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The possibility of human freedom and its transmission (with particular reference to the thought of Bion)

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In this paper I examine where Bion's theory of freedom fits within the traditional philosophical debate. I claim that the notion of freedom is the organizing centre of Bion's thought and that the traditional debate has focused with too great a concentration upon the will. I propose that underlying the workings of the will there is a fundamental substratum. This is governed either by the reaction model or by the response model. Freedom is coextensive with the latter mode of functioning but not with the former. The traditional debate needs to take this layer of personality functioning into account.

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... Assured that the we established in the past can be expected in the future, lovers are free to think their own thoughts about what is transpiring between themselves and their beloved in the present moment. Symington (1990) pointed out that the freedom to think one's own thoughts is dependent on whether the mode of relatedness between the two individuals is responsive or reactive. When urgent feelings and inchoate ideas cannot, be contained by the lover, projective identification is employed reactively. ...
... As Symington (1990) cogently argued, the ability to suspend a reflexive reaction allows one person to respond genuinely to another. The response is dependent on lovers reaching deeply into their own thinking-and-feeling center. ...
... If they are free to think their own thoughts about what they encounter there, they gain access to the essence of their experience in that moment. Despite the highly personal beginning, it is in such moments that the lover is available to the deepest intercourse with the beloved (Symington, 1990). ...
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Offers the concept of romantic space as a way of understanding enduring love. Romantic space is mapped out in the intermediate area between the lover and the beloved, unchallenged with respect to its belonging to inner or external (shared) reality. It is both an intrapsychic and an interpersonal experience evolving between the lover and the beloved that involves the paradoxical coexistence of depressive and paranoid-schizoid modes of relatedness within each partner. The paranoid-schizoid mode brings a sense of freshness, idealization, and receptivity to the relationship and involves coercion of the beloved, through projective identification, to pay a particular role needed by the lover. The depressive mode provides the relationship with a joint narrative, the capacity for concern, and freedom to think one's own thoughts. Inflexibility in either partner leads to pathology of romantic space characterized by rigid adherence to the relatedness mode. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
... Bions Ideen zur Entstehung von Denken machen rezeptiv sprachgestörte Kinder und deren problematische Entwicklung auf einer psychoanalytisch begründeten Ebene verstehbar (Rüth 2004). Phänomene in Balintgruppen und die Wirksamkeit der Balint-Arbeit werden zugänglicher auf der Basis bionischer Modellbildungen (Rüth 2005). ...
... Phänomene in der Balintgruppenarbeit sind gleichfalls mit bionischen Modellen erklärbar (Rüth 2005). Das klassische Balint-Setting kennt den Fallbericht des Vortragenden, die sachlichen Nachfragen und das anschließende Assoziieren und Diskutieren der Gruppe ohne direkte Beteiligung des Vortragenden. ...
... He or she takes part again after quite a while towards the end of the group session, but finally all of them leave the room without a specific solution to the presented problem, or an algorithm worked out for their colleague on how to carry on. Taking part in a classic Balint group and presenting the case of a difficult patient increases the ability to think one's own thoughts when meeting with the patient again-which means shifting from a reaction model to a response model (Symington, 1990) and not being hindered by psychological problems. ...
... According to Bion, mental growth occurs when impressions, feelings, and ideas can be assimilated into something sensible such as α-elements and can therefore be tolerated without means of evacuation. Symington (1990) underpins that one of Bion's main targets was the freedom to think one's own thoughts instead of projected ones. Based on this assumption, Symington differentiated between reacting and responding to another person. ...
Article
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Some of W.R. Bion’s specific ideas can further the understanding of the classic Balint group technique. The group leader supports a ‘container-contained’ process, preventing the group from attacking or criticizing the presenter. ‘Projective identification’ helps the group to understand what has been presented. Meaningless impressions, feelings, emotions, and simple facts are transferred to the group, such as still unthinkable bizarre ‘beta-elements’ to be transformed by the ‘alpha-function’ to the now thinkable ‘alpha-elements’. Abstaining from the group process, the presenter is protected from re-projections of feelings and emotions. The Balint group technique makes sense to promote the ‘digestion’ of bizarre beta-element-like aspects into alpha-elements, enabling the presenter to ‘think his or her own thoughts’ instead of projected one, giving the chance to change into a response model instead of a reacting one. ‘Mental growth’ occurs when feelings and thoughts can be tolerated at a higher level.
