Episode 075: Unconscious Communication within the Psychoanalytic Dyad with Marsha Hewitt, PhD

Psychoanalysis On and Off the Couch

"When you think about the analyst's reverie - we are in a session and something is happening, the patient is telling you something and your mind starts to drift - an image comes to your mind that just sticks and it won't let go. It may well be that something is happening to the patient that they cannot tell you because they don’t know. But it is stirring up something in you that is resonating and an image will come out of that - something that allows us to find a register, a meaningful register, in which to speak to the patient,"

Description: Dr. Harvey Schwartz welcomes Prof. Marsha Hewitt to today’s episode. Professor Hewitt is a psychoanalyst with a private practice in Toronto, Canada. She is also a Professor of Religion in the Department of the Study of Religion at the University of Toronto, Trinity College.

Prof. Hewitt’s books include From Theology to Social Theory: Juan Luis Segundo and the Theology of Liberation, Critical Theory of Religion: A Feminist Analysis. and Freud on Religion (Key Thinkers in the Study of Religion). Her most recent book is called Legacies of the Occult: Psychoanalysis, Religion and Unconscious Communication. Unconscious communication is precisely the subject that is addressed in today’s episode through a discussion about the early history of psychoanalysis and Freud’s relationship to unconscious communication - what he called ‘thought transference’

Prof. Hewitt dives deep into the meaning of being in relation to an analysand, talking about the moments in which an analyst has the experience of daydreaming about something, experiencing a reverie, and moments later, hearing the same thoughts and images from the patient. Dr. Hewitt also emphasizes the importance for analysts to always maintain an open-minded psychoanalytic curiosity about what the meaning of the phenomena happening in the dyad.

Key takeaways:

[10:33] Dr. Hewitt talks about unconscious communication.

[15:56] What is the meaning of a cult?

[18:38] Telepathy means feeling in the distance.

[20:26] Prof. Hewitt talks about the term bracketing.

[22:04] Prof. Hewitt relates the drift of the unconscious and the job of the analyst.

[24:06] There is an aspect of the transference that cannot be understood.

[27:20] Dr. Schwartz shares a case to exemplify how he experienced reverie with a patient.

[29:30] Prof. Hewitt encourages analysts to keep thinking about what is not understood by sharing a case example.

[32:50] Prof. Hewitt dives deep into the concept of intersubjectivity.

[38:10] Prof. Hewitt continues sharing her efforts in understanding what was not evident.

[39:50] The experience of working with people that have been traumatized.

[43:55] Even in the most flagrant psychosis there is truth.

[45:42] Prof. Hewitt explains where her passion for the unseen and the different forms of subjectivity comes from.

Mentioned in this episode:

IPA Off the Couch www.ipaoffthecouch.org

Recommended Readings:

From Theology to Social Theory: Juan Luis Segundo and the Theology of Liberation, Critical Theory of Religion: A Feminist Analysis, Marsha Hewitt

Freud on Religion (Key Thinkers in the Study of Religion), Marsha Hewitt

Legacies of the Occult: Psychoanalysis, Religion and Unconscious Communication, Marsha Hewitt