The Middle Years

THE PROFESSIONAL LIFE OF THE ANALYST is essentially open-ended and to speak of the middle years of the analysts professional life becomes somewhat of a contradiction. Nevertheless for the purpose of this discussion I will assume that the middle years of the professional life of the analyst begin roughly five to ten years after graduation. And while there is a certain degree of communality in the beginning of these middle years the endpoint cannot really be defined, given that ours is a profession with no particular requirement for retirement.

In order to address the experience of being in the middle years of the analytic profession I will focus my remarks on some of the issues faced by middle-level analysts in a professional "family" where "many are graduated but few are chosen." In other words, I will address the paradox faced by analysts roughly five years after graduation within a professional community that does not have an official retirement age; and where the move upward on the professional ladder is neither automatic nor does it happen at a predetermined time. Although five years after graduation is commonly the time when the analyst becomes eligible for advancement to supervisory or training status—and most graduates hope for and aspire to such advancement—there is for most a great deal of uncertainty regarding whether it will happen or when it will happen