ABSTRACT
There is a striking paradox as the therapists attempt to address the ineffable: that which is “too great to be expressed in words”. It is, of course, a fundamental part of trying to tune into another person that they aim to put ourselves empathically into their shoes, in the context of their life story, with their particular experiences and sensitivities, in order to imagine how this person might see life and feel about its many vicissitudes. What is most uniquely true of the other person will always lie beyond the therapists' own imagining. So, the therapists are likely to recognize the familiar in the other much more readily than that which is unfamiliar. And sometimes they will defend themselves against the unfamiliar in their patients, for there the therapists are most likely to find themselves feeling incompetent and out of our depth. Facing the unknown will always be a far greater challenge than staying with the known.
