From the author: I began to think about the phenomenon of anger in therapy after reading a thread on a forum where the author wanted to find out exactly how a psychologist should deal with the client’s negative emotions associated with the psychologist’s behavior. I really like it that non-specialists on the forum often raise such important topics that are worth thinking deeply about. Be sincere So, very often in therapy there are situations when the client experiences negative feelings towards his therapist, for example, anger, and in some way expresses them, or says directly that he is angry with him. How should a therapist behave in such a situation so that the client’s processes are supported most effectively and environmentally, and the client moves forward in his request? There are opinions of some psychologists that the therapist should always be sincere with the client, because any the falseness is still felt. And honestly tell the client about your feelings in response, including anger, in order to maintain a sincere and trusting relationship. I agree that insincerity in the therapist’s statements is of course felt by the client. But is it useful to tell a client about your anger at him? In what form and at what moment? In what cases and with what clients is this acceptable, and in what cases will it not be useful, or may even provoke a worsening of the client’s condition? And if you don’t talk about your feelings, then what should you say? How to be sincere with a client and not lose his trust? What is behind the client’s anger? So, the client expresses any complaints to the therapist, is indignant at the behavior or words, or even the appearance of the therapist, and to the therapist’s question: “What is happening to you? (How do you feel?)” replies: “I’m angry with you.” The client at this moment is experiencing strong emotions and sensations; perhaps it was not easy for him to directly communicate to another person about his anger; perhaps this was the first time in his life. In any case, the client is captured by his mental processes, he has many feelings. He may also experience shame and fear of rejection by the person he has now trusted. Perhaps the client is in a situation of actualizing some childhood traumatic experiences. And at this moment he is self-absorbed, he is overwhelmed, and is not able to accept anything else from the outside, to hear and see another person, to perceive his feelings, to respond to them. He needs to process what is already in his soul. In the therapist's attention to what is happening to him, what he thinks, feels, senses, what he needs from the therapist, so that the therapist sees and hears him. He needs to assimilate (assimilate) his new experience of sincerely communicating to another person about his feelings, to expand the experience of self-awareness. When a client says to a therapist, “I’m angry with you,” you need to understand what it even is. What is behind what the client calls anger. Maybe it’s despair, maybe it’s a feeling of attachment to another, and the fear that he will be rejected, and then it’s easier to express anger than affection. Behind anger, as a rule, there is a need that was formed in a situation of interaction with another person. Without finding out from a person what exactly he calls anger, what is behind it, what he needs, we miss a whole phenomenon in a person’s life that he is not aware of. “I’m angry with you too!” Let’s say the therapist is conscious of some motives, he chooses to immediately inform the client that he is also angry with him. This is new information for the client, received from the outside, and even from an important person. The therapist switches the client's attention to himself, thereby stopping the client's current processes. The client may have a lot of additional context in addition to what he had in his soul before this message. Because, for example, there was a loved one in his life who was angry with him and then left him, or did some things like which the client suffered. Or in his experience, the expression of anger was an expression of love and intimacy. Or it wasn’t accepted in his familygenerally talk about anger and no one quarreled with anyone. Therefore, the client must somehow process the received information in his soul - what it means for him, how he should react and what will happen next. And therefore, those processes that were available before the therapist reported anger become inaccessible to him. Guilt, shame may appear, the traumatist may freeze, fall into insensibility. A borderline client may have very aggressive reactions of the “you’re a fool” type, a psychotic may get scared or not notice at all, a neurotic may ignore and pretend that nothing happened... In my opinion, the therapist’s expression “I’m angry at you too” can be incomprehensible to the client, especially if it is said immediately after the client expresses feelings. However, the sincerity of the therapist is very important, his messages about himself, his thoughts, feelings, reactions, etc. are important. What to do? I will state my a look at what the therapist can do in a situation where the client is angry with him, so that sincerity and trust are maintained, and there is enough attention to what is happening with the client, what is behind the anger. The therapist can ask the client: “What am I doing? Why are you reacting with anger?” This will help the client to realize that anger arose due to some event, and there may be other things behind it. The client could react with anger, for example, because the therapist got carried away