dance #4

On Infancy

Text:

“The wish for absolute assertion of oneself, the demand to have one’s way, the negation of the outside—all that Freud understood as aggression and omnipotence—must sometime crash against the reality of another who reflects back the intransigent assertion that the self displays. The paradox of recognition, the need for acknowledgment that turns us back to dependence on the other, brings about a struggle for control. This struggle can result in the realization that if we fully negate the other, that is, if we assume complete control over him and destroy his identity and will, then we have negated ourselves as well. For then there is no one there to recognize us, no one there for us to desire.”

Jessica Benjamin, The Bonds of Love (1988), “The First Bond” p. 39

The bonds of love

11:00 pm, 7 degrees Celsius. A warm rainy night, melting the snow.

Alice-the-cat crying and rubbing up against my leg as I danced.

~ by nmyers on December 24, 2008.