PSYCHOANALYSIS AND CREATIVITY

Victor Bloom MD

Much has been said about madness and creativity. Not enough has been said about psychoanalysis and creativity. Some have had the misconception that creativity is driven by neurosis, and that therefore a successful psychoanalysis would dissolve the creative drive. My own experience confirms the opposite, that psychoanalysis uncovers and releases creative endeavors.

Some of my patients through the years have become writers and film-makers, others have become artists, musicians, dancers and photographers. I will present case histories that demonstrate the unfolding and development of creative talent, along with the uncovering of unresolved conflicts and the interpretation of inhibiting defense mechanisms.

Some of the neurotic inhibiting factors to creative potential in my patients have been parents who have been critical and controlling, parents who have stifled emotion, fantasy, spontaneity and play. These parents contributed to low self-esteem and feelings of rejection and abandonment. As a result, these patients developed writing blocks, stage fright or the fear that others would laugh at their productions. They were inhibited by feelings of shame and anticipated embarrassment. In the most severe cases, the inhibition of creativity was part and parcel of a severe depression. The dynamics of the chronic depression was the unconscious realization of unfulfilled potential for creativity. The patient knew deep down that there was an artist struggling to get out.

This image brings to mind Rodin's famous statue, "Bound Slave".

The case histories will show that the liberating aspect of free-association, the analysis of resistance and transference, and the development of a positive working alliance, enables the release of creative potential. Before therapy the patient is relatively incapacitated, blocked, symptomatic and limited. After therapy, the patients are enjoying such expressions as writing, singing, playing an instrument, making television documentaries and Hollywood films. The talent must have been there right along, as the artistic productions were at a level to be commercial successes and winning awards, such as Emmys and Peabodys. In a few cases, interviewing techniques of analysis were used to elicit dramatic responses from subjects in documentaries about social issues.

Theoretically, creativity involves access to the primary process of the unconscious, which is close to the primitivity and playfulness of childhood. The therapist's acceptance of the unconscious material which flows from free-associations involves a belated acceptance and approval by the analyst of the core of the patient's soul, which restores self-confidence, self-esteem and self-understanding. Creative expression inevitably follows and continues to develop after successful analyses.

There was a definite correlation between resolution of underlying neurotic conflicts and the emergence of creative expression in these patients. Along with this emergence, symptoms abated and feelings of success and happiness took their place.