Freud to the rescue of post-pandemic neurosis: "We are increasingly hateful people."

During the first wave of the pandemic, psychoanalyst Jamieson Webster worked in the palliative care unit of a New York hospital. She poured those painful experiences, during which many people were unable to say goodbye to their family and friends, into a series of articles that appeared in The New York Review of Books . But she knew there was something more to it. For her, everything that happened began to awaken a series of collective neuroses and a transformation in all of us (and not exactly for the better, despite everything that was said), which led her to write the book. About breathing (Alpha Decay) was published this year in the US (and Spain) and quickly became a hit in his home country . It was more than just self-help; it was a return to Freud and Lacan , among other psychoanalysts, to try to explain what's happening to us. And that's what people want to understand: what's happening to us.

"I think we've repressed our experiences during the pandemic, and there are lessons to be learned from sharing the same atmosphere with almost 9 billion people on this small planet that is our only planet. I don't care what Musk says about Mars or anything else," the psychoanalyst told this newspaper via questionnaire, trying to illustrate why a book full of philosophical reasoning and texts taken from seminars and books on psychoanalysis is so successful.

But there's something else about it, too. It's a book that reads like a hug and an attempt to understand others, much in the vein of Judith Butler , who said, "We cannot truly live without assimilating others." It's a book that seeks to draw attention to the inequality that, she admits, has continued to grow since the pandemic and is turning us into "more shameless and hateful people toward others," reflected in the political triumph of leaders who fuel this type of behavior.

"Inequality has continued to grow since the pandemic, and it's turning us into more shameless and hateful people."

Some may point out that human beings have always been this way—the famous Hobbesian thought that we are wolves to each other—that human beings are predators by nature, but Webster insists that, even if this may be the case, “the pandemic has caused any semblance of sociability to crumble.” In short, we are not holding back, that freedom is ours and no one else's, that there are people offended by everything , bitterness everywhere, and that there is not the slightest interest in reaching a cordial entente. A consequence of all this that she observes in her consultations: “Now we find that we all feel alone, and at the same time, with great social anxiety , as if our ambivalence toward others were the result of this painful tug-of-war (loneliness and anxiety) that is affecting our bodies.”

Breathing and Capitalism

Hence, it's no surprise to him that meditation, yoga, mindfulness, and breathing exercises have become popular since the pandemic. We seek calm in a world that seems to have embarked on a mad dash to who knows where. For Webster, it's obvious that some have truly embarked on it, and it's the rest of us who are left with our tongues hanging out: " The rich are in a brutal race for money before another pandemic, a world war, or an environmental catastrophe breaks out. So, are we in a more realistic world than before the pandemic, or is cynical the most appropriate term to describe it?" he asks rhetorically.

Because in this race, even this search for calm is profitable. Capitalism, once again, devastates everything. Some companies offer retreats to their employees (after exploiting them to keep the wheels turning); the publishing industry, which is on the lookout like few others, has seen the panacea in books on mindfulness and breathing—there's yours—and videos, podcasts, and apps for breathing better have also appeared...

Webster, who doesn't believe the pursuit of feeling better is a hoax (on the contrary, she's been practicing yoga for decades and wouldn't give it up for anything), finds all this even a little funny, and she once again taps into the cynicism that, she believes, pervades our contemporary world. There's something tacky hippie about all this, too.

“We seem to think that if we can breathe properly—that is, freely, consciously, and meditatively—we will become better people and a better civilization. It's a nice idea, but I don't think that's what will make us better people. Furthermore, at the same time, there are people making tons of money from breathing apps, even though only a small percentage of people in this world breathe air quality that meets WHO standards, and nine million people die each year related to air pollution.” Yes, we need to calm down, and someone is going to make money off of it while someone else is suffocating.

Freud to the rescue

She found the answer to this confusion many years ago in psychoanalysis . She's dedicated to it, many people have consulted in her office, and she's clear that Freud hit the nail on the head over a century ago. It even helps explain our current neuroses about social media, technological dependence, and artificial intelligence.

“Freud would later discover that an excessive dependence on sight is highly prevalent in neurosis, with its extreme impulses to look, spy, and monitor, or its reverse: to exhibit, boast, show off, and act,” Webster writes. We forget the power of smell, we focus on the eyes, and Instagram and TikTok reap their share of the spoils, even though society is heading toward derangement as a result.

Psychoanalysis, she recalls, consists of “saying whatever comes to mind,” and that, according to her, is what we most need to break out of the quagmire of images, of FOMO —that anxiety about not missing out on everything that's happening—of feeling left out in that race for the rich. In her New York practice, Freud is back in fashion (if it ever left). “I think psychoanalysis has entered this contemporary void and is capable of helping us talk about irrationality in a way that psychotropic drugs, behavioral therapy, or other overly individualistic therapies can't . People seem to be interested in psychoanalysis again and have a great need for it. I'm sure it will be forgotten at some point, but now it's back in people's minds,” she maintains.

She's aware that these theories have also had their share of challenges. Freud has been criticized for his misogyny and conservative positions. However, Webster doesn't find much support there. "For me, the world is violently misogynistic, but when I read Freud and Lacan , that wasn't the feeling I got. They are, as Juliet Mitchell says, descriptive, not prescriptive. And they created many currents of feminism. I also read a seminar in which Lacan talks about increasing segregation, a takeover of life by technological devices, and a malaise due to our power of destruction, not only of one another but also of the natural world. That was in 1968. I imagine you can see why their thinking is interesting today," she emphasizes.

"Lacan already speaks of a takeover of life by technological devices and a malaise due to our power of destruction."

And if psychoanalysis has been brought back to the table, it's because language has also been brought up. The way we express ourselves. How we do it, in what context, and to whom. And listening. Or not listening. In the book, he also dwells on the growing lack of attention to others, although he also acknowledges that listening has never been easy. Is it true that we used to listen better to others? Maybe we didn't do it much either. "Listening is difficult and strange. Listening to what. Sometimes I think I went to school for more than 15 years to learn how to listen, and I'm still trying. If you're right that we're realizing we don't listen because the internet is a Tower of Babel, maybe we can get somewhere new? Maybe, but maybe we'll end up talking to AI and not to each other, " he speculates. A risk that isn't entirely impossible.

In the questionnaire I sent to Webster, I pointed out that shortly after the lockdown, I interviewed the philosopher Simon Critchley, with whom she wrote a book—and she confesses that he is now her ex-husband, but they maintain a good relationship —and who told me that the worst thing about the pandemic was that we knew it was going to happen sooner or later. He also said that he believed we should all emerge from this experience with greater humility toward each other, toward the planet… And also that the time had come to think carefully . I tell Webster that her ex's wishes haven't been fulfilled much five years later…

"We're in a time of reevaluating life, and I hope we find something more sustainable that offers more breathing room."

“I was right: now is the time to think carefully. But unfortunately, those in power did think very carefully about how to grab as much of it as possible. The rest of us don't know. And yes, we're in a moment of reevaluating life , and I hope we find something more sustainable that offers more breathing room,” he concludes.

I'll ask him again in five years.