TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

CLIENT: [I just want to] (ph)... why was the clock in the trunk?

THERAPIST: Sometimes it ticks loudly, and so I use my phone as a clock.

CLIENT: And then you put it in the trunk and it stops ticking?

THERAPIST: (inaudible at 0:0025)

CLIENT: Yes, well, next metaphor.

THERAPIST: (Chuckling)

CLIENT: Okay. So... (Pause)

THERAPIST: Just let me make sure I've got our schedule. So we're on...

CLIENT: We're on for next Wednesday...

THERAPIST: For Wednesday...

CLIENT: And then we're gone for July.

THERAPIST: And then you're gone for July, returning the first week in August?

CLIENT: Yes. Returning on the 30th, so...

THERAPIST: Okay. [0:00:54] And there's a chance... I'll (ph) be out a week at some point, and it may be that first week in August. I'm still figuring stuff out. So (pause) I will just e-mail you if that's the case.

CLIENT: Just let me know what your schedule is the first week in August. Otherwise we'll plan (inaudible at 0:01:19) subsequent to...

THERAPIST: Yeah, if you don't hear, obviously I'm in. But I'll let you know if I'm not, and if I'm out it'll be a week. (Pause)

CLIENT: So the thought I had as we were disengaging on Wednesday... [0:02:00] (Pause) I mean, I guess I wasn't being pointed in bringing up this... what's to me curious, maybe not all that surprising, but it seems very consistent, this effect of... this kind of creative effect of separation. And I'm struggling for a way to characterize it. I was talking about how... I can't remember exactly the context. [0:02:47] We'd come to a point in the conversation where it was definitely in the flow of our discussion, something about... I don't know, differentiating [its meaning] (ph) was just this sort of challenge of evaluating interactions that could... whose interpretation could be neurotic, could be reality-based, could be some combination of the two. Yes, I think that's where we were. (Exhaling) I've lost it again. Exasperating. At any rate the thought that I had, the thought that came to mind for whatever reason was that there's this kind of recurring pattern where I'll just get frustrated with somebody or some interaction, feel just as if I'm not getting what I ought to out of it. [0:04:00] And I'll say, okay, enough. Now I'm pulling the plug. And somehow that act of pulling the plug has some creative energy (crosstalk)...

THERAPIST: Right, I think you were talking about it in terms of your former therapist, and you'd...

CLIENT: Right, so, I mean, you know. There was this interaction, and I think that one of the sort of... as we've kind of focused, I think, fairly diligently on work process, with Penelope I certainly talked a lot more about relationships and struggled over them and felt very kind of frustrated over the inability to... over my inability to kind of surmount this, I think partly because it was both the work process issue and the relationship issue kind of fitting simultaneously, which made it hard to kind of disaggregate. [0:05:13] At any rate, at a certain point I just said, fuck it. I'm done. And exactly simultaneous to that disengagement, I met Jennie (sp?), and the interactions that had been difficult somehow were easier. At least I was able to really negotiate them, (inaudible at 0:05:37), [sensitivity as well, ineffectively] (ph).

THERAPIST: Right, I remember you saying Jennie (crosstalk).

CLIENT: And she... yeah, she commented on... so on the one hand the disengagement or separation is... or this tendency to do so has been debilitating and damaging and has really undermined me quite a bit. [0:06:03] On the other hand, I guess I have some sense that there's actually something constructive in it. It's not just like a destructive impulse. It also has the potential to be a constructive impulse. And at any given moment it's difficult to know kind of where you pull the plug, where you kind of make a fairly rational evaluation and say, well, this isn't doing it for me. I need something else. I need to move on. And when that... the impulse to do that or the agenda of doing that is simply kind of a neurotic response to discomfort that is in its essence or origin neurotic and should be... needs to be suffered through. [0:07:03] I think that's kind of where I was going with it. And it applies to our interaction as much as to any other interaction.

I think I'm coming to the conclusion that maybe I would have liked to have come to two years ago, but that I really do need to move on. This isn't doing it for me in any sense, this niche that I've developed that's kind of sustained me at a low level for the last few years. It might have sustained me quite a bit better had this impulse not intervened so many times with this particular network. I'm not sure. In other words some of the difficulty of actually sustaining myself in this way is probably the product of people just being very wary about handing me real consequential responsibility institutionally as a result of these past episodes. [0:08:10] I don't know.

