My ambition in philosophy is not modest. I partly hate to declare my ambition because if I write quietly to myself, from an 'underdog' position, one essay at a time, I create no hype, no 'illusions of grandeur' or lofty expectations, allowing my work to hopefully sneak up on the reader in a good way -- again, one essay at a time.
However, if you look at the (evolving) table of contents of Hegel's Hotel, and you are familiar with the history of philosophy at all, you will see that in 'the breadth and scope of its integrative subject matter', Hegel's Hotel is arguably the most ambitious project that any one philosopher -- from Thales to present day -- has ever dared to tackle in one project, one treatise, one interconnected network of hopefully somewhere between five hundred and a thousand essays when it is all through -- perhaps more, God willing relative to the extent of my health and energy.
There have been many prolific writers -- philosophers and psychologists -- some of whom I will never come close to in terms of the shear volume of their work. I look at some philosophers like Spinoza (1632-1645, died at 45 years old), Kierkegaard (1813-1855, died at 42), and Nietzsche (1844-1900, died at 56, stopped writing and institutionalized by 50) -- and they were either dead and buried or institutionalized in the case of Nietzsche before I even started to tap my keys here to begin 'Hegel's Hotel'.
Diderot was the centrepiece of an 'Enlightenment' philosophical project that will probably never be duplicated but he had lots of help -- many other great philosophers helped him with his wonderous 'Encyclopedie' accomplishment. (See Diderot, The French Enlightenment).
.................................................................................
From the internet (Wikipedia)...
Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers (English: "Encyclopedia, or a systematic dictionary of the sciences, arts, and crafts") was a general encyclopedia published in France between 1751 and 1772, with later supplements and revisions in 1772, 1777 and 1780 and numerous foreign editions and later derivatives.
Its introduction, the Preliminary Discourse, is considered an important exposition of Enlightenment ideals. The Encyclopédie's self-professed aim was "to change the way people think." Denis Diderot explained the goal of the project as "All things must be examined, debated, investigated without exception and without regard for anyone's feelings."[1]
..................................................................................
Kant 'disappeared' (to the inside of his home mainly, I presume) for around 8 or 9 years to write his masterpiece 'The Critique of Pure Reason'. That kind of individual dedication and perseverence will probably never be duplicated -- as will the finished product.
.................................................................................
From the internet, Wikipedia...
The Critique of Pure Reason (German: Kritik der reinen Vernunft), first published in 1781 (A) with a second edition (B) in 1787, is the most widely read work of the German philosopher Immanuel Kant, and is widely regarded as one of the most influential in the history of philosophy. It is often referred to as Kant's "first critique," and was followed by the Critique of Practical Reason and the Critique of Judgement.
.................................................................................
Hegel's masterpiece -- 'The Phenomenology of Mind/Spirit' (1807)-- is in my personal opinion, the most important and influential philosophical work in the history of Western philosophy.
................................................................................
From Wikipedia...
Phänomenologie des Geistes (1807) is one of G.W.F. Hegel's most important philosophical works. Translated as The Phenomenology of Spirit or The Phenomenology of Mind due to the dual meaning in the German word Geist, it formed the basis of Hegel's later philosophy and marked a significant development in German idealism after Kant. Focusing on topics in metaphysics, epistemology, physics, ethics, theory of knowledge, history, religion, perception, consciousness, and political philosophy, the Phenomenology is where Hegel develops his concepts of dialectic (including the Master-slave dialectic), absolute idealism, ethical life, and sublation. The book had profound effect in Western philosophy (particularly in the development of Marxism), and "has been praised and blamed for the development of existentialism, communism, fascism, death of God theology, and historicist nihilism."[1]
..................................................................................
My work here -- Hegel's Hotel: DGB Post-Hegelian Philosophy-Psychology -- aims to bring the best out in Hegel's philosophy, not the worst... I aim to 'concretize' it, 'humanize' it, and 'existentialize' it...in ways that have partly been done before by different theorists and therapists: Nietzsche (The Birth of Tragedy), Freud (Psychoanalysis), Jung (Jungian Psychology), Perls (Gestalt Therapy), Derrida (Deconstruction), Foucault (The History of Power)...but Hegel's Hotel aims to put everything above together into one huge integrative project...
There have been many prolific, and brilliant, Western philosophical writers, too many to mention right here but many if not most of them will be covered in Hegel's Hotel -- Plato, Aristotle, Adam Smith, Karl Marx, Kierkegaard, Sartre, Bertrand Russell, Foucault, Ayn Rand, and that is not even touching other cultures... Furthermore, there have been a host of brilliant and prolific psychology writers such as: Freud, Jung, Adler, Fromm, Perls...and more...
I do not pretend that my work holds a candle to these most esteemed philosophers and psychologists -- at least not yet. Similarily, I do not pretend that my work would stand up to some of the 'rigid, technical standards' of most university philosophy programs.
I have a copy of a short paper on 'how to write an acceptable university philosophy essay and I have to confess that most of my essays probably break all the rules -- and yet I am not writing for a university here; I am writing for many different people from every walk of life who likes to read and learn -- and hopefully, at least partly, be entertained as well as educated; I wish not to lull you to sleep before you finish the first essay -- otherwise, why waste my time and energy, as well as yours. If you don't like what you are reading, you won't be around for long to waste your time and energy. No writer is going to please and/or entertain everbody but every writer has a responsibility to be as clear and passionate as possible relative to what one writes about. Otherwise, why write? To put yourself and others asleep? (It might save sleeping pills.)
Thus, it is partly the 'technical university anal-retentiveness and orthodoxy' that I am still partly rebelling against -- a projection of my ongoing love-hate relatioship with universities and the world of academia within them.
I want to 'jolt this crowd awake' -- to show that it is more than the world of academia that can write meaningful, important philosphical works...And that I don't have to 'jump through all of their academic hoops' to deliver a significant philosophical essay. Every good philosopher does not have to pass through a university -- indeed, this may be exactly what kills many a potential philosphical spirit.
Nor is philosphy about everything from the 'neck up' -- that is perhaps the worst stereotype about philosophy that our culture has.
In this regard, Hegel's Hotel is a call to 'philosophical relevance and everyday functional importance' -- not a manuscript that is aimed at learning more and more about less and less until you have to search for the relevance of the subject matter under a high-powered microscope. Meanwhile, the world around us is crashing and burning from philosophical stupidity, unbridled narcissism, righteousness, unilateralism, and a lack of integrity, compassion, and caring about our fellow man and the environment we live in.
My work is aimed at bridging the gap between 'the creative brilliance of academic philosophy at its best' and the common-sense pragmatism of every-day living philosophy. 'DGB(N)' stands for 'Dialectical Gap-Bridging (Negotiations)' which is the essence of the process of my integrative work.
Now, obviously, it takes a lot more than sheer ambition to become good -- let alone great -- at anything. In philosophy, it takes a strong intellect, a strong knowledge of what you're writing about, preferrably lots of experience in living, a strong passion for your subject matter and your mission, and the perseverence and will-power of a bulldog to finish what you start. I have accomplished nothing yet except a growing assortment of hopefully interesting essays on different philosophical subject matters -- the dialectic, epistemology, politics, religion, romanticism, narcissism, natural health, and more...
Letting down all my pretenses and defenses about modesty, and speaking egotistically, by the time I am through 'Hegel's Hotel: DGB Philosophy-Psychology', I want it to be considered the best philosophical work of the early part of the 21st century.
Furthermore, I want it to be considered one of the most important integrative projects in the history of Western philosophy. Look at the table of contents again and tell me that Hegel's Hotel -- if it finishes what it says it will finish, and finishes it well -- that it won't deserve this type of accolade. All I need is the time and energy to finish it. Well, obviously, the talent, intellect, and integrating ability as well...
God, grant me the time, health, and energy to finish Hegel's Hotel. I am 53 years old now. I want to be finished Hegel's Hotel by my 60th birthday (ouch!) -- that would be March 3rd, 2015. Wow! Dare I think that I might be lucky enough to live that long. It might be a stretch.
What I am offering the reader which is different than most philosophical works in the past -- and comes with the invention of the 'blogsite' -- is the opportunity to experience Hegel's Hotel being built piece by piece, essay by essay. Reductionism and concrete particularity meets abstractionism and wholism over the course of time.
In this regard, I have created a 'New Essays' blogsite to accomodate all my new essays and allow those readers who want to follow the evolution of my work -- the building of Hegel's Hotel -- the opportunity to do so. (Google...DGB Philosophy, New Essays). My new aphorisms and self-awarenesses section can be found in the blogsite of the same name (i.e., this blogsite here).
After a certain period of time, all my new essays will be classified and filed into the particular section of Hegel's Hotel that they seem to most fit -- my epistemology essays in the epistemology section, my religious essays in the religious section...and so on. I expect that Hegel's Hotel -- and the essays in it -- will be constantly revised as re-classified under different section names until the work as a whole is finally finished.
That's the gameplan -- and having bared my raw ambition and egotism -- it remains for me simply to deliver the goods, deliver the promises as set out here. In this regard, I am no different than any of the potential presidential candidates as each of them -- Obama, Clinton, McCain -- lay out their presidential gameplan for the upcoming years, or on a lesser platform, any and every one of us who has ever applied for a job -- and, if everything goes right, put our 'best foot forward'.
Here's to substance, quality -- and delivering on 'big promises'.
-- dgb, April 8th, 2008, modified May 31st, 2008, June 1st, 2008.
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Monday, May 19, 2008
Part 5: On The 'First' and 'Third' Floors of The DGB Model of The Human Psyche: Power Relations and Bi-Sexuality in the Personality
'Topologically' (or structurally) speaking -- and let us not forget that this is a 'conceptual-metaphysical' model that we are talking about here, not an empirically verifiable model like the model of a heart or liver or some other 'physical organ' --the first and third floors of the DGB model of the psyche are about as close to the Eric Berne 'structural-analysis' model as you are going to get. The 'four corner ego-states' are virtually identical -- only named a little differently: in Berne's model, they are called: 'The Nurturing Parent', 'The Controlling Parent', 'The Adaptive Child' and 'The Rebellious Child'; in my DGB model they are called: 'The Nurturing (Supportive, Encouraging) Topdog', 'The Righteous (Rejecting) Topdog', 'The Approval-Seeking (Co-Operative, Supportive) Underdog', and 'The Righteous-Rebellious Underdog'.
Power-relations is the name of the game here between two or more of the various ego-states -- between authority and co-operation, authority and rebellion, nurturing and co-operation, nurturing and rebellion, and/or some other mixture of the above. This is either a good or a bad thing -- or both -- depending on the content and dynamics of the particular ego-states involved.
The personality -- man's psychology -- is creatively built just like the body -- man's biology. The human mind/psyche is creatively built to achieve -- or at least to continually strive for, idealistically speaking -- homeostatic (dialectic/democratic) balance.
Both man's body and his/her psychology is creatively -- homeostatically, dialectically,and democratically -- built in terms 'multi-bi-polarites'. This is the physical -- and the psychological-philosophical -- mechanism for achieving -- or at least moving towards -- homeostatic/dialectic/democratic balance.
