The Future of Psychoanalysis

From modest beginnings psychoanalysis has developed into a science that has spread the world over. Numerous physicians practice it; great numbers of laymen gather inspiration and enlightenment from the books of psychoanalysts. Thousands of volumes have been written on the subject. It is necessary to delve far back into the history of medicine to find another movement which has brought about such a revolution of the entire spiritual life as analysis has done. It has not stopped at the exploration of the unconscious inner life of separate individuals, but has gathered from the study of the various separate cases typical characteristics they all had in common, thus portraying the soul of modern civilized man and giving us a picture of him which enabled us to better understand not only the individual but also the broad masses of people. Literature, mythology, history of the arts, religion, psychology, philology and many other branches of science have trodden new paths of research and knowledge inspired by psychoanalysis.

We are just wondering how far the influence of psychoanalysis is going to extend over humanity as a whole and what its future fate will be!

Every science which allows itself to be dominated by certain dogmas runs the risk of getting into a state of rigidity. Psychoanalysis is at present passing through such a crisis. The fact that it was forbidden to doubt the master's words, to deviate from his doctrines has led to various secessions, so that today we differentiate between “orthodox analysis” and “independent analysis.” Strange to say, many analysts have stopped where Freud began. We still have today psychotherapists, who work with hypnosis, or a kind of hypnosis, so as to forcefully bring the patient to make confessions he would not make while fully conscious. Also the technique used at the time by Freud is still in vogue, namely to make the patient