International Interdisciplinary Conference ‘The Desire to Live: Psychoanalysis of Inner Strength’

We sincerely welcome you to the International Conference of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union 

“The Will to Live: Psychoanalysis of Inner Strength”

Already traditionally in September, we gather together to exchange professional experience, present modern research, reflect on the challenges of today and strengthen our professional community.

We wish you interesting meetings, inspiring discussions, new professional acquaintances and warm moments of communication.
 

 

Звичайно. Нижче — англійська версія, відредагована не дослівно, а в стилі міжнародної професійної психоаналітичної конференції.

📜 INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE PROGRAMME

Short Version

“The Desire to Live: A Psychoanalysis of Inner Strength”

12–13 September 2026 • Kyiv + Zoom

 

SATURDAY, 12 SEPTEMBER

Time	Event
10:00–10:15	Participant Registration. 🥂 Traditional glass of champagne to celebrate the opening of the conference and the beginning of the new professional year.
10:15–10:30	Official Opening of the Conference. Welcome address by Olena Savchenko, President of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union (UPU).
10:30–11:30	Plenary Session
11:30–12:00	☕ Coffee Break & Networking
12:00–13:30	Parallel Workshops
13:30–13:50	Special Lecture
13:50–15:00	Lunch & Networking
15:00–16:25	Scientific Session
16:25–16:45	☕ Coffee Break & Networking
16:45–18:15	Art Workshop
18:15	End of Day One

 

SUNDAY, 13 SEPTEMBER

Time	Event
10:00–11:30	Morning Scientific Session
11:30–12:00	☕ Coffee Break & Traditional UPU Celebration Cake 🎂
12:00–13:30	Parallel Workshops
13:30–14:00	Philosophical Lecture
14:00–15:00	Lunch
15:00–16:30	International Panel (simultaneous interpretation into English)
16:30–17:00	☕ Coffee Break & Networking
17:00–18:00	Conference Summary & Closing

 

📜 FULL CONFERENCE PROGRAMME

SATURDAY, 12 SEPTEMBER 2026

10:00–10:15 — PARTICIPANT REGISTRATION

10:15–10:30 — WELCOME ADDRESS

Olena Savchenko, President of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union (UPU) — PhD, psychoanalyst, ECPP supervisor.

10:30–11:00 — Irena Bezić (Croatia)

PhD, clinical psychologist, Gestalt psychotherapist, trainer and supervisor, President of the European Association for Psychotherapy (EAP).

“Inner Strength and Its Sources: A Psychotherapeutic Perspective”

11:00–11:30 — Oleksandr Filts

MD, Professor, psychiatrist, psychotherapist, psychoanalytic psychotherapist; Head of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at Danylo Halytsky Lviv National Medical University; President of the Ukrainian Union of Psychotherapists; President of the European Confederation of Psychoanalytic Psychotherapies (ECPP); Honoured Doctor of Ukraine; ECPP supervisor.

“The Culture of the Home Front: How Do We Live On?”

11:30–12:00 — ☕ COFFEE BREAK

 

12:00–13:30 — WORKSHOPS (CHOICE OF ONE)

1. Iryna Valyavko & Tetiana Vodianina

Iryna Valyavko — PhD, psychoanalyst, crisis psychologist, Senior Research Fellow at the H.S. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine; lecturer at the International Institute of Depth Psychology; member of the UPU Ethics Committee; art therapist; member of the Art Therapy Association of the National Psychological Association; author and lecturer of the specialisation programme “Psychological and Psychoanalytic Work with Military Personnel and Their Families: Theory and Clinical Practice.”

Tetiana Vodianina — psychoanalyst, lecturer at the International Institute of Depth Psychology; author of the course “Psychological Support for Soldiers on the Front Line” for military chaplains; author and lecturer of the specialisation programme “Psychological and Psychoanalytic Work with Military Personnel and Their Families: Theory and Clinical Practice”; commander of a group of practical psychologists in a volunteer battalion.

