Between Us: A Psychotherapy Podcast

Lara Sheehi was doing her job as a professor of clinical psychology when her criticism of Israel catapulted her into uninvited infamy. Bad faith accusations of antisemitism, reliant on obfuscating political dissent with bigotry led to her investigation while reports from news outlets led to her being disinvited from speaking engagements, stalked, and protested. Despite a letter of support from Jewish colleagues that included giants in the field of psychoanalysis, the controversy split the field in two- those who knew her compassionate work on behalf of the oppressed and those who scapegoated her as a danger to psychoanalytic innocence. It is this myth of purity that shapes Lara’s theory and resistance to the veil of mutuality and dialogue, which she contends too often obstructs the very nature of our unequal material realities. Sheehi challenges us to be vigilant towards misrecognition, the not-so-unconscious ways in which we commit to logics of oppression, especially those of us who identify as healers. ----------- Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Sue Grand joins us for a conversation about hatred and totalitarianism. A psychoanalyst who has spent decades studying trauma and the ways evil reproduces across history, Grand is interested in how introspection might protect us and others from our own perpetrator fragments. She challenges the assumption that traumatized people victimize others—most do not. The regeneration of harm, she argues, arises from a complex interplay between psychological defenses and social structures such as gender binaries and racialization. But how do everyday people get caught up in the fevered swell of fascist times? Can psychotherapy be antifascist? Grand examines the erotic lure of fascism, while John and Mason explore Deleuze and Guattari’s provocative claim that, on some level, we all desire it. || Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely || Music by Mason Neely || Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll || Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com || Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com || Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod || Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast || YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Tony Bass is less concerned with building psychological metatheories than with how theory comes alive in the consulting room. From the earliest days of the Relational movement, he worked alongside Stephen Mitchell and others to shape a vision of treatment grounded in mutual influence, drawing inspiration from Ferenczi’s dialogue of unconsciouses—an approach Bass experiences as intuitive and “not so meta.” But whose unconscious is it, anyway? For Tony, the analytic encounter always points to interplay: between patient and analyst, healer and healed. In his view, psychotherapy is not the application of a fixed model but an ongoing improvisation, in which each subjectivity becomes instrumental to the unfolding of new meanings and unexpected revelations of both similarity and difference. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Roy Barsness returns to the show to discuss his new book, which establishes a psychodynamic model of clinical supervision. Steeped in relational psychoanalytic values, this approach offers not only a new way of thinking about supervision, but also a recapitulation of how this theory informs practice in the treatment room—and life in general. By considering each case a muse for both therapist and supervisor, Barsness invites emergent subjectivities into each relationship. Supervision becomes the framework for a path of encounter, with contemporary figures such as Mitchell and Benjamin lighting the way. Roy emphasizes the personal journey of the therapist as crucial to this modality, while Mason reflects with John on his own journey home and the persistent question of to whom we truly belong. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Jay Bakker joins us live from the International Forum for Psychoanalytic Education. As the child of the famous televangelists Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, Jay has always been surrounded by persistent narratives—even among therapists of every stripe. The pressures of life in the limelight from an early age led him to cope through addiction, especially after his parents faced a very public downfall. But when the Oscar-winning film The Eyes of Tammy Faye was released, Jay sought treatment once again—this time with a psychoanalytic psychotherapist. In a vulnerable conversation, in front of an audience of therapists, Jay shares how this treatment helped him better understand what his unconscious was doing to him, and how psychoanalysis has shaped his efforts to build a more hospitable theology as he strives to disagree well with those across ideologies. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Engineering by Ian Knippel Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Lynne Layton joins us for our most political conversation to date. Layton’s concept of the normative unconscious, which addresses the myriad of ways we all strive to maintain the status quo, has been influential to those who believe that the mind is shaped by social forces beyond the family. Racism and sexism play a central role, but these bigotries, that work to separate us and dominate some, also work in tandem with economic and political forces that seek to make us all subservient. Layton discusses the influence Erich Fromm had on her work, her critique of the neoliberal regime through a psychoanalytic lens, and how the controversies produced by such inquiries, are very much alive and well in a field that is capable of crying in terror at straw men like “wokeism” and “identity politics.” Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

