Saturday, May 31, 2014
The Bodily Uncanny
Thoughts on Star Trek: Into Darkness
At tvtropes.org they call Kirk-McCoy-Spock the Freudian Trio and identify Kirk as the ego, Spock as the superego, and McCoy as the id. Later they compare the superego to the angel on the shoulder and the id to the devil on the shoulder.
Although this analysis is facile when they stick to common language and don't try to relate things to their psych 101 course they often have many interesting things to say.
The Spock is an archetype that can be loosely summed up as the tendency to apply rules, reason and the greater good to all of his/her decisions. This character can exist by themselves, but more often, they will have a more emotional and humanistic counterpart to contrast their decisions. The main difference between the two archetypes is that while The McCoy will leap before looking, The Spock's solution to problems will have a balanced and well-thought out approach.
While his counterpart The McCoy is interested in doing the right thing regardless of cost, The Spock is more interested in the end result. For him, everyone (including himself) is expendable and he has no problem treating people as such.
I think that this contrast speaks well to the ethics of the egoist at the phallic trito (i.e. who traverses the father complex) vs. the altruist. Generally then, the trio would represent Spock as the phallic trito egoist or genital character who accepts himself as a peer to other adults in the community and cares about fairness among the peers and following the "rules and injunctions" of the work group that he is in. Kirk would be the phallic deutero egoist or phallic-narcissist who feels entitled to lead others despite not being the smartest, the most skilled, or following the maturation process of going from one rank to the next to get to Captain. McCoy is definitely an altruist in his role of doctor/healer and confidante to Kirk. He is definitely a subject altruist as the other two are subject egoists. I think that McCoy's irascibility generally puts him at the phallic trito as well. However, his character isn't developed enough in what I've seen to be sure about this judgment... The phallic castration complex for subject altruist can lead to the masochistic complaining that Reich indicated so well, towards the father substitute, and may account for McCoys bad mood. But, also "the twin" or idealized mother imago who represents admired qualities and boldness may typify Kirk better.
...we don't see McCoy leading and his role seems to be very much that of "a helper". The phallic trito sees the subject altruist firmly establish herself as a post-ambivalent agent and competitive being while it sees the subject egoist establish post-ambivalent love and morality. Aragorn (the ranger) in Lord of the Rings is an example of the father complex in the altruist in which he has to find the ability to be king and lead (and also seems to be having a relationship with his "sister" in the form of an elf that he was raised with as a child).
Of course, there are pre-genital aspects in all of these characters. Spock's auto-erotic trito affect block is a major part of his libidinal economy, for example.
Star Trek: Into Darkness then is a good example of the tension between the phallic castration complex and the phallic father complex in the egoist. The two remain in a dynamic relation which is also illustrated in group psychology when the guilt conscience is externalized back on to the father-substitute which, as I've written about before, concerns political views and relations to ideologues.
There is also an interesting Symptom Reading in which Kirk is a symptom and Spock is in charge and that Khan comes to represent the 'bad aspect' of Kirk in Spock.
Although this analysis is facile when they stick to common language and don't try to relate things to their psych 101 course they often have many interesting things to say.
The Spock is an archetype that can be loosely summed up as the tendency to apply rules, reason and the greater good to all of his/her decisions. This character can exist by themselves, but more often, they will have a more emotional and humanistic counterpart to contrast their decisions. The main difference between the two archetypes is that while The McCoy will leap before looking, The Spock's solution to problems will have a balanced and well-thought out approach.
While his counterpart The McCoy is interested in doing the right thing regardless of cost, The Spock is more interested in the end result. For him, everyone (including himself) is expendable and he has no problem treating people as such.
I think that this contrast speaks well to the ethics of the egoist at the phallic trito (i.e. who traverses the father complex) vs. the altruist. Generally then, the trio would represent Spock as the phallic trito egoist or genital character who accepts himself as a peer to other adults in the community and cares about fairness among the peers and following the "rules and injunctions" of the work group that he is in. Kirk would be the phallic deutero egoist or phallic-narcissist who feels entitled to lead others despite not being the smartest, the most skilled, or following the maturation process of going from one rank to the next to get to Captain. McCoy is definitely an altruist in his role of doctor/healer and confidante to Kirk. He is definitely a subject altruist as the other two are subject egoists. I think that McCoy's irascibility generally puts him at the phallic trito as well. However, his character isn't developed enough in what I've seen to be sure about this judgment... The phallic castration complex for subject altruist can lead to the masochistic complaining that Reich indicated so well, towards the father substitute, and may account for McCoys bad mood. But, also "the twin" or idealized mother imago who represents admired qualities and boldness may typify Kirk better.
...we don't see McCoy leading and his role seems to be very much that of "a helper". The phallic trito sees the subject altruist firmly establish herself as a post-ambivalent agent and competitive being while it sees the subject egoist establish post-ambivalent love and morality. Aragorn (the ranger) in Lord of the Rings is an example of the father complex in the altruist in which he has to find the ability to be king and lead (and also seems to be having a relationship with his "sister" in the form of an elf that he was raised with as a child).
