Have you noticed that some people can seem very sure of themselves even though they are predominantly living in a state of unreality in many areas, while some people seem to judge themselves for feeling confused about things, when in fact they are much closer to the truth than the falsely confident are. One cannot skip steps to arrive at genuine clarity, and one cannot get there simply by acting sure of oneself.
One way that I’ve conceptualized the process of personal evolution has been as a kind of three-part journey from false clarity to genuine confusion to genuine clarity.
Initially, when someone first arrives to a place where they're ready to take the step of engaging in a full-spectrum self-work process, they are in a state that I’ve found myself thinking of as "false clarity." This is a frame of mind in which one’s personal belief systems are so firmly in place and embedded so far down in the subconscious mind that the person feels certain of their validity, rarely questioning them. From this place, people will frequently start sentences out with "I believe…"
"I believe that I can't only get what I want through the manipulation of myself and others."
"I believe that if I am honest and assert myself directly, no one will like me."
"I believe that if I acted strictly according to my desires, I’d be out of control."
"I believe it’s impossible for Eros and passion to last in a relationship."
"I believe that if I want something done right, I have to do it myself, because no one will ever be there for me."
"I believe that to truly give to others means to sacrifice something of what I want."
And so on…ad infinitum. There are many, many such axioms or beliefs with variations and derivatives aplenty. (In my class on beliefs, and in each of the character structure classes, I present a more extensive list of some of the more common beliefs that we run our lives by.)
Since these beliefs are not doubted for the most part, the person initially coming for therapy is seeking ways to better cope with what are accepted as the harsh “realities" of their life. Much energy has been invested in trying to find better and better ways of manipulating the self and other people to "get what I want". To that end, a person will develop what some theorists have referred to as "masks" ("personas", according to Carl Jung), or false selves, constructed to present to the world in order to gain sought after praise, recognition, validation or other substitutes for what they truly need: unconditional self-love. Indeed, many come to therapy looking to polish up their masks so they might "work better", and are surprised to find out that a key part of the actual self work is, in fact, to expose and "take off" the masks.
One of the first endeavors in a person’s unfolding process, then, is to begin uncovering the embedded beliefs behind the masks, and challenging their validity, thereby confronting the false clarity they offer as a substitute for real knowingness and security. It is not easy. Indeed, if you believe something so thoroughly, you will invite, create or only be able to see that very thing in your life most of the time, so its reality will seem absolute. And, if you have been so invested for so long in a particular method of trying to attain a modicum of happiness, you will not readily forgo it. To face that a strategy that you have been devoting much of your life force to is actually faulty is a heartbreaking proposition.
Let’s consider a common scenario. A person may come to therapy because they have had a series of love relationships in which they’ve found themselves feeling emotionally deprived. In spite of tireless efforts to be agreeable, accommodating and self-sacrificing, they were just "not getting enough" - attention, sex, support, appreciation or affection from their partner. This person feels so defeated and frustrated because while they believe that there really isn’t enough love in the world to go around, they are sure that the way to get what is available is by being…agreeable, accommodating and self-sacrificing! What they are in denial of is the fact that their accommodating, etc., behavior is part of a mask, attempting to hide a very demanding and childish attitude towards their loved one based on a buried belief in deprivation. The partner being bombarded with these masked demands will often withdraw and indeed be less inclined to "give" affection, etc. This then seems to validate the underlying belief that "there is not enough." So therefore, one must manipulate even more, all the while building up a stockpile of resentment. On and on, in a self-fulfilling, vicious cycle that Eva Broch referred to in one of her Pathwork Guide Lectures as a "circular trap." The failure of the manipulations to get more of what is wanted is often what brings the person to therapy, seeking to find out what they’re doing "wrong", why the mask they’re sure is based in reality is not having its designed effect.
This is life in a state of false clarity. Sure you’re right, sure you know how life works, but inexplicably unhappy, which, if the beliefs are seen as clearly right, can only lead the person to the conclusion that they are "failing" - meaning manipulating inadequately.
So, where can one go from there, from this place where the self is so rigidly defined according to firmly held beliefs that only lead to frustration and a sense of inadequacy? When blocked feelings are released through an integrated mind-body-spirit psychotherapy, the embedded beliefs start appearing in higher relief. This is because the beliefs were previously being used to justify keeping emotions trapped in the body. As the emotional channels are opened, the old beliefs become subject to challenge and dismantling. People find themselves at that point without the familiar, stereotypical ways of viewing the world, themselves and others. They feel somewhat lost at first, anxiously free-floating for a while and they will experience a shift in their "I am" completion to the more immediate feeling expressions. "I am…feeling lost now. I don’t know how to act. What can I count on? Where can I find security?" Meaning, without the illusions created by projecting static images into the future, what can they count on for predictability? Again, the reason they are in therapy in the first place is because they realize that their lives have never successfully followed their projections anyway, and the fulfillment promised by the illusions always seemed to remain unattainable or just out of reach. Now, they are starting to realize that they didn’t know what they thought they knew. Now, they are in a state of "genuine confusion!" At this moment, I usually congratulate patients! It is here, at the "I don’t know who I am" place, that true wisdom begins.
What keeps people going at this stage, fortunately, is that despite the confusion, they feel better, and often, in spite of an apparent lack of direction, their outer lives frequently are improving. For one person, it may be physical health that improves, for another financial abundance arrives, or work-life becomes more creative. For still others, they break through a relationship barrier. Yet, for all, it is really the new inner feeling of self-possession and inner connectedness that provides motivation.
At this stage of the process, the person in the above example has uncovered a belief in deprivation and scarcity of love that’s been embedded in the subconscious mind since very early in childhood, based on a less-than-fully-gratifying relationship with a parent. The feelings stored in the body since that time, the hurt and rage, have also now been energized through the therapy and partially released at this stage as well. The origins of the person’s masks are getting uncovered and seen as primitive attempts by the child to "get more" from a parent - with poor results, of course. It is now becoming understood that the world of love has been viewed through this tainted lens for the last two, three, four or more decades, since infancy usually. It is experienced as a revelation to consider that one could be fully gratified in an adult relationship, could give and receive all of the love that one is capable of without having to do anything to "get it". It is also startling to realize that one has discounted or ignored the possibilities for greater love because to see that would have run counter to the "absolutely certain" beliefs that they were holding onto. This is a point at which the resistance to being "wrong" about one’s strategy for living gets confronted. It is painful. One is faced with the fact that all of the feelings of failure and frustration, and of course, self-hate, were not based on reality at all, but on an erroneous conclusion about life which originated in early childhood. Great courage is required by the person to forge on here.
If one does indeed forge ahead, what is the next step on the journey?
When the deep primal feelings have been to a great extent released, and the core negative beliefs very much unveiled, the person comes to a new place of overall inner security and openness that provides both confidence to trust what one knows in the moment, and simultaneously, flexibility to re-evaluate one’s "knowledge" and change when called to do so. This is "genuine clarity."
The person knows how they feel in the moment, and is aware of their immediate inner thought processes as well. Judgmental attitudes about emotions and the contents of one’s mind are not held onto. A person at this stage follows their instincts in major decisions without a lot of second-guessing or rigidly gripping to projections and anticipated outcomes. When one is in a state of genuine clarity, the truth of matters is no longer mainly sought through deductive reasoning, but rather through inner resonance with the truth, and actions are decided upon by trusting "gut feelings." The person at this stage knows that whatever transpires, they will be open and flexible enough to creatively move with the events. Mistakes and temporary obstacles are accepted as information, not measured against images of perfection or rigid beliefs about success or failure. One can experience the "joy of being wrong" in this state, that is the freedom from needing to come up with the "right" strategies, free from worrying about "blowing it" when making decisions, etc.
In our example, the person who once believed in deprivation now knows through experience that life is abundant with opportunities to exchange love and pleasure with another and that the only "efforts" one must make to that end are to keep the emotional channels in oneself clear. Gratifying experiences have begun to come to this person, now in genuine clarity, without manipulation, indeed, without even "wanting" them in the old way at all. "Good things" seem to just arrive as a by-product of being more genuinely oneself. The person understands, too, that we all act like magnets for experiences in life, and that we will attract whatever we are "charged up" with. If it is joy and love that we are energized with, we will attract joy and love. If it is hostility, likewise that is what we will attract. So, unpleasurable events are dealt with by going within to examine one’s inner state. The person is also clear now that one’s attitude towards oneself is one’s attitude toward others. (I believe that a common misunderstanding of "Love thy neighbor as thyself" is corrected intuitively by the person in this place. Most people think this expression means you should love your neighbor as much as you love yourself, as if it were a rule for behavior. In fact, I believe it means that you will love your neighbor to the degree that you love yourself.)
The person who has achieved genuine clarity will also feel it in their body when they are in truth. No other "proof" will be needed to determine the "rightness" for them of courses of action. This person will explain, "I have to do this or that because it just feels right." They will also say about their actions, "To do otherwise would be not being my-self."
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SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT - THE DOWNSIDE OF SELF-SACRIFICE/THE UPSIDE OF SELFISHNESS!
Here's a quote by George Bernard Shaw:
"Self-sacrifice enables us to sacrifice other people without blushing."
Now, think about that. Very interesting. Pretty radical? Blasphemous, even, especially to all the martyrs of the world. The great Irish playwright is saying in most simple terms that those who sacrifice themselves feel justified in sacrificing others. If this is so, can we not conversely conclude that self-love and healthy self-centeredness must lead us to do what benefits all others, as well?
If you're up for it, below is an extensive excerpt from a Pathwork Guide lecture on the "MISCONCEPTION ABOUT SELFISHNESS."
The Guide:
"People very frequently think -- and if they do not do so consciously, they feel it unconsciously -- that whatever brings them happiness must be damaging to someone else. Hence, it is inevitable that your conscience bothers you every time you are happy, whether you were actually selfish or not. This guilt is bound to afflict your inner will for happiness.
Your unconscious concept is that if you enjoy something, your pleasure will automatically be at the expense of somebody else. Since you were taught that it is wrong to be selfish, you feel you must suppress your 'selfish' desire. You fail to distinguish whether your desires are actually selfish or not, and you indiscriminately suppress all desires. In the belief that all desires for happiness are selfish, you do not dare to desire at all. In the process of suppression, unable to distinguish one from the other, you lump together the really selfish with the really healthy desires which have nothing whatever to do with selfishness. Thus, you have no way of sorting them out, of judging, of coming to terms with them. Only then would you be in a position to freely decide for some desires and against some others.
In short, this is the unconscious concept: since desires aim for happiness and wanting happiness is selfish, I must suppress all desires. You do not realize that as they are driven out they continue their existence underground. The really selfish desires in your unconscious make you feel guilty, but so also do the rightful desires. Both continue to claim and clamor inside of you, often without your awareness. On top of all this, the prohibition you inflict on them makes you resentful. You resent the world for not allowing you to be happy, while in reality it is your wrong conclusion about happiness that is the cause. In the process of suppression of all desires and impulses, the childish and therefore actually selfish ones cannot mature and refine themselves. This can happen only if they are faced and dealt with in awareness. As a consequence, your legitimate and healthy desires and impulses, which are not selfish in the least, cannot find fulfillment.
You are all weighed down by the unconscious conclusion that something is selfish merely because it makes you happy. This is very tragic, my friends. It is a needless cost you pay in happiness and joy. You dare not wish for happiness simply because you fail to discriminate between actual and imagined selfishness. Every time a rightful and healthy impulse for self-expression manifests, you feel and think of it as if it were your really immature and crude selfishness.
The question now is how to treat the real selfishness that exists in the immature part of every human being. The usual and wrong way to handle this is to suppress it and superimpose a compulsive unselfishness that is not genuine. Out of the superimposition stems the unconscious concept that it would actually be very pleasant to be allowed to be selfish. This notion gets a foothold within you, and you unconsciously believe that to be selfish would bring you happiness, but alas, you are not allowed to be happy. You wrongly think that should you give in to your desire for happiness, you would not be loved or approved of. Since love and approval are so necessary for you, you would rather forsake 'happiness.' The inner conflict can be stated in this way: 'If I could be selfish, I could do anything I wanted. That would mean happiness. On the other hand, I cannot be happy if I am not loved and approved of. Therefore, I must become unhappy, in order to be happy.' This sounds completely illogical, but the immature unconscious is this illogical and this contradictory. You can now see what utter confusion exists in the human soul. I am sure, you will not have too much trouble confirming similar feelings in yourself. I venture to say that this conflict exists to some extent in all human beings.
This wrong conclusion accounts for the utter hopelessness you so often feel -- a hopelessness that finds an outlet in occasional moods for which you sometimes find outer reasons and rationalizations. This very conflict is the underlying reality of your hopelessness. Were your misconception true, happiness would indeed be an impossibility. You would be justified in being hopeless if you couldn't be happy without being loved, and you cannot be loved when you are happy, for happiness is selfish according to this erroneous concept. There is unhappiness either way. You may fluctuate between the two alternatives, but whichever way you turn you find yourself unhappy and frustrated. You often rebel inwardly and try to force the people around you to break this law, or what seems to you a law. But your conviction that you are in an insoluble situation causes you to try to get out of it in the wrong way. The irony is that you try to come out of it by sometimes actually acting out your most childish and selfish impulses rather than your legitimate and healthy ones. This must offend others and provoke them to react negatively toward you. And this, in turn, convinces you anew that your predicament is indeed hopeless. Since the cause of your rebellion is unconscious, it does not occur to you to choose to act upon your healthy impulses; instead, you pick the most drastic examples for your experiment. The drastic examples are the selfish impulses. Only by a growing awareness and conscious discrimination can you be in a position to make the proper choices and so receive the proof that your conclusion was wrong. It becomes self-evident that this conflict frustrates your inner will and prohibits the deserved fulfillment of your desire.
The idea that selfishness, if allowed, would be a happier state, may be only in your unconscious mind, while consciously you know all the right answers. In that case, questioning yourself in the proper way will bring you closer to the inner contradiction. By going deeply enough, your answers will be less and less convincing, even to yourself. When this happens, you are approaching the afflicted area. Some of you, if you but took the trouble to think about it, might even find a consciously-held belief that you would be happier if you were allowed to be selfish.
Whether this misconception exists in your conscious or in your unconscious mind, how can you be freely unselfish in your actions day in and day out? Not doing the unselfish act makes you feel guilty, doing it seems to be a violation of your will and conviction. It cannot be a free act, independently chosen. Whenever you do something out of compulsion and not because you say yes to it, you cannot be at one with yourself. You must be divided, in conflict, you must lose your inner peace and your sense of rightness. How can you be happy either in doing something that makes you feel guilty, or in doing something that appears to be against your personal interests? Either alternative brings dissatisfaction.
Let us now examine why this concept is wrong. I am addressing that part of your personality where you hold the misconception. First, not everything that makes you happy is automatically selfish and damaging to another merely because it makes you happy. Quite the contrary. As a happy person, you are better able to bring happiness and joy to others. You are entitled to the same consideration for yourself as another person. Only as a free, strong, and happy person can you have fulfillment in life and be constructive in your environment. In order to accomplish this, you have to give yourself consideration, you have to respect your own rights, and they will not conflict with the interests and rights of others. If sometimes it appears that way, ascertain the truth with absolute self-honesty. There are no fixed rules to determine whether actions are right or wrong when they appear to be against the interests of another person. However, it is essential to become completely aware of all your wishes, impulses, and motives. Only in that way can you discriminate and judge which one is selfish and which one is not.
As to the actual selfishness that seems, consciously or unconsciously, so advantageous and desirable: In reality selfishness cannot offer any advantage to you, even if it seems so at the moment. The higher your consciousness is, the more absolute will this conviction be in you. At the moment it may be difficult for you to understand this truth, and then you should just strive toward this fuller vision as a goal. But the true concept cannot become part of you as long as you try to force it upon yourself; as long as you act in the right way because you think you should; as long as the decision is not wholly your own and therefore free. In the meantime, all you can and should do is to be honest with yourself.
When it still seems to you that the selfish act would be more desirable, contemplate the following: An isolated event, with all its causes and effects, will have a different aspect than the same event would in its larger context. In other words, a particular incident may actually seem to warrant the view that selfishness is advantageous. But if you follow through the chain reactions, you are bound to gain a different perspective. The different view will give you the desire and activate the free will to decide for the unselfish act rather than be driven to it as before. This in itself will make a tremendous difference. It will automatically open a new vista, showing you that selfishness is not advantageous, either now or in the long run. It is divorced from reality. As long as you see only the first effects of an action, you do not possess a view of the whole picture. It is only a segment, and the segment cannot convey the whole.
Let us say, you are shown a little stone from a big house. You can tell certain facts by looking at the stone: the quality and material, as well as the color. But you cannot tell what the house looks like from seeing the stone. You can judge neither its beauty, its architecture, nor the proportions and furnishings of the rooms.
It is the same with the inner and outer actions, attitudes, and reactions of the human being. By considering only the immediate effect, you take it upon yourself to pronounce judgment upon the whole picture with only a segment available. You need to extend your view, so that you are in a position to have a truer vision. This does not mean to accept something on faith; nor does it mean that by being good, you will be rewarded in the hereafter. The effect of right action can be seen here and now, while you are still on this earth plane.
When you think or feel that selfishness would be to your advantage, you are leaving out the obvious. You fail to connect cause and effect, and therefore your view is blurred. But you do not need supernatural vision or metaphysical knowledge to put two and two together. You need only to think, reach a little further, and see what is right in front of your eyes.
Let us suppose you have to make a choice between a selfish and an unselfish act. The unselfish act does not seem to bring you benefit, at least not directly. However, if you are objectively convinced that it is beneficial as such, be it for the world at large or for a small group, or for one other person, it is bound to benefit you too in some way, perhaps not always immediately, but often much sooner than you think. This conviction will grow in you. It will become an inner fact, but only if you have made a full and wholehearted decision for the unselfish act. Decide for it only because you are convinced it is right, and not compulsively, because you want to receive a reward, whether in the form of affection, love, approval, or to obligate others, or because you believe that God will reward you for having been a good child. Your action must be self-chosen for its own sake, regardless who seems to benefit from it immediately. When you do so, you will be at one with yourself. This will widen your horizon and raise your consciousness to the necessary maturity. The truth will then dawn on you that selfishness is not advantageous and is definitely not in your interest. Or, to put it differently, unselfishness is healthily "selfish."
I said before that performing an unselfish act for a reward turns the act into a selfish one. However, if you do the right thing in the right and mature way without ulterior motives and out of free choice, you will reap a reward of another sort, namely the good feeling of being at one with yourself, the security that only self-respect can offer. To do something wholeheartedly gives added self-respect that is a decided advantage manifesting in many ways. It will give you, among other things, the strength to overcome many a weakness for which you may despise yourself. It will reduce certain fears and anxieties, especially when dealing with other people. Your fear of others is always based on your feeling weak and inadequate. By coming to terms with your confusions, by making independent decisions for carrying out unselfish acts, thus being at one with yourself, you gain the self-respect which reduces the very inadequacy and self-contempt that make you weak and fearful toward others.
I cannot emphasize strongly enough that it is all-important whether or not you act unselfishly because you truly want to or because you think you have to. As long as the conviction that makes you want to is lacking, you have to continue the work of self-search, of examining your motives and concepts in comparison with objective truth, until you arrive at the point of conviction. Only then are you capable of making a free choice that is not driven by compulsion. This, in turn, will show you that unselfishness is not a yoke that you have to take on against your inner conviction. Instead, you will see without a doubt that unselfishness is really "selfish" in a healthy sense, and that it is to your advantage, provided your motives are right, your decision free, your reactions mature.
This will free you of the misconception that selfishness could make you happy if you were allowed to indulge in it. The other misconception, that happiness is selfish and is therefore forbidden, exists because of this misconception. Because of these wrong conclusions, your inner will cannot function, cannot flow out of you. Each time the desire for happiness manifests, a little inner voice prohibits it so that the inner will is broken. The desire may be reborn on an outer level, but, as I said before, the outer will cannot suffice in bringing you to any goal: it will only tear you apart; it will destroy your inner strength, serenity, and peace.
Try, all of you, to recognize your will; where it comes from, how it feels. If and when you find the inner will blocked, examine where and why you have doubts about the rightfulness of your desire. At times this suspicion may be justified because your desire may actually be harmful to others or to yourself. At times, your desire may be justified, but many unconscious, unhealthy motives may exist together with the healthy ones. At times, a wish may be wholly right and good, but your misconceptions -- about selfishness as well as in other areas -- may prohibit the inner will to function."
"Self-sacrifice enables us to sacrifice other people without blushing."
Now, think about that. Very interesting. Pretty radical? Blasphemous, even, especially to all the martyrs of the world. The great Irish playwright is saying in most simple terms that those who sacrifice themselves feel justified in sacrificing others. If this is so, can we not conversely conclude that self-love and healthy self-centeredness must lead us to do what benefits all others, as well?
If you're up for it, below is an extensive excerpt from a Pathwork Guide lecture on the "MISCONCEPTION ABOUT SELFISHNESS."
The Guide:
"People very frequently think -- and if they do not do so consciously, they feel it unconsciously -- that whatever brings them happiness must be damaging to someone else. Hence, it is inevitable that your conscience bothers you every time you are happy, whether you were actually selfish or not. This guilt is bound to afflict your inner will for happiness.
Your unconscious concept is that if you enjoy something, your pleasure will automatically be at the expense of somebody else. Since you were taught that it is wrong to be selfish, you feel you must suppress your 'selfish' desire. You fail to distinguish whether your desires are actually selfish or not, and you indiscriminately suppress all desires. In the belief that all desires for happiness are selfish, you do not dare to desire at all. In the process of suppression, unable to distinguish one from the other, you lump together the really selfish with the really healthy desires which have nothing whatever to do with selfishness. Thus, you have no way of sorting them out, of judging, of coming to terms with them. Only then would you be in a position to freely decide for some desires and against some others.
In short, this is the unconscious concept: since desires aim for happiness and wanting happiness is selfish, I must suppress all desires. You do not realize that as they are driven out they continue their existence underground. The really selfish desires in your unconscious make you feel guilty, but so also do the rightful desires. Both continue to claim and clamor inside of you, often without your awareness. On top of all this, the prohibition you inflict on them makes you resentful. You resent the world for not allowing you to be happy, while in reality it is your wrong conclusion about happiness that is the cause. In the process of suppression of all desires and impulses, the childish and therefore actually selfish ones cannot mature and refine themselves. This can happen only if they are faced and dealt with in awareness. As a consequence, your legitimate and healthy desires and impulses, which are not selfish in the least, cannot find fulfillment.
