Psychotherapy is such a personal and private process that it is a mystery to most people who have never gone through it. The following series is a unique effort that allows us to sit in on what is ordinarily a very private therapeutic experience. An actual patient was courageous enough and considerate enough to allow herself to be photographed while actually engaged in therapy with three different therapists.
Thus, we are allowed the privilege of seeing and feeling what really transpires. A film series like this, in which three therapists, distinguished by their different orientations, share their therapeutic endeavors, has never been made before. We therefore wish to express our gratitude to Gloria, the patient, and to her therapists for allowing us to share in their therapeutic adventure.
This series will be divided into three separate films. In the first film, we see Dr. Carl Rogers, founder of Client-Centered Therapy, interviewing Gloria. In film number two, Dr. Frederick Pearls, founder of Gestalt Therapy, is working with her.
And in film number three, Dr. Albert Ellis, founder of Rational Emotive Therapy, is our therapist. Each therapist will first describe his system of therapy briefly. He will then demonstrate his work with Gloria, and then he will comment briefly on his work. Now, here is Dr. Carl Rogers. From my own years of therapeutic experience, I've come to feel that if I can create the proper climate, the proper relationship, the proper conditions, a process of therapeutic movement will almost inevitably...
occur in my client. Then I ask, what is this climate? What are these conditions? Will they exist in the interview with the woman I'm about to talk with whom I've never seen before?
Let me try to describe very briefly what these conditions are as I see them. First of all, one question is, can I be real in the relationship? This has come to have an increasing amount of importance to me over the years. I feel that genuineness is another way of describing it. describing the quality I would like to have.
I like the term congruence, by which I mean that what I'm experiencing inside is present in my awareness and comes out through my communication. In a sense, When I have this quality, I'm all in one piece in the relationship. There's another word that describes it for me. I feel that in the relationship, I would like to have a transparency.
I would be quite willing... for my client to see all the way through me, that there would be nothing, nothing hidden. And when I'm real in this fashion that I'm trying to describe them, I know that my own feelings will often bubble up into awareness and be expressed, but be expressed in ways that won't impose themselves on my client.
Then the second question I would have is, will I find myself praising this person, caring for this person? I certainly don't want to pretend a caring that I don't feel. In fact, if I dislike my client persistently, I feel it's better that I should express it. But I know that the process of therapy is much more likely to occur, and constructive change is much more likely, if I feel a real spontaneous prizing of this with whom I'm working. A prizing of this person as a separate individual.
You can call that quality acceptance. You can call it caring. You can call it a non-possessive love, if you wish.
I think any of those terms tend to describe it. I know that the relationship will prove more constructive if it's present. Then the third quality, will I be able to understand the inner world of this individual from the inside?
will I be able to see it through her eyes will I be able to be sufficiently sensitive to move around inside the world of her feelings so that I know what it feels like to be her so that I can sense not only the surface meanings but some of the meanings that lie somewhat underneath the surface I know that if I can let myself sensitively and accurately enter into her world of experience then change and therapeutic movement are much more likely well suppose I am fortunate and that I do experience some of these attitudes in the relationship what then well then, a variety of things are likely to happen. Both from my clinical experience and from our research investigations, we find that if attitudes of the sort that I've described are present, then quite a number of things will happen. She'll explore some of her feelings and attitudes more deeply. She's likely to discover some hidden aspects of herself that she wasn't aware of previously. Feeling herself prized by me, it's quite possible she'll come to prize herself more.
Feeling that some of her meanings are understood by me, then she can more readily perhaps listen to herself, listen to what's going on within her own experience, listen to some of the meanings she hasn't been able to catch before. And perhaps if she senses a realness in me, she'll be able to... be a little more real within herself.
I suspect there will be a change in the manner of her expression, at least this has been my experience in other instances, from being rather remote from her experiencing, remote from what's going on within her, it's possible that she'll move toward more immediacy of experiencing, that she will be able to sense and express what's going on in her in the immediate moment. From being... disapproving of herself, it's quite possible she will move toward a greater degree of acceptance of herself.
From somewhat of a fear of relating, she may move toward being able to relate more directly and to encounter me more directly. From construing life in somewhat rigid black and white patterns, she may move toward more tentative ways of construing her experience and of seeing the meanings in it. From a locus of evaluation which is outside of herself, it's quite possible she will move toward recognizing a greater capacity within herself for making judgments and drawing conclusions.