But, I mean, I guess I'm kind of... I guess as I left I was both in the abstract and in particular relation to this relationship as well as to this other relationship with the extended network that I'm working with at present, the kind of dialectic between, well, leaving's kind of a neurotic impulse versus leaving is both a rational impulse and actually has the seed of some creative energy. The seed of creative energy being the implication of the anecdote about Penelope and a rational impulse being just kind of the product of many of the considerations at work that I've been talking to you about, as well as potentially some conclusion that whatever we're doing together is not... it really hasn't pushed me as far as I would like to be pushed, in kind of regularizing and rationalizing my work life. [0:09:21] Anyway. (Pause)

THERAPIST: Well, it seems to me that... (Pause) I don't know about... I don't know enough about your interactions or what happens in the treatment to know about the kind of rational benefit of leaving Penelope. [0:10:04] But it seems to me... the more obvious part to me is the neurotic benefit in that... (Pause) [In a sense] (ph) there's no reason why you shouldn't have been able to be as perfect with Jennie as you were at the beginning and seeing Penelope at the same time? Do you know what I mean? That just... I mean, unless she was telling you what to say, and it was the wrong thing, and you left. But I'm sure that's not what was...

CLIENT: Well, I hadn't really... I mean, by the time I was basically saying... calling it quits, I hadn't really met Jennie. In other words, I think our last meeting was probably the, say, 20th or something, and then my first real date with Jennie was after... that first chaperoned date was on the 30th or something. [0:11:02] So it wasn't quite like that. I mean, I guess... look. (Exhaling)

THERAPIST: I mean, if there was nothing magically better about... which is kind of the story about... you related to sort of begin or relate it to the after leaving Penelope, that's neurotic. That's not rational. That isn't rational to leave Penelope...

CLIENT: Here's the... yeah.

THERAPIST: I mean, it may have been rational to leave Penelope. I don't know about that. But the idea that you can sort of magically do something better having left her is a... that's a neurotic thing.

CLIENT: That's not... I mean, I think that would be a neurotic framing. I mean, in other words, that framing implies neurosis. Another framing, which I think is probably closer to the way that I think about it...

THERAPIST: Yes. Okay.

CLIENT: I'll fight it out with you. I mean I'm not...

THERAPIST: (Crosstalk) (Chuckling)

CLIENT: (Laughing) I don't want to assume that I'm right here.

THERAPIST: Sure.

CLIENT: Look, I've had... you're the third trick basically in the series of shrinks. [0:11:56] And the first shrink was the shrink where I kind of hashed it out with my father. He was about my dad's age. He was referred to me by the father of a close friend, who has played a kind of paternal role in my life. The second shrink was kind of the relationship shrink.

THERAPIST: So how long were you with the first shrink?

CLIENT: Two years-ish? I was with Penelope for another...

THERAPIST: Oh yeah, much shorter.

CLIENT: Well, not that much shorter. A year and a half.

THERAPIST: Oh, okay. You said twenty visits?

CLIENT: No, I didn't say 20 visits. It was not 20 visits, it was considerably more than 20 visits.

THERAPIST: Okay, I must have misheard when you just said you'd seen her (crosstalk).

CLIENT: I started seeing Penelope in April of two thousand and...

THERAPIST: No, (crosstalk).

CLIENT: No, I'm just trying to sort it out. Yeah, so it was almost exactly a year and a half, maybe a little more.

THERAPIST: Okay. [0:12:56]

CLIENT: And I saw her even when I had to... I was... I would bicycle for four months over the summer of 2010, or... yeah, 2010. And so I had to bicycle 25 miles each way in order to see her.

THERAPIST: Wow.