You are all weighed down by the unconscious conclusion that something is selfish merely because it makes you happy. This is very tragic, my friends. It is a needless cost you pay in happiness and joy. You dare not wish for happiness simply because you fail to discriminate between actual and imagined selfishness. Every time a rightful and healthy impulse for self-expression manifests, you feel and think of it as if it were your really immature and crude selfishness.
The question now is how to treat the real selfishness that exists in the immature part of every human being. The usual and wrong way to handle this is to suppress it and superimpose a compulsive unselfishness that is not genuine. Out of the superimposition stems the unconscious concept that it would actually be very pleasant to be allowed to be selfish. This notion gets a foothold within you, and you unconsciously believe that to be selfish would bring you happiness, but alas, you are not allowed to be happy. You wrongly think that should you give in to your desire for happiness, you would not be loved or approved of. Since love and approval are so necessary for you, you would rather forsake 'happiness.' The inner conflict can be stated in this way: 'If I could be selfish, I could do anything I wanted. That would mean happiness. On the other hand, I cannot be happy if I am not loved and approved of. Therefore, I must become unhappy, in order to be happy.' This sounds completely illogical, but the immature unconscious is this illogical and this contradictory. You can now see what utter confusion exists in the human soul. I am sure, you will not have too much trouble confirming similar feelings in yourself. I venture to say that this conflict exists to some extent in all human beings.
This wrong conclusion accounts for the utter hopelessness you so often feel -- a hopelessness that finds an outlet in occasional moods for which you sometimes find outer reasons and rationalizations. This very conflict is the underlying reality of your hopelessness. Were your misconception true, happiness would indeed be an impossibility. You would be justified in being hopeless if you couldn't be happy without being loved, and you cannot be loved when you are happy, for happiness is selfish according to this erroneous concept. There is unhappiness either way. You may fluctuate between the two alternatives, but whichever way you turn you find yourself unhappy and frustrated. You often rebel inwardly and try to force the people around you to break this law, or what seems to you a law. But your conviction that you are in an insoluble situation causes you to try to get out of it in the wrong way. The irony is that you try to come out of it by sometimes actually acting out your most childish and selfish impulses rather than your legitimate and healthy ones. This must offend others and provoke them to react negatively toward you. And this, in turn, convinces you anew that your predicament is indeed hopeless. Since the cause of your rebellion is unconscious, it does not occur to you to choose to act upon your healthy impulses; instead, you pick the most drastic examples for your experiment. The drastic examples are the selfish impulses. Only by a growing awareness and conscious discrimination can you be in a position to make the proper choices and so receive the proof that your conclusion was wrong. It becomes self-evident that this conflict frustrates your inner will and prohibits the deserved fulfillment of your desire.
The idea that selfishness, if allowed, would be a happier state, may be only in your unconscious mind, while consciously you know all the right answers. In that case, questioning yourself in the proper way will bring you closer to the inner contradiction. By going deeply enough, your answers will be less and less convincing, even to yourself. When this happens, you are approaching the afflicted area. Some of you, if you but took the trouble to think about it, might even find a consciously-held belief that you would be happier if you were allowed to be selfish.
Whether this misconception exists in your conscious or in your unconscious mind, how can you be freely unselfish in your actions day in and day out? Not doing the unselfish act makes you feel guilty, doing it seems to be a violation of your will and conviction. It cannot be a free act, independently chosen. Whenever you do something out of compulsion and not because you say yes to it, you cannot be at one with yourself. You must be divided, in conflict, you must lose your inner peace and your sense of rightness. How can you be happy either in doing something that makes you feel guilty, or in doing something that appears to be against your personal interests? Either alternative brings dissatisfaction.
Let us now examine why this concept is wrong. I am addressing that part of your personality where you hold the misconception. First, not everything that makes you happy is automatically selfish and damaging to another merely because it makes you happy. Quite the contrary. As a happy person, you are better able to bring happiness and joy to others. You are entitled to the same consideration for yourself as another person. Only as a free, strong, and happy person can you have fulfillment in life and be constructive in your environment. In order to accomplish this, you have to give yourself consideration, you have to respect your own rights, and they will not conflict with the interests and rights of others. If sometimes it appears that way, ascertain the truth with absolute self-honesty. There are no fixed rules to determine whether actions are right or wrong when they appear to be against the interests of another person. However, it is essential to become completely aware of all your wishes, impulses, and motives. Only in that way can you discriminate and judge which one is selfish and which one is not.
As to the actual selfishness that seems, consciously or unconsciously, so advantageous and desirable: In reality selfishness cannot offer any advantage to you, even if it seems so at the moment. The higher your consciousness is, the more absolute will this conviction be in you. At the moment it may be difficult for you to understand this truth, and then you should just strive toward this fuller vision as a goal. But the true concept cannot become part of you as long as you try to force it upon yourself; as long as you act in the right way because you think you should; as long as the decision is not wholly your own and therefore free. In the meantime, all you can and should do is to be honest with yourself.
When it still seems to you that the selfish act would be more desirable, contemplate the following: An isolated event, with all its causes and effects, will have a different aspect than the same event would in its larger context. In other words, a particular incident may actually seem to warrant the view that selfishness is advantageous. But if you follow through the chain reactions, you are bound to gain a different perspective. The different view will give you the desire and activate the free will to decide for the unselfish act rather than be driven to it as before. This in itself will make a tremendous difference. It will automatically open a new vista, showing you that selfishness is not advantageous, either now or in the long run. It is divorced from reality. As long as you see only the first effects of an action, you do not possess a view of the whole picture. It is only a segment, and the segment cannot convey the whole.
Let us say, you are shown a little stone from a big house. You can tell certain facts by looking at the stone: the quality and material, as well as the color. But you cannot tell what the house looks like from seeing the stone. You can judge neither its beauty, its architecture, nor the proportions and furnishings of the rooms.
It is the same with the inner and outer actions, attitudes, and reactions of the human being. By considering only the immediate effect, you take it upon yourself to pronounce judgment upon the whole picture with only a segment available. You need to extend your view, so that you are in a position to have a truer vision. This does not mean to accept something on faith; nor does it mean that by being good, you will be rewarded in the hereafter. The effect of right action can be seen here and now, while you are still on this earth plane.
When you think or feel that selfishness would be to your advantage, you are leaving out the obvious. You fail to connect cause and effect, and therefore your view is blurred. But you do not need supernatural vision or metaphysical knowledge to put two and two together. You need only to think, reach a little further, and see what is right in front of your eyes.
Let us suppose you have to make a choice between a selfish and an unselfish act. The unselfish act does not seem to bring you benefit, at least not directly. However, if you are objectively convinced that it is beneficial as such, be it for the world at large or for a small group, or for one other person, it is bound to benefit you too in some way, perhaps not always immediately, but often much sooner than you think. This conviction will grow in you. It will become an inner fact, but only if you have made a full and wholehearted decision for the unselfish act. Decide for it only because you are convinced it is right, and not compulsively, because you want to receive a reward, whether in the form of affection, love, approval, or to obligate others, or because you believe that God will reward you for having been a good child. Your action must be self-chosen for its own sake, regardless who seems to benefit from it immediately. When you do so, you will be at one with yourself. This will widen your horizon and raise your consciousness to the necessary maturity. The truth will then dawn on you that selfishness is not advantageous and is definitely not in your interest. Or, to put it differently, unselfishness is healthily "selfish."
I said before that performing an unselfish act for a reward turns the act into a selfish one. However, if you do the right thing in the right and mature way without ulterior motives and out of free choice, you will reap a reward of another sort, namely the good feeling of being at one with yourself, the security that only self-respect can offer. To do something wholeheartedly gives added self-respect that is a decided advantage manifesting in many ways. It will give you, among other things, the strength to overcome many a weakness for which you may despise yourself. It will reduce certain fears and anxieties, especially when dealing with other people. Your fear of others is always based on your feeling weak and inadequate. By coming to terms with your confusions, by making independent decisions for carrying out unselfish acts, thus being at one with yourself, you gain the self-respect which reduces the very inadequacy and self-contempt that make you weak and fearful toward others.
I cannot emphasize strongly enough that it is all-important whether or not you act unselfishly because you truly want to or because you think you have to. As long as the conviction that makes you want to is lacking, you have to continue the work of self-search, of examining your motives and concepts in comparison with objective truth, until you arrive at the point of conviction. Only then are you capable of making a free choice that is not driven by compulsion. This, in turn, will show you that unselfishness is not a yoke that you have to take on against your inner conviction. Instead, you will see without a doubt that unselfishness is really "selfish" in a healthy sense, and that it is to your advantage, provided your motives are right, your decision free, your reactions mature.
This will free you of the misconception that selfishness could make you happy if you were allowed to indulge in it. The other misconception, that happiness is selfish and is therefore forbidden, exists because of this misconception. Because of these wrong conclusions, your inner will cannot function, cannot flow out of you. Each time the desire for happiness manifests, a little inner voice prohibits it so that the inner will is broken. The desire may be reborn on an outer level, but, as I said before, the outer will cannot suffice in bringing you to any goal: it will only tear you apart; it will destroy your inner strength, serenity, and peace.
Try, all of you, to recognize your will; where it comes from, how it feels. If and when you find the inner will blocked, examine where and why you have doubts about the rightfulness of your desire. At times this suspicion may be justified because your desire may actually be harmful to others or to yourself. At times, your desire may be justified, but many unconscious, unhealthy motives may exist together with the healthy ones. At times, a wish may be wholly right and good, but your misconceptions -- about selfishness as well as in other areas -- may prohibit the inner will to function."
REPOST: ACCEPTANCE TO ENJOYMENT TO ENTHUSIASM!
I want to say to any of my readers who haven't yet read (or listened to) this book... Eckhart Tolle's, "THE NEW EARTH"... do it now!
To those of you have been doing the deep self-work of self-actualization, and to those who frequently read this blog or have read books like "THE BIG LEAP," by Gay Hendricks, you will find a familiarity in Tolle's words, but his clear, direct and high vibrational way of articulating these truths is special.
Many teachers and writers who speak about consciousness mention three levels of consciousness, or three ways in which consciousness can flow into what you do and thus through you into this world. I have talked about the movement from "false clarity to genuine confusion to genuine clarity," while Hendricks refers to the "zones of competence, excellence and genius" in his paradigm. Tolle breaks it down as "acceptance, enjoyment and enthusiasm."
Here's Tolle:
"The modalities of awakened doing
are acceptance, enjoyment, and enthusiasm. If you are not in the state of
either acceptance, enjoyment, or enthusiasm, look closely and you will find
that you are creating suffering for yourself and others. Whatever you cannot enjoy doing, changing a flat tire in the rain at night, for example, you can, nonetheless accept that
this is what you have to do. Performing an action in the state of acceptance
means you are at peace while you do it."
Yes, Eckhart. People often ask me questions about how one can apply Full Permission Living to mundane and distasteful tasks like washing a sink full of dirty dishes or a load of dirty diapers. I answer them by proposing a version of acceptance, or "surrender," giving yourself to the task at hand which must be done for certain reasons, such as desiring clean dishes and fresh baby butts. In the process of surrendering, you can find ways to make the tasks at hand less arduous. Play music, listen to a great audio book, indulge a pleasant fantasy... whatever works for you. It makes the task easier and you can speed up time in the process.
Here's Tolle again:
"The peace that comes with surrendered action turns to a sense of
aliveness when you actually enjoy what you are doing. Joy is the dynamic
aspect of Being. Joy does not come from what you do, it flows into what you do
and thus into this world from deep within you. You will enjoy any activity in
which you are fully present. The joy of Being is the joy of being conscious."
I love that line so much, Eckhart, I'm going to repeat it:
"Joy does not come from what you do, it flows into what you do and thus into this world from deep within you."
“I am a hole in a flute that the Christ’s breath moves through.”
That is true egolessness, and anyone who has truly experienced joy has simultaneously experienced deep humility along with it because they know at some level that they are channeling something higher than their ego.
Back to Eckhart:
"Enthusiasm means there is deep enjoyment in what you do, plus the
added element of a goal or vision that you work towards. This is why Ralph Waldo Emerson said that, 'Nothing great
has ever been achieved without enthusiasm."
Careful, now, all of you rigid character structures! Having a goal/vision is not the same as having expectations, which are a function of the ego.
Like Hendricks' "Zone of Genius," in which inspiration is the driving force, Tolle's enthusiasm is what I would describe as a "calling," a goal, in other words, that pulls you towards it, not a destination that you direct yourself towards with willfulness for the sake of inflating and supporting the ego and mask. In this place, you are at once surrendered, joyful and living your highest excitement, while expressing fully your generativity and benefitting everyone around you.
So, carve yourself into that flute, folks, and live your highest joy!
Do that now, too!!
THE TRIADIC NATURE OF IT ALL!
I've been writing lately about Eckhart Tolle's paradigm for the evolution of consciousness from "acceptance to enjoyment to enthusiasm." I have also written often here about the pulsatory movements of consciousness and the cosmos as being "expansion-contraction-rest," and about the triadic aspects of our Higher Selves as being "love, wisdom and will," and in my own paradigm about the evolution of a person through the healing process as from "false clarity to genuine confusion to genuine clarity."
The triadic nature of so many spiritual paradigms is surely no coincidence.
In Catholicism, there is the "Holy Trinity" of the "Father-Son-Holy Spirit." The "Law of Three" is a significant tenant of Wiccan and Pagan spirituality practices and beliefs. And so on...
Well, I came upon a fascinating bit of "triadic" information today in the Daily Beast.
On the 22nd of this month, it will be the 50th anniversary of the death of President John F. Kennedy. Most people know that fact. What most people don't know is that two other famous men who influenced our world greatly also died that day: Aldous Huxley (philosopher and author of "Brave New World") and C.S. Lewis (author of "The Chronicles of Narnia).
November 22 1963.
Three legendary souls entered the afterlife together. Must have led to some interesting conversations!
The triadic nature of so many spiritual paradigms is surely no coincidence.
In Catholicism, there is the "Holy Trinity" of the "Father-Son-Holy Spirit." The "Law of Three" is a significant tenant of Wiccan and Pagan spirituality practices and beliefs. And so on...
Well, I came upon a fascinating bit of "triadic" information today in the Daily Beast.
On the 22nd of this month, it will be the 50th anniversary of the death of President John F. Kennedy. Most people know that fact. What most people don't know is that two other famous men who influenced our world greatly also died that day: Aldous Huxley (philosopher and author of "Brave New World") and C.S. Lewis (author of "The Chronicles of Narnia).
November 22 1963.
Three legendary souls entered the afterlife together. Must have led to some interesting conversations!
2013: THE SECOND HALF!
"Good morning, everyone. This is your captain speaking. We will be cruising at an altitude of thirty-five thousand feet and a speed of approximately five hundred miles per hour. There may be occasional turbulence, but nothing to worry about. Enjoy the ride."
Sound familiar? If you've taken trips by airplane, you know the drill, and you've had the experience of traveling at that height and speed without really having the sensation of much movement, even at such a velocity. In fact, the take-off from the runway, at a speed of merely 150 miles per hour, always seems a lot faster, right?
Well, that is a perfect metaphor for your personal process so far in 2013. From early November ('round about Hurricane Sandy time), through the winter solstice (12/21/12) and into the New Year, many of you were in "take-off" mode, where the changes and challenges were coming fast and furious, and there definitely was some turbulence. Loss was a big part of that. Loss of lovers, friends or family members, loss of jobs, loss of home environments or possessions, and most significantly, loss of identity.
This latter loss was not due to identity theft, though. It was voluntary, the result of an intense period of self-work, a process of dismantling the structures of the ego that had long been identified with. The roles we played, the masks we wore, our attachments to people, places and things, all fell to the wayside as we progressed through our inner journey. (My favorite Buddhist psychotherapist and writer, Mark Epstein made the point that the true goal of therapy isn't to find oneself, but to lose one's self. From one of Epstein's books: "Wisdom and happiness are to be found only by emptying one's cup of opinions and preconceptions. A mind that is full cannot take in anything new.")
In therapy sessions in early 2013 (and more people came to me for therapy in these last 6 months than ever before during such a period in my entire 30 years of practice), many patients reported feeling "lost," without direction, not knowing "who they were." Yet, as I wrote about in my piece, "FALSE CLARITY TO GENUINE CONFUSION TO GENUINE CLARITY," these same "confused" individuals also reported feeling more grounded, alive and connected to their feelings and inner life. None said that they would rather go back to where they were before the "storm." And indeed, I encouraged my patients to allow themselves to become "empty vessels," and to tap into their inner knowing that could reassure them that they were never abandoned by the Universe, by their Higher Selves, by All That Is. My advice, like the airline pilot, often boiled down to saying, "Relax. Enjoy the ride. You're moving a lot faster than you think." (Well, I added in that last part!)
Which brings us to the second half... of 2013 that is. Last month, July, first month of the second half, and already I'm hearing reports of accelerations and big shifts manifesting. Oh, you thought you were going to simply remain cruising? Ha! Well, actually you are, but you will become aware of the reality that you haven't been remaining still, sitting in your window seat on this plane; you've been shifting proufoundly - internally, just not acutely noticing it. Yet.
Some of you may have noticed changes in your physical body, in your eating, sleeping and dreaming patterns, even in your memory (and that includes young people as well as older people, so it's not the "aging process" we're talking about here). These changes were preparations, the emptying, making room for the outer changes taking place and to come in the second half of 2013... and beyond.
There will be a "landing" experience, so to speak, and an arrival to a very new "country," with new landscapes to observe, new languages to learn, and new people to meet, and the landing process will feel like an acceleration, as the take-off did. In the rhythm of expansion, contraction, rest, this will be an expansion. But unlike any that you have experienced before, in this expansion, you will be a much more conscious creator of your experiences. And as I wrote about in my post at the beginning of this year - "IT'S 2013. WHICH EARTH ARE YOU ON?" - you will be creating not from your ego and emotions, but from your Higher Self and from the collective consciousness, which at first will not feel like "creating."
So, time to fasten your seat belts again, folks!
More to come.
Sound familiar? If you've taken trips by airplane, you know the drill, and you've had the experience of traveling at that height and speed without really having the sensation of much movement, even at such a velocity. In fact, the take-off from the runway, at a speed of merely 150 miles per hour, always seems a lot faster, right?
Well, that is a perfect metaphor for your personal process so far in 2013. From early November ('round about Hurricane Sandy time), through the winter solstice (12/21/12) and into the New Year, many of you were in "take-off" mode, where the changes and challenges were coming fast and furious, and there definitely was some turbulence. Loss was a big part of that. Loss of lovers, friends or family members, loss of jobs, loss of home environments or possessions, and most significantly, loss of identity.
This latter loss was not due to identity theft, though. It was voluntary, the result of an intense period of self-work, a process of dismantling the structures of the ego that had long been identified with. The roles we played, the masks we wore, our attachments to people, places and things, all fell to the wayside as we progressed through our inner journey. (My favorite Buddhist psychotherapist and writer, Mark Epstein made the point that the true goal of therapy isn't to find oneself, but to lose one's self. From one of Epstein's books: "Wisdom and happiness are to be found only by emptying one's cup of opinions and preconceptions. A mind that is full cannot take in anything new.")
In therapy sessions in early 2013 (and more people came to me for therapy in these last 6 months than ever before during such a period in my entire 30 years of practice), many patients reported feeling "lost," without direction, not knowing "who they were." Yet, as I wrote about in my piece, "FALSE CLARITY TO GENUINE CONFUSION TO GENUINE CLARITY," these same "confused" individuals also reported feeling more grounded, alive and connected to their feelings and inner life. None said that they would rather go back to where they were before the "storm." And indeed, I encouraged my patients to allow themselves to become "empty vessels," and to tap into their inner knowing that could reassure them that they were never abandoned by the Universe, by their Higher Selves, by All That Is. My advice, like the airline pilot, often boiled down to saying, "Relax. Enjoy the ride. You're moving a lot faster than you think." (Well, I added in that last part!)
Which brings us to the second half... of 2013 that is. Last month, July, first month of the second half, and already I'm hearing reports of accelerations and big shifts manifesting. Oh, you thought you were going to simply remain cruising? Ha! Well, actually you are, but you will become aware of the reality that you haven't been remaining still, sitting in your window seat on this plane; you've been shifting proufoundly - internally, just not acutely noticing it. Yet.
Some of you may have noticed changes in your physical body, in your eating, sleeping and dreaming patterns, even in your memory (and that includes young people as well as older people, so it's not the "aging process" we're talking about here). These changes were preparations, the emptying, making room for the outer changes taking place and to come in the second half of 2013... and beyond.
There will be a "landing" experience, so to speak, and an arrival to a very new "country," with new landscapes to observe, new languages to learn, and new people to meet, and the landing process will feel like an acceleration, as the take-off did. In the rhythm of expansion, contraction, rest, this will be an expansion. But unlike any that you have experienced before, in this expansion, you will be a much more conscious creator of your experiences. And as I wrote about in my post at the beginning of this year - "IT'S 2013. WHICH EARTH ARE YOU ON?" - you will be creating not from your ego and emotions, but from your Higher Self and from the collective consciousness, which at first will not feel like "creating."
So, time to fasten your seat belts again, folks!
More to come.
REPOST: "ADDICTED TO INTENSITY INSTEAD OF SATISFACTION?!" READ ON...
HERE'S A LINK to an article by Therese Borchard called: "Intensity is not the same thing as intimacy."
In the article, Therese quotes one Craig Nakken, author of "The Addictive Personality." Nakken repeats several times in his book that "The addict has an intense experience and believes it is a moment of intimacy."
Then, Therese goes on to say:
"It's only been in the last two years of my recovery from, well, just about everything, that I've come to appreciate that mistake. I suppose part of my brain is programmed to pursue the thrill, no matter how many people I hurt (myself included) to get it. I chase the adrenaline rush, the dopamine high, that is akin to the buzz I get from smoking an entire cigarette in three puffs after staying away from lung rockets for a year or more. It treats my bruised insides the same way Kids' Tylenol does my son's leg cramps. The addictive object dulls the blunt emotions with which I experience most of life. I crave drama, even as I know it's not good for me. And I create turmoil although I recognize that it obstructs the serenity I'm after."
PL:
I talk about this dynamic often with patients and readers.
Intensity is what we crave when our normal routes to pleasure have been blocked or numbed through our various character defenses.
Over-eating, substance abuse, sexually compulsive behavior, crashing from one personal crisis to another, even too much focusing on one's career or kids, all can be attempts to regain the feelings that have been dulled by our internal defensive operations.
