Last winter I was travelling through New Zealand, where I was exposed to new experiences. One of them was Maori People culture expressed by stories of creation with interesting concepts of
. Each human being own his full
- potential at his birth.
is actualization, the manifestation of his potential through life. These concepts are so close to basis of Theory of Positive Disintegration. This theory combines two different philosophical traditions: elements of the essentialism with the emphasis on individual choice in existentialism. The central, unchanging, essential qualities constitute the essence of man like this tapu - potential and from the time of formation and development of this "essence," the genuine, authentic existence of man begins (mana- actualization of tapu).
Maori people are famous of their art, especially of carving a spiral patterns into wood and stone, painting and tattooing their bodies. These spiral patterns remind me the Belousov-Zhabotinskii reactions's patterns, of rotating circles, spirals. The BZ reation is an example of the dissipative structures.
Maori People connected in my mind, in some synchronistic way these two theories: The Theory of Dissipative Structures and the Theory of Positive Disintegration.
To our analysis of creativity process, we choose the theory of Positive Disintegration developed by Polish/Canadaian psychologist Kazimierz Dabrowski, who promoted the viepoint that psychological tension and conlict may be positive and a necessary precursor to psychological growth.
We make a link between psychology and physics, using the theory of Dissipative Structures created by Ilya Prigogine, and show similarities between the process of dissipative structure anf the process of creativity.
Ilya Prigogine wrote:
"Everywhere around us we see the emergence of structures that bear witness to the "creativity of nature"... I have always felt that this creativity had to be connected to some way to the distance from equilibrium, and was thus the result of irreversible process."
Ilya Prigogine - theoretical chemist was interested in "open" systems, those that constantly interact with their environment, changing, growing, and evolving. He called them "dissipative structures." Such structures, to maintain their existence, must interact with their environment continually maintaining the flow of energy into and out of the system.
The interaction of a system with the outside world, its embedding in nonequilibriun conditions, may become in this way the starting point for the formation of the new dynamic states of matter - dissipative structures.
Close to bifurcation points the fluctuations become abnormally high. Long range correlations appear. Particles separated by macroscopic distances become linked. Local events have repercussions throughout the whole system. Nonequilibrium is a source of order.
At equilibrium molecules behave as essentially independent entities; they ignore one another.
However, nonequilibrium wakes them up and introduces a coherence. Matter becomes more "active."
Near equilibrium, dissipation associated with entropy production ia at a minimum.
Far from equilibrium, it is just opposite. New process sets it and increases the production of entropy.
Near equilibrium fluctuations are harmless, but far-from equilibrium, they play a central role. The system "chooses" one of possible branches available when far from equilibrium. In general we have a succession of bifurcations.
Once we have dissipative structures, we can speak of self-organization. Even if we know the initial values and boundary constraints, there are still many states available to the system among which it "chooses" as a result of fluctuations. Bifurcations can be considered the source of diversification and innovation.
Theory of Positive Disintegration
The Theory of Positive Disintegration, developed by K. Dabrowski is a complex and comprehensive theory of personality development.
Kazimierz Dabrowski was Polish/Canadian Psychologist, who worked on the Theory of Positive Disintegration from 1937 to 1980. In 1964 and 1967, he published in English three books: "Positive Disintegration", "Personality - shaping through Positive Disintegration" and "Mental Growth through Positive Disintegration."
Human existence is possible only through intense and accelerated mental development. This development must be multidimensional and multilevel.
Multidimensional development includes all basic aspects of mental life, especially innate drives, emotions, intelects, imagination, aesthetic, etc.
Multilevel development consists not only quantitative growth and replacement of some elements with others, but acquires new insights and new qualities to progress human toward a self-controlled, creative, empathetic and authentic structure. If these mental qualities autonomously chosen and confirmed through the painful process of positive disintegration are organized to a cohesive structure of secondary integration. Human becomes unique, unrepeatable and lasting individuality.
The theory of positive disintegration is the mental development, which is described by the process of transition from lower to higher levels of mental life with a great deal of tension, inner conflict and struggle, anxiety and despair.
Emotions
There is a wide range of ideas about how to define emotional processes. In developmental psychology,emotions both are regulated and perform regulatory functions. We can say that emotions are everywhere in the process of the mind. Kenneth Dodge states that "all information processing is emotional, in that emotion is the energy that drives, organizes, amplifies, and attenuates cognitive activity and in turn is the experience and expression of this activity (Dodge, 1991).
Daniel Siegel sees emotions as the flow of energy, or states of arousal and activation, through the brain and other parts of the body. This process emerges from and directly affects the further processing of information within the mind by way of appraisal meaning" (Siegel, 1999).
They are dynamic processes of change, they are fluctuation of energy and informational flow of the mind. This is why Dabrowski called these processes - dynamisms. He described many types of types of developmental and creative dynamisms. Dabrowski defined a dynamism as:"A biological or mental forces controling behavior and its developement. Instincts, drives, and intelectual processes combined with emotions are dynamisms." He introduced two categories of dynamisms:
dynamisms characterized by spontaneity and lack of definite organization and
dynamisms which reshape, assimilate and organize the process of positive disintegration.
