Transference, Countertransference,

Co-transference in the Sandplay

Therapy

Carlo Paolo Ruffino

cpruffino@yahoo.it
 Transference-Countertransference Relationship
from Jacoby M., The Analytic Encounter, Inner City Books, Toronto, 1984
 Arhetypal roots of trasference.
• In Jung’s view, behind every complex, there is an archetypal
core. We might say that transference always has its archetypal
roots in the instinctual needs and their related fantasies.
These roots can be found in the primary relationship between
mather and child, which is at the same time a personal
phenomenon and an archetypal drive expressed in the image
of the mother-goddess, the Great Mother with her positive
but also negative sides. This basic archetypal situation takes
different forms in each person according to specific personal
temperaments and personal experiences. Therefore both
sides of the archetype can be projected, together with
personal material, onto the therapist, to a large extent
independently of whether the therapist is a man or a woman.
 Transference and Projection

• Transference is only another word for « projection ».

• Jung c.G., CW, 16, par. 524
• The material projected in the transference-countertransference
relationship may pertain to the personal unconcious (shadow,
complexes) and to the collective unconscious (archetypes, as the
Saviour archetype or even the Self).
• Mario Jacoby expresses clearly this interesting idea: « The projected
contents are not only repetitions uncovering repressed material.
New contents of the creative psyche may come up and are
experienced first in projection. Thus the inner process of self-
realization, the process Jung called individuation, is very often at
work behind the specific coloring, contents and forms that a
tranference shows »
• Jacoby M., The Analytic Encounter, Inner City Books, Toronto, 1984
 Something More about Transference
and Projection
• Many unconscious contents are invariably projected at first onto concrete
persons and situations and eventually they can be recognized as
subjective materials and withdrawn. In the psychotherapeutical
relationship these contents may be transferred to the therapist. The
relation to the parents and to brothers and sisters usually play a
particularly important role, so that the therapist is put in the place of the
father, the mother etc., in part independently of the sex of the therapist.
Jung says that « this projection persists with all its original intensity, thus
creating a bond that corresponds in every respect to the infantile
relationship, with a tendency to recapitulate all the experience of
childhood on the doctor…The bond is often of such intensity that we could
almost speak of « combination ». When two chemical substances
combines, both are altered. This is precisely what happens in
transference…It is inevitable that the doctor should be influenced to a
certain extent and even his nervous health should suffer »
• Jung C.G., CW, 16, par 357-358.
Countertransference
 Illusory countertransference (1)
• The patient may constellate in the therapist some complexes that may deeply
influence the therapist’s countertransference. The therapist may even project
them onto client. M. Jacoby gives some exemples of this situation. «The
analysand can also be experienced unconsciously as a parental figure (by the
analyst). If the analyst is open enough to watch his feeling-reactions before the
patient comes or in the course of the session, he may for instance find himself
anxious not to disappoint the expectations of the patient. Or he may with a certain
patient feel rather stupid and unable to come up with a meaningful insight at
all…the therapist is unable to come up with a meaningful interpretation, and then
begins to feel inadequate…Does the analyst project onto the patient an overcritical
parental figure (his own parental complex) for whom nothing was ever good
enough? ».
In this case it is the therapist that unconsciously projects onto the patient some
aspect of his/her own negative parental complex.
 Illusory Countertransference (2)
• But the situation can also be very different. Is that patient
really demanding or oversensitive that the fear of
disappointing his expectations is realistic? Or is this
reactions partly or entyrely based on a
counterprojection of a parental figure within the analyst
(the patient’s parental complex), for instance a love-
demanding mother who was narcissistically hurt by the
slightest move of independent self-assertion? In this case
the analyst unconsciously experiences his patients as if he
had expectation like his mother’s; he is afraid of loss of love
if he disappoints his patients ». In this case we might
speak of projective identification: the analyst,
unconsciously, behaves as the patient’s mother.
 Syntonic Countertransference
• In this form of countertransference it is no longer a matter of projection.
Here the analyst is empathically feeling someting pertaining to the patient.
• We can distinguish two forms of Syntonic Countertransference:
• Concordant Syntonic Countertransference. In this case feelings,
emotions, thoughts or intuitions come up in the therapist at the same time
as in the patient. This form of countertransference has a lot to do with the
therapist getting in touch with the patient and with experiencing what Jung
has called mystical participation.
• Complementary Syntonic Conuntertransference. Here the
psychotherapist feels an emotion pertaining to the patient, while the patient
is not yet aware of it. For instance the therapist experiences a feeling of
anger while the patient is relating some episode of his/her life. In this case
he should ask himself whether that anger is an emotional reaction, which
has been aroused by the constellation of a complex of the therapist, or an
unconscious emotional reaction of the patient. By communicating this
feeling to the patient the therapist will help him/her to recognize his/her
own anger.
 Identification with an archetype
• The patient’s unconscious and the therapist’s
unconscious communicates (Fig. 2). So there
are factors that are unconscious for both the
patient and the therapist. This is the situation
that Jung described as a state of participation
mystique. It is important for the therapist to
know that such area always exists, and in this
dark area both can identify unconconsciously
with an archetype, which they then
unconsciously act out together.
 Negative transference
• The transference phenomenon may manifest
itself in different forms: Jung mentions that even
« the negative form of transference in the guise
of resistance, dislike, or hate endows the other
person with great importance from the start,
even if this importance is negative ; and it tries to
put every conceivable obstacle in the way of a
positive tranference ».
• Jung C.G., CW, 16, Psychology of trasference, note
to Foreword.
 Questions the therapist should ask him/herself…
• About the patient
• What is the patient telling/showing to the therapist by that attitude or behaviour?
• What are the projections onto the therapist of some aspect of the patient’s family figures?
(think of the peculiar setting of the Sandplay Therapy)
• Is the patient unconsciously pushing the therapist to react in that particular way in order to
repeat an ancient scheme of behaviour connected with a complex (e.g. abandonment,
rejection, exclusion, abuse). For instance he is pushing the therapist to reject him/her, or not
to consider him/her or to treat him/her aggressively? (projection into the therapist =
projective identification).
• What kind of attachment did the patient develop in his/her childhood and does develop at
present with the therapist?
• What are the Anima/Animus aspects, the shadow parts, the chthonic/unexpressed
masculine/feminine sides or what are the complexes that the patient projects onto the
therapist?
• Is he/she seductive, or distant or critical or passively aggressive?
• What archetypal configuration is the patient projecting onto the therapist (e.g. the archetype
of the Saviour or even the Self)?
• What are the needs the patient is trying to satisfy in the psychotherapy (to be seen,
appreciated, loved or guided or scolded and dominated)?
 Questions the therapist should ask him/herself…

