The Systems

Three rival theories of one darkness — Freud's repressed wish, Adler's striving from inferiority, Jung's inherited floor.

A course on the thought of The Unconscious.

Course outline

1. Freud: The Wish That Is Pushed Away — Freud took Janet's split-off idea and answered the question Janet left: WHAT is the buried content, and why is it buried? Not weakness but *repression* — an active force pushes an unacceptable wish…
2. Adler: The Striving from Below — In 1911 I left Freud's circle — not because I misread him but because I read the same patients differently. The root of a neurosis is not a repressed sexual wish but a *striving*: from the child's…
3. Jung: The Deeper Floor — I broke from Freud in 1913, and unlike Adler I did not narrow the unconscious — I opened its floor. My entry was measurable: the word-association test, where a stimulus word touching a sore spot…

Part of the Symposium course library.