Besides power-relations which we will get into shortly, there is also the issue of sexuality. Freud started to get into this issue -- in particular, the issue of 'bi-sexuality in the personality' and then backed away. I will peruse through the Freud/Fliess letters and get back to you on what happened with Freud when I re-fresh my memory. Both before and after Freud, however, one can argue that others have contributed to the idea of -bi-sexuality in the personality from Plato and Chinese philosophy to today's present-day scientific knowledge that both sexes have both sexual hormones -- testosterone and estrogen -- at work in the body in different proportions depending both on the particular sex of the person and also the individual person.
The Chinese have worked with the 'yin' (femininity) and 'yang' (masculinity) concepts for thousands of years -- in biology and medicine, and in philosophy spilling over into psychology.
Let's go back to an example in biology, bio-chemistry, and medicine that is near and dear to my hear -- mainly because whether I am right or wrong will probably go a long way towards determining how long I have to live on this earth. Now I am not a doctor nor do I have anything close to a PHD in biology, physics, chemistry, and/or biochemistry -- so there is a very big 'caveat emptor' here -- I am speaking as an individual and philosopher here with a right to my own opinion; not as any type of 'medical expert' giving any kind of 'expert advice' to anyone who reads this. I believe that when it comes our own physical well-being, we are all responsible for ourselves and where and when we choose to get our 'expert advice' from. Again, I am only expressing an individual -- and a philosophical -- opinion here.
Call this 'fairytale biology and medicine' if you wish but the principle of 'homesotatstic balance' applies to both Western and Eastern medicine, and so too doe Hippocrites First Oath: 'First, do the patient no harm.' And the principle of 'yin' and 'yang' can be applied to the biology and biochemistry of the body -- with a certain amount of 'common sense' as long as we are very careful with our inferences, generalizations, and judgments, where they take us, and where they don't, and -- not to go 'haywire, overboard' with what we conclude. There is probably no such thing as too much medical education and advice but in the end we all have to be responsible for ourselves -- our choices, our actions, and which medical direction we choose to go.
The doctors conclusions on my liver were: 1. infection (of which hepatitis is probably the worst in the liver -- and this has been ruled out many times in my own praticular case); 2. a 'stone' blocking proper liver function; or 3. something more ominous (presumably like a 'tumor'). They gave me anti-biotics for a possible infection; two ERCPs looking for a stone blocking a liver duct or somewhere else on the passageway to my intestines; and 'pictures' (I think it was a couple of MRIs and maybe one set of Xrays). Next up was a 'liver biopsy' which was when I bailed...The operations were getting more and more invasive, I felt like i was improving on at least two occasions -- only to go 'crashing' into another relapse with another ERCP operation (this is where the particular surgeon goes looking for a stone). Of course, medical results pertaining to any type of operation are always open to debate and controversy as everyone throws in their two cents about what they think 'caused what'. I am no different and this is my interpretation, not the doctor's who would probably argue that the resultss were more favorable towards my improvement.
I saw myself going down the road of a 'Clint Eastwood' style of medicine -- first the biopsy and then God -- and the doctors -- only know what. It was not the road I wanted to go. I came to a possible 'fourth conclusion' -- that maybe I was simply dealing with an 'over-stressed, over-toxified' liver that need time, rest, relaxation -- and proper nutrition. No coffee, no alcohol, no debatable herbs, lots of fruits and veggies, soya milk, beet-veggie juice and chlorophyl from the health store, water, chicken noodle soup, very light on the meat -- and a focus on two herbs that all the 'natural health' literature said were good for the liver -- indeed, would help to 'regenerate' it and/or help to make it function better -- and that was 'milk thistle' and 'dandelion'.
From a 'yin'/'yang' perspective, the philosophy is simply this: if your liver is 'on fire', then common sense suggests that you may need to 'soothe it' with 'yin' (relaxing, soothing) foods such as: water, soya milk, chlorophyl, beet and tomato/veggie juice and the like; when your liver is 'comotose', not functioning properly -- or at all -- your yellow, jaundice, backed up with toxins that are going the wrong way in your body -- and ruling out any infection, stone blockage, and/or tumor -- then your liver may need some sort of 'yang-stimulant' like 'milk thistle', 'dandelion', 'ginger', a circulation enhancer that is not too aggressive, massage -- or something of this nature to bring the liver back into 'life and proper functioning again'. If the 'yellow' -- i.e., the 'jaundice' -- starts to 'retreat' in your body and your eyes, then you know that you are doing something right.
That was last August. For better or for worse, my body is normal color today, my eyes are white, not yellow, I'm back to working 50 to 57 hours a week as a dispatcher, my energy levels for the most part continue to improve -- not including a rather nasty flu virus that wouldn't let me go for the better part of a month or more but seems to be under control now...
To me that is the common sense of 'yin/yang' wholistic, homeostatic balance medicine -- of which I believe that Western medicine as a whole -- especially when it is 'narcissistically biased by money and trying to speed up therapy procedures' --does not always properly attend to. Western medicine -- when it is 'stuck' inside its 'Clint Eastwood...more guns, bombs, and ammunition is better' philosophy (kind of like Hillary Clinton when she went after Obama with 'everything including the kitchen sink, hoping that something would 'stick' -- and one or two things did).
It does no good if the infection, stone, and/or tumor is gone -- if the patient is 'gone' too.
The moral of this little story is that there is a need for both 'yin' (soothing, relaxing foods, herbs, and medicine, proper nutrition, etc...) and 'yang' medicine (stimulants and detoxification procedures...). Worded otherwise, there is a room for a delicate, homestatic balance in any type of medical and/or therapy process between 'constructionism' on the one hand (building new cells, re-generating life in the client/patient) and 'deconstructionism' on the other hand (clearing away toxins, pathogens, pollutants, etc.) Too much emphasis on the 'deconstructive' aspect of any type of medical and/or therapy procedure -- what I am calling the 'Clint Eastwood' approach to medicine -- and you may have a 'dead patient' on your hands because the delicate homeostatic balance between yin and yang, constructionism and deconstructionism, has been lost -- all 'deconstructionism' will eventually lead to a completely 'deconstructed patient' -- i.e., a dead one.
That's biology, bio-chemistry, and medicine. Now, let's come back to personality theory where the same rule of thumb applies. Conceptually, metaphysically, and topographically speaking, we have a 'yin' and a 'yang' topdog (the nurturing, supportive topdog -- the 'yin topdog' vs. the righteous, rejecting topdog -- the 'yang topdog' on the third floor of the personality -- both of which are basically 'introjected parental' ego-states (sterotypically speaking here, the 'yin' of the mother vs. the 'yang' of the father although everything can be completely different depending on the particular case. And we have the same on the first floor of the personality in terms of the 'yin' of the 'approval-seeking, co-operative underdog' vs. the 'yang' of the 'righteous, rebellious, rejecting underdog' -- both of which involve the 'compensatory' measures of 'adaptive, childhood ego-states'.
And that is where I will leave you today...
dgb, May 24th, 2008.
Power-relations is the name of the game here between two or more of the various ego-states -- between authority and co-operation, authority and rebellion, nurturing and co-operation, nurturing and rebellion, and/or some other mixture of the above. This is either a good or a bad thing -- or both -- depending on the content and dynamics of the particular ego-states involved.
The personality -- man's psychology -- is creatively built just like the body -- man's biology. The human mind/psyche is creatively built to achieve -- or at least to continually strive for, idealistically speaking -- homeostatic (dialectic/democratic) balance.
Both man's body and his/her psychology is creatively -- homeostatically, dialectically,and democratically -- built in terms 'multi-bi-polarites'. This is the physical -- and the psychological-philosophical -- mechanism for achieving -- or at least moving towards -- homeostatic/dialectic/democratic balance.
Besides power-relations which we will get into shortly, there is also the issue of sexuality. Freud started to get into this issue -- in particular, the issue of 'bi-sexuality in the personality' and then backed away. I will peruse through the Freud/Fliess letters and get back to you on what happened with Freud when I re-fresh my memory. Both before and after Freud, however, one can argue that others have contributed to the idea of -bi-sexuality in the personality from Plato and Chinese philosophy to today's present-day scientific knowledge that both sexes have both sexual hormones -- testosterone and estrogen -- at work in the body in different proportions depending both on the particular sex of the person and also the individual person.
The Chinese have worked with the 'yin' (femininity) and 'yang' (masculinity) concepts for thousands of years -- in biology and medicine, and in philosophy spilling over into psychology.
Let's go back to an example in biology, bio-chemistry, and medicine that is near and dear to my hear -- mainly because whether I am right or wrong will probably go a long way towards determining how long I have to live on this earth. Now I am not a doctor nor do I have anything close to a PHD in biology, physics, chemistry, and/or biochemistry -- so there is a very big 'caveat emptor' here -- I am speaking as an individual and philosopher here with a right to my own opinion; not as any type of 'medical expert' giving any kind of 'expert advice' to anyone who reads this. I believe that when it comes our own physical well-being, we are all responsible for ourselves and where and when we choose to get our 'expert advice' from. Again, I am only expressing an individual -- and a philosophical -- opinion here.
Call this 'fairytale biology and medicine' if you wish but the principle of 'homesotatstic balance' applies to both Western and Eastern medicine, and so too doe Hippocrites First Oath: 'First, do the patient no harm.' And the principle of 'yin' and 'yang' can be applied to the biology and biochemistry of the body -- with a certain amount of 'common sense' as long as we are very careful with our inferences, generalizations, and judgments, where they take us, and where they don't, and -- not to go 'haywire, overboard' with what we conclude. There is probably no such thing as too much medical education and advice but in the end we all have to be responsible for ourselves -- our choices, our actions, and which medical direction we choose to go.
The doctors conclusions on my liver were: 1. infection (of which hepatitis is probably the worst in the liver -- and this has been ruled out many times in my own praticular case); 2. a 'stone' blocking proper liver function; or 3. something more ominous (presumably like a 'tumor'). They gave me anti-biotics for a possible infection; two ERCPs looking for a stone blocking a liver duct or somewhere else on the passageway to my intestines; and 'pictures' (I think it was a couple of MRIs and maybe one set of Xrays). Next up was a 'liver biopsy' which was when I bailed...The operations were getting more and more invasive, I felt like i was improving on at least two occasions -- only to go 'crashing' into another relapse with another ERCP operation (this is where the particular surgeon goes looking for a stone). Of course, medical results pertaining to any type of operation are always open to debate and controversy as everyone throws in their two cents about what they think 'caused what'. I am no different and this is my interpretation, not the doctor's who would probably argue that the resultss were more favorable towards my improvement.
I saw myself going down the road of a 'Clint Eastwood' style of medicine -- first the biopsy and then God -- and the doctors -- only know what. It was not the road I wanted to go. I came to a possible 'fourth conclusion' -- that maybe I was simply dealing with an 'over-stressed, over-toxified' liver that need time, rest, relaxation -- and proper nutrition. No coffee, no alcohol, no debatable herbs, lots of fruits and veggies, soya milk, beet-veggie juice and chlorophyl from the health store, water, chicken noodle soup, very light on the meat -- and a focus on two herbs that all the 'natural health' literature said were good for the liver -- indeed, would help to 'regenerate' it and/or help to make it function better -- and that was 'milk thistle' and 'dandelion'.
