All My Children

Like most self-invented symbolic play, Goethe’s act, as previously suggested, had meaning on many different, important and urgent levels, whereas play material created by others can only rarely fit so well the always-changing demands of the moment. Goethe’s play expressed his feeling that he had been thrown out; his wish that his sibling should be thrown out; his punishing his mother by throwing her dishes out. But on still another level, Goethe probably wanted to get rid of all the dishes, so that he would no longer be fed from them, or be expected to eat from them. His sibling was being nursed, and his play expressed also his own desire to return to an earlier feeding situation that his competitor was now privileged to enjoy, and for which he envied him.

Today many parents would be appalled by such “destructive” behavior. They fear that if permitted to proceed in such a way without being stopped or at least corrected, the little boy will grow up to be uncontrolled, perhaps even destructive and violent. As we know, exactly the opposite was true in Goethe’s case. Fortunately for him, his parents were so convinced that their son would become a very fine person that such an idea did not occur to them. Nor did this idea occur to the neighbors; otherwise they would not have encouraged Goethe’s play, which without this encouragement would not have been such a success. And Goethe, having been able and permitted to act out his annoyance drastically in his own way and with such approval, was also able through these actions actually and symbolically to get rid of his anger to some degree when it was at its height. All this having been done, he could later form a very positive relation to his surviving sibling and of course went on to lead a justly admired life.

The neighbors and the family encouraged Goethe’s “destructive” behavior because they must have felt and understood, on some level, its significance. In fact, they often recalled it with pleasure. In ending his account of this event, Goethe writes: “In recompense for all this broken pottery we had at least a funny story to tell, which amused until they died most especially the neighbors who had incited me.”

As if to emphasize the importance of adult empathy with the play of children, which alone permits it to attain its full positive meanings, Goethe followed this story with a description of the way he and his sister played at the feet of their grandmother, or, when she was ill, by or on her bed, and how important it was to them that she always enjoyed and encouraged their play in a soft, friendly, benign manner.

How likely is it that such an experience could be repeated today? However much we might claim to be concerned with helping our child resolve severe emotional impasses, if it came right down to it, we would probably be just a bit more concerned with the dishes than with the child, and worried that if destructive behavior like that remained uncurbed, it would lead to terrible consequences.

Goethe’s story suggests that in times past, people knew that children need to get things “out of their system,” and that spontaneous play is one of the best ways to do so, although nobody ever talked about it in this manner. Today, the adult peed to “get things out of one’s system” is perhaps commonly accepted, but when children try to do this and get angry—which they often do get, because they are so often frustrated in their attempts to arrange things to their liking, or just do things—they are corrected by adults. Destructive outbursts like Goethe’s do not now meet with an attitude of pleased enjoyment, as was his; with us such destructive play evokes opposite adult attitudes of inner criticism, if not also of open disapproval.

The result is that such events, instead of becoming happy memories enjoyed by children and adults alike all through their lives—forming a strong bond between them because of the child’s feeling of heightened self-esteem and well-being due to the adults‘ approval of his actions—are most likely now to become angry or guilt-laden memories that drive parents and child apart. Today if a child were to throw dishes out of a window deliberately and systematically, such behavior would most likely be rejected and provoke severe criticism, as well as punitive sanctions. The behavior certainly would be stopped long before it had run its full course, more often than not without the adult’s trying to understand the child’s motives. Frustrated in their unconscious intentions and reproached for their actions, our children usually learn to repress whatever feelings cause their destructive impulses and forget the whole incident. But the angry feelings do not go away; they either find an outlet in more devious ways, where their meaning cannot be so readily understood and where the action is so removed from what caused it as to provide little relief, or the anger is repressed and continues to work in full force in the unconscious. In cases of sibling rivalry, to which Goethe abreacted by breaking the dishes, repression may result in a lifelong animosity to the sibling because the childish hatred could not be resolved in an angry reaction. The opposite was true for Goethe, who, having purged his anger at his sibling in one big and oft-remembered act, could develop an excellent relation to him, which was greatly helped because his angry reaction was viewed so positively. It is fairly easy to get over one’s anger when expressing it has such favorable consequences; it is impossible to do so when one has to repress it.

Feeling understood during a very difficult moment in his life added to Goethe’s conviction that even in bad situations, life can still offer compensations. The episode became a shared memory that strengthened the bond between adult and child. If this happened today, the event would either be forgotten or repressed; recalling it would bring only unpleasant memories. Or it would be remembered as an occasion when the child acted foolishly and destructively, which would make the memory damaging to his self- esteem. If he also recalled his parents‘ negative attitude to what he had done, this memory would easily revive the feeling of anger and rejection he had experienced. It certainly would not strengthen his relation with them, but rather weaken it.

I have known many children and adults who suffered deeply because their parents considered their play or some other behavior very foolish. Not knowing any better, they continued to accept their parents‘ evaluation of their actions as correct, although they did so nearly always with considerabl_eresentment. In consequence they thought of themselves as being in part— and in a few extreme cases, quite—foolish persons, but even when they had thus adopted their parents‘ views, the fact that the parents had let their child know of their low opinion of him was always deeply resented. As adults, many of them were ashamed to recall what they had come to consider as their foolish actions when they were children, while others looked back on themselves with an attitude of superiority—how silly they had been! This attitude they assumed in an effort to compensate through the present feeling of superiority for feelings of deep inferiority which their parents‘ view of them had instilled in them.

When they were able to analyze more deeply the meaning of the behavior which had been regarded as foolish by their parents, the analysis revealed how meaningful it had been. Then they recognized with great relief that what they had done had been far from foolish. However, this did not suffice to free them of their feelings of inferiority, which had been caused by the belittling attitudes of their parents. They finally recalled how angry they had been and how deeply hurt they were, not so much because their parents had seriously misunderstood them but because the misunderstanding clearly reflected the low opinion their parents had harbored of their own child.

We ought to assume that whatever a child does, however outlandish or foolish his behavior may seem on superficial observation, he has excellent reasons for engaging in it. If we start out with this assumption, we will search for its meaning, and the more incomprehensible the behavior the more seriously we then search. While we might not quickly or fully understand it on this basis, we are much more likely to do justice to it. This will be of great benefit to our child and will aid our understanding of him. It will greatly improve our relations to each other. By contrast, if the adult’s attitude to significant childish actions is to dismiss them as pranks, or to inhibit or punish the child, then we should not be surprised that adolescents reared in this way consider that nobody over thirty makes sense.

How much have we all lost since Goethe’s time by this shift in attitudes regarding play—children and adults alike!

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