A Reflection on Meaning

my reflections for a psychology class....
I’d like to write about “meaning,” or “meaning making”. This is something that has been on my mind ever since the semester started. For me, it is interesting to contemplate the significance of meaning making, particularly in psychoanalysis. I think this has also been sparked because I am taking projective assessment this semester. Is there meaning in every interaction? Do projections mean something? Does everything inherently have meaning? Is meaning something we construct? And, if so, does everything have to have a meaning or can some things simply be what they are?
I am particularly fond of constructivist notions in that we create meaning, both in our relationships, and in the world around us. This echoes to me words of Viktor Frankl’s writing in his book Man’s Search for Meaning. Creating our own meaning can be a very empowering thing, and also gives the energy of hope and newness to being a therapist and coming to each relationship I have in my life. On the other hand, sometimes I experience that meaning making can become quite neurotic and something I have found I can easily get lost in. What did that mean? What did this mean?
I think that sometimes things just are what they are. And, sometimes I find it difficult to make sense of a lot of interpretation that I experience in psychoanalysis. It seems to me that there is a fine distinction between constructing meaning out of our current experiences and interactions, and over interpreting and over analyzing situations and people we may initially know very little about. I feel like this can become troublesome and keep us from really experiencing what is in front of us. I notice, for myself, that sometimes I can start to get really lost about a case or a person if there is a lot of analysis and hypothesizing going on. On the other hand, I see the benefit and utility of meaning making and interpretations in case presentations, projective assessments and evaluating clinical material. I think what I am realizing for myself is my fondness of allowing for space for meaning to bubble up organically, and to refrain from interpretation until I have more information, as well as trust my own intuition.
Trusting my own intuition hasn’t come easy for me, and there are still times I act counter to what my intuition tells me. These actions don’t usually yield favorable results either. And, often my intuition guides me in the meaning making process. Sometimes it is clear that an interaction, case or test result is quite meaningful, and sometimes it is not. Also, this reminds me of our discussion about the unformulated. When an encounter with something meaningful arises, it appears first as a feeling and a symbol before it is put into words. It is non-conceptual before it reaches our habit of concept forming. I think that sometimes, at least for myself, it’s easy to move straight into the conceptual mind part of things and miss the unformulated, experiential aspects of meaning making.
What is meaning? When an event is significant, it has an emotional quality that impacts us. I think of powerful emotional sessions I’ve had with clients who really opened up a tender part of themselves. And, to me it meant something about our work together. We would process sit and discuss how powerful and meaningful it was for our work together. Only, at the next session, we are back to old enactments and patterns. Does it make the previous session any less meaningful? No, I don’t think so. I think this points to the intangible, unformulated and impermanent aspect of human experience. There is deep experience that passes and does not stay the same forever. What can mean one thing in one instant, can mean something very different in the next. Even as I write this reflection, I take pause and wonder if my writing makes any sense. Will it mean anything to you? How do my thought and questions relate with interpretation and meaning making within the framework of psychoanalytic thinking? This is a question that will be on my mind for quite some time I think.

Posted by email from nandi's posterous