Rethinking Freud

Like all of us, Freud’s views were shaped by his time. For Freud, the horrors of the First World War left him with the point of view that man was fundamentally brutal and egoistic. Society was a restraining force, holding man’s worst impulses at bay in the interests of the group.

It’s from this that all Freud’s talk about repression comes from. If people were to act in the way that they really wanted, then life would be hell. We’d all be raping and assaulting each other.

This view has been at the root of much modern thinking. And it’s pretty sad when you think about it. It tends to suggest that our darker feelings - that we do undoubtedly have – are our true selves. We just hold back on them for the sake of the others.

Happily then, this view seems increasingly at odds with the evidence.

Contrary to the Freudian view, babies are drawn to their mother not just as a source of food but because they have an even more powerful drive towards human closeness.

As we grow older, it is our sense of connection to others that is the basis of sound mental health and wellbeing, especially the connections that we experience as a child. We seem biologically equipped to relate to other in a way that isn’t rational but much more emotional. We can literally feel other people’s feelings, as their behaviour fires the ‘mirror neurons’ in our own brains.

In the same way that Freud was influenced by what was happening around him, so are we all. Freud’s influential theories – that humans are fundamentally bad, repressing their true nature for the sake of society – will have been self-reinforcing, internalized by the generations that grew up with them and, to some extent, shaping their beliefs and even behaviour.

Hopefully then, as the new view of humans as pre-disposed towards empathy gains currency, it too will be self-reinforcing, creating a virtuous circle in which people are willing to believe that others can act out of desires that are not fundamentally self-interested but have to do with developing stronger relationships that, in the end, benefit us all.

This post was inspired by my current read – ‘The Empathic Civilisation’ – by Jeremy Rifkin – highly recommended!