The Divided Self summary

Parents of a demanding baby or wild child may find themselves wishing they had a child who never cried or shouted, who obeyed their orders like a perfect little soldier. But the truth is that this ideal child may need help.

Babies who fail to express their needs – who never cry when they’re hungry, for example – are prone to develop a weak sense of self as they grow older. These children may simply lack the strong instinct to express their feelings and seek out gratification, be it through excited crying or energetic flailing.

Most people are afraid that they are inadequate in some way. Maybe they aren’t attractive enough, or maybe they aren’t the social butterfly they’d like to be. A fundamentally insecure person, on the other hand, experiences a whole other class of fears.

There are some people who are unsure about their own personality, and can’t say definitively that they are real, whole and alive. The author refers to this condition as ontological insecurity, and many of those who suffer from uncertainty regarding their personality will become schizophrenic.

Imagine you’re a therapist and have just had a “eureka moment” about one of your patients. You excitedly share your analysis, and expect them to be ecstatic that someone finally understands them. Instead, they simply look at you aghast and refuse to meet with you again. What happened?

When another person gets too close, ontologically insecure people fear they’ll be engulfed by them. Their insecurities are so severe that they can only feel like an autonomous personality if there are significant differences between themselves and others.

As we’ve seen, contact with other people can endanger an ontologically insecure person’s sense of self. But total isolation is hard to achieve in our world. As a result, these people must find their own way to preserve at least some sense of self.

This starts with a retreat from human contact, either through isolation or by other means. For instance, since ontologically insecure people see being understood and liked by others as a threat, they will try to ensure that what they show the people around them is unintelligible. This way, they can hide their true feelings and thoughts.

Some people go through life feeling like a ghost. They observe the world undetected as if they’re invisible and powerless, unable even to move something as light as a sheet of paper.

These people feel detached from their bodies, believing that these bodies themselves belong to the false self. And since they don’t identify with their false self, their bodies must not really belong to them, either. This sense of detachment can stretch back as far as childhood, and can become so strong that the afflicted person won’t feel any concern if their body is hurt or maimed.

So why would anyone prefer to live a life of isolation? As we’ve seen, ontologically insecure people choose isolation out of necessity, as a means to protect their fragile sense of identity. It should be noted, however, that a life of isolation nevertheless offers them certain advantages.

For one, since all interactions conducted through the body are carried out by the false self, the true self may feel completely self-contained. Since the inner self does not identify with the body, it seems to be uninfluenced by bodily needs like food, warmth, sexual gratification and so on.

Not everyone with a split personality is insane. Sometimes, however, people’s personalities are destroyed, sending them tumbling into a schizophrenic state. But how does this happen?

It starts when the inner self begins developing delusions about the false self. Since no one perceives an ontologically insecure person’s inner self and because it has no opportunity to interact with the outside world, the detached inner self begins feeling insubstantial and unreal.