therapist's scriptures.
This gap between practice and theory exists in any activity that can be performed and described. It is equally true of art, dance or skiing. In most activities, though, the theory is understood to be no more than a temporary manual of procedure on which to lean until the process becomes automatic. Theory, in these instances, may not