We finally see the colors of people like Assad of Syria, someone who was praised by our leaders until his people marched for freedom and democracy. Then he shot them down. I bring this up because I do not believe you can know anyone until you see them in all sorts of conditions. And that is why I think that therapists can never know their patients until they see them in extremis; in a variety of deeply emotional situations, where we see how they react. If we never see our patients except in intellectual discourse we can never know them. They can don their mask and make us believe the opposite of who they are; vis a vis Assad. Put him under stress and he becomes an assassin......alleged
We treated a killer some years back. We discussed the case for hours before we took him. When we got down to feeling he was only a hurt little boy, someone who lashed out. He wasn’t a professional killer; he killed someone in a bar fight. We discovered that he never wanted to be a tough guy but had to be given the violent family he grew up in.
Alice Miller would have agreed. She believed there are no innately evil people, just humans pushed beyond their ability to cope...usually by parents who were themselves not raised well.
ReplyDeleteFew ask WHY people do what they do. When the "doer" is male, it's just assumed that machismo or testosterone or some other factor caused the aggressor to do what he did. Any honest explanation is seen as excuse-making.
We never ask why females do what THEY do, much less note they are equally harmful (albeit often in more veiled ways: poison is as deadly as bullets!).
Witness the demonization of men by feminists. They posit that men are "innately evil," never asking WHY men do what they do. Certainly there is little talk about mothers mistreating children and how those kids turn out as adults.
I'm not saying women are innately evil, either, just noting that the idea that females might "create" the "male monsters" they demonize is never discussed. Like domestic violence, it's deemed a male "thing"...despite research showing women are equally violent when it comes to verbally and physically starting fights.
It's easier to blame males than look honestly at the MUTUAL dynamics involved in "creating the world."
Now, on another topic: Art, I was listening to a pubic radio program:
http://www.npr.org/2011/05/31/136495499/incognito-whats-hiding-in-the-unconscious-mind
I kept thinking how Primal Therapies would explain the "phenomena" the author cited. His "warring" parts of the brain mirrored your tri-line theory. Yet he didn't use your terms. I kept thinking "leaking gates" and other things you've mentioned as he spoke.
The author didn't mention the centrality of "feelings" like you do. It convinced me, yet again, that you remain in the forefront...and on-target.
Might you do a blog entry on the show?
Hi,
ReplyDeletefortunately I'm not a murderer but I did become suspicious about how much I wasn't telling my therapist. I also became suspicious of the power my therapist had to distort both his and my truth due to the confinement of our relationship being strictly in the therapy room.
How could he really know me or test my testimony?
It's true, to know some-one, warts and all we have to live with them at home, work with them and co-relate within the same group of friends.
This is the main reason some people commit to living in enclosed communities, that way we get to be seen, warts and all.
Only then can one say one really knows some-one.
The one exception being the Primal Clinic presumably, perhaps also a few lucky people who may have found rare therapists who know. . .
This is anaethma in our modern society. For good reasons we have separated off and filed away these different aspects of our lives. Very much a modern phenomena of needing "Clear Boundaries". The hazard is becoming disconnected and isolated.
Paul G.
But this also produces a breeding ground for personality disorders. Keeping all offenders in prison is one example of how unsustainable boxing and filing off "problems" really is.
Dr Janov,
ReplyDeleteI agree with your statement that's why it takes years to know a friend, a partner or whatever.
I remenber the time when Saddam Hussein was welcome as a good friend in France (back in the 80's). I was a kid but somewhat disturbed when he was wearing his uniform: I was wondering if someone wearing a war suit could possibly be "a friend"?
I assume that when therapy is practised correctly, the patient will not interpret the therapist as the cause of the feeling, and therefore should not be a threat to the therapist. I hope none of the therapists are ever in any serious danger.
ReplyDeleteYes, we finally see someone! This text helped me a lot to understand the difficult situation that is currently going through. Outer mask a person is not the same as the figure that came from the inside when a person is under stress. This is the real answer to why someone behaves as Dr Jeckil and Mr Hyde. It is a source of great disappointment and pain.
