Tome XVIII, no. 1 - 2025 (9)

Editorial / Gabriel Balaci

Abstract: This issue of the Romanian Journal of Psychoanalysis is cantered on the theme of Intuition. Although not a concept specific to psychoanalytic theory or clinical work, intuition, as a psychic phenomenon, is quite present in the analyst’s work. The articles in this issue offer various approaches to intuition, with clinical vignettes serving as clarifying examples of how intuition can be used in the analytic process.Read moreKeywords: .

1 - ARGUMENT on the theme INTUITION / Georgiana Dobrescu

Abstract: This year’s theme, proposed by the Romanian Journal of Psychoanalysis, refers to the phenomenon of intuition in its dual meaning: both as a means of psychic knowledge and as an extremely valuable working tool for the psychoanalyst. In the Oxford Dictionary, intuition is defined as: “the ability to know something by using your feelings rather than considering the facts; an idea or a strong feeling that something is true although you cannot explain why”. Read moreKeywords: .

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2 - FORESIGHT, FOREKNOWLEDGE, FORETHOUGHT / Stefano Bolognini

Abstract: This work explores some aspects of the attempt at subjective prediction, taking into account the inevitable oscillation between physiological and pathological modes of functioning, which to some extent are common to all human beings, but which beyond a certain level of regression or functional excitement can unbalance the reality-ego structure. Read moreKeywords: prediction, precognition, fantasy, omnipotence, illusion, intuition, creativity.

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3 - THINKING THE DEATH ANXIETY WHEN WORKING WITH HOSPITALIZED PATIENTS IN TERMINAL STAGES Dreaming the Undreamt Thoughts / Georgiana Dobrescu

Abstract: n this paper, the author explores a special type of emotional experiences which is difficult to process it, to contain and dream about, and sometimes even impossible. These experiences bring forth death anxiety and multiple defences for the one who lives them, but also for those who are beside him/her. What is specific to this working-through towards the anxiety of death is related to the setting and the place where the analytical work takes place – the general clinical hospital – and to the type of patients with whom one works – patients with chronic conditions in the terminal stage. In this sense, the author presents how, alongside an interdisciplinary team, she carries out the psychoanalytic work with hospitalized patients in the terminal stage. In the final part of the paper, the author highlights, from her point of view, her own insights that can help both the specialist and the person in suffering to be capable of doing the work of containing the anxiety of death. Read moreKeywords: dreaming process, reverie, death anxiety, loss, palliative care, hospitalized patients

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4 - IMMERSION AND INTUITION Reverie and reflection in relational film analysis / Andreas Hamburger

Abstract: Intuition, sometimes defined as ‘instinctive knowledge’, is by no means an innate instinct. We acquire it in the field of the early dyad and develop it further in later phases, well into adulthood. In the analytical field it becomes an important, if sometimes deceptive, element. The paper applies this interpersonal model of intuition to the cinematic artwork and its analytical interpretation from a specific methodological viewpoint, that will be presented as a field theoretic re-definition of relational psychoanalysis. Read moreKeywords: psychoanalytical field theory, interpersonal psychoanalysis, interpersonal turn, Lacan, deconstruction, Bion, developmental psychoanalysis, spectatorship

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5 - INTUITION, REVERY AND TRANSFORMATION IN THE PSYCHOANALYTICAL RELATION / Daniela Luca

Abstract: In the present work, the author, following the thread of the concept of psychoanalytic intuition, proposes a dialogue between the perspective of Wilfred Ruprecht Bion and those of some post-Bionian psychoanalysts (Howard B. Levine, Thomas H. Ogden, Antonino Ferro, Rudy Vermote, Judy K. Eekhoff), highlighting in particular mental processes such as observation, intuition, reverie and transformation (alpha function). How can we think about the connection between observation and intuition? Or between reverie and intuition? Could the analyst's mental state of observation and receptivity/notation have at its center - before and beyond the sensory - the analyst's capacity for intuition? The author also presents vignettes from her clinical experience, illustrating how daydreaming is an evolution of psychoanalytic intuition and that intuition appears between caesuras, which is supported in particular by Bion's proposal of the analyst's self-discipline, "without memory, without desire, without prior understanding", respectively his negative capacity. Read moreKeywords: alpha function, daydreaming, negative capacity, \\

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6 - INTUITION IN PSYCHOANALYTIC PRACTICE: ANOTHER MISUNDERSTANDING IN THE READING OF BION? / Antonio Pérez-Sánchez

Abstract: his paper explores the author’s perspective on intuition in psychoanalytic practice,expanding on his previous study of misunderstandings in the interpretation of Bion's work. Bion’semphasis on revealing the non-visible aspects of psychic reality can lead to misinterpretations when hisideas are read too literally, neglecting the role o observable elements. While intuition is a crucial toolfor accessing the patient's psychic truth, there is a risk of overvaluing it, if sensoriality and rationalityare not considered components of the analytical relationship, leading to an inadequate perception of it.Clinical material is presented to illustrate how intuition emerges during the evolution of an analyticalsession. Read moreKeywords: Intuition, Bion, misunderstanding, psychoanalytic practice.

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7 - ON UNHEIMLICH - THE UNCANNY The obscure feeling / Anna Ferruta

Abstract: This work explores some aspects of the roots and development of our psychic functioning: anunstable Gestalt, generating a need for certainty, and each subject’s multiple identity.The author has as a reference, the Freud’s work ‘The Uncanny’’. Freud describes ‘Unheimlich’ as anobscure feeling, a type of fright that leads back to something that has been known a long time ago andwhich reappears, arousing horror and allure, like something that cannot really be distanced from.Something unknown and on the other hand, too well known: an unpleasant perception, which is pushedaway but immediately bounces back and must be recognised: it is not me/it is me. Simultaneous negationand affirmation, distance and uncanny closeness, at once.This’’ it is me/it is not me’’ reflects the lability of the ego’s boundaries, between the ego and the world,between the oneself and self-otherness and a coexistence of opposites inside oneself through multipleconfigurations, first of all the Double. Read moreKeywords: Uncanny, unknown, the Double, otherness, boundaries, multiple identity

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8 - CYNICISM, A HASTY MESSENGER OF THANATOS / Brînduşa Orăşanu

Abstract: The paper aims to address cynicism as a variant of cruelty in thinking. Cynicism would be,on the one hand, in a kinship relation with narcissistic perversion, distortion of reality and operativethinking and on the other hand, in a relation of defensive opposition with mourning, ideal, beauty andpoetic function. A particular relation of cynicism with the mental space and time is set forth, in anaction of "contraction" of the latter in order to control it. Cynicism is seen as an «ideology of thelimit», at the extreme, the cruel limit of life and death. As an illustration of this idea, comparativereferences are made to several movies: “Life Is Beautiful” directed by Roberto Benigni, “Ivan'schildhood” directed by Andrei Tarkovsky and “The Messenger” directed by Oren Moverman, as wellas in the novel “Everything Is Illuminated” by J.S. Foer. The paper also sets forth two clinicalvignettes. Read moreKeywords: cynicism, narcissistic perversion, limit, contracting space, contracting time, mourning.

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