ABSTRACT
In my view, one important function of the group is the education and acculturation of its members, in order to achieve a level of psychological sophistication where they can identify the psychodynamics of their fellow members and themselves. My own orientation is eclectic and psychodynamic. Like most of us, when I began training, I. received a psychoanalytic background, which has been modified by my experiences with interpersonal theory, humanistic and existential psychology (Sullivan 1968; Jones, 1953-1957; Maslow, 1968). One major goal of my work is making unconscious ambivalence conscious, so that patients are free to make conscious choices. This process makes use of interpretation. I believe, whenever possible, that there are significant advantages to making these interpretations through stories serving as parables (Crawford, 2004). One advantage of this approach is that the interpretation is not experienced as an ex cathedra authoritative pronouncement, but as an account of a discovery made by an “equal,” from which the patient can draw the interpretation himself or herself.
