Clinical and Theoretical Aspects of Enactment

Abstract

Enactment as a concept can serve analytic discourse through its established meaning of an act intended strongly to influence, persuade, or force another to react. We might agree to use the term in two complementary ways: Broadly, enactment can designate all behaviors of both parties in the analytic relationship, even verbal, in consequence of the intensification of the action intent of our words created by the constraints and regressive push induced by the analytic rules and frame. Patient and analyst are vulnerable to falling back on behaviors that actualize their intentions, doing so in ways motivated by and reflecting transference hopes, fears, and compromises shaped in their developmental past. Specifically, enactment can then be defined as those regressive (defensive) interactions between the pair experienced by either as a consequence of the behavior of the other. While nominally an interpersonal perspective, this concept of enactment facilitates more balanced attention to the involvement of both parties and to the intrapsychic dynamics in both that specifically shape their interactions. A clinical vignette illustrates the analyst's contributions to enactment, especially those reflecting his reactivated conflicts and their relation to his theoretical and technical preferences.

“Our Time is Up”: A Relational Perspective on the Ending of a Single Psychotherapy Session

“…Dorothy seemed unaware of her entitlement to an extra five minutes of my time. I sensed that important meaning might reside in this possible enactment (Chused, 1991;McLaughlin, 1991). I decided to delay commenting on this behavior until I could decide if it was a one-time phenomenon or a pattern.…”

On the Use of Reflection in Supervision

“…Speaking is considered a type of an action and actions as a form of communication [24][25][26]. In addition, action in analytic therapy was brought into the focus of attention by such concepts as enactme [27,28]. Bass [29] explains that from the relational perspective, enactment is omnipresent in the analytic process and relevant to each manifestation of transference and countertransference.…”

Enactments: An Evolving Dyadic Concept of Acting Out

“…One of the major differences between contemporary or neoclassical techniques and that of the early Freud era, has been the additional emphasis on therapists' actual relation with their patients, which now is seen as an essential focus for most therapeutic models. [7][8][9][10] More recently and particularly stressed in relational theories, the dynamic dyadic treatment situation is seen as extending beyond Ego Psychology and Stolorow's narrower concept of Intersubjectivity.…”

“…If continuing enactments are ignored or initiated by the therapist, they can foster boundary violations under the guise of helping or advising. McLaughlin 9 points out that since gestures are older than speech, therapists need to closely observe their patients' movements and activities, as well as listen to their words. Such actions are homologous to play in child analysis, that is a nonverbal equivalent to free association.…”