Internal Conflict. Loneliness Is Affection

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

I continue a series of articles that reveal the essence of my author's course "Effective stress management", as well as acquaint the reader with the causes of stress.

External causes of stress, or external stressors, are widely described in many articles and books on psychology. The uniqueness of my course is that I introduce group members to the internal causes of stress that arise from the basic internal conflicts of the personality. Internal conflicts, as a clash of opposing aspirations, arise in the process of the formation of the psyche and are played out already in real relationships with people. After all, you see, stress most often occurs when interacting with someone or something.

In this article I will describe one of the root, basic personality conflicts - this is the desire for self-sufficiency and independence on the one hand, and the desire for someone else to solve our problems, i.e. the desire for dependence, symbiosis on the other hand.

Everyone has a vital need for attachment and relationships. If we consider the need for relationships in the form of a scale, then at one pole there will be a state of complete dependence, a symbiotic connection, and at the other, there will be a complete denial of the need to be in a relationship. But in the first and second cases, we are dealing with a person who does not feel safe either in a relationship or in loneliness. “Not with you, not without you,” as they say. This is a deep, existential fear. This fear can manifest itself at the level of the body: panic, palpitations, cold hands, feet, sweating, somatic pain. For example, when a person is in society, or he has to go somewhere, where people will be, or when he is at home alone. I have described the extreme forms of conflict. But to a greater or lesser extent, these contradictory aspirations are inherent in every personality.

Let's see how these two sides of the internal conflict are formed and how they manifest themselves in real relationships.

Addicted person in every possible way seeks to preserve the relationship at any cost. He sacrifices his interests, needs for the sake of an invented need to do it for the sake of the Other. For him, the greatest fear is the loss of the object, the loss of the Other. Moreover, the personality of the Other does not matter here, he is perceived as an object, and not as a subject.

In the parental family, while still a child, such a person received an unspoken attitude “do not grow up”. The parent encouraged the child's infantile position in which there is no responsibility, no need to develop willpower. There is such a phenomenon “a too good mother”, who knows everything better than her child: what to do, who to be friends with, what to eat, what to wear. At the same time, the desires of the child and his true needs are not taken into account, they are simply not taken into account. "Suffocating love", where there is no place for a child at all, it is used as a toy. In this case, the child, growing up, remains psychologically immature. Often, either stays in the parental family, or, even if he manages to get married or get married, he is exposed to the intervention of his parents and does not feel independent and adult.

In the family (parental, where he remains, or already his own), such a person takes a conflict-free subordinate position, negative aspects of himself on the part of the partner are minimized, denied, rationalized or denied violence (abuse).

In their professional activities, such people also occupy subordinate positions, avoid responsibility and competition. Such people can work solely for the idea, they need to belong to a company or community.

They are characterized by sacrifice and rejection of material goods for the sake of "maintaining relationships."I am taking it in parentheses, because no relationship is maintained like that. When they, sooner or later, are torn apart by a partner, then sacrifice and “everything I have done for you” is used to arouse feelings of guilt in the partner. This is an opportunity to keep a partner in a relationship. Illness and disability are used to maintain their dependence on a partner. The secondary benefit of the disease is exploited to the full. These are patients who go to be treated, not cured. Sex is not for your own pleasure, but also another resource for retaining a partner.

Rthe baby who was next to his mother, who in analytical psychology is characterized as a "dead mother", that is, emotionally cold, depressed, more immersed in her experiences than in caring for the child, most likely, will be on the opposite point of the scale "addiction - autonomy." He will seek to avoid attachment. This will manifest itself in numerous superficial relationships, choice of a profession outside the team, conflict relations with the parental family.

This is the other side of the coin - exaggerated distance from the relationship. Where all areas of life are carefully guarded from any addiction and attachment. "I am afraid of getting sick - because I will depend on pills", "I will not go to work in an organization because I will depend on the corporate culture and on the boss", "I will not build my family, because they will control me there, and I I will not be able to do what I want”and so on. The fear of being alone appeared in infancy. At the level of consciousness, such a person will strive for autonomy, on the unconscious, he will experience a panic fear of loneliness, because his need for an emotionally close symbiotic relationship has remained unsatisfied. Such individuals leave the parental family early. Family values and authorities are not recognized. Further, interpersonal intimate relationships are built with an exaggeration of autonomy and independence. Relationships are often conflicting, which unconsciously allows you to keep your partner at a distance. Professions are also chosen independent, not requiring compliance with the regulations and devoid of a competitive context. But, it is interesting that this struggle with any structure continues even if a person works as a freelancer at home. The struggle between “I have to sit down and work” and “I want to do what I want, not what I should and should”. The pursuit of financial solvency also serves the interests of building independence in relationships, rather than enjoying life. Material goods are needed to maintain the illusion of independence. Property and money sometimes replace real relationships with people. Or the person can completely deny the financial side of life, again, so as not to become attached. All bodily needs are ignored, delicious food, beautiful clothes, sex as unnecessary and useless. Minimum satisfaction of vital needs in order to survive, not live. These limitations create a sense of meaninglessness and emptiness in life. The way to cope with the feeling of meaninglessness is to go into fantasy, computer games, addictions.