So those are some of the changes that we have. If I have any success in creating the kind of conditions that I described initially, then we... may be able to see some of these changes in this client even though I know in advance that our contact is going to be very brief good morning I'm dr. Rogers you must be Gloria yes I am We have half an hour together and I really don't know what we'll be able to make of it, but I hope we can make something of it.
I'd be glad to know whatever concerns you. Well, right now I'm nervous, but I feel more comfortable the way you're talking in a low voice, and I don't feel like you'll be so harsh on me. But, uh...
I hear the tremor in your voice, so I'm learning. Well, the main thing I want to talk to you about is... I'm just newly divorced, and I had gone in therapy before, and I felt comfortable when I left, and all of a sudden now the biggest change is adjusting to my single life.
And one of the things that bothers me the most is especially men, and having men to the house, and how it affects the children. The biggest thing I want, the thing that keeps coming to my mind I want to tell you about is I have a daughter, Nine, who at one time I felt I had a lot of emotional problems. I wish I could stop shaking.
And I'm real conscious of things affecting her. I don't want her to get upset. I don't want to shock her.
I want so bad for her to accept me. And we're real open with each other, especially about sex. And the other day she saw a girl that was single but pregnant, and she asked me, about can girls get pregnant if they're single and the conversation was fine and I wasn't under the ease of all with her until she asked me if I'd ever made love to a man since I left her daddy and I lied to her and ever since that it keeps coming up to my mind because I feel so guilty lying to her because I never lie and I wanted to trust me and I want I almost want an answer from you I want you to tell me if it will affect her wrong if I told her the truth or would And it's this concern about her and the fact that you really aren't, that this open relationship that has existed between you and her, you feel is kind of...
Yes, I feel like I have to be on guard about that because I remember when I was a little girl, when I first found out my mother and father made love, it was dirty and terrible and I didn't like her anymore for a while. And I don't want to lie to Pammy either and I don't know... And you sure wish I could give you the answer as to what you should tell her.
I was afraid you were going to say that. Because what you really want is an answer. I want to especially know if it would affect her, if I was completely honest and open with her, or if it would affect her because I lied.
I feel like it's bound to make a strain because I lied to her. Because she'll suspect that or she will know something's not quite right. I feel that inside she'll distrust me, yes.
And also I thought, well gee, what about when she gets a little older and she finds herself in touchy situations? She probably wouldn't want to admit it to me because she thinks I'm so good and so sweet. And yet I'm afraid she could think I'm really a devil and I want so bad for her to accept me. And I don't know how much a nine-year-old can take.
And really both alternatives concern you. She might think you're too good or better than you really are. Yes. She might think that you're worse than you are.
Not worse than I am. I don't know if she can accept me the way I am. I think I paint a picture that I'm all sweet and motherly.
I'm a little ashamed of my shady side too. I see. That really cuts a little deeper.
If she really knew you, would she, could she accept you? This is what I don't know, yes. I don't want her to turn away from me. And I don't even know how I feel about it, because there are times when I feel so guilty, like when I have a man over. I even try to make a special setup so that if I were ever alone with him, the child would never catch me and that sort of thing.
Because I'm really wary about it. And yet I also know I have these desires. So it's quite clear it isn't only her problem or the relationship with her, it's in you as well.
In my guilt, yeah. I feel guilty so often. What can I accept myself as doing?
Yes, yes. And you realize that you set up sort of subterfuges so as to make sure that you're not caught or something. You realize that you are acting from guilt, is that?
Yes. I don't like the way... I would like to feel comfortable with whatever I do. If I choose not to tell Pammy the truth, to feel comfortable that she can't handle it, and I don't. I want to be honest, and yet, I feel there are some areas that I don't even accept.
And if you can't accept them in yourself, how could you possibly be comfortable in telling them to her? Right. And yet, as you say, you do have these desires, and you do have your feelings, but you don't feel good about them.
Right. I have a feeling you're just going to sit there and let me stew on it. I want more...
