Drives, archetypes and sub personalities

Drives, archetypes and sub personalities

As human beings seeking a therapeutic process we often believe that our cognitions and behaviours or the way we think and act in the world is what has been causing us disquiet. However, this is only part of the story – we are, unbeknownst, to us, informed by subtler subconscious processes that colour how we feel, interact and take in the world. In other words, the way we think and act is influenced by unconscious processes or habits that we are not really aware of. These processes govern us and run us and through the practise of these unreflective habitual behaviours we constantly hit dead ends we seek psychotherapy. These unconscious processes can be said to be linked to energies that are felt in our bodies. Freudians refer to them as drives, Jungians as archetypes while those following Assagioli referred to them as subpersonalites. They can all loosely be understood as forces within us that organise our sense of self, other, time and space and mould our personalities, predisposing us to think, feel, behave and sense in particular ways. Often, these drives disrupt the peace in our minds and we are seeking external objects or experiences to gratify us,