Of course, there are pre-genital aspects in all of these characters. Spock's auto-erotic trito affect block is a major part of his libidinal economy, for example.
Star Trek: Into Darkness then is a good example of the tension between the phallic castration complex and the phallic father complex in the egoist. The two remain in a dynamic relation which is also illustrated in group psychology when the guilt conscience is externalized back on to the father-substitute which, as I've written about before, concerns political views and relations to ideologues.
There is also an interesting Symptom Reading in which Kirk is a symptom and Spock is in charge and that Khan comes to represent the 'bad aspect' of Kirk in Spock.
Thursday, May 29, 2014
Winnicott on psychic bisexuality
In Psychoanalytic Explorations there are a few more pages on Winnicott's thoughts on Psychic Bisexuality.
"Hamlet's altered attitude to Ophelia and his cruelty to her as a picture of his ruthless rejection of his own female element, now split off and handed over to her" 181
I think Ella Sharpe also read Ophelia as representing Hamlet's feminine side too.The symptom reading favors this interpretation too although there is more going on.
The most interesting aspect is that Winnicott's male patient is sexually active with women, but as a lesbian (i.e. his feminine part in a homosexual defense)
"there was the curious theme that this man felt that if he had had intercourse with his wife although he would have felt satisfied and his wife would have been satisfied this could not be because it would mean that he was unfaithful to his mistress with whom, however, he has a very feeble relation as man and woman and in fact he is giving up this relationship temporarily because it is unsatisfactory and is really a relationship between two women... in the transference therefore the thing is that he is dealing with his wife who is his mother" 186
This is very interesting and I wonder how many males escape castration anxiety by going this route...
"Hamlet's altered attitude to Ophelia and his cruelty to her as a picture of his ruthless rejection of his own female element, now split off and handed over to her" 181
I think Ella Sharpe also read Ophelia as representing Hamlet's feminine side too.The symptom reading favors this interpretation too although there is more going on.
The most interesting aspect is that Winnicott's male patient is sexually active with women, but as a lesbian (i.e. his feminine part in a homosexual defense)
"there was the curious theme that this man felt that if he had had intercourse with his wife although he would have felt satisfied and his wife would have been satisfied this could not be because it would mean that he was unfaithful to his mistress with whom, however, he has a very feeble relation as man and woman and in fact he is giving up this relationship temporarily because it is unsatisfactory and is really a relationship between two women... in the transference therefore the thing is that he is dealing with his wife who is his mother" 186
This is very interesting and I wonder how many males escape castration anxiety by going this route...
Sunday, May 25, 2014
The Odyssey- Aeolus- The Volar nuclear complexes- the house
The Odyssey, as I mentioned in my first post about it, has the proto, deutero, nuclear complex (i.e Oedipal, Antigone, etc.), and trito structure.
I've focussed on the proto, deutero, and trito of some of the earlier stages but have so far neglected the nuclear complex encounters.
In the nuclear complex the father imago is internalized, power is transcribed from the mother to the father, and the difference between the sexes and generations is established.
The power of the mother to swallow the child is ultimately transcribed over to the father (in myth Cronos), in the volar stage.
The winds of Aeolus, as an event, is kept separate from the swallowing and this state of affairs makes me think that the Odyssey generally shows a psychotic structure in which the father is foreclosed and the mother becomes the castrator or the one responsible for castration anxiety. Even though Polyphemus is represented as a male, Circe, for example, isn't and she threatens castration.
However, the the element of wind and swallowing are present in the fable of the Three Little Pigs. The big bad wolf tries to blow the pigs houses down so he can get to them to gobble them up. In the end he is boiled as he comes down the chimney and eaten by the pigs.
I don't have the clinical experience to have certainty about what belongs to the egoist and what to the altruist here. I've had two altruistic patients for whom the house has shown up as an important symbol but, just because they are predominately altruistic doesn't mean that this can't be related to an egoistic aspect of themselves that is defused. It's one thing to experience the repetition-compulsion with the patient oneself and have a strong sense of what material is showing up in that specific relation and it is another to know that the patient is having repetitions and transference to many others in his or her life and trying to figure out what symbols are connected to these relationships.
For the moment, I will conjecture that just as Oedipus and Bellerophon share active and passive references to blinding and Electra and Antigone share active and passive references to death of the family that this extends into pre-phallic forms of the nuclear complexes.
As I've mentioned before the maternal and paternal imagos also often follow the generations so that the phallic are one's parents, the anal are one's grandparents, and the volar are the dead or ancestors. However, when Time is not "out of joint" it seems fitting that the house could symbolize the fused nuclear relationship (or the volar under eros), and in defusion qua phobos, or the castration complex, then the ghosts or "magical" figures can arise.
Perhaps destructive rages in a room are not mere displacements but full on attacks against the parental imagos. If the feminine references the parental imagos at the phallic and anal stage then the OE would express aggression towards the house and the SA would sacrifice having her own house for assisting another. Some of my recent comments on the OA and being prohibited from belonging to the respectable community, one's culture in general, and may at the volar stage be better captured as being prohibited from belonging with those who have basic security and a home. So many substance abuse patients seem addicted to just surviving. Perhaps, when this defusion allows for sublimation then someone might become a nomad or wandering sage or something more romantic.
