Reply to Bauer (2003) and Fisher (2003).

Abstract

The author acknowledges the sophisticated understanding of his article (J. M. Natterson, 2003) on the part of both W. D. Bauer (2003) andD. J. Fisher (2003). The author discusses Bauer's and Fisher's concerns about the defensive idealization of the therapist and about a rigid programmatic imposition of love themes on therapy. There is also a response to the question of the philosophical basis for the basic role of love in therapy. Bauer (2003) andFisher (2003) offer thoughtful and complex discussions on my article (Natterson, 2003) that deserve extensive elaboration. I will restrict myself to consideration of a few of their many salient points.Bauer suggests that attachment, recognition, and mutuality may profitably be conceptually separated. He posits possible conflict of all with all, or of any two with the third. Specifically, attachment may under certain conditions obstruct the achievement of recognition and mutuality, as he points out. However, unlike Bauer, I am unable to imagine that recognition and mutuality can ever really be at odds with one another. My position requires that recognition and mutuality be absolutely interdependent and indivisible. And whereas recognition and mutuality cannot exist without attachment, attachment can certainly occur minus the achievement of recognition and mutuality.Subordinated subjectivity is a term I introduced several years ago. Bauer calls for its explication, and I happily here oblige. The notion that neutrality and anonymity are desirable, even possible, for the therapist has become increasingly controversial. I along with many others have discarded even the possibility. Yet therapists at their best do continue to be restrained, expectant, and receptive. In proffering the concept of subordinated subjectivity, I was emphasizing the continuous, active presence and influence of the therapist's subjectivity, which is nevertheless unobtrusive and often invisible. It may be thought of in part as the therapist's intimate consciousness, existing largely in the background or on the periphery of the therapist's awareness and the therapeutic field, emerging more forcefully and clearly when needed to inform and influence the therapeutic process.