ABSTRACT
Just as my training had emphasised the primacy of interpretation, another of its basic tenets was that the proper attitude for the practice of psychotherapy was what Freud termed ‘benevolent neutrality’. This was the position I worked hard to sustain in my dealings with patients, but when I reflected more closely on how I actually functioned from session to session it was evident that I deviated from it on numerous occasions. I had to concede that my attitude varied from patient to patient; even within the same session it could shift from the empathic to the confrontational and back again. Just as disturbing was the recognition that with some patients I was often inclined to be challenging while with others it was difficult not to be empathic.
