Alfred Adler Archives – The Rabbit Hole

Key Takeaways

Past doesn't matter
1. None of us live in an objective world, but instead in a subjective world that we ourselves have given meaning to. The world you see is different from the one I see, and it’s impossible to share your world with anyone else.
2. PHILOSOPHER: If we focus only on past causes and try to explain things solely through cause and effect, we end up with “determinism.” Because what this says is that our present and our future have already been decided by past occurrences, and are unalterable. Am I wrong? YOUTH: So you’re saying that the past doesn’t matter? PHILOSOPHER: Yes, that is the standpoint of Adlerian psychology.
Trauma doesn't exist
1. YOUTH: Wait a minute! Are you denying the existence of trauma altogether? PHILOSOPHER: Yes, I am. Adamantly. YOUTH: What! Aren’t you, or I guess I should say Adler, an authority on psychology? PHILOSOPHER: In Adlerian psychology, trauma is definitively denied. This was a very new and revolutionary point. Certainly, the Freudian view of trauma is fascinating. Freud’s idea is that a person’s psychic wounds (traumas) cause his or her present unhappiness. When you treat a person’s life as a vast narrative, there is an easily understandable causality and sense of dramatic development that creates strong impressions and is extremely attractive. But Adler, in denial of the trauma argument, states the following: “No experience is in itself a cause of our success or failure. We do not suffer from the shock of our experiences—the so-called trauma—but instead we make out of them whatever suits our purposes. We are not determined by our experiences, but the meaning we give them is self-determining.” We determine our own lives according to the meaning we give to those past experiences. Your life is not something that someone gives you, but something you choose yourself, and you are the one who decides how you live.
2. “People are not driven by past causes but move toward goals that they themselves set”
The first step to change is knowing.
1. The important thing is not what one is born with but what use one makes of that equipment.
Unhappiness Is Something You Choose for Yourself
1. Yes, you can. People can change at any time, regardless of the environments they are in. You are unable to change only because you are making the decision not
2. Adlerian psychology is a psychology of courage. Your unhappiness cannot be blamed on your past or your environment. And it isn’t that you lack competence. You just lack courage. One might say you are lacking in the courage to be happy.
3. Adler’s teleology tells us, “No matter what has occurred in your life up to this point, it should have no bearing at all on how you live from now on.” That you, living in the here and now, are the one who determines your own life.
All Problems Are Interpersonal Relationship Problems
1. The feeling of inferiority is a kind of launch pad? PHILOSOPHER: That’s right. One tries to get rid of one’s feeling of inferiority and keep moving forward. One’s never satisfied with one’s present situation—even if it’s just a single step, one wants to make progress. One wants to be happier. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the state of this kind of feeling of inferiority. There are, however, people who lose the courage to take a single step forward, who cannot accept the fact that the situation can be changed by making realistic efforts.
2. The condition of having a feeling of inferiority is a condition of feeling some sort of lack in oneself in the present situation. So then, the question is— YOUTH: How do you fill in the part that’s missing, right? PHILOSOPHER: Exactly. How to compensate for the part that is lacking. The healthiest way is to try to compensate through striving and growth.
3. You’re saying that boasting is an inverted feeling of inferiority? PHILOSOPHER: That’s right. If one really has confidence in oneself, one doesn’t feel the need to boast. It’s because one’s feeling of inferiority is strong that one boasts. One feels the need to flaunt one’s superiority all the more. There’s the fear that if one doesn’t do that, not a single person will accept one “the way I am.” This is a full-blown superiority complex.
4. Adler himself pointed out, “In our culture weakness can be quite strong and powerful.” YOUTH: So weakness is powerful? PHILOSOPHER: Adler says, “In fact, if we were to ask ourselves who is the strongest person in our culture, the logical answer would be, the baby. The baby rules and cannot be dominated.” The baby rules over the adults with his weakness. And it is because of this weakness that no one can control him.
5. 20. YOUTH: So life is not a competition? PHILOSOPHER: That’s right. It’s enough to just keep moving in a forward direction, without competing with anyone. And, of course, there is no need to compare oneself with others.
6. A healthy feeling of inferiority is not something that comes from comparing oneself to others; it comes from one’s comparison with one’s ideal self.
7. Human beings are all equal, but not the same.
8. Does that mean you dropped out of competition? That you somehow accepted defeat? PHILOSOPHER: No. I withdrew from places that are preoccupied with winning and losing. When one is trying to be oneself, competition will inevitably get in the way.
9. There are probably a lot of people who feel mystified by seeing a child who cuts his wrists, and they think, Why would he do such a thing? But try to think how the people around the child—the parents, for instance—will feel as a result of the behavior of wrist cutting. If you do, the goal behind the behavior should come into view of its own accord.
