Professional Comforter: Psychotherapist Jorge Bucay On The Meaning Of Pain And The Beauty Of Madness

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

The famous Argentine psychotherapist and writer Jorge Bucay is called by readers and critics a "professional comforter": his books can really help a person cope with grief and learn to be himself.

What psychological aspects does your new novel touch on?

- I'm not a writer, I'm a psychiatrist. While doing this, I write. A friend of mine says that anyone who writes dreams of a romance. By publishing books on psychology, I also wanted to become its author. Therefore, I wrote the novel as a game. At first I had to read a little about how to do this, since initially I had only an idea and nothing else. I didn't know how to create characters, so I wrote their case histories. Even if the novel had not appeared, I already knew, for example, what these people were ill with in childhood. I really thought I would make a story. However, things soon began to happen with the characters, and this came as a surprise to me. It turned out that when real writers say that heroes become alive, it's true. It happened to me too. So the novel connects with psychology that the psychiatrist, like the author, can see what is happening with the person inside. And also, of course, that we are talking about the phenomenon of the mass, when people start to act because they have been manipulated. This is a psychological transformation, the same as the changes that occur to a person under the influence of power and the search for power. I wrote primarily about Latin America, but I think it has to do with the whole world.

- The novel is about freedom. What is freedom

- First you need to say what it is not, right? People think freedom is to do what they want. But freedom has nothing to do with this. If everything was arranged this way, no one would be completely free. This is not a definition of freedom, this is a definition of omnipotence. And freedom and omnipotence are not the same thing. Freedom is the ability to choose within the possibilities that reality provides. Ultimately it is the ability to decide "yes" or "no". And this freedom is always certain. You can always say yes or no. This is true for individuals, couples, families, cities, countries, and the entire planet. You can always say yes or no.

- What was the day you decided to become a psychotherapist

- It was not a day, but a whole period. My mom knew that I would become a doctor. In the 40s and 50s, there was an epidemic of polio in Argentina, and during my childhood there were many children who suffered from this disease. When I was four or five years old and I saw a child on the street with the consequences of polio, I always asked my mother what happened to him. Mom explained, I started crying and could not stop. She tried to comfort me, but she didn't succeed. I went into the room, hid and cried for fifteen minutes. My mother, who could not stop me, sat next to me and waited. She thought, "This boy will become a doctor because of the pain that someone else's pain is causing him."

When I grew up, I wanted to study medicine. I was going to become a pediatrician, but when I got to the faculty, I realized that I could not bear the moments when I could not help the children. Once I was assisting during an operation - it was part of the program - and the child died. We couldn't save him. I was very sad. I realized that I could not be a good pediatrician, that this is a fantasy, and as an alternative, child psychiatry came to my mind. Nobody dies there. I began to study it, and it fascinated me. She captured me. I just fell in love with psychology, psychiatry, with patients who suffer from madness. And in fact, later I learned as a psychiatrist that any doctor is a hypochondriac who sublimates his anxiety into the profession. Doctors are very afraid of disease. At that moment, I had a huge fear of insanity, and it became one of the reasons why I decided to do it. When I began to heal from my fear, I stopped taking heavy patients and began to deal more with patients with neurosis - after all, I myself became more neurotic than crazy. And then, when I got even better, I had healthy patients.

“A normal person is one who knows that“2 × 2 = 4”. A madman is a person who believes that there is a "5" or "8". He has lost touch with reality. And a neurotic - like you, like me - is the one who knows that there is "4", but it terribly outrages him"

- What fascinated you about the madness

- In order to understand the human soul, you need a great psychological resource. The human soul has a lot to do with thinking, and to understand thinking is to understand a person. On the other hand, patients with mental illness are so grateful when you help them. These are incredible men and women who, in fact, as the British thinker Gilbert Chesterton said, "have lost everything except their sanity." In our culture, madmen are devalued, driven out, denigrated. I noted that in Argentina, psychiatric wards in hospitals are always on the left, at the end of the corridor, by the toilet. But working with patients from there was great. For such people, doctors really save lives. It was very interesting, I learned a lot and I think that I helped a lot over the years that I worked in psychiatric hospitals with seriously insane patients.

