PSYCHOANALYSIS AND THE PURSUIT OF PERFECTION

PSYCHOANALYSIS AND THE PURSUIT OF PERFECTION

Victor Bloom MD

There are many common misperceptions about psychoanalysis. It is that segment of psychiatry and psychotherapy that was originally called "The Talking Cure" and is known as that method of treatment that utilizes the couch and five fifty-minute sessions per week of free-association, in which the analyst sits behind the patient (analysand) and may or may not take notes or say anything. This form of psychiatric treatment has been the butt of jokes, cartoons and Hollywood movie spoofs for decades, much to the detriment of its reputation. Actually, it is almost a hundred years old and millions of people around the world have benefited from it.

Millennia ago, Socrates was heard to have said, "The unexamined life is not worth living." My own take on this observation is that the examined life is hardly bearable. It is hard to face the truth about one's self and the human condition. We have base instincts, which the media and marketing have exploited throughout this century. We have childish and narcissistic needs, which can interfere with adult life and realistic, mature perceptions. Many of us have a tendency to be our own worst enemy, or to shoot ourselves in the foot, or to cut off our nose to spite our face. Many of us repeat self-defeating behaviors stemming from unresolved conflicts in our childhood, and tend to blame others for our own shortcomings.

The idea of psychoanalysis is to uncover the deeper truths about ourselves, which are often the painful memories of our childhoods that continue to haunt us. These truths are hidden in our unconscious and repressed or forgotten. But repressed memories do not disappear, they just go underground and are noy 'simply' forgotten. Another favorite defense mechanism is 'splitting', in which our worst characteristics are 'split-off' or 'dissociated,' and we become two-faced, hypocritical or inconsistent, without realizing it. The worst form of this is the story of Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde, in which half of the personality is 'good' and the other half is 'evil'. Most often, such a person is totally unaware of this condition. The people around this person are dumbfounded with apparent contradictions and inconsistencies in his or her behavior, and are confused and do not know what to say or do about it.

Psychoanalysis, by using the process of 'free-association' to bring buried memories and feelings to the surface, is also called, "uncovering therapy". It means the analysand (patient) works diligently and persistently to say whatever comes to mind, leaving aside, during the fifty minute hour on the couch, the editing and censoring portion of the mind which is operative and adaptive for everyday living. A person thereby comes to know his or her deeper self. Many individuals fool themselves into thinking they know themselves, but the conscious mind, the rational mind, is but the tip of the iceberg. Self-analysis is an arduous and painful process, but also one which is gratifying, vitalizing, fulfilling and liberates creativity. One gets connected to one's self, it is what is meant by 'getting one's self together', becoming integrated, which is the prerequisite of a trustworthy person.

Ideally, what you see is what you get, you know the person by what he or she says and does. Actions speak louder than words, but we respect a person who does what he says he is going to do and means what he says and says what he means. This is called, in everyday life--- "character" and "integrity" and becoming a whole person.

Psychoanalysis is not the only way to achieve wholeness and maturity, but it certainly facilitates the process. What is the use of growing older if we do not grow wiser? Some people do not learn from experience! Some think that a person who sees a psychoanalyst three, four or five times a week must be very sick to need that much treatment, but that is far from the case! The fact of the matter is that it takes a much healthier person to withstand the requirement of frequent free-association without coming apart. Only the most mentally healthy people undertake the rigors, demands and expense of psychoanalysis.

So why do it? Some of us are sufficiently curious about ourselves to want to know ourselves as well as possible while we are living. This is a healthy curiosity, not necessarily the curiosity that killed the cat. Self-knowledge has always been considered a desirable thing. Insight is useful. As we go through the stages of life, it is good to know what we are dealing with, a complex, developmental process of learning and growth. One can be mentally healthy and still seek to be healthier and to realize the fullness of one's potential.

With apologies to Shakespeare, self-actualization truly is a consummation devoutly to be wished.