The webinar was conducted 6 January 2020, Wednesday where 185 students approximately of PSYH students from all three years of CHRIST (Deemed to be University),BGR campus + 4 teachers participated to discuss how one can use negative capability in psychotherapy and to gain an insight on how one can use negative capabilities to develop their psychotherapeutic skills.
Dr Anil Behal was the resource person for the webinar. He is the Chief Executive Officer of ORGDYNE Training and Consulting, LLC. His research interests include hermeneutic phenomenology, IPA, and grounded theory.
Dr Anil Jose started the session by diving into the origins of the term, ‘negative capability’. This term was first used by English Romantic poet, John Keats in the year 1817.He used this term only once or twice in a letter to his brother but 200 years later, this term became a canonical concept.
The term ‘negative capability’ is used to describe a psychotherapist’s capacity to be with uncertainty, mysteries and doubts without the irritable search for fact and reason. It is, according to Dr Anil Jose, a defining yet unsung feature of the
profession. He explained this concept further by talking about the main goal of therapy which in Dr Anil Jose’s opinion is to make the client feel better. When the therapist first meets the client, they don’t know what the client is dealing with. It is this capacity to stay with this lack of certainty. Then, he asked the attendees what the word ‘uncertainty’ meant to them.
He used this as an opportunity to interact with a number of students. After this, he went on to explain the practical applications of this concept. Therapists with this capability resist the impulse to react or explain what is going on with the client. This capacity of the therapist creates a negative space that is crucial for the therapeutic alliance to be established. When this happens, the therapist
can work with the client (as opposed to working at the client) to uncover the issues the client is facing. He also clarified that the word ‘negative’ in this context does not mean the opposite of positive. It denotes an open space the therapist creates. At this point, Sir started another discussion with the attendees. He wanted to know what this capability meant to us.
Many interesting points were brought across. To put the discussion in a nutshell, humans have a natural tendency to fill in the silence because they feel uncomfortable when there are pauses or gaps in a conversation. This tendency might help in taking the conversation forward; however, more often than not, certain important issues might go unaddressed because the individual wasn’t given the time or opportunity to express themselves or reflect on their emotions.
The crux of this discussion was that sometimes silence is the best response to a situation. Sir then spoke about Dr Diana Voller, a psychotherapist who has spoken about negative capability. She describes therapists as double agents – they are experts but sometimes they have to be comfortable with their own ignorance. Dr Anil Jose also spoke about certain challenges in practising negative capability. He said that a therapist has to learn to be patient before they can practice this capability. A therapist has to practice this ability consistently in order to create a truly open space for the client. Sir also introduced another term called reflective inaction. He described it as a conscious ability to sit with mysteries and ambiguity when the regressive pull is far too great. He describes this regressive pull as the impulse to theorise, hastily explain or offering diagnoses when the therapist is still not very clear about what is going on with the client.
After this, Sir finished with a quote, “Out of the mud of chaos, uncertainty and doubt, grows the lotus unstained as it were, by certitude and the doctrinaire of knowledge. Sir also answered doubts at the end of the session.
This session was highly interactive and engaging especially because it reinforced the importance of certain concepts we had already learnt about such as reflection, listening etc. The resource person was also very knowledgeable and amiable. He was ready to answer everyone’s questions and also had some lengthy discussions for a few questions. He even provided us with his contact information in case we wanted to reach out to him. He provided some additional sources we could refer to.