10. Once the interpersonal relationship reaches the revenge stage, it is almost impossible for either party to find a solution. To prevent this from happening, when one is challenged to a power struggle, one must never allow oneself to be taken in.
11. So when you’re hung up on winning and losing, you lose the ability to make the right choices? PHILOSOPHER: Yes. It clouds your judgment, and all you can see is imminent victory or defeat. Then you turn down the wrong path. It’s only when we take away the lenses of competition and winning and losing that we can begin to correct and change ourselves.
12. In Adlerian psychology, clear objectives are laid out for human behavior and psychology. YOUTH: What sort of objectives? PHILOSOPHER: First, there are two objectives for behavior: to be self-reliant and to live in harmony with society. Then, the two objectives for the psychology that supports these behaviors are the consciousness that I have the ability and the consciousness that people are my comrades.
13. Work that can be completed without the cooperation of other people is in principle unfeasible.
14. There’s no value at all in the number of friends or acquaintances you have. And this is a subject that connects with the task of love, but what we should be thinking about is the distance and depth of the relationship.
15. If you change, those around you will change too. They will have no choice but to change.
16. You are not living to satisfy other people’s expectations, and neither am I. It is not necessary to satisfy other people’s expectations. When one seeks recognition from others, and concerns oneself only with how one is judged by others, in the end, one is living other people’s lives.
17. One does not intrude on other people’s tasks. That’s all. In general, all interpersonal relationship troubles are caused by intruding on other people’s tasks, or having one’s own tasks intruded on. Carrying out the separation of tasks is enough to change one’s interpersonal relationships dramatically. There is a simple way to tell whose task it is. Think, Who ultimately is going to receive the result brought about by the choice that is made?
18. You are the only one who can change yourself.
19. One can build them. The separation of tasks is not the objective for interpersonal relationships. Rather, it is the gateway. YOUTH: The gateway? PHILOSOPHER: For instance, when reading a book, if one brings one’s face too close to it, one cannot see anything. In the same way, forming good interpersonal relationships requires a certain degree of distance. When the distance gets too small and people become stuck together, it becomes impossible to even speak to each other. But the distance must not be too great, either. Parents who scold their children too much become mentally very distant.
20. As I have stated repeatedly, in Adlerian psychology, we think that all problems are interpersonal relationship problems. In other words, we seek release from interpersonal relationships. We seek to be free from interpersonal relationships. However, it is absolutely impossible to live all alone in the universe. In light of what we have discussed until now, the conclusion we reach regarding “What is freedom?” should be clear. YOUTH: What is it? PHILOSOPHER: In short, that “freedom is being disliked by other people.” It’s that you are disliked by someone. It is proof that you are exercising your freedom and living in freedom, and a sign that you are living in accordance with your own principles. YOUTH: But, but . . . PHILOSOPHER: It is certainly distressful to be disliked. If possible, one would like to live without being disliked by anyone. One wants to satisfy one’s desire for recognition. But conducting oneself in such a way as to not be disliked by anyone is an extremely unfree way of living, and is also impossible. There is a cost incurred when one wants to exercise one’s freedom. And the cost of freedom in interpersonal relationships is that one is disliked by other people. The courage to be happy also includes the courage to be disliked. When you have gained that courage, your interpersonal relationships will all at once change into things of lightness.
Community, Praise/Punishment/Encouragement
1. If other people are our comrades, and we live surrounded by them, we should be able to find in that life our own place of “refuge.” Moreover, in doing so, we should begin to have the desire to share with our comrades, to contribute to the community. This sense of others as comrades, this awareness of “having one’s own refuge,” is called “community feeling.” When Adler refers to community, he goes beyond the household, school, workplace, and local society, and treats it as all-inclusive, covering not only nations and all of humanity but also the entire axis of time from the past to the future—and he includes plants and animals and even inanimate objects.
2. It is necessary to make the switch from “attachment to self” to “concern for others.”
3. People who hold the belief that they are the center of the world always end up losing their comrades before long.
4. Physical punishment is out of the question, of course, and rebuking is not accepted, either. One must not praise, and one must not rebuke. That is the standpoint of Adlerian psychology. In other words, the mother who praises the child by saying things like “You’re such a good helper!” or “Good job!” or “Well, aren’t you something!” is unconsciously creating a hierarchical relationship and seeing the child as beneath her. You must simply encourage
5. As you may recall from our discussion on the separation of tasks, I brought up the subject of intervention. This is the act of intruding on other people’s tasks. So why does a person intervene? Here, too, in the background, vertical relationships are at play. It is precisely because one perceives interpersonal relations as vertical, and sees the other party as beneath one, that one intervenes. Through intervention, one tries to lead the other party in the desired direction. One has convinced oneself that one is right and that the other party is wrong. Of course, the intervention here is manipulation, pure and simple. Parents commanding a child to study is a typical example of this. They might be acting out of the best of intentions from their points of view, but when it comes down to it, the parents are intruding and attempting to manipulate the child to go in their desired direction. YOUTH: If one can build horizontal relationships, will that intervention disappear? PHILOSOPHER: Yes, it will. Concretely speaking, instead of commanding from above that the child must study, one acts on him in such a way that he can gain the confidence to take care of his own studies and face his tasks on his own.
