Page - 133 - in Psychoanalytic Perspectives on Puberty and Adolescence - The Inner Worlds of Teenagers and their Parents

The search for the self – identity 133 adolescent recognizes his own shortcomings, his own good and evil sides, can he accept the imperfect world of his parents. As Bion contends, inside every person there are two contradictory forces – one that strives for knowledge (K) and wishes to recognize reality, and another that wishes to hinder this process. Bion calls this force the “inner enemy”. We feel compelled to escape from this unpleasant world with our bodies or thoughts. Escape is a fundamental human answer. Even a young child does not want to know about his or her distress, either denying or idealizing it. According to Bion, existence is not enough; our existence must have a cer- tain quality of aliveness. . . . Bion emphasizes the difference between know- ing and knowing about. Idealization must give way to a realization through which one can perceive the shortcomings of the idealized image. (Bleandonu 1990, 246) Instead of realistic insights into his own relative insignificance, the adolescent can defend himself through arrogance, projecting his own bad qualities onto oth- ers and ultimately achieving a position where he is disliked. Vulnerability and sensitivity can be concealed behind megalomania, a necessary transitory phase of the adolescent state of mind that can persist many years afterward – even for an entire life. Only reluctantly does the adolescent see the real world and accept the attendant disillusionment. Behind his envy of adults who have already achieved success hides the insecurity of whether the adolescent will achieve success, find a profession and establish a family. As we have seen, Freudian psychoanalysis proceeds from the hypothesis that the superego is the heir of Oedipal conflict, an internalization of parental, societal values and norms occurs that we term the superego. The superego is a punishing judge in the image of a feared authority figure. In the adolescent phase, not only the real outer parents are questioned, but also the adolescent’s own “inner” parents – i.e., the values and attitudes she has internalized in order to develop a relatively stable life and character. However, equally important is the idea of what the ado- lescent wants to be – which we term her “ego ideal”. As opposed to the superego, the ego ideal is formed in the image of the love object. Nunberg describes these two agents in the following way: “Whereas the ego bows to the superego out of fear of punishment, it bows to the ego ideal out of love” (1932, 173). The adolescent’s self -image, along with his cognitive development, becomes more complex and abstract. He develops a capacity to reflect on himself and distinguish between his current self and two kinds of possible selves – the ideal self and the feared self, i.e., he can see his own dark sides. The adolescent is also increasingly able to recognize various “identities” or aspects of his identity in connection to various persons and situations – for instance, at school and at home, with friends and strangers. This also includes the knowledge of when one is more “authentic” or adapts to the ideas of others in the sense of a “false self” (Winnicott 1960).