Fink Bruce
Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, PA 15282, USA.
J Am Psychoanal Assoc. 2010 Apr;58(2):259-85. doi: 10.1177/0003065110369349.
The current emphasis on understanding in psychoanalysis--on the analysand's part as well as on the analyst's--is excessive if we assume that the most essential aim of psychoanalytic treatment is change. Situated within the Lacanian register or dimension of the imaginary, the process of understanding can be seen to reduce the unfamiliar to the familiar, to transform the radically other into the same, and to render the analyst hard of hearing. Our ability as analysts to detect the unconscious via slips of the tongue, slurred words, mixed metaphors, and the like is compromised by our emphasis on understanding and can be rectified only by taking as our fundamental premise that we do not understand what our analysands are saying. The emphasis on understanding can also do a disservice to analysands, who learn to observe themselves and to explain their feelings and behaviors to themselves and others in sophisticated terms without necessarily changing. But change can perfectly well occur in the absence of understanding, which in fact often impedes change.
如果我们假定精神分析治疗的最根本目标是改变，那么当前对理解的强调——无论是在受分析者还是分析师方面——就是过度的。处于拉康式想象界的范畴或维度内，理解过程可被视为将不熟悉的事物还原为熟悉的事物，将全然不同的他者转变为相同的事物，并使分析师变得充耳不闻。我们作为分析师，通过口误、含糊不清的言语、混合隐喻等方式来察觉无意识的能力，会因我们对理解的强调而受到损害，并且只有以我们不理解受分析者所说内容这一基本前提为出发点，才能得到纠正。对理解的强调也可能对受分析者不利，他们学会了观察自己，并以复杂的术语向自己和他人解释自己的感受及行为，却不一定会做出改变。但改变完全可以在缺乏理解的情况下发生，事实上，理解往往会阻碍改变。