Winnicott often mentions the "environment" as related to a parental imago and transitional space. This isn't in terms of the planet or whole world, but in a sense closer to a house. In Thinking and Symbol Formation Winnicott mentions "a patient was having breakfast in bed. She got up to take the tray to the kitchen and upset everything on the floor, breaking valuable china and making a mess everywhere. She felt an extreme of exasperation and the incident upset her profoundly" He thinks that the patient must learn to 'feel confidence in her environment and in herself".
The full internalization or the mastery of the nuclear complex in the trito stage nicely leads from the house to one's own item (transitional object)- as I've pointed out with Cronus swallowing a stone that gets thrown up. This stone and the multitudes or swarms of people who come to it conjures up the trito stage and the Laistrygones or (skin harvesters) which I've mentioned in a previous post on the Odyssey.
"Don't throw stones in a glass house" and the obvious consequences of the wind making the house collapse in the 3 little pigs, along with a "house of cards" all point to the volar (narcissistic stage) as the foundational stage of self-esteem. In a previous post I mentioned how Freud sees this as the stage of the reservoir of the libido or the amoeba from which the pseudopodia go forth.
I had previously used body-ego to denote the anal stage ego but I think that with the sense of the mimetic impulse, the hand and tactility, and the pathology of the influencing machine (Tausk) or the mad scientist who is in control of one's thoughts or one's body that volar stage properly deserves the designation of the body-ego. I'll have to return to Freud or maybe look at Mahler's work to see if a name for the ego at the anal stage is out there.
Just as the Antigone complex concerns the individual being able to live for her own image-ego and have her own happiness (or defuse to having to live for another's image), the same establishment of the body-ego is at play here and, as Winnicot says, whether one feels confidence in oneself in a very basic way. I know so many regressed patients who feel like they can't drive on the freeway and have a lot of fear about making mistakes in basic things.
Again, it is key in the story of Aeolus, Hades, and Helios that there is a return to the previous stages. This shows the defusion from the nuclear complex to the castration complex.
Anyway, the myth strongly references the house:
I've focussed on the proto, deutero, and trito of some of the earlier stages but have so far neglected the nuclear complex encounters.
In the nuclear complex the father imago is internalized, power is transcribed from the mother to the father, and the difference between the sexes and generations is established.
The power of the mother to swallow the child is ultimately transcribed over to the father (in myth Cronos), in the volar stage.
The winds of Aeolus, as an event, is kept separate from the swallowing and this state of affairs makes me think that the Odyssey generally shows a psychotic structure in which the father is foreclosed and the mother becomes the castrator or the one responsible for castration anxiety. Even though Polyphemus is represented as a male, Circe, for example, isn't and she threatens castration.
However, the the element of wind and swallowing are present in the fable of the Three Little Pigs. The big bad wolf tries to blow the pigs houses down so he can get to them to gobble them up. In the end he is boiled as he comes down the chimney and eaten by the pigs.
I don't have the clinical experience to have certainty about what belongs to the egoist and what to the altruist here. I've had two altruistic patients for whom the house has shown up as an important symbol but, just because they are predominately altruistic doesn't mean that this can't be related to an egoistic aspect of themselves that is defused. It's one thing to experience the repetition-compulsion with the patient oneself and have a strong sense of what material is showing up in that specific relation and it is another to know that the patient is having repetitions and transference to many others in his or her life and trying to figure out what symbols are connected to these relationships.
For the moment, I will conjecture that just as Oedipus and Bellerophon share active and passive references to blinding and Electra and Antigone share active and passive references to death of the family that this extends into pre-phallic forms of the nuclear complexes.
As I've mentioned before the maternal and paternal imagos also often follow the generations so that the phallic are one's parents, the anal are one's grandparents, and the volar are the dead or ancestors. However, when Time is not "out of joint" it seems fitting that the house could symbolize the fused nuclear relationship (or the volar under eros), and in defusion qua phobos, or the castration complex, then the ghosts or "magical" figures can arise.
Perhaps destructive rages in a room are not mere displacements but full on attacks against the parental imagos. If the feminine references the parental imagos at the phallic and anal stage then the OE would express aggression towards the house and the SA would sacrifice having her own house for assisting another. Some of my recent comments on the OA and being prohibited from belonging to the respectable community, one's culture in general, and may at the volar stage be better captured as being prohibited from belonging with those who have basic security and a home. So many substance abuse patients seem addicted to just surviving. Perhaps, when this defusion allows for sublimation then someone might become a nomad or wandering sage or something more romantic.
Winnicott often mentions the "environment" as related to a parental imago and transitional space. This isn't in terms of the planet or whole world, but in a sense closer to a house. In Thinking and Symbol Formation Winnicott mentions "a patient was having breakfast in bed. She got up to take the tray to the kitchen and upset everything on the floor, breaking valuable china and making a mess everywhere. She felt an extreme of exasperation and the incident upset her profoundly" He thinks that the patient must learn to 'feel confidence in her environment and in herself".
