What to Do If You Do Not Have Whole “Object Relations” and “Object Constancy”

• What are “Whole Object Relations” and “Object Constancy”?

For those unfamiliar with these two psychological concepts, some brief definitions:

Whole Object Relations (WOR): This is the capacity to integrate the liked and disliked parts of a person into a single, realistic, stable picture—as opposed to alternating between seeing the person as either all-good or all-bad.

Object Constancy (OC): This is the ability to maintain your positive emotional tie to someone while you are feeling angry, frustrated, hurt or disappointed with the person.

These are both normal developmental achievements that are generally developed during the course of childhood when the child is raised by parents who themselves have these abilities.

Not everybody is raised in a family situation that models these behaviors sufficiently to help the child attain them.

• How to get WOR & OC later in life

I would start with two simple exercises that you can practice every day. The goal is to train your brain and make new neuronal connections. The good news is that your brain already comes prewired with the capacity to learn this.

So, despite the fact that whole object relations and object constancy are normally learned in childhood, people can develop this capacity at any age with a bit of creativity and diligent practice.

Here are two exercises that I developed to help my clients. You will need to record your efforts in either a notebook or an online folder that you save.

• Exercise 1—Remember the Positives

Step 1—Write down the things that you like

Every time you meet a new person that you like, write down a very detailed description of each thing that you like or admire about the person.

Step 2—Notice when you start disliking them

This requires paying attention to your internal feelings and emotions and accepting that something internal has changed—not the other person.

Step 3—Get out your list of positives

Read your detailed positive descriptions and visualize how the person looked, sounded, and behaved in each of these situations.

Step 4— Notice any shifts in feeling

Your goal here is to shift your feelings about this person back in a positive direction. As you practice this, it will get easier.

• Exercise 2—See the Negatives

Whole Object Relations involves seeing the other person (or yourself) as a realistic mix of liked and disliked, good and bad traits. No one is all-good. The goal of this exercise is to learn to see and tolerate a person’s flaws without seeing them as all-bad.

Step 1—Choose someone that you like and admire

Write down in detail what you like and admire about this person, including specific examples of the times when you saw them demonstrate these qualities.

Step 2—Find some flaws

Everyone has flaws. Find a few minor flaws that this person has that you usually ignore or rationalize away.

Step 3—Notice how “seeing” these flaws affects your view of the person

Do you move from seeing these few flaws to shifting your whole perception to all-bad? Can you hold on to your good image of the person?

Step 4—Reread why you like them

Your goal here is to train yourself to hold onto your basically positive feelings at the same time as you acknowledge the person’s flaws.

Punchline: You can develop whole Object Relations and Object Constancy through practice. The more often you practice, the quicker you will learn. Ideally you will do these exercises on a daily basis. This is similar to learning to play a musical instrument or speak a foriegn language. You will need to be as patient and diligent about practicing as you would if you wanted to learn Italian or how to play the piano.

A2A

Elinor Greenberg, PhD, CGP

In private practice in NYC and the author of the book: Borderline, Narcissistic, and Schizoid Adaptations: The Pursuit of Love, Admiration, and Safety.

www.elinorgreenberg.com