The reason excess is so intrinsic a part of this is because there really are no substitutes for the real thing, for real pleasure. Having a big dose of sugar, or cocaine, when what you really crave is genuine ecstasy (pun intended!), will always leave you unsatisfied and jonesing for the next fix. Having sex ten times with ten different partners you don't really know or love will never gratify the true desire to make love with someone you're in love with. Etc.
A Pathwork Guide lecture on this subject is quite excellent, must reading if you're an intensity addict. Great title, too: "INTENSITY AS AN OBSTACLE TO SELF-REALIZATION!"
Hey, I don't mean to interfere with your holiday partying. Just tapping into any feelings of confusion or remorse you might be having now that you're hung-over and wondering why you did whatever it was that you did.
ENJOY!!
In the article, Therese quotes one Craig Nakken, author of "The Addictive Personality." Nakken repeats several times in his book that "The addict has an intense experience and believes it is a moment of intimacy."
Then, Therese goes on to say:
"It's only been in the last two years of my recovery from, well, just about everything, that I've come to appreciate that mistake. I suppose part of my brain is programmed to pursue the thrill, no matter how many people I hurt (myself included) to get it. I chase the adrenaline rush, the dopamine high, that is akin to the buzz I get from smoking an entire cigarette in three puffs after staying away from lung rockets for a year or more. It treats my bruised insides the same way Kids' Tylenol does my son's leg cramps. The addictive object dulls the blunt emotions with which I experience most of life. I crave drama, even as I know it's not good for me. And I create turmoil although I recognize that it obstructs the serenity I'm after."
PL:
I talk about this dynamic often with patients and readers.
Intensity is what we crave when our normal routes to pleasure have been blocked or numbed through our various character defenses.
Over-eating, substance abuse, sexually compulsive behavior, crashing from one personal crisis to another, even too much focusing on one's career or kids, all can be attempts to regain the feelings that have been dulled by our internal defensive operations.
The reason excess is so intrinsic a part of this is because there really are no substitutes for the real thing, for real pleasure. Having a big dose of sugar, or cocaine, when what you really crave is genuine ecstasy (pun intended!), will always leave you unsatisfied and jonesing for the next fix. Having sex ten times with ten different partners you don't really know or love will never gratify the true desire to make love with someone you're in love with. Etc.
A Pathwork Guide lecture on this subject is quite excellent, must reading if you're an intensity addict. Great title, too: "INTENSITY AS AN OBSTACLE TO SELF-REALIZATION!"
Hey, I don't mean to interfere with your holiday partying. Just tapping into any feelings of confusion or remorse you might be having now that you're hung-over and wondering why you did whatever it was that you did.
ENJOY!!
THE CHARACTER STRUCTURES
SCHIZOID CHARACTER STRUCTURE
TYPICAL PRESENTING PROBLEMS (when first arriving to therapy)
- Lack of feelings, numbness, little or no joy or pleasure in life;
- Inability to engage in intimate relationships;
- Intense fears, paranoia, phobias, panic attacks, dissociative episodes, chronic anxiety, intense perfectionism, procrastination;
- Physical problems that could not be diagnosed medically; hypochondriasis;
- “Existential angst”, questioning one’s right to exist; feelings of emptiness and meaninglessness;
- Suicidal/homicidal ideations, impulses or actions; excessive concerns about death;
- Episodes of explosiveness, which may include physical violence;
- Self-mutilating behavior (biting, burning or cutting of the skin);
- Primary “falling” fear: falling apart;
- Primary holding pattern: holding together
- Primary longing: to feel whole;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to exist.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period – Prenatal to First Four Months of Life)
- Mother (or primary caretaker) was chronically any or all of the following very early in the child’s life, including during pregnancy: cold, hostile, rageful, abusive, erratic, unreliable, removed, distant, disconnected emotionally, fearful and/or anxious;
- Eye contact and physical contact between mother and child was avoided by mother, due to mother’s schizoid elements, or interfered with due to physical illness of mother or child, or due to traumatic birth circumstances (Caesarian, premature or breech delivery, incubator, etc.);
- Home environment was chaotic or threatening due to alcohol/drug abuse, violence, poverty, or external traumatic environmental circumstances (i.e. - natural disasters, political oppression, war);
- One or both parents were resentful of child’s presence (exacerbated by being unprepared for child-rearing due to an unwanted pregnancy, youth or other social conditions);
- Child did not meet parents’ idealized expectations of a “perfect baby”, and was greeted with disappointment or avoidance.
BODY STATUS
- Body is often narrow and contracted in an effort to hold together against the fear of falling apart (body may be fuller and more athletic if there are paranoid elements present due to sexualizing by parents); pervasive tension and stiffness throughout the body, with a frozen or wooden quality;
- Head, often large or with a large forehead, is pushed forward, drooping down or off to the side (due to tension created at base of skull to sever the head from the body and feelings);
- Shoulders up (in fear), and arms hang like appendages (to prevent contact with others or violent acting out);
- Feet are often cold and contracted; person is frequently “on their toes”, ungrounded, in the “fight or flight” position (curled, flexed and/or tight in the Achilles tendon);
- Splits in the body are quite marked, most often between the upper and lower halves, but also between front and back and left and right sides, including the eyes, and between the head and the body (correlates to use of splitting defense);
- Twisted spine (trying to get away from the threatening environment or parent that it also needs); person has particular difficulty with the “bow” position;
- Ocular blocks are very common, causing vision problems (doesn’t want to see the coldness or hostility), and the expression in the eyes is often either frozen terror or disconnectedness, with flashes of murderous fury; expression in the eyes is split from the expression of the rest of the face;
- Lack of color to the body and coldness in the extremities; also cold to the touch in the areas of chronic constriction;
- Skin is hypersensitive due to the withdrawal of energy from the exterior surface; touch is experienced as uncomfortable or painful;
- Shallow, constricted breathing (cannot embrace life), and high-pitched or constricted voice; choke response is easily elicited if the person is asked to breathe deeply (or on roller);
- Psychosomatic illnesses (headaches, eczema, digestive and respiratory problems common) due to chronic contractions and de-energized condition which tend to be worse in persons who are more strongly defended;
- Chronic areas of severe tension: base of the skull, joints of the shoulders, legs and hips, the diaphragm, and the ocular segment of the face;
- Dominant spasticities are in the small muscles around joints (fear of moving), so there is either inflexibility or hyperflexibility (more severe because muscles have given out).
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Energy is withheld from the peripheral structures of the body, those that make contact with the world: the face, hands, genitals and feet (correlates to poor reality testing);
- Organs are not fully connected energetically to the core, but are blocked by chronic tensions at the base of the skull, shoulders, pelvis and hip joints;
- The inner charge tends to be frozen in the core, making the will weak, but also precipitating explosive eruptions because of the compression;
- Energy flow is severely diminished at the waist due to severe contraction in the diaphragm and the separation from sexual feelings, and at the base of the head due to separation of thoughts from feelings;
- Chakras (energy centers): Crown - (spiritual connection) open but asymmetrical; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) open, but asymmetrical; Throat - (self-expression) contracted and inverted; Heart - (love feelings) contracted and inverted; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) partially opened; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) contracted and inverted; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) contracted and inverted.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- Tremendous efforts are made internally to avoid and control any feelings due to the presence of deep-seated terror and murderous rage, which leads to intense fears of annihilation if feelings are expressed (this later becomes attached to any experiences of perceived rejection or failure); crippling anxiety, panic attacks and phobias often arise when feelings threaten to emerge;
- “As if” feelings are expressed according to what one “should feel” in a given situation, but there is no real spontaneity; self-expression is mechanical and controlled; aggression is expressed through passive withdrawal, though explosions are a potential;
- Feelings are talked about, or thought about, but not really felt or acknowledged as being in the body;
- Will is used predominantly to withdraw from external reality and to freeze feelings internally, so outward, assertive expressions have no energy and are weak and scattered;
- Mental faculties are usually highly developed, frequently with a brilliant intellect; the mind is valued above all else, and deduction, reasoning, calculating, and “figuring things out” logically are the only modes of operating that are trusted; gut feelings and intuition are denigrated and feared; this person is always “in their mind.”
PSYCH0LOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self because of a lack of identification with the body;
- Hypersensitivity and hyperawareness because of weak ego boundaries (correlates to the lack of peripheral charge in the body);
- Poor reality testing;
- Paranoia, from projected rage, which is exacerbated if either parent invested sexual energy in the child;
- Psyche is experienced as a “house of many rooms” without access between them;
- Person feels possessed by a demonic, alien presence or voice at times (introjected hostile parental image);
- Subject to dissociation, depersonalization and fugue states;
- Main defenses: denial, projection, introjection, splitting, disintegration, withdrawal, fragmentation, compartmentalization and intellectualization;
- Typical masks: spiritual or mental arrogance or aloofness (“I am special, I am superior because I am above physical existence.”), exaggerated appearance of serenity or peacefulness (“I am never angry or afraid.”), “Don Quixote”- like Idealized Self Image (“I dream the ‘Impossible Dream”; “I am an unrecognized genius”; “legends in their own mind.”)
- Childhood history may include: frequent nightmares or sleep disturbances, withdrawn behavior with occasional outbursts of rage, autism, pervasive fears, preference for fantasy over reality, psychosomatic illnesses, head-banging or self-mutilation, school phobia.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- Reaching out or self-assertion in connecting to others is avoided (very little eye contact or physical closeness can be tolerated);
- Intimacy and emotional and physical letting go are intensely feared, so relating is mental and abstract; others will often experience this person as “spacey” or “not really there”;
- Sexual interaction is mechanical, with fear of losing control; sex is desired mainly to subscribe to a romantic or erotic idea, rather than for actual feeling; some warmth and closeness physically is desired, but in limited quantities; orgasm is not an important objective;
- Others, including love objects, are idealized (positively or negatively) as are relationships, which are seen in a lofty spiritual light with little real human contact.
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “I should not exist.” “There is something essentially wrong with me.”
- “I am my mind.” “I think therefore I am.”
- “Life is threatening to my life.” “I will survive by deadening myself.”
- “I must control my feelings and others with my mind.” “If I feel, I will disintegrate.”
- “My rage will annihilate others and me.” “The world is a dangerous place.”
HIGHER SELF ASPECTS
- Strong connection to and awareness of the profoundly spiritual nature of life;
- Access to vast universal wisdom and the capacity to teach others how to make the connection to that wisdom;
- Great courage and fearlessness to connect with feelings;
- Great capacity to create and appreciate beauty, including through artistic abilities.
THERAPEUTIC TASKS
- Become grounded and energized in physical life and in the body as a whole;
- Develop basic trust in the self, others and life;
- Become aware of, feel consciously, accept and express the deep primal rage and terror in a non-destructive way without retreating to primitive defenses;
- Face original state of helplessness and hurt underlying perfectionistic attitude;
- Reverse the denial of early trauma at the hands of parents and the environment;
- Develop tolerance for ambivalence in oneself and others (correct “good-or-bad”, “right-or-wrong” and other dualistic images); and heal the splits between thoughts and feelings, and between positive and negative feelings;
- Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality (child, adult, higher self), opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
- Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
- Experience pleasure and expansion and recognize and express one’s higher self aspects with less fear of being annihilated;
- Primary negative expression that needs release: “I hate you!” “I kill you!”
- Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to be.”
THERAPEUTIC APPROACH
- Establish an accepting, non-critical, “human” environment, understanding that trusting the therapist and the environment may take a long time; even fairly well into the treatment, this person can become paranoid;
- Engage the formidable intellect in a playful, patient and respectful way to begin the process of exposing the attitudes and beliefs of the mask, and their fallibility, including wrong conclusions made in childhood;
- Address concrete self-care, daily living tasks that may be ineffectively tended to with information, advice, direct teaching and personal anecdotes to relieve the judgmental attitude towards the self as a failure or outcast;
- Gradually guide the person into their body through breathing and grounding exercises initially, then introduce the roller; touching or hands-on work must be very limited at first, nothing too penetrating or soothing; help the person to feel their feet on the ground, to feel energy in their body, to begin noticing the increasing aliveness;
- Remind the person periodically that they survived their childhood, that the real trauma was in the past;
- Move into the expression of rage using the body once some basic trust in the therapeutic relationship has been established and there is some physical groundedness; remind the person that no one gets destroyed by expressing rage this way; have them look in a mirror to see that they haven’t disintegrated after bodywork;
- When the person has become able to tolerate some exposure of the mask and to feel moderate emotions consistently, more penetrating bodywork and group process can be added to the therapy;
- Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their wisdom, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs;
- In the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance, based on their own new experiences, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback;
- The major vehicle for healing the inner splits of this structure is the relationship itself; the therapist can reveal his own struggles, imperfections and mistakes at carefully chosen moments, in small doses, reminding the person that neither of them is perfect and that even when there is conflict in their relationship, the connection between them is still a viable and caring one. (Aloofness in the therapist cannot aid someone who wears a mask of aloofness!).
DEFINITIONS
Denial: a primitive defense consisting of an attempt to disavow the existence of unpleasant reality or feeling.
Depersonalization: a state in which the person feels as though he has lost his identity, that he is different or strange or unreal, or that the environment is strange or unreal (“derealization”).
Disintegration: collapsing into a state of disorganized mental chaos.
Dissociation: sudden and temporary alteration in the functions of consciousness, the fracturing of the integration of one’s identity, or the splitting off of certain mental process from the main body of consciousness (i.e. – thinking from feeling)
Fragmentation: functioning as though the psyche is broken up into many separate parts. (When fragmented feelings such as rage are projected, one may feel plagued by many apparently external voices or faces.)
Fugue: an episode in which a person suddenly leaves an intolerable situation or activity in a way that appears to have no connection to what the person was just doing and of which he or she has amnesia afterwards.
Intellectualization: an attempt to avoid objectionable impulses or feelings by escaping from the world of emotions into a world of intellectual concepts and words.
Introjection: incorporating into one’s mental structure an image, usually harsh and not necessarily accurate or complete, of another. (This can be experienced as an inner alien or demonic oppressive presence.)
Projection: the process of throwing out upon another the ideas, feelings or impulses that belong to oneself.
Splitting: compartmentalization of opposite and conflicting affect states; a defense mechanism in which a person, when faced with emotional stress or conflict, views himself or others as all good or all bad, or alternates between idealizing and devaluing the self or another; positive and negative qualities in the self or others are unable to be integrated into cohesive images.
Withdrawal: the turning away from reality and shutting off the perceptive system in order to avoid the anxiety aroused by interpersonal relationships or feelings.
THE ORAL CHARACTER STRUCTURE
TYPICAL PRESENTING PROBLEMS
- Inability to sustain relationships, projects, jobs or interests, often after a brief period of intense involvement;
- Lack of motivation and energy, chronic fatigue;
- Addictions, eating disorders, chronic money problems (under-earning/compulsive spending);
- Depression and/or chronic mood swings, manic-depressive disorder;
- Inability to let go of relationships, or recover from loss;
- Intense fears of being alone or abandoned;
- Difficulty delaying gratification, impatience, chronic irritability;
- Frequent physical injuries with slow, drawn out recovery periods;
- Dependency on institutions, parents or others for basic survival needs well into adulthood;
- Primary “falling” fear: falling behind;
- Primary holding pattern: holding on;
- Primary longing: for independence;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to need.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period – First Eighteen Months of Life)
- Mother, during first year and a half of child’s life, offered some warmth and nurturance, but was not consistently available, or was prematurely taken away, due to financial problems (i.e.- mother needing to go to work), marital problems, another pregnancy, depression, illness or death, or mother’s orality in general (i.e. - lack of energy, substance abuse or addictions, etc.);
- Mother was uncomfortable allowing the child to bond with her symbiotically and so pushed the child away prematurely, or mother was unwilling to separate and so held onto the child;
- Child was left alone for long periods, and cries were not heard or answered;
- Parents overly relied on child’s premature independence and precocious development (walking and talking early, playing alone, etc.);
- Giving to the child was based on the parents’ needs rather than the child’s, both in terms of timing and what was given (i.e. - food or pacifier given instead of being picked up and held);
- Trauma occurred during child’s first eighteen months that separated mother and child (hospitalization, placement in foster care or adoption, etc.)
BODY STATUS
- Posture is often one of tiredness and collapse; body is generally child-like in appearance (there may be very little body hair), underdeveloped in musculature and the body may be either long and thin (compensated) or very tiny (collapsed); body is generally not extensively armored;
- Neck is often long and reaching forward (looking for nourishment);
- Lips are often thin (holding against reaching out), jaw is clenched (against rage) and there are frequent dental problems or other physical problems around the mouth and throat; chin may be pulled in (against swallowing) or jutting out (determined not to need); in some, mouth may be very large, showing a lot of teeth (aggression, for biting); teeth may be pushed out due to an extensive period of thumb-sucking in childhood;
- Eyes have a longing, pleading look;
- Shoulders are rolled forward, collapsing chest and causing shallow breathing (negating the need to take in); breasts in women tend to be either very large (compensated) or very small (collapsed);
- Tender pain in between shoulder blades (collapsed will center) and in lower back (premature self-support); chronic lower back problems;
- Hands, feet and pelvis (points of contact with the world) are immature-looking, undercharged and often very small; arches in feet may be fallen and knees locked (making this person a “pushover”); feet and legs are not experienced as offering good support;
- Body overall is often in pain, with frequent injuries or illnesses (lower back, knees, respiratory) that take a long time to heal;
- Chronic areas of tension: jaw, shoulder girdle, between the shoulder blades, lower abdomen and lower back, root of the neck (all of these to prevent crying, reaching out or the expression of aggression), and in the back of the knees.
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Generally undercharged, especially so in chest and the lower half of the body, and in the points of contact with the environment;
- Energy tends to come to the periphery weakly and leak out;
- “Energy vampires”, seeking to get energy by “sucking it” from others;
- The core is accessible, but the energy is not metabolized (correlates to shallow breathing not allowing the “burning of fuel” for action);
- Chakras (energy centers): Crown - (spiritual connection) partially open; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) open; Throat - (self-expression) partially collapsed; Heart - (love feelings) partially open; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) partially opened and asymmetrical; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) partially collapsed and inverted; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) partially collapsed.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- Emotional needs are frequently denied mentally and suppressed by the will, creating an inner emotional climate of deprivation, grief, despair and bitterness;
- The intense fear of abandonment and loss of love, combined with an equal fear of losing oneself in love, creates an ambivalent attitude towards surrendering to feelings; separation anxiety is extreme;
- Deep rage at unmet needs is often turned against the self into depression (sometimes alternating with unsustainable periods of exaggerated elation), and aggression is expressed passively and indirectly (through verbal sarcasm, refusing to follow through on tasks, getting sick, not paying bills, chronic lateness, etc.);
- Deep crying and reaching out are suppressed, though a lot of superficial “bitter” crying and clutching and clinging may be manifested;
- The will is used either to try and give excessively to others (in order to get) or to cling desperately onto others for direct support;
- There is a genuine capacity to express love, but relationships often very romanticized by the mind to an unattainable height, or easily given up on;
- Mentally, there are strong intuitive and intellectual capacities, but creative ideas are not charged or put into action, because the will is being used to prevent self-sufficiency in order to get taken care of;
PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self caused by feelings of unfulfillment, incompleteness, and a perceived inability to be independent, combined with intense self-loathing for the perceived weakness and dependency;
- Extreme dependency conflicts may manifest in addictions (in an effort to substitute for the needed, but ambivalent caretaker and genuine sustenance);
- There is an intense focus in the personality on the functions of the mouth and their related psychosocial correlates: taking in (acquisitiveness), holding on (tenacity & determination), biting (destructiveness), spitting out (rejection, contempt), and closing (refusal); continuous smoking, eating, drinking, talking (often fast), biting, etc., may be present, or self-depriving behaviors, like poverty or self-starvation may be acted out;
- Mood swings, cyclothymic disorders, depression, borderline or manic-depressive disorders may be present;
- Main defenses: identification, displacement, reversal, turning against the self, denial, projection, splitting;
- Typical masks: rescuer, caretaker, compulsive giver (“I have so much to give because I have no needs of my own.”); exaggerated self-reliance and pseudo independence (“I stand alone.” “I have to do it all myself.” “No one can do it as good as me.”); helplessness, inadequacy, neediness (“You have to take care of me because I can’t do it.” “I can’t!”); Idealized Self-images: “the Lone Ranger” (“I hide myself and stay alone, coming out only to rescue others.”), “Scarlett O’Hara” (“I will survive by being alone, even though I once had the greatest lover of all time.”), “Mother Theresa” (“I am a saint, devoted to the needy.”)
- Childhood history may include: very early accomplishment of developmental tasks (walking, talking, toilet training, getting dressed and other self-care tasks, reading, writing, etc.), disturbances around eating, intense separation anxiety (i.e. - refusal to go to school, unable to sleep over someone else’s house or be with a babysitter), frequent illnesses or injuries, collecting, clinging and holding onto objects excessively, thumb-sucking well into later childhood, romanticized relationships with teachers or others adults, wishing to be adopted by them.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- Trying to get love and support is the predominant motivation in relationships; this is often attempted either through insistent care-giving (that is experienced by the recipient as intrusive, controlling and demanding), through a helpless, deprived presentation of the self (hiding a covert demandingness and feeling of entitlement); or by direct, self-righteous demanding (“You owe it to me!”); the alienating effects on others of these behaviors will seem to reinforce the experience of early abandonment, causing the person to “give up” on relationships at times;
- Relationships will go back and forth between intense, totally “lost-in-love” involvement to sudden and absolute endings as the symbiotic struggle is acted out (wanting to merge with the all-powerful, giving parent versus wanting to separate from her and individuate);
- Relationships are frequently sought out with people who are extremely needy as the defenses of denial, projection and identification are employed (“I’ll take care of you as the needy me that I’m not.”);
- Love is related to as both “manna from Heaven” and potentially suffocating or devouring (“Can’t live with it; can’t live without it!”);
- Sexual interactions may be used to avoid abandonment and loneliness and for some sense of belongingness; orgasms may be frequent and easy but not particularly charged or strong in women, and men may not have full erections or they may ejaculate easily and prematurely without much charge; being held or cuddled is often more desired than actual sex;
- Surrendering to the love feelings for another brings up intense fears of abandonment and falling behind, losing oneself, being left alone.
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “I must not need.” “If I need, I will be abandoned.”
- “I am alone.” “No one will ever be there for me.”
- “If I connect with another, I will lose myself.” “If I am independent, I must be alone.”