CLIENT: So she was kind of the relationship shrink. So at the end of these two years I said to Ryan (sp?), right, I'm going back to Providence to just start this new chapter, and goodbye. And are you going to give me a little benediction (chuckling)? And he said good luck, etc. I'm still paying him off because I wasn't insured during that period. And, I mean, I think just... I felt a sense of completion after each kind of process. [0:14:03] I felt like each of them... each of you had a very distinct purpose. I felt very... with varying degrees of consciousness. I think it's easier at this point in the process to... having kind of, whatever, for better or worse in varying measures depending on the day, kind of just sort of hashed through this very complex disengagement with my father, then hashed through this kind of complex disengagement with this complexity or difficulty around forming just romantic relationships. Now, with those in the rearview mirror, it's easier for me to say, okay, well, the specific agenda for our discussions is this last big piece. [0:14:57]

But by that time is was very clear to me that there were these three big pieces. And I would say to Ryan, all right, well, I see these three big pieces, one of them about just how I think about household and one of them how I think about relationships and one of them how I think about work. So in that sense I don't think it's... maybe it would be better if one was just to say, okay, well, I think I've gone about as far as I can, and I'm ready to kind of just go fly solo now. But that's not always the way that it works. Sometimes it's a more psychodynamically complex process, and you really just do need to say, I'm done. I've... with a kind of immediate feeling of frustration or irritation or anger, what have you. It's hard to disengage. It's hard... for me in particular, I think, it's hard to leave. [0:15:58] And so it doesn't seem to me... maybe that difficulty leaving is neurotic, and so the (pause) process which ought to have at some level just been more matter of fact or congenial was made... was troubled by that neurosis.

But I don't think that the impulse to leave or the transition from this therapeutic relationship to a more naturalistic or natural one is completely absurd. I mean, at that moment, I probably would not have thought of Penelope as the relationship therapist (chuckling). And I think that is a little bit clearer to me maybe in retrospect. But it doesn't feel unreasonable to me that in ending this therapy I've kind of made it... I made it possible to be more fully in an actual (ph) relationship. [0:17:08] Isn't that how it's supposed to work at some level? There's transference, and then you reverse the transference.

THERAPIST: Reverse the trans (ph)?

CLIENT: Or... excuse me. I mean, there's transference, and then as a result of that transference you do the thing itself, right?

THERAPIST: Let's see. You sort of slay the dragons in the transference, and then you go out and don't have to slay them anymore.

CLIENT: Okay, well...

THERAPIST: Does that...?

CLIENT: That's... I guess that's what I meant.

THERAPIST: That's pretty much what you meant? Yeah. But...

CLIENT: You can tell me how I'm neurotic. That's okay.

THERAPIST: (Laughing)

CLIENT: (Chuckling) I guess that's your job, right?

THERAPIST: Well, maybe one of them. (Pause) [0:18:00] The ending of therapy isn't usually like that...

CLIENT: Hmm.

THERAPIST: And particularly because each of these issues has to do with your struggles around attachment. It seems to me sort of conspicuous that it feels like (pause) you'd sort of expect it to work that way, that you'd have to get to a... kind of a... there'd have to be something a little bit... violent (ph) is sort of too strong a word, but something like that. Some kind of... I mean, I think of adolescence, where there has to be a kind of a... a lot of times you see a little bit of emotional violence as kids and parents are kind of separating. [0:19:03] I don't mean that you're adolescent, but I'm saying there's that same kind of feel. Like, well, there's got to be...

CLIENT: Well, let me be more specific.

THERAPIST: Sure.

CLIENT: Maybe the detail is relevant here. So basically what happened was, I finished my dissertation. I came to Penelope to help me finish my dissertation nominally. And I have no idea how much she helped me finish my dissertation. I saw her, and it was nice, and we had good rapport. And yet I had absolutely no preparation for what came afterwards. I kind of had this vague agreement with some people that they would take me on afterwards. I couldn't focus at all on sort of nurturing those connections and kind of reality-testing them. [0:19:55] I didn't have any resumes out whatsoever. So... and moreover the day that I had to turn in my dissertation my lease was up. So I... basically, while... literally while printing the final draft and bringing it to the Brown registrar, I had to move overnight. And since I was finishing the final draft I didn't have any time to move. It was just a totally crazy move. I basically dumped a whole bunch of stuff in a truck and brought it over and then dumped it in the yard and kind of brought it down to the basement piecemeal. I mean, it was just... it was kind of... it was pretty symptomatic, [I would say] (ph).