From a 'yin'/'yang' perspective, the philosophy is simply this: if your liver is 'on fire', then common sense suggests that you may need to 'soothe it' with 'yin' (relaxing, soothing) foods such as: water, soya milk, chlorophyl, beet and tomato/veggie juice and the like; when your liver is 'comotose', not functioning properly -- or at all -- your yellow, jaundice, backed up with toxins that are going the wrong way in your body -- and ruling out any infection, stone blockage, and/or tumor -- then your liver may need some sort of 'yang-stimulant' like 'milk thistle', 'dandelion', 'ginger', a circulation enhancer that is not too aggressive, massage -- or something of this nature to bring the liver back into 'life and proper functioning again'. If the 'yellow' -- i.e., the 'jaundice' -- starts to 'retreat' in your body and your eyes, then you know that you are doing something right.
That was last August. For better or for worse, my body is normal color today, my eyes are white, not yellow, I'm back to working 50 to 57 hours a week as a dispatcher, my energy levels for the most part continue to improve -- not including a rather nasty flu virus that wouldn't let me go for the better part of a month or more but seems to be under control now...
To me that is the common sense of 'yin/yang' wholistic, homeostatic balance medicine -- of which I believe that Western medicine as a whole -- especially when it is 'narcissistically biased by money and trying to speed up therapy procedures' --does not always properly attend to. Western medicine -- when it is 'stuck' inside its 'Clint Eastwood...more guns, bombs, and ammunition is better' philosophy (kind of like Hillary Clinton when she went after Obama with 'everything including the kitchen sink, hoping that something would 'stick' -- and one or two things did).
It does no good if the infection, stone, and/or tumor is gone -- if the patient is 'gone' too.
The moral of this little story is that there is a need for both 'yin' (soothing, relaxing foods, herbs, and medicine, proper nutrition, etc...) and 'yang' medicine (stimulants and detoxification procedures...). Worded otherwise, there is a room for a delicate, homestatic balance in any type of medical and/or therapy process between 'constructionism' on the one hand (building new cells, re-generating life in the client/patient) and 'deconstructionism' on the other hand (clearing away toxins, pathogens, pollutants, etc.) Too much emphasis on the 'deconstructive' aspect of any type of medical and/or therapy procedure -- what I am calling the 'Clint Eastwood' approach to medicine -- and you may have a 'dead patient' on your hands because the delicate homeostatic balance between yin and yang, constructionism and deconstructionism, has been lost -- all 'deconstructionism' will eventually lead to a completely 'deconstructed patient' -- i.e., a dead one.
That's biology, bio-chemistry, and medicine. Now, let's come back to personality theory where the same rule of thumb applies. Conceptually, metaphysically, and topographically speaking, we have a 'yin' and a 'yang' topdog (the nurturing, supportive topdog -- the 'yin topdog' vs. the righteous, rejecting topdog -- the 'yang topdog' on the third floor of the personality -- both of which are basically 'introjected parental' ego-states (sterotypically speaking here, the 'yin' of the mother vs. the 'yang' of the father although everything can be completely different depending on the particular case. And we have the same on the first floor of the personality in terms of the 'yin' of the 'approval-seeking, co-operative underdog' vs. the 'yang' of the 'righteous, rebellious, rejecting underdog' -- both of which involve the 'compensatory' measures of 'adaptive, childhood ego-states'.
And that is where I will leave you today...
dgb, May 24th, 2008.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
The DGB Model of The Human Psyche -- Part 4: On The Usage of The Terms 'Unconscious', 'Subconscious', 'Ego-State', and 'Ego-Compartment'
In DGB Philosophy-Psychology, we will use the term 'unconscious' and 'subconscious' interchangeably; indeed, in my mind, the 'subconscious' is probably the preferable term because the usage of the term 'unconscious' brings with it a host of problems such as 'the avoidance of self-responsibility' relative to one's behavior and the problem of 'who has the executive right to say what is unconscious and what is not'? Anybody can interpret anything and say that it is 'unconscious'; this terminology is a license for any school of psychology -- of which Psychoanalysis has probably been the worst perpetrator and offender -- to make a totally unproveable 'metaphysical statement' -- or 'diagnosis' -- and to arrogantly think that they lie 'beyond the burden of proof' relative to having to empirically and logically defend their metaphysical statement -- or diagnosis. If wrong -- but accepted as being right -- this type of situation can have horrific consequences in both the clinical psychology/psychotherapy world -- and if it gets this far -- the legal world. How about the possibility of a father being blackballed, charged and/or convicted of a 'childhood sexual assault' that he did not commit. Or the opposite type of 'diagnostic error' -- a father being clinically and/or legally 'dismissed' of a 'real childhood sexual assault' based on the fact that the psychotherapeutic client's 'real memory' is psychoanalytically re-interpreted as the woman's 'distorted, wishful, narcissistic fantasy'.
This brings out the whole Psychoanalytic vs. Jeffrey Masson 'Seduction Theory' Controversy that created a big stir in the Psychoanalytic world -- and in the general public -- in the late 1970s and 1980s, I will be re-opening this controversy and presenting my opinions and clinical beliefs on it in a series of essays to follow at a later date.
I want to 'existentialize' Freud and Psychoanalysis meaning that no one gets away with not taking responsibility for his or her own behavior -- regardless of what is 'unconscious' and/or 'subconscious' and what is not.
Furthermore, the usage of the term 'subconscious' implies more that what may be 'unconsious or subconscious now' -- like for example, a particular 'un/sub-conscious belief and/or belief system' -- may have been, in fact, probably was, 'conscious at a previous date' such as when the person was 'learning/developing the belief/belief system' in the first place. Or alternatively, what may be 'un/subconscious now' may again become 'conscious at a future date' through a number of different and/or connected possibilities such as 'remembering', 'associating', 'introspecting', 'psychotherapy', 'new awarenesses'...etc.
Usually, the unconscious/subconscious is not referred to as being an 'ego-state' or an 'ego-compartment'. But my argument is that -- in Greek, I believe -- the word 'ego' means 'psyche' so if we are talking about the human psyche here, then why would the unconscious/subconscious not be viewed as a part of -- or an 'ego-compartment' of -- the human psyche? The answer is: there is no good answer except the 'classic, orthodox psychoanalytic tradition' of not viewing the 'unconscious' -- nor the 'id' -- nor the 'superego' -- as a part of the ego except perhaps from a historical/evolutionary perspective in which case -- and I will have to look for a Freudian reference here -- the 'ego' traditionally has been viewed as having been 'built' from the 'unconscious'. In contrast, DGB Philosophy-Psychology will view anything and everything connected with the workings of the human psyche as being a part of the 'ego' -- or stated differently -- an 'ego-compartment'.
dgb, May 18th, 2008.
This brings out the whole Psychoanalytic vs. Jeffrey Masson 'Seduction Theory' Controversy that created a big stir in the Psychoanalytic world -- and in the general public -- in the late 1970s and 1980s, I will be re-opening this controversy and presenting my opinions and clinical beliefs on it in a series of essays to follow at a later date.
I want to 'existentialize' Freud and Psychoanalysis meaning that no one gets away with not taking responsibility for his or her own behavior -- regardless of what is 'unconscious' and/or 'subconscious' and what is not.
Furthermore, the usage of the term 'subconscious' implies more that what may be 'unconsious or subconscious now' -- like for example, a particular 'un/sub-conscious belief and/or belief system' -- may have been, in fact, probably was, 'conscious at a previous date' such as when the person was 'learning/developing the belief/belief system' in the first place. Or alternatively, what may be 'un/subconscious now' may again become 'conscious at a future date' through a number of different and/or connected possibilities such as 'remembering', 'associating', 'introspecting', 'psychotherapy', 'new awarenesses'...etc.
Usually, the unconscious/subconscious is not referred to as being an 'ego-state' or an 'ego-compartment'. But my argument is that -- in Greek, I believe -- the word 'ego' means 'psyche' so if we are talking about the human psyche here, then why would the unconscious/subconscious not be viewed as a part of -- or an 'ego-compartment' of -- the human psyche? The answer is: there is no good answer except the 'classic, orthodox psychoanalytic tradition' of not viewing the 'unconscious' -- nor the 'id' -- nor the 'superego' -- as a part of the ego except perhaps from a historical/evolutionary perspective in which case -- and I will have to look for a Freudian reference here -- the 'ego' traditionally has been viewed as having been 'built' from the 'unconscious'. In contrast, DGB Philosophy-Psychology will view anything and everything connected with the workings of the human psyche as being a part of the 'ego' -- or stated differently -- an 'ego-compartment'.
dgb, May 18th, 2008.
Friday, May 16, 2008
The DGB Model of The Human Psyche -- Part 3: An Overview of The Different 'Ego-Compartments' In The Personality
I am writing from the lobby of the newly renovated Sharaton Hotel in Richmond Hill, Leslie and 7, this mornig. High definition tvs in the bedrooms and 5 internet computers in the lobby -- two very nice additions to staying over night at a nice hotel.
My last essay didn't take me where I expected -- the 'genetic unconscious' being the last 'ego-compartment' that I wanted to unfold, not the first. But this is not unusual for me in my writing so let us go with the flow and see where it takes us.
Two day ago I was worried about the model being 'too big and complicated', 'carrying too much excess baggage', pushing the 'analytic reading up the Richter scale and off the charts' while at the same time pushing 'the existential reading' down and off the charts at the other end.
Today I am not as worried about that. My model covers a lot more 'philosophical as well as psychological territory' -- about 2700 years of philosophical -- and before that even mythological -- history that I am bringing into play in Hegel's Hotel that most of the psychologists were not terribly worried about.
Berne's model used six different 'ego-states' in his terminology -- 'ego-compartments in my terminology. Berne's model talked about: 1. the 'nurturing parent' (ego-state); 2. the 'controlling parent' (ego-state); 3. the 'adult' (ego-state); 4. the 'adapted child' (ego-state'; 5. the 'natrual child' (ego-state); and 6. the 'rebellious child' (ego-state). According to Berne, every person 'moves around' form one of these ego-states to another depending on the context of the situation, and the particular inter-relational dynamics of the encounter -- or dialectic -- in progress.
My DGB model is an abbreviated synopsis of everything I am writing in Hegel's Hotel and at this point in time includes these 16 different ego-compartments -- or 'divisions of the ego'.
3rd Floor: 1. The Nurturing Topdog; 2. The Narcissistic-Hedonistic Topdog; 3. The Righteous Topdog;
2nd floor: 4. The Creative-Constructive Ego; 5. The Deconsstructive Ego; 6. The Epistemological Ego; 7. The Enlightenment Ego; 8. The Romantic-Humanistic-Existential Ego; 9. The Economic Ego; 10. The Physical Fitness Ego; 11. The Conflict-Mediating/Executive-Existential Ego;
1st Floor: 12. The Righteous (Rebellious) Underdog; 13. The Narcissistic-Hedonistic Underdog; 14. The Approval-Seeking/Co-operative Underdog;
Basement: 15. The Creative-Dynamic Unconcious; 16. The Structural Unsconscious (consisting of two parts): a) The Social Unconscious (and Transference-Lifestyle-Archetype Templates); and b) The Geenetic Unconscious (of which we have already talked about in the last essay).
That will do for today -- something for you to mull over and ponder on until we get down to more of the specifics of the 'the structural make-up, dynamics and interaction of these different ego-compartments and/or ego-states'.
dgb, May 16th, 2008.
