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The Group and its Protagonist

I wrote a psychodrama thesis that was published in 1999. it took me 15 years to write. I appreciate I did that work – not sure I’d manage it now! I could give it a good edit.

It stands up today as expressing a central idea about the interconnected ness between people… the group is more than the sum of the pars of the individuals. It is the sum of the relationships between them. That is like looking at the stars… grasping the group life is an art. And sometimes a child can do it.

I just posted the thesis on Academia.edu. No idea if that is a good thing to do!

https://www.academia.edu/2001479/The_Group_and_Its_Protagonist

Its also here on this site:

Click to access The-group-and-its-protagonist-Walter-Logeman.pdf

 

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GPT3 AI on Psyberspace

I’ve been having pleasant conversations with Open AI GPT3 and I was wondering if it could create a replica of me using my blog  posts. I asked it:

Can you analyse the blog Psyberspace?

Psyberspace is a blog about psychology, technology, and society. The blog covers a wide range of topics, including the impact of technology on our mental health, the way we interact with technology, and the way that technology is changing our world.

 

The blog is written in a clear and accessible style, and it provides an interesting and thought-provoking perspective on the way that technology is impacting our lives.

That is very good! I am the author of that blog and you say it better than me.

Who are the main thinkers Psyberspace quotes and comments on?

Psyberspace quotes and comments on a wide range of thinkers, including psychologists, sociologists, and philosophers. Some of the main thinkers that the blog covers include Marshall McLuhan, Neil Postman, and Jacques Ellul.

But that is a little strange – I’ve never heard of Jacques Ellul

Who is the author of the blog?

The author of the blog is Dr. Tim Summers.

Psyberspace has a lot about psychodrama and also Imago relationship therapy. What can you glean from the blog about that.

The blog provides an introduction to psychodrama and its benefits for couples. It also covers a wide range of topics related to Imago relationship therapy, including the way that the therapy can help couples to communicate more effectively, to understand each other’s perspectives, and to resolve conflict.

OK it is interesting but not passing the Turing test!

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Here is a link to Timothy Summers

And another to Jacques Ellul

 

 

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Nostalgia

I’ve been cleaning out the attic

Found envelopes full of stamps my father saved for me. And photos of course. So many people from eras past.

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Playing with AI & Poetry

This poem by Joyce Kilmer came to mind.  It led to the prompt to the AI and the result…  I then edited the hell out of it. Leading to a little poem ‘I see a rose’

Trees

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.
___________________________________________________________
Write a simple poem about poetry using nature as a metaphor.

A rose by the side of the road
Is all it takes to make me feel whole
All the colors and scents
Nature has to offer
Take me away to a place where I can be free
And the world is my oyster

This is what poetry does for me
It takes me away to a better place
And fills me with hope and beauty
When I am surrounded by nature
I feel at peace, and everything makes perfect sense

Thank you, dear poet, for giving me this gift
For opening my eyes and my heart
And transport me to a world of your own

Where the only thing that matters
Are the words that we write
And the feelings they inspire

 

I see a rose

I see a rose
& I feel whole.

Your words invite
my heart to open,
thank you.

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GPT-3

I logged into Open AI and asked the the machine to improve the quality of our blurb for the workshops Kate and I run.  Here is the question and the result.

My prompt

Can you improve the following description of a workshop:

Love. Living life to the full. Finding meaning. Global and spiritual matters. Conflict, grief and illness. Examine and be challenged by matters of importance to you in these evening workshops. You can expect to gain a deeper awareness of yourself and others. Learn to be spontaneous, courageous and effective in relationships. We will use psychodrama to explore themes relevant to you and the group. If you are in a couple relationship you are both invited to attend. No previous group experience is necessary.

AI response

If you‘re looking for a workshop series that will help you explore deep, personal themes and improve your relationships, this is the one for you. Using psychodrama, participants will be challenged to examine their own lives and beliefs, and to learn to be more spontaneous, courageous, and effective in their interactions with others. Whether you‘re single or in a relationship, this series is open to anyone and no previous group experience is necessary.

