After advising each other on proper turkey-brining techniques for Thanksgiving, Deb and Maury begin at the beginning, with the very first line of Davanloo's Unlocking the Unconscious, "One of the main aims of all forms of dynamic psychotherapy is to enable the patient to experience his true feelings, but this can only be accomplished by overcoming resistance." (UU, p. 1).

The hosts consider how Davanloo is positioning himself epistemologically with this statement, what is meant by "true feelings," and what that term implies clinically.

They go on to carefully consider several key claims that Davanloo makes throughout the first page of the book, including, "What Freud could not possibly have forseen were the complications to which this increasingly passive technique would lead." (UU, p. 2). They consult Freud's paper, Analysis Terminable and Interminable (1937), in order to investigate this claim more fully. Deb suggests that not only did Freud forsee these "complications," but he also seemed to predict Davanloo's technique to some extent.

Maury questions the passive/active dichotomy that Davanloo sets up here, and suggests that he may be over-simplifying the technique of free association to set up a straw man argument. He also points out that the "complications" Davanloo lists all occur with ISTDP, as well as psychoanalysis.

The episode ends with Deb commenting on a parallel process. She feels aligned with Davanloo in wanting to go faster in their analysis. Maury reminds her that given how important Freudian theory is to Davanloo's framing of ISTDP, it makes sense that they might need a few episodes on how he engages with Freudian theory.

References:

Davanloo, H. (1990). Unlocking the unconscious: Selected papers of Habib Davanloo. John Wiley & Sons.

Freud, S. (1937). Analysis terminable and interminable. (Standard Edition, vol. 23, pp. 216-253). London: Hogarth.