I think I understand the concept and experience of internalizing people. I think it is a bit like transference: often discussed in the context of therapy, and many Ts like to work with it, but it is not specific to therapy and can happen there as well simply because it is a universal phenomenon for people (not saying it applies to everyone, but common enough). I think it is an essential part of developing our personalities in early life and building our social personas mostly unconsciously when we are very young. And I think people internalize the good, bad, ugly, and everything in between in these ways, it just requires relationships with people, especially longer ones. I can easily trace back a few people from earlier in my life that I internalized in some ways, and there have been both benefits and more negative patterns created this way.

I also had a pretty scary experience with my first T. He would be the last person I would want to internalize, but in the end I found myself reacting to him in some similarly manipulative and sneaky ways to his, which really scared the *** out of me when I recognized it because it was very uncharacteristic of me, never happened before. I am very glad that I stopped all contact with him even just to nip that in the bud. Of course I tried to look at it more deeply in ways the psychoanalyst might - was that effect an interaction with something else inside me that I may not be aware of and repressed very effectively, even with all most tendencies for introspection? Maybe, in some ways, as I am definitely not someone who behaves in hostile ways often, especially impulsively... but when looking at it in perspective, I did have similar ones (just less severe) before, on occasion. And they were all triggered by similar kinds of people/behaviors to my Ts. So that is interesting, but I don't think I need a T to investigate this, can use everyday relationships perfectly well if I am observant about it. I also think that there is a lot of truth and merit in psychoanalytic theories and approaches (why I got interested in trying it a few years ago), but also that many psychoanalysts take it too far, into overly simplified and generalized dogmas, plus it can get too stuck in the past and in the client-T relationship sometimes.

I think I also internalized some good things from my second T, mostly small things about his professional communication style that I really liked. They are subtle but I feel they have made me a bit better communicator in some ways. I found it easy to pick them up from him as we had so many similarities in general - I did not resist it and the little "tricks" I learned fit well into my already existing style and values.

From other relationships... I think the most massive, long-term influence in my life in this way came from my father - it is quite complex and mostly positive for me. Not only positive. And a few mentors from my younger years would come next. Luckily, I feel that not much stuck in me from my mom - she was a very insecure, sad and clingy person who, unfortunately, never found the close and loving bonds with others that she obviously craved. I detached myself from her massively when I was very young, 4-5 years of age and remained that way until her death, mostly. I would definitely do it differently now, with my adult understanding of her in retrospect. But what did remain from it, I think, is decades struggling to establish emotional bonds with females and understand women better, unless their interests and personalities are quite close to mine. I am aware of this now and try to go against the current, but do feel the current anyway. Probably this is an example for the lack of internalizing female figures early in my life?

I feel that the internalizing happens all the time and it is an important element of social learning and the development of our identities even when we do not recognize it's happening. I would even risk it may be part of how we can have empathy - an ability to imagine someone else's situation, feelings and thoughts. I think the development of it requires examples and experiences in social life and probably if someone is extremely isolated, resists social influences, or have too many bad examples and encounters, these abilities may not develop so well. And there is also the other side, when someone is too prone to focusing on others and feel for them at the expense of their own stability - I think that probably also has to do with inappropriate amount and quality of social interaction and learning in earlier life. But I digress a but too far now