- Do you like people

- Love is a very wide field. I think you need to talk about love in an organic sense. I definitely don't love everyone the way I love my children. But this difference is in quantity, not quality. The quality is the same. But with love, everything depends heavily on the definition. I sometimes say that every fool has a definition of love, and I don't want to be an exception. I am as fool as everyone else. The definition I like best comes from Joseph Zinker. He said: "Love is the joy that I experience from the fact that another person exists." The joy of the very fact of the existence of another person. And in this sense, I am happy that my patients exist. In this sense, there is indeed love between therapist and patient.

- It takes a lot of effort

- Yes, but what else can give meaning to life? If you don't care what happens to others, what will give you meaning to live? In the end, for me, apart from psychiatry, in everyday life, this also makes sense. When one day in childhood my son Demian, who now also works as a psychiatrist, asked if I loved him, I replied: "Yes, you are very dear to me, I love with all my heart." Then he asked: “What is the difference for you between“cherish”and“love”? What does it mean to love? Hug, give things? " I replied that no, and for the first time I used the words that I had told you before: if someone's well-being plays a role for you, if it is important, you love him. In this sense, it is rather exhausting when the well-being of everyone around you is important to you. But there is no point in living without it. Five minutes ago, I didn't know you. But today I will try so that you do not stumble and fall, not only because it is natural to do so, but also so that you do not break. Love arises by itself, if it is not forbidden. It is not like the feeling from the movies, when the characters run, jump on a horse … This is nonsense from the movies. True love is the importance of your well-being to someone. This is so true and so important that if you are next to a person who is not interested in how you are doing, what you did during the day, why something attracted your attention - that someone does not love you. Even if he speaks beautiful words and gives the most expensive things in the world, even if he swears in all ways in his love. And vice versa: if someone is interested in you, it is important for him how you are doing, he wants to know what you like and tries to give what you are waiting for - he loves you. Even if he says that there is no love, there never was and never will be.

- Have you met people like you among your patients

- I have never met anyone who is not like me. They all remind me in some way: some more, some less. But in the process of helping, it is very important to identify with the person. All psychotherapists do this.

- Is it the same with the readers

-Sure. I often boast that I know people (laughs). But I also identify myself with the characters in my stories. I never write only about others. In my books, the one who got confused is me, the one who is humiliated is me, the one who met someone is me, the one who is lost is me, the one who is stupid is me, and the one who understood something exactly - also me. It's all about me, about the processes that are happening to me. Because I think what happens to me should happen to everyone. And vice versa: when a person reads my book, he identifies himself with the heroes. And he knows that what I gave him is not an invention.

- What should be the consolation

- Consolation? Rather, recovery, resolution of the problem. Look, a normal person is one who knows that "2 × 2 = 4". A madman is a person who believes that there is a "5" or "8". He has lost touch with reality. And a neurotic - like you, like me - is the one who knows that there is a "4", but it terribly outrages him. My condition is gradually improving, I learn to get angry every time less and less when faced with bad things. Recovery, which is no consolation, is never to be angry again. And this process goes on all my life. With or without someone's help, it gets better.

- Why do you need pain

- Pain serves as a warning if something went wrong. When I was studying medicine, I realized that the two terrible things a doctor needs to fix are pain and sadness. A patient who suffers from diabetes and who is saddened by this condition of his legs ends up with an amputation. Pain is irreplaceable. It is necessary so that we know that something is not working well. This is a wake-up call, whether it be physical or psychological pain. He warns that something can happen even when nothing physically bothers you. If the pain suddenly disappears, you either died or received anesthesia. If you die, there is no way out, and if you are given painkillers and you are not paying attention to anything, this can turn into a problem.

“But it looks like pain is also a growth tool

- How will you solve your problem if there is no pain? If you are not studying? You learn to walk by falling. You learn to do something well when it doesn't work out well. And if so, pain tells you about it. On the dashboard in the car, a red light sometimes flashes, whose appearance indicates that the oil pressure in the engine has decreased. What are you doing? You stop the car and go to the service station. Her employee looks at the car and tells you: half a liter is missing. You say, "Add oil." After five meters, the signal starts flashing again. The master says: "The oil is leaking" - and turns the valve harder. But ten meters later, history repeats itself. You walk into a service station and you're fed up. Although in reality the worst thing you can do is turn off the signal so that it does not interfere with you. Because if you do this, after 10 km your motor will melt. Pain is a red light in your car. The worst that can happen is a manifestation of inattention to him.

- What do you do when you yourself are experiencing mental pain

- What I have learned and what I advise others to do: I see what the problem is. And if I don't understand what happened, I go to the doctor.

