Inner Drama


  • Photographer
    Tom Dobrzanski
  • Prize
    Honorable Mention
  • Date of Photograph
    23/02/2011

I had a nearly fatal motorcycle accident. That accident caused a traumatic injury in my brain. Such injury changes you and your perspective on life and relationships. To overcome such a change, I was required to attend cognitive therapy. This therapy simply reverts your thought patterns to a state prior to the accident. I was exposed to a condition termed ‘archetypes’. Each and everyone of us has subparts, archetypes of our personality just like a “father figure”, “mother figure” etc. All are combined into one human being and are having arguments, which can be experienced in our behavior.

Story

The idea for this project came to me a short time after my nearly fatal motorcycle accident. That accident caused a traumatic injury in my brain. Such injury changes you and your perspective on life and relationships. To overcome such a change, I was required to attend cognitive therapy. This therapy simply reverts your thought patterns to a state prior to the accident. I was exposed to a condition termed ‘archetypes’. Each and everyone of us has subparts of our personality just like a “father figure”, “mother figure”, “being angry”, “being a child”. All are combined into one human being. Most of our archetypes are having inner discussions on whether we need to make a decision (‘I really want to buy it’ – the ‘needing’ archetype states a position; ‘You don’t really need it and its too expensive’ – the reasoning archetype responds). We cannot see an archetype directly, but we can experience its function in our own and others' behavior. After the accident, most of my archetypes were angry and trying to belittle and undermine me. I knew myself well enough to be aware that such angry, disappointing trains of thought were not normal, nor did I want to accept them. Cognitive therapy explained clearly that such archetypes were more exposed; and my “regular” trains of thought (which usually subdued them), was now derailed and didn’t have enough strength to get back on track by itself. I should have accepted the situation rather than engage and fight it. At the very beginning, I was trying to fight it! My antagonistic archetype was very strong! However, most of the time, I seemed like I was losing a battle as there was too many of the negative archetypes trying to undermine my decisions. Finally, after a long, on- going battle with too many losses and not enough wins, I gave up. My decision was a breaking point in my battle. Negative archetypes started to take over. It seemed like I lost control over myself. I don’t remember what brought me back. Whether it was a great love for Mel (my wife) or whether it was one of my archetypes trying to put the train of thoughts back on track. I started to accept that negative feelings, emotions will always be a part of my life. It is just the way I managed it that really mattered. This clear idea started to grow with my therapy, which eventually helped me to accept; to stop fighting and focus. My negative archetypes still exist but are now subdued with my “regular” thought processes. I call this photographic project “Inner Drama”

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