IJSP Number 5, 2023

27 the possibility that the repeated enactment of unmet relational needs may indicate that the supervisee would benefit by engaging in their own psychotherapy. Question two: “How do the different needs identified by both the supervisee and the client influence the form and direction of psychotherapy?” The movement from Level 1 to Level 2 involves an elaboration of our supervisory focus in Level 1. We gradually increase our inquiry about both the supervisee’s and their clients’ feelings, needs, beliefs, and behaviours to identify areas of therapeutic attention. We do not intend to turn the supervisee session into a psychotherapy session; our intent is to heighten the supervisee’s awareness of both their own and their clients’ internal processes and behaviours. We have found that the difficulties that continue to arise in our supervisee’s therapeutic interactions can stem from a failure to inquire and explore their client’s internal sensations and early childhood experiences. At this second level, we emphasize the supervisee gaining mastery in their capacity to use phenomenological and historical inquiry and to respond with acknowledgement, validation, and normalization. We have a strategy, a general plan of action, that we employ in this second level that includes: Breaking down the problem and specifying how the supervisee is affected by their client is a crucial supervision task. Typical questions we ask are, "If you could go back in time, when was the moment that you might not have identified what your client needed in relationship with you.”; “Is there any possibility that in providing psychotherapy to your client that your relational needs are dominating the therapeutic process?". We are always alert to the possibility of countertransference and are mindful that the relational needs of the supervisee may provide either benefits and disruptions in their practice of psychotherapy [13]. Identifying the components of the problem is another crucial task. We want to help the supervisee define their personal experience in the therapy process. We may invite the supervisee to describe in detail their own phenomenological experience, to express any emotions that they might have been containing, and to provide a place to explore options in their work with clients. Emphasizing the critical components of the problem involves identifying the supervisee’s possible misattunement to their client, particularly if this misattunement occurs with more than one client. We may ask the supervisee to explore their personal experience, “In what ways might your childhood experiences be similar to those of your clients?”; “What unmet needs might you have in common with your client?”; “In what ways might you be uniquely different from your client?”; “Might you experience any sense of misattunement in our supervisory relationship?” We invite the supervisee to explore their fantasies about the client as we watch for evidence of countertransference. We may guide the supervisee’s awareness by encouraging them to focus on their affect and physical sensations as they talk about their client. During the supervision session we help our supervisees verbalize and make cognitive sense of their internal reactions. Analysis of the therapeutic objectives from a newly acquired perspective includes offering the supervisee opportunities to explore a variety of therapeutic options. We may ask, “If you re-examine your original therapeutic objectives how would reformulate them?”. We may also invite the supervisee to consider ways in