On falling in love and creativity

This paper discusses the ego functioning and self psychological aspects of falling in love and passionate love. These universal and extraordinary phenomena are conceptualized as representing the activity of the creative imagination in solving problems related to coping with intense narcissistic and libidinal pressures. The work of other authors is reviewed and recast into a metapsychological framework involving ego and superego contributions to the experience, and focused on self cohesion. An illustrative clinical psychotherapy case is presented in an effort to understand what has traditionally appeared to be a mysterious and disjunctive life experience, and to explore the creative surge that can be generated by falling in love both in and out of the transference.