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DISPLAYI NG
I M A G I N A RY
7 DISRESPECT TO

267: PARENTS AS A MEANS
OF TREATI NG MENTAL
PROBLEMS

ɳ Question

There is a growing tendency to employ imagination as a psychothera-
peutic tool. The imagination can be used as a means of releasing the
patient from anxiety and negative emotional residues enduring since
childhood. During the first few years of life a child lacks the tools for
grappling with his problems effectively, nor does he have the ability
to pinpoint his problems; instead the child’s psyche suffers compre-
hensive emotional scarring. These emotional scars are responsible for
the projection of feelings onto various people and situations in later
life. The severity of these scars obviously depends on the degree of
pressure that the child’s environment exerted on him when he was
young. In time, these emotional residues become integrated into the
personality. Aggressive behavior on the parents’ part is especially de-
structive, leading to alternating aggression and fear in the child (fear is
actually aggression that the individual directs towards himself.)

Based on cumulative studies, a method whereby the adult sufferer
can free himself from many [festering] angers and fears is by express-
ing feelings solely imaginatively (in the mind) e.g. by becoming angry
with the annoying party, getting back at him, avenging himself etc.

The question is, may the therapist encourage the patient to act in a

Disrespectful thoughts towards Parents 2 177