Meeting of the New York Psychoanalytic Society

THE WISHED-FOR SELF IMAGE. David Milrod, M.D.

Following Jacobson, who first used the term "wished-for self image," Dr. Milrod defined it as a relatively stable substructure within the ego, made up of valued and admired qualities and attributes associated with important others, which individuals recognize they do not possess but which they long to make their own. The wished-for self image and the ego ideal are both concerned with values and both play a role in the regulation of self-esteem. The ego ideal is one of the functions of the superego and is formed with the resolution of the oedipus complex, whereas the wished-for self image develops earlier than the ego ideal and is one of its precursors. The values built in to the wished-for self image have instinctual attributes related to the phasic development of the drives. Values built in to the ego ideal are limited to moral and ethical values. The wished-for self image is highly personified while the ego ideal is depersonified. Behavior guided by the wished-for self image is self-interested and is aimed at strengthening the self-representation. Behavior guided by the ego ideal, as the bearer of moral and ethical standards, is less self-interested and is oriented more toward protecting object relationships. Over a long period of time, the wished-for self image comes more and more into relation with reality and is moderated and modified by it, whereas the ego ideal never loses its magical, idealized, grandiose quality and is not moderated by reality. Both produce a form of narcissistic gratification. Failure to live up to either produces a narcissistic mortification. In the case of the wished-for self image, it is accompanied by feelings of shame, inferiority, or humiliation. In the case of the ego ideal, it is accompanied by guilt feelings.

Dr. Milrod referred to imitation as an identificatory process which begins in Mahler's practicing subphase and is followed by selective identifications in the rapproche