Psychology for Dummies (74 page)
Read Psychology for Dummies Online
Authors: Adam Cash
Tags: #Psychology, #General, #Body; Mind & Spirit, #Spirituality
We’re not going to pay the big bucks just for some analyst to sit there and tell us, “Yep, you’re screwed up alright.” That’s like your family physician diagnosing your bronchitis without developing a treatment plan. So, what does a psychoanalyst contribute beyond the obvious? Bill has some obvious difficulties, but he probably has some difficulties that aren’t so obvious. Discovering these not-so-obvious problems is where psychoanalysis really sets itself apart from other psychotherapies. There’s more than meets the eye in psychoanalysis.
Psychoanalysts never take a symptom at face value. They assume that some reason, some psychological cause, exists for Bill’s actions. Below the surface of Bill’s everyday thoughts, feelings, and actions boils a chaotic brew of inner conflict. Bill’s everyday problems are observable; anyone can see him screwing up. But Bill’s psychoanalyst will look below the surface of his everyday thoughts, feelings, actions and awareness. The search for the internal or mental sources of his difficulties will begin in psychoanalysis.
What does going to strip clubs have to do with deep-seated mental conflict? Maybe nothing, but his psychoanalyst is going to assume that a connection is there. For instance, Bill is about to be a first-time father, and there’s little doubt that the experience will be extremely stressful — getting up in the middle of the night, making emergency visits to the physician, and so on. Maybe Bill is worried, and he’s just trying to unwind by hanging out with his buddies. Or, maybe Bill has some serious reservations about being a father. His wife asked him if he regretted their decision to have a child or if he was scared about the new baby, and he denied it. If Bill is worried, he may be the last one to know. Bill couldn’t tell you if he was in conflict if his marriage depended on it, and it does, so psychoanalysis may not be such a bad idea after all.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, we’ve all got problems. It doesn’t take a PhD to figure that out. But, the point of therapy is not just to pay someone to name all of your inner demons. That would be a big waste of your money and the therapist’s professional training. Psychoanalysis has several goals:
To further the development and maturation of personality
To help the patient become fully aware of his or her inner conflicts and how these conflicts contribute to his or her difficulties in life
To help the patient become aware of how his or her defenses operate and how he or she distorts reality, including relationships
To help the patient experience a more meaningful life overall
To help the patient develop more mature defenses
To help the patient develop healthier ways and means to express his or her impulses
All of these goals have something in common, the importance of
awareness.
If nothing else, psychoanalysis is an exercise in increasing one’s awareness. Awareness sits at the core of the analytic process, and it’s one of the curative aspects of psychoanalysis. Change is brought about through the uncovering of unconscious conflicts so that these issues can then be consciously addressed and worked on. If you don’t know what the problem is, you can’t fix it. Ultimately, according to Sydney Pulver, the goal of psychoanalysis is better functioning through deeper understanding.
A neat thing about professional therapists is that they already have some ideas about what’s going on before you even come to their office. They get out their little crystal ball and tarot cards and predict that a man with Bill’s problems is going to walk through the door at any minute. No, that’s a job for a psychic not a psychotherapist. Therapists may not have a crystal ball, but they do have a theoretical system that explains why people develop psychological problems and where their inner conflicts come from.
Problems in living like those Bill is experiencing can stem from any number of sources. The issues listed here are common underlying causes for more mundane, everyday problems:
Regression:
One source of difficulty in someone’s life is related to the concept of regression — a return to an earlier stage of psychological development.
Freud stated that we’re all vulnerable to regression when under stress. Stress taxes our defenses, and when we increase our efforts to defend ourselves against it, psychological symptoms can emerge. Certain events can trigger unconscious impulses and memories that you’ve forgotten about or are completely unaware of. When this happens you may be at risk for regressing. Bill may have an impulse to leave his wife and future child for a more carefree bachelor lifestyle because he was never allowed to have fun as a child for example. When you regress you act “younger,” often childish. Temper tantrums, ignoring reality, and living in a fantasy world are examples of regression. Do you stick your fingers in your ears and repeat, “La la la la la la” so you can’t hear someone talk? Regression!
Impulse control:
When our impulses to seek pleasure without regard for reality are stirred, we use defense mechanisms to keep them from getting out of control. We don’t want all of those powerful and primitive id impulses overpowering our more mature and reality-based personality. These impulses can boil to the top, either because we’re under stress or because we haven’t been able to successfully deny their power. That’s when our defenses kick-in and symptoms can emerge. Psychological symptoms are the product of these defenses working against our impulses.
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Repression:
One of the most common primary defense mechanisms is repression, keeping those impulses out of our awareness so that we don’t act on them and they don’t destroy our lives. Repression requires a great deal of mental energy. Again, symptoms are produced through the intensification of our defenses, but they can also be viewed as an indirect and unconscious means of expressing of our hidden impulses.
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Hypochondriasis:
What defenses is our old friend Bill employing that may be producing symptoms? Bill’s migraine headaches are good examples of hypochondriasis — the preoccupation with having a serious disease. George Vaillant considers hypochondriasis a defense mechanism that provides someone with an opportunity to complain and then reject other’s efforts to help. Hypochon- driasis allows the individual to feel “misunderstood” because no one can find anything wrong with the person and, therefore, cannot help him or her. That way, everyone looks like they’re being insensitive and uncaring about his or her needs. Maybe Bill feels that no one will listen to his fears and reservations about being a father. This fear might lead to hypochondriacal complaining.
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Acting out:
Another defense mechanism that Bill is employing is acting out — the direct expression of an unconscious impulse or desire without having to consciously acknowledge feeling a particular way. Bill may have the unconscious desire to be a bachelor again, to be free of the responsibility of parenthood. He may not be consciously aware of this, so he acts out his unconscious desire by going to topless bars, as if he were single again.
Bill’s problems are the result of an inner struggle for the expression, repression, and management of impulses by his defenses and fears about having, expressing and satisfying these wishes.