The full internalization or the mastery of the nuclear complex in the trito stage nicely leads from the house to one's own item (transitional object)- as I've pointed out with Cronus swallowing a stone that gets thrown up. This stone and the multitudes or swarms of people who come to it conjures up the trito stage and the Laistrygones or (skin harvesters) which I've mentioned in a previous post on the Odyssey.
"Don't throw stones in a glass house" and the obvious consequences of the wind making the house collapse in the 3 little pigs, along with a "house of cards" all point to the volar (narcissistic stage) as the foundational stage of self-esteem. In a previous post I mentioned how Freud sees this as the stage of the reservoir of the libido or the amoeba from which the pseudopodia go forth.
I had previously used body-ego to denote the anal stage ego but I think that with the sense of the mimetic impulse, the hand and tactility, and the pathology of the influencing machine (Tausk) or the mad scientist who is in control of one's thoughts or one's body that volar stage properly deserves the designation of the body-ego. I'll have to return to Freud or maybe look at Mahler's work to see if a name for the ego at the anal stage is out there.
Just as the Antigone complex concerns the individual being able to live for her own image-ego and have her own happiness (or defuse to having to live for another's image), the same establishment of the body-ego is at play here and, as Winnicot says, whether one feels confidence in oneself in a very basic way. I know so many regressed patients who feel like they can't drive on the freeway and have a lot of fear about making mistakes in basic things.
Again, it is key in the story of Aeolus, Hades, and Helios that there is a return to the previous stages. This shows the defusion from the nuclear complex to the castration complex.
Anyway, the myth strongly references the house:
Thence we went on to the Aeoli island where lives Aeolus son of Hippotas, dear to the immortal gods. It is an island that floats (as it were) upon the sea, iron bound with a wall that girds it. Now, Aeolus has six daughters and six lusty sons, so he made the sons marry the daughters, and they all live with their dear father and mother, feasting and enjoying every conceivable kind of luxury. All day long the atmosphere of the house is loaded with the savour of roasting meats till it groans again, yard and all; but by night they sleep on their well-made bedsteads, each with his own wife between the blankets. These were the people among whom we had now come.
Of course it is Odysseus' men who are to blame for their greed and opening the bag of winds that blows them back to where they were, or eating Helios' cows and being sent back to Charybdis, etc. and not Odysseus.
Saturday, May 24, 2014
Shaw on artists
I'm left speechless by this.
“The true artist will let his wife starve, his children go barefoot, his mother drudge for his living at seventy, sooner than work at anything but his art. To women he is half vivisector, half vampire. He gets into intimate relations with them to study them, to strip the mask of convention from them, to surprise their inmost secrets, knowing that they have the power to rouse his deepest creative energies, to rescue him from his cold reason, to make him see visions and dream dreams, to inspire him, as he calls it. He persuades women that they may do this for their own purpose whilst he really means them to do it for his. He steals the mother’s milk and blackens it to make printer’s ink to scoff at her and glorify ideal women with. He pretends to spare her the pangs of child-bearing so that he may have for himself the tenderness and fostering that belong of right to her children. Since marriage began, the great artist has been known as a bad husband. But he is worse: he is a child-robber, a blood-sucker, a hypocrite, and a cheat. Perish the race and wither a thousand women if only the sacrifice of them enable him to act Hamlet better, to paint a finer picture, to write a deeper poem, a greater play, a profounder philosophy! For mark you, Tavy, the artist’s work is to shew us ourselves as we really are. Our minds are nothing but this knowledge of ourselves; and he who adds a jot to such knowledge creates new mind as surely as any woman creates new men. In the rage of that creation he is as ruthless as the woman, as dangerous to her as she to him, and as horribly fascinating. Of all human struggles there is none so treacherous and remorseless as the struggle between the artist man and the mother woman. Which shall use up the other? that is the issue between them. And it is all the deadlier because, in your romanticist cant, they love one another.”
― George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Why do we only get what we wanted only after we have stopped wanting it?
The child whose heart would have spilled over with gratitude and love has to die, and for what... your vanity? Because you're a little man and are so scared of being found out that you never meet face to face but only cast your shadow on the wall so you can seem taller?
And when the little man finally experiences a little remorse it's always money that he uses to dry his tears.
There are too many little men in the world and they can't be dealt with one at a time. When their money is taken away the flood of tears that will follow will cleanse the earth.
The child whose heart would have spilled over with gratitude and love has to die, and for what... your vanity? Because you're a little man and are so scared of being found out that you never meet face to face but only cast your shadow on the wall so you can seem taller?
And when the little man finally experiences a little remorse it's always money that he uses to dry his tears.
There are too many little men in the world and they can't be dealt with one at a time. When their money is taken away the flood of tears that will follow will cleanse the earth.
the fear of happiness and beauty...[moving] away from all change
I've seen several patients now who fear change at a very primitive level. One one of them who has been living with her parents for the last couple years brought up enrolling in school and how she's afraid and part of her wants it to be just like it was many years ago when she had went before. She even said that the last time she went was awful and that it made no sense to want to repeat it. The conversation expanded and she soon recognized that she didn't want any change in general.