“The Defiant Strength of the Human Spirit”
(Real Clinical Cases)

2. Mariia Yevhrashyna (Berlin, Germany)

MA in Psychology, individual and couples psychoanalyst, lecturer, certified UAP–ECPP specialist, member of the NPA. Extensive experience working with couples.

“The Desire to Live as a Couple: Relationships as a Resource for Survival”

 

13:30–13:50 — Olena Shpak

Psychoanalyst, lecturer on the specialisation programme “Psychoanalysis of Relationships” at the International Institute of Depth Psychology.

“Rhythms of Life: Psychoanalytic Reflections on Rhythmicity”

13:50–15:00 — LUNCH

 

15:00–16:25 — SCIENTIFIC SESSION

15:00–15:20 — Olena Osypenko

Psychologist, psychoanalytically oriented counsellor; MA in Extreme and Crisis Psychology, KROK University, Ukraine; member of UPU, NPA and UAP–ECPP.

“The Hero’s Journey After an Encounter with Death: A Psychoanalytic Reading of the Desire to Live”
(with a clinical vignette)

15:20–15:55 — Oksana Yakushko, PhD

Psychologist, psychoanalyst and Professor in the Psychoanalytic Psychology programme in Washington, DC (USA). Author of three books, including a co-authored volume devoted to Ukrainian psychoanalysis and the war, and more than 60 peer-reviewed publications, including three special issues on Ukraine. Her specialisation is the history of science in psychology and psychoanalysis. Visiting Professor at the University of Oxford.

“Trauma, War and Recovery: From the 1918 International Psycho-Analytical Congress on War Neuroses and Abram Kardiner’s Work on PTSD to the Ukrainian Experience”

15:55–16:25 — Liliia Zakhariiash (Italy)

PhD, psychoanalyst, member of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union.

“The Internal Object as a Source of the Desire to Live: Between the Psychic Legacy of Love and the Transgenerational Transmission of Trauma”

16:25–16:45 — ☕ COFFEE BREAK

 

16:45–18:15 — ART WORKSHOP

Yevheniia Myroshnychenko

Artist, psychoanalytically oriented practitioner and founder of CHEPURNA.lab, a charitable veteran rehabilitation project. She has 12 years of personal psychoanalytic experience and is the author of a unique therapeutic method using oil painting, developed through several years of continuous work with Ukrainian veterans in a military hospital.

“Resilience in Times of War: Oil Painting as a Path to an Inner Point of Support”

 

SUNDAY, 13 SEPTEMBER 2026

10:00–11:30 — MORNING SCIENTIFIC SESSION

10:00–10:20 — Anna Danovska

Psychoanalyst, MA in Clinical Psychology, member of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union (UPU) and the NPA; data analyst, AI trainer and author of educational courses.

“Beyond Suicide: Suicidal Fantasy Between Object Relatedness and the Desire to Live”

10:20–10:40 — Nargis Vodud

Practising psychologist, Head of the Mental Health Programme at the Tabletochki Charitable Foundation, communication trainer.

“From Toxic Resilience to the Depressive Position: A Psychoanalytic Path Towards the Restoration of Vitality”

10:40–11:00 — Yuliia Melashchuk (Portugal)

Psychoanalyst, MA in Psychology, couples psychologist; member of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union, the Division of Psychoanalytic Psychology and Psychotherapy of the NPA, and the National Psychological Association of Ukraine; psychoanalysis researcher and writer.

“The Psyche as an Unwritten Novel: When the Soul Loses Its Pen — Restoring the Desire to Live Through Psychoanalysis”

11:00–11:30 — Meira Sozon (Israel)

PhD in Psychology, psychotherapist, clinical psychologist at the Galilee Medical Center (Nahariya, Israel), expert at NATAL — the Israel Trauma and Resiliency Center.

