The Ninth Street Center Infrequently Asked Questions

"All power to the imagination!"
— slogan of the May 1968 Paris student revolt

Does psychology begin with a radical premise?

Although commercial psychiatry has been captured by medicine and largely confines itself to the sublimation of dissent though drugs, the origins of psychology lie in the heart of man's search for freedom. For the claim that there even exists anything like a psyche is a radical one.

The fact that we have a psyche means we can think anything we want and do anything we want. This simple consequence of the mind/body split explains the extreme diversity of human thought and behavior — from war and madness to genius and cultural evolution. And the fact that we have a psychology means that all our social planning must allow for not only the possibility but the very necessity of such extremes.

The job of today's conventional clinical shrink is that of cleaning up society's little embarrassments. Society plays little overt role in mopping up its victims. They go willingly, like the last soldiers of a lost cause, into the humane encampments of their victors, certain that any terms of surrender will be better than the pain they now feel — willing at long last to suspect that their cause might have been the wrong one.

The job of a real psychologist, however, is quite different. Although someday there will be techniques of psychological manipulation beyond the imaginings of our best science fiction authors, for now simple education into the workings of the psyche can do wonders for those still struggling with an oppressive system. We must educate people that freedom of thought and action is already in their hands, and that the only impediment to employing them is a false dependence on the cooperation and empathy of others.

People who grow up healthy are used to having protective and nurturing adults around. When we take this expectation into the world of creative adult deviance, however, such expectations must be left aside like the training wheels on a bicycle. Otherwise we become beggars at the doors of people who not only don't understand us but who, if we're as creative as we claim, could not reasonably be expected to.

You could say that when we are disappointed with the world's inability to support our creative endeavors we are tacitly failing to make the final transition from secure sibling to at-risk adult. That this is a purely psychic transition is a great advantage, though. For we can decide, all by ourselves, right here and now, to forgive the failure of others to follow the trail we blaze, while still admiring and being grateful to however few can acknowledge our achievement.

It is only because we are psychic beings that we can cure ourselves. So the next time you're under the weather, as a friend of mine recently suggested, try Plato — not Prozac.