"Let's Dance!":

Origins, Development, and Implications of Vitality

An Online Study Group Facilitated by

Cynthia Mulder, LCSW & John Kearney

Instructional Level: Beginning to Advanced

Vitality is considered a manifestation of life, of being alive (Stern, 2010). While most of us have an embodied, intuitive sense of aliveness or deadness in our daily interactions and clinical processes, few of us have systematically studied the concept of vitality. Though the concept remains largely undertheorized in psychoanalysis, there is some available literature on the topic. Study group members will read and discuss articles about forms of vitality, its developmental origins in rhythm, motion, temporality, affect attunement, etc., and the implications of vitality, or lack of vitality, in our clinical process. The group registration will be limited to 23 people (the number who can be seen on one computer screen along with the facilitators), in order to facilitate a lively engagement (vitality!) in our discussions. Group participants are encouraged to share case examples from their own practices. Journal articles will be sent to participants. Participants must obtain their own copies of Daniel Stern’s book, Forms of Vitality: Exploring Dynamic Experience in Psychology, the Arts, Psychotherapy, and Development (Oxford, 2010). 

A Note from the HPS Program Chair: This study group is intended to provide a foundational understanding of the concept of vitality in psychoanalysis. The concept of vitality underlies virtually all of our programs this year, most directly the following: (1) a conference and panel discussion on 9/14/24 addressing vitality in human development and vitalization in psychoanalytic treatment, featuring Stephen Seligman, Anne Alvarez, and Christopher Bonovitz, (2) a conference on vitality as a theoretical and technical parameter in psychoanalysis by Giuseppe Civitarese on 10/19/24, and (3) a book discussion on 02/20/25 of Vitalization in Psychoanalysis, edited by Amy Schwartz Cooney and Rachel Sopher.***JoAnn Ponder, PhD

Cynthia Mulder, LCSW is a psychotherapist and psychoanalyst in private practice in Houston, Texas. She is an assistant professor at Baylor College of Medicine, faculty and secretary of the Center for Psychoanalytic Studies, and past-president of the Houston Psychoanalytic Society. She earned a master’s degree from Smith College of Social Work in Northampton, Massachusetts. In 2005, she worked as a family therapist at the Austen Riggs Center in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. In 2010 she joined the Menninger Clinic as an individual, group and family therapist. Ms. Mulder began facilitating Brené Brown’s curriculum on shame, vulnerability and authenticity - The Daring WayTM to patients at Menninger and training clinicians across the country. In 2013 she was appointed Menninger’s Director of Education and Training where she oversaw clinical training programs, directed the Social Work Fellowship, coordinated Family Education Day, and organized the clinic’s local and national continuing education activities. Ms. Mulder has presented nationally about shame resilience and suicide and has been an invited presenter at APsA. She was the recipient of two awards at Menninger: The Arthur Mandlebaum Award for Excellence in Social Work Education and the Jon G. Allen Distinguished Educator Award.

John Kearney is a clinical Social Worker (BSW) and psychoanalytic psychotherapist in full-time private practice in Sydney, Australia. Prior to his private practice, he worked in a range of government and non-government organizations, including providing assessments of, and community-based treatment to, adolescent delinquents; assessment and treatment of adult patients with co-morbid mental health and substance abuse disorders; and assessment and treatment of youth and adults with harmful sexual behaviors. He has post-graduate qualifications in psychology, adult psychodynamic psychotherapy and child-adolescent psychoanalytic psychotherapy. In his private practice, he sees children, adolescents, couples and families. He also provides independent expertise to the courts (NSW Children’s Court and Family Court), government and non-government organizations in relation to parenting capacity, developmental trauma, and the assessment and treatment of children and adults who engage in harmful sexual behaviors. He has a clinical interest in attachment trauma, developmental psychopathology, forensic psychotherapy, and complex bereavement-- all of which relate to the absence, impairment or distortions of the capacity for aliveness/vitality.

Reference list compiled by JoAnn Ponder, PhD with helpful suggestions from Stephen Seligman, DMH & John Kearney

August 27, 2024

Forms of Vitality

Objectives

1. Describe 3 forms of vitality.
2. State 5 adjectives indicative of vitality.

Stern, D. N. (2010). Part I: Introduction and background. In D. N. Stern, Forms of vitality: Exploring dynamic experience in psychology, the arts, psychotherapy, and development. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 1-72.

September 3, 2024

Foundational Psychoanalytic Contributions to the Concept of Vitality

Objectives

1. Briefly summarize some early contributions to the concept of vitality in psychoanalysis.
2. Briefly describe the psychodynamics of Green’s concept of the dead mother.

