2005 Driving the Other Person Crazy incident
I had just read a book that mentioned an essay, Driving The Other Person Crazy by a Harold Searles, and decided to read the essay. A search on the Internet revealed it was in a book, Essays on Schizophrenia by Harold Searles, and the lowest price was 89.00 so I put it out of my mind.
A short time later I was in Borders Books, waiting to check out when I noticed a rack of books marked '75%' off, so I went over to the rack. Laying on top of the top shelf of books was "Essays on Schizophrenia" by Harold Searles, marked down 75%. I bought it and read the entire book.
Mr. Searles' writings are as good as any I've read, but the main idea that was important to me was that he recognized that even his sickest patient 'mirrored' him, crudely and rudely, in a symbolic way but with apparent insight into the reality of what was going on between them.
The 'crazy patient' seemed to be able to read psychologically and 'act out' what he saw, but could not consciously relate to his own manner of expressing that 'insight'. I read some years ago that one of Carl G. Jung's gifts was that he could recognize that every sick person had a healthy part, speaking through the mouth of his patient, telling him what was wrong. Jung could then at times tell his patient what he'd heard. (That's in The Haunted Prophet by Paul Stern.)