Proceedings, Oxford, UK (2002) - World Federation of Music Therapy

distinguishing between maximum personal growth and fulfilment in the
shared happiness of the self and others or in retreating from these
aspirations for fear of failure into a lesser goal of superiority over others.
Adler saw this latter goal as the cause of all neurosis, psychosis and
crime. ( Macdiarmid 1997). Jacob had understandable reason to question
his ability to achieve a life goal. His education had already been severely
disrupted due to social and mental health problems. In comparison, his
older brother had already flown the parental nest and I wondered if this
raised sibling feelings of envy or inferiority.
I was also interested in the acceptance of my interpretation of the Dove as
a symbol of peace and whether Jacob was unconsciously expressing a
desire to purge himself of badness. In retrospect I considered this
disturbed young man in the light of Fairbairn’s (1952) theories in which
he viewed the delinquent children that he analysed as only able to
internalise bad objects. To enlarge further: It became apparent to me as
the work with Jacob evolved, that despite threats and conflict with his
parents, Jacob could not admit externally that they were bad but he
appeared to have internalised them as being so. In reality his parents
would not be judged as being bad they were quite the contrary in very
difficult circumstances. We are however exploring here the unresolved
phantasies of the new born infant’s primitive relating to a possibly
depressed mother and a stressed father.
Fairbairn’s (1952) model of the mind conceptualises the intrapsychic
world of the infant as object seeking, with investment of libido through
the central ego, rather than as Freud viewed it as primarily pleasure
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