About this episode

Dr. David Puder and his cohort explore reflective function in Steinbeck's East of Eden, discussing how it collapses under emotional distress and its implications for personality health.

In this episode, Dr. David Puder and his psychodynamic psychotherapy training cohort apply reflective function (RF) and mentalization concepts to John Steinbeck's masterpiece East of Eden. They examine how Reflective Function collapses under shame, rejection, threat, and attachment arousal across key characters. The discussion highlights that true personality health is not the absence of aggression, dependency, or guilt but the growing capacity to recognize conflicting self-parts, stay in contact with reality, and remain related to imperfect people. Link to blog Link to YouTube video

People in this episode

Host: David Puder

Topics covered

• psychodynamic therapy
• reflective function
• mentalization
• shame
• attachment
• personality health

Keywords

• psychodynamic therapy
• reflective function
• East of Eden
• John Steinbeck
• mentalization
• shame
• attachment

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: East of Eden

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