Individuation and Narcissism: The Psychology of Self in Jung and Kohut

272 Pages·1991·2.27 MB·English

by  Mario Jacoby

Individuation and Narcissism
Recent developments in Freudian psychoanalysis, particularly the work of Kohut
and Winnicott, have led to a convergence with the Jungian position.
Individuation and Narcissism attempts to overcome the doctrinal differences
between the different schools of depth psychology, while taking into account the
characteristic approaches of each. Through a close examination of the actual
experience of self, the process of individuation, narcissism and narcissistic
personality disorder, the author demonstrates the benefits of a cross-fertilization
of ideas and techniques for the professional analyst.
Mario Jacoby examines the origins of the myth of Narcissus and from a
Jungian perspective attempts an interpretation. He traces the dispute that arose
between Freud and Jung over instinct theory and compares the schools that
developed. He argues that the similarities of the work of Winnicott and Kohut to
the work of Jung are partly obscured by the language they developed to express
their theories.
In applying these theories to the practice of psychotherapy, it is argued that the
therapist must recognise the intervention of his own narcissism in the therapeutic
process. The author demonstrates how the concepts of the ego and the self arise
in therapy and discusses the question of empathy and countertransference and
how they can affect die therapeutic process.
Individuation and Narcissism provides a comprehensive discussion of the
Freud/Jung controversy and the more recent research on the self for the student
of analytical psychology and the trainee analyst or therapist. It also draws
together the experience and techniques gathered in both schools to give the
practising therapist practical guidelines to improve their interaction with patients
suffering from narcissistic wounds.
Individuation and Narcissism
The Psychology of the Self in Jung and Kohut
Mario Jacoby
Translated from the German by Myron Gubitz and in collaboration with
the author, by Francoise O'Kane
First published in Germany in 1985 as
Individuation und Narzissmus: Psychologie des Selbst bei C. G. Jung und
H. Kohut by Verlag J. Pfeiffer, München
© Verlag J. Pfeiffer, München 1985
This edition published in 1990 by Routledge
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Jacoby, Mario, 1925-
Individuation and narcissism: the psychology of the self in Jung and
Kohut.
1. Self. Psychological aspects
I. Title. II. Individuation and Narzissmus. English 155.2
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Jacoby, Mario.
[Individuation and Narzissmus, English]
Individuation and narcissism: the psychology of the self in Jung and
Kohut / by Mario Jacoby; transl. from the German by Myron Gubitz and,
in collab. with the author, by Francoise O'Kane.
p. cm.
Translation of: Individuation and Narzissmus.
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
1. Narcissism. 2. Psychoanalysis. 3. Self psychology. 4. Jung,
C.G. (Carl Gustav), 1875-1961. 5. Kohut, Heinz. I. Title.
RC553.N36J3313 1989
155.2-dc20 89-6399 CIP
ISBN 13: 978-0-415-06464-4
ISBN 10: 0-415-06464-3
Contents
Foreword
Introduction
1THE MYTH OF NARCISSUS
Ovid's tale
Other versions of the Narcissus myth in Antiquity
Evolution of the Narcissus material in medieval and modern times
Interpretation of the myth from a Jungian perspective
2ON NARCISSISM: AN INTRODUCTION
Remarks on Freud's reformulation of the instinct theory
The dispute between Freud and Jung
Differences over the instinct theory
Distinguishing between ‘introversion’ and ‘narcissistic cathexis of libido’
Primary narcissism versus primary object love
EGO AND SELF IN ANALYTICAL PSYCHOLOGY AND
3
PSYCHOANALYSIS
The views of C. G. Jung
Erich Neumann's concept of the ego-self axis
The primary self (Michael Fordham)
The psychoanalytic concept of the self as self-representation
Object constancy
The ego
On the psychology of the self in the works of Heinz Kohut
Comparing various concepts of the self
4ASPECTS OF THE CONCEPT OF NARCISSISM
Narcissism as a developmental stage
Narcissism as a mode of object relation
Narcissism as a synonym for self-esteem
INDIVIDUATION PROCESS AND MATURATION OF NARCISSISTIC
5
LIBIDO
C.G. Jung's views on the individuation process
Self-realisation in the light of Kohut's views on narcissism
The question of meaning for Jung and Kohut
Psychoanalysis' critique of Kohut's position
SOME GOALS OF NARCISSISTIC MATURATION AND THEIR
6
MEANING FOR THE INDIVIDUATION PROCESS
Empathy
Creativeness
Humour
Wisdom
Individuation and thou-relationship - self and ‘object’
7FORMS OF NARCISSISTIC DISTURBANCES
The question of diagnosis
The subjective experience of narcissistic woundedness
Depression, grandiosity, and vulnerability
Influences of the grandiose self
Disturbances in the realm of empathy
The grandiose self and creativity
Narcissistic rage and the ‘shadow’ (in a Jungian sense)
Etiological and psychodynamic views of narcissistic disturbances
PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC TREATMENT OF NARCISSISTIC
8
PERSONALITY DISORDERS
