Birth Trauma and Its Relation to Mental Illness, Suicide and Ecstasy by Stanislav Grof, M.D.
For a long time I have held this COEX idea as central to the psychotherapy I do. I think of them as patterns of the psyche. It is the pattern that unites development with myth. Many myths are stages of development & many stages of development are best expressed as myth. what Groff describes here must go by many names, Complexes? Archetypal structures?
“COEX: Systems of Condensed Experience: – A COEX system is a specific memory constellation comprising in a condensed form experiences (and/or fantasies) from different life periods of the individual. Memories belonging to a particular COEX system have a similar basic theme or contain similar elements and are accompanied by a strong emotional charge of the same quality.
This idea of a complex is at the heart of Imago Therapy too. The current dynamics, when articulated in the Dialogue shape up to something that is familiar from childhood and throughout life. It then makes sense to ask: “Is that feeling of (say, abandonment) familiar?” The more psychological exploration that the person has done the closer they get to the birth moment – where all dynamics begin. “Yes, I think I was kept from my mother after I was born.”
http://www.imagotherapy.com–>