Trevarthen, C. (2019). Sander’s life work, on mother-infant vitality and the emerging person. Psychoanalytic Inquiry, 39: 22-35.

Seligman, S. (2018). Forms of vitality and other integrations: Daniel Stern’s contributions to the psychoanalytic core. Relationships in development: Infancy, intersubjectivity, and attachment. New York: Routledge, pp. 240-248.

Hamilton, V. (2001) Foreward. In J. Edwards (Ed.), Being alive: Building on the work of Anne Alvarez. New York: Brunner-Routledge, pp. xiii-xxii.

Green, A. (1986/2003). The dead mother. In A. Green, On private madness. London: Karnac, pp. 142-173.

September 10, 2024

“I Got Rhythm”: The Origins of Vitality in Early Rhythmical Experience

Objectives

1. Describe how rhythm affect the quality of mental links.
2. Describe how motion influences object relations

Stern, D. N. (2010). When do vitality forms begin? A developmental view. In D. N. Stern, Forms of vitality: Exploring dynamic experience in psychology, the arts, psychotherapy, and development. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 101-117.

Trevarthen, C. (2005). First things first: Infants make good use of the sympathetic rhythm of imitation, without reason or language. Journal of Child Psychotherapy, 31: 91-113.

Maiello, S. (2001). On temporal shapes: The relation between primary rhythmical experience and the quality of mental links. In J. Edwards (Ed.), Being alive: Building on the work of Anne Alvarez. New York: Brunner-Routledge, pp. 179-194.

Seligman, S. (2018). Forms in motion: A personal view of object relations. Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 28: 47-58.

September 17, 2024

How Time Flies! Temporality, Affect Attunement, and the Development of Vitality

Objectives

1. Describe how affect attunement contributes to the sense of self.
2. Describe how temporality contributes to the sense of a lively future.

Stern, D. N. (1985). The sense of a subjective self: Affect attunement. In The interpersonal world of the infant: A view from psychoanalysis and developmental psychology. New York: Basic Books, pp. 138-161.

Seligman, S. (2018). Coming to life in time: Temporality, early deprivation, and the sense of a lively future. Relationships in development: Infancy, intersubjectivity, and attachment. New York: Routledge, pp. 215-239.

Bonovitz, C. (2021). What makes time fly? Loewald’s concept of time and the resuscitation of vitality. In A. S. Cooney & R. Sopher (Eds.), Vitalization in psychoanalysis: Perspectives on being and becoming. New York: Routledge, pp. 257-274.

September 24, 2024

Vitality in Psychoanalytic Treatment

Objectives

1. State several implications of vitality for clinical theory and practice.
2. Give an example of how the analyst’s affect can help in cases of “gridlock” or blindspots.

Stern, D. N. (2010). What implications do forms of vitality have for clinical theory and practice? In D. N. Stern, Forms of vitality: Exploring dynamic experience in psychology, the arts, psychotherapy, and development. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 119-150.

Ferguson, H. (2018). The analyst’s affect: The way back from gridlock, blindspots, and loss of vitality. Psychoanalysis, Self, and Context, 13: 6-12.

Cartwright, D. (2020). “What if” dimensions of the analytic field: Imagination, object vitality, and psychic growth. Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 30: 283-290.

Additional References (Supplemental articles not provided)

Alvarez, A. (1980). Two regenerative situations in autism: Reclamation and becoming vertebrate. Journal of Child Psychotherapy, 6: 69-80.

Harrison, A. M. & Beebe, B. (2018). Rhythms of dialogue in infant research and child analysis: Implicit and explicit forms of therapeutic action. Psychoanalytic Psychology, 35: 367-381.

Seligman, S. (2019). Louis Sander and contemporary psychoanalysis: Nonlinear dynamic systems, developmental research, clinical process and the search for core principles. Psychoanalytic Inquiry, 39: 15-21.

Trevarthen, C. (2014). Remembering Daniel Stern: 16 August 1934-12 November 2012. Attachment: New Directions in Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy, 8: 113-116.

Yerushalmi, H. (2023). Vitality and the perception of movement in supervision. IJP Open - Open Peer Review and Debate, 9: 1-24.

IMAGE of musical notes from Shutterstock

APA Accreditation Statement

Houston Psychoanalytic Society is approved by the American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists. Houston Psychoanalytic Society maintains responsibility for this program and its content.

HPS, through co-sponsorship with the Center for Psychoanalytic Studies, also offers approved CEUs for Texas state-approved social workers, licensed professional counselors, and marriage and family therapists.