Psychodynamic Therapy (brief and long-term)

The purpose of psychodynamic therapy is to help people become aware of their deep-seated, unconscious thoughts and inner world and connect these to their emotional and behavioural problems, both in past and current relationships. It places a great emphasis on one's early experiences and relationships and explores how these have contributed to and impacted on the individual's personality and emotional developments and attachment styles to other people. You may benefit from this type of therapy if you find that you had a difficult relationship with one of your main caretakers as a child and this affected your ability to form functional, fulfilling and long-lasting relationships with others later on. You may also benefit from it if you have experienced a loss of meaning in your life or you are seeking a greater sense of fulfilment. Psychodynamic psychotherapy might be of brief duration, but generally it tends to be a long-term treatment, which involves a lot of commitment for both patient and therapist. The therapeutic relationship is very significant, because the unconscious patterns of your inner world can be re-enacted in the relationship with your therapist (transference). This experience will help you to gradually recognise and understand these unhelpful patterns and change them over time. In turn, you can emotionally mature, feel more content with yourself and make significant changes in your relationships with other people.