On the Sense of Loneliness by Melanie Klein - Essay Example

The urge towards integration, as well as the pain experienced in the process, spring from internal sources which remains powerful throughout life. (On the Sense of Loneliness 1963) From your reading this year describe the resistances Klein described. Introduction The earliest emotional journey of an individual starts from infancy and is often reflected in adulthood. The journey is an ongoing process which has been internalised by the experiences of resistance to pain and the urge towards integration. This theory has been studied and described by Melanie Klein, a famous psychoanalyst, as the embodied human experience which an individual go through from infancy and continues during the lifelong process of growth into adulthood. It is a mental mechanism of projection and introjections which individuals employ to go through life. Klein is of the view that an individual's adulthood behaviour, associated actions, reactions, and emotions can be used to reconstruct childhood memories and experiences which have impacted the individual to find the cause of depression. Her ideas, experts declare, may be primitive as compared to Sigmund Freud but nevertheless practical in psychoanalysis. Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, bases his theories on individual consciousness and unconsciousness. Klein on the other hand is more concerned with early infancy development and object relations which are innate factors contributing to human bonds, sense of life, and mental and physical health. This author is of the view that Klein's ideas of projective identification and object relations are realistic and applicable in psychoanalysis techniques as they relate to both emotional and material health of individuals. In particular, Klein’s concepts of urge of integration and resistance to pain have been major contributions to the understanding of psychoanalysis of individual development. Discussion Freud's Conceptual Framework To comprehend and explicate Melanie Klein’s work on the Sense of Loneliness as presented in the above reference quote, one needs to understand the basis of her conceptual framework first – which is Sigmund Freud’s concepts of development. Freud is considered to be the father of psychoanalysis. He is considered the pioneer of psychoanalysis of the three typographies of the Id, Ego and Superego (which he earlier had categorised as Unconscious, Preconscious and Conscious). In his study he has discovered that the sensory perception and axis of existence of individuals are inherent in the development of the drive and defence, and the transference and resistance. From there Freud has been able to progress towards an understanding of the psychological process and development of an individual by putting these typographies into a timeline - past, present and future (Psyche 2010). The problem that Freud encountered during this experiment has been how to place the Id, Ego and Superego into this time frame. Eventually, he connects them by placing the processes of development with experiences, and principles with reality and pleasure. These elements are temporal and develop with one's unconscious psychological development throughout an individual's life. By categorising experience and principles as unconscious, Freud has opened a Pandora’s Box on Id and unconsciousness (Psyche 2010). Indeed, it is from there that Freud has discovered that object relations stem from the psychoanalytic instinct which can be defined as "the agent through which the instinctual aim is achieved, and the agent is usually conceived as being another person" (Psyche 2010). Usually the object is the mother while the infant develops a relation with the mother in the first year of his life. This relationship, though essential, according to Freud, is merely material and oral in nature. Thus the child is dependent on the mother because of her object relation of nourishment. Freud believes that the unconsciousness of an adult stems from an infant's unconsciousness and is driven by life and death instincts. These instincts can be categorised into three stages of Oral, Anal and Phallic of infantile sexuality. The aim of the instincts is to derive satisfaction from the object during the Phallic and Oedipal phases, which are also the infantile sexuality phases according to Freud (Psyche 2010). Freud's conceptual framework on infantile psychoanalysis has formed early theoretical framework for studying infantile social learning, and dependency and attachment which other theorists have used to establish a child's complex differentiation and distinction psychological functioning and his relationship with the external world. This distinction may be object oriented or relationship base, tend to alter and transfer to adulthood with development. In Freud's view the Id is the internal self relations extended to the outside world. As an individual matures, this relationship also matures and is transferred through self-relations with others leading to presentation of the self to other relations, object relations and so on (Psyche 2010). In essence, the Freudian psychoanalysis forms the initial foundation for theories of object relations and projective identification, later picked up by Melanie Klein but its merit is debatable. What has fascinated me the most about the Freudian concept is that its emphasis on the Id more than the Ego and Superego. As I understand, the Ego and the Superego are related to the consciousness of the individual; these are more like projections rather than the innate characteristics of the individual. Inferences from surroundings, the nature of nurture and more importantly the learned environment contribute to the Ego and Superego whereas the Id's existence starts from the initial stages of the infant's life, remains at