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The response to negative and sexual transference with negative and sexual counter- transference on the part of the analyst prevents the analysand from introjecting the analyst as a ‘good object’, free from anxiety and anger. On the other hand, positive countertransference allows the analyst to identify with the ego and the id of the analysand. It is for this reason that Racker suggests that negative countertransference should always be analysed and dissolved. Anxiety in counter-transference always constitutes a guide for the analyst and it may be expressed in a range that can go from states of tension to irruptions of anxiety of either paranoid or depressive content. The anxiety produced in the analyst by the analysand’s disagreement and the consequent frustration can cause the advance, within his mind of his own masochism or of another kind of resistance, such as intense sexual feelings, induced, in turn, by the unconscious material of the analysand. Although Racker insists on the fact that countertransference should not be confessed, he nevertheless admits that it could be included in the interpretation offered. For instance, by temporarily enacting the role induced by the analysand only to analyse later what has taken place. The analyst must avoid acting out but in certain cases of patients that use the fundamental rule (which favours the use of words) as a resistance to paralyse the influence of interpretation, the analyst’s acting out functions as an interpretation. However, Racker warns that this technique should only be used by widely experienced analysts. Above all, he emphasises the importance of interpretation, focusing on counter- transference neurosis, the core of which is the Oedipus complex (in its positive and negative aspects). He points out that the analyst is an object of impulses, which could distort his perception, but when his neurotic reaction is added to this the capacity to interpret becomes hindered. In addition, neurotic counter-transference in turn has an influence on the analysand’s transference. From the Oedipus complex that becomes involved in counter-transference the analyst transfers his paternal objects onto the analysand and tends to repeat the negative as well as the positive aspects. For instance, rivalries with the analysand’s spouse, jealousy and fantasies of possession might emerge. Racker puts forward these concepts taking into account the training of the analysts. He bases his ideas on the Freud’s (1937) statement in “Analysis Terminable and Interminable”: ‘[The analysis of the analyst] alone would not suffice for his instruction; but we reckon on the stimuli that he has received in his own analysis not ceasing when it ends and on the processes of remodelling the ego continuing spontaneously in the analysed subject and making use of all subsequent experiences in this newly-acquired sense. This does in fact happen, and in so far as it happens it makes the analysed subject qualified to be an analyst himself’ (Freud, 1937, pp.248-249; clarifying brackets are specific to this publication). He also points out that being unable to ‘let go’ of the patient as well as the unwillingness to cure him, or the sexual envy that could push the analyst into acting out, all constitute dangers that risk the evolution of the analysand. He stresses that only by knowing his ‘personal equation’ will the analyst succeed in lessening the danger of inducing, or ‘grafting’ (as he puts it) his own neurosis into the patient.
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