This reminded me of some of Nietzsche's remarks on nihilism:
...this hate against what is human, and even more against animality, even more against material things—this abhorrence of the senses, even of reason, this fear of happiness and beauty, this longing for the beyond away from all appearance, change, becoming, death, desire, even longing itself—all this means, let's have the courage to understand this, a will to nothingness, an aversion to life, a revolt against the most fundamental preconditions of life—but it is and remains a will! . . . And to repeat at the conclusion what I said at the start: man will sooner will nothingness than not will . . . (Genealogy of Morals)
I wonder if this can be formulated as only having a relation to one's memories or mnemic traces... one is closed off against any new experience and only feels comfortable knowing how the movie ends, how the song goes, and won't even let oneself get emotionally invested in new things because the risk can't be made...
This reminded me of some of Nietzsche's remarks on nihilism:
...this hate against what is human, and even more against animality, even more against material things—this abhorrence of the senses, even of reason, this fear of happiness and beauty, this longing for the beyond away from all appearance, change, becoming, death, desire, even longing itself—all this means, let's have the courage to understand this, a will to nothingness, an aversion to life, a revolt against the most fundamental preconditions of life—but it is and remains a will! . . . And to repeat at the conclusion what I said at the start: man will sooner will nothingness than not will . . . (Genealogy of Morals)
I wonder if this can be formulated as only having a relation to one's memories or mnemic traces... one is closed off against any new experience and only feels comfortable knowing how the movie ends, how the song goes, and won't even let oneself get emotionally invested in new things because the risk can't be made...
Saturday, May 17, 2014
Substance Abuse and Gambling and Altruism
While there is undoubtedly libidinal pleasure to be found in substance abuse and gambling.
There are volar stage satisfactions involving the omnipotence of wishes and "being lucky," there are auto-erotic stage satisfactions in oceanic oneness with the world, etc. not to mention the jouissance, in terms of turning bad activities that would invite disapproval and anxiety from father-substitutes into something pleasurable.
However, the superego function of limiting the object altruist to living outside of what others have seems more important.
I've mentioned this before about the homeless, or at least one type of the homeless I've encountered in working with substance abuse, but recent work has deepened it.
In contrast to those who drugs and gambling affect them being able to work and belong to society in basic ways (at the anal level), the volar level of relation to time and just basic survival seems to me to be much more relevant.
Even after the substance abuse is curbed the person is unable to make use of assistance to get their lives back. Everything is scattered and they truly have to live day to day (minute to minute is more accurate).
The Belleropon complex in the object altruist can lead to being banned not just from higher classes, society or basic survival but also from experiencing pleasure and even having health in the most primitive forms of the superego.
To bring up the levels that patients seem to function at and to ask them how it feels to say 'I don't deserve to survive' or 'I don't deserve to have security' etc. will lead to them bringing up bad conscience.
You can't do this without history. You need transference and you need a history of being able to see when they are struggling to tell the truth or not wanting to share a thought.
There are volar stage satisfactions involving the omnipotence of wishes and "being lucky," there are auto-erotic stage satisfactions in oceanic oneness with the world, etc. not to mention the jouissance, in terms of turning bad activities that would invite disapproval and anxiety from father-substitutes into something pleasurable.
However, the superego function of limiting the object altruist to living outside of what others have seems more important.
I've mentioned this before about the homeless, or at least one type of the homeless I've encountered in working with substance abuse, but recent work has deepened it.
In contrast to those who drugs and gambling affect them being able to work and belong to society in basic ways (at the anal level), the volar level of relation to time and just basic survival seems to me to be much more relevant.
Even after the substance abuse is curbed the person is unable to make use of assistance to get their lives back. Everything is scattered and they truly have to live day to day (minute to minute is more accurate).
The Belleropon complex in the object altruist can lead to being banned not just from higher classes, society or basic survival but also from experiencing pleasure and even having health in the most primitive forms of the superego.
To bring up the levels that patients seem to function at and to ask them how it feels to say 'I don't deserve to survive' or 'I don't deserve to have security' etc. will lead to them bringing up bad conscience.
You can't do this without history. You need transference and you need a history of being able to see when they are struggling to tell the truth or not wanting to share a thought.
Wednesday, May 14, 2014
Bellerophon complex- object drives
I don't think I've ever posted about the Bellerophon complex in the object drives but one patient has the repetition very clearly. She aims for men who normally have "model" girlfriends and are the "whole package" and are "out of her league". The excitement of landing one of these men is all-consuming but at the same time she has her doubts that he could honestly want her and thinks that he has a secret life he hasn't told her about. She reports that her "head is spinning" and the punishment of Ixion is salient here. Along with the denial of attaining the man and expectations of him to turn into a cloud (the metaphor used on the Ixion myth) this presents it as a phallic deutero case of the Bellerophon complex.
