Skip to Main Content
 

Global Search Box

 
 
 

ETD Abstract Container

Abstract Header

Ayurvedic and Bionian Theories of Thinking: Mental Digestion and the Truth Instinct

Labbe-Watson, Jenna G
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6444-9083
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=antioch1594069857416562

Abstract Details

2020, Psy. D., Antioch University, Antioch New England: Clinical Psychology.
This theoretical paper integrates Ayurvedic and Bionian psychoanalytic theories of thinking into a new, integrative understanding of how individuals learn from experience. The relationship between knowledge, emotional experience, and the truth instinct is explored. Ayurvedic and Bionian theories describe the complexity involved in transforming raw sensory and emotional experiences into thoughts that nourish our intelligence and permit us to continually dream ourselves into being. Ayurvedic theories of intrapsychic processes and the anatomy and physiology of the mind will be explicated alongside Bionian concepts of intersubjective projective identification. For the promotion and maintenance of psychological growth, Bionian psychoanalytic thinkers describe the prerequisites of possessing a set of mental functions that transform raw sense impressions into usable elements for thinking and a functional mental apparatus that can make meaning from them. In addition, Bionians assert that the presence of a caring other in infancy and beyond aids in the metabolism of our most difficult experiences. Ayurveda describes the prerequisite of sufficient mental digestive capacity, which is supported or remediated by physical, social, psychological, and spiritual factors. These adjunctive therapeutic interventions are useful to therapists working with patients who fail to heal despite immersive psychotherapy. Both traditions hold the paradoxical view that one’s ability to tolerate not-knowing is also essential to psychological growth. In this paper, a dialogic approach between these two schools of thought results in an integrative theory of intrapsychic and intersubjective processes for coherent thinking and illuminates the conditions that support the evolution of self/personality.
Theodore Ellenhorn, PhD (Committee Chair)
Vincent Pignatiello, PsyD (Committee Member)
E. Porter Eagan, PsyD (Committee Member)
79 p.
Clinical Psychology
Ayurveda; Bion; intersubjective projective identification; Absolute Truth; O; doshas; mental gunas; container-contained; waking dreaming; alpha-function

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Labbe-Watson, J. G. (2020). Ayurvedic and Bionian Theories of Thinking: Mental Digestion and the Truth Instinct [Doctoral dissertation, Antioch University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=antioch1594069857416562

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Labbe-Watson, Jenna. Ayurvedic and Bionian Theories of Thinking: Mental Digestion and the Truth Instinct. 2020. Antioch University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=antioch1594069857416562.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Labbe-Watson, Jenna. "Ayurvedic and Bionian Theories of Thinking: Mental Digestion and the Truth Instinct." Doctoral dissertation, Antioch University, 2020. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=antioch1594069857416562

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

antioch1594069857416562
335
© 2020, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Antioch University and OhioLINK.