A Tale of Mortality: Parts 1 & 2 | Clark Falconer | September 28, 2019

Part I is divided in four sections. The first section is an introduction to a “Tale of Mortality”. The second instalment involves a review of pertinent psychoanalytic themes: Freud’s Analysis Terminable and Interminable, Totem and Taboo; The Future of an Illusion; Steiner’s Psychic Retreats, and Winnicott’s Fear of Breakdown. The third segment is a summary of writings and relevant modern philosophical ideas that focus on Time and Aging. Here the focus is on Marcos Aurelius’ Meditations, and the work of Roberto Mangabeira Unger: The Singular Universe and the Reality of Time, along with The Self Awakened. The final section is the ending of the “Tale of Mortality”. Part II involves a case presentation of a man who began a ten year psychodynamically-informed supportive therapy at age 67.

---

Clark Falconer M.D. (1968) is a psychiatrist and psychodynamic therapist who did his postgraduate training at McMaster University and the Tavistock Clinic. A former Associate Professor at the University of Manitoba, there, among other clinical duties, he practiced, taught and supervised psychodynamic psychotherapy. He is a peer reviewed author of several scientific papers, a book chapter, and a novel Stepping on Little Ants. In private practice in Vancouver for the past 14 years, 8 as a Guest of the WBCPS, he arrived at his keen interest in his, and his patients’, aging process honestly.

Learning Objectives: At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

1. Enrich an understanding of the impact and place of aging on a therapist’s work and professional life;
2. Understand transference and counter-transference issues arising from the connections between a patient’s and the therapist’s aging;
3. Summarize the impact of Time and newer metaphysical ideas on present and future religious beliefs and ideas, and how they enrich the first two points.

 

^{Photo Credit: Jerry Zaslove – “Untitled”} 

SCIENTIFIC PROGRAM COMMITTEE: Karin Holland Biggs, Ph.D., FIPA. (Chair),  Elizabeth Wallace, MD, FIPA.

For further information please contact Program Chair: Karin Holland Biggs – khbiggs@telus.net