Cyclical Psychodynamics and the Contextual Self

The Inner World, the Intimate World, and the World of Culture and Society

Paul L. Wachtel

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• eBook ISBN: 9781317743293
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Mental Health in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Cyclical Psychodynamics and the Contextual Self articulates in new ways the essential features and most recent extensions of Paul Wachtel's powerfully integrative theory of cyclical psychodynamics. Wachtel is widely regarded as the leading advocate for integrative thinking in personality theory and the theory and practice of psychotherapy. He is a contributor to cutting edge thought in the realm of relational psychoanalysis and to highlighting the ways in which the relational point of view provides especially fertile ground for integrating psychoanalytic insights with the ideas and methods of other theoretical and therapeutic orientations.

In this book, Wachtel extends his integration of psychoanalytic, cognitive-behavioral, systemic, and experiential viewpoints to examine closely the nature of the inner world of subjectivity, its relation to the transactional world of daily life experiences, and the impact on both the larger social and cultural forces that both shape and are shaped by individual experience. Here, he discusses in a uniquely comprehensive fashiong the subtleties of the clinical interaction, the findings of systematic research, and the role of social, economic, and historical forces in our lives. The chapters in this book help to transcend the tunnel vision that can lead therapists of different orientations to ignore the important discoveries and innovations from competing approaches.

Explicating the pervasive role of vicious circles and self-fulfilling prophecies in our lives, Cyclical Psychodynamics and the Contextual Self shows how deeply intertwined the subjective, the intersubjective, and the cultural realms are, and points to new pathways to therapeutic and social change. Both a theoretical tour de force and an immensely practical guide to clinical practice, this book will be essential reading for psychoanalysts, psychotherapists and students of human behavior of all backgrounds and theoretical orientations.

Part I
Psychotherapy, Personality Dynamics, and the World of Intersubjectivity

Chapter 1
Cyclical Psychodynamics

An Integrative, Relational Point of View

This book extends and further explores a point of view that has characterized my work over the course of many years. The theoretical perspective I have come to call cyclical psychodynamics originated in my efforts to come to terms with challenges to psychoanalytic thought deriving from the arguments and research efforts of behavior therapists and social learning theorists; but as the cyclical psychodynamic perspective has continued to evolve, it has addressed additional challenges and sought additional opportunities in relation to an expanding array of observations and viewpoints, both from outside of psychoanalysis and from within. Among the important nonpsychoanalytic influences in shaping the trajectory of cyclical psychodynamic theory have been the ideas and practices of family therapists and family systems theorists, emotion-focused and humanisticexperiential therapists, and acceptance and mindfulness-oriented cognitive-behavioral therapists. Alongside the influence of these diverse clinical traditions, cyclical psychodynamic thought and practice have been nourished by attachment theory and research and by developments in social and affective neuroscience. Additionally, its particular characteristics were shaped in important ways by efforts to pay more serious attention than is common in clinical theorizing to the powerful influence of cultural values and of race, class, and ethnicity upon the phenomena addressed by clinicians and by the reciprocal effort to explore the ways in which our understanding of the complexities of psychological dynamics could, in turn, shed light on a number of pressing social challenges, especially in the realm of race relations (Wachtel, 1999) and in the interlocking phenomena of materialism, obsession with economic growth, and despoilation of the environment (e.g., Wachtel, 1983, 2003).

An especially important element in the evolution of cyclical psychodynamic theory was its encounter with the concurrently evolving relational movement in psychoanalysis. At first, the relational point of view and cyclical psychodynamics proceeded on parallel tracks, developing very similar ideas in many important respects but remaining separate strands in the overall landscape of the field. But over time, the consonances became more and more apparent (Wachtel, 1997, 2008, 2011a). The beginnings of the relational movement are generally viewed as being marked by the publication of Greenberg and Mitchell’s (1983) book on Object Relations in Psychoanalytic Theory and Mitchell’s (1988) publication of Relational Concepts in Psychoanalysis, though certainly there were numerous precursors, which these two works built upon and integrated. Thus, the first formulations of cyclical psychodynamic theory (Wachtel, 1973, 1977a, 1977b) predated the appearance of relational theory by a number of years, and hence were built on an independent conceptual foundation. Moreover, whereas relational theory was designed to integrate diverse strands of thought within the spectrum of psychoanalysis, cyclical psychodynamic theory aimed at a still broader integration, including not only psychoanalytic theories and observations but those that derived from outside the world of psychoanalysis as well. These differences in origin led to differences in terminology and emphasis that for a time made the substantial overlap between cyclical psychodynamic theory and other versions of relational thought not as readily apparent as they might be today.

