It is obvious that I would eventually find my own illness in psychology books. I had already foreseen this myself. But it was not without surprise that I came across it, precise and undeniable, as if smiling enthusiastically at the first formal contact. I analyze its symptoms and conclude: I am sick. The shrewd psychiatrist convinces me: I am suffering from a rare disease, I need help, I must overcome my resistance, accept it, and run to the doctor’s office. If I have humility, if I make a sincere effort, I can be converted into a normal human being. What a thing… I have identified so much with the disease that I would gladly provide a smiling photo of myself to enrich with an illustration the encyclopedia of mental disorders. But how ugly is the name of my disease! how repulsive! I admit that I suffer, that I am very, very sad, but why this nominal insult? Surely, because the term of terrible taste or the terrible taste of the term accurately defines an animal of my species to the specialist.
Tag: psychology
Although It Is Useful to Try to Attribute Meaning…
Although it is useful to try to attribute meaning to the unconscious mental manifestations, it is necessary to establish a scale of importance for what is being discovered; otherwise, the mind throws the analyst into terrible confusion. It is a simple mistake to believe that the mind only reveals that which occupies the position of greatest momentary or extemporaneous relevance, that everything it evokes has a deep and very important meaning: a little attention and common sense is enough to verify this. If at times it evokes images of unquestionable significance, at others it only seems to be playing. So let it play…
The Creation of Imaginary Friends
As Fernando Pessoa wisely recommended, the creation of imaginary friends, the exercise of mental conversations that would never be carried out in life, the realization of the impossible by the mind, all this, besides the benefits from the infinite novelties, brings invaluable contributions to the organization of reasoning. It is a practice that tests limits, exposes counterpoints, broadens horizons, and fills the need arising from the limitation of experience. The mind is strengthened because it has exercised and learned more, thought takes on more solid contours, and the habit, with time, becomes a healthy, pleasurable, and irreplaceable psychic and existential need.
Although Much Is to Be Gained and Something Can Be Learned…
Although much is to be gained and something can be learned about the mind through dream interpretation, one must be very careful not to fall into the tempting stupidity of rationalizing the non-rationalizable. It is certainly very useful to be aware of what goes on in states where consciousness volatilizes; there is much to be learned and the exercise is quite stimulating. What one must not do is succumb to the logical need to attribute meaning to spontaneous, unpredictable, irrational manifestations. A careful study, with time, points out connections, coincidences, and perhaps one or another circumstantial or emotional archetype particular to the analyzed mind. The rest varies as experience, temperament, real-life circumstances, recent events, and also the unlimited imagination vary. Considering all this, it must be admitted that, although often misused, this is an intriguing study, to say the least.