Joseph G. Kepecs

Physical Dynamics of Character Structure: Bodily Form and Movement in Analytic Theory.

In addition to the main current of psychoanalysis and the most popular divagations from it, backwaters and eddies exist in which development has been going on in ways quite different from ones habitual conceptual set. Alexander Lowen, a follower of Wilhelm Reich, describes what might be considered an attempt at synthesis of Reichs vegetotherapy and psychoanalytic theory. A general theory and its application to a variety of disorders is propounded. Impulse originates in the center of the organism, from whence it moves to the periphery, where it has two functions: charging the organism by intake, and discharging, especially through the sex act and reproduction. In man, the upper part of the body, including arms and hands, is devoted to energy intake. Discharge tends to be relegated to the lower half of the body. Consciousness and higher ego functions tend to be set in opposition to the body, from which, however,