Saturday, May 10, 2014
Another Love pt. 2
I remember when I was 13 or so that I went with a friend to meet one of his childhood friends. We go to where he was staying and I remember that I "was on" that night. This generally meant that I impressed myself with being clever and that whatever delight anyone else could have taken in my wit was overpowered by me dominating so much of the conversation that I was obnoxious at best.
The volar (narcissistic stage) is where the 'reservoir of libido' is for the ego and object drives. Despite the lack of social hierarchy to provide measurement in the ego ideal there is still measurement in non-verbal indications of whether one gets attention, is deferred to, etc. that form an ego ideal 'reality principle'.
The wishing at this stage, whether it is magical and no longer referencing the non-verbal cues or not, is tied to the most fundamental relation to another person. This is where Fairbairn references that the schizoid individual, as the individual in superego defusion, does not want to give. His intellectual and emotional inner life is felt as precious and he or she will no longer give it to others. The reservoir of libido feels like it has run dry and he no longer has the excess energy to be liberal and, moreover, others don't deserve it... self-pity
The volar trito, when aggression and self-assertion joins the altruistic pole, references the next development when the giving, the loving is also tied to devouring and hurting those that one loves.
I remember that our host stayed silent initially and that as he sometimes got up to go to the kitchen or use the bathroom that I had a distinct anticipations of him getting up or coming back to punch me.
The volar (narcissistic stage) is where the 'reservoir of libido' is for the ego and object drives. Despite the lack of social hierarchy to provide measurement in the ego ideal there is still measurement in non-verbal indications of whether one gets attention, is deferred to, etc. that form an ego ideal 'reality principle'.
The wishing at this stage, whether it is magical and no longer referencing the non-verbal cues or not, is tied to the most fundamental relation to another person. This is where Fairbairn references that the schizoid individual, as the individual in superego defusion, does not want to give. His intellectual and emotional inner life is felt as precious and he or she will no longer give it to others. The reservoir of libido feels like it has run dry and he no longer has the excess energy to be liberal and, moreover, others don't deserve it... self-pity
The volar trito, when aggression and self-assertion joins the altruistic pole, references the next development when the giving, the loving is also tied to devouring and hurting those that one loves.
The altruist without a family. Antigone complex.
When I first came up with the symptom reading I was looking at vampire films (like the Lost Boys).
I ended up watching the first Twilight and was surprised to find that the symptom reading covered up not that just Bela had sexual feelings for her father (through Edward) but that more powerfully, she wanted to escape and go and re-join her mother and her new partner and be part of their family. Belonging to Edward's family was an important part of the relationship with him and the baseball his family played ties it to her mother's new family with a major league ball player.
Bela leaving her father to join her mother's new family became an intense anxiety situation in which she was being hunted because she was being disloyal to her father who was on his own and putting her own desire to belong to a family ahead of his loneliness.
A few altruistic patients who have left abusive relationships and are overwhelmed with hate for their ex-partners have got to the point of sharing their fantasies of being with their exes again. Despite the abuse and hate they want to be 'inside' a family. The fantasy is that they are with their children and the partner and they are doing "fun" things such as visiting neighbors, going to the beach, etc. and the partner is there so that they are seemingly not anxious about having to take care of bills, fixing things in the house, so that they feel protected, and don't have to worry about providing for their children.
For some other altruists who don't have the family fantasy it's interesting to note that they feel oppressed by the 'perfection' of the lives of siblings or others who they see as happy, having partners, having children. They feel self-pity about being excluded from this happiness- are 'outsiders'- and in Antigone complex fashion, they are tied to a parental substitute or an actual parent who they pity and feel like they have to assist or make happy. Their situations are more complex than this and they are definitely being taken care of by the parent or parental substitute, have feelings of being more powerful than the parental substitute, and there is fighting and antagonism. Every economy of libido is complex and they suffer from severe regression and multiple defusions but, despite this, the emphasis on the altruistic pole is plainly observable.
I ended up watching the first Twilight and was surprised to find that the symptom reading covered up not that just Bela had sexual feelings for her father (through Edward) but that more powerfully, she wanted to escape and go and re-join her mother and her new partner and be part of their family. Belonging to Edward's family was an important part of the relationship with him and the baseball his family played ties it to her mother's new family with a major league ball player.
Bela leaving her father to join her mother's new family became an intense anxiety situation in which she was being hunted because she was being disloyal to her father who was on his own and putting her own desire to belong to a family ahead of his loneliness.
A few altruistic patients who have left abusive relationships and are overwhelmed with hate for their ex-partners have got to the point of sharing their fantasies of being with their exes again. Despite the abuse and hate they want to be 'inside' a family. The fantasy is that they are with their children and the partner and they are doing "fun" things such as visiting neighbors, going to the beach, etc. and the partner is there so that they are seemingly not anxious about having to take care of bills, fixing things in the house, so that they feel protected, and don't have to worry about providing for their children.