I want you to help me get rid of my guilt feeling. If I can get rid of my guilt feeling about lying or going to bed with a single man, any of that, just so I can feel more comfortable. And I guess I'd like to say, no, I don't want to let you just stew in your feelings, but on the other hand, I also feel that this... This is the kind of very private thing that I couldn't possibly answer for you, but I sure as anything will try to help you work toward your own answer.
I don't know whether that makes any sense to you, but I mean it. Well, I appreciate you saying that. You sound like you mean it.
But I don't know where to go. I don't begin to know where to go. I thought that I'd pretty well worked over most of my guilt, and now that this is coming up, I'm disappointed in myself. I really am. I like it when I feel that no matter what I do, even if it's against my own morals or...
my upbringing, that I can still feel good about me. And now I don't. Like, there's a girl at work who sort of mothers me, and she just, I think she thinks I'm all sweet.
And I sure don't want to show my more ornery devilish side with her. I want to be sweet. and it's so hard for me to...
This all seems so new again, and it's so disappointing. Yeah, I get the disappointment that here, a lot of these things you thought you'd worked through, and now the guilt and the feeling that only a part of you is acceptable to anybody else. Yes.
That keeps coming out. I guess I do catch the real... Deep puzzlement that you feel as to what the hell shall I do?
What can I do? Yes, and you know what I can find, Doctor, is that everything I start to do that I impulse, it seems natural to tell Pam here or to go out on a date or something. I'm comfortable until I think how I was affected as a child.
And the minute that comes up, then I'm all haywire. Like, I want to be a good mother so bad, and I feel like I am a good mother. But then there's those little exceptions. Like, my guilt's with working.
to work and it's so fun having extra money i like to work nights the minute i think i'm not being real good to the children or giving them enough time then i start feeling guilty again then that's when i'm it's a what do they call it a double bind that's just what it feels like i want to do this and it feels right but after all i'm not being a good mother and i want to be both i'm becoming more and more aware of what a perfectionist i am that's what it seems like i want to be so perfect either i want to become perfect in my standards or not have that need anymore or i guess i hear it a little differently that uh what you want is to seem perfect but it means it's a great matter of great importance to you to be a good mother and you want to seem to be a good mother even if some of your actual feelings differ from that does that catch you i don't feel like i'm saying that no that isn't what i feel really i want to approve of me always but my actions won't let me i want to prove with me I think... I realize you... alright, let me...
I'd like to understand that. Sometimes your actions are kind of outside of you. You want to approve of you, but what you do somehow won't let you approve of yourself. Right. Like I feel that I could approve of myself regarding for example my sex life This is the big thing if I really fell in love with a man and I respected him and I adore him I don't think I feel so guilty going to bed with him I don't think I'd have to make up any excuses to the church children because they could see my natural caring for them.
But when I have the physical desire and I'll say, oh well why not, and I want to anyway, then I feel guilty afterwards. I hate facing the kids, I don't like looking at myself, and I rarely enjoy it. And this is what I mean. If the circumstances would be different, I don't think I'd feel so guilty because I'd feel right about it.
Yeah, I guess I hear you saying, if what I was doing when I went to bed with a man was really genuine and full of love and respect and so on, I wouldn't feel guilty in relation to Pam. I really would be comfortable about the situation. That's how I feel, yes. And I know that sounds like I want a perfect situation, but that is how I feel.
And in the meantime, I can't stop these desires. I've tried that also. I've tried saying, okay, I don't like myself when I do that. so I won't do it anymore.
But then I resent the children. I think, why should they stop me from doing what I want? And it's really not that bad. But I guess I heard you saying too that it isn't only the children that you don't like it as well when it really isn't.
I'm sure that's, I know that's it probably even more so than I'm aware of. But I only notice it so much when I pick it up in the children. Then I can also notice it in myself.
Somehow, sometimes you kind of feel like blaming them for the feelings you have. I mean, why should they cut you off from a normal sex life? Well, a sex life I could say, not normal, because there is something about me that says that's not very healthy to just go into sex because you feel physically attractive or something, or a physical need. So something about it tells me that's not quite right. Right, anyway.
So to feel... Really, that at times you're acting in ways that are not in accord with your own inner standards. Right.
Right. But then you were also saying a minute ago that you feel you can't help that either. I wished I could.
That's it. And I can't. Now I feel like I can't control myself as well as I could have before for a specific reason. Now I can.
