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In the concept of countertransference, Freud8,9,10 referred to the analyst's unconscious resistances regarding specific aspects of the patient's transference material, as this impinged on the analyst's own inner conflicts, interfering with the ongoing therapeutic process.
For Freud, the correct analytic stance indicated a constant oscillation between evenly hovering or free floating attention and an intellectual, evaluating attitude. Resistances were not to be tolerated in oneself, the better to maintain direct access to the memory traces of the unconscious. One must orient one's unconscious towards the emerging unconscious of the patient in the attempt to reconstruct what has been transmitted. Continuing to perceive countertransference as an obstacle to optimal analytic procedure as he at first viewed transference, here Freud did not manage the leap he took, in ultimately viewing transference as a positive, catalytic force in the analytic work. He felt moreover, that the analyst should reveal himself minimally, exhorting colleagues and students to avoid discussing their shortcomings or personal experiences.
Others in the Freudian framework wrote on countertransference issues in terms of the analyst's unconscious, empathic processes, equating the latter with identification, a concept theoretically illdefined at that point. Helene Deutsch,3 one of the earliest contributors to the topic of countertransference, described empathic understanding as a “gift,” wherein one may experience the feeling of being the same as another. Empathy is available to the analyst, she suggested, in as much as the psychic structures, developmental phases and functions of the unconscious are similar in patient and analyst embedded in infantile wishes and impulses; the psychic processes of the analyst's preparatory, intuitive work also resemble the patient's