The Shrink

The Shrink

The cold spring light streamed in through the window, stinging his eyes and forcing him to squint to examine the room around him. The antique leather of the chaise-longue creaked painfully beneath him, contributing to his general feeling of uneasiness. Well-worn books crowded together on the vast, wall-spanning bookcase posing an intimidating spectacle to his librophobic mind. Official-looking certificates jostled for pride of place on the walls, pushed aside sporadically by scenes of homely landscapes. He tried to discern the figure sitting across from him, shielded securely by the imposing desk.

Through the glare, he could just make out a wiry, bearded figure scanning studiously through the reams of paper strewn across the polished surface of the desk, occasionally sighing, or taking a moment to peer disinterestedly towards him over the top of his square wire-frame glasses. He held an expensive silver pen, twirling it slowly, jotting notes on the sheet that had caught his attention in that instant, then moving on, shuffling gradually through the pile. His movements seemed tired, almost autonomous. This fitted well with his features which held a haggard, weary pose. It was apparent this man was approaching the end of a tiresome day, which followed from a career of days which had increased logarithmically in their tiresomeness as his life had progressed.

The patient wondered for a second how anyone could go through life in such a fashion. Grinding through, day-by-day, repeating the same old motions, never learning, never progressing. A living death, it seemed to him. But then, many would consider his situation to be no better. Trapped in an old, tattered building, every moment of his day mapped out. Wake, medicate, eat, sit amongst the other walking cadavers watching mind-numbing daytime TV, conduct a session, eat, medicate, bed. A repetitive cycle, but such is life, he thought to himself. Everything is about cycles really, he mused. How we came to hold such a linear view of the world he could never understand.

He was roused from his ponderings by a harsh, croaking cough. He moved his vision out of the soft-focus it often locked in when he was deep in thought, and noticed the man across the desk staring intently at him over the top of his glasses, hands clasped just below his chin.

“Penny for them,” the doctor intoned.

“Huh, s,s,sorry, I was a mile away,” the patient stuttered, startled.

“Yes, so it appears. I would very much like to know what is so deserving of your attention,” the doctor replied, his ragged, hoarse voice suggesting no hostility, only mild curiosity, and perhaps a twinge of amusement.

“Well, nothing in particular really, sir,” the patient responded, “simply musing on the nature of things.”

“Ahhh, the nature of things,” the doctor leaned back in his chair, a wry smile spreading across his lips, “a most worthy subject, a most broad subject also. Care to elucidate for me?” His hands interlocked in front of his face, one index finger tapping his lips.

“Well, there are many topics that capture my attention from time to time,” our patient purred, “I could talk for a great while on some, but I fear none of my musings would be particularly engrossing for a man of your learning and experience,” he murmered, sweeping a broad gesture across the myriad of books and accolades as he spoke.

“My dear friend,” the learned man continued, “the sole reason for both of our presence here today is for me to be both engrossed and intrigued by your musings. Perhaps we can learn something from each other, and both come away greater men than before?”

Our patient felt a surge of ideas floating to the surface of his fragmented mind, each bubble of inspiration bursting with more insistence than the last. Although not normally in the habit of divulging his innermost concepts to others, there was something about this particular individual that piqued his interest. Perhaps he felt like surprising this intellectual out of his pompous stupor, perhaps he felt that something could genuinely be gained from this interaction. Either way, he could sense he was about to behave quite out of character.

“Well, sir, the most primary point that has been capturing my imagination recently is the decisions that humanity has made in the past,” our patient had clearly relaxed, but was leaning forwards in his chair, eyes betraying a wild excitement.

“Indeed, history has been a tirade of bizarre decisions on our part, that is very true,” the doctor replied, imitating the posture of our patient, “which particular area has been perturbing you?”

“Perturbing me? Certainly not!” Our patient was clearly dismayed by this analysis. “None of my thoughts perturb me, I find only interest in these ideas”

“I see, please continue,” came the response.

Our patient was not about to let semantics sway him from his course. “Well, to approach it from a direction I would presume is close to your heart, consider the decision we as a species made when choosing to take the ideas of Sigmund Freud over those of Claude Jung.” He gazed pointedly at the doctor.

“Well, I have a few ideas of my own about Jungian psychology, but I will hear you out.” The doctor’s wry smile had returned.

“Looking at it from what I perceive as an objective position, as I have never received any tutoring in these concepts, I feel that our seemingly arbitrary prioritising of Freud’s mechanistic explanation of the working of the mind over Jung’s more wholistic viewpoint betrays much of what is wrong with our view of the world in general.” Our patient sat back for a moment, gauging the effect his words had elicited in his observer. He gleaned very little from the doctor’s well-worn features.

“Interesting, indeed,” the doctor jotted some brief notes on the paper in front of him, then returned our patient’s gaze questioningly.

Our patient considered his next statement for a moment, taking in the musty intellectualism of the room.

“What this is a symptom of, I believe, is the absurdly reductivist viewpoint we have slipped into, as a species. Rather than looking for the larger pattern, the bigger picture, we fascinate ourselves with the minor details, breaking every available subject down until it becomes almost incomprehensible to anyone unschooled in the topic.” He glanced once more at the Doctor. “I would argue that knowledge that serves no purpose to the everyday working of the human vehicle, although not entirely without value, has been vastly over emphasised in our current social schema. The world has become so hopelessly focused on the minutae, on the infinite irrelevance of such questions as modern physics is mathematically mutilating, that we have split, as a global psyche.”

The Doctor weighed his words carefully, using his years of training to select the words that would carry his point whilst maintaining the dialog.

“Perhaps these minutae are a necessary consequence of scientific enquiry. I would argue that all knowledge has an intrinsic value. Perhaps, and I think this is a point that is very much worth your consideration, we are working towards some great integration of all these irrelevant details. Perhaps the greater whole can only be understood by the detailed examination of its parts. To use your example, physics can only advance towards a theory that encompasses all available phenomena by truly understanding the workings of the world on the tiniest scale.”

Our patient was thrown for a moment, his mind working to integrate this new data.

“Well that, I must admit, is an interesting point. It is entirely possible this splitting is necessary. I may be rushing things a little, taking the short-term view. Not something I would have normally thought myself capable of. I will have to give your ideas some thought.”

Our patient gazed out of the window, watching the birds flit between the blossoming trees, carrying the pollen that would ensure the survival of the very things that ensured their survival. He inhaled, and considered how every breath he took was sustained by the effluence of the trees. He exhaled, and considered how he sustained the trees with his own effluence. Try as he might, the complexity of it all was too much. To our patient, it would always be a whole, an integrated system that defied any form of explanation. He looked across at the Doctor perched across the desk, peering over wire-framed glasses with a bottomless curiosity burning behind his eyes, and a light came on. He saw for the first time the system that he and the Doctor represented. The incompatibility of their viewpoints, the polar variability in their thinking process was a vital part of it all. One could not exist without the other, one could never hope to survive in the world without the other. The Doctor needed our patient, just as our patient needed the Doctor. For the first time in his life, our patient moved from the edge of his circle, just a fraction, towards the centre. Where the truth always lies.