How to deal with this conflict?

Find the "middle ground". Learn and be with the Other and be yourself.

How is it not to lose yourself? Remain yourself?

It means:

Do something on your own, based on your own knowledge;

Make your own conscious choices, taking into account all the sides, pros and cons of this choice and take full responsibility for it;

To be able to provide for oneself and satisfy one's own needs;

Be able to make independent decisions, regardless of the wishes of others;

To be able not to let other people's pain and grief distract you from your own goals;

Do not succumb to emotional blackmail and financial bribery;

Do not deviate from your own values even under pressure from others;

Work on your own identity, be aware of your cultural and family roots, without dissolving in them;

Take responsibility for your life and not blame others for the fact that your life may not have turned out as you dreamed.

The listed landmarks are just landmarks towards autonomy, individuation. But, maturity and adulthood presupposes, above all, flexibility. In making any decision, you need to take into account the situation, the context.

Each of us, who to a greater extent, who to a lesser extent, at one time or another of his life, feels the desire for either dependent symbiotic relationships, or the desire for independence and autonomy. How to satisfy these two opposite needs and find harmony and peace in the soul?

Age is a key factor for extreme symbiosis and autonomy. It is vitally important for the infant to be in a symbiotic, dependent relationship with his parents, since he cannot satisfy his needs on his own. These symbiotic needs must be met unconditionally and to the fullest. Mom should come at the first call of the child, feed, swaddle, warm, be emotionally stable in showing love and emotional warmth to the child. What are the consequences of a deficiency in these healthy addictive relationships?

Physiologically adults with problems come to the psychologist, the roots of which lie in the internal conflict formed in infancy (if we are talking about dependence / individuation).

In therapy, we raise the key issues of this conflict:

Will the fate of such a person now be filled with loneliness and frustration? Or will he until the end of his days be attached to his parents, trying to share their suffering and satisfy their desires in the hope that they will love and recognize him?

Does a person really have to give up their own happiness from their own life, so as not to feel like a traitor and guilty before their parents?

What should parents do if they see that their child does not want to take on independence, to become an adult? Do they need to forgive everything that their children unwilling to grow up can do? Drinking alcohol, drugs, not working and sitting on the neck of your parents?

Do you need to put up with a spouse or spouse who does not want to take part of the responsibility for the financial, everyday part of life together?

How much can we demand love, support, support from our partner, and how much should we ourselves give him?

What is the share of responsibility that needs to be taken on, what needs to be taken, and what should not be taken?

How can we not prevent children and partners from changing themselves or going our own way if we ourselves are emotionally dependent on them?

We humans are group beings by nature and cannot survive alone. For us, there is nothing worse than being alone. One to dine in a restaurant, one to go on vacation, to sit at the table at home. We need an interlocutor, a living being nearby.

But how far does a person's need for contact extend? To what extent should each of us put ourselves at the disposal of the other and demand from the other something for ourselves? Where are the boundaries of the I and where are the boundaries of the Other? When is symbiosis constructive, and when is this clinging at any cost, even at the cost of your own life?

It seems that the ability to stay with someone who is holding and letting go of something that no longer holds is the art of a relationship. The conflict of symbiotic needs and autonomy is inevitable and accompanies us throughout our lives.

So, to summarize what has been said: the main reason for dependent, "sticky" relationships or emphatically independent, in which loneliness is cultivated and presented as a blessing, is symbiotic relationships unsatisfied in childhood. The consequences of this deficit are fears, depression, disorders of the personality structure, psychosis, mania, and somatic diseases. The reason for this dissatisfaction is the dissatisfaction of the parents in their childhood. Symbiotic trauma is passed from generation to generation not arbitrarily and not noticeably for the parents themselves.

Psychodynamic therapy using the symbol drama method helps to work out this deficit. With the help of a psychotherapeutic position, as well as using certain motives of symbol drama, we develop, complete deficiencies, unconditional acceptance, emotional support and warmth in therapy. In the group on Effective Stress Management, we get to know this conflict, explore how and when it manifests itself in your life, outline ways to heal and work through this conflict and, of course, practically work with it. Over the course of two sessions. In individual therapy, the psychotherapist accompanies the patient for months, sometimes years, so that the patient begins to feel the support in himself, the ability to take responsibility for his life and his choices. To enable the patient to build healthy, mature relationships with others. In therapy, we develop a balance - I feel good with you, but I can be alone.

I would like to end the article with the words from the movie "Beaver" with Mel Gibson and Jodie Foster "Everything will be fine - it's a lie, but you don't have to be alone."

The article includes material:

OPD -2 (Operationalized psychodynamic diagnostics)

Franz Ruppert “Symbiosis and autonomy. Trauma alignment"