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Abstract: . . . the productiveness of per- sons with an I-am-me orientation by psychotherapists, social workers, and educators is the phasing out of auxiliary egos, auxiliary superegos, and auxil- iary ego ideals. This process can only be carried out gradually and should not Page 16 16 overtax the persons involved, yet a clear and challenging concept must be proposed, with the goal that I-am-me oriented persons themselves assume responsibility for their strong and weak egos, their personal ideals, and the accepted norms as well as discontinue utilizing the responsibility of the therapist, the social worker, or educator and exercising control over these. The last word belongs to Erich Fromm: „Productiveness is man's ability to use his powers and to realize the potentialities inherent in him .“ (E. Fromm, Man for Him- self , p. 84) Copyright © 2006 by Dr. Rainer Funk, Ursrainer Ring 24, D-72076 Tübingen Tel. 07071-600004, Fax -600049; E-Mail: frommfunk[at-symbol] aol.com Translated from German by Dr. Jo Van Vliet, Tübingen . . . . . . character orientation, encouraging the individual human being and shaping his or her circumstances in such a way that his or her own will, strength, striving for independence and autonomy, and capacity for disobedience are strengthened in order to cancel the projection of his or her own powers onto the authority. To do the same with an I-am-me oriented person would be senseless, and would probably even lead to a reinforcement of this mindset. What productiveness means concretely depends on the type of nonproductiveness preponderant in a society. What, then, do productiveness and strengthening of the productive orienta- tion mean for the social character orientation that is I-am-me directed and becom- ing all the more dominant? My reflections on psychodynamics and on the psy- choanalysis of the I-am-me orientation suggest the following summary. The general goal is always to counter the I-am-me orientation assisted by „made“ ability with an experience of the ego assisted by human ability and to recognize and gradually reduce the dependency on „made“ ability. This does not require the rejection of „fabricated“ or „made“ ability but its implementation for the preserva- tion and multiplication—and not the replacement—of human ability. Whoever fights against „made“ ability (and for that reason never watches television or uses a personal computer) is still concerned with „made“ ability, comparable to the 8 For a thorough discussion of this problem see R. Funk, „Was heißt 'productive Orientierung' . . . --3000,2,750,2688,53867
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