An Antidote

“Dueling banjos open the stock exchange/ paper chasing, hard to stay on the same page”

--Billy Woods, “Versailles”Aethiopes, 2022

Chicago might be celebrating the lowest summer murder rate (122) in over 60 years, and we’ve apparently just opened out first AI school with no teachers, but our culture’s efforts for self-improvement could end up ending humanity by 2030. 

According toThe Guardian:

“’AI developers believe their technology could cause human extinction (or similarly bad outcomes),’ wrote [Samuel] Marks. ‘This could happen in the next few years…’ Sam Altman, chief executive of Anthropic’s rival OpenAI, said last year that certain aspects of AI, including what he called the ‘silent surrender’ of human decision-making, terrified him.”

Psychoanalysis has moved maybe a couple of inches toward the center of our culture (Freud is cool, now) while AI promises to improve our lives with no human interaction at all. This coincides with the neo-liberal capitalist demand for constant goal-oriented self-improvement in everything: To make ourselves thinner, happier, healthier, less stressed, more protein-packed and whatever-maxxed to meet our constructed ideals. Algorithms allegedly will hone our personal and professional productivity while optimizing our emotional IQs via mindfulness, toxic positivity, and idiot compassion. 

Psychoanalytic work addresses why these colluding “psychohygiene” mental health hacks are ultimately disappointing in the long run. According to Mari Ruti and Gail M. Neuman in The Creative Self: Beyond Individualism, psychoanalysis is an antidote to the impossibilities of the self-improvement industrial complex: 

“Today’s neoliberal society… overwhelms us with its seductions, temptations, and provocations. It incites us to constant productivity and cheerfulness. Our self is regarded as an infinitely perfectible entity, and the external world presses on us from all sides, urging us to improve ourselves lest we miss out on what life has to offer.” 

And how we can never be, and shouldn’t be, satisfied:

“…the desire for something more is simply the human condition in the sense that, regardless of how satisfying our lives may be, we are programmed to want more. From this viewpoint, the desire for more is an ontological and existential feature of human life.” 

This proffered self-optimization demands a conformity which bars our efforts of creativity, authenticity, and critical thinking. This conformity is antithetical to the goals of psychoanalysis. 

One joyful realization from my time in the candidate program: We were all having dinner after class, and as I sat and listened to bits of conversation, I realized no one here is normal. No one was trying to be. And we were all good with it. What a fine thing.  

We hope you have the same inclination and can join us this year. 

On Friday, Sept 18th we will start by hosting Jill Gentile at our new home (1132 S. Wabash, suite 502) and along with full schedule, our Racial Equity Initiative is hosting an experiential workshop, and the CCP podcast, Little Hysterics, will continue with more episodes.

To avoid being pulled further into this questionable culture, we have the opportunity to sit and listen to each other in many ways. Like Anton Hart said last year, addressing the socially counterintuitive aspects of psychoanalysis, “Don’t just do something, sit there.”

We hope to see you soon.

Thanks.

Zak Mucha, LCSW

President, Chicago Center for Psychoanalysis

September 2026