I'm wondering whether there might be different kinds of self disclosure. I'm also wondering whether experience-nearness and neutrality (in Freud's sense) might be a different (or at least seperable) distinction too.

For example, it seems perfectly possible that a therapist could be experience-near in their mode of interacting without self disclosing at all. While neutrality might rule out self disclosure I don't think that experience-nearness implies anything about self disclosure one way or the other.

With respect to self disclosure I guess there is at least a distinction between a therapist disclosing their responses to the client (thoughts and feelings) and a therapist disclosing details about their life (marital status etc). it would seem to me that a therapist could make one of these kinds of self disclosures but not the other.

I guess 'transference' is a theory laden term... How should we characterise that... I guess the mark of a transference response is that it is intense and the transference response can either be positive (attachment) or negative (anger or dislike).

I guess it would depend on the patient but I would guess that neutrality would be more likely to leave the patient feeling frustrated (hence negative transference) whereas experience-nearness would be more likely to facilitate attachment (hence positive transference). i wonder if the theorists who emphasise neutrality are the same theorists who posit such things as destructive drives and the inevitability of anger / rage / frustration etc...

Sometimes philosophers talk about there being a space of possibilities and knowledge restricts the space of possibilities by homing in on actualities and ruling out other possibilities. I guess that when a therapist self discloses it rules out possibilities by providing actualities and that was what Freud was getting at with respect to how certain kinds of projections / transferences are ruled out if the therapist self discloses. I'm not sure how much this interfeares with the theraputic process / mechanisms of theraputic change, however. Depends on the specific situation most likely. I would think that if one moves out of experience nearness when one refuses to answer a question (and stays there) then that would be likely to prompt frustration / negative transference, however.

I've had trouble with CBT therapists too. Mostly because I was seeing them in the public service and they were under considerable pressure to have evidence of change in 6-12 sessions I suppose. They were so focused on educating me out of my symptoms that they never really listened to me or got to know me or anything. With councellors it is harder to say what went wrong. Maybe what went wrong was that I didn't have faith that they knew how / were capable of helping me. I feel bad for that because some of them were very caring individuals who were really very good at listening. Part of it was that we had very different world views. They tended to be more into feminism and social critique of reality type stuff and i found it hard to understand where they were coming from so i could relate to them in a way where i really felt like they understood me.

That was nice about dialogue. I had a therapist who took Linehan a little too literally and tried a Socratic dialogue with me once. She asked me what happiness was (one of my goals was to be happier) and I said I didn't know. She kept on at me until I gave her something... Then she showed how that wasn't right. So I (reluctantly) tried again. Then she showed how that wasn't right. That went on for a bit until I brought the whole thing around to the first definition (like Socrates tends to elicit from his interlocuter). She went 'hey you can't do that!!! now you have gone in a...' Then she got it. I miss her. But yeah, little moments of genuine emotion are priceless. They should do a credit card ad on that lol.