As Daniel noted, a consideration of how best to address the legitimate demand that it is time for his wife to engage her priorities, “strangely attracts” his memories of trying to be a “good,” considerate boy during his youth. The “preachy” voice of his parent might be pulled in, indicating that his highest priority as a grown man should be to become a solid “breadwinner.” Thoughts about financial security, feelings concerning obligations, and behaviors related to remaining silent about job-related frustrations are swirling around Daniel’s head and heart. A powerful psychic attractor is in full operation, even if not consciously acknowledged by Daniel. It is appropriate for Dr. Freud to dig a bit deep into the soil of Daniel’s psyche to unearth the content (and dynamics) of this strange attractor.
Peremptory Ideation: I wish to push the matter of life patterns a bit further and in doing so will be turning to psychoanalytically oriented research conducted by George Klein at New York University. In one of his many essays, Klein (1967) introduced an interesting concept regarding the dynamic unconscious processes operating deep in our psyche. He described a process called Peremptory Ideation that I suggest relates not just to the matter of ongoing and reinforced life patterns but also to the dynamics and power of the Tragic Triangle (Regret, Loss and Anger).
Klein proposed that in our internal world (psyche), we create a specific idea or image that begins to “travel” around our psyche (head and heart). It operates as a strange attractor, recruiting thoughts, feelings and behaviors as it courses through our psyche. This train, which is already filled with ideas and images, picks up fragments of unconsciously held material (memories, feelings, and thoughts) along the way. The ideational train operates much like the avalanche, pothole, and other forms of “strange attractors”. The train becomes increasingly rich and emotionally powerful as it picks up new intra-psychic material. It gains increasing energy from this unconscious material.
At some point, this ideation begins to pull in material from outside the psyche. External events suddenly take on greater saliency (more emotional power and vividness). This may be a point when our objects of value gain even greater saliency, for they are aligned with and are picked up by the moving psychic train. Klein suggested that this ideation takes priority when valuing, attending, and remembering in the external world. It assumes a commanding (“peremptory”) presence.
A positive (reinforcing) loop is created, with the external material now joining the interior material. They all cluster around the original (often primitive) ideation. Vibrance is to be found in their clustering. There is a strong pull—a strange attractor—that leads to patterning of our behavior. As the train travels once again to a specific unconscious place, it will pull for specific behavior in our waking life, thus adding to the repetition of behavior, hopes, fears—as well as Regrets, a sense of Loss, Anger, and Anxiety,
Catching the Train: While Klein focused on the internal dynamics of peremptory ideation, I propose that this internal ideation might align with an external ideation arising from challenges in our life—these challenges are often related to dilemmas and polarities that we encounter. We can envision the internal ideation “hooking on” to the ideological “train” passing by us from an external source. We hitch our thoughts and emotions to an outside train. Irrational and anxiety-saturated external ideation—such as Regrets, Losses and feelings of Anger—can be particularly attractive, given that this internal ideation is likely to be quite primitive (often taking on a “haunting” presence). The internal ideation may be “haunted” by ghosts and goblins of Regret, Loss, and Anger from childhood and early adulthood.
