The Creativity of Dissociation

Abstract

ABSTRACT. This paper examines the complex and creative strategies employed in keeping beliefs, memories, and various other mental and bodily states effectively dissociated from normal waking consciousness. First, it examines cases of hypnotic anesthesia and hypnotically induced hallucination, which illustrate: (1) our capacity for generating novel mental contents, (2) our capacity for choosing a plan of action from a wider set of options, and (3) our capacity for monitoring and responding to environmental influences threatening to undermine a dissociative state. These observations are then extended to cases involving dissociated memories of trauma. The strategies needed to maintain a dissociated belief or memory are strikingly similar to those involved in preventing our lies from being exposed. Moreover, these strategies are complex, and they potentially affect seemingly remote aspects of a person's psychology. That point is illustrated by examining the dispositional nature of both memory and belief, the complex web of relations between our mental states and other elements of our psychology, and the interrelatedness of personality states and human capacities.

Experiências mediúnicas e dissociativas em Fernando Pessoa e C. G. Jung à luz da psicologia analítica e da psicologia anomalística

“…Embora seja desafiador estabelecer um diagnóstico retrospectivo do que ocorreu com Fernando Pessoa, seus relatos parecem indicar, a par de sua alta produtividade poética e sua manutenção do teste de realidade, que suas experiências não eram patológicas, mas devem ser enfileiradas entre tantos outros exemplos de dissociação criativa (Maraldi & Krippner, 2013), isto é, uma forma de dissociação não patológica, de caráter muitas vezes adaptativo, que decorre de (ou permite) determinadas atividades artísticas, como quando um ator se envolve profundamente com seus personagens e se dissocia momentaneamente de sua identidade usual ao vivenciar esses papéis no teatro. A dissociação criativa está geralmente a favor do desenvolvimento do ego e representa uma flexibilização dos processos identitários visando uma maior adaptação do indivíduo em seu meio (Braude, 2002;Maraldi & Krippner, 2013).…”

Counting Persons and Living With Alters: Comments on Matthews

“…But I never claimed that this unifying subject meets any criteria of personhood. Perhaps it does, but if so, that would only be relevant in situations where we can ignore the distinct agendas and interests of specific alters-say, situations where we're focusing on the creativity necessary to maintain a dissociated state (see, e.g., Braude, 2002), and perhaps some (but hardly all) abstract philosophical discussions about what it is to be a person.…”