The Intrapersonal Realm

The intrapersonal realm is that part of us that is internal. It is what goes on in our minds whether it is conscious or unconscious. Our lives are in large part dominated by what we think and feel and subsequently act out. There is, in effect, a blooming buzzing confusion that is with us every minute. It is in a sense who we are and is so omnipresent as to often escape any form of direct inspection. Why do we seem to warm up to one of two people we just met and not the other? Why might we resent being criticized by a supervisor or cringe at receiving a direct order? Why might feelings of anger be acted on by one individual in a self- and other-destructive manner and not acted on by another person experiencing the same situation? These questions are intended to draw the reader’s attention to much of what we simply take for granted. There is a vast realm of conscious and unconscious process that takes place within us that influences our behavior. The intrapersonal realm amounts to a black box with much going on in it that is at the same time out of awareness.

This realm includes much of what is written about individual psychology, and can become the focal point of therapy if thoughts and feelings grow to be out of bounds thereby introducing personal dysfunction. Individuals starting from infancy may be exposed to life experience that is nurturing or along a range toward less than satisfactorily nurturing, culminating in highly pathological relationships with caretaking others. The degree of dysfunction that lies within this context deeply imprints the infant, child and young adult with a range of self-experience. This experience may be satisfying and secure, thereby promoting self-esteem, or much less so, thereby promoting exceptional personal fragility and hard to tolerate and regulate anxiety-ridden self-experience. These childhood trends are then transferred to some degree into the balance of one’s life experience, thereby making life fulfilling or much less so. These intrapsychic dynamics enter directly into the workplace filling it with hard to understand psychologically defensive tendencies that may make the person an unpredictable employee (Allcorn and Diamond, 1997). Reflection upon oneself and one’s experience within the workplace is very likely all that is needed to validate the importance of intrapsychic dynamics.