Brian Eno on (psychoanalytic) listening

I recently found the following bit of text from an interview with Brian Eno.

…The biggest mistake is to wait for inspiration. It won’t come looking for you. It’s not so much creating something. It’s noticing when something is starting to happen. Noticing it and then building on it and saying OK. That’s new. That hasn’t happened before. What does it mean? Where can I go with it?

Eno was talking about making art, but when I read this I thought that it sounds a lot like the sort of psychoanalytic listening that I try to engage in when I’m working with patients/analysands.

I think the way the Eno describes how he pays attention, rather than waiting for inspiration, is a good description of listening for the unconscious in a patient/analysand’s speech.

If you’re able to tune into the unconscious, you’ll notice something that you can make note of or re-describe to the person speaking.

Here is the whole thing in a video

Not that anyone cares…

… but, out of all the famous people I’d really like to just hang out with Brian Eno is at the top of my list.