Beyond the Surface: Covert Subjective Experience and Unconscious Communication in Psychotherapy

Can two intrapsychic worlds connect? This paper explores some examples of how therapists write about their subjective experience, how they glean and make sense of their client's internal world as that world is communicated through therapy. It examines the micro process of psychotherapy, the elusive prompts of innuendo, the subtle hints of evidence often missed. The first section Listening Outside (to Other) attempts to describe the intricate clues and cues to which therapists attend during the session: pragmatics, linguistics, slips of the tongue, syntax, paralinguistics, kinesics and the like. The second section Listening Inside (with/to self) focuses on how therapists attend to and process incoming information: reflexivity (awareness of self in action), memory, emotional sensations/reactions, physiological sensations/reactions and fantasy (regular, symbolic and uncanny). Both sections examine the literature focused on clinical experience, as therapists pay attention to the signs of meaning within the therapeutic process. It is concluded that unconscious communication is inherent in conscious communication; its meaning often going unnoticed because of its seeming ordinariness and therapist's elsewhere directed energies. Beyond this, it is concluded that communication is a two way street and attending our clients' reactions to us may lead to a greater understanding and legitimization of all aspects of knowing.