I just let go and I have... There's too many things I do wrong that I have to feel guilty for and I sure don't like that. I want you very much to give me a direct answer, and I'm going to ask it, and I don't expect a direct answer, but I want to know, do you feel that to me the most important thing is to be open and honest? And if I can be open and honest with my children, do you feel that it could harm them if, for example, I could say to Pammy, I felt bad lying to you, Pammy, and I want to tell you the truth now. And if I tell her the truth, and she's shocked at me, and she's upset, that that could bother her more?
I want to get rid of my guilt, so that'll help me, but I don't want to put them on her. That's right. Do you feel that could hurt her?
That's a great concern. I guess, I'm sure this will sound evasive to you, but it seems to me that perhaps the person you're not being fully honest with is you. So.
Because I was very much struck by the fact that you were saying, if I feel all right about what I have done, whether it's going to bed with a man or what, if I really feel all right about it, then I don't have any concern about what I would tell Pam or my relationship with her. Right. All right.
Now I hear what you're saying. Then alright, then I want to work on accepting me then. I want to work on feeling alright about it.
Now that makes sense, but that will come natural and then I won't have to worry about him. But when things do seem so wrong for me and I have an impulse to do them, how can I accept that? What you'd like to do is to feel more accepting towards yourself when you do things that you feel are wrong.
Is that right? Right. Sounds like a tough assignment.
Yeah, I feel like you're going to say, now why do you think they're wrong? And I have mixed feelings there too. Through therapy I'll say, now look, I know this is natural. Women feel it.
Sure, we don't talk about it a lot socially, but all women feel it and it's very natural. I've had sex for the last 11 years. I'm, of course, going to want it, but I still think it's wrong unless you're really, truly in love with a man. And my body doesn't seem to agree. And so I don't know how to accept it.
Sounds like the triangle. It's a triangle to me, isn't it? You feel that I, or therapists in general, or other people say, it's all right, it's all right, it's natural enough, go ahead. And I guess you feel your body sort of lines up on that side of the picture. But something in you says, but I don't like it that way, not unless it's really right.
I have a hopeless feeling. I mean, these are all the things I sort of feel myself, and I feel the, okay, now what? There you feel it. This is the conflict and it's just insoluble and therefore it's hopeless and here you look to me and I don't seem to give you any help on that.
Right. I really know you can't answer for me and I have to figure it out myself but I want you to guide me or show me where to start or... So it won't look so hopeless.
I know I can keep living with this conflict and I know eventually things would work out but I like feeling more comfortable with the way I live. I'm not. I'm going to ask, what is it you wish I would say to you? I wish you would say to me, to be honest, and take the risk that Pam is going to accept me.
And I also have a feeling if I could really risk it with Pammy, of all people, that I'd be able to see, here's this little kid that can accept me, and I'm really not that bad. If she really knows what a demon I am and still loves me and accepts me, it seems like it would help me to accept me more. Like, it's really not that bad.
I want you to say, to go ahead and be honest. But I don't want any responsibility. And it would upset her. I see.
That's where I don't want to take responsibility for it. I see, I know, yeah. You know very well what you'd like to do in a relationship.
You would like to be yourself, and you'd like to have her know that you're not perfect, and do things that maybe even she wouldn't approve of, and that you disapprove of to some degree yourself. But that somehow she would love you and accept you as an imperfect person. Yes. Like I wonder if my mother had been more open with me, maybe I wouldn't have had such a narrow attitude about sex.
If I would have thought that she could be, you know, pretty sexy and ornery and devilish too, that I would look at her as being such a sweet mother, that she could also be the other side. But she didn't talk about that. And maybe that's where I got my picture. I don't know. But I want Pammy to see me as a full woman, but also accept me.
You don't sound so uncertain. I don't? What do you mean? What I mean is, you've been sitting there telling me just what you would like to do in that relationship with pain.
I would, but I don't want to quite take the risk of doing it unless an authority tells me that. It's, I guess one thing that I feel very keenly is, it's an awfully risky thing to live. You'd be taking a chance on your relationship with her? You'd be taking a chance on letting her know who you are, really?
Yeah, but then if I don't take a chance, if I feel loved and accepted by her, I'm never going to feel good about it anyway. If her love and acceptance of you is based on a false picture of you... What the hell is the good of that?
