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Freud's "On Narcissism. An Introduction"
Frente a la revisión del concepto de libido emprendida por sus discípulos Adler y Jung, Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) mantiene, en INTRODUCCIÓN AL NARCISISMO, la identificación del eros con el impulso sexual, pero yuxtapone una nueva polaridad que actúa en el propio seno de la libido, la cual puede alternativamente proyectarse en un objeto exterior o dirigirse de forma narcisista hacia dentro. Completan el volumen OTROS ENSAYOS que ilustran la perspectiva de Freud acerca de diversos temas recurrentes en la práctica psicoanalítica.
256 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1914
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September 19, 2013
Freud's Work in Progress
Between 1920 and 1923, Freud published two works in which he developed the tripartite division of the human psyche into the id, the ego and the super ego.
This is an earlier work first published in 1914. It's fascinating, because it is relatively easy to understand, but also reveals the basis upon which Freud eventually arrived at these concepts.
In a way, we get to see Freud's own mind at work.
Libido
The ostensible subject matter is narcissism. However, in order to understand how narcissism works, Freud explains the operation of the libido and the ego.
Our libido is our sex drive or desire for sexual activity. It is the sexual energy that is at work in our mind.
Freud would come to place sexuality in the centre of psychoanalysis. He attracted much criticism for this apparent innovation. However, in later works, he would explain how this approach owed something to Plato. In "Group Psychology", he stated:
“By coming to this decision, Psychoanalysis has let loose a storm of indignation, as though it had been guilty of an act of outrageous innovation. Yet it has done nothing original in taking love in this ‘wider’ sense. In its origin, function and relation to sexual love, the ‘Eros’ of the philosopher Plato coincides exactly with the love force, the libido of psychoanalysis.”
Normally, the libido is directed at external objects, such as people and things.
Freud calls this the object-libido. It shapes our erotic relationship with the reality of the outside world, the world outside our mind.
However, it is possible for our libido to withdraw from the outside world, in whole or in part.
When the libido detaches from objects, it can do nothing else but turn around and attach to the ego itself.
Freud describes this relationship as the ego-libido.
Narcissism
The ego-libido resembles an earlier infantile stage of sexual development.
At the earliest stages of infancy, we are unable to differentiate ourselves from the outside world and our primary care-giver, our mother.
At this stage, our sexual instincts attach to whatever satisfies our ego, which is our mother, the source of food, care and protection. These sources are also the source of self-preservation or preservation of the self.
Freud describes the child at this stage as a megalomaniac, effectively "His Majesty the Baby".
However, gradually, the child becomes conscious of itself and starts to get its satisfaction from two sources, its mother as nurse and itself (including its own genitalia).
It is the growing sense of self as a source of satisfaction that is the basis of narcissism.
Apart from the mother or nurse, the self is the object-love. The infant has not yet learned to attach itself to other love-objects such as people and things.
Note that at this stage, there is nothing pejorative about the concept of narcissism. It is a perfectly natural and normal stage of libidinal or sexual development.
As the child matures, it starts to attach to external objects. During this stage, the detachment of the libido from the ego or self impoverishes the self in favour of the love-object.
Narcissism diminishes as the focus of the self becomes the external objects.
The attachment of the libido to external objects is called anaclytic love (or attachment).
The attachment of the libido to the ego or self is called narcissistic love.
Male/Female Differences
A certain level of narcissism is consistent with a healthy psyche. However, the libido of males is prone to transfer wholly to objects, which Freud regarded as a sexual overvaluation of the love-object. It represents a wholesale transfer of the narcissism from the self to the love-object.
At a moderate level, this state is the origin of the state of being in love. At a more extreme level, it can become a neurotic compulsion.
In contrast, Freud regards many females as more focussed on themselves than they are on males. In effect, they are more interested in being loved than they are in loving a male.
Not all women are this extreme. However, those who meet this description are regarded as narcissistic and cool to men. In return, males regard this type of woman as enigmatic and alluring.
Even this type of female is capable of complete or significant object-love, when it comes to their children.
Freud explains this transference of narcissism to the child as love-object in terms of a part of themselves becoming an extraneous object. Thus, their complete object-love actually derives from their narcissism.
Freud acknowledges that these are fairly gross generalisations. He also suggests that each gender contains a cross-section of these characteristics.
In future reading and reviews, I will try to assess Freud's analysis of women's sexuality.
Constraints on the Libido
At this point, Freud notes that the megalomania of the infant has been dampened and its narcissism has been effaced.
He therefore asks whether the whole of the ego-libido has converted into object-libido or object-cathexis (object-attachment).
By implication, can the self love all people and things, or is there a limit to the capacity of the libido?
Freud argues that there is, that the subject's libidinal instinctual impulses come into conflict with and are constrained by the subject's cultural and ethical ideas.
