In an examination of twelve audiotaped psychoanalytic sessions, the authors, using both quantitative and qualitative methods, observed a stepwise progression in mental organization, which they term the upward slope. Its constituents include a phase of regression (desymbolization and the agony of equivalence), a phase of transition (disruptive enactment leading to transitional space), and a phase of reorganization (triangulation leading to symbolic synthesis). The hypothesis of a phase-specific progression is advanced, wherein different forms of mental functioning evoke distinct dynamic processes of psychic repair. The authors present detailed clinical summaries of the sessions they examined, as well as their own observational comments, to illustrate these ideas.