and said something of his own, and the client could not tell him about it. And in his life, such a client is most likely angry, silent and receives what he does not need. And then the therapist says: “It turns out that I got carried away and gave greater importance to another phenomenon, and you silently waited for me patiently, listened to what was not important to you.” The client may realize that anger is the overflowing cup of his patience, and that he needs the other person to learn something important about him, and that he is used to doing this - to endure and wait for a long time, and then get angry. Then there is a chance to realize that he does not need to wait so long, and he can stop the therapist and tell him what is important to him now, what he needs, and thus gain new experience in his life that he can use with others people. Or the therapist may say that he, too, notices that something is happening, and can describe the phenomenology of what he observes in the client on a nonverbal level - changes in voice, complexion, breathing, etc. You can say, for example: “I notice that you are now holding your breath and squeezing your hands, and this tells me that you are feeling something, experiencing something.” Or: “Now I understand more about you, you began to speak a little quieter, it turns out that you are experiencing strong emotions.” And then the client can be seen, noticed, acknowledged by the therapist that he is experiencing something, and he can bear the experience that all his feelings are visible to people, they are expressed and they are appropriate and acceptable. And speech just means what is already visible. Thus, when a client says “I’m angry,” this means that a lot of mental processes and phenomena are happening in him, this is always a marker of the client’s experiences and a cluster of experience, and the therapist’s task is to accompany the client in expanding his awareness of the current situation and himself in it, in awareness of his experience, so that there is a chance to do something differently if desired. What should the therapist say about himself? What can the therapist say about himself in response to the client, if he considers it necessary to do this, or if the client asks him about feelings? A very necessary skill for a therapist is the ability to track what is happening to him at the level of bodily sensations, feelings, thoughts, fantasies, etc., which he himself needs in a given situation with the client, what is behind his feeling of anger, for example. That is, the ability to be aware of oneself, not to lose oneself, not to dissolve in the client, not to pick up his feelings. If the therapist realizes that he feels something similar to anger, and is able to freely choose his actions, then he is present at that moment, he is in the therapeutic positions, he can tell the client about what is happening in himsome phenomena that may be similar to a feeling of anger. And then it is more useful for the therapist to tell the client in a phenomenological manner what is happening to him, to reveal his feelings in more detail. For example: “I also notice something about myself, and I can share what is happening to me. I noticed that I had tension in my arms, a heaviness in my chest, and an internal activity to do something when you told me about your anger. Do you have something similar now?” Such a text will help the client understand what is happening to him using the example of another person. That is, the therapist makes self-disclosure, but only for the purpose of helping the client realize what is happening to the client more deeply. Or the therapist may say: “I have a feeling that the other person should do or say something to me now, but Do you have anything similar?” The client may agree or not, and notice something new about himself. And then we find interesting nuances that can be discussed, and this turns into intention, into movement, into a more conscious range of other feelings... If the client is interested in my feelings, then my opinion is that if I tell the client directly that the therapist is also angry with him, but only with a full disclosure of the therapist’s entire phenomenology in order to draw a parallel with the client’s possible processes: “Yes, at some point I got angry. I came up with ideas that I really liked. And I assumed that they were supposed to help you and that you would be happy with them. But you answered that they do not matter to you. I felt some rejection of myself along with the ideas: “How is it possible, such good things, I thought so much about it, and they turned out to be unnecessary.” But I noticed that you do not run away from me, but continue the dialogue, maintaining involvement and interest. And then the anger went away, because I realized that these are just my ideas that would be useful, perhaps more to me than to you, because you are just a different person. And you only rejected my ideas, not me. And when I realized this, I returned my attention to you. I was reassured by the fact that you stayed next to me, along with my ideas that were not suitable for you. And I realized that I needed you to remain in dialogue with me, even if I do something inappropriate for you and you reject it. Does what I told you about myself matter to you? How does this happen in your life?” What the therapist says in this example is a sincere message based on his life experience. That is, the therapist is familiar with rejection, but the feelings were actualized precisely with this client, which means that the client is also familiar with it based