- “I cannot stand on my own two feet.”
- “I must give to others in order to get.” “The needs of others will devour or suffocate me.”
- “There is not enough.” “The world is a depriving place.”
HIGHER SELF APSECTS
- Great capacity to give to others in a deeply nurturing, truly healing way;
- An appreciation for the vastly abundant nature of existence and the joy of sharing;
- Genuine independence, autonomy and self-confidence with full capacity to surrender to the oneness with another;
- Powerful intuitive abilities and the capacity to follow insights through to fruition by sustained, patient effort.
THERAPEUTIC TASKS
- Acknowledge, accept and express emotional needs and longings;
- Develop the capacity to reach out, while releasing clinging or grabbing impulse;
- Face the reality of the early deprivation in childhood and finish grieving for losses;
- Face and move through the fears of rejection and abandonment;
- Develop the capacity to experience the self as autonomous without needing to be alone in the world;
- Develop the capacity to connect to others without feeling the loss of identity and autonomy;
- Relinquish addictions to transitional objects and self-numbing substances by experiencing direct pleasure and self-nurturance;
- Create a foundation of support in the physical world by stabilizing and sustaining relationships, work-life and income, and basic self-care functions;
- Energize and strengthen the feet and legs as a foundation of support;
- Recharge the chest and open the capacity to receive life and give and receive love;
- Energize aggression and release rage held in the oral segment and the hands;
- Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality, opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
- Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
- Experience pleasure and expansion, and recognize and express one’s Higher Self aspects with less fear of losing one’s self;
- Primary raw negative expression that needs release: “Give it to me!”
- Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to need.”
THERAPEUTIC APPROACH
- Establish a supportive, nurturing environment, acknowledging the frustration, despair and hopelessness the person has felt in trying to get their needs met; listen patiently and empathetically to the person’s expression of his or her considerable pain (including physical) and feelings of loss;
- While acknowledging the person’s genuine desire to give to others, begin confronting the hidden agenda to get from others through a mask of giving;
- Demystify the underlying causes of addictive behaviors and repetitive cycles and challenge the helpless, out-of-control image the person has of the inner self and of his or her needs and longings;
- Engage the person’s innate belief in the abundance of life that has been denied but is demonstrated by the very fact of their frustration;
- Guide the person into fuller breathing by opening up the chest, and also facilitate the experience of self-support by grounding the legs and feet; energize the hands and mouth by facilitating the expressing of rage through hitting, towel-twisting (choking the suffocating mother), biting, yelling, and by reaching for help with the hands and arms; extensive rage held in the jaw can be released through massage and then kicking; facilitate deeper crying by opening up the lower abdomen through rolling and massage of the diaphragmatic segment and lower back; consistent encouragement, creativity and patience will be needed to help the person engage the body in the therapy when the impulse to collapse surfaces; the person with this structure will not want to “do the work”, but rather will try to get the therapist to “do it for them”; massaging the body, holding and cuddling, allowing the person to receive support and comfort directly without having to reciprocate can be a very corrective experience;
- Help the person face the impossible dilemma of the symbiotic bind they were in - needing to merge with a parent who didn’t give enough, and then needing to separate when they felt too weak to do so or weren’t let go of by a clinging parent; reassure the person that they can now experience that bond with the therapist, and ultimately their own adult self, without risk of abandonment or suffocation;
- While allowing the dependency feelings of the person to be experienced positively with the therapist, challenge any idealizations of the therapist, and explore, without confrontation, passive behaviors that express the resentment that comes from those idealizations and hidden demands to be taken care of (i.e.- not paying fees);
- The person who employs this character structure is an inherently giving person who needs to open up to receiving again in the child aspect of the personality that has been deprived; if the therapist gives directly and genuinely to this person, without “rescuing”, and “lends” his or her ego temporarily to the person, he or she will flourish as the deep capacities for love and gratitude become directed towards self-nurturance and self-love by the adult;
- Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their truly giving nature, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs;
- In the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance,
- based on experience, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback.
DEFINITIONS
Denial: a primitive defense consisting of an attempt to disavow the existence of unpleasant reality.
Displacement: the process by which energy, feelings or impulses are transferred from one idea, experience, place in the body or object to another; the substitution of one object for another as the target of feeling.
Identification: the process by which one either blurs or eliminates the distinction between the self and others by extending his or her identity into another, borrowing one’s identity from another, or fusing identities with another (merging).
Projection: the process of throwing out upon another the ideas, feelings or impulses that belong to oneself.
Reversal: the process by which an energetic expression, an impulse or feeling, is changed into its opposite. Through this mechanism, hate may change to love, sadism to masochism, longing for an object to rejection of it, etc.
Splitting: compartmentalization of opposite and conflicting affect states; a defense mechanism in which a person, when faced with emotional stress or conflict, views himself or others as all good or all bad, or alternates between idealizing and devaluing the self or another; positive and negative qualities in the self or others are unable to be integrated into cohesive images.
Symbiosis: a bond between a mother and child in which the child functions as though the mother and child form a single, omnipotent unit. During the “symbiotic phase” of development (4 months to 18 months), the mother functions as the auxiliary ego for the child, performing functions the child cannot yet perform for itself.
Transitional Object: an inanimate object that a little child uses to sooth itself with that serves as a substitute for the comforting mother (blanket, stuffed animal, pacifier, etc.);
Turning Against The Self: the process by which an individual directs hatred for another against the self; the desire to retaliate becomes the propensity to self-torture.
MASOCHISTIC CHARACTER STRUCTURE
PRESENTING PROBLEMS (When first coming to therapy)
- Chronic feelings of suffering and chronic low-level anxiety, both emotionally and physically;
- Submissive behavior, and lack of self-assertion (inability to say, “No”);
- Intense feelings of shame and humiliation;
- Feeling trapped;
- Self-destructive behavior patterns (sabotaging success in jobs and relationships, accidents, sexual acting out, etc.);
- Obsessive/compulsive problems, particularly around sex, cleanliness and orderliness;
- Preoccupations with sex, masturbation, pornography and/or excretory functions, accompanied by intense guilt, shame and self-punishment;
- An inability to let go of or change repetitive patterns in abusive or ungratifying relationships;
- Inability to tolerate pleasure or success without guilt or anxiety;
- Sadistic, cruel and abusive acting out, or pervasive worrying about urges to do so;
- Primary “falling” fear: of the bottom falling out;
- Primary holding pattern: holding in;
- Primary longing: to be free/spontaneous;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to be assertive.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period - 19th to 30th Months)
- Parents offered conditional love to the child based on compliance with their will (that the child “be a good boy or girl” and control impulses);
- Attempts by child to assert its own will or say “No” were overpowered by parents and greeted with threats of abandonment or withdrawal of love;
- Parents were excessively involved in child’s eating and excretory functions (child may have been pushed to eat more than it wanted, toilet training may have been severe, enemas given, etc.), and in general, there was a strong focus on eating and defecating in the family;
- Father may have been passive, submissive or absent while mother was dominating, smothering, or harsh (often with a self-sacrificing, martyr-type mask), or father may have been harsh, controlling or sadistic while mother was permissive and indulgent;
- Parents may have been excessively concerned about “messing up” (around personal hygiene, household cleanliness, finances, order in general, etc.);
- A sudden interruption in the parent-child relationships may have occurred in the child’s second year of life (birth of a sibling, divorce, absent parent due to work, illness, death, etc., or a physical illness of child).
BODY STATUS
- Body is typically shortened, thick and muscular (to restrain assertiveness and negative impulses), with chronic tension in the body; there may be excessive body hair;
- Neck is short and thick (from a “turtle-like” pulling in of the head);
- Shoulder muscles enlarged (to bear burdens);
- Buttocks are pulled in and squeezed together (to control the impulse to mess up and let out), which pushes the pelvis forward;
- Waist is short and thick, encased, compressed and collapsed (from pulling in and down from the top and up and in from the bottom to control impulses to let out); in women, hips and thighs are often thick and heavy; in men, the abdomen often balloons;
- The abdominal compression affects the whole diaphragmatic segment, making exhalation difficult and hindering all of the organs in the area;
- There is often an awkwardness or clumsiness in the person’s gait and movements, with frequent minor accidents (messing up), along with a general uncomfortability in the body;
- There is anal and genital tension and spasticity (causing acute suffering and inability to freely experience pleasure) as the whole pelvic floor is contracted;
- Skin tends to have a brownish hue due to stagnant, held energy charge; there may be severe problems with acne;
- Chronic areas of tension: the neck, shoulder girdle, pelvis and buttocks, and most of the large muscles;
- Chronic physical ailments of the throat and colon/anal region, such as sore throats, colitis, constipation and hemorrhoids, and digestive problems;
- Expression in the eyes is one of suffering, often combined with compulsive smiling.
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Fully charged energetically, but energy is tightly held in check (though not frozen), so this person is “boiling” inside;
- Energy moving upward and downward is choked off at the neck and waist (causing compression) and outlets for energy discharge are blocked (throat, anus, genitals);
- The highly charged energy is stagnant in the skin;
- Chakras (energy centers): Crown - (spiritual connection) deflated; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) open; Throat - (self-expression) contracted; Heart - (love feelings) open, but constricted; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) open; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) partially open; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) partially blocked.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- Feelings are often predominant and strongly felt, but held in, literally packed within by massive armoring, creating chronic feelings of pain, suffering and anxiety;
- Negative feelings, which are intense in this structure (including desires to punish, crush or be sadistic to others), and their expressions, are severely prohibited, accompanied by powerful feelings of guilt, shame and humiliation if any self-assertion is made, and a fear of exploding violently;
- Positive feelings of love, including humor and joy are very active, but encased deep within and inhibited from full expression; pleasure and any strong surges of energy are perceived as a threat (of exploding or the bottom falling out);
- Extreme efforts are made to be kind, pleasant, pleasing, servile, self-sacrificing and ingratiating in order to hide the inner hostility and spitefulness, which is considerable; negative feelings are expressed mainly through passive-aggressive behavior or provocative attitudes;
- The will is weakened by the constant holding pattern, but it is strong enough to express its resistance (to the parents’ crushing will) through stubbornness, defiance and passive refusal (to move, to be successful or happy, etc.); the will is also often directed to make the individual appear stupid or eccentric, or to dissimulate, so there is much inner doubting about one’s own intelligence or wisdom;
- The mind can be very orderly, but usually obsessively so, with much ruminating on details, serving as a distraction from feelings;
PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self caused by the negation of spontaneous, assertive expressions and deep feelings of inferiority; self-assertion is severely limited and there is an emotional heaviness (feeling burdened, “stuck in the mud”, “too hard to move”);
- Consciously identified with trying to please, while unconsciously identified with sadism, spite and hostility;
- Disguised exhibitionism combined with self-derogation and self-deprecation and a chronic compulsion to damage the self;
- Strong castration/mutilation anxieties (fear of retaliation for inner negativity and exhibitionism);
- Intense fears of being abandoned, due to a perceived reliance on others for both stimulation and “decompression” from stimulation and pent-up feelings;
- In the “anal-compulsive” (“retentive”) character type, there is great concern about orderliness, cleanliness, efficiency and control, with great difficulty tolerating change;
- Main defenses: reaction formation, ruminative thinking, undoing, externalization, reversal, rationalization;
- Typical masks: self-sacrificing, martyr (“I suffer for you.” “I am special, noble and superior because I suffer.”), pleasing, submissive, ingratiating, slave (“I live only to serve.” “I have no selfishness in me.”), efficiency expert, perfectionist (“I am superior because I never mess up.” “If I fail, it is because I didn’t try hard enough.”), pacifism (“I have no hurtful intentions towards anyone.” “I have no aggression or hostility in me.”);
- Childhood history may include: clumsiness and many minor accidents, “good boy” or “good girl” behavior patterns in childhood, followed by rebellious or cruel acting out behavior in adolescence, overeating (to stuff down feelings), chronic sore throats, acne, digestive problems (coupled with anxiety about vomiting), constipation, and excessive neatness or sloppiness.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- Relationships, while able to be engaged in and sustained, are fraught with tension and pressure, at times exploding into outright hostility and abusiveness as the suppressed and highly charged negativity seeks an outlet;
- Trying to get appreciation and approval, permission to feel, and relief from guilt are predominant motivations in relationships; this is attempted either through exaggerated pleasing, servile and submissive behavior (that is experienced by the recipient as hostile, controlling and contemptuous), through self-deprecating attitudes and self-damaging behavior, constant whining and complaining, or through directly provocative behavior; the angry reactions provoked in others by these characteristics will then seem to justify this person’s self-righteous fury and/or self-punishing guilt;
- Intense preoccupation with sex and frequent masturbation are common as this person continually seeks pleasure and release, both of which are intensely desired and also inhibited; fascination with pornography and/or sadomasochistic fantasy is common (seeking to turn pain, submission and humiliation into “pleasure”); orgasms are controlled by pushing and squeezing actions (of the buttocks, thighs and pelvis);
- Surrendering to love is related to as both potentially liberating and potentially crushing, with pain as a necessary ingredient and good feelings in love and sex as “too much.”
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “I will be loved as long as I submit to the will of others.” “If I assert my independence, I will be crushed.”
- “To get love, I must please others.” “I can never say no.”
- “I must never express my negativity.” “I will hurt myself to prevent others from hurting me.”
- “If I feel too much, I will explode.”
- “I am inferior and disgusting because of my negative feelings.”
- “Life is hard and suffering unavoidable.”
HIGHER SELF ASPECTS
- Great capacities for pleasure, humor, optimism, playfulness and joy;
- Genuine supportiveness, strength and desire to be of service to others;
- An expansive, open heart with deep compassion, true kindness and understanding;
- Positive assertiveness and healthy aggression with substantial amounts of energy;
- Ability to be spontaneously creative in the moment, surrender ego control and trust the natural order in all things;
THERAPEUTIC TASKS
- Develop spontaneity, assertiveness and healthy aggression without fears of humiliation or retaliation;
- Become aware of, accept and release negative feelings and attitudes, and sadistic impulses, without guilt or anxiety;
- Relinquish the obsessive-compulsive patterns, and the excessive need to control and not mess up;
- Recognize and relinquish the self-sabotaging and passive-aggressive behavior patterns that have been a resistance to expansion and an illusory form of vengeance against the dominating parents of childhood;
- Stretch and decompress the body, opening it up to its full length; release the held aggression everywhere in the body, and particularly let go of the spasticity in the entire pelvic floor area;
- Experience sexual feelings freely without guilt or the fear that the bottom will fall out; let go of the pushing and stopping as a way of controlling the energy flow;
- Release the judgmental attitudes and disgust toward bodily functions and needs, particularly sex, eating and excretory functions;
- Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality, opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
- Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
- Experience pleasure and expansion, and recognize and express one’s Higher Self aspects with less fear of exploding;
- Primary raw negative expression that needs release: “No!”
- Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to be free.”
THERAPUETIC APPROACH
- Establish a light and warm environment, acknowledging the genuine kindness, compassion and goodness in this person who suffers from a belief in his or her own “badness”;
- Engage the person’s capacity for humor to counteract the heaviness in their emotional climate and despondent view of their life as a burden;
- Encourage the person to talk about their perceived “disgusting” habits and self-destructive patterns to neutralize the shame and guilt;
- Help the person face the reality of having been controlled and dominated by the parents, and that “being good” was a desperate attempt to get love and acceptance;
- Confront the person’s defiance and hostility underneath their passivity; the person employing this structure can tolerate and even needs provocation by the therapist to get their anger acknowledged and moving;
- Use full bodywork regimen early on and regularly, including group; use rolling to stretch out the compressed torso, pelvic thrusts, hitting and kicking to free up the aggression; massage the heavily armored large muscles deeply, even pounding them, to release pain and tension; massage chest and diaphragmatic segment to facilitate fuller exhalation; facilitate crying through deep massaging of the neck, chest and abdomen, which will be necessary to clear the massive contractions there;
- Energize the “No!’ fully and regularly in this person through verbal expressions while doing the bodywork; also have this person energetically verbalize scatological expressions and sounds during bodywork (“Shit on you!”);
- Confront the person’s passive resistance to therapy as a way of spiting the perceived controlling will of the therapist (as parent); this person will tend to be a “model patient” (“good boy or girl”) by always being on time, always paying, following up advice, etc., but will “thwart” the therapist by “never feeling any better”;
- Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their compassionate and joyful nature, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs;
- In the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance, based on experience, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback.
DEFINITIONS
Compulsion: a repeated action, the need for whose performance insistently forces itself into consciousness even though the person simultaneously does not wish to perform the act; compulsions are obsessions in action, are ego-alien and are therefore always resisted.
Dissimulation: the act of pretending.
Externalization: a process by which one’s feelings toward oneself are experienced as feelings toward others.
Obsession: an idea or impulse that repetitively and insistently forces itself into consciousness even though it is unwelcome; an example of an intellectual obsession is a preoccupation with metaphysical questions concerning one’s purpose in life, ultimate destiny, etc.; an example of an impulsive obsession is an idea that leads to action like concerns about germs leading to repeated hand-washing.
Rationalization: making a thing appear reasonable, when otherwise its irrationality would be evident; meant to act as a screen, to cover up ideas or actions intended to gratify an unconscious need.
Reaction Formation: the development of conscious attitudes and interests that are socially acceptable that are the antithesis of unconscious attitudes and impulses that are not acceptable.
Reversal: the process by which an energetic expression, an impulse or feeling, is changed into its opposite. Through this mechanism, hate may change to love, sadism to masochism, longing for an object to rejection of it, etc. (precursor to reaction formation)
Ruminative Thinking: repetitively going over ideas (often unpleasant ones), recollections or plans mentally that serves no adaptive purpose, but rather serves to distract one’s conscious mind from being aware of feelings deemed unacceptable.
Undoing: a defense mechanism consisting of positive action that actually (or in fantasy) is the opposite of something against which the ego must defend itself (i.e. – eating health food to defend against an impulse to literally “eat shit”).
PSYCHOPATHIC CHARACTER STRUCTURE
PRESENTING PROBLEMS (when first arriving to therapy)
- Intense fears of being defeated, humiliated, controlled, or used;
- Feelings of falseness, insincerity, and a lack of integrity;
- Feelings of emptiness and boredom, counteracted by episodes of recklessness, risk-taking and thrill-seeking behavior;
- addiction to intensity;
- Conflicts with authority (including employers, institutions and the legal system);
- Impulsive sexual acting out, promiscuity, many shallow relationships, but no real intimacy or trusting friendships;
- Criminal, sociopathic behavior; antisocial personality disorder;
- Primary falling fear: falling down;
- Primary holding pattern: holding up;
- Primary longing: to have integrity;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to trust.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period – Birth to 4 Years)
- One or both parents manipulated, seduced, sexualized, or otherwise used child (covertly or directly) for their own narcissistic purposes; parents instilled in the child an image of how they wanted the child to be in order for the adults to feel good about themselves;
- The parents used the child as a buffer or weapon against each other; the child was overly involved in the marital relationship;
- There was a role reversal in which the child was maneuvered, often with sexual overtones and promises of love that were never delivered, into being the pseudo-spouse or pseudo-parent to a parent (frequently of the opposite sex); the child was expected to be more than he or she was to that parent (“Mommy’s little man”; “Daddy’s little princess”);
- One or both parents invested child with feelings of specialness and importance and then rejected or ignored child, or otherwise became unavailable (frequently the parent of the opposite sex);
- One or both parents competed with the child, feeling threatened by the child’s real or imagined accomplishments, and sadistically exploited the child’s weaknesses to humiliate, control and diminish the child’s self-confidence;
- Child experienced horror from witnessing events that could not be understood or integrated, such as verbal or physical abuse (either of a violent or sexual nature); a major trauma occurred in the child’s life, usually after the second year, that could not be understood intellectually by the child and was experienced as a betrayal; (i.e. – hospitalization and surgery, exposure to sex acts by adults, witnessing extreme violence, etc., while being told that all was well by the adults, or blaming the child for the trauma);
- Parent of the same sex was significantly absent from child’s early life (due to work, illness, death or divorce, etc.).
BODY STATUS
- Body is “designed” to serve the purposes of dominating or seducing and can take almost any form, following whatever main image the person is primarily attached to (i.e.- athletic and powerful, youthful and innocent, sexual and alluring); generally, however, there are two types of body formations typical of this character structure:
1. The “overpowering type” which is inflated on top, “blown-up” looking, with a barreled chest, broad shoulders, and large head, while rigid and small in the pelvis, with small buttocks and thin legs, particularly the calves; or 2. The “seductive type” which is inflated in the pelvis (but numb to feelings there), with broad hips and hyperflexibility in the back, while deflated and immature in the chest area;
- Armoring is particularly marked in the chest, diaphragm, legs and shoulders;
- Eyes are highly charged, often large, and frequently gleaming or sparkling; in the dominating type, the eyes are penetrating and compelling; in the seductive type, they are soft and intriguing, cunning, dreamy or sleepy looking (“Bette Davis eyes”);
- Often, there is a pronounced split (correlates to a lack of integrity in the personality) between the head and the body (mature body, with a small child-like face and head, or visa versa); this split is facilitated by severe tension at the base of the skull and in the shoulder girdle, which holds the head tightly in place (“I must never lose my head.”);
- Arms tend to be immobilized and away from the body (due to the inflated chest and severe shoulder girdle tensions);
- Feet tend to be “pulled off the ground” and may be small; calves and thighs may be short and thin, even when the torso is heavy;
- Physical illnesses are often not felt or manifested until late in life due to extreme willfulness and numbness (later life problems may be in the hips, prostate, pelvis in general, or the heart);
- Spine may be twisted or fused and immobile;
- Chronic areas of tension: base of the skull, shoulder girdle, chest and rib cage, including the diaphragm, waist and abdominal muscles (which are often hard and clenched to pull sexual energy away from genitals), pelvic area in general, genitals specifically.
