“We have become aware of the ‘countertransference’, which arises in him as a result of the patient's influence on his unconscious feelings, and we are almost inclined to insist that he shall recognise this countertransference in himself and overcome it” (Freud 1910, 144-145).

Initially Freud regarded countertransference as a set of emotional difficulties aroused in the analyst by the patient, which hamper the acquisition of analytic knowledge. Freud was convinced that the analyst had to limit the influence of countertransference, to silence his own unconscious, as it were, in order to be able to understand better.