Negative capability

How to unleash creativity, intuition, and political transformation. Forget memory. Kill desire. Seize the moment to unleash creativity, intuition, and transformative psychic growth. Paul Tritschler, who teaches psychology at Lowestoft Sixth Form College in Suffolk, explains the concept of negative capability. "Within the therapeutic context, negative capability required the individual to develop a radically different concept of self. Most analysts had their clients search for the self in ever-deeper layers of memory and desire. But Bion believed that negative capability – the ability to let go of these things entirely – enabled even greater self-knowledge and success. On one level, negative capability would help us to manage the emotional challenges associated with uncertainty. On another level, it could reveal the unconscious as a reservoir of possibility and hope. That reservoir would be a fount of intuition and creativity – a link supported by a growing body of research evidence."