My last essay didn't take me where I expected -- the 'genetic unconscious' being the last 'ego-compartment' that I wanted to unfold, not the first. But this is not unusual for me in my writing so let us go with the flow and see where it takes us.
Two day ago I was worried about the model being 'too big and complicated', 'carrying too much excess baggage', pushing the 'analytic reading up the Richter scale and off the charts' while at the same time pushing 'the existential reading' down and off the charts at the other end.
Today I am not as worried about that. My model covers a lot more 'philosophical as well as psychological territory' -- about 2700 years of philosophical -- and before that even mythological -- history that I am bringing into play in Hegel's Hotel that most of the psychologists were not terribly worried about.
Berne's model used six different 'ego-states' in his terminology -- 'ego-compartments in my terminology. Berne's model talked about: 1. the 'nurturing parent' (ego-state); 2. the 'controlling parent' (ego-state); 3. the 'adult' (ego-state); 4. the 'adapted child' (ego-state'; 5. the 'natrual child' (ego-state); and 6. the 'rebellious child' (ego-state). According to Berne, every person 'moves around' form one of these ego-states to another depending on the context of the situation, and the particular inter-relational dynamics of the encounter -- or dialectic -- in progress.
My DGB model is an abbreviated synopsis of everything I am writing in Hegel's Hotel and at this point in time includes these 16 different ego-compartments -- or 'divisions of the ego'.
3rd Floor: 1. The Nurturing Topdog; 2. The Narcissistic-Hedonistic Topdog; 3. The Righteous Topdog;
2nd floor: 4. The Creative-Constructive Ego; 5. The Deconsstructive Ego; 6. The Epistemological Ego; 7. The Enlightenment Ego; 8. The Romantic-Humanistic-Existential Ego; 9. The Economic Ego; 10. The Physical Fitness Ego; 11. The Conflict-Mediating/Executive-Existential Ego;
1st Floor: 12. The Righteous (Rebellious) Underdog; 13. The Narcissistic-Hedonistic Underdog; 14. The Approval-Seeking/Co-operative Underdog;
Basement: 15. The Creative-Dynamic Unconcious; 16. The Structural Unsconscious (consisting of two parts): a) The Social Unconscious (and Transference-Lifestyle-Archetype Templates); and b) The Geenetic Unconscious (of which we have already talked about in the last essay).
That will do for today -- something for you to mull over and ponder on until we get down to more of the specifics of the 'the structural make-up, dynamics and interaction of these different ego-compartments and/or ego-states'.
dgb, May 16th, 2008.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
A DGB Model Of The Human Psyche -- Part 2: The Genetic Un(Sub)conscious
Everything here has got to be based on function. If this model is not functional -- or any part of it -- then throw it out. Function dictates everything. Did our Creator create a part of our body that does not have a function? Hardly! And so it has to be with this model.
The danger of creating a model with too many 'compartments' in it, is that is prone to create too much analysis. You know what they say about too much analysis -- it creates paralysis.
The best thing I learned at Gestalt Therapy was how to keep things -- 'existential'. Alive! Too much analysis turns life into death. Movement into stagnation. Excitement into boredom. Growth into entropy.
Through all of this 'model-building', we need to stay alive. It's like watching a professional basketball game -- or any sport or performance. The analyis is done in the dressing room, but the game still has to be played on the court or the field or the ice or the stage... There is a 'dialectical dance' going on here between 'analysis' and 'existentialism' as well as between 'wholism' and 'reductionism'. Again, we must keep things in balance. We must not lose track of the existentialism in the analysis; similarily, we must not lose track of the wholism in the reductionism. We need a 'ping pong game' back and forth. If there is an emphasis at all it is on keeping the existentialism -- the dialectic encounter -- alive, and similarily, the wholism. We must not get so caught up in 'part-function analysis' that we forget how everything is integrated into a sophisticated whole. This is the way with the body. And this is also the way with the mind.
As well as being a post-Hegelian philosopher, and a post-Nietzschean philosopher, and a post-Freudian philosopher, I am also a post-Gestalt philosopher. Although it has been about 17 years since I have been involved with The Gestalt Institute, and I am not authorized to speak for them, still I spent the greater part of 12 years, off and on, participating in various group workshops at The Gestalt Institute. And Fritz Perls was a very entertaining and educational writer. He had the same type of flare and 'existential gusto' as one of our common mentors -- Nietzsche. Anyone who has been touched by the work of either Nietzsche and/or Perls -- and/or The Gestalt Institute -- is not likely to forget it. Gestalt Therapy is very much a living extension of much of Nietzschean philosophy.
So as I start to unfold the following DGB model -- with all of its different 'ego-functions and compartments' -- using the Transactional Analysis model mainly as my starting-point -- it remains on my existential conscience that we not lose track of the 'dialectical pulse of life', the stuff that makes our existence important and meaningful more than anything I can say 'analytically'. Perls -- and Gestalt Therapy -- had/have an 'allergy to analysis' which I do not follow quite as 'anally-retentively' as they do -- but still, I have a healthy respect for their motto of 'Get out of your head and into your senses'...or paraphrased...live your life existentially -- and with dialectical aliveness -- not cognitively, and put people, including yourself -- asleep. Live your life totally in your head and you put yourself, and others, asleep. Know when it's time to get out of your head and into your senses...That's a very important part of the 'dialectic dance' of living...
.....................................................................................
It is two days later from when I wrote the paragraphs above. I needed a break to churn on what I was about to write. I was afraid. I was seriously wondering -- and questioning -- the model I was about to present. Was/is it good enough to make any kind of a serious impact on those people who are in the 'know' -- the psychologists, the psycho-theorists, the psychotherapists, the clinical psychologists out there -- who have spent many, many countless hours indulging in these types of issues, asking these types of questions, and delivering their own particular types of answers?
At the same time, I was/am trying to hold onto a different type of reading audience -- the psychology and/or philosophy student at whatever level of academia he or she has progressed to, as well as the 'lay intellect' and the 'self-teaching/taught student' who may be seriously entering this type of territory for the first or near to first time.
I say all this because one of main things that we will be talking about below as we delve into the realm of 'personality theory' is the different 'ego-states' in the personality -- 'ego-states' being a term that the post or neo-psychoanalyst, Eric Berne, made famous during the 1960s with books like 'Games People Play' and 'What Do You Say After You Say Hello'.
...................................................................................
Dr. Eric Berne, Psychiatrist and Creator of Transactional Analysis
Author of Games People Play
Dr. Eric Berne is the author of Games People Play, the groundbreaking book in which he introduces Games and Transactional Analysis to the world. According to Dr. Berne, games are ritualistic transactions or behavior patterns between individuals that can indicate hidden feelings or emotions. A runaway success, Games People Play spent more than two years on the New York Times bestseller list in the mid 1960s - longer than any non-fiction book over the preceding decade. Games People Play and Transactional Analysis have gone on to influence and inspire millions of people, including Thomas A. Harris, author of the book I'm OK - You're OK, and Muriel James, author of Born to Win.
Five million copies later and nearly forty years after it first debuted, Games People Play remains popular and continues to sell across the world. It has been translated into over 10 different languages, with millions of laypeople and trained psychotherapists employing Dr. Berne's techniques.
Dr. Eric Berne
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Games People Play
"An important book . . . a brilliant, amusing, and clear catalogue of the psychological theatricals that human beings play over and over again. The good Doctor has provided story lines that hacks will not exhaust in the next 10,000 years"
-Kurt Vonnegut Jr. in Life Magazine
"Original, disturbing, and delightful, a prime conversation piece... Many of these games are real-life horrors, played in dead earnest in public places, the parlor, bedroom, consulting room"
- The Chicago Tribune
"A fascinating book... These are not necessarily 'fun' games. In fact, most of them are hair-raisingly neurotic rituals in which tensions are discharged and satisfactions are gained, usually at the expense of others"
- Newsweek
ALSO! A 2004 essay in the New York Times on the impact of Games People Play, as well as an excerpt from a 1966 article in which Dr. Eric Berne plays games with Frank Sinatra.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dr. Berne with his trademark pipe Dr. Eric Berne (1910-1970) was a prominent psychiatrist and bestselling author. He grew up in Montreal, Canada, and received his MD degree from McGill University in 1935. He completed his psychiatry training in the United States and then entered the US Army as a psychiatrist.
After the war, Berne moved to Carmel, California. He continued his work as a psychiatrist, but felt increasingly frustrated with the psychoanalytic approaches at the time. As a result, he began developing a new and revolutionary theory, which he called Transactional Analysis. In 1958, he published the paper "Transactional Analysis: A New and Effective Method of Group Therapy" where he outlined this new approach.
After creating Transactional Analysis, Berne continued to develop and apply this new methodology. This led him to publish Games People Play and to found the International Transactional Analysis Association. He led an active life and continued his psychotherapist and writing duties up until his death in 1970. He left a remarkable legacy, including the creation of Transactional Analysis, Games People Play and 30+ other books and articles, and the founding of the International Transactional Analysis Association.
.................................................................................
Berne specifies 6 different ego-states on three different 'topological levels' similar to Freud's dividing the personality into three or more different topological levels -- depending on the year he was writing -- such as the 'id' basically in the 'basement' of the personality, the 'ego' on the 'main floor' of the personality, and the 'superego' on the 'top floor -- or 'penthouse' -- of the personality. With Berne it was the 'adapted child', the 'natural child', and the 'rebellious child' on the bottom floor of the personality, the 'adult' on the main floor of the personality, and the 'nurturing parent' and 'critical parent' on the top floor of the personality.
With an integration of different names influenced by, and borrowed partly from, Psychoanalysis, Jungian Psychology, Transactional Analyis, Adlerian Psychology, and Gestalt Therapy -- DGB Personality Theory will continue this topological approach with a host of partly old and partly new 'ego-states' and/or 'ego-compartments' to talk about.
I have a high level of respect for the 'self-teaching and self-taught student' -- meaning that there are no universities and/or colleges involved -- because after 1991, all of my learning falls into this category. I learned what I read. I read what I dug up with my 'Sherlock Holmes' nose. And what I dug up with my Sherlock Holmes nose -- at just the time I needed it -- seemed to come from the deepest depths of my intuitive, genetic unconscious -- or 'soul'. Perhaps it is not surprising then, that one of the main features of my DGB model of the human psyche -- influenced mainly by Carl Jung's 'collective unconcious' and the 'creative projection' of my own psyche -- is the 'genetic unconscious', 'the genetic blueprint and/or template' -- or the 'genetic soul'. I wouldn't even cry foul if you and/or I said that it was 'our own personal, unique, genetic soul as created by God.'
When I was wandering the halls of The University of Waterloo back around 1978, preparing to write my honours Thesis in psychology, and I wandered into the University library, visiting the psychology section to see what I could find -- I stumbled upon a book by 'Alexander Bain' called 'The Emotions and The Will'. Was I looking at the work of a great, great, (great?) grandfather?
At this point in time, I do not think so because I think I read in an old Encyclopedia Brittanica that Alexander Bain had no kids. Still, he remains what I would call an 'archetypal mentor/figure' for me -- consciously, and/or unconsciously perhaps if there is some sort of a 'genetic connection'.
....................................................................................
From the internet...