One-Person, Two-Person, and Contextual Points of View

Among the various features that cyclical psychodynamic theory shares with the majority of relational theories, one of the most fundamental is the shared emphasis on what has come to be called the two-person point of view. As I have discussed in detail elsewhere (Wachtel, 2008), there are actually several dimensions to the two-person point of view that are not always sufficiently distinguished. Most common in all relational theories is a two-person epistemology. Here, the emphasis is on a critique of the objectivist assumptions that led early analysts to regard themselves as neutral observers, simply commenting on the dynamics of the other person. This objectivist element in psychoanalytic thought was, in fact, never as total as the neat distinction between one-person and two-person theory suggests, but there are certainly important differences between the epistemological foundations of classical psychoanalytic thought and those of relational thought, as has been well articulated by writers such as Aron (1996), I. Z. Hoffman (1998), and Mitchell (1988, 1993, 1997). Cyclical psychodynamics is, in this sense, clearly a two-person theory, and there are very few differences in this regard between the cyclical psychodynamic point of view and those of other relational theorists.

But when consideration moves from matters of epistemology to the understanding of personality dynamics or the essentials of clinical practice, new complexities enter. Not all writers who manifest a two-person point of view with regard to epistemology are as thoroughly two-person in their thinking when it comes to personality dynamics or to the practice of psychoanalysis or psychotherapy. In these realms, what I have called the default position, the largely unexamined set of assumptions carried over from older psychoanalytic conceptualizations, finds its way into relational thinking to a surprising extent (Wachtel, 2008). As discussed later, and throughout this book, the cyclical psychodynamic understanding of personality dynamics and development highlights the pervasive relevance of the relational context in contributing to the individual’s behavior and experience, not just in the analytic session, but in every facet of the person’s life throughout the day. The relational matrix is not just the shaping context for development in the earliest years of life or the epistemological foundation for observations in the analytic session. It is an inextricable element in personality dynamics throughout life. When this critical point is lost, and what Mitchell (1988) called the metaphor of the baby and the developmental tilt take center stage, then relational theories unwittingly take on crucial properties of the one-person theories they were created to replace.

Although the one-person versus two-person distinction served very valuably in highlighting the differences between older classical models in psychoanalysis and the newer relational models, it is a misleading term when applied to the dynamics of personality. The crucial contexts in which personality continues to evolve include not just two-person contexts. They include as well the triangular configurations highlighted both by family therapists and by psychoanalysts in relation to the Oedipus complex; the groups of varying sizes encountered in school, at work, and at play; and the larger context of culture and society. For this reason, although cyclical psychodynamics falls squarely on the two-person side of the epistemological divide between one-person and two-person theories, its understanding of personality dynamics is more accurately described as contextual than as two-person (Wachtel, 2008).

The observations that psychotherapists make in the therapeutic session are two-person observations because there are two people in the room, and each is contributing to what transpires and what is observed. But in formulating a more complete understanding of the person sitting across from her,¹ what is essential for the therapist to achieve is a contextual understanding, an understanding of the person in the context of his life, of the ways in which his experiences are shaped by the myriad forms of relational matrices that he encounters and participates in throughout the day and week. As discussed in various ways throughout this book, the two-person form of that context can at times be overvalued in clinical theory because the observations most immediately available to the therapist or analyst are two-person observations. But for that very reason, it is essential that our understanding of the patient not be shaped too exclusively by the emotional experience of the two parties in the room alone. That experience, to be sure, is of enormous importance in developing a deep and personally substantive understanding of the patient’s experience. It is a crucial element in the approach to therapeutic practice and therapeutic understanding depicted in this book. But it is also a potential trap, a seductive and partial substitute for the even broader and deeper understanding that can only be achieved when attention to the co-created emotional experience in the room, no matter how compelling, is complemented and illuminated by equal attention to what we learn from the patient’s accounts of his life outside the room.

