Psyche and Daily Life

For a gentle understanding of our mental states, attributions, and the effects of everyday life on the psyche.

Mental illness and our understanding of it tend to be both trivialized and isolated. We speak of "private neuroses," our "own little traumas," and practice resilience in order to function in everyday life. The question about one's own well-being is all too often answered with a simple "everything is fine". We throw around psychological expressions in a clichéd and inflationary manner that have little meaning, that we mostly use incorrectly, or that we don't even know what is meant by them in the first place. It is precisely through the constant trivialized talk about the psyche that we declare it a mere small talk topic and distance ourselves from our psychological states and their causes. Instead, we avoid seriously dealing with how we feel. An appropriate discussion hardly ever takes place - insofar as we talk about how we feel at all.

At the same time, when we do talk, it is rarely about all of us, but mostly about our individual mental states. Yet many of us are locked into similar constellations of everyday life - which also provoke similar psychological problems. Full-time jobs, relationships with partners, friends and family, financial precariousness or the desire for self-realization shape our mental states. How we feel psychologically is a consequence of our lifestyles. What we do in everyday life, how we relate to each other and what we (have to) feel influences our psyche.

In this seminar we first want to explore how everyday life concretely affects our psyche, i.e. how everyday experiences determine our mental well-being. We will then develop a critical and emancipatory understanding of our mental states and attributions. This will be done by discussing concrete concepts. The practical goal is to develop a tender approach to mental states in everyday life.

Syllabus

How everyday life determines our psyche (4 sessions)

1. Collective self-examination: pressure to perform & winter time

2. About the connection between everyday life and psyche

3. Basics of an analysis of our psyche

4. Dealing with psyche today: repressing in order to function

How we talk about our psyche in everyday life (9 sessions)

1. depressive*depression

2. narcissistic*narcissism

3. neurotic*neurosis

4. manic*mania

5. demented*dementia

6. hysterical*hysteria

7. traumatic*trauma

8. shameful*shame

9. sad*mourning // melancholic*melancholy

Outlook into lost futures (1 session)

... and the desire that everything could be different: Rationalization & Liberation

Fo further information please contact info@assoziation-e.org

DISCLAIMER: The seminar is not intended to and cannot replace psychotherapeutic or -analytic treatment.