He argues that the subject recognises these constraints as a standard by which he may be judged. As a result, he submits to the constraints. His submission, the repression of the instinctual impulses is a conscious act of the ego. It is in fact an act of self-respect of the ego.
Freud proceeds to argue that not every individual regards themselves as bound by identical constraints.
The constraints are individual and personal to each subject.
Idealisation
From this, he argues that each person sets up an ideal in himself, by which he measures and judges his actual ego.
The creation of this ideal self is the basis upon which the subject represses instinctual impulses.
Freud describes this ideal self as an ideal ego. The subject finds perfection in this ideal ego. Therefore, it becomes the target of the subject's self-love and narcissism.
Having found narcissistic perfection in infancy, the subject now seeks narcissistic perfection in the ideal ego.
To the extent that the subject satisfies his quest, he is satisfied and enjoys himself.
The ego ideal becomes the substitute for the lost narcissism of his childhood.
The subject's goal is now to pay homage to his high ego ideal.
Sublimation
Freud notes that this process of idealisation is still a libidinal process of sexual satisfaction.
He differentiates it from the process of sublimation.
Sublimation still concerns the object-libido. However, the instinct directs itself to something other than sexual satisfaction. It deflects from sexuality. Sublimation operates on the instinct itself. (Note again that the concept of sublimation appears earlier in the philosophy of Plato.)
In contrast, idealisation operates on the object. It aggrandises and exalts the object in the subject's mind. Even the sexual overvaluation of an object is an idealisation of the object.
Idealisation makes demands on the ego. These demands can lead to repression. Alternatively, sublimation is a method of allowing the ego to comply with these demands by channelling the instincts and avoiding repression.
Having set up an ego ideal, the psyche has a method by which it enforces compliance with the ideal. This mechanism involves a sense of an agent or watchman who notices or watches us. In effect, this watchman is our conscience, an extension of the critical attitude of our parents, our peers and public opinion.
Self-observation is the foundation of self-criticism. It is also related to our philosophical concerns.
Self-Regard
At this point, Freud starts to discuss the positive effects of compliance with the ideal-ego in terms of self-regard, which is effectively an aspect of narcissism.
We can derive self-regard from object-cathexis or attachment. However, we can also derive it from detachment from objects and return to the self or the ego, i.e., narcissism.
In a way, happiness proceeds from narcissistic perfection and the consequent sexual satisfaction.
Homosexuality
Up to this point, Freud has not attempted to identify the nature of the object of love in terms of sexuality.
However, Freud discusses homosexuality in terms of the social character of the ego ideal.
The ego ideal has the potential to liberate homosexual libido. (Freud simply makes this statement, and I didn't quite understand the mechanism by which this liberation occurred. It seems I will have to go elsewhere for a clarification of this mechanism, possibly to Freud's essay on Leonardo da Vinci: “The boy represses his love for his mother: he puts himself in her place, identifies himself with her, and takes his own person as a model in whose likeness he chooses the new objects of his love”. In a way, he loves another man as his mother loved him. However, in his case, the other man is actually a projected self).
However, to the extent that the ego ideal is affected by social factors, this liberation causes a failure to comply with the ego ideal, and results in a sense of guilt or social anxiety.
This sense of guilt derives from a fear of punishment by or loss of love by the parents. Later, it transforms into a fear of social sanctions.
It's worth noting that, within the scope of this particular work, Freud makes no value judgement about homosexuality as a valid sexual option.
Any sense of neurosis associated with homosexuality comes not from the nature of the eroticism, but from the fact that it is socially proscribed.
I want to explore this issue further in my reading of Steven Bruhm's "Reflecting Narcissus: A Queer Aesthetic".
Super-Ego
The most notable aspect of this account is the absence of the language of id, ego and super-ego.
In effect, the concept of the super-ego developed from the ideal ego or the ego-ideal.
While I was familiar with this tripartite distinction, I've always tended to associate the super-ego with the mechanism by which society represses the libido of the individual subject.
While this might have been a misunderstanding of a subtle distinction on my part, I found the analysis in this work really helpful, especially in relation to how the ego-ideal is a positive source of self-regard, not just a negative instrument of repression.
Exaltation of the Object
The work also helped me to understand how important the subject is in the definition of its love-object. The subject is largely responsible for the idealisation, aggrandisement and exaltation of the object.
Presumably this is the beginning of the concept of projection of the subject's ideals on the object.
In effect, the subject loves the beloved, because it defines the object as loveable or consistent with the subject lover's object- or love-ideal.
While Freud does not construct his tripartite division of the psyche in this essay, there are some aspects in which it reflects some of the approach of Plato in "The Symposium" and "Phaedrus".
I want to explore the relationship between Plato's philosophy and Freud's psychoanalysis in my further readings.