Anyway, so I kind of worked something out before I completely ran out of money and had a job that was not really... one of these classic jobs that wasn't really a job, where I kind of charmed somebody, and he said, all right, well, we'll work it out for three months and see if it works. [0:21:05] And it didn't really work. It wasn't really feasible. Meanwhile, the place where I was living was a house share with somebody who was basically kind of depressed and hard to live with and female. So I was just in a very bad situation, where the professional situation was completely fucked, and the relationship situation was completely fucked, and the (pause) housing... the kind of household situation was completely fucked. And Penelope basically said, okay, well, when you can pay me, then pay me. [0:21:59] And I said, listen, I have no idea when I'll be able to do this. I'm trying to sort it out to some degree. I suppose it depends on the success of our therapy.

And so, I mean, periodically I squeezed everything that I possibly could out of the resources that I had at my disposal. Let's put it that way. And I lived on very little. And I continued seeing her once a week, and I accumulated a bill that was not... I mean, it was about $6,000, I think, outstanding. And by the following fall I succeeded in getting one class at Brown of my own devising, which was nice. [0:22:58] But it was way undersubscribed and ultimately was cancelled. So they continued to pay me, but I was very upset. And, at any rate, I was very upset. And my job application process was very troubled, really almost violently troubled. And I didn't see immediate job prospects for myself. And so I was getting a little bit of money from the part-time lectureship at Brown. It was not a huge amount, and I felt like I had to bank some of it.

And then all of a sudden basically Penelope said, I need you to pay the money back. And I said, I've got no resources. [0:23:55] And she said, well, I'll send you a payment plan. And basically she says all of this while I'm trying to interview for jobs. And I felt like it was very abrupt, and it felt also like she was being very instrumental. Like, it was... my sense was that she tended to be instrumental about these things and that she was being instrumental about this as a kind of mixture of maybe her own personal sort of financial exigency but also kind of in keeping with what I felt was a kind of manipulative approach to psychodynamic psychotherapy. And I really didn't like it, and it really made me angry.

THERAPIST: Manipulative in what way?

CLIENT: Well, [she felt like] (ph)... the therapeutic object... I was sort of acutely depressed and upset and anxious and that she needed to jolt me and that she was jolting me. [0:25:02] The instrument that she had chosen to jolt me, which probably was mixed with... this was assessment at the time, I have no idea how reality-based it was. But my perception was that there was a kind of confluence of her therapeutic strategy and her kind of financial situation. And I didn't like that impression. It really upset me...

THERAPIST: Sure.

CLIENT: In addition to which, I really liked her. And I felt kind of betrayed and upset by that decision, or at least my perception of that decision. So I got really angry. I really felt genuinely angry, and I said, okay, fine. And I took out a loan from Brown Employees... Brown University Employees Credit Union, a short-term loan. And I just paid her off. I paid my entire outstanding bill, and I said, I'm done. [0:25:57] Maybe that was neurotic. But I don't know. At any rate I do think that the separation had creative energy embedded in it that made it easier to engage in this relationship and to kind of nurture this relationship.

And I think that there was some... embedded in my frustration or anger or irritation with Penelope was also some upset because she was the kind of person that I find attractive. I mean, one of the interesting tensions in our relationship was that we really liked each other. (Chuckling) And this is, I think, a good... it's a good foundation for rapport, but when one of the issues is my ability to form dyadic (sp?) relationships I think there's a complexity there that (pause) came out when I just got angry about this thing and just felt like I had enough, which is to say that I... at some level in my kind of post-game analysis, I thought that... well, maybe there was some element of saying, well, this is not an appropriate relationship, even if it's with a person that I have rapport with. [0:27:25] So maybe I'll find one. Or now that this is kind of broken up, maybe now is the time to... now's the time to find an actual, real, genuine relationship.

THERAPIST: The (ph) part of it where kind of unconsciously or half-consciously (ph) you had a fantasy of being in a relationship with her, which you knew full well you were not.

CLIENT: Yeah, no. I mean, I wasn't delusive, but yeah.

THERAPIST: No, you know, that's the kind of (crosstalk)...

