IJSP Number 4, 2022

38 In therapy and clinical supervision the focus is on the relationship. The consideration of the relationship has fortunately strongly increased in the recent past, as the increase in corresponding publications show [5]. However, another level comes into play when we look at supervision. The challenges that arise for the supervisees in the relationship-centred work with their clients become the object of reflection and learning in supervision in another relationship constellation, that between them and their supervisors. We are convinced that this constellation should also be considered as a relationship-centred one, even if at first glance other aspects (s uch as the supervisor’ s lead in terms of experience and knowledge and other competencies) seem to be dominant. However, the challenges are not simply the same as in the supervisee-client relationship because the tasks, power fields and interpersonal dynamics are different. Nevertheless, there are definitely interrelations between the two realms that deserve attention. Let’ s start with three main different meanings of relationship-centring in the psychotherapeutic context: In therapy, attention and activity can be centred on different relational spheres: 1. The patient ’ s relationships with others in everyday life that become a topic in therapy; 2. The p atient’s relationship with her or himself; 3. The patient ’ s relationship with the therapist. These different relational spheres are in close interaction with each other: For example, if a person has repeatedly had unpleasant experiences in relationships in his life, this will have an effect on his self-relationship [6]. If this person enters psychotherapeutic treatment, these experiences will inevitably flow also into the relationship with the psychotherapist. As is well known, this is also a therapeutic opportunity: If this transfer is noticed and worked on, negative experiences from other relationships can be processed constructively in the relationship with the therapist. When, in what form, with what effects these various relationship spheres may appear and become effective in the context of therapy is neither random nor arbitrary: It depends on a great many conditions and not all of these conditions are subject to potential therapeutic influence. Often centring shifts are unnoticed: For example, patient and therapist may repeatedly analyse the subject of the patient ’ s difficulties with a colleague at work, which may be about envy, inferiority, helplessness, or the like, and thereby fail to recognize that similar ways of experiencing have long determined the relationship to each other in the therapeutic relationship. However, the patient and the therapist can also deliberately and consciously determine whether one of the above relationship spheres should be addressed and worked on in a certain situation and in a certain phase of the therapeutic process. Here, too, we have two global spheres (and on both sides, that of the supervisee as well as that of the supervisor, although with certain differences): The processes and problems in the work of the supervisee with his client and the processes and problems in the work of the supervisee with his supervisor. In regard to the supervisee ’ s work with his client, the focus of attention may be directed, for example, to the following questions: