An Unforeseen Event in NY

An Unforeseen Event

The Fall activities began with great impetus when Mauricio Tarrab’s gave his Pass Testimony in New York and later on in Miami this past week. A guest of the Members of the WAP in US, Mauricio Tarrab’s Pass testimony was a first time event in our community.
An analysis he said, is finding the “footprints that have marked us, and along this path we hope to reduce the weight of the pathos that affects our body and mind, this pathos being what we call our symptoms”.
He demonstrated how a signifier “soplo” which in English can be translated as murmur (as in heart murmur), blow or breath occupied a fundamental part in his analysis and in his life, being first the signifier of the maternal desire, S1, to be replaced by the paternal metaphor, and becoming an object a: “a breath on the side of the symptom, the other breath on the side of the fantasy.
During his pass testimony, Mauricio Tarrab discussed what he called an unforeseen event; the Pass and he qualified his presentation in New York also as an unforeseen event in his life in the sense that nothing will have prepared him for something like this.
The decision of presenting oneself for the Pass is like a math test he said, where “one has to use knowledge, a knowledge that gives no effect of sense but which gives a result”.
Mauricio Tarrab’s presentation was elegant and transparent, unveiling significant parts of his history, of his analysis, his symptoms and of the interpretation of the analyst.

About thirty people attended the testimony and they were all captivated by the presentation. We had the luxury of having almost an hour of exchange with questions and comments from the audience.
A member of the audience was surprised hearing the testimony, asking why would somebody discuss his own analysis in public instead of presenting a clinical case.
Somebody wanted to know how could somebody remember all the significant parts of an analysis. Another how can one be sure this is the end of analysis. Another compared it to Lacan’s example of the prisoners in the logical time, when discussing how to find the hole to go out. Somebody else wanted more precisions about the sinthome at the end of analysis.
It was an unforeseen event, a unique learning experience, and a very rich moment.
We are most grateful to Mauricio Tarrab’s for his generosity and willingness to work with us and to share his Pass experience.

New York, September 10, 2007

Maria Cristina Aguirre