Chapter 1: Subjectivity and Intersubjectivity

Psychoanalytic theories of mind consist of comprehensive explanations of human behavior and motivation. Such theories seek to account for normal and abnormal development at both the population and individual levels, but these abstract and global ideas can seem distant from our personal, moment-by-moment, lived experience. Intersubjectivity theory has reformulated psychological concepts of why people act, feel and behave the way they do in terms that directly capture our internal and relational experiences. In writing this book we hope to communicate these compelling ideas and to facilitate the translation of these concepts into the practice of psychotherapy. In this chapter, we try to unravel the paradox that intersubjectivity presupposes subjectivity and subjectivity presupposes intersubjectivity. A central organizing concept of intersubjectivity theory is that our experience of ourselves is fundamental to how we operate in the world. Our subjective experience is the phenomenology of all that one might be aware of at any given moment and much of what is out of awareness, as well. Over time, the complex interweaving of individual abilities and temperament, relational configurations with caregivers during infancy and childhood, and the lucky or harsh realities of one " s life circumstances converge to form patterns. These patterns of experiencing oneself and the world describe our subjective, personal reality and become structured as our organizations of experience. In treatment we hope to understand these 2 patterns in the context of a relationship that becomes a new lived experience and the basis of new organizing patterns. All psychoanalytic theories of personality begin with some conception of the central motivational constructs that underlie both normal and pathological human behavior. For example, Freudian theory sees human motivation as deriving from the instinctual drives of sex and aggression, while modern relational theories typically view motivation as springing from some need to create or maintain bonds to others. Along with other modern relational theories, developments in self psychology and intersubjectivity theory point to the inadequacy of earlier psychoanalytic conceptions of motivation to explain human psychology. In work that has had a strong impact on intersubjectivity theory, Lichtenberg (1989) has observed that " ...motivations arise solely from lived experience " (p. 2). Human motivations, whether for food, sexual gratification, or attachment (Lichtenberg posits five motivational systems) serve to promote, maintain or restore a fundamental sense of self-cohesion. " Lived experience is about how we human beings consciously and unconsciously seek to fulfill our needs and …