They can interact either synergistically or antagonistically.
Five Levels of Development
The process of positive disintegration includes five levels:
primary integration - point attractor,
unilevel disintegration - cycle attractor,
spontaneous multilevel disintegration - strange attractor,
organized multilevel disintegration -emerging order,
secondary integration - order.
The first level - primitive or primary integration is characterized by mental structures and functions of a low level; they are rigid, automatic, impulsive , determine by primitive, innate and drives. Intelligence neither controls nor transforms basic drives. Individuals with primitive psychic integration are not capable of having internal conflics, although they often have conflicts with their external environment. They are not able to understand the meaning of time; they cannot postpone immediate gratification, and they cannot follow long-range plans but are limited to the reality of immadiate, passing feelings.
Disintegration of this primitive structure is possible only if there are nuclei of psychoneurotic traits, or sensitivity, which are acted upon by very strong positive influence of a highly developed environment.
Unilevel disintegration begins with loosening of the rigid structure of primary integration. Among the first symptoms of disintegration are increased sensitivity to internal stimuli, vague feelings of disquietude, ambivalenncs and ambitendencies. Unilevel disintegration occurs during developmental crises such as puberty or menopause, in periods of difficulty in handling some stressful external event. Unilevel mental disturbances have mostly unconscious character and a continous oscillation of "pros" and "cons," no clear direction "up" and "down."
The next development level is the spontaneous multilevel disintegration. The individual searches not only for novelty, but something higher; he/she searches for examples and models in his external environment and in himself/herself. This is the time of the appearance of such developmental dyanmisms as astonishment with oneself, disquietude with oneself, dissatisfaction with oneself, feeling of shame and guilt, positive maladjustment, feeling of inferiority toward oneself.
Organized multilevel disintegration wich is the next level, exhibits more tranquility, systematization and conscious transformation of oneself.The developmental dynamisms are:"subject-object" in oneself, the third factor, self-awareness and self-control, idnetification and empathy, education of oneself and autopsychotherapy.
The last level called secondary integration consists in a new organization and harmonization of personality. The main dynamisms active at this level are:autonomy and authentism, empathy, self-perfection, personality ideal.
Spontaneous Multilevel Disintegration - Strange Attractor
In the first phase of multilevel disintegration, dynamisms are characterized by spontaneity and lack of definite organization. They are:
astonishment with oneself - the first phase in the authentic observation of oneself and beginning of the desire to change, "something is not quite right with me"and "what is wrong with me."
disquietude with oneself - search of meaning of one's behavior and existence, growing attitude of self-criticism with emotional tension and"readiness" toward inner psychic transformation.
dissatisfaction with oneself- critical, condemning attitude toward oneself accompanied by states of anxiety and depression.
feeling of inferiority toward oneself- the awareness of the posibility of development, the awareness of weakness and, at the same time, the feeling of one's potential and strength, the disparity between one"is" and what one "ought to be."
feeling of shame and guilt -"mental hiding of oneself", experience of feeling embarrassed in the relation to others and to oneself.
positive maladjustment- a conscious and selective rejection, a lack of adjustment to ceratin external or internal dynamisms, the need for adaptation to a higherhierarchy of values, to the ideal, to that which"ought to be."
creativity- connected with the process of multilevel disintegration, develops under conditions of emotional changes, tensions, and external and internal conflicts and is a desire to build a new reality through an expanded awareness.
All these dynamisms acted as positive feedback to create more complex, open and sensitive mental structure.
Organized Multilevel Disintegration - New Order Emerging
The organized multilevel disintegration exhibits more tranquility, systematization and conscious transformation of oneself. Dynamisms reshape, assimilate and organize the process of positive disintegration. To this category belong:
self-awareness and self-control - the conscious feeling of distance toward one's daily tasks, leading to calmess and reflection, awareness of personal identity, awareness of personal distinctness from external world, a feeling of individual uniqueness and the importance of certain traits and characteristics.
"subject-object in onself" - the practice of inner self-observation for the sake of mental development, the recognition of one's inner self bringing a sense of one's uniqueness and personal identity, a readiness to change thinking.
syntony, identification, empathy - an ability to feel something in common with others, to understand them, and to be willing to help them.
the third factor - the agent of conscious choice of development, the basis for perfection.
inner psychic transformation - the transformation of instinctive drives into sublimated elements which gradually become permanent constituents of one's personality.
education of oneself and auto-psychotherapy - that makes one take his fate in his own hands.
The ideal of personality takes more distinct contours and becomes closer to the individuals.
All these dynamisms are negative feedback - organizing mental structure and making it more stable.
