Record of a Friendship

(Ben Green) #1

For some reason I cannot trace, I can't do any psychological work at
all. I am full of energy in my work; I believe more vitally in what I am
doing, and I rejoice to see the result in the children, but I cannot bring
myself to do individual analysis. Is it that you destroyed my saving
Christ attitude? Is it that the O. Reflex gave me a satisfaction that I was
trying to find in assisting others? Or is it that I didn't go far enough
with you? I don't know, Reich, and it all troubles me. On the other
hand I have an intense interest in your wor�, and long to read your
journal in my own language. And the time I had with you has changed
me much. The effect is seen on the school. The atmosphere is happier
because I am happier. I can take decisions easily now, but still can't be
aggressive.
I feel I have let you down; that I am not fighting in the front line for
the new psychology. I have tried to face the question: Is my apathy due
to not really believing in Reich? I think the answer would be: If I didn't
believe in Reich wouldn't I seek the truth in Freud or Jung or Stekel or
Adler or anyone else? I have no interest in any of these gentlemen now.
Whatever the cause, I am not worthy to be the representative in England
of your Veg.-Therapy. Best to expel me from the Society.
Like most people here now I am greatly interested in the Russian war.
Even if U.S.A. stays out I can't see that Hitler has any chance to win,
for even the German army can't keep down 180 million Russians. Look
at their difficulties even in Norway where the people are fighting back.
And what do the five million Germans who voted for Communism in ' 32
or '33 think of this new war?
One feels a desire to live for a thousand years to see what is to come
to pass. I am no longer satisfied with the explanation that it is purely an
economic war for profit and imperialism. The slowness of the masses is
very disheartening ... the army of Japan after all these years of fighting
China should have demanded to know what it was leading to for each
man personally, each man facing destruction, sex starvation, total lack
of creative life. Yet the J aps still follow leaders blindly. How much of
any army is conscious? Soldiers complain, but mainly about the small
things-food or absence of leave, etc. When will all the soldiers of the
world ask the big question: What is all this leading to? For they are
the men who will build the new world. We see now the result of what
we called education, which was mere learning about things that didn't
matter. The education of the emotions was entirely neglected when it
wasn't deliberately repressive. Hence the easiness with which a Hitler
can get his millions of emotionally-starved men to let out their feelings

Free download pdf