71 A New and Better Way of Understanding Myself and Others

Jun 7, 2021

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Introduction
1. Very autobiographical today, I'm going to tell you a lot about me and the mistakes I've made and how those mistakes have brought me to do this episode.
  1. I don't really like talking about myself -- not a lot of autobiographical material in previous episodes
  2. I especially don't like talking about myself all by myself in my little studio -- not being interviewed by a host -- the really Competent part of me thinks it's a little weird to be sharing details of my life and my struggles and my mistakes, not knowing who is listening because I haven't met most of you, those of you who are my listeners. I've checked in with the different parts of me and they are all good with it, I have at least grudging acceptance of the idea.
2. I’m clinical psychologist Peter Malinoski and I am here with you, to be your host and guide.
3. This podcast is called Interior Integration for Catholics, and it is part of Souls and Hearts
  1. our online outreach at soulsandhearts.com
4. 1. which is all about shoring up our natural foundation for the Catholic spiritual life, all about overcoming psychological obstacles to being loved and to loving God and neighbor and ourselves. We're getting into that much more deeply now.
6. This is episode 71, released on June 7, 2021, entitled A New and Better Way of Understanding Myself and Others. -- Beginning a brief series of episodes that takes the great insights of Internal Family Systems approaches to understanding the human person on a natural level, and reconciles them with the eternal truths of the Catholic faith.
The Great Journey
1. I could be considered "Highly successful" as a child and adolescent -- 4.0 GPA in High School, Valedictorian, Varsity letters in Track and Cross Country, I acted in high school musicals and plays, excelled in competitive solo-acting, was on the chess team, active in student government and I was a pretty good shot on the local pistol team -- I had a lot going for me. I continued that success from Northwestern University, graduating with honors, traveling the world, living in Seville, Spain for a year, romping around Mexico one summer.
1. 1991 -- brought to my knees -- 22 years old, just left a high-demand group Catholic group -- strong sense of having been manipulated and used, exploited.
  1. Trying to figure out my own experience -- what just happened? Why so many contradictory thoughts and feelings? What was going on.
    1. Either I made a mistake in joining that group or I made a mistake in leaving it.
    2. Existential crisis -- A leader of the group told me that the founder once said that "he wouldn't give a nickel for the soul of any son who abandons his vocation the group." For the true believer, there was no viable way out.
    3. Common reason for getting into psychology - there's something to the meme.
    4. My models were not sufficient. I was not satisfied with superficial reasons
      1. For why I felt the ways I did
    5. 1. For why I thought the ways I thought
    6. 1. For why I acted the ways I did.
1. In 1993, Began a Ph.D. program in clinical psychology -- the best that psychology had to offer.
2. The Hunt for a Unitary Personality
3. We all want to understand ourselves
  1. 4 temperaments -- Encyclopedia Britannica: Humoral theories: 2500 years ago. Perhaps the oldest personality theory known is contained in the cosmological writings of the Greek philosopher and physiologist Empedocles and in related speculations of the physician Hippocrates. Empedocles’ cosmic elements—air (with its associated qualities, warm and moist), earth (cold and dry), fire (warm and dry), and water (cold and moist)—were related to health and corresponded (in the above order) to Hippocrates’ physical humours, which were associated with variations in temperament: blood (sanguine temperament), black bile (melancholic), yellow bile (choleric), and phlegm (phlegmatic). This theory, with its view that body chemistry determines temperament, has survived in some form for more than 2,500 years. According to these early theorists, emotional stability as well as general health depend on an appropriate balance among the four bodily humours; an excess of one may produce a particular bodily illness or an exaggerated personality trait. Thus, a person with an excess of blood would be expected to have a sanguine temperament—that is, to be optimistic, enthusiastic, and excitable. Too much black bile (dark blood perhaps mixed with other secretions) was believed to produce a melancholic temperament. An oversupply of yellow bile (secreted by the liver) would result in anger, irritability, and a “jaundiced” view of life. An abundance of phlegm (secreted in the respiratory passages) was alleged to make people stolid, apathetic, and undemonstrative.

Art and Laraine Bennett. The Temperament God Gave you.

Freud
Desire for unity
Testing expert
1. Layered Personalities, overlays -- trying to accommodate
1. Personality is supposed to be stable
  1. Definition of personality
    1. Encyclopedia Britannica: the study of personality focuses on classifying and explaining relatively stable human psychological characteristics.
  2. 1. VeryWellMind.com; At its most basic, personality is the characteristic patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that make a person unique. It is believed that personality arises from within the individual and remains fairly consistent throughout life.
  3. 1. But DSM-5, PDM -- Borderline Personality Disorder -- not stable
2. 1. We want predictability

In 2000 I was at a crossroad in life, about to finish my Ph.D. in clinical psychology and very much struggling to find a way to ground psychology in a Catholic ...