Sigmund Freud

3 Pages 673 Words

 Freudian psychology is a much debated topic that encompasses many
different elements. Some believe it was Freud’s unhappy childhood that led him to
his conclusions on how we view life while others believe he was simply a genius,
seeing the world in ways most of us can’t. Let’s examine Freud’s life as well as his
most famous theory, psychoanalysis.
Freud believes our personality is for the most part fixed by the time we turn
five or six. He believed our feelings about ourselves come from jealousness,
anxieties, and guilt regarding how we relate to other family members and how they
view us. There is strong reason for him to believe this.
Freud’s childhood consisted of constant sadness and turmoil. His father was
20 years older than his mother, had a couple of children by a previous marriage, and
had a mistress throughout the good time of his marriage. His mother had an
additional eight children. At one point, there were the eight children, a half-brother
the age of Freud’s mother, the father, and a nephew all living in the same cramped
30-foot-by-30-foot room. Knowing this, it is not hard to see where Freud gets his
beliefs about the family unit.
As Freud got older he became a physician and for a time practiced medicine
in the traditional sense. However, two things changed his life around into the man
we know of now: 1) As he listened to his patients, he became more and more
convinced that the problems they were having were coming from psychological
forces rather than physical ones, and 2) He couldn’t stand the sight of blood. At one
point in his career he began treating patients by giving them cocaine and eventually
became addicted himself, nearly ruining his career.
Now let’s discuss psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis is a personality theory
based on the assumption that how we develop and behave is the result of impulses
or needs that are unknown to us. This theory originated from a beli...