For some other altruists who don't have the family fantasy it's interesting to note that they feel oppressed by the 'perfection' of the lives of siblings or others who they see as happy, having partners, having children. They feel self-pity about being excluded from this happiness- are 'outsiders'- and in Antigone complex fashion, they are tied to a parental substitute or an actual parent who they pity and feel like they have to assist or make happy. Their situations are more complex than this and they are definitely being taken care of by the parent or parental substitute, have feelings of being more powerful than the parental substitute, and there is fighting and antagonism. Every economy of libido is complex and they suffer from severe regression and multiple defusions but, despite this, the emphasis on the altruistic pole is plainly observable.
Wednesday, May 7, 2014
Another Love- reflections on volar deutero pathology; questions about naming.
The first of the verses are set up to offer something but then to take it away
I wanna take you somewhere so you know I care
But it's so cold and I don't know where
I pick you daffodils in a pretty string
But they won't flower like they did last spring
But they won't flower like they did last spring
And I wanna kiss you, make you feel alright
I'm just so tired to share my nights
I'm just so tired to share my nights
I wanna cry and I wanna love
But all my tears have been used up
But all my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
The second set of verses references the hand which I've connected as the relevant part object of the volar (narcissistic) stage. If the subject egoist and object altruist sharing of symbols holds, then I'd like to make a couple conjectures. The giving impulse of the object altruist to cause delight is experiencing ambivalence. Is this because of a fixation of aggression there or is the ambivalence an expression of the egoistic side in a dynamic relation to the altruistic side?
And if somebody hurts you, I wanna fight
But my hands been broken, one too many times
The broken hand that is still giving may reference something else... What if the conversion of anxiety into jouissance at the deutero stages means that instead of fearing castration anxiety here the individual is inviting it? To give in order to take away would no doubt invite a punitive response from some individuals. The beating fantasy in masochism has been sometimes represented as having a narcissistic basis: it concerns the beating of the body and not something to do with the image ego or social punishment; it doesn't seem to have any consequences and therefore isn't in reference to time (cartoon violence is a good example).
It is also possible that the broken hand signifies full superego defusion, but as far as I understand the concept in melancholia or paranoia the drive function ceases... The melancholic, for example, no longer goes after love but is caught up in her self-reviling and depression. So the giving (drive) to only take away doesn't seem to be defusion.
But my hands been broken, one too many times
The broken hand that is still giving may reference something else... What if the conversion of anxiety into jouissance at the deutero stages means that instead of fearing castration anxiety here the individual is inviting it? To give in order to take away would no doubt invite a punitive response from some individuals. The beating fantasy in masochism has been sometimes represented as having a narcissistic basis: it concerns the beating of the body and not something to do with the image ego or social punishment; it doesn't seem to have any consequences and therefore isn't in reference to time (cartoon violence is a good example).
It is also possible that the broken hand signifies full superego defusion, but as far as I understand the concept in melancholia or paranoia the drive function ceases... The melancholic, for example, no longer goes after love but is caught up in her self-reviling and depression. So the giving (drive) to only take away doesn't seem to be defusion.
So I'll use my voice, I'll be so fucking rude
Words they always win, but I know I'll lose
Words they always win, but I know I'll lose
The loss of the fight implies a beating. His words win, so the loss means not that they have stronger words but that their hands aren't broken.
And I'd sing a song, that'd be just ours
But I sang 'em all to another heart
Later object drives of wanting to protect the object may function (i.e. the phallic altruistic drive of wanting to defend the love object) but things will ultimately return to the volar lack of connection.
The heart and the voice are definitely feminine (OE and SA) anal objects but I haven't placed them yet. Persephone eating the pomegranate likely puts the heart at the anal deutero. However this also raised the question of identifying the stages volar, anal, phallic, by the masculine part object if there are feminine ones that are different...
Later object drives of wanting to protect the object may function (i.e. the phallic altruistic drive of wanting to defend the love object) but things will ultimately return to the volar lack of connection.
The heart and the voice are definitely feminine (OE and SA) anal objects but I haven't placed them yet. Persephone eating the pomegranate likely puts the heart at the anal deutero. However this also raised the question of identifying the stages volar, anal, phallic, by the masculine part object if there are feminine ones that are different...
And I wanna cry I wanna learn to love
But all my tears have been used up
But all my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
I wanna sing a song, that'd be just ours
But I sang 'em all to another heart
And I wanna cry, I wanna fall in love
But all my tears have been used up
But I sang 'em all to another heart
And I wanna cry, I wanna fall in love
But all my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
Sunday, May 4, 2014
oedipus and the difference between the sexes, the single libido
I spoke with someone who asserted that both Freud and Lacan hold that oedipus complex creates man and woman.
I want to be clear that I've always acknowledged the difference between the sexes as a linguistically mediated part of the superego. There's just not that much to say about it unless one wants to study sociology and look at norms around masculinity and femininity at different historical periods in different cultures.
What's important for the psychoanalyst is what I've cited from Reich: a man can have an altruistic drive structure without having formed the subject egoistic phallic drives and that this will cause strong conflict between his identity as a man and his motivational structure.
The second issue is the so called 'single libido' based upon the phallus.
It's true that Freud made this claim but it can be explained on account of two errors.