CLIENT: I mean, it was serving... it came... part of the angst or whatever, neurosis-maybe that's it-also was out of an understanding that this wasn't really serving the needs that I wanted, and yet it was kind of substituting for it. [0:28:06] And I really needed to find somebody who was an actual candidate.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: And I think that that... it's not calculation, that's not the right word. But that...

THERAPIST: Economy (ph)?

CLIENT: Calculus, right? Economy. That partly unconscious thought process underlies a lot of these separations. It's like, well, this kind of extended network of physicians and public health institutions, isn't really an appropriate...

THERAPIST: (inaudible at 0:28:43)

CLIENT: Venue for me to discover right livelihood or my work in the world. It substituted for it for a little while, but now it's time to separate. [0:28:58] Or Marshall isn't... I'm just... I'm speaking hypothetically here, isn't the... the relationship with Marshall isn't the one where I can really hash out the question of how to work properly. It's substituted for a while. We hashed some things out together, but now it's time to go. And the separation, as you say, can have a variety of different characteristics. It doesn't always have to be just sort of violent and abrupt. I think optimally it wouldn't be. But sometimes it is, and sometimes there are other reasons for the separation, the declaration of independence, of a number of different clauses. [0:29:54] And the proximal ones are not... the proximal causes are not always the ones that ultimately motivate the separation. But regardless I think that it can... there can be some energy in coming to that realization and saying, okay, well, let me find another relationship that can (crosstalk).

THERAPIST: Right, and I think... (inaudible at 0:30:20) is because, in each of these situations, there's some ambiguity about who's abandoning whom, whether with Brown, at this job, or with Penelope. And (pause) I think you... I think some of the energy you are referring to in a way comes from leaving the other party holding the bag somewhat. [0:31:01]

CLIENT: Really?

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: I didn't leave Penelope holding the bag. I totally paid her off.

THERAPIST: Yeah, but...

CLIENT: I didn't leave Ryan holding the bag. We have this...

THERAPIST: That one sounds different.

CLIENT: Well, I mean, it wasn't different in the sense that I wasn't done. Returning to Providence, to this very high pressure environment...

THERAPIST: But you did leave each of them holding the bag in that you didn't leave her, owing her money, although you did leave him owing him money. But...

CLIENT: That was by mutual agreement. It wasn't... I mean, I owed him $15,000. I... we had a long conversation about it. I'm still paying him off.

THERAPIST: I under... I'm not saying anybody did anything wrong. I'm just saying...

CLIENT: It's not done, the relationship is not done (ph).

THERAPIST: It's not done, and that you were the one... I think with Penelope the leaving her holding the bag part was not the money. [0:31:57] But it was the relationship. You kind of said, okay, here's your money. I mean, there's a complex interaction between the two of you around the money, right? First, she says, oh, whatever, whenever you can pay me. And then you can't for a while, and then, at least as I'm hearing it, sort of out of the blue she says, look, the money's an issue. You've got to pay me back. And it sounds to me clearly... I'm in a way speaking very tentatively here because I don't know a lot of details of what happened, and I'm sure it was examined closely...

CLIENT: Sure.

THERAPIST: But then you feel, as you say, betrayed by how she was about needing the money. And it seemed you at least felt in some moments as though it was unclear whose interests were being served there in the way she handled it.

CLIENT: Yes. [0:32:56]

THERAPIST: And I imagine that was terribly hurtful. She meant a lot to you. And so you're (inaudible at 0:33:04). You take the money, but I'm taking the relationship.

CLIENT: Okay.

THERAPIST: I'm done with you. I mean, that... you were sort of the one who actively got up and left.

CLIENT: Yes.

THERAPIST: I mean, in a way, her point was, you need to pay me so we can continue.

CLIENT: Yes. That was her point.

THERAPIST: And you said, I'm paying you, but I'm leaving.

CLIENT: Yes, that was my point.

THERAPIST: (Chuckling) Yeah. And so in that sense it seems to me like you were the one actively getting up and walking away, although it was preceded by something again... and this is where the ambiguity comes in, where she says, you need to pay me, or this isn't going to... you're going to stop. So it gets a little unclear about who's leaving who and why, but then, when you're the one who, of your own volition, says, okay, I'm leaving, I think the other person becomes the abandonee or the one abandoned. [0:33:57] And I think that's a little galvanizing for you, rather than being the...

