The Legacy of Sigmund Freud is psychoanalysis. It is not so pure and it is not so simple, but it will forever be connected to the Austrian neuropsychologist who turned the mind of the world inward to seek the causes of his neurotic behavior.
How he loved the subconscious, that part of our being that lies just below our awareness, yet is, in a sense directing our actions. He divided this inner giant’ into three sections, the id, the ego and the superego, one lying just directly above or below the other.
The Id he taught is the furthermost layer down and is the cellar, the place where all unmentionable thoughts and actions and all unworthiness is kept. (I am not sure he called this the cellar but I have always thought of it in this way)
The next layer up is the ego. If the id makes any upward movement it must be through the ego. Here is where personality is formed and it decides what the world is to see. On top of these two is the superego, “something like, but not
quite the conscience’ so says Chuck Missler whose article I read.
Was he right, or was he wrong? Both. Many other psychologist who learned from him and took from his what he had to offer, such as Carl Jung, Alfred Adler, and other, and moved in other directions. But still he is a hot topic of conversation and his psychoanalytical methods are still used and are still controversial today. But no matter, he made us all take a good look at ourselves, warts and all.
Yet, he is also credited and rightfully so, with creating the sexual liberation that makes sex what it is today, a street commodity. He released the libido from hiding and no one it seems can corral it and put it back where it belongs, behind closed doors.
Freud’s failings, of course, was his failure to dig himself out of the pit he had climbed into, or out of the cellar, if you will, We all have been a bunch of frolicking children, laughing and giggling and playing dangerously with our creative instincts as if they were ours to play with creativity, as if it is ours to play with.
He did lots of things right and for that we thank him. But what did he do wrong? He left out God. Much of what I have read on the Internet blames Freud. I do not blame him. I thank him for opening the door to our subconscious, but I do not approve of he way he did it. He should have knocked before he entered into the realm of the sacred. Man’s inner being is where God dwells and he alone holds the key to his soul.
It is a common practice for writers to condemn Freud, while at the same time using and assessing his insights. We all have learned from him and now we accuse him of opening Pandora’s box and letting loose all the ills of mankind on a poor unsuspecting world. Now while enjoying this free-for-all, they find him a handy dog to kick when their libido has all but done them in. In his favor I ask? Was not Freud so busy playing in the cellar with man’s soul, he had no time to explore the attic?
This one excellent writer, and one who knew her stuff, Lucy Freeman, in her writing quoted Heraclitus, a writer who wrote five centuries before Christ: “The soul of a man is a far country, which cannot be appreciated or explored”. The writer went on: But one man, Sigmund Freud, not only crossed the frontier of that far country but penetrated its heartland, and through his writings and personal influence made the inner landscape available to all who dared follow”.
Freud’s Legacy is his having opened the door to the understanding of the inner lives of mankind. That’s it. He made it possible and fashionable for mankind to look inward and drag whatever is found there out into the sunshine. Too bad he did not have to help us pick and choose and did not leave a dumpster outside our door to toss the trash in. Into that we would have tossed his Oedipus complex, as one example of the Brat doll kind of thing we never needed.
Source:
www.khouse.org/articles/1996/108/
Webster, Richard, “Introduction: Legacy of Freud
www.richardwebster.net/freudslegacy.html
Freeman, Lucy