... A fundamental difficulty that therapists experience when dealing with adhesive identification is how to respond to the patient (Symington 1990, Rüth 2022. This is because the absence of an inner space entails that the patient cannot be "visited". ...
Article
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Adhesive identification, as a Kleinian concept of elementary infant thinking founded by Ester Bick and Donald Meltzer, has not been widely received so far. It remains, nevertheless, a very common and as-of-yet poorly understood phenomenon, both in psychological states before a borderline level and before projective identifications are reached, as well as at the societal level. A differentiated observer might experience adhesive identifications as "stupid" thinking, which are then repelled by the observer because the underlying state of mind of two-dimensional thinking-and of lacking any depth-is unbearable. At the same time, adhesive identification serves for the actor being observed as a defense against elementary fear and as a narcissistic restitution method.
... A number of writers outside the psychoanalytic scope influenced Symington's thinking, among them Tolstoi, Buber and Socrates, whom he praised for his pursuit of truth, which is to some extent also W.R. Bion's main point. Among the central ideas in Symington's thinking is freedom, and this is what On the possibility of human freedom (Symington 1990) targets at, while focusing on thinking, projective identification and the concept that freedom comes from responding to each other instead of reacting. ...
Article
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The paper refers to Neville Symington’s concept of responding versus reacting, pub- lished in 1990, focusing on Bion’s ideas on projective identification as an inter-psychic phenomenon of nonverbal communication. Projective identification as a communica- tive mode uses the other person as a container for unwanted thoughts and feelings, thus leading to reactions which attack the freedom to think one’s own thoughts. In the mode of responding we abstain from projective identification, targeting at human freedom as we try to really answer the needs of the other person.
... Anders als in der Supervisionsgruppe will die Balintarbeit keinen Algorithmus zum weiteren Vorgehen erarbeiten. Vielmehr soll die Fähigkeit gestärkt werden, auf den Patienten und seine Bedürfnisse weniger zu "reagieren", sondern angemessener und freier zu "antworten" [14]. Die Gruppe, ihr Leiter, wie auch jeder einzelne Teilnehmer in der Diskussion stellen damit ihre Aufnahmefähigkeit für Unsicherheiten zur Verfügung -und damit über ein bloßes Containment hinaus ihre "Negative Fähigkeit". ...
Article
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Zusammenfassung Negative Fähigkeit nach W.R. Bion, zu verstehen als Aufnahmefähigkeit für Ungewusstes und Unbewusstes auf Seiten von Teilnehmern und Leitern, stellt eine wichtige Voraussetzung für eine gelungene Balintarbeit dar. Deses, bisher wenig rezipierte Konzept ermöglicht ein vertieftes, tiefenpsychologisch-psychoanalytisches Erfassen der Phänomenologie von Balintarbeit. Zu diesen Phänomenen gehören beobachtbare Widerstände oder Überforderungen von Teilnehmern, aber auch spezifische Techniken, wie die der Prismatischen Balintgruppe. Negative Fähigkeit zeigt Überschneidungen zum ebenfalls von Bion entwickelten Containment-Begriff, geht aber in den psychodynamischen Implikationen deutlich über diesen hinaus.
... Patients who bring in lists or dictate the topics of the session without input from the therapist may be engaging in an overt form of control. Symington (1990) noted that projective identification itself can be an attempt to control the therapist's freedom of thought, a form of control that is unconscious. Therapists may feel scrutinized, controlled, and monitored to a point that they may feel they only can have a narrow range of thoughts and words. ...
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Narcissistic personality disorder is a pleomorphic entity that requires the psychodynamically oriented therapist to tailor the approach to the characteristics of the individual patient. Psychodynamic principles encompass a broad range of interventions depending on the patient's specific characteristics. The therapist's interventions range from interpretation of the transference to supportive approaches that emphasize empathic validation and direct advice. In the absence of systematic data on these variations, this article attempts to offer clinically based principles. Several themes are emphasized: the experience of shame, the predictable transference-countertransference developments, the role of comorbidity with other personality disorders and traits, and the approach to resistances.
