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I NEED A GUIDE by Sandy Silverman

Early in the pandemic, I realized that what I needed was an instruction book that would tell me how to survive. I pictured it, a guide tailored to my personal needs, the first section titled How to be a Psychotherapist…

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CRAZIES by Naomi Janowitz

Naomi Janowitz is a graduate of the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis. Her articles have appeared in the American Journal of Psychoanalysis and Psychoanalytic Psychology. She teaches Religious Studies at the University of California, Davis. Her most recent book is…

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BLACK AND BLUE by Lee Jenkins

We talk about the blues as sadness and transcendence of sadness. As an American Black, my experience tells me that it certainly seems to be both of these things simultaneously—contradictory things existing together, something we psychoanalysts know about. To me…

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Poems Photo by Kunal Shinde

THERE IS MORE TO LIFE, THERE IS MORE, by Ayşe Tekşen

Ayşe Tekşen lives in Ankara, Turkey, where she works as a research assistant at the Department of Foreign Language Education, Middle East Technical University. Her work has been included in Brickplight, the Willow Literary Magazine, Fearsome Critters, Susan, the Broke…

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CLOSE UP by Hattie Myers

“An urgent sense of the possible contributed to my pursuit of psychoanalytic training over a decade ago, back when CO2 levels were still below 400 ppm. At the time, my analyst and my own analysis were introducing me to an…

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Essays Illustration by Mafe Izaguirre

WORD, VOICE, BODY by William F. Cornell

As an article or essay that I am writing is nearing completion, I take the essential step of reading it aloud to myself. I have found that this practice helps me identify phrases, sentences, or paragraphs that feel awkward in…

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A NEW THING UNDER THE SUN by Susan Kassouf

An urgent sense of the possible contributed to my pursuit of psychoanalytic training over a decade ago, back when CO2 levels were still below 400 ppm. At the time, my analyst and my own analysis were introducing me to an…

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FROM BEIRUT TO SAN FRANCISCO by Karim Dajani

“AWASSNI, AWASSNI.” The man screamed these words before letting out a guttural cry. Awassni is Arabic for “he shot me.” It had been some years since the war began, and most of us had learned to distinguish sound more keenly.…

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ASSISTED PASSAGE by Jo Wright

The news photos—the bulky container ship straddled across the straight blue gash cut through yellow sands—prompted memories of my wonder and curiosity when, as an eight-year-old in June 1956, I gazed down from the deck of the P&O liner Strathaird…

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OF FRUIT AND COVID by Santiago Delboy

I stood in front of the granadillas for what felt like an eternity, holding an empty plastic bag in my right hand and a shopping basket in my left. (A granadilla is a small South American fruit, with a round…

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Art © Jacqueline Shatz

THE GESTURE AND THE MEANING by Jacqueline Shatz

Jacqueline Shatz’s work has been included in exhibitions at the June Kelly, Monique Knowlton, and Kouros galleries in New York City, and she has curated and organized many exhibitions, including CollageLogic which was last presented in 2012 at Hampden Gallery…

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RADICAL OPENNESS, PART II

Anton: The concept of loss or losing is important because it speaks to the ways that opening oneself up and allowing oneself to be moved is not just a benign thing to do; it involves relaxing one’s grasp of what…

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Essays Illustration by Bibadash /Shutterstock.com | Edited by Mafe Izaguirre

REMAINING TO BE SEEN by Umi Chong

It is Tuesday at 4:00 pm, and it is time for Ben, a white man in his early thirties. He often refers to himself as “strange” for feeling out of step in not holding popular, mainstream views like most of…

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Essays Red Frame by Mafe Izaguirre

REFRAMED by Celeste Kelly

“I was thinking to myself, I can’t wait to tell them. They’re going to be so excited!” Or maybe the patient didn’t say excited—maybe they used a different word. I can’t exactly remember because my mind got stuck on them/they’re.…

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MOVING BOUNDARIES by Dinah M. Mendes

Many of us have had the experience of standing in front of the window of a hospital’s newborn nursery, a partition that simultaneously protects and allows visitors to gaze at the variety of human life displayed within. The tiny creatures,…

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