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Weaving deceptive webs and untangling emotional truths

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Abstract

This paper explores how the allure of magical thinking and groupthink contrasts with intuition of emotional truth. Since truth can terrify, the author suggests that a longer learning curve is needed to apprehend what Bion (1970a) called the “evolving O” of the analytic session. Traumatized patients are described as dream weavers who spin webs of partial truths and lies around their true selves. For the analyst, untangling these webs involves what Bion (1970b) calls an “act of faith.” Clinical material is presented to show how groupthink and other concretions of thought can, under favorable circumstances, be transformed on the wings of psychic truth. Alternatively, uncontained violent emotions can become calcified, creating a carapace over the chrysalis of the patient’s true self. The author concludes that the analyst’s desire for a particular treatment outcome can unwittingly lead to the formation of an adhesive web where healthy analytic culture becomes a cult. Paradoxically, it is only when there is equal attention to emotional truth and lies that a trajectory of growth is likely to evolve.

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  1. LICSW, PhD, FIPA, 7500 212th Street SW, Suite 105, Edmonds, WA, 98026, USA

    Stan Case

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  1. Stan Case
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A version of this paper was presented Online as part of a series of online preconference scientific meetings promoting the Thirteenth International Evolving British Object Relations (EBOR) Conference: Truth and Lies (October 8-9 and 15-16, 2022), sponsored by Northwestern Psychoanalytic Society and Institute.

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Case, S. Weaving deceptive webs and untangling emotional truths. Am J Psychoanal 83, 547–565 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1057/s11231-023-09428-4

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