... Die Gesamtprognose wird besonders vom Ausmaß der narzisstischen Störung abhängen, aber auch von der Möglichkeit, sich als Therapeut aus einer beginnenden parasitären Verstrickung herauszulösen. Ein konkretes Heraustreten aus dem parasitären Beziehungskontext erscheint hier immer wieder als durchaus notwendige "Antwort" auf den Patienten, im Gegensatz zu einer bloßen "Reaktion" auf das pathologische Beziehungsangebot [14]. ...
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Anhand eines komplexen Fallberichts aus der Balintgruppe wird das Konzept der parasitären Beziehung nach Bion aufgegriffen, bei welcher Denken und Entwicklung zerstört werden und eine Alpha-Funktion zur Transformation gemachter Erfahrungen nicht mehr zur Verfügung steht. Ausgehend von der Überlegung, dass eine parasitäre Beziehung gar keine übliche Arzt-Patienten-Beziehung mehr darstellt, wird ein aktives Leiterverhalten beschrieben, um die über Spiegelungsphänomene in der Gruppe verloren gegangene Alpha-Funktion zu ersetzen und die parasitäre Verstrickung aufzulösen. Abstract: Referring to a complex Balint case, the parasitic container-contained relationship is discussed, where thinking is destroyed and the Alpha-function is no longer available. On the basis that a parasitic relationship isn`t a patient-doctor-relationship any more, an active leadership behaviour is described, aiming at reinstalling the lost Alpha-function, targeting at the resolution of the parasitic entanglement.
... traditional sense it is not an interpretation, but the analysand's need is understood so clearly that there is obviously interpretative work going on. On some occasions such an event may be a mistake on the part of the therapist, a sudden absence, or a tactless comment, but the effect will be the same, that the clients meaning system is de-centred. Symington (1990) has referred to this, linking it to freedom. When not accurately timed and placed it will lead to a closing down, a shutting instead of an opening. ...
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This paper looks at a number of existing theories of human development from an existential-phenomenological perspective. Most existing theories are stage theories which attempt to find common factors in human development in terms of invariant stages, phases or periods. Human development therefore is in terms of movement from one stage to the next. It is suggested that this passive view of human life is incompatible with an existential-phenomenological perspective because it does not take into account the givens of existence i.e. the primacy of time, death, freedom and responsibility to make meaning, and the lived body. An alternative existential model is proposed whereby the person moves towards a greater understanding and ownership of their existence in a world of others through encounters with largely chance events which they make, to a greater or lesser extent, a part of their own autobiography.
... Die fallbezogene Teamdynamik bzw. die sich einstellende Gruppendynamik kann in der Supervisionssitzung über den Weg einer modifizierten Balint-Gruppentechnik diagnostisch und therapeutisch verwertet werden [24, 25]. In der Supervisionsarbeit ist dabei eine Gegenübertragungsanalyse, angelehnt an die Balint-Methode, durchaus sinnvoll und möglich [26] . ...
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Anhand der Gruppentheorien und einiger Denkansätze von W.R. Bion wird in dieser Arbeit beleuchtet, wie über den Weg der Balint-Gruppenarbeit in der Arzt-Patienten-Beziehung anstelle eines Modus des „Reagierens” und damit des Mitagierens der Modus eines genuinen „Antwortens” auf den Patienten gesetzt werden kann. „Antworten” auf den Patienten wird hierbei verstanden als ein ganzheitliches Eingehen des Arztes auf seinen Patienten über eine bloße „Interaktion” hinaus. Im Modus des Antwortens auf den Patienten ist die Fähigkeit wirksam, „eigene Gedanken” zu denken und in der Arzt-Patienten-Beziehung nicht verstrickt zu sein in Projektionen, Manipulationen oder auch Auslassungen.