Again, this is part of my personal quest to understand the mechanisms of desire, lust and love.
Between 1920 and 1923, Freud published two works in which he developed the tripartite division of the human psyche into the id, the ego and the super ego.
This is an earlier work first published in 1914. It's fascinating, because it is relatively easy to understand, but also reveals the basis upon which Freud eventually arrived at these concepts.
In a way, we get to see Freud's own mind at work.
Libido
The ostensible subject matter is narcissism. However, in order to understand how narcissism works, Freud explains the operation of the libido and the ego.
Our libido is our sex drive or desire for sexual activity. It is the sexual energy that is at work in our mind.
Freud would come to place sexuality in the centre of psychoanalysis. He attracted much criticism for this apparent innovation. However, in later works, he would explain how this approach owed something to Plato. In "Group Psychology", he stated:
“By coming to this decision, Psychoanalysis has let loose a storm of indignation, as though it had been guilty of an act of outrageous innovation. Yet it has done nothing original in taking love in this ‘wider’ sense. In its origin, function and relation to sexual love, the ‘Eros’ of the philosopher Plato coincides exactly with the love force, the libido of psychoanalysis.”
Normally, the libido is directed at external objects, such as people and things.
Freud calls this the object-libido. It shapes our erotic relationship with the reality of the outside world, the world outside our mind.
However, it is possible for our libido to withdraw from the outside world, in whole or in part.
When the libido detaches from objects, it can do nothing else but turn around and attach to the ego itself.
Freud describes this relationship as the ego-libido.
Narcissism
The ego-libido resembles an earlier infantile stage of sexual development.
At the earliest stages of infancy, we are unable to differentiate ourselves from the outside world and our primary care-giver, our mother.
At this stage, our sexual instincts attach to whatever satisfies our ego, which is our mother, the source of food, care and protection. These sources are also the source of self-preservation or preservation of the self.
Freud describes the child at this stage as a megalomaniac, effectively "His Majesty the Baby".
However, gradually, the child becomes conscious of itself and starts to get its satisfaction from two sources, its mother as nurse and itself (including its own genitalia).
It is the growing sense of self as a source of satisfaction that is the basis of narcissism.
Apart from the mother or nurse, the self is the object-love. The infant has not yet learned to attach itself to other love-objects such as people and things.
Note that at this stage, there is nothing pejorative about the concept of narcissism. It is a perfectly natural and normal stage of libidinal or sexual development.
As the child matures, it starts to attach to external objects. During this stage, the detachment of the libido from the ego or self impoverishes the self in favour of the love-object.
Narcissism diminishes as the focus of the self becomes the external objects.
The attachment of the libido to external objects is called anaclytic love (or attachment).
The attachment of the libido to the ego or self is called narcissistic love.
Male/Female Differences
A certain level of narcissism is consistent with a healthy psyche. However, the libido of males is prone to transfer wholly to objects, which Freud regarded as a sexual overvaluation of the love-object. It represents a wholesale transfer of the narcissism from the self to the love-object.
At a moderate level, this state is the origin of the state of being in love. At a more extreme level, it can become a neurotic compulsion.
In contrast, Freud regards many females as more focussed on themselves than they are on males. In effect, they are more interested in being loved than they are in loving a male.
Not all women are this extreme. However, those who meet this description are regarded as narcissistic and cool to men. In return, males regard this type of woman as enigmatic and alluring.
Even this type of female is capable of complete or significant object-love, when it comes to their children.
Freud explains this transference of narcissism to the child as love-object in terms of a part of themselves becoming an extraneous object. Thus, their complete object-love actually derives from their narcissism.
Freud acknowledges that these are fairly gross generalisations. He also suggests that each gender contains a cross-section of these characteristics.
In future reading and reviews, I will try to assess Freud's analysis of women's sexuality.
Constraints on the Libido
At this point, Freud notes that the megalomania of the infant has been dampened and its narcissism has been effaced.
He therefore asks whether the whole of the ego-libido has converted into object-libido or object-cathexis (object-attachment).
By implication, can the self love all people and things, or is there a limit to the capacity of the libido?
Freud argues that there is, that the subject's libidinal instinctual impulses come into conflict with and are constrained by the subject's cultural and ethical ideas.
He argues that the subject recognises these constraints as a standard by which he may be judged. As a result, he submits to the constraints. His submission, the repression of the instinctual impulses is a conscious act of the ego. It is in fact an act of self-respect of the ego.
Freud proceeds to argue that not every individual regards themselves as bound by identical constraints.
The constraints are individual and personal to each subject.
Idealisation
From this, he argues that each person sets up an ideal in himself, by which he measures and judges his actual ego.
The creation of this ideal self is the basis upon which the subject represses instinctual impulses.