CLIENT: Okay. Which is neurotic. It's the being galvanized by it that's neurotic, you're saying.

THERAPIST: Yeah, I think so. Yes, whereas when you're feeling like the one being left, I think you feel much more defeated and actively disempowered.

CLIENT: I feel disempowered. Okay.

THERAPIST: I mean, this is certainly what we say here.

CLIENT: Okay, yes. I think that's right. I endorse that analysis.

THERAPIST: And it sounds like what happened with her, in that you were feeling... and understandably so. This was not neurotic. You were feeling kind of betrayed and upset. (Pause) But the way... right, you kind of flipped it around. It was like the feel of superiority (ph), yeah.

CLIENT: I did. I remember... and I remember as I think about it... I remember feeling like I was flipping it around.

THERAPIST: Yeah. So that... this is more of a stretch perhaps, but you kind of did something like that with Brown, too. [0:34:56] You had been... who's abandoning who when you finish your dissertation? It's complicated. In a way you're taking off. You're graduating, you're finishing, you're done. But on the other hand it's a home in a way, for a while, and a relationship. And [there's sort of a question] (ph) about are they or aren't they providing for your future, which is part of why you're there in the first place. I imagine that was quite stressful and may have related to why you didn't make any plans around leaving until the eleventh hour. And... I'm rolling here. (Chuckling) You'll be away for a month, starting next week. And we're talking about leaving, that abandonment (crosstalk)...

CLIENT: Oh, I know, yeah, no. I was very conscious of that as well.

THERAPIST: Yeah, okay. And I... the other thing that's sort of related to that and what you're talking about is, I'm not sure how... literally for this, because this is unclear to me. [0:36:00] But, at least manifestly in what you say, you're never that far from leaving here. You so often have told me that this isn't helping, and it isn't solving the problem you're trying to solve. Then at least it gives me the feeling... and this is where I'm imputing something and putting words in your mouth. There's always the feeling of, like, I'm... maybe I'm two steps from being out the door, maybe I'm one step from being out the door. But I'm thinking about the door (chuckling). And it's usually because you're feeling hurt and frustrated with me, that I'm not... I haven't helped you more.

I mean, in other words, there're a lot of ways somebody can say that. Somebody can say, well, I'm just disappointed, and this is just clearly not good enough. I'm out of here. But the feeling is more like, hey, I've done my fucking part here. I've showed up, I paid, I [blah blah blah] (sp?). And where the hell are you? You're not there for me in the way that I want you to be. [0:36:52] So in other words there's something sort of particular to the character of how you describe this and how (inaudible at 0:36:59) talked about explicitly and (inaudible at 0:37:01) about, that involves you feeling a bit gypped really. And...

CLIENT: And the... let me see if I can finish your thought.

THERAPIST: Yeah, go ahead.

CLIENT: Feeling a bit gypped and taking steps to ensure that the relational implications of feeling gypped don't imply my disempowerment. In other words, taking active steps in order to orient myself in the relationship so that that feeling of being gypped does not lead me to feel completely de-agentified (sp?), which sounds like horrible jargon but probably exists (chuckling).

THERAPIST: I know what you mean (chuckling). Yeah.

CLIENT: That's where you were going.

THERAPIST: Yeah. Kind of like...

CLIENT: True. True. [0:37:57]

THERAPIST: Microcosmic echoes of what happens.

CLIENT: I get it. I think that is right. I think that it is... I think that is a useful insight. I don't know. Is that a very unusual way of orienting oneself to the universe? I mean, I can see why you say that it's neurotic in the sense that...

THERAPIST: I think...

CLIENT: It implies a kind of tenuousness to almost all relationships, but...

THERAPIST: Yes. I think you're... the extent to which you are caught up in it is unusual.

CLIENT: Kind of vigilant about it. Is that what you mean? Or just that I'm so acutely aware of it?

THERAPIST: It's... you know what it is? It's the Scheherazade story?

CLIENT: Scheherazade (inaudible at 0:38:44) (laughing). But which one?

THERAPIST: Right (chuckling). The one where... well, that's why she tells the stories is because he says, well, I'll probably kill you tomorrow. And so she has to come up with a story every night. [0:38:59] I mean, I'm probably not getting that quite right, but (crosstalk)...

