W.H.R.Rivers

“ Suppression is a process of reaction to the pleasures and pains which are immediately present, and takes no account of the more extended experience with which it is the function of intelligence to deal. ”

“ The memories which disappear in war-neurosis are always of happenings so distressing that the most painful emotions arise when the happenings are recalled. The conclusion to which we are led both by the experience of everyday life and by the analysis of pathological and semi-pathological states is that there is no difference in nature between the forgetting of he [sic] unpleasant experience of ordinary life, often quite trivial in character, and such examples of complete and life-long suppression as those which I have chosen to illustrate the nature of the unconscious. ”

“ If these two kinds of forgetting are essentially alike, if they furnish the two ends of a continuous series, a study of the forgetting of everyday life should provide a means of understanding the suppression which occurs in pathological states. If we attempt such a study the first point which may be noticed is that the active forgetting of everyday life is not voluntary and intentional, but is essentially a process which takes place unwittingly. ”

“ It is suppressed because the interest and meaning are of a kind which arouse pain or discomfort and, if present in consciousness, would set up activities which would be painful or uncomfortable. Active forgetting is thus a protective process or mechanism, one by which consciousness is protected from influences which would interfere with the harmony essential to pleasure or comfort. ”

“ Formerly psychologists were especially concerned with the process by which we remember, but they have gradually been coming to recognise that the more important problem is to discover how and why we forget. ”

“ If we were able to consider rationally the consequences [p. 21] of the lapse, we should find that in most cases the I course which would give us least trouble and inconvenience is the long run would be to keep the appointment or write the letter. ”