Is that what you're saying? Yes, that's what I mean, yes. But I also feel there's a lot of responsibility with being a mother.
I don't want to feel like I've caused any big traumas in the children. I don't like all that responsibility. I think that's it. I don't like it feeling it could be my fault.
I guess that's what I meant when I said life is risky. It's to... Take the responsibility for being the person you would like to be with her is a hell of a responsibility.
It is. A very frightening one. You know, I look at it two ways.
I like to see myself as being so honest with the kids and really being proud of myself, though, that no matter what I told them or no matter how bad they might think I was, I was honest. And down deep, it's going to be a much more wholesome relationship. And yet, you know... I get jealous of like when they're with their daddy.
I feel he's more flip. He's not quite as real. He's not quite as honest, but nevertheless, they see a sweet picture of their dad.
You know, he's all goodness and light. And I'm envious of that too. I want them to see me just as sweet as they see him.
And yet I know he's not quite as real with them. So it seems like I've got to swap the one for the other. And I know this is really what I want the most, but I miss some of that glory.
I sort of feel I want them to have just as nice a picture of me as they have of their dad. And if his is a little phony, then maybe mine will have to be too. I think that's putting it a little too strongly.
That's close. That is what I mean. So, I know she can't have that neat a picture of me if I were honest. Besides that, I do feel I'm a little more ornery than their dad anyway, so I'm likely to do more things that they disapprove of.
It sounds like you really found it quite hard to believe that they would really love you if they knew you. That's right. You know, that's exactly it.
Before therapy, I would have definitely chosen the other area. I'm going to get respect from them no matter what, even if I have to lie. I see.
Well, right now, I know that's not true. and positive don't really accept me and something tells me they will be able to not positive i want reassurance i keep wanting these things no man's land probably shifting from one point of view toward them to another but boy you'd sure like somebody to say that's right you go ahead and do it yes that's why i get encouraged when i read a book from somebody i respect and admire that this is the right thing no matter what honesty will win out well then that keeps giving me confidence by gosh i'm right It's so damn hard to really choose something on your own, isn't it? Which makes me feel very immature. I don't like this in me.
I wish I were grown up enough or mature enough to make my decisions and stick by them. But I need somebody to help me on, somebody to push me. So you kind of reproach yourself for that, I guess, and feel, why if I...
Was anybody, if I was grown up, I'd be mature enough to decide things like this for myself. Right. And take more risks.
I wish I'd take more risks. I wish that I could just go ahead and be this and say, however the children grow up, I've done my best. I didn't have to constantly have this conflict.
And I'd like later years to say, no matter what you ask me, kids, at least I told you the truth. You may not have liked it, but it's been the truth. That somehow I can admire. I disrespect people that lie.
I hate it. So you see what a double bind I am in. I hate myself if I'm bad, but I also hate myself if I lie.
So, uh, it's accepting. I want to become more accepting. I guess... Judging from your tone of voice, you sound as though you hate yourself more when you lie than you do in terms of things you disapprove of in your behavior. I do.
I do. Because this has really bothered me. This happened with Pammy about a month ago, and it keeps coming to my mind.
I don't know whether to go back and talk to her. about it. Oh wait, she may have even forgotten what she asked me.
But uh, it just... One day you haven't forgotten. I haven't, no.
I haven't. And I'd like to at least be able to tell her that I remember lying and I'm sorry I lied and it's been driving me bugs because I did. I don't, no, I feel like now that's solved and I didn't even solve a thing but I feel relieved. I do feel like you've been saying to me, you're not giving me advice, but I feel like you're saying, you really want to, you know what pattern you want to follow, Gloria, and go ahead and follow it. I sort of feel a backing up from you.
I guess the way I sense it is, you've been telling me that you know what you want to do, and yes, I do believe in backing up people in what they want to do. It's just a little different slant than the way it seems to you. Are you telling me...
You see, one thing that concerns me is, uh, it's no damn good you're doing something that you haven't really chosen to do. That's why I'm trying to help you find out what your own inner choices are. And there's also a conflict there because I'm not really positive what I want to do.
The lying part, yes, but I'm not positive what I want to do when I go against myself. Like when I bring a man to the house, I'm not sure I want to do that. If I feel guilty afterwards, I must not have really wanted to.