General remarks on the analytic approach to psychotherapy
Mirror transference
Idealising transference and archetypal fantasy
Empathy, countertransference, and narcissistic problems in the analyst
Jung's ‘dialectical procedure’ and the analysis of childhood
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Foreword
This work arose out of a need to bring together and review different sets of
observations, theories, and therapeutic systems. Since the birth of our still-young
science (generally reckoned as the publication of Freud's Interpretation of
Dreams in 1900), there has been a vast outpouring of research, speculation,
theorizing, analysis, and controversy, resulting in a broad spectrum of schools
and movements, all holding high the banners of their own truths and hostile to
the others. Considering that all branches of depth psychology register about the
same percentages of success and failure in treatment, it seems to me that the time
has come for more tolerance. If the various analytical schools were to take
greater notice of one another, they might all be significantly enriched, since each
of them has amassed experience and developed techniques from their own
particular theoretical perspective. But even assuming sufficient readiness to pay
attention to other approaches, there is another difficulty: die different schools
have all developed their own specialized vocabularies, the nuances of which can
be adequately understood only by insiders. For example: Heinz Kohut's
extremely interesting train of thought, which he expressed in 1971 in his first
book, The Analysis of the Self, was packaged in such a stiff and circumlocutory
psychoanalytic idiom that many potential readers were put off. I found it
necessary to read the book several times in order to really grasp its subtleties, but
I took the trouble to do so because it seemed to me that what Kohut had to say
was illuminating and stimulating for my own therapeutic work; in many respects
I perceived in them an intimate kinship with my own psychological approach. A
small number of my colleagues of the Jungian persuasion read Kohut's early
work and commented: 'Why, that's pure Jung!'. Some of them also felt that it was
outrageous of Kohut never to have so much as mentioned Jung. But most of the
colleagues and students to whom I recommended Kohut's book set it aside very
quickly, maintaining that it was simply unreadable.
Once Kohut developed Ins own terminology (about 1977) to describe the
various aspects of his psychology of the self, his work became somewhat more
accessible. But it still demands considerable effort by the reader. Winnicott, too,
uses a language of his own in his attempts to articulate the pre-verbal
experiences of infants. Nor may we assume that the specialized jargon of
Jungians is readily comprehensible to outsiders; an observation that applies in
even greater measure to the language of object-relations theorists.
All schools of depth psychology focus their attention on the same object —
they all hope to understand and explicate the human psyche. But such an
enterprise faces an insurmountable obstacle. Without becoming involved here in
an extensive epistemological discussion, I should like to make the following
brief observation on this subject: we can never achieve purely 'objective' results
in our efforts to make the human psyche the object of our understanding, since
the psyche is at the same time an active element of our subjective being. In other
words, the subjective, the 'personal equation' of the observer, is always a part of
his or her attempt to understand and explain; it cannot be eliminated. Hence
there is no universally valid, demonstrable truth in depth psychology; we must
always rely upon our Evidenzgefühl, our sense of whether or not theories about
the workings of the psyche seem plausible and in harmony with experience.
Ultimately, that is the only fundamental criterion.
To date, no particular school of psychology has managed, on the basis of its
findings, to convey an Evidenzgefühl that is entirely satisfactory for everyone. In
all probability this will never happen; and if it did, it would weaken the
motivation for new questing and discovery. At the same time, it is extremely
questionable whether the theories and analytical techniques of the various
schools are really as different from one another as their diverse jargons would
lead us to believe. It is understandable that the members of each school of
psychology and their professional associations, by emphasizing their own
specialized terminology, try to underscore what is original and unique about their
own theories and methods. But it seems to me that there is a great deal of
overlap.
My present attempt at integration is based on the effort to trace as closely as
possible the empirical reality from which various technical terms have been
abstracted. My purpose, then, is to describe how certain kinds of psychic
suffering 'feel' and to point out those qualities of subjective perception that are
often more veiled than revealed by technical terminology. In this way I hope to
make a small contribution towards increasing our sensitivity to the reality of the