CLIENT: No, you are getting it right.

THERAPIST: And that... there is sometimes that theme to therapy. But there is an intensity to it and a (pause) vigilant attention to that dimension of things that is unusual and that makes that dynamic become very... dealing with that dynamic becomes a lot of the work.

CLIENT: Well, I mean... yeah, yeah.

THERAPIST: And I feel it's that way for a particular reason, which is... (Pause) That's often the problem... I mean, the parallel here is to what happens at work when you get stuck in one of these periods of unproductiveness, is you get so focused on this precise dynamic that you can't sort of suspend it for a minute and get something done. [0:40:16] And that's often the feel here. And in a way it's okay here because whatever comes up is the work we can do. But there is that quality of (pause) the sort of relationship or the endeavor as a whole being sort of so often questioned, that the questioning becomes the content of the endeavor itself. [0:41:00] And that's unusual. And that's what happens at work.

CLIENT: When I'm not productive at work, is it the fault of the work, or is it the fault of me? When I'm not productive at work, is it because I'm veiling (ph) in this hyper-vigilant way that you're talking about, or is it because it's not the work that I want to do or the work that serves me well or work that will lead to my professional advancement or work that will support me and my wife and my child and so on and so forth (crosstalk)?

THERAPIST: It's precisely those external considerations about the work and the situation of the work. I mean, you could be saying, whatever the bigger picture is about, I better get this thing written for tomorrow. And that's the thing you can't do.

CLIENT: That's the thing I can't do.

THERAPIST: And... I know.

CLIENT: I really... and I genuinely can't do it, it's such a...

THERAPIST: I see it... that's what I'm saying. I see that very same thing in here (inaudible at 0:41:55) all the time.

CLIENT: I really can't. [0:41:58] I mean, it's like, if I'm feeling either a grievance or that somebody else has a grievance, and separating the two of them is many times impossible for me, I really cannot do it. I genuinely... I can't formulate the problem (ph).

THERAPIST: I have a very immediate feel of that because of the same thing here. I mean, you're so busy questioning, as today, as last week...

CLIENT: What do you mean today? I think I've been very...

THERAPIST: Well, you're telling me, look (laughing)...

CLIENT: (Laughing)

THERAPIST: You're also saying, look! I may... I have this thought that this has really gotten to the point...

CLIENT: I've been nice (laughing).

THERAPIST: I'm not saying I've been nice. (Crosstalk)

CLIENT: (inaudible at 0:42:40)

THERAPIST: One of the things I here you saying is that, look, I also have this thought that maybe the... that Marshall is not the person who can really help me do the work, and so maybe (ph) it's really time to...

CLIENT: Well, so... I don't know. I think I put that in the Scheherazade story though. I mean, the... I wasn't really saying... I was saying...

THERAPIST: [So that was just sort of] (ph) illustrative (crosstalk). [0:43:02]

CLIENT: I just wanted to finish the parallel. I wasn't...

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: I mean, I... the only really active thought that I had, the conscious thought I had was as I was leaving and actually as I was coming on Wednesday, which was that, well, maybe in order to finish the task, I need to leave.

THERAPIST: Yeah.

CLIENT: It wasn't so much, this is unproductive, and I've reached an impasse, and...

THERAPIST: Yeah, right. Okay, fair enough.

CLIENT: In the way that you're saying, it was like, well, maybe that's the way [this works] (ph).

THERAPIST: Well, the whole point is you think about leaving here pretty much at least once a week.

CLIENT: (Laughing)

THERAPIST: And that's unusual (laughing).

CLIENT: Okay. I got you. I got you.

THERAPIST: We should stop for...

CLIENT: I guess we should...

THERAPIST: Yeah, no, I take the point...

CLIENT: You take the distinction.

THERAPIST: It's from a different... I mean, there's different angles.

CLIENT: It really is from a different angle.

THERAPIST: There's one angle for Penelope, and this is a different angle.

CLIENT: That was three weeks ago (laughing).

THERAPIST: (Laughing)

CLIENT: Okay.

THERAPIST: All right. Okay, have a good week.

CLIENT: You, too. Bye.

END TRANSCRIPT