The unconscious/subconscious aspects of the individual have long held fascination for many.
This blog is tilted the Ideal Ego in recognition of the Ideal Ego’s role in symbolic identification. While I await a potential offer in a Masters of Art therapy, I plan to share my thoughts, interests and internal framework that will help shape my experience of learning should I be successful in gaining a place in the course.
This simple extract encapsulates the way Lacan reads Freud (I much favour Lacan’s interpretations and understanding of Freud, than Freud). Freud uses three distinct terms for the activity that drives people to act ethically: he speaks of ideal ego (Idealich), ego-ideal (Ich-Ideal) and superego (Ueberich).
Lacan introduces a precise distinction between these three terms: the "ideal ego" stands for the idealized self-image of the subject (the way I would like to be, I would like others to see me); the Ego-Ideal is the agency whose gaze I try to impress with my ego image, the big Other who watches over me and propels me to give my best, the ideal I try to follow and actualize; and the superego is this same agency in its revengeful, sadistic, punishing, aspect. The underlying structuring principle of these three terms is clearly Lacan's triad Imaginary-Symbolic-Real: ideal ego is imaginary, what Lacan calls the "small other," the idealized double-image of my ego; Ego-Ideal is symbolic, the point of my symbolic identification, the point in the big Other from which I observe (and judge) myself; superego is real, the cruel and insatiable agency which bombards me with impossible demands and which mocks my failed attempts to meet them, the agency in the eyes of which I am all the more guilty, the more I try to suppress my "sinful" strivings and meet its demands. The old cynical Stalinist motto about the accused at the show trials who professed their innocence ("the more they are innocent, the more they deserve to be shot") is superego at its purest.
Through the modality of experiential creative therapy I hypothesise should the Ego-Ideal be nurtured..... it will learn to ignore the superego and finally be free of harsh cruel criticisms and allow the person to live in the moment freely.
What do you think?
No comments:
Post a Comment