... In the case of W.R. Bion, despite his analysis with Melanie Klein and eventual emergence as a leading Kleinian in London, the full corpus of his writings demonstrate many departures from the theory of both Freud and Klein (Symington, 1990;Symington & Symington, 1996). However, any parallels or similarities existing in the notions of Bion and those of the more recent existential therapies appear to have gone largely unnoticed. ...
Article
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The origins of today's humanistic and existential schools of psychotherapy may be seen to lie in the philosophical theories of existentialists such as Soren Kierkegaard and Jean-Paul Sartre. In their focus on being and self, some therapies converge meaningfully with the aims and methods of depth psychotherapy - including the later psychoanalytic theory of W.R. Bion. In rather remarkable ways, Bion's views of mental growth and the active counter/transferential process may be seen as conceptually closer to Kierkegaard's notions of relational being and truth - and to Sartre's interplay of subjectivity and objectivity - than they are to certain of Freud's classical constructs. Bion conceives of psychoanalysis as a mutual activity, one where the transference dynamic is characterized by 'client-and-therapist-as-relationally-present'. More than this, the active investment of the analyst's person in the countertransference parallels existentialism's notion of relational being. As a form of joint-feeling and mutual exploration, the patient's emotions, conflicts, and neuroses are seen as intimately related to similar experiences both felt and expressed by the analyst. While neutrality and objectivity remain priorities in Freud's initial theory of analysis, Bion's thought reflects a transference dynamic characterized by the essential ingredient of comradeship. It is not that Bion's theory is necessarily the only (or the best) example of an existential counterpart to psychoanalytic theory. It is difficult, however, not to be inspired by elements of his framework that resound clearly with the more powerful tenets of existentialism. While it is primarily the schema of transference/countertransference examined in the current paper, Bion's later writings also examine other themes that may too be considered as existential in direction.
... On some occasions such an event may be a mistake on the part of the therapist, a sudden absence, or a tactless comment, but the effect will be the same, that the clients meaning system is de-centred. Symington (1990) has referred to this, linking it to freedom. When not accurately timed and placed it will lead to a closing down, a shutting instead of an opening. ...
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Whilst there has been substantial growth in brief therapies in recent years there have been limited attempts to specifically theorise the practice of brief existential therapy. Moreover, the recent attempts to provide guidelines for brief existential practice (Strasser and Strasser, 1997) provide only limited advances on 'traditional' open-ended existential practice. In this paper, I seek to explore the possibility of employing techniques from solution focussed therapy (SFT) in brief existential practice. I argue that the relatively a-theoretical nature of SFT readily enables the existential practitioner to engage with these techniques and indeed provide the necessary theoretical ground for this particular form of practice. Whilst making the case for the use of SFT in brief existential practice I also aim to highlight the possible difficulties of such a move and the tensions that might emerge from integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
... Psychoanalytic training in a tripartite system rigorously emphasises that the training analysis or personal therapy, not education or support, is paramount to achieving the goal of knowing oneself. Furthermore, contemporary psychoanalytic writers (Casement 1985, Symington 1990, Nahum 1993 have made no apology for the limitations of the supervision process in developing personal insight. ...
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This paper examines the concept of formalized clinical supervision by focusing attention on several aspects. First, the current popularity of the concept and the practice of clinical supervision in the British nursing literature. Second, further discussion takes place about the lack of agreement among scholars on the definitions, models and models of utilization of clinical supervision. Third, the significance of the relationship between clinical supervision and management is analyzed. Fourth, the identification of what is currently presented as formal clinical supervision in both mental health nursing and general nursing is achieved through an examination of the relevant psychoanalytic sources from which the concept originated, and the North American nursing contribution. Finally, from examination of the current and past literature, the conclusion is that nursing has misconceived the intention of formalized clinical supervision.
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Like any theory, the Kleinian concept of Projective Identification (PI) represents an abstract explanatory pattern for concrete phenomena. In the course of the development of the PI concept, different emphases emerged: Bion sees PI as an original, pre-linguistic way of communication-which is used, for example, in borderline disorders. Current Kleinian authors have abandoned the idea of a communicative phenomenon ubiquitous in human coexistence, in favour of a view focussing on defence mechanisms, and thus no longer make a fundamental distinction between projection and projective identification. Kernberg's object relations theory points us to possibilities of understanding phenomena in borderline disorders, and of understanding group dynamic effects also for use in the treatment process, especially with the help of the concept of projective identification. Furthermore, the concept of PI can make escalating individual, as well as group conflicts more understandable. On the other hand, the concept points to possible ways of establishing human freedom in everyday interpersonal interaction and relationships outside a therapeutic context, this by dispensing with projective identification and applying a concept of genuine response.
