ABSTRACT
The concept of impasse was first conceptualized in the transactional analysis literature as an intrapsychic process that inhibited or blocked internal communication among the states of the ego within an individual. This chapter presents an understanding of impasse as an interpersonal process that disrupts the work of the professional dyad. As the working relationship deepens, it develops an unavoidable intimacy or closeness, with many of the same pleasures and problems that attend any close relationship. In this often turbulent field, points of impasse may emerge through the mutual evocation of each person’s unconscious interpersonal patterns, which Berne called protocol. Protocol operates principally at an unworded, body level. Once an impasse has developed, resuming productive work depends on realizing what each person does, what each avoids, and how each becomes stuck when experiencing the vulnerabilities, intimacies, and uncertainties of this work. This chapter arose from the paper that was the third for which the Eric Berne Memorial Award was granted.
