Adam Blatner
Words and Images from the Mind of Adam Blatner
Lolling About
What a great activity: Lolling about, sort of going La la la la, like a silly. This is a perfectly plausible form of leisure, but there’s an art to it, maybe. I mean, what’s good lolling and what’s better, or even great lolling? These are frontiers to be investigated, but I fear they might not […]
Posted in Autobiographical, Foolin Around, Whassup? | No Comments
My (?) Identity
As another bit of mythmaking, this metaphor is useful: I’m but a cell on a finger-tip of God. We cells sort of know about the other cells that make up the skin, and there are other cells in the subcutaneous tissue, pressure receptors and such. Here the metaphor shifts over to the ranks of angels, […]
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Living Subjectively
Once again I have been reminded of the fact that we all live subjectively, and we select out and resonate to songs, nature, whatever in idiosyncratic ways. This is great fodder for the existentialists: No one can truly rise to absolutely complete empathy with another, even if we try. While we may become truly close, […]
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“Trauma”
This has become a bit of a catch-word: It catches you. It says, “This was really painful for the client.” But I confess that I rather wince with the term, as if all psychopathology was due to trauma and no one’s responsible for anything. I’m vulnerable in speaking up because of course some people are […]
Posted in Psychodrama, Psychotherapy and Psychiatry | 1 Comment
Just Kick ‘Em Out (?)
I know a nice lady who suggested that we should "rise up and dump the tea into the harbor. Kick out everyone in Washington and start all over." Well, I considered this and please forgive me, but I do have a suspicious bone in my body. The problem is that the people who would then […]
Posted in Current Events, Essays and Papers, Follies | 1 Comment
Mysteries in Nature
There was a lovely scene in our back meadow this morning. A little fawn scampered up to his mother and began to nurse. It took about ten minutes! After about four minutes the mommy ewe reached around and liked the baby’s bottom. What’s that about? Meanwhile the fawn is eagerly licking and thrusting its head […]
Posted in Current Events, Essays and Papers, Uncategorized, Whassup? | No Comments
Psychodrama Theory
A recent NY Times Magazine article dated Sunday, June 28, 2015 by Casey Schwartz was titled “Tell it about your mother: Can brain scanning save psychoanalysis”. Schwartz interviewed Otto Kernberg, now 86, known for his contributions to using psychoanalysis with borderline person-ality and work on personality disorders. “Psychoanalysis is several things,” he said. “It’s a […]
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Peace and Quiet
Ahhh. We have disguised our little withdrawal space as an inoffensive bedroom within a little seemingly ordinary house on a suburban street in a nondescript section of an ordinary town in a quiet and stable region of a relatively peaceful country on an ecologically stable (for now) planet in a solar system in mid-process—neither beginning […]
Posted in Autobiographical, My Favorite Things | No Comments
Creativity Carries On
I have of late encountered a series of experiences that have delivered a reassuring and startling message: There are many who carry on the work of creativity, and many who are doing so in ways that are more refined, more radical, more elaborate, more whatever than me! A small and not-to-be-honored egocentric part begrudges them: […]
Posted in Essays and Papers, Play and Spontaneity, Spirituality and Philosophy, Wisdom-ing | No Comments
The World of Almost-Real: Some Introductory Notes
It’s less important that you believe this version of meta-reality than you be liberated by this example: Fairly mature people (like the author) can engage in what the psychoanalysts call “adaptive regression in the service of the ego” (or ARISE for short) and use this activity as a way to open their minds for fun […]
Posted in Foolin Around, My Favorite Things, World of Almost-Real | No Comments