I'm interested to see, I'm not sure which word to use, but you don't like yourself or you don't approve of it when you do something against yourself. Yes. You know, this is so different. Now, this kind of thing that we're talking about now, it isn't just knowing whether you want to do something or not.
If I want to go to work in the morning or I don't want to go to work, that's easy. But when I find myself doing something I don't feel comfortable with, I automatically say, if you're not comfortable, Gloria, it's not right. Something's wrong. All right, now what I want to ask you is, how can I know which is the strongest?
Because I do it, does that mean that's the strongest? And yet if I disapprove, that's just part of the thing that's got to go along with it. See, it sounds like you're...
I'm picking up a contradiction. I'm not following. It sounds like you're feeling a contradiction in yourself, too. Although what I heard you saying in part is the way you like it is when you feel really comfortable about what you're doing. Yes.
And I have at times when I've made a decision. Now that seems right, that seems perfectly right, no conflict. But then there are times I do things that I feel uncomfortable with, so that there is a conflict there.
It's not the same at all. So what I'm saying is, how do I really know when I'm following my true feelings if I have conflicts afterwards or guilt afterwards? I see, because in the moment it may seem like your true feelings.
Yes, like if I'm starting to do it, okay. But that really is tough. And if you feel comfortable in the moment about it, but then afterward don't feel at all comfortable, which course of action was really the one you should have followed?
You know, the most outstanding thing, I don't know if you're following me when I say about this conflict. The one thing I know is I've wanted, for example, to leave. my husband for quite a few years. I never did it.
I kept thinking how nice it would be or how scary it would be, but I never did it. And all of a sudden when I did it, it felt right. I didn't feel mean toward him. I just knew this is what I had to do. That's when I know I'm following myself.
I'm following my feelings completely. I had no conflict there. Some unhappy things came from it, but I still had no conflict. That to me is when I'm following my feelings. And in everyday life, the small little decisions, the small little things to do don't come out that clear at all.
So many conflicts come with them. Is this natural? Although you're saying, I expect it is, but you're saying too that you know I perfectly well a feeling within yourself that occurs when you're really doing something that's right for you. I do.
I do. And I miss that feeling other times. It's right away a clue to me. You can really listen to yourself sometimes and realize, oh, this isn't the right feeling, this isn't the way I would feel if I was doing what I really wanted to do. But yet many times I'll go along and do it anyway and say, oh, well, I'm in this situation now, I'll just remember next time.
I mention this word a lot in therapy and most therapists grin at me or giggle or something when I say utopia. But when I do follow a feeling and I feel this good feeling inside me, that's sort of utopia. That's what I mean.
That's the way I like to feel, whether it's a bad thing or a good thing. But I feel right about me. I have a sense that in those utopian moments you really feel kind of whole.
You feel all in one piece. Yes. Yeah, it gives me a choked up feeling when you say that because I don't get that as often as I'd like. I like that whole feeling, that's real precious to me.
I expect none of us get it as often as we'd like, but I really do understand that. that really does touch you, doesn't it? Yeah, and we also are just thinking, we also are just thinking, I feel dumb saying it, um...
All of a sudden as I'm talking to you, I thought, gee, how nice I can talk to you. And I want you to approve of me, and I respect you, that I miss that my father couldn't talk to me like you are. I mean, I'd like to say, gee, I'd like you for my father.
I don't even know why that came to me. You look to me like a pretty nice daughter. You really do miss the fact that you couldn't be open with your own baby. Yeah, I couldn't be open, but I want to blame it on him. I think I'm more open than he'd allow me.
Me, he would never listen to me talk like you are, and not disapprove, and not lower me down. Yeah, I thought of this the other day. Why do I always have to be so perfect?
I know why. He always wanted me to be perfect. I always had to be better.
And, uh, yeah, I miss that. They just shine like hell to be the girl he wants you to be. Yeah, at the same time, they're belling. That's right.
Like, I almost quoted writing him a letter the other day and telling him, I'm a waitress, which I expect him to disapprove of. I go out at nights, and I almost quoted hitting him back, like, No, how do you like me? Uh-huh.
And yet, I really want acceptance and love from him. I mean, I know he loves me. So you slap at him and say, this is what I am now, see?