As a child of Palestinian parents displaced to Beirut, Karim Dajani became interested in psychoanalysis at a young age. These days, he’s justifiably interested in the field’s own exiles, particularly Trigant Burrow, who theorized as early as the 1920’s that the unconscious is structured in concordance with the social world, only to be expelled from the APA shortly thereafter. Dajani explains how the field has time and time again, invested in the erasure of the social unconscious, in a misguided effort to keep psychoanalysis pure. His disillusionment with the institution lies in the contradiction- that as a business of scholarship and truth-making, its leaders strive to suppress the understanding that culture is an antecedent force that was working hard on us back when we were simply fantasies. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

This week, we continue our conversation with Eyal Rozmarin. If belonging is a powerful force compelling us to identify with groups, it follows that our collectives must imprint themselves on the foundation of our very subjectivity. Drawing on the work of Foucault and Giorgio Agamben, Rozmarin paints a portrait of personhood that is always in conflict between the warm acceptance of the State, and the terror of being cast out into the wilderness as bare life. But what if we were to transcend the Self? What does a liberated Subject look like? An ideology that positions the Self as always in transition would only echo what we should already know as therapists- that identity is transient, the Self is expansive, and that our borders, no matter how much we build walls, are permeable. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

In the premiere of season six, psychoanalyst Eyal Rozmarin joins our host John Totten to discuss the constitutive power of belonging. A native of Israel-Palestine, and an objector to his compulsory military service, Eyal has a unique take on the respective costs of belonging and its counterpart abandonment. From Oedipus to the superego, Freud is subverted here; Rozmarin posits it is not that society protects us from our own nature, but that belonging turns us into killers. Is it possible that our collectives are antithetical to the goals of psychotherapy and what is the implication for the treatment room? This and more is discussed in the first of a two-part conversation. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Orna Guralnik joins host John Totten in our season finale. When John discovered Orna’s show, Couples Therapy, it was a breath of fresh air as depictions of psychotherapy in media go. However, Orna’s presence as a protagonist who is not the main character raises all sorts of questions about disclosure and authority; the line between anonymity and transparency is curious territory for a televised analyst. Orna discusses with John her commitment to transference and the paradoxical places where her subjectivity shines through the analytic projection screen, including a particular confession of her Israeli heritage to a Palestinian patient. Fantasies abound here- of mutual recognition, of utopia, of separating ourselves from our violent collectives. And yet, while Orna lives in the tension between sovereignty and her associations, her work thrives when surrounded by those with incompatible histories. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Avgi Saketopoulou’s work challenges our notions about trauma and much more. Her concept of traumatophilia asks us to consider not what we do about our trauma but what we do with our trauma. These theories are profoundly disruptive to our therapeutic sensibilities- the value we place on safety and the import of language. Favoring Freud’s earlier, frenzied model of sexuality, Avgi draws connections from the erotic to the violent, providing a framework for understanding sadisms and the horrors happening in the world. As John and Mason discuss political violence and its psychoanalytic influence, Avgi dares us to rethink our investment in containment, pacification, and repair itself. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Donna Orange is a foundational figure in the world of intersubjective psychoanalysis. A philosopher-practitioner who carved out her niche as the radical ethicist of the field, she discovered the work of Emmanuel Levinas to provide an alternative to mutuality. His description of the hierarchy of intersubjective space, in which the Other is always primary, became integral to her progressive ethos. As John and Mason explore the limits of symmetry and the Zionism of their favorite thinkers, Donna discusses how her own violent origins might have led her to the Holocaust survivor Levinas, the respect she shares for Martin Buber, and the importance of good, ethical fun. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Lynne Jacobs joins us for our first ever live episode. In 2023, the International Forum for Psychoanalytic Education hosted John in Pasadena to interview Lynne for the conference theme, “…but is it psychoanalytic?” As a therapist with loyalties both in psychoanalysis and gestalt therapy, Lynne has much to say about the use of presence and emotional process in the treatment room. This focus has been particularly useful to her in cross-racial relationships, where she makes the case that it is important for white therapists to lean into their own racialized shame. Lynne discusses with John the journey that brought her to this stance, including her own treatments and the experience of losing her analyst, Daphne Stolorow, in the midst of their work- a loss into which John now shares some insight. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Engineered by Ian Knippel Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Website: www.betweenuspodcast.com Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Steven Kuchuck was taught by classical psychoanalysis that his subjectivity was an artifact to bury. However, through his interest in social responsibility he found a relational revolution, and a promising way for therapists to stay more alive in the room. As a dedicated guardian of the contemporary perspective, he speaks with John about the importance of examining the humanity in all of us, including the darkness that lurks in our dissociated corners and the supposed bad guys we lose when excommunicated from the psychoanalytic lineage. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely
 Music by Mason Neely
 Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com
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Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod/
YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Nancy McWilliams is a renowned psychologist with many foundational books to her name. Her work has been particularly groundbreaking to psychoanalytic psychotherapists in reshaping how practitioners all over the world think about diagnosis and personality. In an extensive conversation, she discusses the beginnings of her career, how her personal tragedies appeared in her own analysis, and the faith she has in this iterative process that can withstand change due to its unique capacity for making challenges into grist for the mill. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely
 Music by Mason Neely
 Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast/
Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod/
YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

