Saturday, July 3, 2010

Psychological polarities **


“The lady doth protest too much, methinks”.

William Shakespeare (Hamlet)


I ran a therapy group lately where one client made the statement, “I hate victims”. As soon as she said that I knew she had polarised the victim in her and thus the treatment plan was for her to acknowledge the victim in her and to accept it. Once done it gets ‘integrated’ in to the personality as they say. If this happens then she will no longer ‘hate’ victims.


She may dislike them but the deep core level dislike and angst will not be there. The reason why she has strong feelings about such people is because she has that quality in herself which she finds repugnant. The strong dislike of others in this way allows her to not see that quality in herself. It becomes a distraction. Also by focusing on others like that she is trying to convince herself she is not like that.


Exercise

Write a list of the people who you dislike and what you dislike about them. It is best if it is people who you have known personally.

Will you own the disliked part of the other and accept yourself as that?


Psychological polarities

There is a concept in psychotherapy which refers to polarities. The therapist looks for polarities in the client such as shown below.


I hate victims -------------------------------------I am a victim

I hate critical people------------------------------I can be excessively critical

I hate war mongers --------------------------------I desire to be a warmonger


The psychologically healthy person sits some where in the middle and not at the polar ends of each continuum. If a client presents at one of the polar ends then the therapist would be looking at them accepting the other end of the polarity in their personality. This concept shows one other interesting aspect of the therapeutic mission and highlights what we are actually suggesting to our clients.



Psychotherapy breeds mediocrity, exceptional people who do exceptional things (both good and bad) have to be neurotic to some degree. The psychologically healthy person does not have the drive to strive for the exceptional. They do not have the inner torment that makes exceptional people exceptional. For instance all olympic gold medalists would be of this ilk.


To do something exceptional such as win at the Olympics means one has to push through a pain barrier, often many pain barriers. If they didn’t have to do this then every one would be doing it and thus it wouldn’t be exceptional. The psychologically healthy person would not waste their time doing such things. They are not going to get up at 4 am 6 days a week to swim up and down a pool for 4 hours each day for years on end. People will only do this when there is some underlying psychological angst and drive that forces them to go through such ‘pain’.


They have to be obtaining some other psychological advantage by doing so rather than the possibly of just winning a gold medal. It is their neurosis that gives them that psychological advantage. Winning the medal means something extra to them that it does not mean to the psychologically healthy person. It can be a wide variety of things such as “If I win then mother will finally love me”, “I will show them that I can do it”, “If I come first then father will finally notice me” and so on endlessly.



The other thing about exceptional achievement whether that be in sport, the arts, science, politics and so forth is the person has to prioritise. To achieve something exceptional some where along the line they have to put in the long hours at their task. This means their family relationships have to suffer. Their achievement becomes more important to them than their family relationships which would usually be defined as a state of psychological ill health.


People will only do this if their potential achievement has some extra psychological meaning for them like I mentioned before. The more we encourage our clients to move away from the polar ends the more psychologically healthy they become and the more mediocre they also will become.


The individual gains and the group looses.


Graffiti

27 comments:

  1. These are true statements Tony. Thank you for saying them.

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  2. I like how you're talking about how these problems can also be adaptive. Too often that gets ignored.

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  3. How do you get someone to accept their polar ends without compromising their drive and motivation? Can you make acceptance the key without making the person then feel as though they are going to end up being or feeling mediocre. Although, medicority can be a subjective thing can't it?

    How do you help a person reach a healthy mindset without taking away that very unique thing that will give them the edge they feel they need to succeed? Is it possible?

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  4. Hello Roses,

    Happy july 4th

    Graffiti

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  5. Hello Major, thanks for dropping by.

    and thanks for the comment

    Tony

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  6. Yes I agree that mediocrity is subjective Linda,

    One could easily define the most exceptional thing a person could do is raise a psychologically sound child rather then winning a big running race.

    So I am only talking about exceptional in terms of practical achievement in sport, business and so forth. In answer to your question I don't think so. If a person becomes less angst driven and more happy then they loose some of their edge to push self so hard.

    just my view though and others may disagree

    tony

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  7. So interesting! I run, as you might have noticed since I talk about it sometimes on my blog. I often wonder why I don't run like a "regular" person, you know 2 or 3 miles a few times a week. No, a short run for me is 5-6 miles, a long run 8-10, sometimes 13. It hurts, I have to get up really early on a weekend when I could be sleeping, it takes time away from other things, I get injured sometimes, and most of the time it isn't really fun. It's like something I have to prove to myself. Or maybe I need to make myself hurt in order to prove something. Now, I am not an elite runner, I run in races but my times are slow. Which, actually, proves that I am even more crazy than I first thought. If I'm not even good at it, why am I doing this?

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  8. Hi Harriet
    thanks for your candor.

    You wonder why you run like that?

    Well you may have answered your own question by indicating the psychological advantage of your running that I talk about in the post.

    You say

    It's like something I have to prove to myself. Or maybe I need to make myself hurt in order to prove something.


    These could be the psychological advantages. That is its not about the running its about you proving such things which just happens to be attached to running in your own mind. So run you will, and may be most reluctant to give it up because then you would also loose the advantage as well.

    Hope you don't mind a brief bit of blogosphere analysis. If you do let me know and I will delete it.