the subliminal level throughout his life yet Freud attributes the Ego and Superego as the troubling stage of adulthood whereas it is the Id which he attributes as the initial point of reference. This makes it one of the most important developmental study issues in psychoanalysis as well as in the profession. Freudian's conceptual framework helps one to understand the way individual behaves by tracing his behaviours to his Id, and thereby reconstruct the reason behind his unconscious defence mechanisms, sexuality and inevitably resistance to object relations (Psyche 2010). At the same time, like Klein, I find that Freud's concept of early development on sexuality during the Oral stage too elusive as he is of the view that it is at this stage that the infant develops the Oedipal complex, a psychoanalysis technique which states that a child becomes attached to the mother because of his sexual relation with her. Among male infants this becomes an extreme sense of attachment to the extent of jealousy towards the father whereas among female infants, the Oedipus complex is a genesis of the superego which develops into a death instinct in later life. The connection with the mother may become repressed but surfaces at later stages of life. However, I feel the theory of Oedipus complex is based on the assumption that it is the singular determinant of the child's later life psychology whereas there are other factors which intervene in altering one's behaviours such as external reality and environment (King and Steiner 1992). This leads me to turn to Melanie Klein's concept for further understanding of infantile development and its connection with adulthood development. Klein's Concepts Melanie Klein's career in psychoanalysis began when Anna Freud and she had started their observation study of childhood relationships based on Freud's three dimensional categories and the Oedipal complex. She uses the same map and develops a representation of her own findings using the external reality of the infant as projective identification. On this map greed, envy and jealousy are the dominant emotions during childhood development. From this concept she progresses towards the paranoid-schizoid-depressive positions (Klein 1957). By paranoid-schizoid position Klein means the post-natal life anxieties of the infant which he experiences from internal and external sources. During this position, the child develops life and death instincts because of the fear of being annihilated. The externalisation process of such instincts takes place through projective identification. The concept of projective identification is perhaps one of the most important developments in psychoanalysis and distinguishing feature of Klein's career. Projective identification refers to a dynamic process of communication between the subject and his/her relations with others - which may be internal self or other relations. Klein maintains that projective identification is a mental and physical closeness that the infant develops with the mother inside and outside the womb, characterised by feelings of security, dependency, and love. These innate feelings are transferred to the post-natal stage. This stage continues to exist with the assumption that the state of post-natal is undisturbed and the psychological and physical condition of the mother is well (Klein 1957). However, I understand, such assumptions are idealistic. According to Klein, anxiety through unpleasant experiences, insecurity due to separation from the mother, and non-gratification due to difficulty in feeding lead to cravings, desires, greed, and envy. She writes, "The struggle between life and death instincts and the ensuing threat of annihilation of the self and of the object by destructive impulses are fundamental..." (Klein 1957, p.4). The infant thus resists against these threats as he feels the danger of being taken away from his object relation by his rival. From this infantile greed the adult, at an unconscious level, transfers greed to more mature emotions of jealousy, envy and other destructive introjections. It is through this projective identification aspect that Klein defines the starting point of the struggle against the pain of separation and survival in infants. She further enumerates on this point as follows: "This feeling that the mother is omnipotent and that it is up to her to prevent all pain and evils from internal and external sources is also found in the analysis of adults....favourable changes in feeding children which have come about in recent years, in contrast to the rather rigid way of feeding according to timetable, cannot altogether prevent the infant's difficulties, because the mother cannot eliminate his destructive impulses and persecutory anxiety." (Klein 1957, p.14). As a result, the splitting of the object relations gives rise to defence mechanisms, early mental disturbances, and perception of the world which continue throughout life. The pain caused by anxiety stems from different types of projective identification - the object's (mother) dominance, control, invasion, and capacity to take over the feelings of the infant can be over-powering and give rise to the sense of loss, anger, envy, panic and phobias etc. (Joseph 1987). It is from this point that one gets to the understanding that projective identification is a powerful and influential element in infantile development. It may lead to ambivalent and tolerant object relations, or it could lead to hate and dependence on object relations. This latter situation is the main cause of depressive position, according to Klein, implying that the mother has the capacity to induce the infant to integrate into the external environment through better communication, object relations, and transference of emotions into other objects. By the time the child moves towards the depressive