Between Emergence and Dissolving: Contemporary Reflections on Greatness and Ideals in Kohut's Legacy

Abstract

The development of self psychology is examined here through contemporary reflections on basic concepts of Kohut's classical theory: greatness and ideals. The definition of man's existential condition as a permanent oscillation between emergence states of the individual self and the state of dissolving into transcendental selfhood forms a conceptual foundation for a new model in the theoretical space of self psychology. The proposed model facilitates a historiosophic exploration into the linear evolution of the Kohutian school of thought and its various derivatives, revealing—at the same time—points of disharmony which have troubled the community of self psychology throughout its entire history. The new prism proposed in this paper—a product of two decades of research and clinical work whose initial tiers have been presented in earlier papers in Israel and abroad—offers a way to decipher and resolve thorny issues in Kohut's theory, and lays down an alternative trajectory for the evolution of self psychology.