It is certainly true that those accounts lack the immediacy of what is happening right at the moment, and they require, in certain ways, more filling in, because we are not there with the patient at the time and must rely on his recollections and his selective attention and memory. Our knowledge of these events is always partial and in certain ways conjectural, but there are ways to inquire about the patient’s experiences outside the room that give us a better chance to achieve at least a therapeutically useful approximation (see, for example, Wachtel, 2011a, 2011b; E. F. Wachtel & Wachtel, 1986). And, of course, our understanding of what is transpiring in the room right at the moment, notwithstanding our immediate presence and participation, is also limited and subject to selectivity and personalized constructions. Indeed, both facets of the more complete and accurate picture to which we aspire – the observations from within the room and the reports of what transpire outside – are more adequately understood and more adequately evaluated in relation to each other. It is not that either realm can validate the other; if we have made up a story for ourselves about the patient, we are capable of imposing that story on both kinds of observations. But the complementarity of observations and formulations helps to shed light on each in ways that underline both their consonances and their contradictions, and thus, for the best of clinicians, can serve to continually raise questions about formulations that have become too comfortably or confidently settled.

Constructivism and Other Shared Themes

Another element of convergence between cyclical psychodynamic theory and most other relational perspectives is their shared emphasis on constructivism. The constructivist epistemology that underlies cyclical psychodynamic and most other relational theories dovetails with the two-person point of view in important ways (see, for example, Aron, 1996; I. Z. Hoffman, 1998). It dovetails as well with the findings of contemporary research on perception and memory (e.g., Schacter, 1996; Schacter, Norman, & Koutstaal, 1998). The older understanding that informed Freud’s theorizing, a vision of camera-like registration of perceptual input and of fixed memory traces that are stored in an original form and then distorted in the service of defense (see Schimek, 1975), has been replaced in subsequent years by a vision of perception and memory in which it is understood that memory and perception are active processes whereby we select, construct, and reconstruct anew each time we remember or, indeed, perceive.

Further characterizing the shared assumptive world of cyclical psychodynamics and most other relational approaches is an emphasis on mutuality, reciprocity, co-construction, intersubjectivity, and the powerful interconnectedness of people and their experiences and perceptions. Each of these terms refers to something slightly different, but they converge and overlap both with each other and with the previously noted concepts of the two-person point of view and of constructivism. In this, they imply as well an approach to the therapeutic relationship that is more collaborative and egalitarian than had been typical of psychoanalysis previously or than is typical of some contemporary cognitive and cognitive-behavioral approaches. I shall have more to say about these latter points as I proceed.

The Integrative Aims of Relational Theory and Cyclical Psychodynamics

Another key theme that unites cyclical psychodynamic theory and most other relational theories is the emphasis on integrating different points of view into a larger, more comprehensive theoretical vision. Central to the origins of the relational turn in psychoanalysis was the effort to highlight convergences between object relations theory, interpersonal theory, and self-psychology. Greenberg and Mitchell (1983) first articulated these convergences in their distinction between the drive/structure model and the relational/structure model, and a wide range of relational writers has noted them subsequently. This original integrative thrust in relational theorizing has been complemented by efforts to integrate as well a variety of other perspectives, especially attachment theory (e.g., Beebe & Lachmann, 2003; Mitchell, 1999; Wallin, 2007) and critical elements of feminist thought (e.g., Aron, 1996; Benjamin, 1988; Dimen & Goldner, 2002; Goldner, 1991; Harris, 2005). This latter feature of the relational synthesis overlaps in important ways with the already mentioned emphasis on mutuality, collaboration, and awareness of the constructed nature of what is often taken as just the way things are, in matters of gender as well as in other realms of living.

Cyclical psychodynamic theory too originated in an effort at integration, but, as has already been noted, the integration sought included not just diverse psychoanalytic perspectives but also points of view that were outside the psychoanalytic spectrum altogether and that, in some cases, were conceived of as in opposition to psychoanalysis. Thus, to reconcile these competing points of view required a still more probing examination of the assumptions underlying each. The key to addressing this challenge was to look to each facet of the emerging integration not in terms of its received formulations (the official or standard versions of psychoanalytic thought, cognitive-behavioral thought, and so forth – which often were formulated in ways that looked incompatible), but to focus instead on what clinicians or researchers from each tradition actually did and actually observed. As I further elaborate as I proceed, this strategy was predicated on the assumption that the differences in viewpoint by proponents of different theories and approaches at least in part reflected primary focus on and attention to certain phenomena and relationships and a marginalizing or even outright failure to notice certain others. The construction of a more comprehensive and integrative theory required close attention to how each theoretical perspective foregrounded different phenomena and, where strong incompatibilities appeared, placed at the margins some of the very observations that were central to the other point of view. The challenge, thus, was to develop more comprehensive formulations that included, in a single coherent framework, the observations central to each perspective without excluding those central to the others.

