When relational trauma strikes the developing psyche of a child, a split sometimes occurs in which an “innocent” part of the self retreats into the unconscious where it continues to live in suspended animation as a lost soul, frequently represented in dreams as a lost or orphaned ‘child.’ Deprived of this lost spark, the outer personality struggles to survive in a “de-animated” world, often becomes depressed, and sometimes seeks psychotherapeutic help. Depth Psychotherapy offers the opportunity for renewed contact with the lost soul and hence for renewed feeling-life, creativity, and relatedness—but not without fierce resistance thrown up by the psyche’s defensive powers.
How the psychotherapy process invites the lost soul back into relationship, will be the focus of this slide-illustrated lecture and discussion. Through a series of clinical vignettes and transference/countertransference “moments,” (each followed by an important dream) Dr. Kalsched will show how the splitting and dissociation occasioned by early trauma, are gradually healed in the slow relational process of depth psychotherapy.
