Are we all neurotic?

[coberst]

Are we all neurotic?

My reading tells me that we are all neurotic and some of us are so neurotic that we cannot function satisfactorily in normal society and are then considered to be mentally ill.

]b]All humans repress aspects of their life that might cause anxiety. This repression is called neurosis.[/b] It is the constant conflict wherein the ego constantly struggles to hold down thoughts that will cause anxiety. Freud discovered the unconscious in life and there exists a constant conflict between the unconscious and the ego. The ego keeps that in the unconscious that can cause anxiety from becoming conscious.

Humans are the only species to be self conscious. We dread death and repress that dread because we cannot live with a constant consciousness of our mortality.

Conflict is the essential characteristic of humanness.

Regression to animal existence is one answer to the quest to transcend separateness. Wo/man can try to eliminate that which makes her human but also tortures her; s/he can discard reason and self-consciousness. What is noteworthy here is that if everybody does it, it ain’t fiction; anything everyone does is reality, even if it is a virtual reality. For most people, reason and reality is nothing more than public consensus. “One never ‘loses one’s mind’ when nobody else’s mind differs from one’s own.”

Regression to our animal form of instinctual behavior happens when we replace our lost animal instincts with our own fully developed symbolic instincts; we can then program our self to uncritically follow these culturally formed instincts without further consideration. We can then do like the elephant parade; we hold the tail of the one in front of us with our trunk and march in file without any other thoughts to disturb our tranquility.

“The great characteristic of our time is that we know everything important about human nature that there is to know. Yet never has there been an age in which so little knowledge is securely possessed, so little a part of common understanding. The reason is precisely the advance of specialization, the impossibility of making safe general statements, which has led to a general imbecility.”

The steel worker on the girder

learned not to look down, and does his work

And there are words we have learned

Not to look at,

Not to look for substance

Below them. But we are on the verge

Of vertigo.

George Oppen

Norman Brown informs us that to comprehend Freud one must understand “repression”. “In the new Freudian perspective, the essence of society is repression of the individual, the essence of the individual is repression of the self.”

Freud discovered the importance of repression when he discovered the meaning of the “mad” symptoms of the mentally deranged, plus the meaning of dreams, and thirdly the everyday happenings regarded as slips of the tongue, errors, and random thoughts. He concludes that dreams, mental derangements, and common every day errors (Freudian slips) have meaningful causes that can be explained. Meaningful is the key word here.

Since these psychic phenomena are unconscious we must accept that we have motivation to action with a purpose for which we are unconscious (involuntary purposes). This inner nature of which we are completely unaware leads to Freud’s definition of psychoanalysis as “nothing more than the discovery of the unconscious in mental life.”

Freud discovered that sapiens have unconscious causes which are hidden from her because they are disowned and hidden by the conscious self. The dynamic relationship between the unconscious and conscious life is a constant battle and psychoanalysis is a science of this mental conflict.

The rejection of an idea which is one’s very own and remains so is repression. The essence of repression is in the fact that the individual refuses to recognize this reality of her very own nature. This nature becomes evident when it erupts into consciousness only in dreams or neurotic symptoms or by slips of the tongue.

The unconscious is illuminated only when it is being repressed by the conscious mind. It is a process of psychic conflict. “We obtain our theory of the unconscious from the theory of repression.” Freud’s hypothesis of the repressed unconscious results from the conclusion that it is common to all humans. This is a phenomenon of everyday life; neurosis is common to all humans.

Quotes from Ernest Becker, Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction Denial of Death

[Virtual Particle]

If a fear of death were fundamental, then less animal’s babies and human babies would die from engaging in events that result in death. Fear of death is really a learned behavior one natural conclusion m made by children when they become aware of death is that, it is akin to pain. Therefore, death is the most painful experience one can have which is not always true. Freud's methodology implies a blank slate theory of human development with no "Hard drive," with basic programming (DOS for example). Clearly there are issues with such a model; this because, if in fact there is information encoded in DNA, that relates to thought processes, to the higher animal the DNA forms, therapy needs to address this information differently than if it did not exist at all.

The truth is most lower animals are born with all the information they need to survive and it is only in the more advanced, that new born’s need care. I submit that this information is not gone from higher forms of life but rather in a recessive albeit unconscious state.

Fear of pain is more likely the culprit as the transition from womb to child ready for school. In the womb every need is met and once a child is born, a balance has to be struck in relation to pleasure and pain. Creating a balance between being on Earth and being on Earth inside a womb can actually be challenging. Freud assigned sexuality and fear of death only (for the most part) as motivators, but never considered, not only what information exists innately in the brain designed to aid in survival (potentially the unconscious), but also the individuals experiences prior to being born.

Any thoughts?

[coberst]

Aristotle said that all men seek happiness. Freud said that the goal of the pleasure-principle is happiness. Man’s desire for happiness sets at odds to the reality-principle. It is the reality-principle that propels the world into tomorrow. Humans naturally seek what they wish but “reality imposes on human beings the necessity of renunciation of pleasures”.

