Even today people with training in modes of therapy that are more or less theoretically divorced from Freudianism will say that "Freud is the basis of all thera

Even today people with training in modes of therapy that are more or less theoretically divorced from Freudianism will say that "Freud is the basis of all therapy". He wasn't the first person to philosophize about the parts of the soul or the first person to offer therapy; but he was a very prolific writer and thinker early on in our attempts to bring a scientific understanding and therapeutic emphasis to what had previously been the province of religion and disinterested philosophers. It is undeniable that he failed in many significant ways, but three basic ideas to seem to hold up: * The transference and the counter-transference -- the patient projects on to the therapist and vice versa * The defense mechanisms -- methods by which people seek to escape not from their situation but from their feelings about it * The corrective emotional experience -- therapy provides a way, in part through the transference, for the patient to work through feelings that they otherwise deny themselves Freud had many crazy ideas, too -- and both he and his successors devoted far too much time and effort to these crazy ones. Quit when you are ahead.