Start seeing things you never saw.

Self-deception is common and universal, and the cause of most human tragedies. Of course, the science of self-deception can help us to live better and get more out of life. But it can also cast a murky light on human nature and the human condition, for example, on such exclusively human phenomena as anger, depression, fear, pity, pride, dream making, love making, and god making, not to forget age-old philosophical problems such as selfhood, virtue, happiness, and the good life. Nothing, in the end, could possibly be more important.

◆ Grab your copy now for a new understanding of yourself and others.

Burton provides an excellent explanation of how we use psychological defence mechanisms to protect ourselves from painful truths. —The Psychiatrist

A nuanced examination… Burton’s exploration of self-deception is intellectually appealing, both for readers steeped in psychoanalytic thought and the layperson. An abundance of everyday examples clearly illustrates a range of behaviours, from denial and repression to scapegoating and magical thinking… —The US Review of Books (Recommended)

Burton guides the reader to unlearn, rediscover, and return to wholeness. It is a journey out of Plato’s cave… —The International Review of Books

Burton is never short of an interesting and sharp judgment. —Prof Peter Toohey, Psychology Today

Neel is an incredibly insightful and elegant writer, with a deep knowledge of all he surveys.  —Dr James Davies, medical anthropologist and psychotherapist, author of ‘Cracked’

I’ve read many Neel Burton books. He’s a wonderful writer and able to immerse you lightly in pretty heavy stuff. —Adrian Bailey, Vine Voice

Burton’s writing blends deep knowledge of his subject with lively anecdote and a genuine concern for how we might draw on the insights of psychology and philosophy to live a better life. Highly recommended! —Gareth Southwell, philosopher and writer

About the author

Dr Neel Burton FRSA is a psychiatrist, philosopher, and wine-lover who lives and teaches in Oxford, England. He is a Fellow of Green-Templeton College in the University of Oxford, and the recipient of the Society of Authors’ Richard Asher Prize, the British Medical Association’s Young Authors’ Award, the Medical Journalists’ Association Open Book Award, and a Best in the World Gourmand Award. His work has featured in the likes of Aeon, the Spectator, and the Times, and been translated into several languages.

Contents

Introduction and Overview

Part I: Abstraction

1. Denial
2. Repression
3. Dissociation
4. Intellectualization
5. Rationalization
6. Positive Illusions
7. Depression

Part II: Transformation

8. Displacement
9. Scapegoating
10. Somatization
11. Reaction Formation
12. Stockholm Syndrome
13. Undoing
14. Minimization and Exaggeration
15. Symbolization and Dream Interpretation
16. Reification and the Self
17. Magical Thinking

Part III: Evasion through Fraud or Fantasy

18. Vagueness
19. Inauthenticity
20. Reconstruction of Reality
21. Confabulation
22. Splitting
23. Dehumanization
24. Daydreaming
25. Regression

Part IV: Evasion through People or the World

26. Socialization
27. Garrulousness
28. Dramatization
29. Grandiosity
30. Humour
31. Asceticism
32. Sublimation
33. Altruism
34. Anticipation
35. Fear and Anxiety

Part V: Projection

36. Projection
37. Projective Identification
38. Idealization
39. Devaluation
40. Identification

Final Words

A book on ego defences

Self-deception is common and universal, and the cause of most human tragedies. Of course, the science of self-deception can help us to live better and get more out of life. But it can also cast a murky light on human nature and the human condition, for example, on such exclusively human phenomena as anger, fear, pride, dream making, love making, and god making, not to forget age-old philosophical problems such as selfhood, virtue, happiness, and the good life. Nothing, in the end, could possibly be more important. 

At the same time, I should issue something of a health warning. Some people may find Hide and Seek difficult to read, more so even than the other books in the Ataraxia series. These books, it is true, can be intellectually demanding, but they are above all emotionally challenging, especially to those who have seldom had the opportunity, strength, humility, or misfortune to delve into their deepest thoughts and feelings. All the books in the series can provoke violent reactions, but this one all the more for being about the violent reactions themselves. 

But the effort, greater for some than for others, is certainly worth making. In the words of the philosopher Bertrand Russell: ‘A certain kind of resignation is involved in willingness to face the truth about ourselves; this kind, though it may involve pain in the first moments, affords ultimately a protection—indeed the only possible protection—against the disappointments and disillusionments to which the self-deceiver is liable.’ More than that, by locking herself up in her own head, by losing herself in a labyrinth of her own making, the self-deceiver is, at the same time, missing out on the colours, shades, and nuances of life, missing out on life itself. 

Most of this book’s chapters are constructed around the ego defences recognized by Sigmund Freud and others. I have chosen to discuss self-deception in terms of ego defences because most of the thinking on the subject has been carried out in these terms. This, happily, is just as it should be. In the final analysis, all self-deception can be understood as a means of protecting or enhancing the ego. For example, a man who buys a 10,000 dollar watch instead of a 1,000 dollar one because ‘you can really tell the difference in quality’ is not only hiding his (unrecognized) craving to be loved, but also trying to pass it off as a virtue, namely, a concern for quality. 

The chapters are arranged into five parts, with each part corresponding to a family of ego defences clustered around a basic operation for defusing threats to the ego or the fear and anxiety that arise from those threats. I have called these five basic operations, and so the five parts of the book: abstraction, transformation, evasion through fraud or fantasy, evasion through people or the world, and projection. 

I have not discussed every ego defence ever recognized, but only the most important or interesting ones. In any case, many if not all of the ego defences that I have left out can be understood as subtypes of other, more basic ones that I have, of course, been sure to include. 

Nothing, said Russell, is more fatiguing nor, in the long run, more exasperating than the daily effort to believe things which daily become more incredible. To be done with this effort is an indispensable condition of secure and lasting happiness. 

A University of Oxford psychiatrist examines the psychological underpinnings of self-deception—and how taking action to counter these defence mechanisms can help you see your life, emotions, and abilities in an entirely new light. —BookBub

Purchase now from Amazon or Apple, or go back to the Ataraxia series page.