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Highly charged, with energy displaced and pulled upwards into the top half of the body and away from the pelvis;
- Eyes are particularly highly charged, used to penetrate, intimidate and/or seduce;
- Energy is directed outwardly to control, hook and dominate others, and directed inwardly to deny feelings in the self by contracting all feeling centers;
- Energy is not allowed to flow downwards, cut off by severe tensions in the pelvis, waist, diaphragm, shoulders and base of skull;
- Chakras (energy centers): Will Centers – (in the back of the body) are open; Crown - (spiritual connection) can be open and lopsided; can be collapsed; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) open, but exaggerated; Throat - (self-expression) contracted; Heart - (love feelings) contracted; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) partially contracted; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) severely contracted; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) contracted.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- The will is powerfully exerted to control others and to control feelings; feelings are alive in the body, however, but denied recognition by the mind;
- Feelings and the body are denigrated and not trusted, so neither are the external senses; therefore only what’s in one’s head, only one’s own ideas in the moment, are treated as valid and real;
- Power rather than pleasure is sought from life;
- The mind is the servant of the will in this structure, so reasoning can be dramatically inconsistent, though capable of brilliance; arguing both sides of a situation or mixing lies with truth is common if it suits a manipulative purpose to gain power or be “right”; one’s own lies are often believed; there is also a tendency to poor judgement and an inability to learn from mistakes;
- Pain is numbed, and genuine feelings are denied, but dramatic emotionality and false feelings are acted out to achieve some purpose, like intimidation or seduction;
- Fear of being wrong or of submitting to the will of others is extreme and is powerfully denied;
- Intuitive capacities of the mind are formidable, with very strong abilities to read what is going on inside of other people, although the understanding of the meaning of what is going on is often very distorted.
PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self due to a lack of integrity and treating the self and others as objects for manipulation and control;
- Lack of empathy or compassion and a lack of conscious feelings of remorse or guilt due to numbness defense (numbness is often augmented by alcohol and drug abuse);
- Craving for intensity and excessive stimulation to counteract numbness;
- Poor impulse control and an intolerance of boundaries and structure;
- Paranoia about being controlled or humiliated underlying an extreme need to be in control of feelings, others and all situations; intense fears of losing power, being defeated or helpless, and collapsing into desperate neediness (orality);
- Aggression is used as a defense against surrender to feelings (which are equated with weakness) or to the will of others;
- Powerful investment in and identification with idealized self-images; desperate need to be special and important;
- Main defenses: displacement, numbing, denial, acting out, rationalization, confusion;
- Typical masks: grandiosity, self-dramatization, outlandishness (“I am the one and only of my kind, the greatest, the best, the most, the first, the worst, the baddest”. “There’s nobody like me.”), exaggerated false sincerity (“I would never lie to you.”), the hero (“Only I have the power to save you.”), the guru (“Only I can take you to the light.”), the great promise giver (“I know what you want and I can give it to you.”), the courtesan (“I will control you by letting you use me…on my terms.”), the chameleon (“I can be whatever the situation calls for in order to get my way.”); Idealized Self-images: “Don Juan” or “Venus” (the God or Goddess of Eros), “the Godfather” or “Black Widow” (“I’ll make you an offer you can’t refuse.” “I always get what I want.”), the “blowfish/monster” (“I am a very scary, dangerous person, so be afraid of me.”);
- Childhood history may include: restlessness and hyperactivity, dangerous behavior (i.e. - fire-setting), severe tantrums, spectacular achievements (in school, sports or the arts) coupled with spectacular self-sabotage or delinquency, cruelty to animals or other children, premature sexual behavior, “troublemaker” persona, inappropriate lack of fear and a lack of crying when hurt.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- People are primarily related to as objects, as sources of “narcissistic supply” to support images of power and specialness; since others are objectified, anything can be said or done to get what is wanted from another without concern for the other’s feelings or well-being;
- A “divide and conquer” approach is often taken to gain control of others, individually and in groups, pitting people against each other, then sometimes taking the role of mediator or peacemaker;
- Eccentric, radical, dramatic, unpredictable or extreme behavior and appearance are often used to gain attention and/or to keep others off balance;
- The need to have “followers” is felt as an essential reason to engage with others; it is through the “needing to be needed” that the person with this character structure maintains his or her feeling of power, while denying the inherent dependency (orality) of the dynamic at the same time;
- Antisocial behavior may be engaged in with very little provocation, though it may be seen as justified by the person in the moment; these actions are not followed by feelings of remorse afterwards; only getting caught or confined is of concern, not hurting others or the self;
- This person looks directly at others, but doesn’t really see them as real (whereas the schizoid character sees but doesn’t look!);
- Sex is seen as a means to an end, or a contest, often used to gain power, not pleasure, or to express revenge feelings; sex is related to as a conquest of the other person and as further proof of one’s prowess;
- In men, maintaining an erection is more important than having an orgasm, and extreme pride is taken in the penis; in women, likewise, being seen as sexually powerful and technically skilled is more important than sensual or orgasmic pleasure; feelings in the genitals are greatly diminished, so performances of great endurance are possible, but genuine surrender to sexual feelings and orgasm is experienced as humiliating or terrifying.
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “I must never surrender.” “If I surrender, I will be helpless.”
- “Everything is a lie, including love, including me.” “Whatever I believe in the moment is the truth.”
- “I must never be wrong.” “If I am wrong, I will be humiliated.”
- “I must get others to need me, so I can control them, in order to get what I need.”
- “If I acknowledge my feelings, I will be weak and get abused.” “The world is an abusive place.”
HIGHER SELF ASPECTS
- Great leadership and executive qualities and capacities to bring people with differences together in a harmonious effort;
- Strong abilities to guide and inspire others to accomplish their chosen tasks in life and see their own specialness without competitiveness or separation;
- True innovators and adventurers able to travel “the road not taken”, or “to boldly go where no one has gone before”, without recklessness or excess;
- A genuine seeker of truth, with genuine humility, honesty, loyalty and unwavering integrity;
- A truly big heart full of love and fearlessness to surrender to the flow of feelings, life and the Higher Self.
THERAPUETIC TASKS
Develop the capacity for empathy and compassion by reversing the numbing of pain in the body and the denial of feelings in general;
Deflate the grandiose self-images by facing their falseness and discovering the longing for truth, sincerity and integrity in the self;
Deflate the overcharged upper half of the body and become grounded and energized in the lower half of the body, allowing for the experience of real pleasure and safety;
Release the tensions at the base of the skull and shoulders, and in the diaphragm and abdomen, allowing for the flow of energy between the mind, heart and genitals;
Become aware of the feelings of emptiness from trying to “win”, “be right”, “be on top”, “get revenge”, “have it my way”, etc., when the real desire is to be able to trust;
Face the horror and confusion in childhood that came from being lied to, used and manipulated by the parents that the child was dependent on and helpless to defend against; confront the illusions that the abuse by the parents meant the child was special, powerful or bad;
Express and release the feelings of hurt and rage at the betrayal by the parents that are hidden by the mask of pride and grandiosity and the fear of humiliation, and discover that those feelings are not devastating to the self now;
Acknowledge, feel and release the early dependency feelings and neediness underneath the fear of collapsing and falling down;
Release the addiction to intensity, overstimulation and exaggerated expansiveness by experiencing the true aliveness of surrendering to feelings;
Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality (child, adult, higher self), opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
Experience pleasure and expansion and recognize and express one’s higher self aspects with less fear of being humiliated;
Primary negative expression that needs release: “My way!”
Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to trust.”
THERAPEUTIC APPROACH
Establish an honest and sincere environment being clear and direct about the nature and boundaries of the therapeutic relationship, understanding that this person will test them to discover where the hidden agendas and lies are; do not make promises about the outcome of therapy;
Engage playfully with this person’s challenging manner to begin confronting his or her efforts to be in control of the therapy and the therapist; it is important to establish a balance in which control feels and is shared, but not at the expense of the therapy; allowing acting out against the therapy or therapist will undermine the person’s feelings of trust and safety, which are minimal to begin with;
Encourage the person to talk about the betrayals he or she has experienced, and the desire for revenge, beginning with current circumstances, then tracing back to related childhood experiences; help the person face the reality that the desire for revenge is a cover for the feelings of helplessness and impotent fury he or she felt in childhood when they were being used by parents;
Use rolling to begin softening up the rigidity in the chest and to open up to feelings; use kicking, including on the roller, to begin opening up the pelvis; use massage of the neck, shoulders and chest to soften up the armoring there and to begin establishing contact with the person, providing an experience that is physically intimate, but not sexualized or abusive; use hitting and vocalization to access the real rage underneath the “blowfish” mask; use grounding and vibrating to get energy moving downwards, reversing the upward displacement; generally, a person employing this character structure will resist the bodywork early on, and maybe for a long time, experiencing it as “embarrassing”, “silly”, “not what I need”, etc., and when the feelings do start to come they may feel humiliated afterwards; acknowledge those feelings and explain the reasons for the body work, but let the person know that it’s his or her decision whether or not to do it;
In group, this person will want to “take over”, one way or the other, by challenging the therapist’s role or approach, by trying to be the smartest, funniest, most advanced, most dramatic member, etc., or by being disruptive; it is risky to directly deflate this mask with confrontation publicly, because it will feel like a re-creation of the intense feelings of humiliation from childhood, but it may be necessary to maintain the integrity of the person and the group; as an alternative to confrontation, openly support the genuine special qualities of the person and his or her genuine importance to the group; remember that this person carries a deep longing to be genuine and to constructively bring people together;
Tell this person the truth to counteract the belief that everyone lies; with the highly developed intuitive capacities that this person has, he or she will readily sense things going on inside of the therapist, but often misinterpret their meaning; within the boundaries established, it’s helpful to answer personal questions, especially about how the therapist is feeling in the moment; it is also helpful to this person to hear about the reasons for what the therapist is choosing to do, and to have diagnostic updates, encouraging the person to join with the therapist in assessing their progress;
When the underlying feelings of helplessness, dependency and abandonment first begin to surface in this person, it will be a very tenuous moment; even after a long-standing positive relationship, a person using this defensive structure can “turn on you”; impulses to quit therapy or attack the therapist may be acted out; acknowledge that the person always has the power to leave therapy, but that acting out against the therapist is not allowed; give a clear and compassionate diagnostic understanding of what is going on, and “leave the door open” for this person to come back if they want to;
When this person’s powerful feelings of rage have been released, and the body has become more supple, deep grieving may emerge, along with the true courage this person has, as well as a deep capacity to give and receive love;
Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their integrity, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs;
In the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance, based on their own new experiences, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback.
DEFINITIONS
Acting Out: a discharge of tension, impulses or feelings through action that attempts to alter or control the environment as if that environment and those in it were part of a transferential (from childhood) conflict or threat.
Denial: a primitive defense consisting of an attempt to disavow the existence of unpleasant reality.
Confusion: a defense that creates a disturbance of consciousness in which awareness of time, place, or person is unclear; this also serves the purpose of keeping others, perceived as a threat, off balance;
Displacement: the process by which energy, feelings or impulses are transferred from one idea, experience, place in the body or object to another; the substitution of one object for another as the target of feeling.
Numbing: a defense mechanism that causes insensitivity to feelings and sensations in general, and in particular, pain.
Rationalization: making a thing appear reasonable, when otherwise its irrationality would be evident; meant to act as a screen, to cover up ideas or actions intended to gratify an unconscious need.
THE RIGID CHARACTER STRUCTURE
PRESENTING PROBLEMS (when first coming to therapy)
- Unwillingness to fall too deeply in love or engage in a long-term, monogamous love relationship;
- Series of broken relationships, marriages or extramarital affairs in which either some sexual or emotional gratification is experienced, but never the two together with the same person;
- Drivenness, competitiveness, restlessness, hyperactivity, relentless need to “look good” and “achieve”;
- Feelings of unfulfillment in spite of substantial success in work-life; never feeling satisfied;
- Intense fears around vulnerability and betrayal and concerns about looking foolish;
- Hysterical outbursts, psychosomatic symptoms, insomnia;
- Primary falling fear: falling forward (on one’s face);
- Primary holding pattern: holding back;
- Primary longing: to surrender;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to love sexually.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period – 40th to 60th Months)
- Child’s natural erotic strivings and expressions, including masturbation, were greeted with anxiety, rejection, severe disapproval or punishment by sexually repressed parents;
- The parent of the opposite sex reacted to the child’s amorous advances, flirtatiousness and romantic fantasies with rejection, possessiveness, or overstimulation;
- The parent of the same sex vicariously encouraged the child to express that parent’s repressed sexual feelings (mother dressing daughter up in “sexy” outfits, father encouraging son to be a “ladies’ man”, encouraging coy, provocative behavior, etc.), or that parent inappropriately confided in the child about the details of the marital relationship;
- The parent of the opposite sex was significantly absent from the child’s life during the 3rd to 5th year of life (due to work, illness, death or divorce, etc.);
- A major trauma (severe illness, surgery, accident, etc.) occurred in the child’s 3rd to 5th year of life.
BODY STATUS
- Though the body is generally integrated and harmonious, with body parts proportionate, there is often rigidity and excessive uprightness in the posture;
- Rigidly held straight back and neck (correlates to pride);
- Pelvis is pulled back, while the chest is pushed out with exaggerated authority or seductiveness (“You can want me, but you can’t have me.”);
- The jaw is often set in a look of determination;
- In men, the face may be sharply masculine and very hard-looking; in women the face may be doll-like;
- Physical armoring tends to be superficial and can move around; there are spasticities in the extensor and flexor muscles that create the rigidity in the posture;
- Walking or gesturing tends to be sexual and flirtatious, or very businesslike;
- History of unexplained psychosomatic (“hysterical”) symptoms that appear and disappear without any apparent physical cause (vertigo, fainting, loss of vision, skin rashes, allergies, hyperventilating, heart palpitations, paralysis, etc.);
- Chronic areas of tension: the long muscles of the body, inner thigh muscles, vaginal muscles in women.
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Strong, vigorous energy charge, but held back somewhat at the periphery of the feeling side of the body, allowing for the movement of energy internally and through the will, but with a controlled receptivity;
- Energy is often directed to “getting things done”, often with some hyperactivity; the “rest” rhythm is resisted, while all of the will centers are active and open;
- There is little capacity to bind energy with armoring, so this person is prone to the development of psychosomatic symptoms;
- Chakras (energy centers): Crown - (spiritual connection) varies, can be open or closed; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) developed and open; Throat - (self-expression) partially blocked; Heart - (love feelings) developed, but partially blocked; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) partially opened and asymmetrical; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) developed, but partially blocked; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) open.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- Love and erotic feelings are strong, but are controlled by the mind and will; there are intense fears of having one’s “heart broken” in love;
- Surrendering to another is deemed unacceptable and collapse is unthinkable;
- The mind is developed, with an efficient, but unyielding intellect that is trusted much more than feelings or impulses; thinking tends to be very linear, with good concentration, but little capacity for abstraction; creativity is controlled;
- Pride is the driving force in this structure and great efforts of the will are directed towards performance and outer appearances (always being attractive and never appearing vulnerable or foolish);
- Aggression, is generally expressed through competitiveness in socially acceptable ways, without much inhibition.
PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self caused by the separation of love feelings from sexual feelings;
- A strong Reality Principle that dominates a mistrusted Pleasure Principle;
- Intense pride and competitiveness with an excessive focus on accomplishments, appearances and performing for self-esteem;
- Feelings of emptiness, boredom and dissatisfaction caused by the resistance to receiving from and surrendering to others and feelings;
- Passivity and submissiveness are intensely avoided and experienced as weakness, while stubbornness and rigidity are seen as strength;
- Repressed sexual feelings are pathologically expressed through psychosomatic symptoms, in frequent sexual activity without any love involvement (“flings” or affairs), restlessness, hyperactivity or “flighty” behavior”, or diverted into ambitiousness in the material world (“No time for love in my busy life.”);
- Unresolved Oedipal conflicts are repressed, causing deep longings for the opposite sex, but with persistent fears of betrayal; there is intense competitiveness with the same sex, but with fears of retaliation (“castration anxiety”);
- Constant attention-seeking, trendiness, and a need for compliments pervade the personality;
- Main defenses: repression, sublimation, somatization, identification;
- Typical masks: the flirt or tease (“I’m available…not!”), the alluring temptress (“I’ll give you my magnificent beauty and unimaginable sensual pleasures…maybe if you’re lucky!”), the real man (“I take what I want!”), the serious man of business (“There’s no time for fooling around or getting involved. There’s work to be done.”), the “Barbie doll” (“I’ll be the perfect girlfriend, cheerleader or trophy wife, the ‘Perfect Ten’, just for you!”), the proud one (“At least I’ve got my pride.”), the high society lady or gentleman (“Manners, formality and civility are all that really matters.”);
- Childhood history may include driven perfectionism and competitiveness in learning situations, extreme frustration around any perceived failures (“sore losers”), constant participation in activities that are socially approved of (sports, school plays, musical training, religion, etc.), constant attention-seeking through performing, intense same-sex sibling rivalry, psychosomatic symptoms (allergic reactions, fainting, nosebleeds, etc.); early “dating” or going steady and a preoccupation with romance and gossip.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- Relationships often exhibit a push-pull quality, especially around sexual contact, with a constant seeking out of sexual situations and simultaneous flight from them; often one person is chosen as a sexual partner, while another is chosen as a love partner;
- Relationships are often sought out with people who are seen as having status in socially acceptable ways (the "checklist"); others are often related to as either competitors (to be defeated) or suitors (to be seduced);
- There tends to be a superficial or formal quality to interactions, though often with undertones of intrigue (gossiping or a soap opera kind of drama as the style of communicating), argumentativeness, or there may be an hysterical quality to self-expression;
- Something is always held back in relationships to maintain interest and mystery and an “edge”;
- Sex is primarily sought after for validation of one’s attractiveness and prowess and secondarily for pleasure; sexual energy is often re-routed into external or material accomplishments;
- Sexual desires are often experienced as incestuous;
- Sexual pleasure and full orgasm are possible, but often avoided out of the fear of surrendering and appearing vulnerable; orgasms, when allowed, may take a long time and a lot of effort.
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “If I love, I will be vulnerable.” “I will get love by appearing invulnerable and attractive.”
- “If I desire sexually, I will be rejected.” “I will get sexual gratification by controlling my sexual longings.”
- “I will accept praise, attention and accomplishments as a substitute for love and pleasure.”
- “No one surrenders to another.” “I will survive by never surrendering.”
- “The world is a rejecting, competitive place.”
HIGHER SELF ASPECTS
- Tremendous passion and connection to the sensuality of human relationships, with a true appreciation for and capacity to express the wonder of coming together physically in love with another;
- Great capacity to let go and surrender to the flow of love, to fall in love with life and with others;
- Genuine capacities to make and sustain commitments;
- Strong organizational skills combined with flexibility, patience and acceptance of new approaches to situations;
- A deep appreciation for the beauty of physical life, and sensibilities to integrate the elements of form to create beauty.
THERAPUETIC TASKS
- Develop the capacity to experience love and sexual passion at the same time, connecting the heart and genitals energetically;
- Bring into consciousness and release the guilt feelings and judgements for having had loving desires for the parent of the opposite sex, and reverse the repression of those desires caused by fears of retaliation by the parent of the same sex;
- Develop the capacity to yield to others and to surrender to feelings without fears of becoming weak, vulnerable or losing face;
- Develop the capacity to experience the full pleasure of sexual release without ego control, and the joy of falling (falling in love, falling asleep, etc.);
- Become able to make and sustain commitments without fears of being rejected;
- Relax the fierce competitiveness and hyperactivity and constant need to prove oneself;
- Develop flexibility in the body, particularly the back of the body and neck (will centers) and the tensor and flexor muscles; develop natural sensual movements rather than exaggerated gestures of sexual “come on”;
- Develop flexibility in approaches to life’s tasks and relationships, relinquishing the exaggerated pride and need to hold back;
- Eliminate psychosomatic symptoms by making the connection with the repressed impulses behind them, and allowing those impulses to be felt;
- Become aware of and open up to the true depth and beauty of the self that exists beyond the superficiality of appearances and performances;
- Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality, opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
- Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
- Experience pleasure and expansion, and recognize and express one’s Higher Self aspects with less fear of embarrassment;
- Primary raw negative expression that needs release: “I won’t surrender!”
- Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to love.”
THERAPEUTIC APPROACH
- Establish a respectful and professional environment, acknowledging the person’s genuine accomplishments in life, and the seriousness and concern for how he or she has successfully managed many aspects of adult living; also acknowledge the confusion and disappointment the person feels that in spite of these achievements, he or she is bored, lonely, restless and dissatisfied;
- Engage the person’s subtly provocative manner with warmth and an accepting neutrality; do not initially confront any seductive behavior or offer praise for superficial attributes;
- Use unsatisfying experiences in adult relationships to make connections with childhood experiences, particularly to illuminate times in which the child may have felt disappointment and rejection by the parent of the opposite sex, or an uncomfortable possessiveness by that parent (i.e. – not allowing dating as a teenager); also uncover memories in which the parent of the same sex may have shown moralistic disapproval towards, competitiveness with or vicarious involvement in the person’s young love life (i.e. - being overly involved with the teenager’s boyfriends or girlfriends);
- Encourage the person to give examples of having had his or her heart broken in relationships, and the vows they may have made secretly to never be vulnerable again; surface the controlled longing to “have it all” (love and passion) in one relationship, but the fear of surrendering to that longing or believing in its possibility;
- Use stretching, bending, massaging, rolling and vibrating to loosen the rigidly held back and neck, and the spasticities in the tensor and flexor muscles; use pelvic thrusts and rotations to release the holding back in that area and to allow for the experience of pleasure moving through the pelvis; use hitting and kicking to express aggression and pride and refusal to surrender; use massage and hands-on touch over the heart to help opening up to the love feelings, and use visualizations to help the person focus on connecting their heart center to their sexual center; this person will experience the body work as embarrassing, so a professional and technical explanation of its usefulness can be helpful;
- Analyze the meanings of psychosomatic symptoms, their timing, the part of the body affected, etc., and make connections to guilt or anxiety about sexual feelings, competitive impulses, etc.;
- Explore hidden and emerging feelings, desires and fantasies towards the therapist as a love object in a matter-of-fact way, including using dream interpretation, to decrease guilt and anxiety about the feelings, to normalize them, and to begin undoing the pride defense that anticipates rejection or exploitation; when transferences are made to the therapist (i.e. – accusing the therapist of being seductive or rejecting), clarify them as they occur;
- As this person’s heart and genitals become connected and the powerful onrush of integrated love feelings comes forward, he or she will become very sensitive to any perceived insults to their pride or any abuse of their perceived vulnerability; simultaneously, because of the openness, the person will feel exhilarated yet relaxed, confident yet supple, secure yet not rigid; re-assure the person that those new feeling combinations are real, and that now in fact he or she is truly not vulnerable, because of the flexibility and strength of being open;
- Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their capacity to love fully, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs; in the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance, based on their own new experiences, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback.
DEFINITIONS
Hysterical Personality: (also known as “Histrionic or Repressed Personality) vain, attention-seeking, sexually provocative, dramatic presentation of the self, with a history of many vague symptoms, chronic feelings of disappointment, excitability and exaggerated emotionality; primary repressed conflicts center around genital incestuous strivings.
