How does the mind form into an integrated self during normal development, and what kind of structures need to form and be activated, that can work together to give rise to a mind able to navigate life’s demands? What is the role of the seven affective (drive) circuits, the surrounding speech, and the immediate physical experiences in this process? We will study theories of mental structure, from early French writers like Bernheim and Janet, through Freud’s and Klein’s models to Ego Psychological descriptions of psychological functions, and current neuroscientific systems of mind. Our genes contain the blueprints for all needed organizations of self, the environment determines their final shape.
Early trauma and suboptimal environments interfere with the development of mental structures in different ways, de- pending on a child’s temperament and the nature of the impingements. What types of structure, and to what degree, need to either be broken or fail to develop, for dissociative and psychotic states, or downright psychosis to ensue? We will look at the different tasks humans must master at different times, the corresponding brain circuits involved and the experiences that happen when, and when not, those tasks can be accomplished. We will relate basic psychotic states to the interplay of tasks that failed to unfold, that were there and got broken, or that developed in a distorted manner. In this light we will look at positive and negative symptomatology.
No matter how dire the state of psychological disarray, a person will always try desperately to find a solution, attempting to reach a state of minimal pain and greatest integration. The patient uses their creative faculties to make meaning, a sign of their vitality and our ally in healing. We will examine many examples of psychotic symptoms, with an eye on their integrational function, and appreciating them also as expressions of direct traumatic memories. This part of the course will focus on cases, our own as well as ones from history, and will put the theory into the practice of seeing the method in the madness.