The innate, dormant potential in us

Innate because it is in our DNA, and dormant, not because it is really inoperative, but because it is not realised, not utilised; active in our adaptation to everything around us, we are not aware whether this adaptation is positive or negative, or that it even exists.

There is a lack of awareness of the potential to heal through dialogue. Because it isn't critical to our basic needs, and we can talk to facilitate our actions, we function, neglecting deeper attentive connection through communication. We adapt to the language of others as well, which results in a depreciation of our community. As a result of our habituated, unconsciously motivated ways of surviving, many people are negatively impacted physically, psychologically and spiritually. This creates illness, and if we are very ill, we need support.

Psychoanalytic ideas have permeated certain periods, disciplines and activities around the globe; and psychoanalysis itself has been significant in furthering a greater understanding of our potential and what motivates us. Clinically it has been significant in facilitating the recovery from many of the psychosomatic afflictions.

Although many of Sigmund Freud's discoveries and insights have been under-utilised because new, modified or more convenient therapies have developed. His work nevertheless has been continued and expanded by practitioners and scholars who are in no doubt as to its global social relevance. Through Freud, and through Jacques Lacan's expansion of the Freudian field, we continue to have many psychoanalysts and analytic psychotherapists practising and furthering psychoanalytic theory and practice toward its efficacy in the clinic.

In Russia during the revolutionary 1920s, Mikhail Bakhtin and his group were meeting to discuss philosophy and politics. The Bakhtin Circle was composed of Bakhtin himself (philosopher, social theorist and writer), Valentin Voloshinov (linguist and musicologist), Pavel Medvedev (literary theorist and editor of academic journals), and Lev Pumpianskij (philologist and professor of literature). This circle was attended by a wide range of scholars. (Moraes, Marcia. 1996, p14)

In the realm of social consciousness, the members of the Bakhtin Circle shared a myriad of theoretical assumptions with Lev Vygotsky, who was a prominent Russian intellectual and developmental psychologist, and these assumptions are considered to have been the subject of Bakhtin Circle discussions (1996, p14). Vygotsky, along with Bakhtin and Voloshinov, is still cited and considered relevant in educational and sociological theory today. The works of the Bahktin Circle, "are still frequently cited in linguistics, communication studies, and other language sciences [...] Moreover, Bakhtin and Voloshinov are cited, not as venerable relics of the past, but rather as direct inspiration for innovative work and new developments." (Sandler. 2013, p152). Moraes writes,

According to Bakhtinian theory, an individual does not exist outside of dialogue – a dialogue in which the consciousness of the speaker encounters the consciousness of another speaker; a dialogue that reveals conflicts; a dialogue that embodies history and culture; and therefore, a dialogue that is multifaceted. This view of dialogue considers the social location that constructs the self and the other (1996, p94).

Jaakko Seikkula of the University of Jyvaskyla, Finland was part of the team whose innovative work, Open Dialogue, gradually changed the way people were helped recover from first episode psychosis. Seikkula wrote,

Mikhail Bakhtin, Lev Vygotsky and Valentin Voloshinov view the psyche as a thoroughly social phenomenon, and language as a meaning system that is constructed in the space between interlocutors. (Seikkula, 2003. p83)

These notions of dialogism, "assisted in understanding the new phenomena arising in the new practice of organising open meetings, in contrast to family therapy sessions." (Seikkula, Olsen. 2003, p406)

In 2014 Jaakko Seikkula together with Markku Sutela, Chief Psychologist at Keropudas Hospital in Tornio, Western Lapland, came to Australia to present the theory and practice of Open Dialogue in each state. Open Dialogue is spreading, and various practitioners are working toward promoting it as a part of the mental health system here in Australia.

A question concerning what type of psychotherapy is used in an Open Dialogue group treatment meeting has arisen. Is it the same or similar to Freudian-Lacanian analytic therapy, or to the psychodynamic object relations approach, or that of family therapy? Is it possible to be analytic in a group setting in which each person is considered an unique individual whose words are responded to specifically in order to stimulate a reflection on what they have said? Open Dialogue uses the language 'the polyphony of voices – horizontal and vertical' that relates to the conscious present language emerging, that energises the not yet spoken aspects of our embedded histories.

Linguist, philosopher and psychoanalyst Julia Kristeva’s intertextuality relates to the conscious and unconscious communication of psychotherapy, as much as it relates to Bakhtin's analysis of the text and the perception of the reader.

Mikhail Bakhtin ... had introduced ... the notions of alterity and dialogism. My conception of dialogism, of ambivalence, or what I call "intertextuality" – notions heavily indebted to Bakhtin and Freud ... issued from my reading of Bakhtin, encourages one to read the literary text as an intersection of other texts. (Kristeva, Julia. 2002)

The polyphony of voices relates to the many different roles that we inhabit, the thoughts that appear in relation to their activities intersecting with the voices of others in our spoken and unconscious dialogue.

Within this complexity, wondering about difference could be a trap to fall into, or a trap to be avoided. Certainly by understanding the differences between several approaches, one may understand and predict their disparate effects. However suspending judgement may be conducive to cooperation. It seems that what we need to do is to find out what works for us – which also works for those we are supporting. This is worthy of a collaborative effort within the 'talk' therapies, the dialogical, dialectic approaches which are based on an inate human need – to talk, to be heard, so that someone listens, responds in a way that creates more dialogical connection, and that this connection revels to us what is missing in the answer to "What do you want?" By talking, symptoms go away, be they chronic depression, or anxiety, or psychosis.