Therein lay the rub and the rub is called repression.

Freud says that the whole edifice of psychoanalysis is constructed on the theory of repression—the essence of society is the repression of the individual--the essence of the individual is repression of him or her self—Freud’s theory is that the phenomena dreams, neurotic symptoms, and errors are caused—i.e. the principle of psychic determinism—they are meaningful because this means there is purpose or intention—“since the purport of these purposive expressions is generally unknown to the person whose purpose they express, Freud is driven to embrace the paradox that there are in a human being purposes of which he knows nothing, involuntary purpose”—i.e. unconscious ideas.

Neurosis is “the disease called man” Nietzsche. “Neurosis is an essential consequence of civilization or culture.” Brown

“Between “normality” and “abnormality” there is no qualitative but only a quantitative difference, based largely on the practical question of whether our neurosis is serious enough to incapacitate us for work.” The difference between “neurotic and healthy is only that the healthy have a socially useful form of neurosis.”

Freud defined psychoanalysis as “nothing more than discovery of the unconscious in mental life”—the other hypothesis is that “some unconscious ideas in a human being are incapable of becoming conscious to him in the ordinary way, because they are strenuously disowned and resisted by the conscious life”.

Norman Brown tells us that to comprehend Freud one must understand “repression”. “In the new Freudian perspective, the essence of society is repression of the individual, the essence of the individual is repression of the self.”

Freud discovered the importance of repression when he discovered the meaning of the “mad” symptoms of the mentally deranged, plus the meaning of dreams, and thirdly the everyday happenings regarded as slips of the tongue, errors, and random thoughts. He concludes that dreams, mental derangements, and common every day errors (Freudian slips) have meaningful causes that can be explained. Meaningful is the key word here.

Since these psychic phenomena are unconscious we must accept that we have motivation to action with a purpose for which we are unconscious (involuntary purposes). This inner nature of which we are completely unaware leads to Freud’s definition of psychoanalysis as “nothing more than the discovery of the unconscious in mental life.”

Freud discovered that sapiens have unconscious causes which are hidden from her because they are disowned and hidden by the conscious self. The dynamic relationship between the unconscious and conscious life is a constant battle and psychoanalysis is a science of this mental conflict.

The rejection of an idea which is one’s very own and remains so is repression. The essence of repression is in the fact that the individual refuses to recognize this reality of her very own nature. This nature becomes evident when it erupts into consciousness only in dreams or neurotic symptoms or by slips of the tongue.

The unconscious is illuminated only when it is being repressed by the conscious mind. It is a process of psychic conflict. “We obtain our theory of the unconscious from the theory of repression.” Freud’s hypothesis of the repressed unconscious results from the conclusion that it is common to all humans. This is a phenomenon of everyday life; neurosis is common to all humans.

Dreams are normal phenomena and being that the structure of dreams is common to neurotics and normal people the dream is also neurotic. “Between “normality” and “abnormality” there is no qualitative but only quantitative difference, based largely on the practical question of whether our neurosis is serious enough to incapacitate us for work…the doctrine of the universal neurosis of mankind is the psychoanalytical analogue of the theological doctrine of original sin.”

Quotes from “Life against Death: The Psychoanalytical Meaning of History” Norman O. Brown

[Virtual Particle]

The Roman Empire fell because human nature wants very much to get back to the womb. Is it normal or realistic to be carried around, fed and have every other need provided for; sure in the womb. In Feuds day the idea that a child in the womb was capable of understanding there surroundings was altogether dismissed, these days that is simply unrealistic. People do not repress they way they used to and the inherent way society addresses such issues has also changed substantially. One really good example is the actually patients that Freud treated, I mean have you seen the artist rendering of there faces and the explanations why they looked the way they did? There are those who feel that Freud actually addressed the transition from agrarian society to city- dwelling. In other words, many behaviors would have existed then, due to the degree of separateness, which was inherent in agrarian cultures and was inappropriate with respect to living in European city in Freud’s day (all his patients were hysterical). By today’s standards what was done to these women would be considered criminal today and in that regard, there have also been many other changes. Sigmund Freud placed much emphasis upon the conclusion that psychotherapy was used to develop different coping mechanisms, the result of which would alleviate symptoms and/or complaints. To several of his peers he seemed almost obsessed with this conclusion when the reality is, that leaned behavior can be unlearned and there simply is a mechanism for that. There are many problems with psychotherapy especially in relation to personality conflicts between the therapists and patients, some of which can cause more ham than good. Lets take for example, a very real part of life this being, that small children between the ages of 1 and 4 can and do become sexually aroused (although they have no idea why). How does a parent react to that issue these days, when confronted for the first time to that truth; compared to how they reacted say 60 years ago, or 200 years ago (and so on).

The pleasures of the womb vs. the realities of pain in life and with respect to any particular society or environment, is the question in regards to neurosis I feel. Creating a balance in relation to basic human expectations a response to many of the problems defined clonally under the term Neurosis.

Would also add at this point that living in the wild is very stressful.

Any thoughts?