208 THE INDIVIDUAL PSYCHOLOGY OF ALFRED ADLER
PSYCHOLOGY OF USE 209
just as inherited physical properties, may represent allurements toward a certain form
of response. To establish his relationship to the problems of the outside world and to
mold these relationships in accordance with his style of life is the achievement of the
child, the "father of the man." in a moving, changing world. Some understanding of
this fact is to be found among authors who attribute all outcomes, particularly all
failures, to environment and education. None of them, however, has asserted, let alone
demonstrated, that sameness in environment and education could create absolute
"equality." Environmental influences, the example of the attitude of relatives, and
educational factors act only as allurements for the individual child which he takes
up in accordance with or against the intention of the educator, and this in a thousand
varieties.
These indisputable facts frequently cause the following ambiguous play. Whatever
cannot be evaluated as environmental influence is evaluated as hereditary influence,
while whatever cannot be referred to obscure hereditary factors, is attributed to
environment. One thing, however, is certain. Hereditary and environmental factors are
directed by the child, fumbling and groping around in the dark, as it were, toward pos-
sibilities of success, toward the successful solution of his problems. Naturally when
examined with a maturer knowledge, they very frequently cannot [properly] be
regarded as possibilities of success. I have pointed out previously that success may mean
to some individuals the suppression of the weak, to some the leaning on others, and to
some the elimination of important problems of life when these seem to portend
possibilities of defeat. We can understand such interpretations of success, although of
course we do not approve of them.
No experience is a cause of success or failure. We do not suffer from the shock of
our experiences—the so-called trauma—but we make out of them just what suits our
purposes. We are self-determined by the meaning we give to our experiences, and
there is probably always something of a mistake involved when we take particular
experiences as the basis for our future life. Meanings are not determined by situations,
but we determine ourselves by the meanings we give to situations.
In drawing a comparison [between the neurotic and] the healthy-psyche, it seemed
at first, as it would to anyone, that particular experiences or fantasies in childhood
give rise to the development of the neurosis. Indeed the first psychoanalytic
investigations, especially of Freud and Breuer, emphasized that the traumatic
influence of a sexual experience, with its direct and indirect consequences of
repression and
1. PERCEPTION AND HALLUCINATION 4
displacement, played the most important role among the causes of the neurosis. Yet the
sexual and other childhood impressions which are brought to light by the examination
of the neurotic do not differ particularly in degree or extent from the normal.
Sometimes one finds more of them, sometimes less, but always an amount which is
also reached by healthy individuals.
Unhappy experiences in childhood may be given quite opposite meanings. One man
with unhappy experiences behind him will not dwell on them except as they show him
something which can be remedied for the future. He will feel, "We must work to
remove such unfortunate situations and make sure that our children are better
placed." Another man will feel, "Life is unfair. Other people always have the best of
it. If the world treated me like that, why should I treat the world any better?" It is in
this way that some parents say of their children, "I had to suffer just as much when I
was a child, and I came through it. Why shouldn't they?" A third man will feel,
"Everything should be forgiven me because of my unhappy childhood." In the actions
of all three men, their interpretations will be evident. They will never change their
actions unless they change their interpretations. It is here that Individual Psychology
breaks through the theory of determinism.
It is not the child's experiences which dictate his actions; it is the conclusions which
he draws from his experiences. When we inquire into the story of a problem child, we
see difficulties in the relation between himself and his mother. We can, however, see
the same difficulties among other children, but they have answered them in a better
way. This brings us back to the fundamental view of Individual Psychology: There are
no reasons for the development of character; rather, a child can make use of experiences
for his goal and turn them into reasons. We cannot say, for example, that if a child is
badly nourished he will become a criminal. We must see what conclusion the child has
drawn [from this experience].
B. Cognitive Processes
a. Perception. According to an expression of Charcot which refers to scientific
research, one always finds only that which one knows. This ob-