On greed in psychoanalysis. Freud famously broke out a cigar to celebrate a patient's work on a dream, saying, when the patient protested there was yet more to be learned, “Don't be greedy.” To this, a Chicago colleague said to me, “Freud just wanted a cigar.” Greed resonates as a pejorative, and relentless work can be productive. So where does one draw the line? Or, as Andrew Klafter turns it around, “What is wealth?”
On the tip of many people's tongues, when the word “greed” is spoken: rapacious Wall Street. However, in proposing a special section on the subject of “greed,” Salman Akhtar pointed out it has many manifestations central to our work as psychotherapists and psychoanalysts. So he pulled together four authors, himself included, to address the subject in clinically-near contributions. After Akhtar opens up the word in its multiple meanings, Klafter writes about the patient's greed, Aisha Abbasi presents a case about the analyst's greed, and Kerry Sulkowicz offers a new take on greed in the business world.
I hope you come away as stimulated and clinically thoughtful as I was.
Michael Slevin, M.A., M.S.W., a former TAP editor, graduated as academic associate from the Baltimore Washington Institute for Psychoanalysis, where he completed the Adult Psychotherapy Training Program. He works at Jewish Community Services of Baltimore and has a private practice.