In September 2022, Severnside Institute for Psychotherapy will inaugurate an annual series of 'Dialogues' during which guest speakers will explore a subject or idea, each from the perspective of a different psychoanalytic school(s) of thoughts.

Classical psychoanalysis has taught us much about the passions. Less explored are the passionless, often mindless, and empty states which certain passive patients present to us. These may in some instances be the result not of a defensive or aggressive retreat but of having given up in despair or boredom. Such patients seem to be not hiding, but lost, not withdrawn but undrawn. Their internal objects seem to be unvalued rather than devalued and nothing much matters. This may affect curiosity and desire, even the desire to follow a train of thought. This lecture discusses what might be missing or underdeveloped and ways in which analytic technique may try to address these issues.