Corrective Emotional Experience in the Therapeutic Process

David Hartman, MSW and Diane Zimberoff, M.A. *
Abstract: While we are using Alexander’s work as a beginning point for this analysis of
corrective emotional experience in the therapeutic process, we extend the concept beyond
the level of ego experience (emotion, memory, and cognition) to that of Self or Soul experience (the transpersonal realms of collective unconscious, subtle energy, and the spirit world). Our analysis is grounded on the basic premise of our developmental theory, which is existential, transcendent, and karmic. Healing unresolved traumas from early life requires accessing the events that produced the trauma,re - experiencing them cathartically in the original ego state, and reframing the meaning of the experience through corrective emotional experiences. We identify more than twenty types of corrective experiences, and suggest that they all fit into one of three categories: (1) building ego strength through release of shame and reclaiming worthiness; (2) building agency through release of helplessness and reclaiming personal power; and (3) building authenticity through release of dissociation and identification and reclaiming self-reflective identity.
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