• About the therapist

• What does the therapist feel with the patient, right from first contact? (empathy, interest,
attraction, or boredom, aggressiveness, embarrassment, repulsion, fear) And how he/she reacts to
the patient?.
• Is the emotion that the therapist is feeling with the patient (anger, disappointment, sadness,
despair) his/her patient’s unexpressed or unperceived emotion (syntonic countertransference
according to Fordham) or the therapist’s emotional reaction towards the patient’?
• Is it connected to the constellation of some personal complex of the therapist?
• What Anima/Animus aspect, shadow part, chthonic/unexpressed masculine/feminine side or what
complexes (parental, inferiority…) are activated in the therapist in the therapeutic relation with this
particular patient?
• What are the Anima/Animus aspects, the shadow parts, the chthonic/unexpressed
masculine/feminine sides or what are the complexes that the therapist projects onto the patient?
• Is the patient unconsciously pushing the therapist to react in that particular way in order to repeat
an ancient scheme of behaviour connected with a complex (abandonment, rejection, exclusion,
abuse). For instance, he is pushing the therapist to reject him/her, or not to consider him/her or to
treat him/her aggressively? (projection into the therapist = projective identification)
• What kind of archetypal configuration is activated in the therapist’s unconscious with this particular
patient (the Saviour, Puer-Senex ….)
• What kind of personal needs does the therapist unconsciously try to satisfy with his work with this
particular patients (therapeutic success, power, curiosity, possessiveness….)?
 Margaret Lowenfeld
• In order to protect the child from any possible form
of manipulation from the therapist, M. Lowenfeld
emphasised the autonomy of the child in doing
his/her own « world » and the importance of
allowing every child to express freely and be what
he/she is. Therefore she excluded the transference of
the child’s onto the therapist, as well as the
therapist’s emotional countertransference reaction.
She let the children work with many different
therapists. In her view, the transference doesn’t
involve the therapist but the sandtray.
 Dora Kalff
• « I aim to give the child’s Self the possibility of constellating and manifesting in
therapy. Through the transference I try to protect it and to stabilize the
relationship between the Self and the ego. This is possible within the therapeutic
relationship because it corresponds to the natural tendency of the psyche when a
free and protected space is created.
• The free space occurs in the therapeutic setting when the therapist is fully able to
accept the child so that the therapist, as a person, is as much a part of everithing
going on in the room as is the child himself.
• The relationship of confidence is of great importance, for in some instance, the
first phase of psychic development, the mother-child unity, can be restored.
• It is the role of the therapist to perceive these possibilities and, like the guardian of
a precious treasure, protect them in their development. For the child the therapist
represents the protector, the space, the freedom and at the same time the
boundaries. »
• Kalff D., Sandplay. A Psychotherapeutic Approach to the Psyche.
• What about the negative feelings that can be evoked in the transference-
countertranference relationship (anger, hostility, rejection)?
 Co-transference
• Kay Brodway (1991) introduced the world co-transference to
indicate the « therapeutic feeling relationship between therapist and
patient. These inter-feelings seem to take place almost
simultaneously » and include both « positive » and « negative »
emotional reactions, which are the expression of reciprocal
projections of unconscious personal and archetypal elements. Both
projections and responses can occur simetimes at an entilely
unconscious level.
• Sometimes the client or the therapist can unconsciously grasp some
trait or quality which is really present in the other. These can be the
hooks on which to project unused or repressed parts of themselves,
or personal memories from the past or archetypal images.
• Bradway K. and McCoard B., Sandplay – Silent Workshop of the Psyche.
 In the Sandplay Therapy Room
• According to Dora Kalff, in the Sandplay Therapy room a very deep and trustful
relationship can develop between the therapist and the client. The child, and even
more so the adult, finds him/herself playing in the presence of an other person,
the therapist, who can witness the client’s creative act, observes his /her
movements in the room, the way he/she moves his/her hands touching the sand.
• The client discovers his/her blockage and fear towards the tray, his/her hesitation
in choosing the object, shows his/her pleasure in playing with the sand and his/her
satisfaction or disappointment with the result. It is a regressive situation, where
the therapist’s gaze evokes the Kohut’s image of « the gleam in the mother’s eye »,
the first mirror where the baby discovers the joy that its very existence can arouse.
This particular situation of regression and trustful intimacy has an important
impact on the transference – countertransference relationship and on the
resistance that the Sandplay can evoke in the patient who is afraid of becoming
too much close to the therapist or of beeing seen in his/her more intimate aspects
and unconsciously revealing something of which he/she is not even aware.
 The transference in the Sandplay Therapy

