Saying the Unsaid

Sarah + Vanessa talk about some of the ideas of Provocative Therapy, as coined by Frank Farrelly, and the invitations of the unexpected. 

Vanessa and Sarah talk about the utility of paying attention to negative or disavowed thoughts/feelings as a way to hold onto one's hot potatoes.

Vanessa shares three recent experiences of jealousy and the two of them share the invitation of expanding ones range of thoughts, feelings and relational impulses. 

Sarah + Vanessa catch up about recent experiences of getting tattooed, telling the truth, and witnessing children on airplanes.  

Vanessa + Sarah talk about an article on using psychodrama in group work and their associations with acting things out.  

Sarah + Vanessa discuss their resistance to the idea of marketing while simultaneously wanting to promote Process Groups.  

Vanessa + Sarah have a conversation about an interpersonal approach to group, noticing and following replications, and being the canary.

Vanessa + Sarah talk about the art of Joining and the invitation to call a spade a spade in process groups.

Vanessa + Sarah share some reflections on the similarities of good parenting and good group leading.  

Vanessa + Sarah check in about their personal current experiences as members of process groups.

Sarah + Vanessa talk about the idea of mending as it pertains to group, and Vanessa gives an update on her recovery from her accident.  

Vanessa + Sarah talk about group process as playing with play-dough, and share some imaginations around the invitations of Lent.  

Sarah + Vanessa talk more about the permission to be ourselves and to follow the grain of our wood, professionally and personally.  

Sarah + Vanessa talk about the how sometimes choosing pleasure and ease is just what the doctor ordered.  

Vanessa and Sarah talk about the energizing quality of aggression.

Vanessa + Sarah discuss the Aaron Black's 2017 article "On Attacking and Being Attacked in Group Psychotherapy" and the utility of expressed aggression in groups.

Sarah + Vanessa talk about one of many approaches to working with dreams, and gratitude for the composting/metabolizing function of the unconscious.  

Sarah shares with Vanessa some of the impact of psychoanalyst Dr. David Ramirez on the psychoanalytic community; David was the first to teach her that the highest form of psychoanalysis is Play.  

Vanessa and Sarah discuss maxims for a New Year.

At the close of the year, Vanessa + Sarah talk about group in relation to endings, and variations of ending well.  

Vanessa + Sarah reflect on the idea of the longest day of the year, the dark invitations of group, a Gerald May quote on savoring life-juice, and a poem titled,  "Prayer at Winter Solstice" by acclaimed poet Dana Gioia.

Sarah + Vanessa share a conversation they recorded earlier this year but never published on: Process Group as Comparably Uncomfortable to Acting Game and/or Ecstatic Dance.

Sarah + Vanessa talk about the value of exploring wishes and jealousy as a way to discover what we might be longing for. 

Vanessa + Sarah discuss Ronnie Levine's (2017) article, A Modern Psychoanalytic Perspective on Group Therapy.

Vanessa + Sarah share a few more thoughts about the invitations of exploring erotic transference in group and life.  (PART III.)

Sarah + Vanessa talk about the grief-side of longing.  

Sarah + Vanessa begin to describe some of the invitations of exploring erotic transference in therapy and in group.  

Sarah + Vanessa talk about their particular (though not unique) need to learn to say No. 

Sarah + Vanessa discuss their association to the (1981) article by Rutan and Rice: The Charismatic Leader: Asset or Liability?  

Sarah + Vanessa try to answer the question: how do you Say the Unsaid when the Other won't listen?  

Vanessa + Sarah reflect on one year of leading process groups, tolerating the aggression and gift of Slug Hugs, the invitation of faking it until you make it, and the imperative to make mountains out of molehills.

Sarah + Vanessa talk about leading with vulnerability, the etymology of the word vulnerability, and a few resonant ideas from Livington's 1999 article on Vulnerability and Tenderness in Group Psychotherapy.

Sarah + Vanessa talk about how in group you can talk about everything, even when it feels "too late," or "the moment has passed."  

Sarah + Vanessa discuss group as an opportunity to develop richer emotional connections with others by simultaneously owning what is going on within us while considering what is going on within the Other. 

Vanessa + Sarah revisit the Operating Room situation, and what went Right.  They talk about how a sense of creative agency and having a voice mitigates against the potentially traumatic impact of scary situations.  

Vanessa + Sarah talk about the use of consulting the "felt sense" as a way of listening to what is beneath the surface.  

Vanessa + Sarah share some examples of how process group relating is leaking into their outside lives, including Vanessa's experience of her first follow-up surgery this week removing the screws from the metal plates in her jaw.    

Vanessa + Sarah discuss group work through the lens of Jungian concepts of the problem of opposites, the transcendent function, individuation, and fairytales.  

Sarah + Vanessa talk about the concept of Negation as a clue to the unconscious, and the practice of playing Opposite Day in process groups as a way to wonder how sometimes what we say or deny might hide a less-tolerable or intolerable opposite thought that might also be true. 

Vanessa + Sarah share associations to Margaret Crastnopol's article, "The Analyst's Achilles Heels: Owning and Offsetting the Clinical Impact of Our Intrinsic Flaws" (2019). 

Vanessa + Sarah talk about Vanessa's follow-up appointment with her surgeon as well as some of the parameters-around and utility-of the "frame" in running a process group.  

Vanessa + Sarah discuss a chapter from Louis Ormont's article titled, "Leader's Role in Resolving Resistances to Intimacy in the Group Setting." 

Vanessa + Sarah reflect on the one year anniversary of Joy's death and how her death was a catalyst to prioritize friendship and a Joy-ful life, including their decision to lead process groups together.

Vanessa + Sarah talk about what it means to Say the Unsaid when something bad happens.  A week prior Vanessa was in a bike accident that resulted in a broken jaw in multiple places and multiple broken teeth.  Sarah flew out to accompany her in the hospital pre- and post- reconstructive jaw surgery. 

Vanessa + Sarah describe process groups as a bunch of animal creatures showing up in their precise animal form, learning about themselves and other creatures by putting as much as possible into words.  

Sarah + Vanessa discuss a second component to learning to take what you want in process groups: finding out if your strategy is working.  

Sarah + Vanessa talk about one of the goals of process groups: learning how to take what you want, and coming to see that that "taking" doesn't necessarily mean "taking-away" from others, but can add to their potential vitality, too. 

Vanessa + Sarah talk about one of the reasons someone might want to participate in a Process Group: to see how others perceive them.  

Sarah + Vanessa talk about group as a metal detector for (often unconscious) protector armor.  

Vanessa + Sarah review some of the ways Saying the Unsaid group participants finished the sentence, "Group is like _____________."  (Part two of two.)