What brings you here today? That’s how he always begins his intake sessions. Fans of the cranky Viennese hold that you should sit quietly and let the client lead. But in this, he thinks, they are mistaken, or at least overzealous, as in a host of other concerns. In the night class he teaches, Introduction to the Principles of Therapy, he quarrels with them, and perhaps also with the therapeutic enterprise as a whole.

She took her time.

Somebody spiked my drink.

Someone put a drug in your drink?

She nodded: I sat down for a drink with a friend at the club. Then I got up to dance. Suddenly my head began spinning. I felt nauseous. I didn’t know where I was. I started sweating. I felt I was going crazy. I couldn’t breathe. I thought I was dying. I ran outside. One of the girls, a friend of mine, took me home. Since then I can’t dance there anymore.

So what? he asked and immediately chided himself; too early to confront the client like this. It is useful and customary to wait, establish rapport. But his patience has been waning recently, and at any rate, those who suffer from anxiety convince themselves that some disaster is approaching. This very conviction is of course their real disaster, which tortures them and destroys their lives.

She squinted: So what?

He nodded: Your drink was spiked and you can’t go dancing in the club. So what?

I have to dance.

You like to dance at clubs.

I need to dance. For money. I’m a dancer at a nightclub.

A stripper.

A dancer.

He looked at her again. Dark raven eyes wide open; freckled upturned nose. Old acne scars dot her pale face. She looked at him. Here is a crucial moment, he thought. She is checking to see if I will judge or patronize her. He knew he would pass this test. He doesn’t judge his clients, doesn’t compete with them, and doesn’t carry their load. This position is fundamental to his therapeutic approach. He is very proud of it.

Eager therapists, the people-persons who drip with goodwill and sympathy, theirs is a false promise, and theirs is a wounding touch, he will say later in class. A therapist who rushes to help forgets to listen, and therefore cannot understand, and therefore cannot see. The eager therapist, the one who’s determined to offer salvation, involves himself and seeks his own salvation. The good psychologist keeps his distance and does not involve himself in the results of his work. The right distance allows a deep and clear gaze. The good psychologist reserves the business of closeness for family members and beloved pets and leaves the business of salvation to religious officials and street corner eccentrics.