- They say that mental imbalance is conducive to creativity. What do you think about this

- There are things that are repeated only because it is so accepted. Some geniuses were really crazy. But a madman is a madman. Not more. Not a genius. The fact that crazy geniuses are given special abilities does not mean that all crazy people are genius. As well as the fact that all geniuses must be mad. The creative resource is organized anarchically, and if so, it cannot be based on reason. A creative person has to go beyond conventional structures to be able to create. But to be in a world permeated with the intoxication of creative anarchy is one thing, and to go mad is quite another. Because a person can flirt with this world: go in and out - and he will not become crazy. Although some geniuses, having passed its border, could not return. Van Gogh was absolutely crazy, but he was not crazy about creativity: it happened before.

Nobody thinks that insanity comes from creativity. Maybe you have to be a little crazy to be brilliant - I don't know, I've never been a genius. But I don't think it's worth paying such a price anyway. Artists who need to enter a creative trance with the help of alcohol or something else are on a path that is dangerous even for their creativity. I knew genius people who did not need any trance - and I knew many people who went into trance every day, but did not create anything.

- If you could give one piece of advice that would hear everything you would say

- It's hard for me to give advice. I think I would say that it is worth doing what is important to you. The things that make your life better. And if there is not something that is important to you, they can help you find where to look. I could advise you to make your life absolutely, completely free. And in any case, it seems to me that if freedom alone is not enough for you, an area will soon appear where you can apply it.

I'm a psychiatrist, so I think the main thing is to give yourself the freedom to be who you are. And not letting anyone tell you that it would be better if you were different. Defend your right to be yourself. And then with time you will understand that this is not right - it should be so. How can this be achieved? You need to give yourself permission to be where you want to be - and then try to sit where you are comfortable. Permission to think what is being thought and not to think as someone else would think in your place. Speak if you want, and be silent if nothing comes to mind. It is your right to give yourself this permission. Permission to feel what you feel, and when you need it. And not to feel what the other would feel in your place, and stop feeling what others expect. You need to give yourself permission to take the risks that you decided to take, if and only if you pay for the consequences. But let no one tell you that you cannot take such risks - if you do not involve anyone in your business, this is your decision. And the last thing is very important. You need to give yourself permission to go through life looking for what you want, instead of waiting for others to give you it.

- Is it hard to live when you know so much about people and their psyche

- Yes … But imagine that a person who has never seen himself finds a mirror and looks into it. He doesn't like what he sees, he throws out the mirror and breaks it. But he already knows. And nothing can be done. Knowledge cannot be diminished. If you choose to look at yourself, you are doomed to know. It is provable that some people ignore things that are known to me. It's easier, but not better. But you always want to change this, if only you could do it. Because some things hurt more when you understand them better. But if it is true that this is so, it is equally true that the pain of other people will help you learn, as we said earlier. Therefore, I continue to think that it is better to walk this path and know more, even if this way there will be more pain too. In fact, there is a famous Socratic question: you are walking along the road and you see a slave who is sleeping and talking in a dream. By what he says, you understand that he dreams of freedom. What should you do: leave him to sleep so that in his sleep he can enjoy what he really does not have, or wake him up, although it is not very merciful, so that he returns to his painful reality? Sometimes this choice is very difficult to make. But everyone should know what he would like if he himself were this slave. I am 64 years old, and 40 years of them I dedicated to waking people up. So in his place, I would like to be woken up. I do not want to live in a dream: when I wake up, it will take away my hope, because I will realize that I cannot achieve the same in real life.

- Where to find the light when the soul is completely dark

“From a physics standpoint, darkness does not admit any light - not even that which is needed to find light. Real darkness is absolutely incompatible with light. So if you are in complete darkness, you will move blindly. This is bad news. But we must understand that the darkness that we are familiar with is not complete darkness. And it seems to me that it is very similar to a physical phenomenon when you enter a dark room and see nothing there. If you stay there instead of running away, very soon your eyes will get used to it, and you will begin to distinguish objects. There is always a light in a dark room that you did not see in the beginning. Therefore, in order to find light in the dark, first of all you need to know: it is not as dark here as it seems to you because of your established idea of light. If you don't get scared and don't run out, your eyes will begin to perceive the light that is in the darkness. And with this amount of light, you can find a place where there is more of it. But you cannot escape. If you run away, there is no way. So you have to stay.