View/Open - Scholarly Commons Home

Chapter Eight – A Consulting Break - Page 255
On Page 246, Bill again appears to be trying hard to raise his concern about this group,
now (i.e. this particular Semester 4 group, in this teaching session), rather than diverting
to other groups and times. This seems to be very rapidly halted by Judi, but then used by
her soon after to express her own concern. 12
Judi does hold the focus, though, on her own anxiety with her teaching and the fear that
she talks too much. This bravely raises an edge of shame. It seems difficult for Bill and
Judi to recognise explicitly that these feelings may well be in part the result of
countertransference to the teaching, involving the same affective experience (i.e. a fear
of talking too much and of shame at doing that) but for a different reason (because these
feelings are effectively those of the students, but experienced by the tutor so that they
can potentially be understood and offered back in a form where they can be taken in).
The absence of a fuller recognition (and possibly, exploration) of the dynamics at the
time represents one of a number of missed opportunities.
On Pages 246 and 247, There is a process of symmetry, leading from Judi’s offering
that Bill is doing really well, to Bill’s confession of anxiety of not doing enough for the
group, to Judi’s confession of the difficulty of not projecting her anxiety into the group.
It may be that the symmetrisation is a partly unconscious attempt to build and hold
rapport in the face of pressures that are otherwise competitive. This is rather like a
verbal equivalent of the way that the non-verbal behaviour of two participants in a
conversation can be mirroring, with each taking on the posture and gesture of the other.
12 I think this is a clear example of a group-related process, in that the capacity to voice anxiety has a
strong social determinant.