I guess a lot of you have some day heard of Sigmund Freud. If somebody doesn’t I will tell you.
Sigmund Freud (6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and founder of psychoanalysis. One part of it is that our psyche is divided in three parts that he calls Id, ego and super-ego. I would like to talk today in a quick overview about these three parts.
Id
The id is the part of our psyche that we are all born with. The id contains all biological drives like for example survival or reproduction as well as learned impulses in process of life. These can be separated in two kinds.
Constructive: Sexual impulses (this also includes everything pleasant) and basic energy of life
Destructive: Aggression, destruction, death
Freud claims that all drives and impulses are occupied with energy otherwise they couldn’t be succeeded. The id only carries about itself and how to satisfy those needs. There are no moral or any other thoughts.
Super-ego
The behavior of a baby is formed by its environmental influences which at the beginning mainly comes from its parents. An infant will try to adapt because it wants to be accepted by other people. However, it is important to pride the child when doing something right.
So, the super-ego arises through acceptance of orders, prohibitions and the so-called moral in a society.
It becomes a main part of a person’s psyche and is jointly responsible for preserving self-esteem.
Ego
The ego evolves between the both instances mentioned before. It conciliates between the demands of the id and the orders and prohibitions of the super-ego. The ego thinks, it’s rational whereas the id feels, being emotional.
As an individual has to cope in reality the intellect of a person is being evolved in its ego.
In the following picture, you can see how the three parts of personality are working.
I hope you enjoyed this short overview. Thanks for reading :)
References
BIRKENBIHL, Vera F.: Kommunikationstraining: Zwischenmenschliche Beziehungen erfolgreich gestalten, 37. Auflage 2017
"Siegmund Freud", https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmund_Freud, 10 January 2018