ABSTRACT
In our analytic work it occasionally happens that we see and understand something in the patient which seems important to us, but we do not reveal it to him. At times this abstention seems advisable: we feel we are complying with the rules governing interpretation. But at other times this is not the case; we are aware of an emotional factor within us which prevents us from communicating what we have perceived, as, for in-stance, a fear of hurting the patient or causing him too much anxiety, a fear of losing him or of provoking an excessive ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ transference response. In such cases the doubt may arise as to whether our abstention was really objectively justified or was merely a rejection produced by subjective factors, a ‘counterresistance’ opposing the interpretation.