6. Being praised is what leads people to form the belief that they have no ability. YOUTH: What did you say? PHILOSOPHER: Shall I repeat myself? The more one is praised by another person, the more one forms the belief that one has no ability. Please do your best to remember this. You convey words of gratitude, saying thank you to this partner who has helped you with your work. You might express straightforward delight: “I’m glad.” Or you could convey your thanks by saying, “That was a big help.” This is an approach to encouragement that is based on horizontal relationships. YOUTH: That’s all? PHILOSOPHER: Yes. The most important thing is to not judge other people. “Judgment” is a word that comes out of vertical relationships. If one is building horizontal relationships, there will be words of more straightforward gratitude and respect and joy. YOUTH:
7. This is a point that will connect to our subsequent discussion as well—in Adlerian psychology, a great deal of emphasis is given to “contribution.” YOUTH: Why is that? PHILOSOPHER: Well, what does a person have to do to get courage? In Adler’s view, “It is only when a person is able to feel that he has worth that he can possess courage.”
8. So the issue that arises at this point is how on earth can one become able to feel one has worth? YOUTH: Yes, that’s it exactly! I need you to explain that very clearly, please. PHILOSOPHER: It’s quite simple. It is when one is able to feel “I am beneficial to the community” that one can have a true sense of one’s worth. This is the answer that would be offered in Adlerian psychology.
9. I should start? PHILOSOPHER: That’s right. Without regard to whether other people are cooperative or not.
10. This is a very important point. Does one build vertical relationships, or does one build horizontal relationships? This is an issue of lifestyle, and human beings are not so clever as to be able to have different lifestyles available whenever the need arises. In other words, deciding that one is “equal to this person” or “in a hierarchical relationship with that person” does not work. YOUTH: Do you mean that one has to choose one or the other—vertical relationships or horizontal relationships? PHILOSOPHER: Absolutely, yes.
Excessive Self-Consciousness Stifles the Self
1. There is no need to go out of one’s way to be positive and affirm oneself. It’s not self-affirmation that we are concerned with, but self-acceptance. YOUTH: Not self-affirmation, but self-acceptance? PHILOSOPHER: That’s right. There is a clear difference. Self-affirmation is making suggestions to oneself, such as “I can do it” or “I am strong,” even when something is simply beyond one’s ability. It is a notion that can bring about a superiority complex, and may even be termed a way of living in which one lies to oneself. With self-acceptance, on the other hand, if one cannot do something, one is simply accepting “one’s incapable self” as is and moving forward so that one can do whatever one can. It is not a way of lying to oneself.
2. This is also the case with the separation of tasks—one ascertains the things one can change and the things one cannot change. One cannot change what one is born with. But one can, under one’s own power, go about changing what use one makes of that equipment. So in that case, one simply has to focus on what one can change, rather than on what one cannot. This is what I call self-acceptance.
3. The basis of interpersonal relations is founded not on trust but on confidence. YOUTH: And “confidence” in this case is . . . ? PHILOSOPHER: It is doing without any set conditions whatsoever when believing in others. Even if one does not have sufficient objective grounds for trusting someone, one believes. One believes unconditionally without concerning oneself with such things as security. That is confidence.
4. Well, I see what you’re getting at—the main objective, which is to build deep relationships. But still, being taken advantage of is scary, and that’s the reality, isn’t it? PHILOSOPHER: If it is a shallow relationship, when it falls apart the pain will be slight. And the joy that relationship brings each day will also be slight. It is precisely because one can gain the courage to enter into deeper relationships by having confidence in others that the joy of one’s interpersonal relations can grow, and one’s joy in life can grow, too.
5. To take it a step farther, one may say that people who think of others as enemies have not attained self-acceptance and do not have enough confidence in others.
6. Contribution to others does not connote self-sacrifice. Adler goes so far as to warn that those who sacrifice their own lives for others are people who have conformed to society too much. And please do not forget: We are truly aware of our own worth only when we feel that our existence and behavior are beneficial to the community, that is to say, when one feels “I am of use to someone.” Do you remember this? In other words, contribution to others, rather than being about getting rid of the “I” and being of service to someone, is actually something one does in order to be truly aware of the worth of the “I.” YOUTH: Contributing to others is for oneself? PHILOSOPHER: Yes. There is no need to sacrifice the self.
