My Approach

Today, psychoanalysis refers to more than a particular form of psychotherapeutic treatment. It is also a theory of inner life, a method of exploring unconscious processes and a particular stance towards a person's experience. It starts from the assumption that our thoughts, feelings and actions are not entirely determined by conscious intentions. Experiences can influence us even when we cannot readily remember them or put them into words. Feelings can be defended against, needs rejected and inner tensions kept out of awareness, while continuing to affect relationships, bodily sensations, recurring decisions or psychological symptoms.

The unconscious is not a hidden place where fully formed contents await discovery. It encompasses wishes, fears, conflicts and experiences in relationships that it has not yet been possible to recognise consciously or put into words. Some things remain unconscious because they are associated with anxiety, shame, guilt or pain; others have not yet found a form in which they can be understood and communicated.

From this perspective, psychological symptoms are not viewed solely as isolated disturbances to be eliminated as quickly as possible. They may also express an inner conflict, a sense of being overwhelmed or a form of protection that has been necessary until now. A symptom may keep unbearable tension in check or prevent a person from coming into contact with feelings and experiences that they have not yet had sufficient resources to process. This view does not minimise the symptoms. It helps to explain why something that causes considerable suffering can also be difficult to let go of. In my work, I therefore try to understand together with you what a symptom means in your present life, what it may protect you from and what it may indirectly express that cannot yet be experienced directly or put into words.

The diversity of psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis today is not a closed body of doctrine. Different theories and treatment approaches have developed within it. Among other things, they focus on unconscious conflicts, ways of dealing with feelings, self-perception, internal experiences of relationships and what happens in the therapeutic relationship.

My psychoanalytic approach is particularly shaped by developments that place emotional experience, the inner world and the significance of relationships at the centre. The inner world consists of memories, fantasies, feelings and internalised experiences with other people. These are not stored as unchanged replicas. They become intertwined with wishes and fears and shape expectations about how relationships unfold, what can be expected of other people and which aspects of oneself seem welcome or dangerous.

Loving and hostile, trusting and mistrustful, dependent and independent aspects of experience can coexist. Psychological development does not mean eliminating aggressive, vulnerable or dependent feelings. Rather, it involves being able to bear contradictory feelings at the same time, such as love and anger, gratitude and disappointment, or closeness and the need for boundaries. This can make it easier to take responsibility for one's own feelings and actions and to develop relationships further even after disappointments or conflicts.

From the body to emotional experience

Not every feeling is already present in a form that can be recognised, remembered and communicated in words. Some experiences first appear as physical tension, diffuse anxiety or a sense of threat that is difficult to name. They can be so intense that they are barely tolerable within. In therapeutic work, a form can gradually emerge for what was previously felt mainly in the body, defended against or translated directly into action. Anxiety can be recognised as anxiety, anger can be acknowledged without having to act on it immediately, and grief can be connected with an experience of loss. Feelings do not lose their significance as a result. They can, however, increasingly be accepted as one's own experiences and tolerated internally.

The therapeutic relationship

Inner experience develops and changes in relationships. Earlier relationship experiences shape how a person perceives present situations, what responses they expect and which aspects of themselves they have to show, conceal or defend against.

The therapeutic process is also a relational process in which we are both involved. What helps is not only a ‘good’ relationship in which tensions are avoided, but one that can also make room for and bear anger, misunderstandings and conflicts. Like all living things, psychological development needs a favourable climate: a reliable space where there is room for a person's uniqueness and for their difficult as well as their good experiences. Such a climate is not simply a given. It arises afresh, time and again, in our work together, and after tensions or ruptures it sometimes needs to be found again. It is precisely through this that something new and healing can develop.

Like psychoanalysis, analytical psychology assumes that inner experience is not entirely under conscious control. Earlier experiences, unconscious conflicts, patterns of relating, feelings that have been defended against and inner images and ideas can shape present life without being directly recognised.

Psychoanalysis and analytical psychology share important common ground, but differ in emphasis. Psychoanalytic thinking asks particularly how earlier experiences, unconscious conflicts and patterns of relating shape present experience. Analytical psychology adds to this retrospective view by asking what a symptom, conflict or crisis might point towards and what direction of development might be emerging within it. Both perspectives complement one another in my work. This does not mean romanticising suffering or attributing a hidden positive message to every symptom. The distress caused by symptoms must be taken seriously. At the same time, the possibility remains open that something has not had enough room in the way a person has lived so far.

How the unconscious can prompt development

In analytical psychology, the unconscious is not only a domain in which processes that are no longer conscious, or have never been conscious, remain active. It can also give rise to new connections, images and possibilities that have so far been inaccessible to conscious thought. Jung described the psyche as a system that seeks to compensate for one-sidedness. Feelings, fantasies, dreams or symptoms may therefore draw attention to aspects of experience that have received too little consideration in a person's understanding of themselves so far.

This does not mean that unconscious processes automatically point in a right or healing direction. They may equally be shaped by anxiety, defence, early emotional wounds and painful repetitions. Their meaning therefore needs to be carefully understood and related to the realities of the person's conscious life.

Symbols, images and dreams

Analytical psychology attaches particular importance to the world of inner images. An image in a dream, a fantasy or the imagination can be understood as a symbol. Such a symbol has no fixed translation. It may express something that cannot yet be fully understood or clearly put into words. Its meaning emerges first from a person's own associations, feelings, memories and present life circumstances. From there, connections may also emerge with images passed down through tradition and recurring human experiences.

Dreams and inner images can portray earlier experiences and present conflicts. At the same time, they may complement or contradict a conscious attitude. They are neither decoded using a fixed dictionary nor understood as direct instructions for action. Rather, they offer access to aspects of one's own experience that have so far received little attention.

The past and possible development

A retrospective view asks how a difficulty arose. It explores earlier experiences, losses, emotional wounds, conflicts and patterns of relating, seeking to understand how they continue to affect present experience.

Jung complemented this perspective by asking what a process of psychological development might currently be pointing towards: Which aspect of oneself has so far had too little room? What change becomes necessary because one's existing way of living, protecting oneself or relating to others is no longer sufficient? This means neither that every illness follows a predetermined life plan nor that suffering is necessary for personal development. In my work, I therefore combine the question of how something arose and what it protects against with the question of what change it might be signalling.

Individuation

In analytical psychology, individuation refers to a lifelong process of psychological development. It rests on the assumption that the psyche does not merely respond to past experiences, but has an inherent tendency towards development, differentiation and inner order. This developmental principle seeks to compensate for one-sidedness and repeatedly takes the conscious personality beyond its existing understanding of itself.

This movement may make itself felt in dreams, inner images, feelings, conflicts or life changes. Individuation means neither defending against such experiences prematurely nor following them uncritically, but understanding their meaning and developing new ways of responding to life that feel more fitting for oneself.

Individuation does not, however, take place solely within the individual. It is also a relational process: encounters with others bring one's own expectations, attachments and previously little-known possibilities to life.

Psychoanalytic and Jungian perspectives stand alongside one another in my work. Which perspective comes to the fore depends on the individual and the course of treatment.