“Working with Trauma and Resilience: Metamorphoses of Trauma in Conditions of Prolonged War — The Israeli-Ukrainian Experience of Psychological Support”

11:30–12:00 — ☕ COFFEE BREAK & TRADITIONAL UPU CAKE

🎂

 

12:00–13:30 — WORKSHOPS (CHOICE OF ONE)

1. Kateryna Danylevska

Certified psychotherapist (ECPP, EAP, UUP), KISTUT supervisor, relational psychoanalyst.

“The Desire to Sleep: Psychoanalysis of the Royal Road”

2. Yaroslava Butenko

Psychoanalyst, founder and director of Institut d’Sujet (Institute of the Subject, Kyiv); curator of the “Psychoanalysis in Business” programme; author and facilitator of seminars on applying psychoanalysis to management, leadership and organisational development; consultant to executives and top managers; researcher of unconscious processes in business and corporate culture; author of scholarly publications on psychoanalysis, including remote psychoanalytic practice and career crises.

“A Psychoanalytic Perspective on the Nature of the Capacity to Create a Business”

 

13:30–14:00 — Larysa Harmash

PhD, Associate Professor, philosopher, researcher of the history of philosophy, philosophical anthropology and psychoanalysis; author of scholarly works on the philosophy of myth, the work of Friedrich Nietzsche and Lou Andreas-Salomé.

“Sources of the Vitality of the Spirit: Lou Salomé’s Psychoanalytic Studies of the Resources of the Cognitive Instinct”

14:00–15:00 — LUNCH

 

15:00–16:30 — INTERNATIONAL PANEL

Simultaneous interpretation into English

15:00–15:30 — Dmitry Olshansky (Buenos Aires, Argentina)

Psychoanalyst and philosopher, member of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union (UPU), host of a psychoanalytic film club.

“Digital Entropy and the Drive for Life”

15:30–15:45 — Osvaldo Menendez (Buenos Aires, Argentina)

Psychoanalyst, member of the Argentine Psychoanalytic Association (APA) and the International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA).

“The Theorem of Unrequited Love”
(A Clinical Case of a Newborn Child)

15:45–16:00 — Cosimo Schinaia (Genoa, Italy)

Psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, training analyst of the Italian Psychoanalytic Society (SPI), member of the International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA).

“Working Hope and Environment”

16:00–16:15 — Zacarías Marco Pastor (Madrid, Spain)

Clinical psychologist, psychoanalyst, member of the Spanish Psychoanalytic Society (SEP) and the International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA).

“La Petite Vie of Scrolling: A Shift in the Paradigm of Desire?”

16:15–16:30 — Plinio Luiz Montagna (São Paulo, Brazil)

Psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, training analyst of the São Paulo Psychoanalytic Society (SBPSP), member of the International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA), former President of the Federation of Psychoanalytic Societies of Latin America (FEPAL).

“Inner Strength: Enduring the Unendurable”

16:30–17:00 — ☕ COFFEE BREAK

17:00–18:00 — CONFERENCE SUMMARY & CLOSING

 

CONFERENCE MODERATORS

Nina Savchenko — PhD candidate, Head of the Science and Development Committee of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union (UPU), psychoanalyst.

Olena Shpak — psychoanalyst, lecturer on the specialisation programme “Psychoanalysis of Relationships” at the International Institute of Depth Psychology.

Dmitry Olshansky — psychoanalyst and philosopher, member of the Ukrainian Psychoanalytic Union (UPU).

 

📜 CERTIFICATE

A certificate for 16 academic hours will be issued to participants.

📍 Venue: Zoom / Kyiv, 8/14 Mala Zhytomyrska Street, 3rd floor, Office 4 “Sofiia”

📅 Dates: 12–13 September 2026

💳 PARTICIPATION FEE

For participants and discussion participants:

Until 15 August 2026:
UAH 2,000
UPU members and combat veterans: UAH 1,500

15–29 August 2026:
UAH 2,500
UPU members and combat veterans: UAH 2,000

After 29 August 2026:
UAH 3,000
UPU members and combat veterans: UAH 2,500

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