Psychoanalytic Concepts: Drives, Mirror Stage, Identity

The Underpinnings of the Drive

If self-talk alone were enough to move us to survive, it would be the sexual drive, which is mounted on the gregarious instinct, forming self-preservation. This drive would then seek another. Sexuality in us is open to the world; the libido is what makes us feel sympathy or apathy towards another. The mother creates a kind of map through which desire travels in the newborn. When it goes beyond mere need, the baby can perceive a creature of altered demand. Need in us would be equivalent to instinct, but in humans, it is very rudimentary and insufficient.

The Mirror Stage: Image and Self-Formation

The Mirror Stage opens us to fundamental concepts, such as the kingdom of the image, which encompasses the imaginary, narcissism, and the cohesion of the body. It is located immediately after the drive body, given as a settlement of desire and joy within us. In the passage through the mirror stage, the child begins to see their body as unified, not fragmented, which is crucial for neurological maturity. While erogenous zones are concentrated islets of enjoyment, the mirror stage achieves the union of these sensations, building a united body surface. This brings us into the realm of the image, absolutely linked to performance and the realization of self and non-self.

The Imaginary Realm

The Imaginary is a place that satisfies the desire to bring something back that is not present, especially between 9 to 11 years of age.

Lacan's Perspective

Lacan discusses imaginary identity, but the text notes a lack of clarity on what exactly constitutes the imaginary in this context.

Freud's View on Identity

Freud favored a concept of real identity. What opens the "rotunda" of the mirror stage is considered the basic formation of the self.

Myth of the Mirror Stage

The myth associated with the mirror stage suggests that the child, from 6 to 18 months, sees in the mirror what appears as the diffuse mass of the mother.

Registration of the Imaginary

For the registration of the imaginary, the child must understand that the image is both "me" and "not me." In the mapping provided by the mother, human development goes beyond sheer necessity; the drive begins to manifest through actions like running and sucking.

Narcissism and Autoeroticism

The relationship between narcissism and autoeroticism is evident when infant sucking fixates on what is not physically present. Narcissism is deeply connected to seeing oneself through the mirror stage, where the central image is crucial; without an image, there is no reflection. Where there is no anti-sociability, the underpinnings of the drive are present.

The subject establishes itself through the mirror stage. Initially, the infant is reflected in the eyes of the mother, who serves as the first reflecting surface.

Autoeroticism: Primary Libido State

Autoeroticism is a very ancient concept, stored within the mapping of the drive, representing the primary state of libido.

Understanding Libido

Libido is defined as desire, the quantitative component of the sexual drive. It is the desire to name or to call forth.

The Id: Core of Identity

The Id represents that which we create, admit, and identify with; it is "me," not another.

The Ego: Psychic Projection

The Ego (I) is the psychic projection of the body's surfaces into the mirror image.

Projection and Symbolic Matrix

Projection implies that "I" must be that which is projected. The Symbolic Matrix adheres to the image, anticipating unity.