The dialectic of listening, believing, responding, and developing a reflection of self, causes a realisation of the primacy of what we speak and the necessity of the other in being heard. Of the words we use, what these words project, and what they reveal within a mirroring connection. This is one way of thinking about the dialogue of psychodynamic therapy, and of Open Dialogue group meetings. It is all about language.

The importance of language in a developmental sense is not just the province of analytical psychotherapies. Language underlines psychological connections and their personal and social subtleties. Many scholars have studied language as a social phenomenon: Montessori, Piaget, Vygotsky, Friere, Dewey and others. All figures who have realised and shared a more formative and a more constructive understanding of language and of the human potential in our cultures. They have created threads of this consciousness across many cultures.

At times the psychoanalytic world has been removed from engaging with potential natural partners. Much of this has been enforced by external systemic ignorance and by the exclusion through being misunderstood. Perhaps this exclusion has protected psychoanalysis from being contaminated, while at the same time limiting the potential for social contribution.

Innate dormant potential, the words in the title, refer to the unknown in all of us, and also refer to the innate potential of Freudian ideas and clinical practice to influence and further change. These ideas could lift the world community out of its dormancy; a dormancy dominated by the psychopathology of power and misuse of wealth. Psychoanalytic ideas help in the understanding of human development and behaviour and could help to adjust the world's socio-communal systems to an equilibrium where the welfare of all is considered.

The changes that were made in Western Lapland, Finland, and to the Finnish education system itself, are both examples of methods that are working toward a more egalitarian society, and in doing this they are making significant progress. The Open Dialogue approach being used in mental health processes is a part of an evolution of being that happens in minds that follow similar paths in our collective unconscious. Through their influence and their difference we can all benefit. Now there is a need to promote and share freely the improvements discovered, without any ownership or competition.

The Open Dialogue approach has trialled elements of dialogical communication and connection that have been previously used in many systems of therapy . Some are already shared, but these have been applied in a specific needs-based approach which has focussed on already existing support systems. Generally support systems have been of some help, but in many instances, no help at all, as they have been passed down from generation to generation, adapted to in an unconscious manner.

What the dialogical approach in Open Dialogue has achieved is a method to strengthen the social group through a specific dialectic structure which satisfies innate needs of connections with others. In the discovery of one's own potential through this process, we see the changes in group members that reveal a new satisfaction and confidence with approaching common problems.

Dialogism or psychoanalysis, individual or group therapies, all have elements from original thinkers who have critically and analytically forged new ways of thinking and being derived from their unique individual circumstance. Accessing, studying and utilising the knowledge available still depends on our own individual circumstance and what is possible to accomplish within our own culture and its bias. However, whichever description and theory we use for our work, it needs to privilege the primacy of the others' needs, and to understand those needs, we need to listen carefully without assumptions to anyone who can speak freely about what they are experiencing. When we have some understanding we can then engage in a mutual dialogue that expands and illuminates the understanding of both parties.

I have never been comfortable with the term 'psychoanalytic', I prefer 'analytic' because the word describes the process. Mia Kurtti, a psychotherapist and psychiatric nurse from Finland, explained that the words describing Open Dialogue as a 'treatment meeting' were not as good a translation from the Finnish language as was 'care meeting'. This explains the care that has been taken in the dialogical approach to be accurate and specific to purpose. This is a characteristic of analytic therapy and any support system wishing to create as clear and comfortable a situation for the participants that is possible. Fundamental is the primacy of a needs-based approach. The responding in a dialogical approach is the same as in the analytic approach, and ultimately relies on the knowledge and circumstances of all participants.

Analytic processes have a lot of potential to support change within the individual and the group, through a dialogical approach that is highly attuned to the needs of the participants. Kristeva says, "I suggest that in the future, psychoanalysis may be one of the few remaining endeavors that will allow change and surprise, that is, that will allow life." (1993) Open Dialogue has, in Finland, already proven that the developed dialogical approach has achieved this.

Working with individuals or social groups to support their innate potential and to stay connected to community, requires more collaboration, interchange and understanding, inside and outside the therapy community. By holding and supporting this innate potential we can share the reality of how language and specific dialogical communications can significantly improve our lives and our prospects.

References :

KRISTEVA, Julia. 1993. New Maladies of the Soul. New York: Columbia University Press.

KRISTEVA, Julia. 2002. My Memory’s Hyperbole. In K. Oliver (Ed.), The Portable Kristeva updated edition. New York: Columbia University Press.

MORAES, Marcia. 1996. Bilingual Education - A Dialogue with the Bakhtin Circle. Albany: State University of New York Press.

SANDLER, Sergeiy. 2013. Language and philosophical anthropology in the work of Mikhail Bakhtin and the Bakhtin Circle. RIFL vol.7, n.2: 152-165. DOI 10.4396/20130711.

SEIKKULA, Jaakko. 2003. Dialogue is the Change: Understanding Psychotherapy as a Semiotic Process of Bakhtin, Voloshinov, and Vygotsky. Human Systems: Volume No. 14, Issue 2, pp83-94.

SEIKKULA, Jaakko. OLSEN, Mary. 2003. The Open Dialogue Approach to Acute Psychosis: Its Poetics and Micropolitics. Family Process, Vol. 42, No. 3, pp403-418.

Neil Sullivan, after twenty-nine year as a Montessori Upper Primary and Secondary teacher, studied Analytic Psychotherapy at the Churchill Clinic in Perth. Graduated from Perth School of Psychotherapy and Counselling and, as a member of the association Psychoanalytic/dynamic Practitioners of Perth, worked in the PdPP Community Programs offering low-cost therapy at crisis accommodation centres. He has a small private practice in West Perth. His work is based in an eclectic form of Freudian/Lacanian therapy, and he has more recently added the practice of Open Dialogue group care meetings to his work.