Mind, Brain and Adaptation in the Nineteenth Century: Cerebral Localization and Its Biological Context from Gall to Ferrier
by Robert M. Young
Synthesis of Associationism and Sensory-Motor Physiology
Alexander Bain was probably the first modern thinker whose primary concern was with psychology itself He has been credited with writing the first 'comprehensive treatise having psychology as its sole purpose'.[1] His two-volume systematic work, The Senses and the Intellect (1855) and The Emotions and the Will (1859), was the standard British text for almost half a century, until Stout's replaced it.[2] He also founded Mind (1876-), the first psychological journal in any country. His work requires close attention, because it is the meeting-point of experimental sensory-motor physiology and the association psychology. His influence on the conceptions of later workers was direct and extremely important. Ferrier studied classics and philosophy under Bain at Aberdeen (first class honours, 1863). When he and Jackson acknowledge their intellectual debts or make references to psychology, the names most often mentioned are Bain and Spencer-the figures whose work was the culmination of the association psychology in its traditional form. Ferrier and Jackson strongly influenced each other, and together they
1 Murphy, 1949, p. 107.
2 Boring, 1950, p. 235.
.....................................................................................
Within my concept of the genetic unconscious, I include Freud's concept of the 'id' -- paraphrasing Freud, 'the bridge' between human biology-physiology-bio-chemistry', biological-hormonal impulses like 'sex impulses (in Freud's more genetic-deterministic terminology -- 'sex instincts') -- and finally, the human psyche. More on this at a later date.
And within my concept of the genetic unconscious, I include Jung's concept of the 'collective unconscious' or what I would call the 'mythological-symbolic unconscious' -- the stuff that 'night dreams' and 'psychotic hallucinations' are made of. Freud once wrote -- and I paraphrase: The psychotic dreams while he is awake. (My apologies but I will have to dig for the source. The best I can come up with so far is: Freud, 1940, An Outline of Psychoanalysis. I will see if I can find it upstairs in my library. How about this?: 'A dream, then, is a psychosis, with all the absurdities, delusions and illusions of a psychosis.' Sigmund Freud, 1940, pg. 49.)
'Topologically', I would put the genetic unconscious in the 'basement' -- or the deepest depths -- of the human psyche. Or alternatively, call it the deepest basement of 'Hegel's Hotel'.
Dare I say that we have 15 more 'ego-compartments' to go -- classifying the genetic unconscious as an 'unconscious ego-compartment' -- something that Freud definitely would not have done. For Freud, neither the 'id' nor the 'super-ego' were to be construed as a part of the 'ego' -- except perhaps in an earlier, evolutionary personal and/or cultural stage of development. Nor did Freud ever -- to my knowledge talke about 'ego-states' and/or 'ego-compartments' -- a type of terminology that would surface years later under the influence of Object Relations -- and then more definitively under the influence of Berne's 'Transactional Analysis'.
It is to Transactional Analysis that our next discussion will return to as a starting point. And upon checking my research records -- rather than my faulty memory -- the first thing I noted was that the Tranactional Analysis model of the human psyche is a 'six-ego-compartment or ego-state' model; not a five compartment model as I first stated in this article a couple of days ago. I was digging some 25 years back into my memory -- back I would say to about 1983 when I last studied Eric Berne -- so I guess it is not too surprising that my memory was not foolproof. We will fix this up in the next essay.
-- dgb, May 14th, 2008; modified and updated May 18th, 2008.
The danger of creating a model with too many 'compartments' in it, is that is prone to create too much analysis. You know what they say about too much analysis -- it creates paralysis.
The best thing I learned at Gestalt Therapy was how to keep things -- 'existential'. Alive! Too much analysis turns life into death. Movement into stagnation. Excitement into boredom. Growth into entropy.
Through all of this 'model-building', we need to stay alive. It's like watching a professional basketball game -- or any sport or performance. The analyis is done in the dressing room, but the game still has to be played on the court or the field or the ice or the stage... There is a 'dialectical dance' going on here between 'analysis' and 'existentialism' as well as between 'wholism' and 'reductionism'. Again, we must keep things in balance. We must not lose track of the existentialism in the analysis; similarily, we must not lose track of the wholism in the reductionism. We need a 'ping pong game' back and forth. If there is an emphasis at all it is on keeping the existentialism -- the dialectic encounter -- alive, and similarily, the wholism. We must not get so caught up in 'part-function analysis' that we forget how everything is integrated into a sophisticated whole. This is the way with the body. And this is also the way with the mind.
As well as being a post-Hegelian philosopher, and a post-Nietzschean philosopher, and a post-Freudian philosopher, I am also a post-Gestalt philosopher. Although it has been about 17 years since I have been involved with The Gestalt Institute, and I am not authorized to speak for them, still I spent the greater part of 12 years, off and on, participating in various group workshops at The Gestalt Institute. And Fritz Perls was a very entertaining and educational writer. He had the same type of flare and 'existential gusto' as one of our common mentors -- Nietzsche. Anyone who has been touched by the work of either Nietzsche and/or Perls -- and/or The Gestalt Institute -- is not likely to forget it. Gestalt Therapy is very much a living extension of much of Nietzschean philosophy.
So as I start to unfold the following DGB model -- with all of its different 'ego-functions and compartments' -- using the Transactional Analysis model mainly as my starting-point -- it remains on my existential conscience that we not lose track of the 'dialectical pulse of life', the stuff that makes our existence important and meaningful more than anything I can say 'analytically'. Perls -- and Gestalt Therapy -- had/have an 'allergy to analysis' which I do not follow quite as 'anally-retentively' as they do -- but still, I have a healthy respect for their motto of 'Get out of your head and into your senses'...or paraphrased...live your life existentially -- and with dialectical aliveness -- not cognitively, and put people, including yourself -- asleep. Live your life totally in your head and you put yourself, and others, asleep. Know when it's time to get out of your head and into your senses...That's a very important part of the 'dialectic dance' of living...
.....................................................................................
It is two days later from when I wrote the paragraphs above. I needed a break to churn on what I was about to write. I was afraid. I was seriously wondering -- and questioning -- the model I was about to present. Was/is it good enough to make any kind of a serious impact on those people who are in the 'know' -- the psychologists, the psycho-theorists, the psychotherapists, the clinical psychologists out there -- who have spent many, many countless hours indulging in these types of issues, asking these types of questions, and delivering their own particular types of answers?
At the same time, I was/am trying to hold onto a different type of reading audience -- the psychology and/or philosophy student at whatever level of academia he or she has progressed to, as well as the 'lay intellect' and the 'self-teaching/taught student' who may be seriously entering this type of territory for the first or near to first time.
I say all this because one of main things that we will be talking about below as we delve into the realm of 'personality theory' is the different 'ego-states' in the personality -- 'ego-states' being a term that the post or neo-psychoanalyst, Eric Berne, made famous during the 1960s with books like 'Games People Play' and 'What Do You Say After You Say Hello'.
...................................................................................
Dr. Eric Berne, Psychiatrist and Creator of Transactional Analysis
Author of Games People Play
Dr. Eric Berne is the author of Games People Play, the groundbreaking book in which he introduces Games and Transactional Analysis to the world. According to Dr. Berne, games are ritualistic transactions or behavior patterns between individuals that can indicate hidden feelings or emotions. A runaway success, Games People Play spent more than two years on the New York Times bestseller list in the mid 1960s - longer than any non-fiction book over the preceding decade. Games People Play and Transactional Analysis have gone on to influence and inspire millions of people, including Thomas A. Harris, author of the book I'm OK - You're OK, and Muriel James, author of Born to Win.
Five million copies later and nearly forty years after it first debuted, Games People Play remains popular and continues to sell across the world. It has been translated into over 10 different languages, with millions of laypeople and trained psychotherapists employing Dr. Berne's techniques.
Dr. Eric Berne
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Games People Play
"An important book . . . a brilliant, amusing, and clear catalogue of the psychological theatricals that human beings play over and over again. The good Doctor has provided story lines that hacks will not exhaust in the next 10,000 years"
-Kurt Vonnegut Jr. in Life Magazine
"Original, disturbing, and delightful, a prime conversation piece... Many of these games are real-life horrors, played in dead earnest in public places, the parlor, bedroom, consulting room"
- The Chicago Tribune
"A fascinating book... These are not necessarily 'fun' games. In fact, most of them are hair-raisingly neurotic rituals in which tensions are discharged and satisfactions are gained, usually at the expense of others"
- Newsweek
ALSO! A 2004 essay in the New York Times on the impact of Games People Play, as well as an excerpt from a 1966 article in which Dr. Eric Berne plays games with Frank Sinatra.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dr. Berne with his trademark pipe Dr. Eric Berne (1910-1970) was a prominent psychiatrist and bestselling author. He grew up in Montreal, Canada, and received his MD degree from McGill University in 1935. He completed his psychiatry training in the United States and then entered the US Army as a psychiatrist.
After the war, Berne moved to Carmel, California. He continued his work as a psychiatrist, but felt increasingly frustrated with the psychoanalytic approaches at the time. As a result, he began developing a new and revolutionary theory, which he called Transactional Analysis. In 1958, he published the paper "Transactional Analysis: A New and Effective Method of Group Therapy" where he outlined this new approach.
After creating Transactional Analysis, Berne continued to develop and apply this new methodology. This led him to publish Games People Play and to found the International Transactional Analysis Association. He led an active life and continued his psychotherapist and writing duties up until his death in 1970. He left a remarkable legacy, including the creation of Transactional Analysis, Games People Play and 30+ other books and articles, and the founding of the International Transactional Analysis Association.
.................................................................................
Berne specifies 6 different ego-states on three different 'topological levels' similar to Freud's dividing the personality into three or more different topological levels -- depending on the year he was writing -- such as the 'id' basically in the 'basement' of the personality, the 'ego' on the 'main floor' of the personality, and the 'superego' on the 'top floor -- or 'penthouse' -- of the personality. With Berne it was the 'adapted child', the 'natural child', and the 'rebellious child' on the bottom floor of the personality, the 'adult' on the main floor of the personality, and the 'nurturing parent' and 'critical parent' on the top floor of the personality.
With an integration of different names influenced by, and borrowed partly from, Psychoanalysis, Jungian Psychology, Transactional Analyis, Adlerian Psychology, and Gestalt Therapy -- DGB Personality Theory will continue this topological approach with a host of partly old and partly new 'ego-states' and/or 'ego-compartments' to talk about.
I have a high level of respect for the 'self-teaching and self-taught student' -- meaning that there are no universities and/or colleges involved -- because after 1991, all of my learning falls into this category. I learned what I read. I read what I dug up with my 'Sherlock Holmes' nose. And what I dug up with my Sherlock Holmes nose -- at just the time I needed it -- seemed to come from the deepest depths of my intuitive, genetic unconscious -- or 'soul'. Perhaps it is not surprising then, that one of the main features of my DGB model of the human psyche -- influenced mainly by Carl Jung's 'collective unconcious' and the 'creative projection' of my own psyche -- is the 'genetic unconscious', 'the genetic blueprint and/or template' -- or the 'genetic soul'. I wouldn't even cry foul if you and/or I said that it was 'our own personal, unique, genetic soul as created by God.'
When I was wandering the halls of The University of Waterloo back around 1978, preparing to write my honours Thesis in psychology, and I wandered into the University library, visiting the psychology section to see what I could find -- I stumbled upon a book by 'Alexander Bain' called 'The Emotions and The Will'. Was I looking at the work of a great, great, (great?) grandfather?
