“A bent tree will never grow straight,” Wilhelm Reich once declared. The radical psychotherapist was referring to children, not to oaks or maples, and the metaphor signaled his lifelong commitment to resolving unhappiness before it has a chance to fester in the psyche. To this end, Reich split off from conventional psychology/psychiatry’s obsession with pathology—one that continues to this day—and worked instead to formulate a model of healthy development. Likewise he believed that the only real and lasting solution to mass sociological problems is the prevention of neuroses, not the individual treatment of neurotic symptoms.
The cornerstone of Reich’s model was “self-regulation,” the idea that if a child’s needs for nurturing, love and affirmation are met consistently and unconditionally early in life, then that child will automatically grow in the ability to regulate his or her own impulses and needs later on. Children are naturally equipped for autonomy and self-direction, Reich was convinced—unless, that is, they have to “armor” themselves against a hostile, anti-life environment.
“Armoring” was another key term in Reich’s lexicon. It describes the protective tendency to shrink away from conditions of trauma, abuse, or emotional deprivation. Reich discovered that the muscles in the body contract when a person feels repeatedly threatened, forming, in effect, a kind of protective armor.
To illustrate, he used the analogy of the amoeba, which in its undisturbed state is highly fluid and expands and contracts in a natural pulsation. When the amoeba is pricked by a pin, however, it immediately withdraws from the painful stimulus. Its movements become restricted and mobility is replaced by rigidity. After a period of time, the amoeba will slowly return to its former state of pulsation; but if the environment continues to subject the amoeba to harm, eventually the contracted state of withdrawal will remain permanent—the condition that Reich called armoring.
The implications of self-regulation and armoring for education are many, and they led Reich in the late 1930s to forge a twenty-year collaboration with Summerhill School founder A.S. Neill. In turn, the work of both men had a significant influence on the educational liberation movement of the1960s and ‘70s. With Reich’s encouragement, Neill fashioned Summerhill into a self-governing sanctuary in which children could gradually shed their armor and recover the confidence and the self-awareness they would need to make the affirmative day-to-day choices that are the stuff of distinctive, purposeful lives.
Perhaps it could be said that Summerhill went on to prove Reich wrong. Perhaps children who have been bent by a world filled with pricking pins can learn to regulate themselves and live responsibly in the company of others. I, for one, would like to think so.
And considering the following quote from Reich’s book Children of the Future I suspect that he would think so too: “We cannot tell our children what kind of world they will or should build. But we can equip them with the kind of character structure and biological vigor that will enable them to make their own decisions, to find their own ways, to build their own future and that of their children, in a rational manner.”
Chris Mercogliano has been a teacher at the Free School in Albany, New York, since 1973, working with children from ages two to fourteen. In 1987 he was named co-director. An environmental activist, he has recently been appointed to the mayor’s advisory committee on recycling and waste reduction. He is also an essayist, poet, organic farmer, mason, plumber, and journeyman carpenter. He is the author of Making It Up As We Go Along, a book about his experiences at the Free School over the past twenty years.
Photo by Jack Delano. Child of an FSA – R.R. borrower? in front of their house, Puerto Rico, Dec 1941 or Jan 1942. (LOC)