transference is one of the most
important and intriguing concepts in
psychology it refers to the unconscious
redirection of feelings from a person in
one’s cast to another in the present
knowing about the word in its meaning is
a key to trying to become a slightly
more mature and less dangerous person to
be around at the heart of the theory of
transference is the idea that our
expectations of what other people are
like is to an overwhelming extent
dictated by what the people in our
immediate vicinity were like in our
childhoods especially our parents these
formative figures determine a whole
range of our behaviors our sensor for
example how people might respond to our
weaknesses whether those in authority
are benign or humiliating where the
setbacks can be met with panic or
resilience whether others can be
depended upon and so on in other words
we don’t enter adulthood like a blank
slate waiting until all the data is in
before we judge a situation and draw our
conclusions strictly on the evidence in
front of us instead we have powerful but
hidden tendencies to prejudge according
to patterns laid down by our personal
histories some of this prejudgment might
be sensible but a lot of it can be very
troublesome we may get more panics than
is warranted we may be so suspicious
we don’t give others a fair hearing we
may be so sure were about to be attacked
we strike out preemptively we may be so
nervous we fail the key thing about
transference is that we can’t generally
tell it’s happening we assume we’re
entirely reacting to the present when in
fact our feelings are drawing energy
from a source from long ago
that’s why maturity deeply depends from
getting to know one’s tendencies to
transference to help us in the task
psychologists have devised a number of
tests to tease out these transferences
one exercise involves asking someone to
finish sentence stubs very quickly
without giving too much thought thereby
allowing the unconscious to reveal
another classic transference exercise is
the Rorschach test devised in the 1930s
by the psychologist Hermann Rorschach by
being shown an ambiguous image and asked
a saying what it was roche believed that
we would naturally reveal some of our
latent guiding fears hopes prejudices
and assumptions the important point in
any Roche test is that the image has no
one true meaning different people mainly
see different things in it according to
what their past predisposes them to
imagine to one individual with a rather
kindly and forgiving conscience this
image could be seen as a sweet mask with
eyes floppy ears covering for the mouth
and wide flaps extending from the cheeks
another more traumatized by say a
domineering father might see it as a
powerful figure viewed from below with
splayed feet thick legs heavy shoulders
and head bent forward as if poised for
attack the goal of maturity in general
and psychotherapy in particular is to
help you to get on top of your
transferences that means seeing the ways
in which our views of authority or
sexuality or uncertainty have been
distorted the idea is ultimately to be
released in the past’s indiscriminate
hold on the present and to reduce the
scope of our personal histories to
determine our futures once we overcome
our transferences we can be free to
respond more reliably to the world as it
is rather than how it was if you liked
our films take a look at our shop the
school of life comm forward slash shop
you’ll find lots of thoughtful books games stationery and more
important and intriguing concepts in
psychology it refers to the unconscious
redirection of feelings from a person in
one’s cast to another in the present
knowing about the word in its meaning is
a key to trying to become a slightly
more mature and less dangerous person to
be around at the heart of the theory of
transference is the idea that our
expectations of what other people are
like is to an overwhelming extent
dictated by what the people in our
immediate vicinity were like in our
childhoods especially our parents these
formative figures determine a whole
range of our behaviors our sensor for
example how people might respond to our
weaknesses whether those in authority
are benign or humiliating where the
setbacks can be met with panic or
resilience whether others can be
depended upon and so on in other words
we don’t enter adulthood like a blank
slate waiting until all the data is in
before we judge a situation and draw our
conclusions strictly on the evidence in
front of us instead we have powerful but
hidden tendencies to prejudge according
to patterns laid down by our personal
histories some of this prejudgment might
be sensible but a lot of it can be very
troublesome we may get more panics than
is warranted we may be so suspicious
we don’t give others a fair hearing we
may be so sure were about to be attacked
we strike out preemptively we may be so
nervous we fail the key thing about
transference is that we can’t generally
tell it’s happening we assume we’re
entirely reacting to the present when in
fact our feelings are drawing energy
from a source from long ago
that’s why maturity deeply depends from
getting to know one’s tendencies to
transference to help us in the task
psychologists have devised a number of
tests to tease out these transferences
one exercise involves asking someone to
finish sentence stubs very quickly
without giving too much thought thereby
allowing the unconscious to reveal
another classic transference exercise is
the Rorschach test devised in the 1930s
by the psychologist Hermann Rorschach by
being shown an ambiguous image and asked
a saying what it was roche believed that
we would naturally reveal some of our
latent guiding fears hopes prejudices
and assumptions the important point in
any Roche test is that the image has no
one true meaning different people mainly
see different things in it according to
what their past predisposes them to
imagine to one individual with a rather
kindly and forgiving conscience this
image could be seen as a sweet mask with
eyes floppy ears covering for the mouth
and wide flaps extending from the cheeks
another more traumatized by say a
domineering father might see it as a
powerful figure viewed from below with
splayed feet thick legs heavy shoulders
and head bent forward as if poised for
attack the goal of maturity in general
and psychotherapy in particular is to
help you to get on top of your
transferences that means seeing the ways
in which our views of authority or
sexuality or uncertainty have been
distorted the idea is ultimately to be
released in the past’s indiscriminate
hold on the present and to reduce the
scope of our personal histories to
determine our futures once we overcome
our transferences we can be free to
respond more reliably to the world as it
is rather than how it was if you liked
our films take a look at our shop the
school of life comm forward slash shop
you’ll find lots of thoughtful books games stationery and more
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