1. The father, as I've mentioned many times, symbolizes the not-mother and the regulation of the ego ideal (the 'double tie' that allows the a father substitute to be accepted). The castration complex defusion from the father and going after the phallus represents both egoistic competition and altruistic restoration. The father and the phallus are shared as symbols between the egoistic and altruistic poles. The phallus is both the weapon and the wand or staff of regeneration.
2. As I've tried to indicate, the centrality of the oedipus is that all the libidinal positions reach strong inter-mixture that is the height of striving for happiness. All the libidinal positions have their own forms of sadism and masochism, for example.The subject egoist can sadistically try to humiliate his boss through showing his work to be weak or inadequate. The subject altruist may steal from the person while socially showing overt gestures of dependence and submissiveness. However, affection on the side of the altruist and egoist will also be expressed in differing ways and can be turned on the self like sadism can be turned into masochism. Freud's monistic libido is contradicted by his binaries of aggression-affection and the active-passive designation is phenomenologically distinct as it applies to egoists and altruists.
I want to be clear that I've always acknowledged the difference between the sexes as a linguistically mediated part of the superego. There's just not that much to say about it unless one wants to study sociology and look at norms around masculinity and femininity at different historical periods in different cultures.
What's important for the psychoanalyst is what I've cited from Reich: a man can have an altruistic drive structure without having formed the subject egoistic phallic drives and that this will cause strong conflict between his identity as a man and his motivational structure.
The second issue is the so called 'single libido' based upon the phallus.
It's true that Freud made this claim but it can be explained on account of two errors.
1. The father, as I've mentioned many times, symbolizes the not-mother and the regulation of the ego ideal (the 'double tie' that allows the a father substitute to be accepted). The castration complex defusion from the father and going after the phallus represents both egoistic competition and altruistic restoration. The father and the phallus are shared as symbols between the egoistic and altruistic poles. The phallus is both the weapon and the wand or staff of regeneration.
2. As I've tried to indicate, the centrality of the oedipus is that all the libidinal positions reach strong inter-mixture that is the height of striving for happiness. All the libidinal positions have their own forms of sadism and masochism, for example.The subject egoist can sadistically try to humiliate his boss through showing his work to be weak or inadequate. The subject altruist may steal from the person while socially showing overt gestures of dependence and submissiveness. However, affection on the side of the altruist and egoist will also be expressed in differing ways and can be turned on the self like sadism can be turned into masochism. Freud's monistic libido is contradicted by his binaries of aggression-affection and the active-passive designation is phenomenologically distinct as it applies to egoists and altruists.
Saturday, May 3, 2014
My first book pt 2.
The book, with a cover I did not choose, is up on the forthcoming page at Karnac
http://www.karnacbooks.com/Product.asp?PID=35773&MATCH=1
I was thinking of using the caduceus on the cover to impart the mixing the egoistic and altruistic poles with both the hermeneutic and medical connotations it has (the staff of Asclepius is supposed to have a single serpent but the caduceus is sometimes mistakenly used), but I guess the publisher decides these things.
If anyone has any thoughts please send me an email.
http://www.karnacbooks.com/Product.asp?PID=35773&MATCH=1
I was thinking of using the caduceus on the cover to impart the mixing the egoistic and altruistic poles with both the hermeneutic and medical connotations it has (the staff of Asclepius is supposed to have a single serpent but the caduceus is sometimes mistakenly used), but I guess the publisher decides these things.
If anyone has any thoughts please send me an email.
Thursday, May 1, 2014
altruist's bad conscience and need for punishment as "shock"
I've had the same experience with several altruists recently.
After a relatively short time seeing me I find that they used to refer to themselves as having been more social in the past. This naturally leads to the question of what is on their minds now that they are isolating themselves; although they may have given themselves over to caring for children or their boyfriends they don't have much of their own life. They respond that sometimes they think about the bad things they have done or that they avoid being alone with their thoughts and will watch TV, overeat, etc. to be outside of themselves. They might even have compensatory narcissistic fantasies about their past or about their talent or abilities that show up before this. I ask them how I would react if they told me some of the things they have done and they tell me I would be "shocked". None of them want to tell me about the "shocking" things they've done at that moment, but just letting me know that they are there already seems to help their conditions a little. I tell them that they will tell me when they're ready and sometimes many sessions elapse until they return to a mood that seems quiet enough that I might ask if they try to shock me...
After a relatively short time seeing me I find that they used to refer to themselves as having been more social in the past. This naturally leads to the question of what is on their minds now that they are isolating themselves; although they may have given themselves over to caring for children or their boyfriends they don't have much of their own life. They respond that sometimes they think about the bad things they have done or that they avoid being alone with their thoughts and will watch TV, overeat, etc. to be outside of themselves. They might even have compensatory narcissistic fantasies about their past or about their talent or abilities that show up before this. I ask them how I would react if they told me some of the things they have done and they tell me I would be "shocked". None of them want to tell me about the "shocking" things they've done at that moment, but just letting me know that they are there already seems to help their conditions a little. I tell them that they will tell me when they're ready and sometimes many sessions elapse until they return to a mood that seems quiet enough that I might ask if they try to shock me...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)