Psychoanalysis.

Psychoanalysis is a form of therapy that helps you explore hidden thoughts and feelings that affect your behaviour and well-being. By digging deeper into past experiences, especially from childhood, you gain a better understanding of how they shape you today.

The method aims to find the reasons behind challenges such as anxiety or low self-esteem. Together with a psychoanalyst, you will gain insights that will help you break negative patterns and create new ways to feel better.

What can psychoanalysis help with?

Psychoanalysis is particularly useful if you want to understand and change emotional problems such as:

• Anxiety and worry: Explore the roots of your emotions and find long-term solutions.
• Depression: Understand underlying causes and break negative patterns.
• Relationship problems: Identify patterns in relationships and improve the way you connect with others.
• Self-destructive behaviours: Gain insights into why these occur and develop healthier strategies.
• Trauma and grief: Processing past experiences and finding ways to move on.
• Low self-esteem: Understand what’s behind it and build a more positive self-image.
• Identity issues: Explore questions about who you are and what you want in life.

Through psychoanalysis, you can gain deeper insights and create lasting changes in your life.

Benefits of psychoanalysis.

Psychoanalysis offers several valuable benefits:

• Self-awareness: Understand how your thoughts, feelings and behaviours are connected to better navigate life.
• Stronger relationships: Break old patterns and create healthier and more meaningful relationships.
• Emotional strength: Learn to manage stress and difficult emotions in a more balanced and constructive way.
• Healing: Process past traumas and release painful memories that are holding you back.

How does psychoanalysis work?

Psychoanalysis is a step-by-step process where you and your psychoanalyst work together to explore your inner self and create change:

• Building trust: The first sessions focus on establishing a safe and trusting relationship. You’ll discuss your challenges and what you want to achieve from therapy.
• Exploratory dialogue: You talk freely about your life, including current situations and past experiences such as childhood and relationships.
• Free association: You are encouraged to share anything that comes to mind, which can help reveal unconscious patterns and connections.
• Discovering connections: Together you identify how past events affect your feelings, thoughts and behaviours today.
• Resolution and growth: With increased self-awareness, you can begin to break negative patterns, process painful memories and create positive changes in your life.

Common techniques in psychoanalysis.

Psychoanalysts use several techniques to help you understand yourself better:

• Dream interpretation: by analysing dreams, you can gain insights into unconscious thoughts and feelings.
• Free association: You are encouraged to speak freely about whatever comes to mind, which can reveal hidden themes and patterns.
• Transference analysis: You explore how past relationships affect your current relationships, including your relationship with the therapist.

When is psychoanalysis suitable?

Psychoanalysis may be right for you if you:

• Have long-standing emotional problems that affect your wellbeing.
• Want to understand yourself and your relationships on a deeper level.
• Are looking for a form of therapy that focuses on root causes rather than just symptoms.

When should you consider another form of therapy?

If you need quick help for an acute crisis, such as panic disorder or intense stress, therapies such as CBT may be more appropriate as they offer more direct and structured problem solving.

Psychoanalysis is an in-depth process that is suitable for those who are ready to spend time and commitment exploring and changing fundamental aspects of themselves.