What does it mean to play in psychotherapy? And what does it mean to become, especially in adolescence? Two books that have shaped my clinical thinking in profound ways are D.W. Winnicott’s Playing and Reality  and Richard Frankel’s The Adolescent Psyche . Though written in different contexts, both works invite us to reconsider how we understand psychological growth, creativity, and transformation. At their heart is a shared concern with something alive in the psyche: the spa