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Abstract: Wie alle Theoriebildung, stellt auch das kleinianische Konzept der Projektiven Identifizierung (PI) ein abstrahierendes Erklärungsmuster für konkrete Phänomene dar. Im Laufe der Entwicklung des Konzepts zeigten sich unterschiedliche Schwerpunkte: Bion sieht PI als ursprünglichen, vorsprach-lichen Kommunikationsweg – auf den z.B. bei Borderlinestörungen zurück-gegriffen wird. Aktuelle kleinianische Autoren haben die Idee eines im menschlichen Zusammenleben ubiquitären Phänomens zugunsten einer auf Abwehrmechanismen fokussierenden Sichtweise verlassen und unterscheiden so nicht mehr grundlegend zwischen Projektion und Projektiver Identifikation. Kernbergs Objektbeziehungstheorie weist uns Möglichkeiten, Phänomene bei Borderlinestörungen insbesondere mit Hilfe projektiver Identifizierung zu verstehen und deren gruppendynamische Auswirkungen auch für den Behandlungsprozess zu verstehen. Gleichzeitig kann das Konzept der PI aber auch eskalierende Konfliktgeschehen verständlicher machen – und andererseits Wege weisen, im konkreten zwischenmenschlichen Zusammensein außerhalb eines therapeutischen Kontexts durch Verzicht auf Projektive Identifikation und Anwendung eines Konzepts genuinen Antwortens menschliche Freiheit in Beziehungen überhaupt erst herzustellen.
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Competent agency is a basic assumption of psychoanalytic change. Yet as an aspect of health, personal agency has in the main been only intuitively addressed and remains clinically unsystematized. Here experience-near and observer-centered criteria are developed that assess a person-as-agent's competence in particular domains. These ideas, clinically illustrated, stand as an operational framework that helps thinking and talking about agency in everyday clinical events and psychoanalytic outcomes. Three specific criteria are proposed: reversibility, self-observation, and appropriateness. The first is descriptively polar; together the three apply to each given context of action. They can also serve to ground future research. In this regard, several empirical psychoanalytic studies of adults and children that exemplify measurable aspects of agency are reviewed. Once clinical markers of personal agency are articulated, it will not be necessary to resolve the free will debate: pragmatically, we need only put such distinctions to work.
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Bion's ideas may be extended to describe an emotional phenomenology of the analyst's subjectivity and a methodology which helps differentiate countertransference enactments from fuller emotional participation. Bion called the process of integrating and utilizing one's most basic and important emotions to make meaning, "passion." The analyst's primal feelings--of love, hate, and curiosity--serve as a central organizer of meaning in the analytic interaction. These feelings involve pain, and to the extent the analyst unconsciously decides to evade or foreclose the evolution of the feelings, such that they remain unintegrated in the thinking process, the analyst is liable to become mired in repetitive transference-countertransference experiences without establishing fresh meaning. A case example illustrates the relevance of "passion" to contemporary relational theory and practice.
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While psychoanalysis has generally been regarded as "the talking cure," written communication from patient to analyst commonly appears within the analytic setting. In our electronic age, e-mail communications from patient to analyst have become commonplace. This paper describes a case of erotic transference conveyed primarily through e-mail messages, and discusses their multiple meanings as an enactment. The unique features of e-mail communication are explored and contrasted with verbal discourse in the analytic dyad.
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The development of a third position is a key aspect of the analyst's ability to survive in the analytic relationship. In exploring the value of the third position, the author discusses other models relevant to clinical work, including the analytic-therapeutic position, the internal analyst, the alive analytic contact, and the phobic position. A case example illustrates these models and forms the basis for further discussion of the internal analytic working process.
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