At this point in time, I do not think so because I think I read in an old Encyclopedia Brittanica that Alexander Bain had no kids. Still, he remains what I would call an 'archetypal mentor/figure' for me -- consciously, and/or unconsciously perhaps if there is some sort of a 'genetic connection'.
....................................................................................
From the internet...
Mind, Brain and Adaptation in the Nineteenth Century: Cerebral Localization and Its Biological Context from Gall to Ferrier
by Robert M. Young
Synthesis of Associationism and Sensory-Motor Physiology
Alexander Bain was probably the first modern thinker whose primary concern was with psychology itself He has been credited with writing the first 'comprehensive treatise having psychology as its sole purpose'.[1] His two-volume systematic work, The Senses and the Intellect (1855) and The Emotions and the Will (1859), was the standard British text for almost half a century, until Stout's replaced it.[2] He also founded Mind (1876-), the first psychological journal in any country. His work requires close attention, because it is the meeting-point of experimental sensory-motor physiology and the association psychology. His influence on the conceptions of later workers was direct and extremely important. Ferrier studied classics and philosophy under Bain at Aberdeen (first class honours, 1863). When he and Jackson acknowledge their intellectual debts or make references to psychology, the names most often mentioned are Bain and Spencer-the figures whose work was the culmination of the association psychology in its traditional form. Ferrier and Jackson strongly influenced each other, and together they
1 Murphy, 1949, p. 107.
2 Boring, 1950, p. 235.
.....................................................................................
Within my concept of the genetic unconscious, I include Freud's concept of the 'id' -- paraphrasing Freud, 'the bridge' between human biology-physiology-bio-chemistry', biological-hormonal impulses like 'sex impulses (in Freud's more genetic-deterministic terminology -- 'sex instincts') -- and finally, the human psyche. More on this at a later date.
And within my concept of the genetic unconscious, I include Jung's concept of the 'collective unconscious' or what I would call the 'mythological-symbolic unconscious' -- the stuff that 'night dreams' and 'psychotic hallucinations' are made of. Freud once wrote -- and I paraphrase: The psychotic dreams while he is awake. (My apologies but I will have to dig for the source. The best I can come up with so far is: Freud, 1940, An Outline of Psychoanalysis. I will see if I can find it upstairs in my library. How about this?: 'A dream, then, is a psychosis, with all the absurdities, delusions and illusions of a psychosis.' Sigmund Freud, 1940, pg. 49.)
'Topologically', I would put the genetic unconscious in the 'basement' -- or the deepest depths -- of the human psyche. Or alternatively, call it the deepest basement of 'Hegel's Hotel'.
Dare I say that we have 15 more 'ego-compartments' to go -- classifying the genetic unconscious as an 'unconscious ego-compartment' -- something that Freud definitely would not have done. For Freud, neither the 'id' nor the 'super-ego' were to be construed as a part of the 'ego' -- except perhaps in an earlier, evolutionary personal and/or cultural stage of development. Nor did Freud ever -- to my knowledge talke about 'ego-states' and/or 'ego-compartments' -- a type of terminology that would surface years later under the influence of Object Relations -- and then more definitively under the influence of Berne's 'Transactional Analysis'.
It is to Transactional Analysis that our next discussion will return to as a starting point. And upon checking my research records -- rather than my faulty memory -- the first thing I noted was that the Tranactional Analysis model of the human psyche is a 'six-ego-compartment or ego-state' model; not a five compartment model as I first stated in this article a couple of days ago. I was digging some 25 years back into my memory -- back I would say to about 1983 when I last studied Eric Berne -- so I guess it is not too surprising that my memory was not foolproof. We will fix this up in the next essay.
-- dgb, May 14th, 2008; modified and updated May 18th, 2008.
Sunday, May 11, 2008
A DGB Model Of The Human Psyche: (Part 1)
Let's start with Freud. Freud had a very simple but functionally effective model of the human psyche -- for both therapist and common folk alike. It was a metaphysical model involving 3 compartments in the personality: 1. the superego; 2. the id; and 3. the ego. Basically, the division of responsibility and function in the personality worked like this: 1. the superego handles all social-ethical responsibilities. It functions as the 'ethical and social conscience' of the personality; 2. the id handles all the biological instincts in the personality -- both acceptable and non-acceptable , sensory, sexual and violent (although all three of these points are debatable as we shall soon see); 3. the ego handles all the 'reality-testing', 'epistemology', 'conflict-mediation', and 'executive action' functions in the personality. It is the 'conflict-negotiating, compromising bridge' between the id and the superego. The name 'DGB(N) Philosophy expresses the same idea -- 'Dialectical, Gap-Bridging Negotiations'. In other words, the ego in Freudian Psychology fulfills a 'Hegelian conflict-mediating function' -- specifically the evolutionary function of: a) thesis (superego), b) anti-thesis (id), and c) synthesis (ego)'. Again -- a simple and functionally effective metaphysical model.
However, boys will be boys -- they all want(ed) to make their own models and put their own 'personal stamp' on it. Is this a sexist comment? Perhaps -- or even probably -- today. 'The times they are a changin'. Anyways, Melanie Klein, a German Psychoanalyst got involved in the 'model-building competition' -- and she was a girl/woman; not a boy/man. Stereotype broken.
Alfred Adler couldn't fit his brand of 'conceptual narcissism' (model-building) with Freud's brand of conceptual narcissism (Psychoanalysis) so they split -- Adler creating the school of psychology now known as Adlerian or Individual Psychology;
Carl Jung couldn't fit his brand of 'conceptual narcissism' (model-building) with Freud's model of Psychoanalysis -- so they split too -- Jung went on to create his own school of psychology called 'Jungian Psychology'. Carl Jung was also partly influenced by Adler's thinking -- parts of which can be found in Jung's system, particularly the idea of 'compensation'. The idea of 'compensation is also important in my own brand of DGB Philosophy-Psychology.
Adler's effect on personality theory was substantial and partly paradoxical. In a field of 'dialectical' theorists, Adler was an exception -- he was a 'monistic' theorist: he believed in the 'unity' and 'wholism' of the personality in 'Spinozian fashion' or like the very ancient 'monistic philosophy' of the Greek philosopher Thales (water being the source of all things) vs. the 'dialectic philosophy' of Anaxamander and Heraclitus where they began to talk about 'opposites colliding' with each other (Anaxamander) or 'opposites needing to balance with each other' (Heraclitus).
I had a tough time wrestling with this conceptual problem in the early 1980s: in attending both The Gestalt Institute in Toronto and The Adlerian Institute of Ontario at the same time, I was struck with the paradoxical difference between the 'dialectical theory' that I was learning at The Gestalt Institute and the 'wholistic-unity' theory I was learning at The Adlerian Institute. How could they both be theorizing about the same human personality when the difference in this theoretical outlook was so -- remarkably different? 'Unity and Wholism in The Personality' (Adler) vs. Dialectical Polarity and Conflict in the Personality (Freud, Jung, Klein, Perls...) Why was Adlerian theory -- 'non-dialectical'?
Or was it? There was a 'hint' of a 'dialectical split' in Adlerian theory that I was grasping a bit of back then when I was learning it in 1980-81, more so now. But it was explained in a different way. 'Lifestyle' was/is the central concept in Adlerian theory. All of an individual's unique personality according to Adler -- and I am paraphrasing what I remember learning -- revolves around the person's unique 'lifestyle (pattern)' which is similar to what I will be developing in my concept of a person's unique 'transference-lifestyle complex'. This is Freud and Adler integrated in typical DGB Post-Hegelian style.
What was the hint of a possible 'dialectical split' in Adlerian theory? Adler postulated that every person had some unique form of an 'inferiority or insecurity feeling' which he or she 'compensated for' through his or her own unique process of 'superiority-striving' -- which was the essence of his/her own unique 'lifestyle pattern'. That is as far as Adler took it basically although there is obviously a lot more to Adlerian theory than I have just quickly summerized here. But I will 'extrapolate' on Adlerian theory a bit in DGB terminology and conceptuology.
This connects Adlerian Theory with Freud's pre-1900 'Traumacy Theory' and his post-1900 'Narcissistic Theory'.
A person invariably and inevitably experiences a number of similar and/or different types of 'narcissistic ego traumacies' in his early childhood -- some of a more subjectively psychologically significant nature than others, some of a unique, individual nature, and others of a more 'chronic, serial' nature. It is impossible to get through childhood without experiencing 'narcissistic ego traumacy' from the 'objectively small' to the 'objectively huge' to the 'subjectively small' to the 'subjectively huge'. Objective psychology and 'objective narcissistic ego traumacy' does not always meet 'subjective narcissistic traumacy'.
It is subjective narcissistic ego traumacy that counts and subjective narcissistic ego traumacy is in the eye of the beholder; specifically, the eye of the person who experiences, interprets, and evaluates the 'nature of the ego-traumacy' and often ends up carrying this narcissistic ego traumacy consciously and/or subconsciously -- together with his 'superiority compensations' for the rest of his or her life. So now we have a theoretical connection between: 1. 'narcissistic ego traumacy'; 2. 'inferiority feeling and/or feeling of insecurity'; 3. 'compensation' and/or 'compensatory action'; and 4. 'superiority-striving' (lifestyle pattern which generally consists of the compensatory action). DGB Psychology will call this whole state of affairs the person's 'transference-lifestyle complex'.
However, we are getting ahead of ourselves here. Back to the history of personality theory. There were other things happening in the history and evolution of personality theory that need to be accounted for, and integrated into our evolving DGB model of the human psyche.
Perls' Gestalt Model: Perls (or maybe it was Perls, Hefferline, and Goodman -- or maybe it was Fritz and Laura Perls) introduced -- and I am not sure when and under what circumstances these two concepts were introduced (I will have to research it) -- the 'bi-polar dialectical concepts' of 'topdog' and 'underdog'. This was similar to Freud's dialectical split between the superego and the ego -- but with a little difference: more of an articulation of a 'power struggle' in the personality, and kind of a hint of a possible Adlerian influence of the 'underdog' being connected to Adler's idea of the 'inferiority feeling'. The underdog has the inferiority feeling; whereas the 'topdog' has the 'superiority complex'. An important difference in the evolutionary direction of personality structure/theory was starting to happen here.
This difference was even more clearly articulated in Eric Berne's 'Transactional Analysis' model of the human psyche. From Classic Psychoanalysis to Object Relations to Transactional Analysis, the idea of different 'ego-states' was starting to catch on and become more and more popular. DGB Personality Theory has likewise moved in this direction -- with Transactional Analysis providing the main theoretical influcence.
In Transactional Analysis, the classic Freudian 'superego' was dialectically split in two, giving one of the dialectical splits a new 'job-function' (nurturing)-- and giving both a new name: 'The Nurturing Parent' (the new more 'maternal' Superego)vs. 'The Critical Parent' (the old paternal Superego). An interesting evolutionary development, indeed.
Berne argued basically that the developing child introjects the 'righteous, critical parent' (sexistly speaking -- the paternal father) and introjects the 'nurturing, encouraging, supportive parent (sexistly speaking -- the maternal mother) -- and splits the difference. (One detects the presence and the essence of the Chinese 'yin/yang' theory here.)