on the parallelism of the processes. And then the therapist’s message encourages the client to find out more about himself. In this example, I demonstrated a situation in which anger appears, what you can do with it, and how you can get out of it - see another person who is different, but at the same time remains close and does not leaves, which the client can learn later. But statements of this kind by the therapist should only be made if the therapist is sure that the client is capable and wants to hear him. “I’m completely calm!” I’ve also come across the opinion of psychologists that it is best for the therapist to say to the client that “Everything is fine, you are angry, but I am completely calm, nothing is happening to me.” But here the very insincerity appears, which is still read by the client. The client may feel abnormal - “how can this be, I feel when they are angry with me, or at least something is happening to another person,” or “he is generally indifferent to me, I am alone among many other clients, and it doesn’t matter so much to him what happens to me, he just gets money, and I’m here alone with my feelings.” Awkwardness, reticence, ambiguity, and all this will then be in the field, and will be unconscious. It seems that the therapist’s intentions are good - to make it clear to the client that he is stable and is not being destroyed. On the other hand, the client loses the concept of permissibility, andHe learns from the experience that you can throw out whatever you want to another and not ask how it feels to hear it, but the other will still not collapse. The client is left without feedback. Often clients ask the therapist how he feels about their expression of anger; they feel ashamed of their reactions. But it is important for them to know that the therapist will not be destroyed, will not reject and the relationship will not end because of the client’s sincerity. Here it is important to show the client that I, as a therapist, react, I am not an insensitive person, that this is a natural process in a relationship, and that in a situation the client is angry at I have nothing to do with it, I take part, I update some of his experience with my actions, but these feelings are bearable for me. And it is important not just to say what is bearable to me, but to show the client my support, to show what makes me bearable and calmly. And then the client may wonder how he can be calm, what resources he may have, what he can rely on in such situations. “If the therapist is calm because he is well aware and accepts himself and the current situation, then maybe I should learn this from him?” If you simply say “I am calm,” it means putting the client in a situation of uncertainty and anxiety, and often more increase his anger more. Because then the client will need to “reach out” to the therapist in any way. We must always understand that therapy is such a special procedure when you need to be ready to make any element obvious to the client. Because there are many phenomena, and the therapist chooses which phenomenon to give space to, but one must be prepared to show everything that the client will need. This gives the client stability and reduces anxiety. The client can conclude that he is upset and is very worried because he does not have enough support, knowledge and understanding of himself, that he pays a lot of attention to one phenomenon and not enough to another, and that due to the broader With awareness, you can see a more holistic picture of what is happening. For example, he sees another person angry at himself and understands that his anger may not only relate to him directly, but that it may be mostly a projection onto him, or the person may be in a bad mood or physically ill, or something else .And the client gains experience in how to react to those people who show their aggression to him, and becomes more resistant to expressing anger at him from other people. Therefore, an important task of the therapist is to help the person become more resilient to the events that may occur, and he can learn this from the therapist, who by example shows how he reacts and what helps him remain calm. Therapeutic position There are situations when the therapist is not able to freely choose whether or not to tell the client about his feelings, and what to say at all, and he is simply “carried”, he cannot help but tell the client about himself and what is happening to him, or even goes into an accusing-defensive position, and then he loses the therapeutic position and takes the client’s words too personally. What can help not to lose balance and the therapeutic position? As I wrote above, the therapist’s ability to be aware of himself is very important for the therapeutic position. And what also helps me personally is that I basically expect that the client might be angry with me, and I assume that the expression of anger is an attempt to tell me something very important for the client. And then I become curious about what is behind this anger and how exactly I participated in the situation that the client had such feelings. I meet anger with curiosity, and therefore for me this is not a destructive phenomenon: “I see that something significant is happening for you now, tell me in more detail, I want to understand you.” In conclusion, I want to say that the expression of any feelings by the therapist to the client is self-disclosure, and self-disclosure is one of the main tools of a Gestalt therapist, and without it a trusting relationship will not develop. But you need to remember that, as a rule, this tool is used in.