Identification: the process by which one either blurs or eliminates the distinction between the self and others by extending his or her identity into another, borrowing one’s identity from another, or fusing identities with another (merging).
Oedipal Complex: the dilemma of early childhood, occurring after the 4th year, in which the genitally charged child focuses on the parent of the opposite sex as a primary love object, and comes into internal conflict over perceived competition with the parent of the same sex.
Repression: the process of banishing from consciousness ideas or impulses that are deemed unacceptable.
Somatization: bodily disorders arising from deep-seated emotional and mental conflicts through which repressed instinctual tendencies gain expression.
Sublimation: the modification of an instinctual impulse, expressed in such a way as to conform to the demand of societal norms.
posted by peter loffredo, lcsw at 6/22/2009 0 comments links to this post
TYPICAL PRESENTING PROBLEMS (when first arriving to therapy)
- Lack of feelings, numbness, little or no joy or pleasure in life;
- Inability to engage in intimate relationships;
- Intense fears, paranoia, phobias, panic attacks, dissociative episodes, chronic anxiety, intense perfectionism, procrastination;
- Physical problems that could not be diagnosed medically; hypochondriasis;
- “Existential angst”, questioning one’s right to exist; feelings of emptiness and meaninglessness;
- Suicidal/homicidal ideations, impulses or actions; excessive concerns about death;
- Episodes of explosiveness, which may include physical violence;
- Self-mutilating behavior (biting, burning or cutting of the skin);
- Primary “falling” fear: falling apart;
- Primary holding pattern: holding together
- Primary longing: to feel whole;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to exist.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period – Prenatal to First Four Months of Life)
- Mother (or primary caretaker) was chronically any or all of the following very early in the child’s life, including during pregnancy: cold, hostile, rageful, abusive, erratic, unreliable, removed, distant, disconnected emotionally, fearful and/or anxious;
- Eye contact and physical contact between mother and child was avoided by mother, due to mother’s schizoid elements, or interfered with due to physical illness of mother or child, or due to traumatic birth circumstances (Caesarian, premature or breech delivery, incubator, etc.);
- Home environment was chaotic or threatening due to alcohol/drug abuse, violence, poverty, or external traumatic environmental circumstances (i.e. - natural disasters, political oppression, war);
- One or both parents were resentful of child’s presence (exacerbated by being unprepared for child-rearing due to an unwanted pregnancy, youth or other social conditions);
- Child did not meet parents’ idealized expectations of a “perfect baby”, and was greeted with disappointment or avoidance.
BODY STATUS
- Body is often narrow and contracted in an effort to hold together against the fear of falling apart (body may be fuller and more athletic if there are paranoid elements present due to sexualizing by parents); pervasive tension and stiffness throughout the body, with a frozen or wooden quality;
- Head, often large or with a large forehead, is pushed forward, drooping down or off to the side (due to tension created at base of skull to sever the head from the body and feelings);
- Shoulders up (in fear), and arms hang like appendages (to prevent contact with others or violent acting out);
- Feet are often cold and contracted; person is frequently “on their toes”, ungrounded, in the “fight or flight” position (curled, flexed and/or tight in the Achilles tendon);
- Splits in the body are quite marked, most often between the upper and lower halves, but also between front and back and left and right sides, including the eyes, and between the head and the body (correlates to use of splitting defense);
- Twisted spine (trying to get away from the threatening environment or parent that it also needs); person has particular difficulty with the “bow” position;
- Ocular blocks are very common, causing vision problems (doesn’t want to see the coldness or hostility), and the expression in the eyes is often either frozen terror or disconnectedness, with flashes of murderous fury; expression in the eyes is split from the expression of the rest of the face;
- Lack of color to the body and coldness in the extremities; also cold to the touch in the areas of chronic constriction;
- Skin is hypersensitive due to the withdrawal of energy from the exterior surface; touch is experienced as uncomfortable or painful;
- Shallow, constricted breathing (cannot embrace life), and high-pitched or constricted voice; choke response is easily elicited if the person is asked to breathe deeply (or on roller);
- Psychosomatic illnesses (headaches, eczema, digestive and respiratory problems common) due to chronic contractions and de-energized condition which tend to be worse in persons who are more strongly defended;
- Chronic areas of severe tension: base of the skull, joints of the shoulders, legs and hips, the diaphragm, and the ocular segment of the face;
- Dominant spasticities are in the small muscles around joints (fear of moving), so there is either inflexibility or hyperflexibility (more severe because muscles have given out).
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Energy is withheld from the peripheral structures of the body, those that make contact with the world: the face, hands, genitals and feet (correlates to poor reality testing);
- Organs are not fully connected energetically to the core, but are blocked by chronic tensions at the base of the skull, shoulders, pelvis and hip joints;
- The inner charge tends to be frozen in the core, making the will weak, but also precipitating explosive eruptions because of the compression;
- Energy flow is severely diminished at the waist due to severe contraction in the diaphragm and the separation from sexual feelings, and at the base of the head due to separation of thoughts from feelings;
- Chakras (energy centers): Crown - (spiritual connection) open but asymmetrical; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) open, but asymmetrical; Throat - (self-expression) contracted and inverted; Heart - (love feelings) contracted and inverted; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) partially opened; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) contracted and inverted; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) contracted and inverted.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- Tremendous efforts are made internally to avoid and control any feelings due to the presence of deep-seated terror and murderous rage, which leads to intense fears of annihilation if feelings are expressed (this later becomes attached to any experiences of perceived rejection or failure); crippling anxiety, panic attacks and phobias often arise when feelings threaten to emerge;
- “As if” feelings are expressed according to what one “should feel” in a given situation, but there is no real spontaneity; self-expression is mechanical and controlled; aggression is expressed through passive withdrawal, though explosions are a potential;
- Feelings are talked about, or thought about, but not really felt or acknowledged as being in the body;
- Will is used predominantly to withdraw from external reality and to freeze feelings internally, so outward, assertive expressions have no energy and are weak and scattered;
- Mental faculties are usually highly developed, frequently with a brilliant intellect; the mind is valued above all else, and deduction, reasoning, calculating, and “figuring things out” logically are the only modes of operating that are trusted; gut feelings and intuition are denigrated and feared; this person is always “in their mind.”
PSYCH0LOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self because of a lack of identification with the body;
- Hypersensitivity and hyperawareness because of weak ego boundaries (correlates to the lack of peripheral charge in the body);
- Poor reality testing;
- Paranoia, from projected rage, which is exacerbated if either parent invested sexual energy in the child;
- Psyche is experienced as a “house of many rooms” without access between them;
- Person feels possessed by a demonic, alien presence or voice at times (introjected hostile parental image);
- Subject to dissociation, depersonalization and fugue states;
- Main defenses: denial, projection, introjection, splitting, disintegration, withdrawal, fragmentation, compartmentalization and intellectualization;
- Typical masks: spiritual or mental arrogance or aloofness (“I am special, I am superior because I am above physical existence.”), exaggerated appearance of serenity or peacefulness (“I am never angry or afraid.”), “Don Quixote”- like Idealized Self Image (“I dream the ‘Impossible Dream”; “I am an unrecognized genius”; “legends in their own mind.”)
- Childhood history may include: frequent nightmares or sleep disturbances, withdrawn behavior with occasional outbursts of rage, autism, pervasive fears, preference for fantasy over reality, psychosomatic illnesses, head-banging or self-mutilation, school phobia.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- Reaching out or self-assertion in connecting to others is avoided (very little eye contact or physical closeness can be tolerated);
- Intimacy and emotional and physical letting go are intensely feared, so relating is mental and abstract; others will often experience this person as “spacey” or “not really there”;
- Sexual interaction is mechanical, with fear of losing control; sex is desired mainly to subscribe to a romantic or erotic idea, rather than for actual feeling; some warmth and closeness physically is desired, but in limited quantities; orgasm is not an important objective;
- Others, including love objects, are idealized (positively or negatively) as are relationships, which are seen in a lofty spiritual light with little real human contact.
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “I should not exist.” “There is something essentially wrong with me.”
- “I am my mind.” “I think therefore I am.”
- “Life is threatening to my life.” “I will survive by deadening myself.”
- “I must control my feelings and others with my mind.” “If I feel, I will disintegrate.”
- “My rage will annihilate others and me.” “The world is a dangerous place.”
HIGHER SELF ASPECTS
- Strong connection to and awareness of the profoundly spiritual nature of life;
- Access to vast universal wisdom and the capacity to teach others how to make the connection to that wisdom;
- Great courage and fearlessness to connect with feelings;
- Great capacity to create and appreciate beauty, including through artistic abilities.
THERAPEUTIC TASKS
- Become grounded and energized in physical life and in the body as a whole;
- Develop basic trust in the self, others and life;
- Become aware of, feel consciously, accept and express the deep primal rage and terror in a non-destructive way without retreating to primitive defenses;
- Face original state of helplessness and hurt underlying perfectionistic attitude;
- Reverse the denial of early trauma at the hands of parents and the environment;
- Develop tolerance for ambivalence in oneself and others (correct “good-or-bad”, “right-or-wrong” and other dualistic images); and heal the splits between thoughts and feelings, and between positive and negative feelings;
- Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality (child, adult, higher self), opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
- Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
- Experience pleasure and expansion and recognize and express one’s higher self aspects with less fear of being annihilated;
- Primary negative expression that needs release: “I hate you!” “I kill you!”
- Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to be.”
THERAPEUTIC APPROACH
- Establish an accepting, non-critical, “human” environment, understanding that trusting the therapist and the environment may take a long time; even fairly well into the treatment, this person can become paranoid;
- Engage the formidable intellect in a playful, patient and respectful way to begin the process of exposing the attitudes and beliefs of the mask, and their fallibility, including wrong conclusions made in childhood;
- Address concrete self-care, daily living tasks that may be ineffectively tended to with information, advice, direct teaching and personal anecdotes to relieve the judgmental attitude towards the self as a failure or outcast;
- Gradually guide the person into their body through breathing and grounding exercises initially, then introduce the roller; touching or hands-on work must be very limited at first, nothing too penetrating or soothing; help the person to feel their feet on the ground, to feel energy in their body, to begin noticing the increasing aliveness;
- Remind the person periodically that they survived their childhood, that the real trauma was in the past;
- Move into the expression of rage using the body once some basic trust in the therapeutic relationship has been established and there is some physical groundedness; remind the person that no one gets destroyed by expressing rage this way; have them look in a mirror to see that they haven’t disintegrated after bodywork;
- When the person has become able to tolerate some exposure of the mask and to feel moderate emotions consistently, more penetrating bodywork and group process can be added to the therapy;
- Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their wisdom, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs;
- In the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance, based on their own new experiences, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback;
- The major vehicle for healing the inner splits of this structure is the relationship itself; the therapist can reveal his own struggles, imperfections and mistakes at carefully chosen moments, in small doses, reminding the person that neither of them is perfect and that even when there is conflict in their relationship, the connection between them is still a viable and caring one. (Aloofness in the therapist cannot aid someone who wears a mask of aloofness!).
DEFINITIONS
Denial: a primitive defense consisting of an attempt to disavow the existence of unpleasant reality or feeling.
Depersonalization: a state in which the person feels as though he has lost his identity, that he is different or strange or unreal, or that the environment is strange or unreal (“derealization”).
Disintegration: collapsing into a state of disorganized mental chaos.
Dissociation: sudden and temporary alteration in the functions of consciousness, the fracturing of the integration of one’s identity, or the splitting off of certain mental process from the main body of consciousness (i.e. – thinking from feeling)
Fragmentation: functioning as though the psyche is broken up into many separate parts. (When fragmented feelings such as rage are projected, one may feel plagued by many apparently external voices or faces.)
Fugue: an episode in which a person suddenly leaves an intolerable situation or activity in a way that appears to have no connection to what the person was just doing and of which he or she has amnesia afterwards.
Intellectualization: an attempt to avoid objectionable impulses or feelings by escaping from the world of emotions into a world of intellectual concepts and words.
Introjection: incorporating into one’s mental structure an image, usually harsh and not necessarily accurate or complete, of another. (This can be experienced as an inner alien or demonic oppressive presence.)
Projection: the process of throwing out upon another the ideas, feelings or impulses that belong to oneself.
Splitting: compartmentalization of opposite and conflicting affect states; a defense mechanism in which a person, when faced with emotional stress or conflict, views himself or others as all good or all bad, or alternates between idealizing and devaluing the self or another; positive and negative qualities in the self or others are unable to be integrated into cohesive images.
Withdrawal: the turning away from reality and shutting off the perceptive system in order to avoid the anxiety aroused by interpersonal relationships or feelings.
THE ORAL CHARACTER STRUCTURE
TYPICAL PRESENTING PROBLEMS
- Inability to sustain relationships, projects, jobs or interests, often after a brief period of intense involvement;
- Lack of motivation and energy, chronic fatigue;
- Addictions, eating disorders, chronic money problems (under-earning/compulsive spending);
- Depression and/or chronic mood swings, manic-depressive disorder;
- Inability to let go of relationships, or recover from loss;
- Intense fears of being alone or abandoned;
- Difficulty delaying gratification, impatience, chronic irritability;
- Frequent physical injuries with slow, drawn out recovery periods;
- Dependency on institutions, parents or others for basic survival needs well into adulthood;
- Primary “falling” fear: falling behind;
- Primary holding pattern: holding on;
- Primary longing: for independence;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to need.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period – First Eighteen Months of Life)
- Mother, during first year and a half of child’s life, offered some warmth and nurturance, but was not consistently available, or was prematurely taken away, due to financial problems (i.e.- mother needing to go to work), marital problems, another pregnancy, depression, illness or death, or mother’s orality in general (i.e. - lack of energy, substance abuse or addictions, etc.);
- Mother was uncomfortable allowing the child to bond with her symbiotically and so pushed the child away prematurely, or mother was unwilling to separate and so held onto the child;
- Child was left alone for long periods, and cries were not heard or answered;
- Parents overly relied on child’s premature independence and precocious development (walking and talking early, playing alone, etc.);
- Giving to the child was based on the parents’ needs rather than the child’s, both in terms of timing and what was given (i.e. - food or pacifier given instead of being picked up and held);
- Trauma occurred during child’s first eighteen months that separated mother and child (hospitalization, placement in foster care or adoption, etc.)
BODY STATUS
- Posture is often one of tiredness and collapse; body is generally child-like in appearance (there may be very little body hair), underdeveloped in musculature and the body may be either long and thin (compensated) or very tiny (collapsed); body is generally not extensively armored;
- Neck is often long and reaching forward (looking for nourishment);
- Lips are often thin (holding against reaching out), jaw is clenched (against rage) and there are frequent dental problems or other physical problems around the mouth and throat; chin may be pulled in (against swallowing) or jutting out (determined not to need); in some, mouth may be very large, showing a lot of teeth (aggression, for biting); teeth may be pushed out due to an extensive period of thumb-sucking in childhood;
- Eyes have a longing, pleading look;
- Shoulders are rolled forward, collapsing chest and causing shallow breathing (negating the need to take in); breasts in women tend to be either very large (compensated) or very small (collapsed);
- Tender pain in between shoulder blades (collapsed will center) and in lower back (premature self-support); chronic lower back problems;
- Hands, feet and pelvis (points of contact with the world) are immature-looking, undercharged and often very small; arches in feet may be fallen and knees locked (making this person a “pushover”); feet and legs are not experienced as offering good support;
- Body overall is often in pain, with frequent injuries or illnesses (lower back, knees, respiratory) that take a long time to heal;
- Chronic areas of tension: jaw, shoulder girdle, between the shoulder blades, lower abdomen and lower back, root of the neck (all of these to prevent crying, reaching out or the expression of aggression), and in the back of the knees.
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Generally undercharged, especially so in chest and the lower half of the body, and in the points of contact with the environment;
- Energy tends to come to the periphery weakly and leak out;
- “Energy vampires”, seeking to get energy by “sucking it” from others;
- The core is accessible, but the energy is not metabolized (correlates to shallow breathing not allowing the “burning of fuel” for action);
- Chakras (energy centers): Crown - (spiritual connection) partially open; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) open; Throat - (self-expression) partially collapsed; Heart - (love feelings) partially open; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) partially opened and asymmetrical; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) partially collapsed and inverted; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) partially collapsed.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- Emotional needs are frequently denied mentally and suppressed by the will, creating an inner emotional climate of deprivation, grief, despair and bitterness;
- The intense fear of abandonment and loss of love, combined with an equal fear of losing oneself in love, creates an ambivalent attitude towards surrendering to feelings; separation anxiety is extreme;
- Deep rage at unmet needs is often turned against the self into depression (sometimes alternating with unsustainable periods of exaggerated elation), and aggression is expressed passively and indirectly (through verbal sarcasm, refusing to follow through on tasks, getting sick, not paying bills, chronic lateness, etc.);
- Deep crying and reaching out are suppressed, though a lot of superficial “bitter” crying and clutching and clinging may be manifested;
- The will is used either to try and give excessively to others (in order to get) or to cling desperately onto others for direct support;
- There is a genuine capacity to express love, but relationships often very romanticized by the mind to an unattainable height, or easily given up on;
- Mentally, there are strong intuitive and intellectual capacities, but creative ideas are not charged or put into action, because the will is being used to prevent self-sufficiency in order to get taken care of;
PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self caused by feelings of unfulfillment, incompleteness, and a perceived inability to be independent, combined with intense self-loathing for the perceived weakness and dependency;
- Extreme dependency conflicts may manifest in addictions (in an effort to substitute for the needed, but ambivalent caretaker and genuine sustenance);
- There is an intense focus in the personality on the functions of the mouth and their related psychosocial correlates: taking in (acquisitiveness), holding on (tenacity & determination), biting (destructiveness), spitting out (rejection, contempt), and closing (refusal); continuous smoking, eating, drinking, talking (often fast), biting, etc., may be present, or self-depriving behaviors, like poverty or self-starvation may be acted out;
- Mood swings, cyclothymic disorders, depression, borderline or manic-depressive disorders may be present;
- Main defenses: identification, displacement, reversal, turning against the self, denial, projection, splitting;
- Typical masks: rescuer, caretaker, compulsive giver (“I have so much to give because I have no needs of my own.”); exaggerated self-reliance and pseudo independence (“I stand alone.” “I have to do it all myself.” “No one can do it as good as me.”); helplessness, inadequacy, neediness (“You have to take care of me because I can’t do it.” “I can’t!”); Idealized Self-images: “the Lone Ranger” (“I hide myself and stay alone, coming out only to rescue others.”), “Scarlett O’Hara” (“I will survive by being alone, even though I once had the greatest lover of all time.”), “Mother Theresa” (“I am a saint, devoted to the needy.”)
- Childhood history may include: very early accomplishment of developmental tasks (walking, talking, toilet training, getting dressed and other self-care tasks, reading, writing, etc.), disturbances around eating, intense separation anxiety (i.e. - refusal to go to school, unable to sleep over someone else’s house or be with a babysitter), frequent illnesses or injuries, collecting, clinging and holding onto objects excessively, thumb-sucking well into later childhood, romanticized relationships with teachers or others adults, wishing to be adopted by them.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- Trying to get love and support is the predominant motivation in relationships; this is often attempted either through insistent care-giving (that is experienced by the recipient as intrusive, controlling and demanding), through a helpless, deprived presentation of the self (hiding a covert demandingness and feeling of entitlement); or by direct, self-righteous demanding (“You owe it to me!”); the alienating effects on others of these behaviors will seem to reinforce the experience of early abandonment, causing the person to “give up” on relationships at times;
- Relationships will go back and forth between intense, totally “lost-in-love” involvement to sudden and absolute endings as the symbiotic struggle is acted out (wanting to merge with the all-powerful, giving parent versus wanting to separate from her and individuate);
- Relationships are frequently sought out with people who are extremely needy as the defenses of denial, projection and identification are employed (“I’ll take care of you as the needy me that I’m not.”);
- Love is related to as both “manna from Heaven” and potentially suffocating or devouring (“Can’t live with it; can’t live without it!”);
- Sexual interactions may be used to avoid abandonment and loneliness and for some sense of belongingness; orgasms may be frequent and easy but not particularly charged or strong in women, and men may not have full erections or they may ejaculate easily and prematurely without much charge; being held or cuddled is often more desired than actual sex;
- Surrendering to the love feelings for another brings up intense fears of abandonment and falling behind, losing oneself, being left alone.
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “I must not need.” “If I need, I will be abandoned.”
- “I am alone.” “No one will ever be there for me.”
- “If I connect with another, I will lose myself.” “If I am independent, I must be alone.”
- “I cannot stand on my own two feet.”
- “I must give to others in order to get.” “The needs of others will devour or suffocate me.”
- “There is not enough.” “The world is a depriving place.”
HIGHER SELF APSECTS
- Great capacity to give to others in a deeply nurturing, truly healing way;
- An appreciation for the vastly abundant nature of existence and the joy of sharing;
- Genuine independence, autonomy and self-confidence with full capacity to surrender to the oneness with another;
- Powerful intuitive abilities and the capacity to follow insights through to fruition by sustained, patient effort.
THERAPEUTIC TASKS
- Acknowledge, accept and express emotional needs and longings;
- Develop the capacity to reach out, while releasing clinging or grabbing impulse;
- Face the reality of the early deprivation in childhood and finish grieving for losses;
- Face and move through the fears of rejection and abandonment;
- Develop the capacity to experience the self as autonomous without needing to be alone in the world;
- Develop the capacity to connect to others without feeling the loss of identity and autonomy;
- Relinquish addictions to transitional objects and self-numbing substances by experiencing direct pleasure and self-nurturance;
- Create a foundation of support in the physical world by stabilizing and sustaining relationships, work-life and income, and basic self-care functions;
- Energize and strengthen the feet and legs as a foundation of support;
- Recharge the chest and open the capacity to receive life and give and receive love;
- Energize aggression and release rage held in the oral segment and the hands;
- Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality, opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
- Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
- Experience pleasure and expansion, and recognize and express one’s Higher Self aspects with less fear of losing one’s self;
- Primary raw negative expression that needs release: “Give it to me!”
- Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to need.”
