Management of Measurement Constructs

The Dispersion of Primary Freudian Concepts

We know that Freud postulated three personality components: the Ego (Latin for “I”), that which emerges in development to handle transactions with the environment, locating situations to fulfill needs, specifically id-orientated needs (the Sun-Moon blend and the need structures of the planets as behavioral symbols); the Superego (Latin for “above the I” or “Higher I”, the restraints and cautions developed in the personality through identification with the parents, the conscience (Saturn, principally); and the Id (Latin for “it”), the primitive core in every person, the domain of basic drives that seek immediate gratification, predominantly sexual in orientation.

The flow of personal behavior basically begins with Id energy and its pressure toward fulfillment, seeking the channel of least resistance to expression. This Id impulse is then modified, adjusted, censored by the Superego to meet the specifications of society, to improve the chances of expression within the Ego’s self-presentation to the world.

Now, while Saturn is the archetype of the Superego, I maintain that the thought constructs of the Id and Superego are distributed among all of our behavioral faculties; not one of them is exempt from the life-energy of the Id AND the socially inculcated restrictions of the Superego. All of our behavioral faculties, over time, within experience, take on restrictions; when Saturn is directly involved it can be extreme; Saturn’s voice is heard one way or another, to one degree or another, throughout our life system. –Saturn is time; time contains and necessarily controlling mechanisms.

For example: Mercury, how we need to think in order to be maximally efficient.: our mind desperately needs to think in the way that is best for us and only us. Direct expression of this through the Ego would be optimally selfish and disruptive to socialization. Its condition within us is adjusted (intensified or ameliorated) by aspects: Neptune will camouflage/suppress/redirect it; Mars, Uranus, and/or Pluto will drive it intensely forward toward fulfillment, gratification; Jupiter will suggest overindulgence of it. Saturn will curtail it directly to what is correct or depress it until a wiser option appears.

Every behavior, with its indigenous Id content is going to relate to every other behavior with its indigenous Superego content, i.e., the “rules of the game” internalized and routined throughout development. The aspects involved illuminate this process.

For Venus: it is clear how our primal need to relate could be completely disruptive (get out of hand en route to egocentric fulfillment) to the ways of socialization, cooperation, relationship; it needs modification to be efficient. Saturn will slow it down, modify it, as the most direct action of the Superego. And the other planets with their internalized disciplines will be working on our Venus to keep things homogeneously acceptable and effective … All the while, all these behaviors will be serving the reigning need of the Moon, energized by the Sun.

The clearest “feel” of the Superego action upon Id energy is the relation between Saturn and Mars. We can easily say, “Thank God for Saturn”, or else the Mars component would ravage the individual’s world for Ego gratification. And even if there is no aspect contact between Saturn and Mars, we see the Superego principle within all planets operating on every other planet, the interaction of behavioral faculties. –For example, my Mars (high in equanimity, in Libra) influences in an equanimical way the highly charged opposition of Pluto and Mercury, squaring that opposition axis. Even this Pluto learns through experience to “say” to Mercury (and to Mars), “know your limits and that will bring busyness and success through your perceptions and communications; if you don’t, there will be disruption and trouble!” Even Mercury, in awareness of Pluto, is forced to figure out how far the driving energy and perceptions will go: “What is the best perspective for me overall?” And, of course this reservoir of energy serves my Capricorn-fueled Moon in Leo.

Now, there can be curves in the developmental path; detours on the tracks: overstated Superego considerations, for example, working on Mars, turning applied energy into overt or hidden anger, ravaging the system, spilling over into the balance of other behavioral faculties.

Caution –the Superego function—can easily be internalized as repression.
The cautions take on the dimension of, are converted into fear. “Nice girls don’t date and don’t forget it!” turns eventually into a fear of relationships.

There are fears that are hidden, there are fears that are wide-open. All fears beyond the primal (fears of the dark, of fire, etc., which are normally quite up-front, open) register primarily through Saturn, the arch significator of the Superego principle.

Often within the persona, there can be what is technically called polymorphous anxiety, anxiety in a generalized form that is hard to pin down (like hypochondria), where a specific deep fear is a bit too much to manage openly so it is dispersed (diluted) into generality. It is hard to get a handle on what is bothersome, etc. Saturn introduces symbolically the concept of threat, deprivation, and loss potential. For example, I have a pronounced fear of the ocean, of what is unknown below the surface, what is too deep for me to comprehend –even though I am a highly skilled and experienced swimmer– and I KNOW this is a registration of Saturn and Neptune in opposition in my horoscope.

NOW: This deep, really self-protecting fear could also signify a deep parental relational trauma. This trauma could even have been so horrendous as, say, my mother threatening to drown me if I didn’t comply behaviorally about something or other, or stories told to me punitively about attempts to abort me, i.e., “you should never have been born”.

The anxieties out of the primal fear could have developed to the point that I could not handle them easily; something else would have to help dissipate the anxiety, just as multiple-personality disorders help manage deep trauma not acceptable to the prime identity. I would become phobic, neurotically averse to, say, relationships, with my Saturn ruling the 7th, with the base opposition axis being in my parental axis, Neptune ruling the 10th. The fear of the ocean, of being killed before birth, of being drowned punitively by mother, Nature, God, etc., say, could be used in phobic manifestation, DISPLACING (camouflaging, substituting for) the parental relational trauma carried forward into my adult life.

This is not the case with me, but how many thousands of cases have I seen where the fear of intimacy has an anxiety routing within a similar astrological guideline network!?, where a base fear is converted into a substitute outlet??!!

But we must remember that each behavioral faculty, each need construct learns quickly certain Superego modifications through Saturn directly, through society generally, through experience to one degree or another that are basically designed to improve efficiency of expression.

However, sometimes these dynamic interrelationships are seriously, dysfunctionally out of balance. The “too much” causes trouble. Sometimes others –parents, spouse, political leaders, spiritual leaders– enter our system for their own benefits. Our personal development is detoured into gratification channels for others. We are sacrificed, and the Id content of our entire being resents it deeply.

What can be done? Instinctively we want to fight back, but the repression is too great. We internalize … sometimes with anger so powerfully inner directed it leads to self-destruction. We overcompensate by rewarding ourselves with excess indulgence and destroy other parts of our system. We withdraw and depress our Selves. We suffer directly physically, mentally, spiritually. We become obstreperous, dysfunctional among others. Eventually, we become alone, that state that is completely contrary to the natural thrust of life: to relate, to be fruitful and multiply.

Indeed, this overview appears extreme and dramatic, but it is valid and it is real. And there are complementary and diversified views that issue practicably from this Freudian keystone. This overview alerts us to the extraordinary dimensionality of our symbolisms and again polishes the lucid life lens of analytical astrology.