At the Border of Supervision: Critical Moments in Psychotherapists’ Development

Supervision in psychotherapy is a complex series of tasks for both supervisor and supervisee/therapist. At times, the anxiety experienced by the supervisees within a highly charged supervision can signal critical opportunities for their professional development. At these junctures, the supervisor’s understanding and interventions are not always sharply distinguished from the skills of the psychotherapist. Three cases of supervisory intervention into learning impasse are presented to illustrate the resemblance between the practice of psychotherapy and supervision. While supervision is not psychotherapy, a subset of listening and intervention skills are common to both.