ABSTRACT
As human enterprises, dynamic psychotherapy and psychoanalysis are intensely paradoxical at their base. On the one hand, they are grounded in theoretical formulations regarding development, mental functioning, psychopathology and technique. On the other hand, they involve a deep and sustained emotional relationship between two individuals. Although Freud’s early topographic model and later structural model both implied separation barriers within the mind itself, the term ‘boundaries’ was not used by him. It appeared, with a prefix, as ‘ego boundaries’ for the first time in a paper by Tausk. The boundaries of the self as a distinct organism have been described from various perspectives. Psychoanalysts studying developmental processes invariably posit a view of boundaries as evolving from a ‘dual unity’ or ‘symbiosis’ or ‘merger experiences’ between two persons—i.e. mother and child. The term ‘optimal distance’ was introduced into psychoanalytic literature by Bouvet.
