A-void--an exploration of defences against sensing nothingness

The author describes the potentially annihilating terror implicit in the experience of contact with the void--the 'domain of the non-existent' or nothingness, conceived as an immensely hostile object, terrifying space or a place of 'nameless dread'. All manifestations of existence are threatened by contact with the void, necessitating the deployment of a variety of defences. These various defences--universally employed to avoid contact with this domain--are then discussed. These include trying to search for a fixed sense of identity that can often propel people to seek refuge inside an object or state of mind, as described in Meltzer's 'claustrum' and Steiner's 'psychic retreat'. Other defences, including distraction and grandiosity, are also described. The author then goes on to discuss techniques for helping patients to tolerate contact with mental states engendered by the threat of potential contact with the void, in order to strengthen their capacity to feel and thus enlarge their repertoire of coping with anxiety in a non-reactive and thus growth-inducing manner. This involves discussion about psychoanalytically informed Buddhist understanding of these states and the nature of identity itself, as well as the correlation between these insights and those offered by Bion and other psychoanalytic writers.