The beginning of a psychoanalysis attempts to establish those aspects of the treatment that define the situation and process as uniquely psychoanalytic. From a classical perspective this entails the creation of a particular therapeutic ambience that encourages the patient to expand his or her capacity for self-reflection on the transference experience. In the present article, the author considers 3 major types of patients for whom the potential for establishing such a situation and process is compromised by various characterological difficulties. Clinical material is used to illustrate the particular way the analytic process is impeded in each of these types, and an attempt is made to systematically relate their difficulties to specific anxieties each experiences in reflecting on transference experience.