What do you think?

 

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What makes being in a couple different from being in other relationships?

A couple is truly a couple when the hitherto hidden dimensions of pain surface in the relationship. The couple may not see it, but there is an interconnected web of role relationships that involve projections and yearnings from childhood.  Thus a defining aspect of couplehood is:

  • Connections at a primal wounds

Of course there are other aspects of couplehood:

  • Love
  • Sexuality
  • Children
  • Intimacy
  • A wedding ceremony
  • Significance
  • Familiarity
  • Shared memories
  • Commitment
  • Domestic life
  • Social reality & recognition

Some of these will apply and some may not.

The crucial aspect of couplehood is an uncanny reciprocity of pain. Hedy Schleifer refers to the “deepest desires meeting the darkest resistance, and vice versa.”  This can appear like a disconnect, but it is the relationship doing its purposeful work, a profound connection.

Psychodrama refers to ‘the interpyche’ with an interplay of co-conscious and co-unconscious ways of being. Evocative and useful words. Imago relationship therapy has the word ‘imago’, a word meaning image, referring to the match of the unconscious dynamics involving the unmet needs from childhood, mixed with the love that was there.

One word for it: trouble!

Who wants it? Who knows how to get through this impasse when one person’s deep desires meet the other person’s fears? And vice versa. It gets harder as regression seeps in and our usual adult functioning goes out the window. I’d rather look at facebook or go for a walk.

There is another side to the story, trouble means opportunity. The ‘interpsyche’ is not so stupid!  This mystical third entity wove a web for us to climb through impasses. They are not impossible passes, we can get through, with help. And once through we continue the adventure with new vigour.

For the therapist it is easy! “Wow, you two are here, facing this trouble! Well done. This is normal, this is healthy, this is natural and right and you can work through this. Talk and listen. Listen with great care! Talk without blame. I’ll help you do it.”

Its is not so easy when you are in it. Love is blind, and so is trouble. Have a look at this feast of quotes about love: 90 Beautiful Love Quotes from Literature I wish there were as many beautiful quotes about the purpose of trouble as there are about the glorious magic of love.

 

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Jottings

I’ve updated my writing page and moved it to https://www.walterlogeman.com/writing

Reflecting on my work – some of it going back to 1993.

I’m not so obsessed with the internet as I was in the 1990s. I still think the psyche is created through various creative acts such as naming, writing theorising and managing the medium. The psyche evolves. I’d be happy to call it culture, zeitgeist. I think this  creativity goes beyond cyberspace. Marx created a bunch of concepts that fit. We can invent fiction and we also invent non-fiction but it has to relate to the real, to fit, to resonate. to enable.

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I learned about hyperstition today

Podcast Youtube 

The K-Files: Who’s Pulling Your Strings? featuring Amy Ireland

(I will watch this https://vimeo.com/ondemand/hyperstition/167803565)

Truth is Science is Fiction.
HYPERSTITION
a film by Christopher Roth
in collaboration with Armen Avanessian

More here:

https://www.full-stop.net/2020/10/21/features/essays/macon-holt/hyperstitional-theory-fiction.

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Archetypes

Hermes rules the internet – he pulls the strings – but he can’t pull them all — but no one can.

And who rules the world? Mammon?

Who is the angel of history?

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Angelus_Novus

It’s like naming a theme in a group. I concretised a discussion by drawing a line on the stage. A fine line between moaning and denial. It resonated.

Does the Angelus Novus resonate with some sort of reality?

Is “relations of production” an angel? who is that entity pulling the strings?

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The meaning of INTERSTITIAL is occurring in or being an interval or intervening space or segment : of, relating to, or forming an interstice.

interstition
An interstice or interstitium; an interstitial space. Middle English. Noun. interstition. an intervening period …

  • Hyperstition
  • Superstition
  • Interstition

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I heard this in the K-Files podcast as well:

  • Inspire
  • Conspire

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Materialism is a description of relationships

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