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Although Kohut's bipolar theory of the self has received voluminous critical attention as a clinical hypothesis that illuminates a particular set of psychological disorders and has been subjected to some philosophical reflection (see especially ), it has not received a full critical examination as a theory of the self independently of its clinical functions. What follows is an attempt to show how Kohut's theory of the self intersects with a number of the most important theories of the self in Western thought, relates to their vocabularies, incorporates a number of their profoundest insights, and helps solve some of the tradition's most vexing problems while leaving some others unexplored.
Grandiosity and idealization constitute the two poles of what Kohut terms the bipolar nuclear self. The bipolar self has two sources of primary motivation: desires and ideals. The desires (needs) of the grandiose pole say “This is what I want”; the idealized pole asserts “This is what you ought to become.” In other words, humans have as part of their natural constituencies both “desire-based motivation” and “authoritative motivation” (Scheffler, 1992). There is a tension between these two poles, for grandiosity gives the sense that as a particular being I am absolutely adequate and entitled to have my needs met, whereas the idealized pole stands in opposition to the self-satisfaction of grandiosity by holding up an ideal of what I might become, but am not.