The id and the self are described as constructs of our unconscious which can be deployed in describing the analytic process. They can be used like the x in mathematics or the joker in a pack of cards as fitting in almost anywhere. But we can call on them as important aids to concentration, when additional room is made for meditating on the past which then comes to life again. They are useful for analysing ourselves and others. In this way the id as well as the self become aide-mémoires. The analysis of the repressed by means of the transference is not the only road to hitherto unconscious memories.

This kind of meditation has helped me despite all reservations to undertake self-analysis and to write an autobiography. I maintain that one can have a transference to oneself. It is, of course, narcissistic. But then, no one can write an autobiography without a healthy dose of narcissism.