Umpire #1 — I call’s ’em as I sees ’em
Umpire #2 — I calls ’em as they are
Umpire #3 — They ain’t nothin’ until I calls ’em
The brain receives a lot of sensory input. To make sense of the complex environment with which we have to cope, the nervous system summarizes and abstracts from the raw sensory data it receives. But the maps it creates are different than the territory it is attempting to represent.
Reification
Acting as if the map was the same as the territory is called the fallacy of reification. Failing to appreciate this fallacy is the cause of much of the suffering you cause yourself and those around you. Consider the consequences of reifying a belief that handicaps your performance, for example: "I will try but probably fail," "She is not going to like me." On the other hand, Hypnotic Suggestion involves using reification intentionally to bring about a desired emotional or motivational state, for example: "I am
conscientious and hard-working," "She wants me to pay attention to her."
Stage hypnotists make a living demonstrating the practical power of reification. We are all suggestible. Unfortunately, self-sabotaging suggestions are more salient and believable than beneficial ones. Which of these two beliefs do you think would be more effective at evoking a meaningful emotional reaction: "Your partner thinks you are competent" vs "Your partner thinks you are incompetent."
The Transformation of Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde
Dr. Jekyll is a college professor who sees me for anger management — although I have never seen him angry. His descriptions of violent arguments with his wife are delivered quietly and often with great contrition. In my office Dr. Jekyll is experiencing these events from the dissociative perspective of the narrator; during the fight he experiences the same sequence of events from the associative perspective of an emotionally aroused biological creature. For example, when describing one argument, Jekyll reported: "I felt angry and thought, ‘she is such a bitch; she is always putting me down.’ But I know that I’m an ass-hole when I’m drunk. I’m probably more to blame than she is. . ."
The trance formation of Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde began the moment he took the negative appraisals of his wife seriously, as if she really was a bitch who was always putting him down. By the time I saw him in my office he had resumed the persona of the rational Dr. Jekyll. Note his statement, "I thought, ‘she is always putting me down.’" Once he was able to view things from the observer’s perspective he de-reified the concept that she was and always would be a bitch, and appreciated that the idea that she was a bitch was his thought, not necessarily a valid description of reality.
Reification of pathogenic beliefs is the sinister potion
that turns the rational Dr. Jekyll into the destructive Mr. Hyde.
De-Reifying those beliefs is the antidote that prevents
the destructive trance-formation.
My mission as Jekyll’s therapist is to help him to de-reify his pathogenic beliefs. The first step [described above] was to ask him to describe how the fight came about. To describe it to me, he had to review the sequence of external events and internal states from the perspective of an observer. The dispassionate narrator in my office was not handicapped by state-dependent distortions, and had cognitive resources — including the ability to think rationally and the awareness of his motivation to be a good dad — that were not available to Mr. Hyde.
Jekyll was embarrassed by how he looked from this dispassionate perspective. Later in the session he vowed he would never get angry at her again, and would work to make amends for his previous destructive actions. Easy for Jekyll to say, but can he speak for Mr. Hyde? [Note: In the past, Mr. Hyde routinely broke the sincere vows made by Dr. Jekyll.]
Spouse abusers tend to follow a predictable sequence of escalating anger culminating in overt aggression, followed by a period of guilt, contrition, and the intention never to act out that way again. During the anger phase the previous intention not to repeat the sequence has little influence — just as during the contrite phase the abuser is unaware of the power of the angry state to distort his perceptions and so he falsely believes he will never act irrationally again.
Intellectual appreciation of this Soul Illusion is not sufficient. To promote good outcome Dr. Jekyll will have to learn how to de-reify pathogenic abstractions such as, "She is always trying to undermine me."
Beneficial Reification
Therapy often focuses on the De-Reification of pathogenic abstractions, but Reification is also a powerful therapeutic tool. I have purposely reified the concept of traps to illustrate the workings of psychological cause-and-effect principles. However, these traps are not assumed to exist as real entities. They are merely abstractions—stories—that help make sense of things, rather than perfect representations of the complex and finely-grained reality. [Likewise, the client examples presented throughout this course are used as fables that omit the complexity of the actual case, but still, hopefully, provide useful lessons for the reader].
The more you reify an abstraction—in the sense of taking it seriously and acting as if it were true— the greater the impact it will have on you. Since I think these concepts will be helpful to you, I want to reify them . On the other hand, you can help yourself by de-reifying your pathogenic concepts. [To identify what these are, use the Personal Research Tool].
The Meta-Cognitive Awareness that your appraisals, judgments, and interpretations are fictions that you create will free you from the Soul Illusion that results from taking your abstractions too seriously.
These creative fictions are your inventions; they are made up by you. They are not true, and — as long as they are not contrary to objective facts — they are not false. Our collaborative task is to De-Reify the harmful fictions and Reify the helpful ones.
The Reification Fork
The events that happened in your past are now part of world history and cannot be changed. However, the story you tell yourself about what these events mean about the world or say about you and other people is a creative fiction. It is one of an infinite number of equally valid interpretations of events that happened. Are you a traffic victim or a heroic survivor? Before you answer, consider the perspectives of the three umpires at the top of this page.
Barry’s judgment of himself as socially inept impairs his social performance and so becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. That fact that his expectations are confirmed continue to reify his self-sabotaging self-image. My job as his therapist is to encourage him to De-Reify his pathogenic fictions. The only fictions I’d like him to reify are those that promote good outcome as he defines it.
Reification is a key concept, and a navigational fork is available here. One option is to follow a philosophical path that promotes de-reification of pathological concepts:
Or, you can follow the default path to step outside of your subjective reality so you can mindfully influence it.