    Cheers

    Tony

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  9. No, I was hoping to get your analysis! Thank you for that. I guess it's my part to figure out what I'm proving.

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  10. Okay so this is why it's taken me a gazillion years to finish my book project? I'm normal? And all this time I thought it was too many kids and a lack of discipline. Oh, wait. It is, right?

    I'm going to have to get up at 5 a.m. now and write till midnight to prove to myself I can do it. Grrrr.

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  11. P.S. I loved this post. Very eye opening.

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  12. Well Tony,

    Happy July 5th! *Giggles*

    roses

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  13. And good morning to you to Roses

    Graffiti

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  14. Hi Harriet,

    That seems like a good idea to find out what you are trying to prove

    regards

    Tony

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  15. Hello Fragrant,

    So did you get up at 5am?

    I have just finished a book project myself!

    Graffiti

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  16. That is a good question about Therapy making people mediocre. The very thought crossed my mind for some time. Fortunately or unfortunately in the end I found out that "it does not".

    By experience I have found that one can still be "driven creatively" after therapeutic change, however with different purpose and without similar script pitfalls. In some ways its possible to achieve more or better and be healthy - psychologicaly.

    k

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  17. I certainly note feeling more mediocre, "dumbed down" and less driven to excellence when more mood stable. And I always wonder about the trade off. I quit writing and never will be one of those hard-core doctors. But...then I try to reason that happy people spread a lot of happiness in the world.

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  18. Hello Kenoath,

    I concur that people can be creative after therapeutic change, but i would still say that their intense 'edge' and sense of 'driven' would subside

    Graffiti

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  19. Hello Sara,

    Yes more stable people would tend to spread more love than angst to the world I think it is safe to say. But perhaps we also need our misfits of the species who keep us growing and developing as a group. I would worry if the perfect therapy was found and everyone was psychologically cured. Indeed as a species we may then die out.

    Tony

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  20. Tony,

    Honestly? There is no cure - unless we were to finally rid ourselves of this rediculous social structure. There are just so many people who can't fit into it.

    If we keep up this farce of pretending 'this is the way it should be' (note the 'should' in that statement), our species will (is) most definately die out!

    Its such a sad story really... our species had so much potential.

    roses

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  21. Howdy to you Roses,

    Well i think our species is already there Roses, realizing its potential. If we lost the misfits and 'bad eggs' of society I think we would be stuffed. they allow us to reach outr potential which we are already doing, to my mind.

    We need prisons and prisoners in society. If everyone became law abiding we would never reach our potential. we need danger and indeed sometimes death of the innocent. Imagine living in a soicety where that never happened. it would be like one of those futuristic horror stories. Like logans run or fahrenheight 451.

    So some individuals loose but the group gains

    Tony

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  22. Howdy to you Roses,

    Well i think our species is already there Roses, realizing its potential. If we lost the misfits and 'bad eggs' of society I think we would be stuffed. they allow us to reach outr potential which we are already doing, to my mind.

    We need prisons and prisoners in society. If everyone became law abiding we would never reach our potential. we need danger and indeed sometimes death of the innocent. Imagine living in a soicety where that never happened. it would be like one of those futuristic horror stories. Like logans run or fahrenheight 451.

    So some individuals loose but the group gains

    Tony

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  23. Oh Tony,
    That has to be one of the saddest reply's I think you've ever given. We have not reached any potential... unless you perceive that cutting people's personalities and differences up into little properly shaped pieces that will fit into this specifically designed society is 'reaching potential' then... no Tony, I lie to myself often enough. I'm don't feel like taking on your delusion too.

    I hope you have a very fitting day... roses

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  24. OH Roses you can't do that? it is theft to take on my delusion, if you want it you have to pay 5 dollars a day.

    What do you do Roses, people are forever saying how bad society is and it never really seems to get any better how they want it to be. Crime is destroying society as are drugs and the youth are yet again lost according to the social commentators. Just the same old complaints over and over at least in australia.

    The best thing a psychotherapist can hear froma client is “I accept me as I am”. They accept self including their imperfections. The more a disabled person accepts their disability the better off they are. Maybe a ‘disabled’ society could do the same. This is as good as it gets and lets be happy about life?

    I would tend to see that as an optimistic view my good friend

    Tony

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  25. Society is crippled and dying. The human race, how ever will always be at odds with itself and everything else. I simply and absolutely love that you want people to find and see themselves just as we are. Truly Tony - lovely!

    As for our potential... most of our potential is outlawed in this 'society'. That's what is so sad.

    $5 aday? That's a cuppa and a bikky! No thanks, you can have your delusion. I'll have the bikky with macadamea nuts and white choc chips thanks.

    Hugs... roses

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  26. Ohh Tony,
    I'm sorry I said that about society - it was so negative and sad sack but it also happens to be true too.

    And you, my 'graffiti' friend, must understand what i mean about potential's being outlawed? It's what you're all about, isn't it? Well graffiti is something you do bang on about.

    AND... did you have a bikky and cuppa today yet?

    Sincerely... roses

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  27. Yes I do bang on about it Roses and I had a bikky and a cup-o-soup today. its really cold here so soup is the go.

    Yes graffiti is a very interesting symbol of our society and reflection of the psyche of the modern city. Government just has no idea about it and thus their dealing with it is next to useless.

    graffiti

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