Psychoanalytic therapy aims to explore the hidden emotions, repressed childhood memories, fantasies and thoughts affecting present behavior and relations of the client. The ultimate gain is a sound sense of self, contentment at a higher state of consciousness and self-mastery. The history of the psychoanalytical practice is not only long but it has been evolving ever since S. Freud’s work in psychoanalysis from 1915s up to present. Moving from the divan (couch) to psychoanalytic therapy wherein the client is relocated to the armchair facing the therapist and further on to the developmental approach founded by S. Freud’s daughter Anna …
Category: Psychology
The practice of psychology had started with two traditional schools: psychoanalytic and cognitive psychology from which further derivatives and styles of therapies would be formulated in tandem with advanced research in cognitive science and developmental psychology. Freud’s pioneering work with psychoanalysis at the turn of the 20th century and the Jungian approach to the unconscious, both prepared the field for psychological practices, primarily paving the way for psychoanalytical therapy in the 1930s. The next major school – Cognitive Behavioral psychology was founded in the late sixties by the developmentalists Bruner and Neisser. Here is a simplified outline …
“Murmuring, noisy, intuitive, singing, liberating, the conversation made with oneself is the characteristic of all human beings” states psychologist and anthropologist Victor Rosenthal, in his recent book Somebody is Talking. From an early age on, one speaks to himself without any external trigger, relentlessly accommodates and comforts himself … in the form of talking aloud either through objects or directly with oneself… It allows us to reflect, to come back to our self while distinguishing us from our environment, and helps us to develop our sense of discernment for the good and the bad. This kind of inner dialogue …
The impact of our perceptual patterns on the way we navigate the “self” has always been a cornerstone in understanding human behavior. Long before neuroscience started thought experiments on the nature reality, W. James put forward “our view of the world is truly shaped by what we decide to perceive” and that, in effect, shapes the world around us. C. Jung, firmly believing “unconscious is our great guide”, he proclaimed that the information stored in the unconscious plays up in decoding the world, and the manifestation of the self out there. It happens in daily life that we know …
“Resilience across writing is a good way to get out of the fog and light up your life” says Boris Cyrulnik, neuropsychiatrist and writer, having lost both his parents at the age of five, is a living model of how one develops resilience and can overcome the major dramas of life. When the word “resilience” was first used in physics it referred to a body’s ability to absorb an impact. Transformed to the human psyche, it is the capacity to transcend from traumatic experiences. Brené Brown defines resilience as a character quality “it is how we fold our experiences …
Happiness is defined for ages since the beginning of time. It is a lifelong quest for us human beings. For some it is an activity, for another it is acceptance, for George Sand it is to love and be loved, for Marcus Aurelius it depends on the quality of your thoughts which should be sound and aligned with virtue…and for some people happiness is sustained simply by helping the other…The list of definitions is much longer than what is written here. To bring it down to the practical habitual life, many psychological studies were done on people who could sustain …
The French Nobel laureate writer Rolland, having read Freud as early as 1909, long before Europe recognized his seminal work on the human psyche, regarded Freud as a fellow pilgrim on this black continent, courageous and genius navigator, and recognized the huge power of Freud’s findings at the turn of the century in 1909. When he later visited Freud and his daughter Anna Freud in their apartment in Vienna in 1924, they would exchange their views on the 19th century including the topics such as the power of man’s instincts, morality, fear, peace of mind, and hypocrisy. Rolland would describe …
“Sacred sounds charge the cortex of the brain and stimulate health and wellness.” —Dr. Alfred Tomatis Fifty years ago, the French scientist Dr. Alfred Tomatis was asked to find out the reasons for fatigue and lack of vigor among the monks in a Benedictine monastery. He found that the monks who regularly chanted Gregorian Chants had exceptional memories, coupled with higher energy levels, compared to those who did not chant. Following this research, Tomatis developed his method of sound therapy addressing children with a range of childhood disorders including auditory processing problems, dyslexia, attention deficit disorders, learning disabilities, and autism. …
I have been pondering on the question: Is compassion inborn or can it be acquired through learning and practicing in a lifetime? Though I easily recognize compassion when I see it in another person, it is difficult for me to evaluate how compassionate I am as a person or if the degree of my compassion varies depending on the context. When I observe the people around me, I often notice that the ones who are compassionate tend to be relatively nonjudgmental and altruistic. Usually they are non-selective on whom to act with compassion. For example, a friend of mine …
For most people being mentally healthy means being up, alive and happy. For they know that mental health needs taking care equally as the body does. Going on being in the midst of thousands of thoughts crossing the mind every day and different shades of emotions coloring one’s mood, all the while being exposed to numerous stimuli from the external environment how can the human being keep his or her mind clear, healthy and in well order? Here are the 5 things they do which bring them the “mental wellness”: Attention and mindfulness: The typical practice is taking 3 minutes …
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