Abstract

This paper is devoted to explore a basic concept of psychology and of all humankind: understanding. As people and as psychologists, we are continuously faced with the issue of attempting to understand: events, people, and meanings. In clinical practice, the word “understanding” is like a mantra: it is the main process in which therapist and patient are involved and plays a key role in therapeutic experience. To the extent that we are “able to understand”, we constantly create new, vital spaces and opportunities of construing and living. In this paper we will cautiously try to understand understanding by examining different philosophical traditions, in order to explore the different paths and enlarge the approach to this fascinating construct. This paper is based on the assumption that understanding is present in and actively shapes every human culture.