ABSTRACT
Interpretation is the most effective instrument used by a therapist to further the analysis of a patient. Interpretations may be directed to understanding the nature and function of resistances, or to making the patient aware of what in his unconscious is being resisted. Resistances are conceived to stem from the ego and repression is an important one; by it is meant that a particular affective content cannot become conscious because it is prevented from doing so by denial. It follows that acceptance by the patient of an interpretation only defining the repressed content is suspect because the denial is omitted. The open-system view of timing interpretations depends on including the analyst as well as the patient in any interchange and this applies whether he is in training or afterwards. The analyst's knowledge is inevitably related all along to his affects, related to the particular setting which the patient introduces.