On the bottom part of this first 'multi-dialectical psychological model', Berne postulated another psychological split -- and two more 'ego-states' -- the 'approval-seeking child' vs. the 'rebellious child'. Thus, Transactional Analysis had become the first form of 'Multi-Dialectical-Analysis'. Bernes' '4 ego-state' model was topped off with one more additional ego-state sitting 'topologically' in the middle of the model and functioning mainly as the old Freudian (Hegelian) ego -- as an 'adult conflict-mediator'. He called this last ego-state 'The Adult'. Thus, Bernes worked very effectively in Transactional Analysis for a good number of years -- I'm not sure how popular it is now -- with a multi-dialectical, 5 ego-state (or ego-compartment) model of the personality. I liked it although I wasn't crazy about the popularized names for the different ego-states. Still -- I was influenced by, and continue to be influenced by, this model.
However, I wanted to introduce my Freudian-Adlerian influence into this model -- specifically, 1. narcissistic theory; and 2. transference-lifestyle complex theory.
Furthermore, I found Berne's work a little too 'cognitive' and 'analytic' for my liking; I preferred the 'existential anxiety-excitement' of Gestalt Therapy.
Finally -- and this has been a much more recent development of the last few years -- I wanted to add a Jungian 'mythological-archetype' influence to the model, and I wanted to add a few different 'philosophical ego-states' to the model. This would make the model much bigger -- in terms of number of 'ego-states-functions-compartments' -- than all of its predecessors, even the Bernes' Transactional Analysis model.
This brings us historically up-to-date -- and ready for Part 2.
-- dgb, May 11th, 2008.
However, boys will be boys -- they all want(ed) to make their own models and put their own 'personal stamp' on it. Is this a sexist comment? Perhaps -- or even probably -- today. 'The times they are a changin'. Anyways, Melanie Klein, a German Psychoanalyst got involved in the 'model-building competition' -- and she was a girl/woman; not a boy/man. Stereotype broken.
Alfred Adler couldn't fit his brand of 'conceptual narcissism' (model-building) with Freud's brand of conceptual narcissism (Psychoanalysis) so they split -- Adler creating the school of psychology now known as Adlerian or Individual Psychology;
Carl Jung couldn't fit his brand of 'conceptual narcissism' (model-building) with Freud's model of Psychoanalysis -- so they split too -- Jung went on to create his own school of psychology called 'Jungian Psychology'. Carl Jung was also partly influenced by Adler's thinking -- parts of which can be found in Jung's system, particularly the idea of 'compensation'. The idea of 'compensation is also important in my own brand of DGB Philosophy-Psychology.
Adler's effect on personality theory was substantial and partly paradoxical. In a field of 'dialectical' theorists, Adler was an exception -- he was a 'monistic' theorist: he believed in the 'unity' and 'wholism' of the personality in 'Spinozian fashion' or like the very ancient 'monistic philosophy' of the Greek philosopher Thales (water being the source of all things) vs. the 'dialectic philosophy' of Anaxamander and Heraclitus where they began to talk about 'opposites colliding' with each other (Anaxamander) or 'opposites needing to balance with each other' (Heraclitus).
I had a tough time wrestling with this conceptual problem in the early 1980s: in attending both The Gestalt Institute in Toronto and The Adlerian Institute of Ontario at the same time, I was struck with the paradoxical difference between the 'dialectical theory' that I was learning at The Gestalt Institute and the 'wholistic-unity' theory I was learning at The Adlerian Institute. How could they both be theorizing about the same human personality when the difference in this theoretical outlook was so -- remarkably different? 'Unity and Wholism in The Personality' (Adler) vs. Dialectical Polarity and Conflict in the Personality (Freud, Jung, Klein, Perls...) Why was Adlerian theory -- 'non-dialectical'?
Or was it? There was a 'hint' of a 'dialectical split' in Adlerian theory that I was grasping a bit of back then when I was learning it in 1980-81, more so now. But it was explained in a different way. 'Lifestyle' was/is the central concept in Adlerian theory. All of an individual's unique personality according to Adler -- and I am paraphrasing what I remember learning -- revolves around the person's unique 'lifestyle (pattern)' which is similar to what I will be developing in my concept of a person's unique 'transference-lifestyle complex'. This is Freud and Adler integrated in typical DGB Post-Hegelian style.
What was the hint of a possible 'dialectical split' in Adlerian theory? Adler postulated that every person had some unique form of an 'inferiority or insecurity feeling' which he or she 'compensated for' through his or her own unique process of 'superiority-striving' -- which was the essence of his/her own unique 'lifestyle pattern'. That is as far as Adler took it basically although there is obviously a lot more to Adlerian theory than I have just quickly summerized here. But I will 'extrapolate' on Adlerian theory a bit in DGB terminology and conceptuology.
This connects Adlerian Theory with Freud's pre-1900 'Traumacy Theory' and his post-1900 'Narcissistic Theory'.
A person invariably and inevitably experiences a number of similar and/or different types of 'narcissistic ego traumacies' in his early childhood -- some of a more subjectively psychologically significant nature than others, some of a unique, individual nature, and others of a more 'chronic, serial' nature. It is impossible to get through childhood without experiencing 'narcissistic ego traumacy' from the 'objectively small' to the 'objectively huge' to the 'subjectively small' to the 'subjectively huge'. Objective psychology and 'objective narcissistic ego traumacy' does not always meet 'subjective narcissistic traumacy'.
It is subjective narcissistic ego traumacy that counts and subjective narcissistic ego traumacy is in the eye of the beholder; specifically, the eye of the person who experiences, interprets, and evaluates the 'nature of the ego-traumacy' and often ends up carrying this narcissistic ego traumacy consciously and/or subconsciously -- together with his 'superiority compensations' for the rest of his or her life. So now we have a theoretical connection between: 1. 'narcissistic ego traumacy'; 2. 'inferiority feeling and/or feeling of insecurity'; 3. 'compensation' and/or 'compensatory action'; and 4. 'superiority-striving' (lifestyle pattern which generally consists of the compensatory action). DGB Psychology will call this whole state of affairs the person's 'transference-lifestyle complex'.
However, we are getting ahead of ourselves here. Back to the history of personality theory. There were other things happening in the history and evolution of personality theory that need to be accounted for, and integrated into our evolving DGB model of the human psyche.
Perls' Gestalt Model: Perls (or maybe it was Perls, Hefferline, and Goodman -- or maybe it was Fritz and Laura Perls) introduced -- and I am not sure when and under what circumstances these two concepts were introduced (I will have to research it) -- the 'bi-polar dialectical concepts' of 'topdog' and 'underdog'. This was similar to Freud's dialectical split between the superego and the ego -- but with a little difference: more of an articulation of a 'power struggle' in the personality, and kind of a hint of a possible Adlerian influence of the 'underdog' being connected to Adler's idea of the 'inferiority feeling'. The underdog has the inferiority feeling; whereas the 'topdog' has the 'superiority complex'. An important difference in the evolutionary direction of personality structure/theory was starting to happen here.
This difference was even more clearly articulated in Eric Berne's 'Transactional Analysis' model of the human psyche. From Classic Psychoanalysis to Object Relations to Transactional Analysis, the idea of different 'ego-states' was starting to catch on and become more and more popular. DGB Personality Theory has likewise moved in this direction -- with Transactional Analysis providing the main theoretical influcence.
In Transactional Analysis, the classic Freudian 'superego' was dialectically split in two, giving one of the dialectical splits a new 'job-function' (nurturing)-- and giving both a new name: 'The Nurturing Parent' (the new more 'maternal' Superego)vs. 'The Critical Parent' (the old paternal Superego). An interesting evolutionary development, indeed.
Berne argued basically that the developing child introjects the 'righteous, critical parent' (sexistly speaking -- the paternal father) and introjects the 'nurturing, encouraging, supportive parent (sexistly speaking -- the maternal mother) -- and splits the difference. (One detects the presence and the essence of the Chinese 'yin/yang' theory here.)
On the bottom part of this first 'multi-dialectical psychological model', Berne postulated another psychological split -- and two more 'ego-states' -- the 'approval-seeking child' vs. the 'rebellious child'. Thus, Transactional Analysis had become the first form of 'Multi-Dialectical-Analysis'. Bernes' '4 ego-state' model was topped off with one more additional ego-state sitting 'topologically' in the middle of the model and functioning mainly as the old Freudian (Hegelian) ego -- as an 'adult conflict-mediator'. He called this last ego-state 'The Adult'. Thus, Bernes worked very effectively in Transactional Analysis for a good number of years -- I'm not sure how popular it is now -- with a multi-dialectical, 5 ego-state (or ego-compartment) model of the personality. I liked it although I wasn't crazy about the popularized names for the different ego-states. Still -- I was influenced by, and continue to be influenced by, this model.
However, I wanted to introduce my Freudian-Adlerian influence into this model -- specifically, 1. narcissistic theory; and 2. transference-lifestyle complex theory.
Furthermore, I found Berne's work a little too 'cognitive' and 'analytic' for my liking; I preferred the 'existential anxiety-excitement' of Gestalt Therapy.
Finally -- and this has been a much more recent development of the last few years -- I wanted to add a Jungian 'mythological-archetype' influence to the model, and I wanted to add a few different 'philosophical ego-states' to the model. This would make the model much bigger -- in terms of number of 'ego-states-functions-compartments' -- than all of its predecessors, even the Bernes' Transactional Analysis model.
This brings us historically up-to-date -- and ready for Part 2.
-- dgb, May 11th, 2008.
Prelude To A DGB Integrative Model Of The Human Psyche (Part 2): Internalization and Externalization (Introjection and Projection)
In order to understand the co-relation between man's culture -- religion, art, mythology, philosophy, psychology, medicine, architecture, business, politics, law --and the nature and makeup of man's psyche, we have to understand the process of 'internalization' and 'externalization' which can be called alternatively 'introjection' (or 'identification') and 'projection'. These are primarily 'psychoanalytic concepts' although many if not most forms of psychotherapy today use them in similar fashion (Jungian Psychology, Gestalt Therapy...)
I am not here to knit-pick over small technical differences in meaning. I am here to integrate concepts in a way that hopefully helps us to understand the relationship between man and his culture, and the evolution of man and his culture.
Quite simply put, we learn from our culture and we give back to our culture what we have learned either in an 'either/or' format (either we completely 'introject' what we have learned or we completely 'reject' it); or in a 'modified-integrative-assimilative' fashion. I heard a religious preacher on tv say that we either 'transmit' what we have learned or we 'transform' it. I like the distinction.
Either we can transmit what we have learned in its entirety -- for better or for worse -- or we can transform what we have learned in which case we have internally changed a part of what we have learned to make it something else -- which is particularly important when we have learned something 'toxic' and 'pathological' and 'detoxified' this to make it something that is much healthier for social consumption.
The religious preacher was talking about 'purifying toxic beliefs and forms of living' and 'transforming' these beliefs/behaviors into something that was not going to pass on these toxins to someone else. He gave the example of Jesus as the perfect 'role-model' for how this 'detoxification process' was done. I might mention 'Mother Teresa' and 'Martin Luther King' as two other role models who rose far above other people in their ability to deliver this 'detoxification process' -- and in so doing -- inspire hope and optimism where before there was only hopelessness and despair.
