Doin' the archetypal rag

Enkidu and Gilgamesh

I recall reading about a social psychology test some years ago. College students were placed in groups and their behavior tracked. It turned out that some were leaders, some were clowns, some were the outsider-omegas, etc. Not surprising.

But then they put all the leaders in a separate group by themselves, all the clowns, all the omegas, etc. and a very interesting thing happened. Each group then replicated the variety of roles that had been observed in the first constellation. Leaders emerged in groups of outsiders, while in others, a former leader played the role of clown, even of omega, etc.

Turns out, according to this experiment, that beyond the individual preferences, the needs of the group for these various roles actually drew people into them.

I suspect that it is not dissimilar in dyad relationships. Depending on who is in the relationship, even though people tend to have repetitive styles, aka, characters, these can shift with a different mix.

One of the standard dynamics of couple is the balance between attraction and separation. Gay male couples are famous for having troubles really connecting deeply. Lesbians are famous for meshing so much that they lose all sexual interest, so called "lesbian bed death." Gender has something to do with it, apparently.

But in both same and opposite sex couples, you often have one person pursuing and the other distancing. One becomes the specialist in connection --of a certain kind, to be sure-- and the other a specialist in differentiation. It can create alienation if not handled well.

I have worked with people who take a different specialist role in different partnerships. One man I know used to be partnered with a very emotionally close and passionate guy. This was a trial for him, since his natural sense of distance from other people was pretty large. To him, of course, it simply felt ordinary and unproblematic. But to his connection-driven, closeness-desiring partner, it felt like abandonment, rejection and flight. Took him a long time and a lot of work to be more flexible about that. Because, as with so many relationship issues, you are dealing with your own sense of the obvious and your own compulsions.

Then this guy was in another relationship where, by comparison with his then lover, he was the connector and pursuer. It was very disorienting for him, and he had to learn the ins and outs of that role from scratch. More hard work. It gave him some compassion for his former boyfriend's issues.

One of the insights of depth psychology is that what we are conscious of and in control of constitutes only a part of who we are, and that indeed most of us operates independently and without our considered, rational ego-consent. So much of what is obvious about us to others, we are oblivious to. Good friends, reflected experience and a good therapist can enlarge the area where we have a dialogue between the awake self and the far larger and more powerful subterranean self. And both of them operate, IMHO, within an even larger archetypal world of narratives and roles which our species has evolved in order to survive.

Sometimes we find ourselves chosen for and starring in a role that we would never audition for!

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