Freud describes this ideal self as an ideal ego. The subject finds perfection in this ideal ego. Therefore, it becomes the target of the subject's self-love and narcissism.
Having found narcissistic perfection in infancy, the subject now seeks narcissistic perfection in the ideal ego.
To the extent that the subject satisfies his quest, he is satisfied and enjoys himself.
The ego ideal becomes the substitute for the lost narcissism of his childhood.
The subject's goal is now to pay homage to his high ego ideal.
Sublimation
Freud notes that this process of idealisation is still a libidinal process of sexual satisfaction.
He differentiates it from the process of sublimation.
Sublimation still concerns the object-libido. However, the instinct directs itself to something other than sexual satisfaction. It deflects from sexuality. Sublimation operates on the instinct itself. (Note again that the concept of sublimation appears earlier in the philosophy of Plato.)
In contrast, idealisation operates on the object. It aggrandises and exalts the object in the subject's mind. Even the sexual overvaluation of an object is an idealisation of the object.
Idealisation makes demands on the ego. These demands can lead to repression. Alternatively, sublimation is a method of allowing the ego to comply with these demands by channelling the instincts and avoiding repression.
Having set up an ego ideal, the psyche has a method by which it enforces compliance with the ideal. This mechanism involves a sense of an agent or watchman who notices or watches us. In effect, this watchman is our conscience, an extension of the critical attitude of our parents, our peers and public opinion.
Self-observation is the foundation of self-criticism. It is also related to our philosophical concerns.
Self-Regard
At this point, Freud starts to discuss the positive effects of compliance with the ideal-ego in terms of self-regard, which is effectively an aspect of narcissism.
We can derive self-regard from object-cathexis or attachment. However, we can also derive it from detachment from objects and return to the self or the ego, i.e., narcissism.
In a way, happiness proceeds from narcissistic perfection and the consequent sexual satisfaction.
Homosexuality
Up to this point, Freud has not attempted to identify the nature of the object of love in terms of sexuality.
However, Freud discusses homosexuality in terms of the social character of the ego ideal.
The ego ideal has the potential to liberate homosexual libido. (Freud simply makes this statement, and I didn't quite understand the mechanism by which this liberation occurred. It seems I will have to go elsewhere for a clarification of this mechanism, possibly to Freud's essay on Leonardo da Vinci: “The boy represses his love for his mother: he puts himself in her place, identifies himself with her, and takes his own person as a model in whose likeness he chooses the new objects of his love”. In a way, he loves another man as his mother loved him. However, in his case, the other man is actually a projected self).
However, to the extent that the ego ideal is affected by social factors, this liberation causes a failure to comply with the ego ideal, and results in a sense of guilt or social anxiety.
This sense of guilt derives from a fear of punishment by or loss of love by the parents. Later, it transforms into a fear of social sanctions.
It's worth noting that, within the scope of this particular work, Freud makes no value judgement about homosexuality as a valid sexual option.
Any sense of neurosis associated with homosexuality comes not from the nature of the eroticism, but from the fact that it is socially proscribed.
I want to explore this issue further in my reading of Steven Bruhm's "Reflecting Narcissus: A Queer Aesthetic".
Super-Ego
The most notable aspect of this account is the absence of the language of id, ego and super-ego.
In effect, the concept of the super-ego developed from the ideal ego or the ego-ideal.
While I was familiar with this tripartite distinction, I've always tended to associate the super-ego with the mechanism by which society represses the libido of the individual subject.
While this might have been a misunderstanding of a subtle distinction on my part, I found the analysis in this work really helpful, especially in relation to how the ego-ideal is a positive source of self-regard, not just a negative instrument of repression.
Exaltation of the Object
The work also helped me to understand how important the subject is in the definition of its love-object. The subject is largely responsible for the idealisation, aggrandisement and exaltation of the object.
Presumably this is the beginning of the concept of projection of the subject's ideals on the object.
In effect, the subject loves the beloved, because it defines the object as loveable or consistent with the subject lover's object- or love-ideal.
While Freud does not construct his tripartite division of the psyche in this essay, there are some aspects in which it reflects some of the approach of Plato in "The Symposium" and "Phaedrus".
I want to explore the relationship between Plato's philosophy and Freud's psychoanalysis in my further readings.
Again, this is part of my personal quest to understand the mechanisms of desire, lust and love.
July 16, 2013
This essay takes on entirely new meaning after you find out that it was written shortly after Freud and Jung had their falling out. It is actually all about Freud calling Jung a narcissistic sexual, but thinly disguised as a psychoanalytic paper.
September 16, 2019
3.5 bintang
Pak Freud nih kalo zaman sekarang pasti udah kena sambet SJW 😂😂😂
Pak Freud nih kalo zaman sekarang pasti udah kena sambet SJW 😂😂😂
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