[di meliora]

Dr. Eric Maisel describes noimetics thusly:

Derived from noima, Greek for meaning, noimetics is an integrative philosophy that studies human subjectivity, human aims, human values—the range of human experience—and the part that meaning plays in our experience of life.

Although among the most important of human phenomena, meaning is also among the most difficult to get a handle on.” This helps explain why it is so rarely studied. Students of noimetics—noimetists—are engaged in precisely this study.

Noimetists take as their field of inquiry meaning in its various aspects: meaning as a psychological experience, meaning as an idea, meaning as an evaluation, and meaning as a poignant human challenge. They examine questions like, “How much meaning does a human being require?”, “Is meaning overrated, underrated, or both?”, and “Does meaning trump value or does value trump meaning?”

You may think of yourself as an existentialist, a Buddhist, a Christian, an atheist, a humanist, a Jew, a postmodernist, spiritual, or some eclectic mixture of many themes, threads, and traditions. Noimetics takes its place among the many traditions and lays claim to a singular focus on the human experience of meaning... http://ericmaisel.com/noimetics-2/

In his blog, Dr. Maisel invited Judith Levy to talk about this article: Meaning Making in Psychoanalytic Theory and Practice. She begins by noting:

"As a psychologist, psychoanalyst and longtime admirer of Eric's work, I'm pleased to see him inviting us all to think about the nature and function of meaning making in people's lives. This endeavor is quite familiar to me, since psychoanalytic theory and practice centers itself around how and why various aspects of life are construed as meaningful or become denuded of meaning, how meaning develops, what purpose it serves, how we can create and cultivate meaning, and what stops us from doing so. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/...ud-and-meaning

After more preliminaries, Levy gets back to Maisel's specialty:

"I want to very briefly address Eric's interest in 'the nature and location of human meaning.' In the last few decades, contemporary psychoanalysts and attachment researchers have been studying how certain chronic mismatches between mothers and babies can create intense tension and dysregulated affect states. Babies' natural, burgeoning ability to make meaning of their experiences by mentally representing them via a process of symbolizing and linking thoughts and feelings to each other can become compromised.

"This is a complicated process effecting the way children's minds get structured. It has ramifications for continuing cognitive and emotional development as a child matures into adulthood, where it can effect many areas that Eric mentions, and show up in subtle and not so subtle ways, including having thought blockages, difficulties with writing (using language), compromised mental flexibility and fantasy life, concrete thinking, clinging to certainty, feelings of mental paralysis, emptiness, dissociation, or a chronic sense of 'meaninglessness.'

"Often, these kinds of problems are not 'either-or'; they occur on a continuum and in particular contexts. Rather than looking at people as 'normal' or 'abnormal' or thinking in terms of diagnostic labels, psychoanalysts look at these processes on multiple levels. They 'live into and with' these phenomena as they attempt to generate meaning by creating a mutually constructed 'transitional space' together with their patients. They address both the content of people's conflicts, as well as the process by which these become manifested and enacted with the analyst and in life."

In part two, Levy further explains:

"The paradoxical idea that meaning is both created and found was first proposed in the post World War II years by Donald Winnicott, a British pediatrician and psychoanalyst who coined the terms 'holding environment,' 'transitional object' (colloquially known as 'security blanket), and 'transitional space.' He elaborated upon how what we construe as meaningful is highly subjective and involves a developmental trajectory influenced by the interaction between mothers and babies, and emphasized the importance of play in the development of creativity.

"If the mother (or parenting figure) is 'good enough' she provides a combination of both attunement to and inevitable frustration of her baby's needs and desires, which spark the development of the child's mind as well as a sense of agency, continuity, and self as distinct from that of the mother. As part of this process, mother and child 'create' each other. For the baby the particular interactions, behaviors, smells, facial expressions, touch, etc. of the mother are imbued with rudimentary meaning, but, paradoxically, the mother 'was waiting there to be created.' http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/...meaning-part-2

Levy summarizes:

"When children play they create meaning by actualizing their internal imaginary experiences by enacting them in the real world. Artists, writers, religions, use different symbolic vehicles to do the same. Play is a transitional phenomenon because it involves the coming together of inner psychic reality with the objective external world via the positive use of 'illusion.' It's both very serious, and very fun. In my experience, many people who have difficulty with creating meaning in their lives suffer from an inability to play fully or at all, and may struggle to construct a coherent narrative or story about themselves which feels centering and organizing.

"To me this is what meaning making is all about: the ability to bring inner vision to oneself and the world emanating from a spiral of evolving mutuality with another. It's a complex matter for some, and easier for others, depending upon a number of factors. I see my work as being about bringing my clients to a place in which they can play more fully, using our dialectic, interactive process to enable them - and myself as well! - to experience and to have both the freedom and the discipline to cultivate a sense of possibility and enhanced meaning. It's a continual work in progress.

Noimetics is subjective. Levy's meaning is subjective too. Those who are better at creating seem to have more meaningful lives.

[Perna]

Originally Posted by Elan Vital

"To me this is what meaning making is all about: the ability to bring inner vision to oneself and the world emanating from a spiral of evolving mutuality with another. It's a complex matter for some, and easier for others, depending upon a number of factors.

Meaning making, or "creating" meaning is like most other things; improved with focused practice. It does not depend on whether one can/cannot do it but on whether one tries or does not try to do it.

We all make associations, imagine (use words, which only happens in our heads) what has taken place or will take place or is taking place. The creation is up to us and what we want. If I want a purple sky, I can have/create a purple sky. Yes, everyone else declares that color "blue" but no one else sees what I see (I could be seeing purple) and another's description of their or a joint creation does not have to be my description!

When I try to get others to define things for me, I am rejecting my own job of creating meaning for myself. It is okay to agree with the description of other's or society's creations ("Money" is worth something; that's a human construct and agreement; there is nothing in nature that says those green bills mean anything!) but a good idea to think about and realize what/that one is agreeing/to. Otherwise, we can get hung up on our own constructs and not even realize it, the true meaning of getting in one's own way.