Yeah. You raised me. How do you like it? But you know what I think I want him to say? I knew this was you all along, honey, and I really love you.
I guess you really feel badly that there's very little chance you'll say that. No, he won't. He doesn't hear. I went back home to him about two years ago, really wanting to let him know I loved him, although I've been afraid of him.
He doesn't hear me. He just keeps saying things like, honey, you know I love you. You know I've always loved you.
And he doesn't hear. He's never really known you and loved you. And this somehow is what brings the tears inside.
I don't know what it is. You know, when I talk about it, it feels more flip. If I just sit still, it feels like a great big hurt down there that I feel cheated.
It's much easier to feel a little flip because then you don't feel that big lump inside hurt. And again, that's a hopeless situation. I tried working on it, and I feel it's something I have to accept.
My father just isn't the type of man I'd really like. I'd like somebody more understanding and caring. He cares, but not in a way that we can cooperate or communicate. I feel, note, that I am permanently cheated. That's why I like substitutes, like, I like talking to you, and I like men that I can respect.
Doctors and I, I keep sort of maybe underneath feeling like we're real close, you know, and it's sort of like a substitute father. I don't feel that's pretending. Well, you're not really my father. No, I meant about the real close business.
Well, see, I sort of feel that's pretending, too, because I can't expect you to feel very close to me. You don't know me that well. All I can do is what I am feeling, and that is I feel close to you in this moment. In spite of feeling initially the artificiality of the situation, particularly the hot lights, I very quickly became oblivious to the outside situation, and I think that Gloria did too. In many ways I'm glad that she kept pushing me for an answer to her very personal questions about her...
Sex life and her relationship to her daughter. I say I'm glad of this because as the relationship developed, it became, I think, completely clear to her as well as to me that she was seeking something a good deal deeper than that. Incidentally, I'd like to pay my tribute to her deep honesty and being willing to talk about herself so freely. Although every individual is entirely unique, and in this respect I was definitely unprepared for and sometimes surprised by the material she brought up, still in another sense this was very typical of my experiences in therapy. When I'm able really to let myself enter into a relationship, and I feel that this was true in this instance, Then I find myself not only being increasingly moved by being in touch with the inner world of my client, but I find myself bringing out of my own inner experience statements which seem to have no connection with what's going on but which usually proved to be or proved to have a very significant relationship to what the client is experiencing.
I felt there were one or two incidents of this kind in this brief interview. I was genuinely moved, I probably showed it, by the fact that she told me near the end of the contact that she saw me as the father she would like to have. My reply was also a thoroughly spontaneous one, that she seemed to me like a pretty nice daughter.
I guess I feel that we're only playing with the real world of relationships when we talk about such an experience in terms of transference and counter-transference. I feel quite deeply about that. I want to say, yes, we can put this experience into some such highly intellectualized framework, but when we do that, it completely misses the point of the very immediate I-Thou quality of the relationship at such moments.
I felt that Gloria and I really encountered each other, and that in some... small, but I believe lasting way, we were each of us enriched by the experience. I'm saying these things almost immediately after the conclusion of the interview, and as is characteristic of me, there are not more than one or two statements or incidents which I recall from the interview. I simply know that I was very much present in the relationship, that I lived it in the moment of its occurrence, and I realize that after a time I may begin to remember it too. But at the present time, I really have a very non-specific memory of the whole interview.
I'll try to look at it, though, a little bit more from an intellectual rather than a strictly feeling point of view. Gloria showed what I've come to feel are characteristic elements of therapeutic movement. In the first part of the interview, she was talking about her feelings, and they were past feelings. She was talking about aspects of her behavior and of herself as if she didn't quite own them. She was looking outside herself for a center or locus of evaluation, some source of authority.
She saw some of the things she was talking about in fairly black and white fashion. By the end of the interview, she was experiencing her feelings in the immediate moment, not only as evidenced by her tears, but by her ability to express very directly and with immediacy her feelings toward me. She was also much more aware of her ability to make her own judgments and choices.
I guess put in terms that have become somewhat commonplace, you could say that she moved from the there and then of her life to the here and now of elements that she was discovering in herself and feelings which she was experiencing in the moment in her relationship with me. All in all, I feel good about the interview. I guess I feel good about myself in the interview.
And like Gloria, I feel very real regret that the relationship cannot continue.