Mick Cooper is a British existentialist who is most interested in how humanistic psychology can play a role in social change. As a leader in pluralistic psychotherapy, he is wary of the monoliths we espouse even down to the most basic concepts that the relationship is curative. In this week’s episode, he discusses how research has made him more open to difference, the influence of Emmanuel Levinas and Martin Buber, and his own development through therapy, ever closer to dancing in the proverbial rain. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast/ Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod/ YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

For Kj Swanson, an upbringing in Christian purity culture did not metabolize as trauma. It wasn’t until her queer awakening that she realized just how much it aligned with her identity. As an academic working in theology, Kj has always been interested in the heart of matters. This week, she discusses with John the various ways this commitment to meaning permeates her entire personality, including an emerging language signaling her place apart from compulsory sexuality. Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely
 Music by Mason Neely
 Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast/
Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod/
YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ

For our first guest in years, John speaks with his friend Caleb Williams, a fellow psychotherapist in Seattle. Over dinner, they discuss Caleb’s affinity to the British psychoanalyst Neville Symington, their thoughts on narcissism and the neediness of masculinity. Less of an interview and more a study in the relationship of friend/colleague, John and Caleb reminisce about their own camaraderie and make meaning of the current discourse as two oldest brothers grappling with their own ambivalence. Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast/
Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod/
 Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely
 Music by Mason Neely
 Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll

In the premiere of season five, our host John Totten checks in with co-producer Mason Neely as they reflect on the last season of Between Us, the hiatus that followed, and the boundaries of the therapeutic purview. In a meandering conversation, John and Mason look inward at their own creative and family lives and forward to the upcoming season, a collection of dialogues and reflections that, in spite of an aimless production, emerged as far more thematic than intended. 
Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast/
Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod/
YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely
Music by Mason Neely
Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll

In the finale of our fourth season, John discusses therapeutic stance with Dr. Anton Hart who views openness as a key component of healing in the treatment room, especially in regard to societal trauma. Dr. Hart makes the case that foreknowledge is in opposition to curiosity and that curiosity is necessary to introduce new prospects to the therapeutic relationship. As a psychoanalyst, teacher and co-producer of the documentary Black Psychoanalysts Speak, Anton has a unique perspective on the usefulness of our language and how important it is to embrace complexity in a process that, when conducted with a posture of openness and curiosity, leads down endless paths of possibility. Support: www.patreon.com/betweenus Contact: betweenuspodcast@gmail.com Facebook: www.facebook.com/betweenuspodcast/ Twitter: twitter.com/BetweenUsPod Instagram: www.instagram.com/betweenuspod/ YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UC4pPUTf_wRjNxHcCsFJoSSQ Produced by John Totten and Mason Neely Music by Mason Neely Research Assistant: Rose Bergdoll