Good things about the superego, and how it came to have a bad rap.
Category: Points of Departure
The basic emotional issues that drive us, and their implications for the most common psychological problems: depression, anxiety, shame, low self-esteem, etc.
Why Empathy Fails
In order to empathize with another person, you have to recognize that he or she actually exists apart from and without specific reference to you. Our ability to tolerate separateness largely determines how well we are able to empathize with others.
Defense Mechanisms III: Further Uses for Projection
In addition to ridding the self of painful experience, projection may also defuse internal conflict between opposing impulses or ideas. People who use projection in this way often provoke behavior in others than appears to “validate” the projection.
The Hatred of Authority
While rebellion against established authority often leads to progress and positive change, legitimate authority exerted with concern has its value. Some people can’t tolerate the expression of authority in any form, however, and live in constant rebellion against it.
Defense Mechanisms I: Splitting
Splitting (along with its companion defense, projection) is one of the primary defense mechanisms; it’s also an indispensable part of everyday mental processes, enabling us to make distinctions and evolve meaning out of our experience.