What then about the potential impact of psychotherapy on the armor—can therapy at least expand the armor. Here is what Reich (1972, p. 48) declares:
In the analysis, the neurotic character traits as a whole prove to be a compact defense mechanism against our therapeutic efforts, and when we trace the origin of this character “armor” analytically, we see that it also has a definite economic function. Such armor serves on the one hand as a defense against external stimuli; on the other hand it proves to be a means of gaining mastery over the libido, which is continuously pushing forward from the id, because libidinal and sadistic energy is used up in the neurotic reaction formations, compensations, etc. Anxiety is continually being bound in the processes which are at the bottom of the formation and preservation of this armor in the same way that, according to Freud’s description, anxiety is bound in the compulsive symptoms.
Thus, it seems that therapy can have only a limited impact—for the libido (and primitive impulses) are not going away meaning that one must remain on guard with armor fully in place.
Reich (1972, pp. 167-168) has this final statement to make about the matter of trait and state:
Summing up, we can also say that the neurotic character, both in its contents and in its form, is made up entirely of compromises., just as the symptom is. It contains the infantile instinctual demand and the defense, which belongs to the same or different states of development. The basic infantile conflict continues to exist. transformed into attitudes which emerge in a definite form, as automatic modes of reaction which have become chronic and from which, later, they have to be distilled through analysis.
By virtue of this insight into a phase of human development, we are in a position to answer a question raised by Freud: are repressed elements retained as double entries, as memory traces, otherwise? We may now cautiously conclude that those elements of infantile experience which are not worked into the character are retained as emotionally charge memory traces; whereas those elements which are absorbed into and made a part of the character are retained as the contemporary mode of reaction.
With this conclusion, we are inclined to consider Reich’s character armor to be bound up in a highly resistant psychic formation. It is a trait that contains childhood memories and fears that are never forgotten or resolved. It is a trait that requires constant vigilance against powerful, ever-present instinctual drives and impulses. It contains armament that might expand or contact but is always present. The Tin Man remains unmoved—until Dorothy and the Scarecrow show up. Can contemporary Tin Men and Tin Women look forward to a liberating Dorothy or Scarecrow? Is there a squirt of oil and liberation of the heart to be found in the future of these rigidified men and women of the mid-21st Century/ That is the fundamental question to be addressed in this essay.
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