Response to “Black Holes, Event Horizons, and Psychotherapy”
By Dr. Willard W. C. Ashley, Sr.
June 19, 2025
Dr. Sherry, this is brilliant.
You’ve taken what often feels like unspeakable weight in the therapy room and given it a cosmic metaphor that holds emotional gravity and scientific integrity. I’m especially struck by the image of our most painful experiences becoming “mass” inside personal black holes — accumulating quietly until one small moment tips everything.
Your reflection makes me think about the ways we, as clinicians, sit near these psychological event horizons — not always able to see what’s gone in, but watching for the distortions, the radiation, the Hawking residue that signals: something’s in there.
And you’re right: it often emerges scrambled. A sudden tone shift in group. A compulsive joke in the middle of a deep share. A frantic effort to rearrange the room — or the self.
I once had a patient say, “I don’t know why I’m reacting this way — it’s like a ghost walked through me.” Your piece reminds us that sometimes the ghosts aren’t dead, they’re just on the other side of the horizon, waiting for gravity and time to shift.
Looking forward to Part II. Something tells me wormholes and free association have more in common than most textbooks suggest.
Dr. Willard W. C. Ashley, Sr., D.Min., SCP, NCPsyA, is a psychoanalyst, pastor, educator, and author based in New Jersey. He writes at the intersection of race, spirituality, and relational psychotherapy. Learn more at yourpsychoanalyst.com.
Yeah, the metaphors work (even though not always so neatly ;). That quote of your patient's is chilling, a word that will also come up in Part II or III of this ;). I love what you say about us sitting near the Event Horizon, absolutely ! Like the astronaut in the picture ;)
I enjoyed this Deana Troy meets Spock perspective. 🥰
I’ve gotten good at sensing when my reaction doesn’t match the trigger, when I know that my brain is cross-pollinating the trauma. lol But even so, it always catches you off guard.
"pollinating the trauma"; I love that! Yeah, there's just so much we can do, but we do what we can! Sometimes it takes decades, but eventually, we get there.
And yes Deanna: The Goddess of Empathy ;) For several months, while watching them, I wore as many turquoise outfits as I could find ;).
I had fun writing this; glad you enjoyed. Part 2 and probably 3 soon ;). I took the basics from an old article I had written, made it more fun and playful, and found that there was still so much left over to work with. Coming up
LOL, I've seen them more recently than you, so I don't expect you to remember these details, but there was like a whole season of turquoise dresses, tights, shoes, headbands, almost every episode. I imagine you do remember the "Goddess of Empathy" reference ;)
Sherry: I love this -- I agree with Dr. Ashley below that it is briliant. It is not only psychoanalysis at its best, but there is also something spiritual about it. I also agree that we as clinicians hover around the rim of the event horizons and, sometimes, either through projective identification, or through evocation of some contents of our own mass, we are in the hole too. There are time/space dimension of which we are only dimly aware -- even when we visit them. Your cosmic methaphors touch the spirit as well asd the mind. Thank yoiu.
Thank you Mary Gail! I'm honored by your feedback. And I'm happy you enjoyed it. Actually, just after I published it, I was thinking about projective identification and how that's our version of becoming lost in the hole with them! Great minds think alike, especially when one has been trained by the other ;) You're right that we have our own mass, of course! I love that. And that will actually segue nicely into either Part II or III as well. I took the basic physics metaphors out of a short reaction article I wrote for an EGPS journal years ago. I made it more fun than my original piece. I also left tons for later essays because there's so much .
I'm honored that you found it spiritual as well; you know that IS how I think about so much of physics AND therapy ;)
Response to “Black Holes, Event Horizons, and Psychotherapy”
By Dr. Willard W. C. Ashley, Sr.
June 19, 2025
Dr. Sherry, this is brilliant.
You’ve taken what often feels like unspeakable weight in the therapy room and given it a cosmic metaphor that holds emotional gravity and scientific integrity. I’m especially struck by the image of our most painful experiences becoming “mass” inside personal black holes — accumulating quietly until one small moment tips everything.
Your reflection makes me think about the ways we, as clinicians, sit near these psychological event horizons — not always able to see what’s gone in, but watching for the distortions, the radiation, the Hawking residue that signals: something’s in there.
And you’re right: it often emerges scrambled. A sudden tone shift in group. A compulsive joke in the middle of a deep share. A frantic effort to rearrange the room — or the self.
I once had a patient say, “I don’t know why I’m reacting this way — it’s like a ghost walked through me.” Your piece reminds us that sometimes the ghosts aren’t dead, they’re just on the other side of the horizon, waiting for gravity and time to shift.
Looking forward to Part II. Something tells me wormholes and free association have more in common than most textbooks suggest.
⸻
Tags: #Psychotherapy #RelationalPsychoanalysis #BlackHoles #Trauma #GroupTherapy #NeuroscienceAndTherapy #DrSherryResponse #EmotionalGravity #HawkingAndHealing
Author Bio:
Dr. Willard W. C. Ashley, Sr., D.Min., SCP, NCPsyA, is a psychoanalyst, pastor, educator, and author based in New Jersey. He writes at the intersection of race, spirituality, and relational psychotherapy. Learn more at yourpsychoanalyst.com.
Thanks Dr Rev,
Yeah, the metaphors work (even though not always so neatly ;). That quote of your patient's is chilling, a word that will also come up in Part II or III of this ;). I love what you say about us sitting near the Event Horizon, absolutely ! Like the astronaut in the picture ;)
I enjoyed this Deana Troy meets Spock perspective. 🥰
I’ve gotten good at sensing when my reaction doesn’t match the trigger, when I know that my brain is cross-pollinating the trauma. lol But even so, it always catches you off guard.
Looking forward to part two.
"pollinating the trauma"; I love that! Yeah, there's just so much we can do, but we do what we can! Sometimes it takes decades, but eventually, we get there.
And yes Deanna: The Goddess of Empathy ;) For several months, while watching them, I wore as many turquoise outfits as I could find ;).
I had fun writing this; glad you enjoyed. Part 2 and probably 3 soon ;). I took the basics from an old article I had written, made it more fun and playful, and found that there was still so much left over to work with. Coming up
….hmmm… I do love all shades of turquoise lol
LOL, I've seen them more recently than you, so I don't expect you to remember these details, but there was like a whole season of turquoise dresses, tights, shoes, headbands, almost every episode. I imagine you do remember the "Goddess of Empathy" reference ;)
Sherry: I love this -- I agree with Dr. Ashley below that it is briliant. It is not only psychoanalysis at its best, but there is also something spiritual about it. I also agree that we as clinicians hover around the rim of the event horizons and, sometimes, either through projective identification, or through evocation of some contents of our own mass, we are in the hole too. There are time/space dimension of which we are only dimly aware -- even when we visit them. Your cosmic methaphors touch the spirit as well asd the mind. Thank yoiu.
Thank you Mary Gail! I'm honored by your feedback. And I'm happy you enjoyed it. Actually, just after I published it, I was thinking about projective identification and how that's our version of becoming lost in the hole with them! Great minds think alike, especially when one has been trained by the other ;) You're right that we have our own mass, of course! I love that. And that will actually segue nicely into either Part II or III as well. I took the basic physics metaphors out of a short reaction article I wrote for an EGPS journal years ago. I made it more fun than my original piece. I also left tons for later essays because there's so much .
I'm honored that you found it spiritual as well; you know that IS how I think about so much of physics AND therapy ;)