7. Acceptance: accepting one’s irreplaceable “this me” just as it is. Confidence in others: to place unconditional confidence at the base of one’s interpersonal relations rather than seeding doubt.
8. For the sake of convenience, up to this point I have discussed self-acceptance, confidence in others, and contribution to others, in that order. However, these three are linked as an indispensable whole, in a sort of circular structure. It is because one accepts oneself just as one is—one self-accepts—that one can have “confidence in others” without the fear of being taken advantage of. And it is because one can place unconditional confidence in others, and feel that people are one’s comrades, that one can engage in “contribution to others.” Further, it is because one contributes to others that one can have the deep awareness that “I am of use to someone” and accept oneself just as one is. One can self-accept.
9. They probably try to justify that by saying, “It’s busy at work, so I don’t have enough time to think about my family.” But this is a life-lie. They are simply trying to avoid their other responsibilities by using work as an excuse. One ought to concern oneself with everything, from household chores and child-rearing to one’s friendships and hobbies and so on. Adler does not recognize ways of living in which certain aspects are unusually dominant.
10. On such occasions, those who can accept themselves only on the level of acts are severely damaged. YOUTH: You mean those people whose lifestyle is all about work? PHILOSOPHER: Yes. People whose lives lack harmony.
11. Does one accept oneself on the level of acts, or on the level of being? This is truly a question that relates to the courage to be happy.
12. For a human being, the greatest unhappiness is not being able to like oneself. Adler came up with an extremely simple answer to address this reality. Namely, that the feeling of “I am beneficial to the community” or “I am of use to someone” is the only thing that can give one a true awareness that one has worth.
Happiness is the feeling of contribution.
1. If one really has a feeling of contribution, one will no longer have any need for recognition from others. Because one will already have the real awareness that “I am of use to someone,” without needing to go out of one’s way to be acknowledged by others. In other words, a person who is obsessed with the desire for recognition does not have any community feeling yet, and has not managed to engage in self-acceptance, confidence in others, or contribution to others.
2. What Adlerian psychology emphasizes at this juncture are the words “the courage to be normal.” YOUTH: The courage to be normal? PHILOSOPHER: Why is it necessary to be special? Probably because one cannot accept one’s normal self. And it is precisely for this reason that when being especially good becomes a lost cause, one makes the huge leap to being especially bad—the opposite extreme. But is being normal, being ordinary, really such a bad thing? Is it something inferior? Or, in truth, isn’t everybody normal? It is necessary to think this through to its logical conclusion.
3. This conception, which treats life as a kind of story, is an idea that links with Freudian etiology (the attributing of causes), and is a way of thinking that makes the greater part of life into something that is “en route.” YOUTH: Well, what is your image of life? PHILOSOPHER: Do not treat it as a line. Think of life as a series of dots. If you look through a magnifying glass at a solid line drawn with chalk, you will discover that what you thought was a line is actually a series of small dots. Seemingly linear existence is actually a series of dots; in other words, life is a series of moments.
4. If life were a line, then life planning would be possible. But our lives are only a series of dots. A well-planned life is not something to be treated as necessary or unnecessary, as it is impossible.
5. You should be on a journey the moment you step outside your home, and all the moments on the way to your destination should be a journey. Of course, there might be circumstances that prevent you from making it to the pyramid, but that does not mean you didn’t go on a journey. This is “energeial life.”
6. The greatest life-lie of all is to not live here and now. It is to look at the past and the future, cast a dim light on one’s entire life, and believe that one has been able to see something.
7. And Adler, having stated that “life in general has no meaning,” then continues, “Whatever meaning life has must be assigned to it by the individual.”
8. No matter what moments you are living, or if there are people who dislike you, as long as you do not lose sight of the guiding star of “I contribute to others,” you will not lose your way, and you can do whatever you like. Whether you’re disliked or not, you pay it no mind and live free.
9. Philosophy refers not to “wisdom” itself but to “love of wisdom,” and it is the very process of learning what one does not know and arriving at wisdom that is important. Whether or not one attains wisdom in the end is not an issue.

What I got out of it

I think the narrative format is really helpful to make some concepts very concrete and memorable - all problems are interpersonal problems; you can be happy today; you are the only one who can change you; happiness is contribution; past doesn't matter; trauma isn't real - we are not determined by our experiences, but the meaning we give to them; separation of tasks; courage comes from the confidence that you can contribute, that you are worthy; only encouragement and not praise