THERAPEUTIC APPROACH
- Establish a supportive, nurturing environment, acknowledging the frustration, despair and hopelessness the person has felt in trying to get their needs met; listen patiently and empathetically to the person’s expression of his or her considerable pain (including physical) and feelings of loss;
- While acknowledging the person’s genuine desire to give to others, begin confronting the hidden agenda to get from others through a mask of giving;
- Demystify the underlying causes of addictive behaviors and repetitive cycles and challenge the helpless, out-of-control image the person has of the inner self and of his or her needs and longings;
- Engage the person’s innate belief in the abundance of life that has been denied but is demonstrated by the very fact of their frustration;
- Guide the person into fuller breathing by opening up the chest, and also facilitate the experience of self-support by grounding the legs and feet; energize the hands and mouth by facilitating the expressing of rage through hitting, towel-twisting (choking the suffocating mother), biting, yelling, and by reaching for help with the hands and arms; extensive rage held in the jaw can be released through massage and then kicking; facilitate deeper crying by opening up the lower abdomen through rolling and massage of the diaphragmatic segment and lower back; consistent encouragement, creativity and patience will be needed to help the person engage the body in the therapy when the impulse to collapse surfaces; the person with this structure will not want to “do the work”, but rather will try to get the therapist to “do it for them”; massaging the body, holding and cuddling, allowing the person to receive support and comfort directly without having to reciprocate can be a very corrective experience;
- Help the person face the impossible dilemma of the symbiotic bind they were in - needing to merge with a parent who didn’t give enough, and then needing to separate when they felt too weak to do so or weren’t let go of by a clinging parent; reassure the person that they can now experience that bond with the therapist, and ultimately their own adult self, without risk of abandonment or suffocation;
- While allowing the dependency feelings of the person to be experienced positively with the therapist, challenge any idealizations of the therapist, and explore, without confrontation, passive behaviors that express the resentment that comes from those idealizations and hidden demands to be taken care of (i.e.- not paying fees);
- The person who employs this character structure is an inherently giving person who needs to open up to receiving again in the child aspect of the personality that has been deprived; if the therapist gives directly and genuinely to this person, without “rescuing”, and “lends” his or her ego temporarily to the person, he or she will flourish as the deep capacities for love and gratitude become directed towards self-nurturance and self-love by the adult;
- Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their truly giving nature, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs;
- In the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance,
- based on experience, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback.
DEFINITIONS
Denial: a primitive defense consisting of an attempt to disavow the existence of unpleasant reality.
Displacement: the process by which energy, feelings or impulses are transferred from one idea, experience, place in the body or object to another; the substitution of one object for another as the target of feeling.
Identification: the process by which one either blurs or eliminates the distinction between the self and others by extending his or her identity into another, borrowing one’s identity from another, or fusing identities with another (merging).
Projection: the process of throwing out upon another the ideas, feelings or impulses that belong to oneself.
Reversal: the process by which an energetic expression, an impulse or feeling, is changed into its opposite. Through this mechanism, hate may change to love, sadism to masochism, longing for an object to rejection of it, etc.
Splitting: compartmentalization of opposite and conflicting affect states; a defense mechanism in which a person, when faced with emotional stress or conflict, views himself or others as all good or all bad, or alternates between idealizing and devaluing the self or another; positive and negative qualities in the self or others are unable to be integrated into cohesive images.
Symbiosis: a bond between a mother and child in which the child functions as though the mother and child form a single, omnipotent unit. During the “symbiotic phase” of development (4 months to 18 months), the mother functions as the auxiliary ego for the child, performing functions the child cannot yet perform for itself.
Transitional Object: an inanimate object that a little child uses to sooth itself with that serves as a substitute for the comforting mother (blanket, stuffed animal, pacifier, etc.);
Turning Against The Self: the process by which an individual directs hatred for another against the self; the desire to retaliate becomes the propensity to self-torture.
MASOCHISTIC CHARACTER STRUCTURE
PRESENTING PROBLEMS (When first coming to therapy)
- Chronic feelings of suffering and chronic low-level anxiety, both emotionally and physically;
- Submissive behavior, and lack of self-assertion (inability to say, “No”);
- Intense feelings of shame and humiliation;
- Feeling trapped;
- Self-destructive behavior patterns (sabotaging success in jobs and relationships, accidents, sexual acting out, etc.);
- Obsessive/compulsive problems, particularly around sex, cleanliness and orderliness;
- Preoccupations with sex, masturbation, pornography and/or excretory functions, accompanied by intense guilt, shame and self-punishment;
- An inability to let go of or change repetitive patterns in abusive or ungratifying relationships;
- Inability to tolerate pleasure or success without guilt or anxiety;
- Sadistic, cruel and abusive acting out, or pervasive worrying about urges to do so;
- Primary “falling” fear: of the bottom falling out;
- Primary holding pattern: holding in;
- Primary longing: to be free/spontaneous;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to be assertive.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period - 19th to 30th Months)
- Parents offered conditional love to the child based on compliance with their will (that the child “be a good boy or girl” and control impulses);
- Attempts by child to assert its own will or say “No” were overpowered by parents and greeted with threats of abandonment or withdrawal of love;
- Parents were excessively involved in child’s eating and excretory functions (child may have been pushed to eat more than it wanted, toilet training may have been severe, enemas given, etc.), and in general, there was a strong focus on eating and defecating in the family;
- Father may have been passive, submissive or absent while mother was dominating, smothering, or harsh (often with a self-sacrificing, martyr-type mask), or father may have been harsh, controlling or sadistic while mother was permissive and indulgent;
- Parents may have been excessively concerned about “messing up” (around personal hygiene, household cleanliness, finances, order in general, etc.);
- A sudden interruption in the parent-child relationships may have occurred in the child’s second year of life (birth of a sibling, divorce, absent parent due to work, illness, death, etc., or a physical illness of child).
BODY STATUS
- Body is typically shortened, thick and muscular (to restrain assertiveness and negative impulses), with chronic tension in the body; there may be excessive body hair;
- Neck is short and thick (from a “turtle-like” pulling in of the head);
- Shoulder muscles enlarged (to bear burdens);
- Buttocks are pulled in and squeezed together (to control the impulse to mess up and let out), which pushes the pelvis forward;
- Waist is short and thick, encased, compressed and collapsed (from pulling in and down from the top and up and in from the bottom to control impulses to let out); in women, hips and thighs are often thick and heavy; in men, the abdomen often balloons;
- The abdominal compression affects the whole diaphragmatic segment, making exhalation difficult and hindering all of the organs in the area;
- There is often an awkwardness or clumsiness in the person’s gait and movements, with frequent minor accidents (messing up), along with a general uncomfortability in the body;
- There is anal and genital tension and spasticity (causing acute suffering and inability to freely experience pleasure) as the whole pelvic floor is contracted;
- Skin tends to have a brownish hue due to stagnant, held energy charge; there may be severe problems with acne;
- Chronic areas of tension: the neck, shoulder girdle, pelvis and buttocks, and most of the large muscles;
- Chronic physical ailments of the throat and colon/anal region, such as sore throats, colitis, constipation and hemorrhoids, and digestive problems;
- Expression in the eyes is one of suffering, often combined with compulsive smiling.
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Fully charged energetically, but energy is tightly held in check (though not frozen), so this person is “boiling” inside;
- Energy moving upward and downward is choked off at the neck and waist (causing compression) and outlets for energy discharge are blocked (throat, anus, genitals);
- The highly charged energy is stagnant in the skin;
- Chakras (energy centers): Crown - (spiritual connection) deflated; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) open; Throat - (self-expression) contracted; Heart - (love feelings) open, but constricted; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) open; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) partially open; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) partially blocked.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- Feelings are often predominant and strongly felt, but held in, literally packed within by massive armoring, creating chronic feelings of pain, suffering and anxiety;
- Negative feelings, which are intense in this structure (including desires to punish, crush or be sadistic to others), and their expressions, are severely prohibited, accompanied by powerful feelings of guilt, shame and humiliation if any self-assertion is made, and a fear of exploding violently;
- Positive feelings of love, including humor and joy are very active, but encased deep within and inhibited from full expression; pleasure and any strong surges of energy are perceived as a threat (of exploding or the bottom falling out);
- Extreme efforts are made to be kind, pleasant, pleasing, servile, self-sacrificing and ingratiating in order to hide the inner hostility and spitefulness, which is considerable; negative feelings are expressed mainly through passive-aggressive behavior or provocative attitudes;
- The will is weakened by the constant holding pattern, but it is strong enough to express its resistance (to the parents’ crushing will) through stubbornness, defiance and passive refusal (to move, to be successful or happy, etc.); the will is also often directed to make the individual appear stupid or eccentric, or to dissimulate, so there is much inner doubting about one’s own intelligence or wisdom;
- The mind can be very orderly, but usually obsessively so, with much ruminating on details, serving as a distraction from feelings;
PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self caused by the negation of spontaneous, assertive expressions and deep feelings of inferiority; self-assertion is severely limited and there is an emotional heaviness (feeling burdened, “stuck in the mud”, “too hard to move”);
- Consciously identified with trying to please, while unconsciously identified with sadism, spite and hostility;
- Disguised exhibitionism combined with self-derogation and self-deprecation and a chronic compulsion to damage the self;
- Strong castration/mutilation anxieties (fear of retaliation for inner negativity and exhibitionism);
- Intense fears of being abandoned, due to a perceived reliance on others for both stimulation and “decompression” from stimulation and pent-up feelings;
- In the “anal-compulsive” (“retentive”) character type, there is great concern about orderliness, cleanliness, efficiency and control, with great difficulty tolerating change;
- Main defenses: reaction formation, ruminative thinking, undoing, externalization, reversal, rationalization;
- Typical masks: self-sacrificing, martyr (“I suffer for you.” “I am special, noble and superior because I suffer.”), pleasing, submissive, ingratiating, slave (“I live only to serve.” “I have no selfishness in me.”), efficiency expert, perfectionist (“I am superior because I never mess up.” “If I fail, it is because I didn’t try hard enough.”), pacifism (“I have no hurtful intentions towards anyone.” “I have no aggression or hostility in me.”);
- Childhood history may include: clumsiness and many minor accidents, “good boy” or “good girl” behavior patterns in childhood, followed by rebellious or cruel acting out behavior in adolescence, overeating (to stuff down feelings), chronic sore throats, acne, digestive problems (coupled with anxiety about vomiting), constipation, and excessive neatness or sloppiness.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- Relationships, while able to be engaged in and sustained, are fraught with tension and pressure, at times exploding into outright hostility and abusiveness as the suppressed and highly charged negativity seeks an outlet;
- Trying to get appreciation and approval, permission to feel, and relief from guilt are predominant motivations in relationships; this is attempted either through exaggerated pleasing, servile and submissive behavior (that is experienced by the recipient as hostile, controlling and contemptuous), through self-deprecating attitudes and self-damaging behavior, constant whining and complaining, or through directly provocative behavior; the angry reactions provoked in others by these characteristics will then seem to justify this person’s self-righteous fury and/or self-punishing guilt;
- Intense preoccupation with sex and frequent masturbation are common as this person continually seeks pleasure and release, both of which are intensely desired and also inhibited; fascination with pornography and/or sadomasochistic fantasy is common (seeking to turn pain, submission and humiliation into “pleasure”); orgasms are controlled by pushing and squeezing actions (of the buttocks, thighs and pelvis);
- Surrendering to love is related to as both potentially liberating and potentially crushing, with pain as a necessary ingredient and good feelings in love and sex as “too much.”
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “I will be loved as long as I submit to the will of others.” “If I assert my independence, I will be crushed.”
- “To get love, I must please others.” “I can never say no.”
- “I must never express my negativity.” “I will hurt myself to prevent others from hurting me.”
- “If I feel too much, I will explode.”
- “I am inferior and disgusting because of my negative feelings.”
- “Life is hard and suffering unavoidable.”
HIGHER SELF ASPECTS
- Great capacities for pleasure, humor, optimism, playfulness and joy;
- Genuine supportiveness, strength and desire to be of service to others;
- An expansive, open heart with deep compassion, true kindness and understanding;
- Positive assertiveness and healthy aggression with substantial amounts of energy;
- Ability to be spontaneously creative in the moment, surrender ego control and trust the natural order in all things;
THERAPEUTIC TASKS
- Develop spontaneity, assertiveness and healthy aggression without fears of humiliation or retaliation;
- Become aware of, accept and release negative feelings and attitudes, and sadistic impulses, without guilt or anxiety;
- Relinquish the obsessive-compulsive patterns, and the excessive need to control and not mess up;
- Recognize and relinquish the self-sabotaging and passive-aggressive behavior patterns that have been a resistance to expansion and an illusory form of vengeance against the dominating parents of childhood;
- Stretch and decompress the body, opening it up to its full length; release the held aggression everywhere in the body, and particularly let go of the spasticity in the entire pelvic floor area;
- Experience sexual feelings freely without guilt or the fear that the bottom will fall out; let go of the pushing and stopping as a way of controlling the energy flow;
- Release the judgmental attitudes and disgust toward bodily functions and needs, particularly sex, eating and excretory functions;
- Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality, opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
- Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
- Experience pleasure and expansion, and recognize and express one’s Higher Self aspects with less fear of exploding;
- Primary raw negative expression that needs release: “No!”
- Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to be free.”
THERAPUETIC APPROACH
- Establish a light and warm environment, acknowledging the genuine kindness, compassion and goodness in this person who suffers from a belief in his or her own “badness”;
- Engage the person’s capacity for humor to counteract the heaviness in their emotional climate and despondent view of their life as a burden;
- Encourage the person to talk about their perceived “disgusting” habits and self-destructive patterns to neutralize the shame and guilt;
- Help the person face the reality of having been controlled and dominated by the parents, and that “being good” was a desperate attempt to get love and acceptance;
- Confront the person’s defiance and hostility underneath their passivity; the person employing this structure can tolerate and even needs provocation by the therapist to get their anger acknowledged and moving;
- Use full bodywork regimen early on and regularly, including group; use rolling to stretch out the compressed torso, pelvic thrusts, hitting and kicking to free up the aggression; massage the heavily armored large muscles deeply, even pounding them, to release pain and tension; massage chest and diaphragmatic segment to facilitate fuller exhalation; facilitate crying through deep massaging of the neck, chest and abdomen, which will be necessary to clear the massive contractions there;
- Energize the “No!’ fully and regularly in this person through verbal expressions while doing the bodywork; also have this person energetically verbalize scatological expressions and sounds during bodywork (“Shit on you!”);
- Confront the person’s passive resistance to therapy as a way of spiting the perceived controlling will of the therapist (as parent); this person will tend to be a “model patient” (“good boy or girl”) by always being on time, always paying, following up advice, etc., but will “thwart” the therapist by “never feeling any better”;
- Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their compassionate and joyful nature, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs;
- In the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance, based on experience, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback.
DEFINITIONS
Compulsion: a repeated action, the need for whose performance insistently forces itself into consciousness even though the person simultaneously does not wish to perform the act; compulsions are obsessions in action, are ego-alien and are therefore always resisted.
Dissimulation: the act of pretending.
Externalization: a process by which one’s feelings toward oneself are experienced as feelings toward others.
Obsession: an idea or impulse that repetitively and insistently forces itself into consciousness even though it is unwelcome; an example of an intellectual obsession is a preoccupation with metaphysical questions concerning one’s purpose in life, ultimate destiny, etc.; an example of an impulsive obsession is an idea that leads to action like concerns about germs leading to repeated hand-washing.
Rationalization: making a thing appear reasonable, when otherwise its irrationality would be evident; meant to act as a screen, to cover up ideas or actions intended to gratify an unconscious need.
Reaction Formation: the development of conscious attitudes and interests that are socially acceptable that are the antithesis of unconscious attitudes and impulses that are not acceptable.
Reversal: the process by which an energetic expression, an impulse or feeling, is changed into its opposite. Through this mechanism, hate may change to love, sadism to masochism, longing for an object to rejection of it, etc. (precursor to reaction formation)
Ruminative Thinking: repetitively going over ideas (often unpleasant ones), recollections or plans mentally that serves no adaptive purpose, but rather serves to distract one’s conscious mind from being aware of feelings deemed unacceptable.
Undoing: a defense mechanism consisting of positive action that actually (or in fantasy) is the opposite of something against which the ego must defend itself (i.e. – eating health food to defend against an impulse to literally “eat shit”).
PSYCHOPATHIC CHARACTER STRUCTURE
PRESENTING PROBLEMS (when first arriving to therapy)
- Intense fears of being defeated, humiliated, controlled, or used;
- Feelings of falseness, insincerity, and a lack of integrity;
- Feelings of emptiness and boredom, counteracted by episodes of recklessness, risk-taking and thrill-seeking behavior;
- addiction to intensity;
- Conflicts with authority (including employers, institutions and the legal system);
- Impulsive sexual acting out, promiscuity, many shallow relationships, but no real intimacy or trusting friendships;
- Criminal, sociopathic behavior; antisocial personality disorder;
- Primary falling fear: falling down;
- Primary holding pattern: holding up;
- Primary longing: to have integrity;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to trust.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period – Birth to 4 Years)
- One or both parents manipulated, seduced, sexualized, or otherwise used child (covertly or directly) for their own narcissistic purposes; parents instilled in the child an image of how they wanted the child to be in order for the adults to feel good about themselves;
- The parents used the child as a buffer or weapon against each other; the child was overly involved in the marital relationship;
- There was a role reversal in which the child was maneuvered, often with sexual overtones and promises of love that were never delivered, into being the pseudo-spouse or pseudo-parent to a parent (frequently of the opposite sex); the child was expected to be more than he or she was to that parent (“Mommy’s little man”; “Daddy’s little princess”);
- One or both parents invested child with feelings of specialness and importance and then rejected or ignored child, or otherwise became unavailable (frequently the parent of the opposite sex);
- One or both parents competed with the child, feeling threatened by the child’s real or imagined accomplishments, and sadistically exploited the child’s weaknesses to humiliate, control and diminish the child’s self-confidence;
- Child experienced horror from witnessing events that could not be understood or integrated, such as verbal or physical abuse (either of a violent or sexual nature); a major trauma occurred in the child’s life, usually after the second year, that could not be understood intellectually by the child and was experienced as a betrayal; (i.e. – hospitalization and surgery, exposure to sex acts by adults, witnessing extreme violence, etc., while being told that all was well by the adults, or blaming the child for the trauma);
- Parent of the same sex was significantly absent from child’s early life (due to work, illness, death or divorce, etc.).
BODY STATUS
- Body is “designed” to serve the purposes of dominating or seducing and can take almost any form, following whatever main image the person is primarily attached to (i.e.- athletic and powerful, youthful and innocent, sexual and alluring); generally, however, there are two types of body formations typical of this character structure:
1. The “overpowering type” which is inflated on top, “blown-up” looking, with a barreled chest, broad shoulders, and large head, while rigid and small in the pelvis, with small buttocks and thin legs, particularly the calves; or 2. The “seductive type” which is inflated in the pelvis (but numb to feelings there), with broad hips and hyperflexibility in the back, while deflated and immature in the chest area;
- Armoring is particularly marked in the chest, diaphragm, legs and shoulders;
- Eyes are highly charged, often large, and frequently gleaming or sparkling; in the dominating type, the eyes are penetrating and compelling; in the seductive type, they are soft and intriguing, cunning, dreamy or sleepy looking (“Bette Davis eyes”);
- Often, there is a pronounced split (correlates to a lack of integrity in the personality) between the head and the body (mature body, with a small child-like face and head, or visa versa); this split is facilitated by severe tension at the base of the skull and in the shoulder girdle, which holds the head tightly in place (“I must never lose my head.”);
- Arms tend to be immobilized and away from the body (due to the inflated chest and severe shoulder girdle tensions);
- Feet tend to be “pulled off the ground” and may be small; calves and thighs may be short and thin, even when the torso is heavy;
- Physical illnesses are often not felt or manifested until late in life due to extreme willfulness and numbness (later life problems may be in the hips, prostate, pelvis in general, or the heart);
- Spine may be twisted or fused and immobile;
- Chronic areas of tension: base of the skull, shoulder girdle, chest and rib cage, including the diaphragm, waist and abdominal muscles (which are often hard and clenched to pull sexual energy away from genitals), pelvic area in general, genitals specifically.
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Highly charged, with energy displaced and pulled upwards into the top half of the body and away from the pelvis;
- Eyes are particularly highly charged, used to penetrate, intimidate and/or seduce;
- Energy is directed outwardly to control, hook and dominate others, and directed inwardly to deny feelings in the self by contracting all feeling centers;
- Energy is not allowed to flow downwards, cut off by severe tensions in the pelvis, waist, diaphragm, shoulders and base of skull;
- Chakras (energy centers): Will Centers – (in the back of the body) are open; Crown - (spiritual connection) can be open and lopsided; can be collapsed; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) open, but exaggerated; Throat - (self-expression) contracted; Heart - (love feelings) contracted; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) partially contracted; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) severely contracted; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) contracted.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- The will is powerfully exerted to control others and to control feelings; feelings are alive in the body, however, but denied recognition by the mind;
- Feelings and the body are denigrated and not trusted, so neither are the external senses; therefore only what’s in one’s head, only one’s own ideas in the moment, are treated as valid and real;
- Power rather than pleasure is sought from life;
- The mind is the servant of the will in this structure, so reasoning can be dramatically inconsistent, though capable of brilliance; arguing both sides of a situation or mixing lies with truth is common if it suits a manipulative purpose to gain power or be “right”; one’s own lies are often believed; there is also a tendency to poor judgement and an inability to learn from mistakes;
- Pain is numbed, and genuine feelings are denied, but dramatic emotionality and false feelings are acted out to achieve some purpose, like intimidation or seduction;
- Fear of being wrong or of submitting to the will of others is extreme and is powerfully denied;
- Intuitive capacities of the mind are formidable, with very strong abilities to read what is going on inside of other people, although the understanding of the meaning of what is going on is often very distorted.
PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self due to a lack of integrity and treating the self and others as objects for manipulation and control;
- Lack of empathy or compassion and a lack of conscious feelings of remorse or guilt due to numbness defense (numbness is often augmented by alcohol and drug abuse);
- Craving for intensity and excessive stimulation to counteract numbness;
- Poor impulse control and an intolerance of boundaries and structure;
- Paranoia about being controlled or humiliated underlying an extreme need to be in control of feelings, others and all situations; intense fears of losing power, being defeated or helpless, and collapsing into desperate neediness (orality);
- Aggression is used as a defense against surrender to feelings (which are equated with weakness) or to the will of others;
- Powerful investment in and identification with idealized self-images; desperate need to be special and important;
- Main defenses: displacement, numbing, denial, acting out, rationalization, confusion;
- Typical masks: grandiosity, self-dramatization, outlandishness (“I am the one and only of my kind, the greatest, the best, the most, the first, the worst, the baddest”. “There’s nobody like me.”), exaggerated false sincerity (“I would never lie to you.”), the hero (“Only I have the power to save you.”), the guru (“Only I can take you to the light.”), the great promise giver (“I know what you want and I can give it to you.”), the courtesan (“I will control you by letting you use me…on my terms.”), the chameleon (“I can be whatever the situation calls for in order to get my way.”); Idealized Self-images: “Don Juan” or “Venus” (the God or Goddess of Eros), “the Godfather” or “Black Widow” (“I’ll make you an offer you can’t refuse.” “I always get what I want.”), the “blowfish/monster” (“I am a very scary, dangerous person, so be afraid of me.”);
- Childhood history may include: restlessness and hyperactivity, dangerous behavior (i.e. - fire-setting), severe tantrums, spectacular achievements (in school, sports or the arts) coupled with spectacular self-sabotage or delinquency, cruelty to animals or other children, premature sexual behavior, “troublemaker” persona, inappropriate lack of fear and a lack of crying when hurt.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- People are primarily related to as objects, as sources of “narcissistic supply” to support images of power and specialness; since others are objectified, anything can be said or done to get what is wanted from another without concern for the other’s feelings or well-being;
- A “divide and conquer” approach is often taken to gain control of others, individually and in groups, pitting people against each other, then sometimes taking the role of mediator or peacemaker;
- Eccentric, radical, dramatic, unpredictable or extreme behavior and appearance are often used to gain attention and/or to keep others off balance;
- The need to have “followers” is felt as an essential reason to engage with others; it is through the “needing to be needed” that the person with this character structure maintains his or her feeling of power, while denying the inherent dependency (orality) of the dynamic at the same time;
- Antisocial behavior may be engaged in with very little provocation, though it may be seen as justified by the person in the moment; these actions are not followed by feelings of remorse afterwards; only getting caught or confined is of concern, not hurting others or the self;
- This person looks directly at others, but doesn’t really see them as real (whereas the schizoid character sees but doesn’t look!);
- Sex is seen as a means to an end, or a contest, often used to gain power, not pleasure, or to express revenge feelings; sex is related to as a conquest of the other person and as further proof of one’s prowess;
- In men, maintaining an erection is more important than having an orgasm, and extreme pride is taken in the penis; in women, likewise, being seen as sexually powerful and technically skilled is more important than sensual or orgasmic pleasure; feelings in the genitals are greatly diminished, so performances of great endurance are possible, but genuine surrender to sexual feelings and orgasm is experienced as humiliating or terrifying.
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “I must never surrender.” “If I surrender, I will be helpless.”
- “Everything is a lie, including love, including me.” “Whatever I believe in the moment is the truth.”
- “I must never be wrong.” “If I am wrong, I will be humiliated.”
- “I must get others to need me, so I can control them, in order to get what I need.”
- “If I acknowledge my feelings, I will be weak and get abused.” “The world is an abusive place.”
HIGHER SELF ASPECTS
- Great leadership and executive qualities and capacities to bring people with differences together in a harmonious effort;
- Strong abilities to guide and inspire others to accomplish their chosen tasks in life and see their own specialness without competitiveness or separation;
- True innovators and adventurers able to travel “the road not taken”, or “to boldly go where no one has gone before”, without recklessness or excess;
- A genuine seeker of truth, with genuine humility, honesty, loyalty and unwavering integrity;
- A truly big heart full of love and fearlessness to surrender to the flow of feelings, life and the Higher Self.
THERAPUETIC TASKS
Develop the capacity for empathy and compassion by reversing the numbing of pain in the body and the denial of feelings in general;
Deflate the grandiose self-images by facing their falseness and discovering the longing for truth, sincerity and integrity in the self;
Deflate the overcharged upper half of the body and become grounded and energized in the lower half of the body, allowing for the experience of real pleasure and safety;
Release the tensions at the base of the skull and shoulders, and in the diaphragm and abdomen, allowing for the flow of energy between the mind, heart and genitals;
Become aware of the feelings of emptiness from trying to “win”, “be right”, “be on top”, “get revenge”, “have it my way”, etc., when the real desire is to be able to trust;
Face the horror and confusion in childhood that came from being lied to, used and manipulated by the parents that the child was dependent on and helpless to defend against; confront the illusions that the abuse by the parents meant the child was special, powerful or bad;
Express and release the feelings of hurt and rage at the betrayal by the parents that are hidden by the mask of pride and grandiosity and the fear of humiliation, and discover that those feelings are not devastating to the self now;
Acknowledge, feel and release the early dependency feelings and neediness underneath the fear of collapsing and falling down;
Release the addiction to intensity, overstimulation and exaggerated expansiveness by experiencing the true aliveness of surrendering to feelings;
Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality (child, adult, higher self), opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
Experience pleasure and expansion and recognize and express one’s higher self aspects with less fear of being humiliated;
Primary negative expression that needs release: “My way!”
Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to trust.”
THERAPEUTIC APPROACH
Establish an honest and sincere environment being clear and direct about the nature and boundaries of the therapeutic relationship, understanding that this person will test them to discover where the hidden agendas and lies are; do not make promises about the outcome of therapy;
Engage playfully with this person’s challenging manner to begin confronting his or her efforts to be in control of the therapy and the therapist; it is important to establish a balance in which control feels and is shared, but not at the expense of the therapy; allowing acting out against the therapy or therapist will undermine the person’s feelings of trust and safety, which are minimal to begin with;
Encourage the person to talk about the betrayals he or she has experienced, and the desire for revenge, beginning with current circumstances, then tracing back to related childhood experiences; help the person face the reality that the desire for revenge is a cover for the feelings of helplessness and impotent fury he or she felt in childhood when they were being used by parents;
Use rolling to begin softening up the rigidity in the chest and to open up to feelings; use kicking, including on the roller, to begin opening up the pelvis; use massage of the neck, shoulders and chest to soften up the armoring there and to begin establishing contact with the person, providing an experience that is physically intimate, but not sexualized or abusive; use hitting and vocalization to access the real rage underneath the “blowfish” mask; use grounding and vibrating to get energy moving downwards, reversing the upward displacement; generally, a person employing this character structure will resist the bodywork early on, and maybe for a long time, experiencing it as “embarrassing”, “silly”, “not what I need”, etc., and when the feelings do start to come they may feel humiliated afterwards; acknowledge those feelings and explain the reasons for the body work, but let the person know that it’s his or her decision whether or not to do it;
In group, this person will want to “take over”, one way or the other, by challenging the therapist’s role or approach, by trying to be the smartest, funniest, most advanced, most dramatic member, etc., or by being disruptive; it is risky to directly deflate this mask with confrontation publicly, because it will feel like a re-creation of the intense feelings of humiliation from childhood, but it may be necessary to maintain the integrity of the person and the group; as an alternative to confrontation, openly support the genuine special qualities of the person and his or her genuine importance to the group; remember that this person carries a deep longing to be genuine and to constructively bring people together;
Tell this person the truth to counteract the belief that everyone lies; with the highly developed intuitive capacities that this person has, he or she will readily sense things going on inside of the therapist, but often misinterpret their meaning; within the boundaries established, it’s helpful to answer personal questions, especially about how the therapist is feeling in the moment; it is also helpful to this person to hear about the reasons for what the therapist is choosing to do, and to have diagnostic updates, encouraging the person to join with the therapist in assessing their progress;
When the underlying feelings of helplessness, dependency and abandonment first begin to surface in this person, it will be a very tenuous moment; even after a long-standing positive relationship, a person using this defensive structure can “turn on you”; impulses to quit therapy or attack the therapist may be acted out; acknowledge that the person always has the power to leave therapy, but that acting out against the therapist is not allowed; give a clear and compassionate diagnostic understanding of what is going on, and “leave the door open” for this person to come back if they want to;
When this person’s powerful feelings of rage have been released, and the body has become more supple, deep grieving may emerge, along with the true courage this person has, as well as a deep capacity to give and receive love;
Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their integrity, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs;
In the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance, based on their own new experiences, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback.
DEFINITIONS
Acting Out: a discharge of tension, impulses or feelings through action that attempts to alter or control the environment as if that environment and those in it were part of a transferential (from childhood) conflict or threat.
Denial: a primitive defense consisting of an attempt to disavow the existence of unpleasant reality.
Confusion: a defense that creates a disturbance of consciousness in which awareness of time, place, or person is unclear; this also serves the purpose of keeping others, perceived as a threat, off balance;
Displacement: the process by which energy, feelings or impulses are transferred from one idea, experience, place in the body or object to another; the substitution of one object for another as the target of feeling.
Numbing: a defense mechanism that causes insensitivity to feelings and sensations in general, and in particular, pain.
Rationalization: making a thing appear reasonable, when otherwise its irrationality would be evident; meant to act as a screen, to cover up ideas or actions intended to gratify an unconscious need.
THE RIGID CHARACTER STRUCTURE
PRESENTING PROBLEMS (when first coming to therapy)
- Unwillingness to fall too deeply in love or engage in a long-term, monogamous love relationship;
- Series of broken relationships, marriages or extramarital affairs in which either some sexual or emotional gratification is experienced, but never the two together with the same person;
- Drivenness, competitiveness, restlessness, hyperactivity, relentless need to “look good” and “achieve”;
- Feelings of unfulfillment in spite of substantial success in work-life; never feeling satisfied;
- Intense fears around vulnerability and betrayal and concerns about looking foolish;
- Hysterical outbursts, psychosomatic symptoms, insomnia;
- Primary falling fear: falling forward (on one’s face);
- Primary holding pattern: holding back;
- Primary longing: to surrender;
- Primary survival struggle: the right to love sexually.
EARLY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS
(Developmental Period – 40th to 60th Months)
- Child’s natural erotic strivings and expressions, including masturbation, were greeted with anxiety, rejection, severe disapproval or punishment by sexually repressed parents;
- The parent of the opposite sex reacted to the child’s amorous advances, flirtatiousness and romantic fantasies with rejection, possessiveness, or overstimulation;
- The parent of the same sex vicariously encouraged the child to express that parent’s repressed sexual feelings (mother dressing daughter up in “sexy” outfits, father encouraging son to be a “ladies’ man”, encouraging coy, provocative behavior, etc.), or that parent inappropriately confided in the child about the details of the marital relationship;
- The parent of the opposite sex was significantly absent from the child’s life during the 3rd to 5th year of life (due to work, illness, death or divorce, etc.);
- A major trauma (severe illness, surgery, accident, etc.) occurred in the child’s 3rd to 5th year of life.
BODY STATUS
- Though the body is generally integrated and harmonious, with body parts proportionate, there is often rigidity and excessive uprightness in the posture;
- Rigidly held straight back and neck (correlates to pride);
- Pelvis is pulled back, while the chest is pushed out with exaggerated authority or seductiveness (“You can want me, but you can’t have me.”);
- The jaw is often set in a look of determination;
- In men, the face may be sharply masculine and very hard-looking; in women the face may be doll-like;
- Physical armoring tends to be superficial and can move around; there are spasticities in the extensor and flexor muscles that create the rigidity in the posture;
- Walking or gesturing tends to be sexual and flirtatious, or very businesslike;
- History of unexplained psychosomatic (“hysterical”) symptoms that appear and disappear without any apparent physical cause (vertigo, fainting, loss of vision, skin rashes, allergies, hyperventilating, heart palpitations, paralysis, etc.);
- Chronic areas of tension: the long muscles of the body, inner thigh muscles, vaginal muscles in women.
ENERGETIC CONDITION
- Strong, vigorous energy charge, but held back somewhat at the periphery of the feeling side of the body, allowing for the movement of energy internally and through the will, but with a controlled receptivity;
- Energy is often directed to “getting things done”, often with some hyperactivity; the “rest” rhythm is resisted, while all of the will centers are active and open;
- There is little capacity to bind energy with armoring, so this person is prone to the development of psychosomatic symptoms;
- Chakras (energy centers): Crown - (spiritual connection) varies, can be open or closed; Third Eye - (intuitive abilities) developed and open; Throat - (self-expression) partially blocked; Heart - (love feelings) developed, but partially blocked; Solar Plexus - (universal wisdom) partially opened and asymmetrical; Sexual - (pleasure and creativity) developed, but partially blocked; Base – (grounding and connection to physical life) open.
OPERATING MODES OF THE MIND, EMOTIONS AND WILL
- Love and erotic feelings are strong, but are controlled by the mind and will; there are intense fears of having one’s “heart broken” in love;
- Surrendering to another is deemed unacceptable and collapse is unthinkable;
- The mind is developed, with an efficient, but unyielding intellect that is trusted much more than feelings or impulses; thinking tends to be very linear, with good concentration, but little capacity for abstraction; creativity is controlled;
- Pride is the driving force in this structure and great efforts of the will are directed towards performance and outer appearances (always being attractive and never appearing vulnerable or foolish);
- Aggression, is generally expressed through competitiveness in socially acceptable ways, without much inhibition.
PSYCHOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING
- An inadequate sense of self caused by the separation of love feelings from sexual feelings;
- A strong Reality Principle that dominates a mistrusted Pleasure Principle;
- Intense pride and competitiveness with an excessive focus on accomplishments, appearances and performing for self-esteem;
- Feelings of emptiness, boredom and dissatisfaction caused by the resistance to receiving from and surrendering to others and feelings;
- Passivity and submissiveness are intensely avoided and experienced as weakness, while stubbornness and rigidity are seen as strength;
- Repressed sexual feelings are pathologically expressed through psychosomatic symptoms, in frequent sexual activity without any love involvement (“flings” or affairs), restlessness, hyperactivity or “flighty” behavior”, or diverted into ambitiousness in the material world (“No time for love in my busy life.”);
- Unresolved Oedipal conflicts are repressed, causing deep longings for the opposite sex, but with persistent fears of betrayal; there is intense competitiveness with the same sex, but with fears of retaliation (“castration anxiety”);
- Constant attention-seeking, trendiness, and a need for compliments pervade the personality;
- Main defenses: repression, sublimation, somatization, identification;
- Typical masks: the flirt or tease (“I’m available…not!”), the alluring temptress (“I’ll give you my magnificent beauty and unimaginable sensual pleasures…maybe if you’re lucky!”), the real man (“I take what I want!”), the serious man of business (“There’s no time for fooling around or getting involved. There’s work to be done.”), the “Barbie doll” (“I’ll be the perfect girlfriend, cheerleader or trophy wife, the ‘Perfect Ten’, just for you!”), the proud one (“At least I’ve got my pride.”), the high society lady or gentleman (“Manners, formality and civility are all that really matters.”);
- Childhood history may include driven perfectionism and competitiveness in learning situations, extreme frustration around any perceived failures (“sore losers”), constant participation in activities that are socially approved of (sports, school plays, musical training, religion, etc.), constant attention-seeking through performing, intense same-sex sibling rivalry, psychosomatic symptoms (allergic reactions, fainting, nosebleeds, etc.); early “dating” or going steady and a preoccupation with romance and gossip.
INTERPERSONAL AND SEXUAL FUNCTIONING
- Relationships often exhibit a push-pull quality, especially around sexual contact, with a constant seeking out of sexual situations and simultaneous flight from them; often one person is chosen as a sexual partner, while another is chosen as a love partner;
- Relationships are often sought out with people who are seen as having status in socially acceptable ways (the "checklist"); others are often related to as either competitors (to be defeated) or suitors (to be seduced);
- There tends to be a superficial or formal quality to interactions, though often with undertones of intrigue (gossiping or a soap opera kind of drama as the style of communicating), argumentativeness, or there may be an hysterical quality to self-expression;
- Something is always held back in relationships to maintain interest and mystery and an “edge”;
- Sex is primarily sought after for validation of one’s attractiveness and prowess and secondarily for pleasure; sexual energy is often re-routed into external or material accomplishments;
- Sexual desires are often experienced as incestuous;
- Sexual pleasure and full orgasm are possible, but often avoided out of the fear of surrendering and appearing vulnerable; orgasms, when allowed, may take a long time and a lot of effort.
PREDOMINANT NEGATIVE CORE BELIEFS
- “If I love, I will be vulnerable.” “I will get love by appearing invulnerable and attractive.”
- “If I desire sexually, I will be rejected.” “I will get sexual gratification by controlling my sexual longings.”
- “I will accept praise, attention and accomplishments as a substitute for love and pleasure.”
- “No one surrenders to another.” “I will survive by never surrendering.”
- “The world is a rejecting, competitive place.”
HIGHER SELF ASPECTS
- Tremendous passion and connection to the sensuality of human relationships, with a true appreciation for and capacity to express the wonder of coming together physically in love with another;
- Great capacity to let go and surrender to the flow of love, to fall in love with life and with others;
- Genuine capacities to make and sustain commitments;
- Strong organizational skills combined with flexibility, patience and acceptance of new approaches to situations;
- A deep appreciation for the beauty of physical life, and sensibilities to integrate the elements of form to create beauty.
THERAPUETIC TASKS
- Develop the capacity to experience love and sexual passion at the same time, connecting the heart and genitals energetically;
- Bring into consciousness and release the guilt feelings and judgements for having had loving desires for the parent of the opposite sex, and reverse the repression of those desires caused by fears of retaliation by the parent of the same sex;
- Develop the capacity to yield to others and to surrender to feelings without fears of becoming weak, vulnerable or losing face;
- Develop the capacity to experience the full pleasure of sexual release without ego control, and the joy of falling (falling in love, falling asleep, etc.);
- Become able to make and sustain commitments without fears of being rejected;
- Relax the fierce competitiveness and hyperactivity and constant need to prove oneself;
- Develop flexibility in the body, particularly the back of the body and neck (will centers) and the tensor and flexor muscles; develop natural sensual movements rather than exaggerated gestures of sexual “come on”;
- Develop flexibility in approaches to life’s tasks and relationships, relinquishing the exaggerated pride and need to hold back;
- Eliminate psychosomatic symptoms by making the connection with the repressed impulses behind them, and allowing those impulses to be felt;
- Become aware of and open up to the true depth and beauty of the self that exists beyond the superficiality of appearances and performances;
- Acknowledge and experience the different aspects of the personality, opening the lines of communication between them, while establishing an identification with the adult self;
- Become aware of the erroneous conclusions, images and beliefs of the mask/false self, and the limitations and unreality of the idealized self image;
- Experience pleasure and expansion, and recognize and express one’s Higher Self aspects with less fear of embarrassment;
- Primary raw negative expression that needs release: “I won’t surrender!”
- Primary positive self-affirmation that needs assertion: “I have the right to love.”
THERAPEUTIC APPROACH
- Establish a respectful and professional environment, acknowledging the person’s genuine accomplishments in life, and the seriousness and concern for how he or she has successfully managed many aspects of adult living; also acknowledge the confusion and disappointment the person feels that in spite of these achievements, he or she is bored, lonely, restless and dissatisfied;
- Engage the person’s subtly provocative manner with warmth and an accepting neutrality; do not initially confront any seductive behavior or offer praise for superficial attributes;
- Use unsatisfying experiences in adult relationships to make connections with childhood experiences, particularly to illuminate times in which the child may have felt disappointment and rejection by the parent of the opposite sex, or an uncomfortable possessiveness by that parent (i.e. – not allowing dating as a teenager); also uncover memories in which the parent of the same sex may have shown moralistic disapproval towards, competitiveness with or vicarious involvement in the person’s young love life (i.e. - being overly involved with the teenager’s boyfriends or girlfriends);
- Encourage the person to give examples of having had his or her heart broken in relationships, and the vows they may have made secretly to never be vulnerable again; surface the controlled longing to “have it all” (love and passion) in one relationship, but the fear of surrendering to that longing or believing in its possibility;
- Use stretching, bending, massaging, rolling and vibrating to loosen the rigidly held back and neck, and the spasticities in the tensor and flexor muscles; use pelvic thrusts and rotations to release the holding back in that area and to allow for the experience of pleasure moving through the pelvis; use hitting and kicking to express aggression and pride and refusal to surrender; use massage and hands-on touch over the heart to help opening up to the love feelings, and use visualizations to help the person focus on connecting their heart center to their sexual center; this person will experience the body work as embarrassing, so a professional and technical explanation of its usefulness can be helpful;
- Analyze the meanings of psychosomatic symptoms, their timing, the part of the body affected, etc., and make connections to guilt or anxiety about sexual feelings, competitive impulses, etc.;
- Explore hidden and emerging feelings, desires and fantasies towards the therapist as a love object in a matter-of-fact way, including using dream interpretation, to decrease guilt and anxiety about the feelings, to normalize them, and to begin undoing the pride defense that anticipates rejection or exploitation; when transferences are made to the therapist (i.e. – accusing the therapist of being seductive or rejecting), clarify them as they occur;
- As this person’s heart and genitals become connected and the powerful onrush of integrated love feelings comes forward, he or she will become very sensitive to any perceived insults to their pride or any abuse of their perceived vulnerability; simultaneously, because of the openness, the person will feel exhilarated yet relaxed, confident yet supple, secure yet not rigid; re-assure the person that those new feeling combinations are real, and that now in fact he or she is truly not vulnerable, because of the flexibility and strength of being open;
- Help the person recognize their Higher Self aspects, especially their capacity to love fully, to see that their gifts are there even when hidden behind the mask, and that although they have a wounded aspect in their personality, they need not identify with that aspect in order for it to get the help it needs; in the later stages of therapy, as the person drops the mask and releases the raw negative feelings, fear of pleasure and expansion must be addressed as it comes up with reassurance, based on their own new experiences, that they can tolerate the energy now and that the fear is not a regression or a setback.
DEFINITIONS
Hysterical Personality: (also known as “Histrionic or Repressed Personality) vain, attention-seeking, sexually provocative, dramatic presentation of the self, with a history of many vague symptoms, chronic feelings of disappointment, excitability and exaggerated emotionality; primary repressed conflicts center around genital incestuous strivings.
Identification: the process by which one either blurs or eliminates the distinction between the self and others by extending his or her identity into another, borrowing one’s identity from another, or fusing identities with another (merging).
Oedipal Complex: the dilemma of early childhood, occurring after the 4th year, in which the genitally charged child focuses on the parent of the opposite sex as a primary love object, and comes into internal conflict over perceived competition with the parent of the same sex.
Repression: the process of banishing from consciousness ideas or impulses that are deemed unacceptable.
Somatization: bodily disorders arising from deep-seated emotional and mental conflicts through which repressed instinctual tendencies gain expression.
Sublimation: the modification of an instinctual impulse, expressed in such a way as to conform to the demand of societal norms.
posted by peter loffredo, lcsw at 6/22/2009 0 comments links to this post
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