position, the projective identification has less influence on externalisation of the individual into the environment. Instead, the child is encouraged to integrate into society with less resistance, albeit the feelings of resistance continue to exist at the subliminal level (Joseph 1987). Here, I understand that transference and drive, and defence and resistance are the elements which give rise to unconscious revival of the past as perceived by the infant, and transferred it into the future. It is the also the means of transferring defence mechanisms into individuals which are externalised by resistance. Hence, in adulthood, transference gives rise to projective identification of the self in relation with the external environment (instead of relations with the mother) which may comprise of objective relations with the mother, relatives, and other individuals in life. This is basically the actualisation process of the projective identification taking the form of the self and others. However, I notice that Klein does not give any indication of the role of communication or interaction between the self with others nor does she outlines the boundary of the object relations (mother) against others. This aspect of inter-objectivity I feel should be connected through some form of communication. Instead, Klein jumps directly to the adulthood and hypothesise transference and resistance giving rise to the painful object relations inherent in individuals in depressive conditions. In her work Love, Guilt and Reparation, Klein (1975) attributes this sense of loss, conflict and aggression to depression and offers the explanation of it being a void, an empty space which must be filled. The empty space has been created from a defensive struggle against the painful longing for the “good mother”. The sense of loneliness thus stems from infantile aggressive instincts struggling against the bad mother and causes the infant to withdraw from her. In adulthood, this sense of loneliness emerges again in the form of yearning for a perfect internal state of ideal relation with the mother again, as in the foetal unity. In the infant’s ideal, the good mother does not stimulate aggression thereby induce the pain of resistance (Spira and Richards 2003). Klein is of the view that during adulthood, loneliness stemming from this yearning leads to depression which has nothing to do with the quality of care or actual relationship with the mother. The pain of resistance occurs even when one is loved because it is a fragmented phantasy of the infant’s losing part of the self in the process of development and growing up (Spira and Richards 2003). Furthermore, the individual's attempts towards reparation stem from the urge to come to terms with this pain; thus emerged the concept of reparation. Klein believes that in the process of resistance and aggression, the infant, and later on in life the adult, damages the image of the object relation so much that its guilt and urge of reparation leave a void (of depression) which must be filled. The quest to fill this space can extricate the individual from depression (or vice versa inability to do so leads to acute depression). According to Klein, externalised projection identification increases the feelings of loneliness because of its embedded aggressive and unforgiving nature. This in turn increases the schizoid-paranoid and depressive anxieties among adults leading to complex personalities and behaviours. Reparation therefore manifests itself from guilt and can occur at any stage of life, but usually during adulthood. It is a recreated experience, which in Freud's conceptual framework has depicted as re-found reality (Klein 1975). However, through psychosis, reparation can help the individual to deal with this sense of loneliness and pain through self acceptance and confession of the idealised state of the object relation. Reparation therefore is the need to deal with the internal loss of the self, the object relation, the function and ability to become one with the good mother. Just as resistance is the reality of survival instinct and pain against the urge of integration, reparation is the willingness to accept death as the painful reality of the self. Later in life, in old age, the individual continues to struggle for the balance of resistance and acceptance, to deviate from the painful feelings of loneliness in old age. Implications on Psychoanalysis Klein believes that the earliest years of development are evident in the individual's demeanour while in a child it is evident in his/her behaviours through play. It does not need reconstruction. She is of the view that object relations are the first connection that the infant develops with the mother. This relation remains throughout his/her life in the form of object relations with the mother and later with others (King and Steiner 1992). This aspect enables one to understand the value of childhood development. Klein goes further to establish that the individual's early "phantasy" becomes externalised and transferred to personality, behaviour and attitude towards life (King and Steiner 1992). This is a critical connection in psychoanalysis to link the bridge between infancy resistance and urge of integration, and adulthood resistance and project identification. Klein most influential idea has been this inherent concept of projection identification developed at infancy which continues into adulthood. Projection identification is the inner mental life and image which every individual maintains and is the mirror of his/her emotions, attitudes and behaviours towards others. Object relations is thus connected with projection identification. Furthermore, projection identification is split up into resistance and defence, both instincts, an infant develops during post-natal stages but which continue