Secondary Integration - Order
The last level called
secondary integration ia a new organization and harmonization of personality. The main dynamisms active at this level are:
responsibility for oneself - increased self-awareness and self-control tend to increase the sense of responsibility for one's thoughts, emotions, desires ane experiences,
responsibility for others - is fulfilled by attention to the needs of others through empathy, and readiness to assist others,
autonomy - state of inner freedom, conscious choices of one's action dominate over compulsive behavior, and
authenticity - is possible only on the basis of a sufficiently developed autonomy and if the individual is open to a wide range of experiences and able to transform them in a positive and creative way.
Positive Disintegration versus Dissipative Structures
Positive Disintegration process mirrors Dissipative Structure process. The lower levels of mental structures are organized more rigidly and operate more automatically tha the higher levels.
First level of positive disintegration -
primitive integration can be described by
pint attractor , which is characterized by rigid, automatic and impulsive behavior.
Next level -
unilevel disintegration is
a limit cycle attractor, characterized by a continous fluctuations of "pros" and "cons."
Third level -
spontaneous disintegration can be described by
a strange attractor . Through this level mental structure start to be more "open" to inner and external environment. Fluctuations of functions nad mental tensions associated with the search for a new hierarchy of values cause an acceleration of the process of shaping personality. It is characterized by the authentic observation of oneself and the beginning of the desire to change, growing attitude of self-criticism with tension and "readiness" toward inner psychic transformation, states of anxiety and depression, a lack of adjustemnt to certain external or internal reality and searching for novelty and for something higher.
Next level-
the organized multilevel disintegration is characterized by openness to external experiences, sensitivity and identification with others. Mental structure transforms itself into a new structure of increased complexity. Personality grows towards integration of its ideal. We can say that
new order started to
emerge with higher complexity.
Last level -
secondary integration is a new order, a new organization and harmonization of personality, characterized by autonomy and authenticity.
The process of positive disintegration can be expressed as a movement from point attractor to cycle attractor, to strange attractor and then to emerging order and order with increasing complexity and sensitivity.
A driving force for this developemnt is
the movement from simplicity toward complexity. Mental structure is maximizing its complexity and therefore its stability by pushing forward to higher levels. Attractors of mental structures emerge in interaction with the internal and external environment.
Creative Dynamisms
The creative dynamisms arise and develop on the level of spontaneous transformation. They transform old elements and dimensions of reality and create new ones in an original mentally rich and complex manner. They are an expression of "psychological awakening." The creative dynamisms are an outlet for the increased tension of inner conflicts. We can say that they are acting as positive feedback that cause the system to change, to be more complex, more open and more sensitive to internal and external stimuli. They help to move system to the next level of development - to organize multilevel disintegration, to reorganize of the a disintegrated mental structure. On the level of multilevel organized disintegration the creative dynamisms participate in organization of new, more complex structure. Individual is able to gradually to increase and deepen his/her knowledge of himself/herself, and authentically to chose his/her aims and ideas. By assimilating of the new and unknown into the structure of the growing personality, grows the content of consciousness. Individual becomes conscious of being able to direct his own progress towards an integrated personality. The creative dynamisms on this level act as negative feedback that grow inside of chaotic system - mental structure, organizing it and making it more stable.
Dabrowski states:
Man becomes more truly himself having passing through a variety of painful experiences, having exercised his own will and having made his own choices.
The basic features of developing man are: self-conscious, self-chosen, and self-educated. Insights into nature of personality integration brings concentration, meditation, and creative inspiration. Creative dynamisms on the level of secondary integration are the developmental forces that shape one's authentic personality, becoming a unique human individual with an unrepeatable, autonomously developed social attitude.
Summary
Based on these two theories we summarize that:
Creativity developes under conditions of emotional fluctuations, tensions, and external as well internal conflicts.
Creativity would be referred to as "self-organizing dissipative structure," that can survive only through a constant exchange of energy and information with its environment.
Creativity continously creates disequilibria and bifurcations, breaks routine, to liberate from automatic experiences in order to achieve inner autonomy.
Creativity can be regarded as desire to build a new reality, generate new ideas and make new connections.
creativity brings meaning to disorder, by creating new order and stabilizing into compex pattern.
The concept of the dissipative structure and the theory of positive disintegration provide a new point of view to the process of creativity as a model "Order through Emotion."
Reference
1. Dabrowski, K. (1973). The Dynamics of Concepts. Gryf Publications Ltd., London.
2. Dabrowski, K.. (1964). Positive Disintegration. Little, Brown and Company, Boston.
3. Dabrowski, K. (1970). Mental Growth through Positive Disintegration . Gryf Publication Ltd., London.
4. Dodge, K. A. (1991) Emotion and social information processing , In J. Garber & K.A. Dodge (Eds.), The development of emotion regulation and dysregulation (pp. 159 -181). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press
5. Nicolis, G., and Progogine, I. (1989). Exploring Complexity W.H. Freeman and Company/ New york.
6. Prigogine, I. (1980). From Being to Becoming W.H. Freeman and Comapny, San Francisco
7. Prigogine, I., and Stengers, I. (1984). Order out of Chaos Bantam Books.
8. Siegel, D. (1999). Developing Mind The Guilford Press.
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