tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post8670838286718815416..comments2024-03-29T04:06:37.402-07:00Comments on Had Enough Therapy?: Psychoanalysis: A New ReligionStuart Schneidermanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12784043736879991769noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-15432979860198519122017-03-17T03:19:20.958-07:002017-03-17T03:19:20.958-07:00Stuart: Jacques Lacan became a cult leader, not be...Stuart: Jacques Lacan became a cult leader, not because of his arcane theories that no one understood, but because he embodied—in the flesh—the ideal of what one would become if one completed a successful psychoanalysis. <br /><br />That makes sense. I've actually wondered about all the obscure branches of knowledge that exist, and any given branch would seem so difficult (even if technically correct), that no one will bother follow you once you're gone. And if a person gains "celebrity" status within a field, and other people write about him and his work, then, inspired newbies will feel some obligation to go back to his work, even if they're actually more reading what someone else wrote about him.<br /><br />There's an interesting celebrity rise of Canadian Pyschology professor Jordan Peterson, since he stood up to the transgender activists last fall, and now everyone wants to hear from him. Will his rise be a "cult of personality" and be heard with religious conviction?<br /><br />He wrote a book nearly 20 years ago called "Maps of meaning" which is LARGE and HARD, so very few will ever read it, but if he can speak about it, people listen, and he admitted it has taken him these 20 years to unpack his "maps" so they can be communicated in his speeches.<br /><br />Here's his latest one, seeing how individuals can stand up to the tyranny of political correctness around them.<br /><br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwcVLETRBjg Strengthen the Individual: A counterpoint to Post Modern Political Correctness <br />---<br />This is a lecture (Q & A forthcoming) that I gave in Ottawa, Canada's capital city, on Saturday. I discuss the development of post-modernism, its relationship to Marxism, the dangers it poses to the civilization of the West, and what might be done, in consequence.<br />---<br /><br />It is also interesting to see that status is often raised by your willingness to stand up to authority figures within a culture, and of course anyone without a coherent argument won't be able to stand up for long. But Peterson has done his homework, and he's picked a side, and he's now got a following, whether or not they hear exactly what he wants to say, or if many are just awed by his force of will and passion to try to say hard things.<br /><br />After an hour speech above, he had an hour talk sessions too. I see he offered an opinion about psychotherapy.<br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UL-SdOhwek Strengthen the Individual: Q & A Parts I & II <br />--- @4:42<br />"...The two most fundamental parts of psychotherapy are, let's find out what you're afraid of and avoiding and help you confront it, so you can gather the information that's there, and let's allow them to laid their story out in all its catastrophe in detail so you can straighten yourself out through speech. That's exactly what happens in psychotherapy."<br />---<br /><br />That definition is of course very different than what the author of this blog would say, at least it doesn't mention the word unconscious at all, and doesn't presume that the analyst has any special knowledge that the patient is unaware. It's just trying to get all the facts on the table, and possibly no different than what a coach would do. But it still seems weaker than a coach since no advice has been offered in that process. Supposedly the client will come up with his own advice if he can get clarity on all the facts of a situation?<br /><br />Finally I can see how any dynamic personality risks false promises of "solving" someone else's problems, and whether an analyst or coach, probably the incentive is there to try to do things for the client that they can do for themselves, and perhaps this is where wisdom is needed, to know when to hold back what you know, or when you do speak, refuse definite answers that reject potential solutions that haven't been tried yet just because they're hard.<br /><br />Ares Olympushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09726811306826601686noreply@blogger.com