The feeling of emptiness is hard to talk about. It can evoke discomfort, embarrassment or a deep sense of shame in the client. In this article our BTP trainer Natasha de Meric unpicks the topic of emptiness in a brand new article presented in this blog post.

When we learn to understand, recognise and work with emptiness in the consulting room, it can profoundly shift the relationship between therapist and client – shame is lessened, and deeper work is allowed to begin.

If you want to learn more about this topic then join our upcoming CPD: *Emptiness in the Consulting Room* with Natasha de Meric is taking place on Monday 28th April 2025, 6pm – 9pm, with catch-up available if you can’t make it on the day. 

Emptiness can also be disguised or minimised in the therapy room, and may come out in phrases the therapist might misinterpret, such as the client saying:

I don’t know what to talk about.

This is uncomfortable.

I don’t think I’m getting the therapy right.

Our clients may be trying to communicate their struggle with emptiness, have a longing to be heard and understood, but not know how to begin. If we listen carefully, we may notice they are really asking: 

Can you tolerate my empty feelings? 

Are you bored and will you send me away if I am empty?

If there is nothing inside me, do I even exist?

Clients need to know that their therapist can recognise and tolerate these feelings before they feel able to talk about them.

What is emptiness?

The nature of emptiness implies that it holds nothing and perhaps this stops our capacity for inquiry in the consulting room.

When we learn to sit with, rather than avoid, emptiness, we discover that it holds a kaleidoscope of meaning and states of experience. 

These are some interpretations of emptiness:

The psychoanalyst Wilfred Bion (1970) describes emptiness as ‘the nameless dread’, a cut of and dissociated part of our being that is inaccessible to thought, but holds all kinds of terrors of disintegration, annihilation and fragmentation. 

For the child psychotherapist Donald Winnicott (1986) emptiness is about early attachment, in which the baby’s internal state is not mirrored or reflected in the gaze of the mother/caregiver. The author Kenneth Wright (2009) describes how ‘the mother’s face shows a picture of (the child’s) own feeling state’. If the child expresses feelings, but the parent’s gaze is blank, this is for the child, like looking into a mirror and seeing nothing there. The child grows to believe there is nothing inside them.     

In mourning and grief, the client may that the world feels empty and that they are empty in the world.

In experiences of complex trauma and post-traumatic stress disorders, clients report emptiness as a continual state of not being (I feel that I don’t exist), feeling disconnected to mind and body. 

On the other hand, emptiness can be felt as a peaceful relaxed state of being, or the beginning of a creative process, akin to the blank page or canvas. 

Emptiness can be pervasive or fleeting, pleasant or terrifying. 

When therapists learn to listen, we hear the unique experience of emptiness for our clients.

Defending against emptiness

Human beings spend much time defending against emptiness.

Distraction, manic activities, workaholism, avoiding alone time, drugs alcohol and other addictions as well as constant sound, phones or anything to avoid that empty feeling! 

We can hold a façade; a performative way of being in the world, but when the distraction is removed, clients may feel devoid of meaning or that their day-to-day life is pointless. 

Distracting from the unbearable feelings of emptiness can be prevalent in trauma and in adults who experienced childhood neglect.

Emptiness can be missed or avoided in the room

There are many reasons why the sense of emptiness may be missed or avoided in the consulting room. 

One, is that therapists themselves find it hard to sit with this feeling. When the client reports feeling they have it wrong or have nothing to, therapists may feel like a failure, sensing they have not done enough or ‘fed’ the client enough. The therapist might stay quiet, but inside feel frozen, passive or avoidant. 

In supervision, therapists share how the ‘full’ clients, who present complex narratives, get more attention, whereas the clients who report emptiness, may be neglected.  Therapists may say things like: 

I don’t know if anything is happening here.

It just feels awkward.

When therapist learn to recognise these patterns and develop an understanding of our own narrative around emptiness, they begin a capacity to think about, rather than avoid, emptiness. 

Emptiness and change

Emptiness is an important and missed part in the therapy process. It can easily get mixed up with shame or be avoided. 

When emptiness is given a language, space and interest, it becomes a place of deep connection. 

Learning to work with emptiness in the consulting room can be profound. It can become the birth of original thought and a deeper sense of meaning. 

When we learn compassion and curiosity in the space of emptiness it allows the client to trust in their ability to connect to their emerging sense of self and to experience emptiness as the beginning and not the end of therapy. 

Upcoming Workshop with Natasha de Meric

Want to explore more? Join us for our upcoming workshop – Learn more about this topic in our online CPD workshop: * Emptiness in the Consulting Room* with Natasha de Meric is taking place on Monday 28th April 2025, 6pm – 9pm, with catch-up available if you can’t make it on the day. 

In this three-hour seminar, we have space to think more deeply about emptiness. Our trainer will open up an exploration of what we can learn from emptiness and how to work with it in the consulting room.

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