• What are the transference manifestations

which are more typical of the Sandplay
Therapy? According to Francesco Montecchi,
transference can manifest itself in the Sandplay
Therapy room at different levels. To simplify
his thinking, we can distinguish two different
modalities.
• Montecchi F., Giocando con la sabbia. La psicoterapia con la sabbia
con bambini e adolescenti e la Sandplay Therapy.
 Transference in the sandtray
• The trasference manifests itself unconsciuosly
by the very scene the patient creates in the
sandtray, the objects he/she chooses or their
position in the sandtray in relation to the
therapyst’s position: the sandtray becames
the container of archetypal contents which
have been constellated by the archetypal
transference.
Transference through the sandtray and
the sandplay room
The sandtray and sandplay room are the means by which
transference aspects are expressed. Here the scene
created in the sandtray is no longer the expression of the
patient’s psychic situation and inner images, but becomes a
message for the analyst. Furthermore this kind of
transference expression can be revealed in many different
ways. For instance, the position that the patient chooses in
relation to the therapist (in front or turning his/her back),
whether he/she asks for help or criticises the objects
collection which may not include what he/she exactly
needs, of drops the sand on the floor or uses some objects
in such a way as to make it difficullt to remove it
afterwards, or even doing something to show his skill and
knowledge or to gratify the analyst.
 Countertransference
• The same elements that are an expression of the
transference can evoke countertransferential
emotional reactions in the therapist. The
therapist’s mind and body are both involved in
the attentive and empathic participation in what
is taking place in the sandplay room. Of course
these reactions should not be acted out, but they
become precious instruments to understand the
patient’s inner world and his/her patterns of
behaviour and establishing relationship.
 Resistance

• The particular setting of the Sandplay Therapy, the

absence of interpretation that avoids immediate
intellectual comprehension, the closeness with the
therapist and the regressive condition inherent in
the method may inevitably evoke resistence which
manifests itself in different ways. Sometimes the
resistance is so strong to prevent the beginning or
the prosecution of the therapy with Sandplay. We
can distinguish different ways in which resistance is
expressed.
.
 Resistance in the Sandtray
• As in the case of the transference, the very
image created in the sandtray unconsciously
depicts the resistance. It is the most
« analytical » way of expressing it. Sometimes
a road is blocked by a policeman, or two sides
of the tray are connected with difficulty.
Sometimes the repetition of the same scene or
a « superficial », conventional scene can
suggest a difficulty in dealing with a new step
in the therapy .
 Resistence through the Sandtray and
the Sandplay Room
• Resistance in this case is not expressed mainly by
the image produced in the sandtray. Sometimes
there is a block towards the tray, which is often
associated with a feeling of anguish. In other
cases there is a refusal to touch the sand or even
look at the objects. Furthrmore many behavioural
patterns considered as expression of a particular
aspect of the transference can as well manifest a
resistance. Interstingly, the fact that the patient
plays just to please the therapist can be
considered a form of resistance as well as a
manifestation of transference.