This is great critique from Bruce Fink of the valorisation of intuition in therapeutic practice, arguing these are simply unexamined theoretical assumptions:
“Intuition” is nothing but a sense one has or a guess one makes that is based on unarticulated, unexamined notions that one has assimilated in the course of one’s lifetime;16 and commonly heard phrases about life and people in our culture bring a whole, albeit unacknowledged, metapsychology with them, some of which comes from Freud, some from a raft of other sources.
A Clinical Introduction to Freud: Techniques for Everyday Practice, Loc 224
To rely only on everyday language is simply to resort to unanalyzed, unarticulated theory, which usually turns out to be bad theory, in the sense that it is rife with prejudices and stereotypes. One is always already functioning within a theory or relying on a grab bag of assorted (and potentially mismatched) theoretical notions. So-called ordinary language has its own genius but also its own demons.
A Clinical Introduction to Freud: Techniques for Everyday Practice, Loc 246
I entirely agree with the point he’s making here. But it did get me reflecting on my own tendency to invoke my ‘intuition’ in decision making. Over the last couple of years I’ve learned to recognise and trust the intuitions I have, finding they nearly always lead me in the right direction. In group settings at work I suspect the terminology might grate sometimes, particularly for those who hear me say it a lot.
My sense is that it’s nonetheless useful that I usually have a suggestion about what we could do about a problem or how we could move things forward. In the process of the doing, I become more articulate about the intuition and why it’s occurred to me. But recognising that initial, inarticulate flash provides knowledge which I otherwise wouldn’t have in the moment. There’s a risk that taking Fink’s observation too far would deprive us of the ability to raid the inarticulate, to paraphrase Eliot.
Mark Carrigan 