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Link to share: https://hanglberger-manfred.de/en-projections-in-a-partnership.htm
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The temporal splitting of projections in a partnership
In a marriage or a similar relationship, the initial infatuation with one another is intensified by an unconscious projection of yearning. In this phase of infatuation and usually for some time afterwards, this unconscious projection of yearning leads to the belief that the unfulfilled yearning from childhood will finally be fulfilled by the partner. This means that the positive feelings of yearning are projected onto the partner in the first phase of the relationship. Later on, the discomforting feelings that cause devaluation, anger and indignation, and for example the feeling of being hurt and treated unfairly, can be projected onto the partner. There can be many causes for such hurt, which first causes yearning and later conflict: Examples (without any claim of completeness!):
1. As a girl, the woman was not able to reach her father, because he wanted to pursue a successful career and had no time for his children. She later projected her yearning for her father onto her partner. 2. During her childhood, a woman was constantly judged by her father based on her school grades. She did not feel loved unconditionally. Instead, she was supposed to compensate her father’s complex about performances. She later projected her yearning for unconditional love onto her partner. 3. Another woman’s father always compared her to her sister, who was the father’s favorite child and supposedly more intelligent, creative, and lovable. She later projected her yearning for recognition and appreciation onto her partner. 4. Another woman felt loved by her parents at first, but once her brother was born, he became the prince of the family, and the daughter became irrelevant and was barely noticed. She later projected her yearning for love and to be noticed onto her partner. 5. One woman took on her mother’s compassionate love for her father, who had lost his mother in childhood, and married a man who was also missing a mother. She projected the love inherited from her mother onto her husband. 6. One woman had experienced sexual abuse in her childhood. She later projected her yearning for a love that comes with respect and appreciation onto her husband. The feelings associated to sexual assault and the corresponding projections can even be carried into a daughter’s or granddaughter’s partnership when the mother or grandmother experienced it in her childhood. Even in the event of the mother or grandmother having experienced sexual assault in childhood, a daughter or granddaughter can take on the associated feelings and carry the corresponding projections into her partnership. 7. One man’s mother had lost her fiancé in an accident as a young woman. The man took on his mother’s yearning for love and projected it onto his wife. 8. Another man was the favorite son of his mother, who had been exploited and degraded by his father. As the favorite child he forwent phases of defiance to avoid causing his mother feelings of insecurity and pain. He later projected his yearning for a “mother”, whom he does not have to support, onto his partner. 9. In his youth, one man was accused by his mother of becoming like his father, who was an alcoholic, and beat and cheated on the mother. He later projected his longing for a mother, who loves him unconditionally onto his wife. 10. One man lost his mother to a fatal disease when he was a child. His son took on his father’s painful yearning for his mother and projected it onto his partner. 11. The aforementioned experiences of hurt, being overwhelmed and having a deficit during childhood can, as personal experiences, lead to repression and future projections. But it is also possible that a parent or grandparent made such burdensome experiences and repressed them. This can then lead to a child or grandchild taking on the corresponding feelings and then carrying those into their own partnership as a projector.
When such feelings of yearning stemming from one’s childhood are projected onto the partner, the emotional pain of these yearning feelings is appeased, and the partner appears very loveable. As a result, the first phase of this relationship is characterized by a great connection and strong feelings of love. But through the trust and the lack of fear that come to life in an intense love relationship, the mechanisms of repression, through which one has repressed anger, indignation and pain of all kinds, dissolve. Now, when these feelings arise, they will be projected onto the partner after a while. He or she then appears to be more and more like the parent by whom one was injured, let down or overwhelmed in childhood. This projection of the unpleasant feelings onto the partner strains and poisons the relationship and is not infrequently the reason for a separation if these projection problems are not dealt with. Often the partners do not see through these projections, but live them out by accusing, blaming, insulting, and hurting their partner in any way. The dissatisfaction that this creates within the relationship sometimes leads one partner to seek “comfort” in a new relationship. But then the sequence of yearning projections and painful projections often begins all over again. Since projections usually happen subconsciously, it often takes a long time to recognize them. This requires an honest and self-critical confrontation, a constructive culture of criticism and dispute, and an attentive look at one’s own childhood and the childhood of the parents. Often it is not possible to see through and resolve burdensome projections without competent external help.
Resolving projections in a relationship:
· Working with the family tree (compiling the dates of birth, marriage, and death of three generations with all siblings and additionally the dates of the great-grandparents) >>> · Taking one’s own and the partner’s childhood and youth into consideration and checking for possible repressions · Taking the childhood and further biography of the respective parents into consideration and checking for unusual burdens and possible repressions · When looking at middle children and grandparents’ children, it is often necessary to also take the biography of the respective grandparents into consideration · When burdened in one’s own childhood: Depending on the type of burden: - Building up self-protection and accepting the life of the parents >>> - Existential meditation - Dialogue with the “inner child” >>> · When having taken up someone else’s burden: >>> Otherwise, the rules for constructive criticism and disputes must be followed when entering conflict situations: · Constructive criticism rules: >>> · Constructive dispute rules: >>>
Additional note: The temporal splitting of projections is by far the most commonly present in relationships. But also in the workplace, in the client-therapist-relationship and in other areas of life in which relationships exist over a longer period of time, there can be a comparable splitting of opposing projections.
Manfred Hanglberger
Link to share: https://hanglberger-manfred.de/en-projections-in-a-partnership.htm
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The splitting of opposing projections of parents onto two children >>> What Pope Francis expects from the pastors of the Church: >>> |