In terms of understanding the dynamics of man, everything is integrated -- history, politics, law, economics, business, philosophy, art, architecture, sports and enteratainment, masculinism and feminism...
From one you can come to understand them all, and from all you can come to understand one. Reductionism is connected to/integrated with wholism just as wholism is connected to/integrated with reductionism.
Understand mythology and you can get some understanding of man's psychology -- ancient mythology is like a 'soap opera' involving the externalization of the internal dynamics of man's psyche. If you understand the 'projective-externalization' process of a man's -- or woman's -- God', then this can give you a very good working indication of at least one of the man's/woman's 'internal archetype -- and transference -- figures'.
'Transference' -- in my opinion, Freud's most creative and powerful psychoanalytic concept -- we will delve into with considerable gusto at a different time. Unlock a person's transferences -- and 'transference complexes' -- and you unlock the the depths of a person's spiritual and/or sexual, poisoned and/or enlightened, soul. Obviously, transference is not a concept that we want to talk about lightly, casually, or carelessly. In the hands of the best psychotherapists, understanding 'the dynamics of the transference' can be like a 'magic wand'. Self-enlightenment -- and change -- can follow. Or not.
Most of us have to live with the dynamics of our own personal transferences complexes -- for better and/or for worse -- for the entirety of our life, with perhaps some greater or lesser modifications along the way. It is a short -- connected distance -- between our transference complexes, our archetypes and sterotypes, our narcissistic ego traumacies and their compensations, our obsessions, our addictions, and our serial behavior patterns. The more 'poisoned' a person's transference complexes are, the more 'poisonous' are likely to be his or her resulting 'serial behavior patterns'. I am talking about cases like the 'serial rapist and/or killer', the 'serial victim'...and so on. Another day. Let us move on.
The model that is about to follow -- the DGB integrative model of the human psyche -- is a mixture of: Psychanalysis Theory (Traumacy Theory, Narcissistic Theory, Ego Theory, Object Relations, Self-Theory), Jungian Theory, Transactional Analysis, Adlerian Theory, Gestalt Theory, the history of philosophy, and Greek Mythology...
Many will say the model is too big. There are too many different 'ego compartments' in it. Remember that 'ego compartments' are 'metaphysical constructs' that can be expanded or reduced, accepted or rejected, at a moment's notice. They are metaphysical constructs that are meant to have 'functional value'. If they don't have functional value for teaching and/or learning purposes, then trash them. They are not 'God-given epistemological truths'. They are not empirically verifiable. They are metaphysical constructs that are meant to have functional value. No value -- don't use. It's as simple as that. Too many psycho-theorists spend endless hours righteously arguing for or against where a particular 'ego-compartment boundary' should or should not be drawn. A waste of time! Again these boundaries are not like the boundaries of a 'liver' where someone can actually trace the boundary with a finger, a pen, or a knife. They are conceptual, metaphysical boundaries that are more or less completely arbitrary -- except for the factor of 'pragmatic, functional value and usage'. Throw them out if they are not useful -- and try again. Try another model that works better for what you are trying to accomplish. But don't get into the 'righteous either/or' argument of 'true or false', 'right or wrong'. True and false, right or wrong -- are for mathematics and spelling; not for metaphysical constructs and models.
I think we are ready. 'The Messiah is coming!' The DGB Integrative Model of the human psyche is coming! Hold onto your hats! Hide your children! We might be coming into something that is X-rated. Man -- in the deepest depths of his being -- is X-rated. Homer said that -- or he projected man's X-ratedness onto man's 'Gods'. Plato said that man had three energy sources: the mind, the heart, and the loins. St. Augustine said that man was X-rated -- or at least he admitted that he, himself was: 'God, make me chaste -- but not yet!' (Wait until I have no testosterone left! -- my editorial addition). Hobbes wrote that man was X-rated. (You need a heavy police force to contain him.) Schopenhauer wrote that all of life is X-rated -- and there is nothing that we can do about it except maybe learn Budhism or go see a good theatre play in order to release our pent up feelings.
Nietzsche said that man was X-rated -- and that was basically a 'good thing'. Man needed to be more in touch with his senses -- and do away with the 'Christian, herd mentality'. Man needed to strive to be a 'Superman' at whatever he was good at -- and wanted to be. (I hear you, Professor Nietzsche, I hear you. In 'Hegel's Hotel', I am striving to be a 'Superman'. Even though you hated Hegel, 'The Birth of Tragedy ('BT')' was one of your best works -- and it was extremely 'Hegelian'. Your 'BT' was the bridge between Hegel, Schopenhauer -- and Freud. BT -- perhaps more than anything Freud wrote -- marked 'The Birth of Psychoanalysis'. Man needed to 'integrate' his inner 'Apollo' with his inner 'Dionysus'. Only then could he achieve the proper balance that he needed to live his life with 'existential gusto'! Sounds like 'homeostasis'. Sounds like the beginning of the need for man's 'ego' to integrate his 'superego' (Apollo) with his 'id' (Dionysus). Where BT started, Freud -- and Jung -- took over.
And that too is where we will start.
dgb, May 11th, 2008.
I am not here to knit-pick over small technical differences in meaning. I am here to integrate concepts in a way that hopefully helps us to understand the relationship between man and his culture, and the evolution of man and his culture.
Quite simply put, we learn from our culture and we give back to our culture what we have learned either in an 'either/or' format (either we completely 'introject' what we have learned or we completely 'reject' it); or in a 'modified-integrative-assimilative' fashion. I heard a religious preacher on tv say that we either 'transmit' what we have learned or we 'transform' it. I like the distinction.
Either we can transmit what we have learned in its entirety -- for better or for worse -- or we can transform what we have learned in which case we have internally changed a part of what we have learned to make it something else -- which is particularly important when we have learned something 'toxic' and 'pathological' and 'detoxified' this to make it something that is much healthier for social consumption.
The religious preacher was talking about 'purifying toxic beliefs and forms of living' and 'transforming' these beliefs/behaviors into something that was not going to pass on these toxins to someone else. He gave the example of Jesus as the perfect 'role-model' for how this 'detoxification process' was done. I might mention 'Mother Teresa' and 'Martin Luther King' as two other role models who rose far above other people in their ability to deliver this 'detoxification process' -- and in so doing -- inspire hope and optimism where before there was only hopelessness and despair.
In terms of understanding the dynamics of man, everything is integrated -- history, politics, law, economics, business, philosophy, art, architecture, sports and enteratainment, masculinism and feminism...
From one you can come to understand them all, and from all you can come to understand one. Reductionism is connected to/integrated with wholism just as wholism is connected to/integrated with reductionism.
Understand mythology and you can get some understanding of man's psychology -- ancient mythology is like a 'soap opera' involving the externalization of the internal dynamics of man's psyche. If you understand the 'projective-externalization' process of a man's -- or woman's -- God', then this can give you a very good working indication of at least one of the man's/woman's 'internal archetype -- and transference -- figures'.
'Transference' -- in my opinion, Freud's most creative and powerful psychoanalytic concept -- we will delve into with considerable gusto at a different time. Unlock a person's transferences -- and 'transference complexes' -- and you unlock the the depths of a person's spiritual and/or sexual, poisoned and/or enlightened, soul. Obviously, transference is not a concept that we want to talk about lightly, casually, or carelessly. In the hands of the best psychotherapists, understanding 'the dynamics of the transference' can be like a 'magic wand'. Self-enlightenment -- and change -- can follow. Or not.
Most of us have to live with the dynamics of our own personal transferences complexes -- for better and/or for worse -- for the entirety of our life, with perhaps some greater or lesser modifications along the way. It is a short -- connected distance -- between our transference complexes, our archetypes and sterotypes, our narcissistic ego traumacies and their compensations, our obsessions, our addictions, and our serial behavior patterns. The more 'poisoned' a person's transference complexes are, the more 'poisonous' are likely to be his or her resulting 'serial behavior patterns'. I am talking about cases like the 'serial rapist and/or killer', the 'serial victim'...and so on. Another day. Let us move on.
The model that is about to follow -- the DGB integrative model of the human psyche -- is a mixture of: Psychanalysis Theory (Traumacy Theory, Narcissistic Theory, Ego Theory, Object Relations, Self-Theory), Jungian Theory, Transactional Analysis, Adlerian Theory, Gestalt Theory, the history of philosophy, and Greek Mythology...
Many will say the model is too big. There are too many different 'ego compartments' in it. Remember that 'ego compartments' are 'metaphysical constructs' that can be expanded or reduced, accepted or rejected, at a moment's notice. They are metaphysical constructs that are meant to have 'functional value'. If they don't have functional value for teaching and/or learning purposes, then trash them. They are not 'God-given epistemological truths'. They are not empirically verifiable. They are metaphysical constructs that are meant to have functional value. No value -- don't use. It's as simple as that. Too many psycho-theorists spend endless hours righteously arguing for or against where a particular 'ego-compartment boundary' should or should not be drawn. A waste of time! Again these boundaries are not like the boundaries of a 'liver' where someone can actually trace the boundary with a finger, a pen, or a knife. They are conceptual, metaphysical boundaries that are more or less completely arbitrary -- except for the factor of 'pragmatic, functional value and usage'. Throw them out if they are not useful -- and try again. Try another model that works better for what you are trying to accomplish. But don't get into the 'righteous either/or' argument of 'true or false', 'right or wrong'. True and false, right or wrong -- are for mathematics and spelling; not for metaphysical constructs and models.
I think we are ready. 'The Messiah is coming!' The DGB Integrative Model of the human psyche is coming! Hold onto your hats! Hide your children! We might be coming into something that is X-rated. Man -- in the deepest depths of his being -- is X-rated. Homer said that -- or he projected man's X-ratedness onto man's 'Gods'. Plato said that man had three energy sources: the mind, the heart, and the loins. St. Augustine said that man was X-rated -- or at least he admitted that he, himself was: 'God, make me chaste -- but not yet!' (Wait until I have no testosterone left! -- my editorial addition). Hobbes wrote that man was X-rated. (You need a heavy police force to contain him.) Schopenhauer wrote that all of life is X-rated -- and there is nothing that we can do about it except maybe learn Budhism or go see a good theatre play in order to release our pent up feelings.
Nietzsche said that man was X-rated -- and that was basically a 'good thing'. Man needed to be more in touch with his senses -- and do away with the 'Christian, herd mentality'. Man needed to strive to be a 'Superman' at whatever he was good at -- and wanted to be. (I hear you, Professor Nietzsche, I hear you. In 'Hegel's Hotel', I am striving to be a 'Superman'. Even though you hated Hegel, 'The Birth of Tragedy ('BT')' was one of your best works -- and it was extremely 'Hegelian'. Your 'BT' was the bridge between Hegel, Schopenhauer -- and Freud. BT -- perhaps more than anything Freud wrote -- marked 'The Birth of Psychoanalysis'. Man needed to 'integrate' his inner 'Apollo' with his inner 'Dionysus'. Only then could he achieve the proper balance that he needed to live his life with 'existential gusto'! Sounds like 'homeostasis'. Sounds like the beginning of the need for man's 'ego' to integrate his 'superego' (Apollo) with his 'id' (Dionysus). Where BT started, Freud -- and Jung -- took over.
And that too is where we will start.
dgb, May 11th, 2008.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)