Open-Secrets

Category: Observations

  • Ego Ideal – Is There an Ideal Ego?

    Ego-idealOh, the ego ideal! What misery this little psychodynamic bug-a-boo causes us.

    What is ego ideal?

    Early on, Freud used both expressions ‘ideal ego‘ and ‘ego ideal’. Later, Freud (1921), (1923) abandoned the use of ‘ideal ego’ using the term ‘ego ideal’ which then became integrated into the term ‘super-ego’.

    The ego ideal is the standard which the superego uses to continually beat the crap out of us. We’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t! There is no pleasing the superego.

    What is really tragic about the situation is that most of us are being constantly tortured by the anti-libidinal force inherent in the superego while we try to effect an extreme makeover of themselves to become their ego ideal. All of this to finally get the love, acceptance, peace or understanding we deeply crave.

    The ego ideal is deeply intertwined with the punitive part of our consciousness. The righteous have used this in the name of God, country, and the common good to beat, batter, and bruise others for their own good.

    Taking the time to observe our minds and constant self-chatter reveals how much demeaning comparison is active in our daily lives.

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  • Object Relations Theory

    Object-relationshipUnderstanding object relations theory gives one invaluable insight into themselves and others.

    Object Relations Theory is the idea that the ego-self exists in relation to other objects, which may be external or internal. The internal objects are internalized versions of external objects, primarily formed from early interactions with the environment (primarily parents).

    Three fundamental “affects” that can exist between the self and the other:

    • attachment
    • frustration
    • rejection

    Object relations is a way the mind organizes information. The mind is always relating and comparing what is happening to the past – looking for understanding and meaning. At a Object-relationssubconscious level, object relations is how we project the past onto the present. We rarely see others or events as they are – we see the past and interact with the past.

    Object relations are not just about people. An idea, and ideal, your car, your house, your situation – all of these are part of object relations in your subconscious mind.

    Object relations theory helps explain “our buttons” and those endless cycles we continue to go through. Digging down into the dark grey matter is not pleasant at times, but it can be freeing.

     

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  • Castration Complex

    KendollThe core of the castration complex is castration anxiety. Castration anxiety literally means the fear that one’s testicles will be chopped off.

    The other day, I was talking to a friend who related to me a dream in which he was a Roman soldier standing at the bedside of his frail, ailing, 80–year old mother. In this lucid dream, he was aware of being this fierce, fearless Centurion and yet, at his mother’s bedside, he realized she had all the power!

    As we talked about this, the castration complex naturally came up. Many people suffer from some degree of the castration complex. Notice I said people and not just men. There are phallic women who have their penises in this pot also.

    As we explored castration anxiety and it’s relationship to loss of love and power, the image of the Ken doll arose. My friend said he felt like a Ken doll standing there at the foot of the bed – all buffed out and handsome with no genitals.

    Most men I know want to hang on to their penis and testicles – so to speak. Few show an interest in discovering and exploring castration anxiety or the castration complex and the issues of love and power around it.

    It was an interesting evening sipping wine, watching the sun set on Mt. Diablo and talking Ken, castration and the missing genitalia fear!

     

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  • Conceptualizing the Non-Conceptual

    Think about it – conceptualizing the non-conceptual. Not only is that wild, but also mysterious and incredibly fantastical!

    If all of reality is based on space, nothingness, emptiness, or the void – it seems unfathomable to be able to wrap the mind around the reality of the material world. And yet, we constantly hear this assertion – being and non-being co-emergent.

    Conceptualizing is nothing but putting a boundary around part of reality and imagining that boundary actually creates something. – A.H. Almaas

    ConceptualizingThe mind loves concepts. Mind feels secure in the world of concepts – conceptualizing makes us feel like we know. Conceptualizing (mental constructs) supports our tenuous grip on feeling secure and in control. Or looking at it from the other side of the coin conceptualizing helps to repress the ego’s underlying anxiety, fear and terror.

    Our normal sense of self that develops is built on concepts and conceptualizing that begin as representations or object images in the mind.

    Take a walk on the wild side – no thought, no thinker. Non-Conceptual perception – the end of conceptualizing, the mind at rest.

  • Sense of Identity

    Identity-selfWhat gives us our sense of identity? Some of the components of our sense of identity include:

    • Personal History
    • Body Image
    • Familiar Sensations
    • Thought Patterns
    • Patterns of Reactivity
    • Name

    Beyond the basic need for a sense of control, we are deeply driven by our sense of identity, of who we are. ‘I’ is a capital letter, denoting the importance we place on our sense of individual self. As Descartes said, ‘I think, therefore I am.’ Many social theories are to do with creating or preserving our sense of identity. – Changing Minds

    Of coures there is always the number of cards, accounts, bills, mail, and the like that are connected to our identity.

    But is all of this, in part or total, who we really are? What is our fundamental identity and how does that sense of identity differ from our day-to-day sense of identity?

    One of the most significant characteristics of the soul is that it can identify with the content of experience. It can take any impression, for example self-image, and make itself believe that that impression is itself. It can also take a part of the psychological structure and believe it to be the whole of itself. Identifying with an impression or the content of experience makes the self believe that it has an identity, and through this identity it then recognizes itself. Our personal history, constituted by our memories, comprises the basic content of our usual identity. This identification with the personal history provides a feeling of self-recognition, a sense of identity, or a sense of self. So in experiencing itself through the veil of memories, the soul not only loses sight of its primordial purity – its Essence – but also identifies itself through and with this veil of personal history. – A.H. Almaas

    Questioning the self or identitiy is a basic practice or koan in Buddhism – Who Am I?

    Don’t know? Here’s help

  • Good and Evil

    Came across this today in Your Soul’s Compass:

    We’ve defined the Soul’s Compass as an intelligence located in the heart that’s capable of perceiving and responding to the good. In Hebrew there’s a concept called yetzer ha-tov – the urge to good. Sometimes yetzer -ha-tov is imagined sitting on one shoulder, and yetzer ha-ra’ – the evil urge – on the other. We grow in wisdom through our attempts to inquire into, and ultimately transcend the tension of those opposite impulses. The function of the evil urge is to clarify the good, the true, and the beautiful by motivating us to orient to the visible fruits of Spirit in our choices.

    St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order, was the Catholic dean of discernment. In the late 15th century, when he was born, discernment was indeed centered on distinguishing good from evil in the classical theological sense of whether a thought came from God or the devil. In the theology of Ignatius, which reflected the thinking of the time, the devil was thought to be a crafty creature intent on leading us astray who was separate from our own more primitive, instinctive desires and inclinations. But regardless of where the “evil urge” originates – most likely from our own inborn nature and conditioning – we can easily distinguish it from the action of our higher nature by the inner state it produces, which Ignatius described as desolation in contrast to consolation.

    – Consolation is a feeling of inner warmth, of being loved by and loving the Creator. A state of interior joy, consolation is characterized by a quiet mind and an open heart. One feels inspired, confident, courageous… held and supported by unseen but beneficent forces.

    – Desolation is a state of interior disturbance that Ignatius called “darkness of the soul.” Sadness, sloth, and separateness from God are its hallmarks. Today’s common maladies of burnout, depression, despondency, addiction and hopelessness are all symptoms of desolation.

    This is fine example of how authors Joan Borysenko and Gordon Dveirin bring wisdom from the past and from differing traditions to their open-ended inquiry into spiritual guidance. Your Soul’s Compass is a great blend of insight from the past and present into the question – What is Spiritual Guidance?

Open-Secrets