ABSTRACT
Terms like being-together, being-with, meeting, presence, have over the decades come to mean a great deal to some, while being flimsy, inadequate, and mystifying jargon for others. The potential for a shared experience, or those fleeting moments of real connection, when recognition and learning for teacher and learners hover almost palpably in the air are the embodiment of being-together. The language of traditional psychoanalysis does not take kindly to discussion of "being-together". The twin classical concepts of transference and countertransference can encourage a false dichotomy between the "transference relationship" and the "real relationship" between therapist and patient. Taking the leading role in reflecting on the modes of being-together, the therapist attends to the unique, complex symphony of the interplay between the desires, fantasies, and anxieties of both herself and the client, and the therapeutic context or frame. The being-together of teacher and learner demands a relinquishing of any claim to "knowing" on the part of the teacher.