throughout life as well. Both instincts are formed because of the infant's fear of life and death on separation from the intrinsic object relations with the mother. This fear leads to defence mechanisms in infants, and becomes inherent in every turn of life-long development. Resistance, the other counterpart instinct, becomes inherent in the individual because of the negative experiences that infants develop with fear of detachment from the mother. These instincts contribute towards the resistance towards the mother in the beginning and later in life towards others. In this context, I find Freud's approach to be lacking in connectivity as his ideas tend to segregate the past, from the present and the future based on the conceptual framework of Id, Ego and Superego. He believes infant development is separate from adulthood whereas as one can observe from Klein's ideas they are connected. This becomes clearer when applied to psychoanalysis approaches. Through Klein one can trace the reason behind depression due to repression and resistance towards the mother in infancy. Klein offers the reason being that when a child is repressed through control and dominance in the early stages of life, its leads to resistance and aggression. These passions when repressed, can emerge at any stages of life and can be internalised or externalised (transference) depending on the projection identification. In later life situations, an adult become guilty of such aggressions and negative emotions so much it becomes a void or space within leading to depression. Such conditions then need reparation by rebuilding the image or expressed through other communication channels in order to come to terms with infant ideas of unity and happiness with the object relation (the mother). The purpose of studying psychoanalysis is to find logic and means to remedy psychological conditions which appear beyond the control of the individual. This is why, I find studying Klein’s framework comprehensive with significant implications on modern approaches to psychoanalysis. Conclusions From the above discussion it is clear that Klein has revolutionised the psychoanalysis tradition established by Freud. His central tenets may have offered the foundation for unconsciousness and human emotional attachments but it has been Klein's contribution which has made it more valuable to the psychoanalysis field. The inner workings and structure of the mind, the individual life-long development constructed in projection identification and his relationships with others are inherent in Klein's model of representation. The fact that her ideas originate from Freud's model cannot be neglected but one must give her the credit as being an influential figure in offering us with psychoanalysis techniques to study children and their development when earlier experts have considered it an obscure area to explore. Furthermore, the key construct of her model describes the individual's developmental stages as connected from the past to the present and into the future. This ability to graph and predict behaviour is highly important in the field of psychoanalysis because it helps one to underpin the rationale behind emotions and behaviours, and thus direction for cure. For example the discovery of guilt and reparation in later stages of an individual's life connected with infancy helps one to identify the cause and thereby the cure through expression. But that is not all. The most influential aspect I believe is Klein's ideas of urge of integration and the pain of resistance. It is the holistic and summary of her contribution towards psychoanalysis which describes the psychology affecting relationships, emotions, mental state of mind and individual representation. It is critical for the individual to understand these aspects of a patient in order to find its cure. Klein's projection identification theory and object relations, as discussed above, demonstrate that an individual is not merely a bundle of emotions and illogical behaviours. Instead, these emotions and behaviours are developed over time having been caused by some interventions, experiences or anxieties in early stages of life. Thus, Klein's in essence provides us with guidance path towards psychoanalysis approach and techniques which has been absent in earlier theories of psychoanalysis. References Joseph, B. 1987. "Projective identification - some clinical aspects" in Melanie Klein today: developments in theory and practice, Volume 1 By Elizabeth Bott Spillius 1988 Routledge. King, P. and Steiner, R. 1992. The Freud-Klein Controversies. Routledge. Klein, M. 1957. Envy and Gratitude, Volume 6. Routledge. Klein, M., 1975. Love, guilt and reparation and other works 1921-45. London: The Hogarth Press. Psyche 2010. "Cube of Space: Cognitive and Psychoanalytic/Psychodynamic Mappings" Online accessed on 29 May 2010 from: http://www.psyche.com/psyche/cube/cube_psyche.html Spira, L. and Richards, A.K., 2003. On Being Lonely, Socially Isolated and Single: A Multi-Perspective Approach. Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp. 3-21 Additional Readings Bronstein, C. 2001. Kleinian theory: A contemporary perspective. London: Whurr Publishers. Fonagy, P. & Target, M. 2003. Psychoanalytical theories: Perspectives from developmental psychopathology. London: Whurr Publishers Ltd. Gillespie, W. 1987. Melanie Klein: Her World and her Work. International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 68: 138 –142. Greenberg, J.R. & Mitchell, S.A. 1983. Object relations in psychoanalytic theory. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Wasdell, D. 1980. Anxiety Defences: Their Origin, Functioning and Evolution: A detailed critique of Melanie Klein’s work on ‘paranoid-schizoid’ defences in ‘Developments in Psycho-Analysis’. Meridian Programme, Meridian House. Read More