The body

Abstract

This paper embarks on a consideration of the role of the body in psychoanalytic theory and practice.In particular, starting from Freud’s reflections on the telepathic experience, the characteristics of the analyst’s receiving apparatus are examined, as well as the ways in which the presence of the other is perceived, and on how this experience of meeting can be taken in and commu-nicated. Analogizing the notion of the talking cure to the activity of chimney-sweeping, the necessity of the analyst «getting his hands dirty» is noted, if he truly wants to accompany his patient in exploring the unconscious. In this regard, alongside reflectionsbased on traditional analytic practice, considerations derived from a psychotherapy are examined, namely, «Psychotherapy of Relaxation » in the tradition of Ajuriaguerra’s thinking, subsequently developed by the French psychoanalytic school as psychoanalytic psychotherapy (bodily PPC).