ReplyDeleteS.N Serbia
Richard: nope. AJ
ReplyDeleteBecause there are so many people with inscrutable masks everywhere, I always feel somewhat uneasy around other adults in our society.This all leads to widespread loneliness, confusion, and mistrust.
ReplyDeleteAnd it is so true that only under stressful situations sometimes can we see the truth of a person. How unfortunate this is. It should be the opposite: that we should be able to be relaxed and open with one another under normal conditions.
Hi Art, "untill they see them in extremis"
ReplyDeletemy deceased friend always talked as the nice
guy to his doctor , and lied to him ,after he
he had drove his car into another one
wondering " whwter I am God" clearly a psychotic episode ! But just one minute later he told me not to betray him!
But who is to throw the first stone 1 Yours emanuel
i've been wanting to say this for a long time...i know what i am trying to say but it's hard to find the right words:
ReplyDeleteprimal theory is beautiful because it doesn't focus on the craziness....it focuses on the humanity. it shows us that we are all real, important and lovable people underneath all of the craziness.
Assuming Assad has shown his true face while put under stress, what about those who are responsible for putting him under pressure? It's too easy to watch the events through the mainstream media lens. I mean, shouldn't we also consider Hillary Clinton and those Pentagon warmongers as neglected children thus adults with narcissistic/megalomaniac disorder who won't stop until the world and everyone (neurotic or not) becomes their property and slave. Let's face it. Saddam was one of those, but so was George Bush Sr. (and so was his son too) who sold him the weapons required to exterminate his own kurdistani population…and most probably is Barack Obama too and his fellow wall street mafiosi, who desperately need us all to believe their saving the libian/yemeni/ people from . Is Assad showing his assassin face? Yes. Should the US role as policemen/kindergarden keeper of the wold since 1946 be questioned and stopped? Yes. I fully believe republican candidate Ron Paul's perspective should be considered in its entirety. Everybody could become an assassin when his ideas/beliefs are shown to the world as wrong. Everybody has the right to grow at their own speed.
ReplyDeleteRichard: Excluding psychopaths. We should feel sorry for them, but they don't have an "underneath".
ReplyDeleteI would like to show the connections between several posts from A.Janov. We have unmmeet needs from our childhood that are not allowing us to see people as they really are: in everyday life situations when we meet someone for the first time: we see our needs. I guess that it's the same neurotic process with our political leaders: they are elected because they seem to be able to fullfilled our needs.Those people craving for political power have their own unmeet needs (with specific needs like "power" or "being in control"). I don't agree with Lars's comment, not "everybody could become an assassin when his ideas/beliefs are shown to the world as wrong". it would be the case for people struggling for power, wanting to control but everyone is not a political leader ( alot of people just don't care about power). Power corrupt people with strong neurotic needs, people who decided since childhood to struggle to become "powerfull". You don't choose to follow a political carrier just by accident.
ReplyDeleteLars, I really think it is a stretch to put Hillary Clinton and Obama, even George Bush Jr, in the same league as Assad. Small delusions like that give the Left an undeserved bad name.
ReplyDeleteAndrew,
ReplyDeleteIf we could lock up a psychopath for what he did… he would probably kill himself before the feeling of what led him to become a psychopat... but if not then I think even a psychopath with supervision during his isolation would come to life?
Frank
Frank: don't be too sure. art
ReplyDeletei knew a fisherman who slipped on his boat and hit the side of his head. despite the accident, he was very intelligent, well-spoken, and seemed like a regular guy. but when he was in the supermarket, he would walk down the isle, and suddenly he would crash into something, making a huge mess. he did this so many times, eventually he stopped going out, and then a short while later he killed himself.
ReplyDeletemost people thought he was normal. they didn't know about the brain damage or the supermarket accidents. he told me about his life and the brain damage shortly before he killed himself.
obviously the brain is very complicated. brain damage doesn't necessarily turn you into a drooling simpleton.
are psychopaths severely brain damaged? new evidence suggests they are. many of them are "high achievers"
Lars, you hit the nail on the head. Some ca't take too much truth. Kind of like going from total darkness into the bright light of a freshly fallen snow with the sun out. No one in politics is innocent or superior morally. Great post!
ReplyDelete