Have you ever found yourself arguing with your partner over and over again? Maybe you’ve had the same recurring argument with multiple romantic partners.
Why does this keep happening?
One possibility is projective identification. You may be familiar with Sigmund Freud’s psychological concept of “projection,” where people attribute things about themselves to someone else. For example, a narcissist might accuse others of being self-centered while failing to see it in themselves.
Psychologist and couples therapist Polly Young Eisendrath says projective identification takes this process a big step further, by projecting the projected traits into the other person. She takes a deep dive into projective identification in her latest book, Love Among Equals: Relationship as a Spiritual Path, which we discussed on the Think Act Be podcast.
I often find projective identification a bit difficult to understand, so let me give you an example. Let’s say you have a somewhat conflicted relationship with your father. Today, you and your father had a conversation, and he asked you to change your vacation plans to spend more time with your family of origin.
When you tell your partner about your father’s request, he gets upset and says that your father is “manly.” You don’t know why your partner is always criticizing your father, and you feel upset. A long argument ensues, ending in tears and hurt.
What happened? There are many possible explanations, many of which don’t involve projective identification. But if it is a factor, your unrecognized frustrations with your father have influenced your partner (unconsciously) to feel and express those frustrations.
So, your feelings about your parent have been projected onto your partner, who identifies with and expresses those feelings.
According to theorists in this field, almost all relationships have at least some degree of projective identification, and this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. We can project positive things onto our partners, which can be part of why we find them so attractive.
Where do our projections come from?
As with many concepts developed by Freud and his followers, projective identification is thought to have its roots in our past. “You begin to experience your partner the way you experienced your mother or your father or your older sibling, the way you experienced something when you were a helpless little child over which you had no control,” Young-Eisendrath said.
People often find themselves drawn to partners who resemble their childhood caregivers—usually a parent. For example, a person might choose partners who are as controlling and unpredictable as their mother. While it’s possible that a person continues to choose partners who are similar to their mother, it’s also possible that they project their childhood experiences onto each new partner. “Another way to think about it is that each person is running an internal stage, and the other person doesn’t know the play,” Young-Eisendrath said. “But the director directs in such a way that he or she gets results that prove to the director that the other person is playing that role, and thinking and feeling that way.”
As a result, each person finds evidence that their partner is being assigned the role they’ve been assigned—but it’s a self-fulfilling process. It often works both ways, Young-Eisendrath explains, with each partner projecting their fears, beliefs, and history onto the other.
One cautionary note: Not every instance of marital conflict, recurring arguments, and so on can be attributed to projective identification. Taken to an extreme, one might blame the abusive partner for “bringing up” the abuse. That would be a misapplied concept, in my opinion.
How to Recognize Projective Identification
Projective identification is often difficult to spot because it happens unconsciously—you don’t realize you’re projecting, and your partner doesn’t know they’re identifying with it. So we have to look for clues that might point to it.
You’re stuck in a vicious cycle. “One symptom is recurring conflict,” Young-Eisendrath says, “where people keep saying the same things, and things never seem to move forward.” She notes that these arguments can be mistaken for direct “communication problems,” when in fact the problem may be an unconscious emotional process. “The problem of projective identification is the only problem that couples have over time if they are otherwise healthy, intelligent, and engaged individuals in general,” she says.
You’re upset. Another sign is feeling upset with your partner, and you may not even know why. On a superficial level, it may not be clear why you’re feeling angry, hurt, resentful, or other painful emotions, but you can’t shake the feeling that your partner mistreated you. You may also be surprised by the intensity of your feelings in response to a minor insult from your partner. For example, they haven’t responded to your text for two hours, and you feel like your world is falling apart. These seemingly “overblown” reactions can indicate that things from earlier in your life are resurfacing.
You’re confused. Confusion is another common sign of projective identification. You may feel confused by your partner’s reactions to you, or by your reactions. You may wonder and worry about the frequent arguments you have, even though you care about each other. And as we suggested above, you may be puzzled by how quickly things can escalate between you and your partner, at the slightest provocation.
How to Deal with Projective Identification
Fortunately, there are effective ways to deal with projective identification so that it doesn’t color every interaction you have with your partner.
- Recognize it. The first step, of course, is to become aware that it’s happening, using the signs we discussed above as clues.
- Be curious. Be curious about your interactions with your partner. What deeper dynamics might you have missed? What elements from your past are likely playing out in your current relationship?
- Slow down. “The only way out of this is to deconstruct the whole thing and slow it down,” Young-Eisendrath said. By slowing down, we’re more likely to interrupt the automatic, self-defeating patterns in our relationship and gain space to observe what’s going on.
- Practice mindfulness. Young-Eisendrath describes mindfulness as “the skill of being able to bring focus and balance to your perceptions and experiences.” With mindfulness, you can observe yourself and your partner more clearly, with openness and curiosity.
- Check your understanding. Paraphrasing what your partner is saying helps you slow down, engaging “more prefrontal cortex and less limbic activity,” according to Young-Eisendrath. It also gives you a chance to see if you’ve heard the other person. “When you’re in a state of projective identification, you’ll be shocked at how little you’ve heard,” she says. It’s hard to hear someone else “when your mind is rehearsing what you wanted to say or the ways you’ve been hurt—it’s like your ears are plugged.”
Consider therapy. Some couples may find that working with a therapist can be very helpful in working through their conflicts, communication, and projective identification. It can be very helpful, Young-Eisendrath notes, to have a neutral third party “witness what you’re doing.” If you suspect that projective identification has played a big role in your romantic relationship, don’t despair—there’s good reason for hope. “If they can resolve the projective identification, they can resolve all these other issues—parenting, finances, sex, negotiating free time, household decisions,” Young-Eisendrath says. “If they can resolve that one thing, they can trust each other to resolve the other things.”
