ABSTRACT
The relational ideal has implications for our therapeutic goals, our patients, and for ourselves. Who do we aim to be in the consulting room? How do we view our patient—her potential and her limitations? What are the clinical goals of a relational analysis? And what might those goals occlude? This Chapter reviews and critiques the relational ideal as it coalesced in response to other psychoanalytic models. The clinical/theoretical contributions of relational thinking are addressed in tandem with its potential for clinical excess. There is value and risk in a focus on intersubjective exchange and self disclosure. Both are explored and unpacked. Can we engage the relational ideal without going too far?