As a consequence of its broader integrative aim, cyclical psychodynamic theory, although strongly rooted in the psychoanalytic point of view and in the relational reconceptualization of that point of view, also has important differences from other psychoanalytic viewpoints, including other relational viewpoints (Wachtel, 2008). Both the broader integrative ambitions of cyclical psychodynamic theory and the fact that for a number of years its evolution proceeded apart from that of the relational movement gave it a different cast and attuned it to different phenomena. It thus makes sense to think of cyclical psychodynamic theory as a theory whose foundations lie both in the relational point of view and in the larger psychotherapy integration movement (Wachtel, Kruk, & McKinney, 2005).²

Alternative Conceptions of the Dynamics of Psychological Development

Cyclical psychodynamics shares with virtually all psychoanalytic perspectives, relational and nonrelational, an emphasis on unconscious motivations, conflicts, and defenses, but it conceptualizes the dynamics of those unconscious phenomena – and especially the dynamics of their persistence over time – in a different fashion. In place of the emphasis in much psychoanalytic theorizing on processes such as fixation and developmental arrest – that is, on how portions of the psyche are split off and prevented from growing and changing, remaining instead infantile, archaic, primitive, and out of touch with the reality of the person’s everyday life – the cyclical psychodynamic conceptualization understands the influence of early experiences rather differently. Cyclical psychodynamic theory too treats early experiences as of critical importance, but their importance lies in how they skew the later experiences the person has. That is, people with different early experiences are likely to have different later experiences as well, because the early experience leads them to interact with others differently, to interpret and give meaning to events differently, and so on.

Now, of course, all theories that stress the importance of early experiences posit that later experiences are changed as a consequence. Otherwise, there would be little meaning to claiming that the early experience is consequential. But from a cyclical psychodynamic perspective, these differences in the person’s later experiences are not just a result of the earlier representations having been deeply etched into the psyche or rendered persistent and relatively unchangeable because they have been internalized. Rather than depicting psychological inclinations, once internalized, as playing themselves out more or less independently of what is transpiring in the present, the cyclical psychodynamic understanding is that there is a continuing and mutually consequential transaction between the person’s existing predispositions and the people and events he or she encounters. The maintenance over time of the pattern of behaving and experiencing established early in life requires repeated confirmation of the assumptions that early experience has ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Epigraph
• Halftitle
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of Contributors
• Acknowledgments
• Psychotherapy, Personality Dynamics, and the World of Intersubjectivity
• Cyclical Psychodynamics An Integrative, Relational Point of View
• The Good News: To Mess Up Your Life, You Need Accomplices. The Bad News: They Are Very Easy to Recruit
• The Inner and Outer Worlds and Their Link through Action
• Attachment in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy A Two-Person, Cyclical Psychodynamic Approach
• The Surface and the Depths Reexamining the Metaphor of Depth in Psychoanalytic Discourse
• Repression, Dissociation, and Self-Acceptance Reexamining the Idea of Making the Unconscious Conscious1
• Active Intervention, Psychic Structure, and the Analysis of Transference
• Incorporating the Panther Toward a More Clinically Seamless Integration in Therapeutic Practice
• Thinking about Resistance Affect, Cognition, and Corrective Emotional Experiences
• Should Psychoanalytic Training Be Training to Be a Psychoanalyst?
• Epistemological Foundations of Psychoanalysis Science, Hermeneutics, and the Vicious Circles of Adversarial Discourse
• Race, Class, Greed, and the Social Construction of Desire
• Psychoanalysis and the World of Cultural Constructions The Contextual Self and the Realm of Everyday Unhappiness
• Full Pockets, Empty Lives Probing the Contemporary Culture of Greed
• Greed as an Individual and Social Phenomenon
• Psychoanalysis, Psychotherapy, and the Challenges of Race and Class
• The Vicious Circles of Racism A Cyclical Psychodynamic Perspective on Race and Race Relations
• References
• Index