Being a Character: Psychoanalysis and Self Experience

What This Research Found

Being a character as self-elaboration. Christopher Bollas explores how we live as “characters”—developing a personal idiom through countless choices about how to use objects (people, ideas, experiences, places) in the ongoing project of self-elaboration. This process is largely unconscious; we know ourselves through what we do more than through explicit self-reflection. Our character emerges through the way we inhabit and use our world.

Objects as self-experience. Bollas describes how we use objects not just for practical purposes but for psychological elaboration—choosing music that evokes certain states, gravitating toward people who elicit particular self-experiences, creating environments that extend our internal world. This “use” isn’t exploitation but a normal psychological process. Problems arise when the objects used become destructive or when the self-elaboration process is severely constrained.

The concept of “loving hate.” Among Bollas’ most relevant concepts for understanding narcissistic abuse is “loving hate”—the paradoxical psychological state where hatred becomes a source of pleasure and gratification. Rather than experiencing hatred as uncomfortable and seeking to resolve it, some individuals come to love hatred itself, seeking out targets for enmity because the hatred provides psychological satisfaction. Hatred becomes an “object” used for self-elaboration, a reliable source of arousal, power, and connection.

Hatred as addiction. The “loving hate” phenomenon helps explain why certain individuals and groups become addicted to enmity. The physiological arousal, the sense of power, the simplification of complexity, the connection with fellow haters—these benefits become reinforcing. Each expression of hatred provides gratification that encourages further hatred. The pattern escalates not because circumstances require it but because the hatred itself has become psychologically necessary.

Why This Matters for Survivors

The pleasure in their cruelty makes sense now. Many survivors describe confusion at the almost joyful quality of their abuser’s rage—the smirk when delivering devastating criticism, the gleeful tone when recounting how they destroyed someone, the energy they seemed to derive from conflict. Bollas’ concept explains this: your abuser wasn’t just managing frustration through aggression—they had come to love the hatred itself. The cruelty wasn’t a means to an end; it was the end.

This explains why appeasement never works. If you tried to stop the abuse by being better, giving more, complying more completely—and found it never satisfied them—“loving hate” explains why. They weren’t seeking resolution of a grievance; they were seeking the gratification that hatred provides. Your compliance removed a target, which frustrated their need to hate. Some abusers escalate precisely when victims comply, creating new reasons for hatred because they need the hatred to continue.

You weren’t the cause of their hatred. Survivors often search for what they did to deserve such intense hostility. “Loving hate” reveals that you were a target, not a cause. The hatred existed as an internal need seeking an object; you became that object. Someone with this orientation would have found something or someone to hate regardless of your behavior. You provided a convenient target for a preexisting need.

Understanding without excusing. Recognizing that your abuser may have derived pleasure from hatred helps explain their behavior without excusing it. They chose to cultivate and indulge this tendency. Many people with difficult internal states don’t develop “loving hate.” Understanding the psychology helps survivors process what happened while maintaining clarity that the abuser remained responsible for their choices.

Clinical Implications

Recognize ‘loving hate’ in assessment. Clinicians should assess for patterns of gratification through enmity: Does the client light up when discussing enemies? Do they seem more alive, more engaged when hostile? Do they seek out conflict and seem energized by it? Do they struggle to let grievances go despite costs? These patterns suggest hatred has become psychologically organizing and gratifying, requiring specific treatment approaches.

Identify what hatred provides. Before clients can relinquish hatred, they need alternative sources for what hatred provides: power (hatred makes them feel strong), connection (shared hatred bonds), simplicity (hatred reduces complexity), arousal (hatred is physiologically activating), identity (hatred defines them). Treatment involves building these through healthier means while mourning what hatred provides that they’ll lose.

Expect resistance to interpretation. Clients who love hatred will likely experience interpretation of this pattern as attack—another enemy to hate. The therapist must survive being hated before the client can examine their relationship to hatred. This requires careful timing, robust therapeutic alliance, and tolerance for being a target of the very phenomenon being addressed.

Work with the underlying pain. “Loving hate” typically develops as a way of managing intolerable internal states—often shame, powerlessness, or grief. The hatred converts passive suffering into active aggression, transforming victim into victor. Treatment must eventually address what the hatred manages, requiring sufficient ego strength and therapeutic safety before this exploration.

Distinguish from healthy anger. Not all intense anger is “loving hate.” Healthy anger at injustice, appropriate rage at violation, assertive aggression in self-defense—these serve adaptive functions. The distinguishing feature of “loving hate” is that the hatred is sought for its own sake, divorced from realistic grievance, and becomes a preferred psychological state.

Broader Implications

Political Movements and Collective Hatred

Bollas’ concept illuminates how political movements can organize around shared hatred. When leaders identify enemies and followers experience collective enmity, the hatred itself becomes a source of pleasure and bonding. Rally chants targeting enemies, social media pile-ons, and coordinated harassment provide the “high” of shared hatred. This explains why movements persist even when their stated goals are achieved—the hatred, not the policy, is the point.

Online Radicalization

Digital platforms facilitate “loving hate” by providing endless targets, instant community with fellow haters, and dopamine-driven engagement metrics that reward extreme content. Online harassment campaigns give participants excitement, purpose, and connection through shared enmity. Understanding this helps explain why arguing facts rarely de-radicalizes—the hatred isn’t about the stated cause but about the gratification hatred provides.

Workplace Dynamics

Some toxic workplaces develop cultures of “loving hate”—where bonding occurs through shared contempt for targets (the CEO, a department, certain colleagues). This can feel like solidarity but actually cultivates hatred as organizational glue. New employees are inducted through learning who to hate. The workplace becomes difficult to leave because leaving means losing the community that shared hatred created.

Family Systems

Narcissistic family systems sometimes organize around shared hatred of a scapegoat. The family bonds through collective cruelty toward one member. The scapegoat’s suffering provides gratification for others while allowing them to avoid examining their own dynamics. When the scapegoat leaves, the family often finds a new target—revealing that the hatred, not the scapegoat’s behavior, was the point.

Therapeutic Communities

Understanding “loving hate” has implications for group therapy and therapeutic communities. Groups can develop hatred toward external targets (managed care, administrators, the insurance company) that provides bonding through shared enmity. While some shared frustration is appropriate, it can become “loving hate” that organizes group identity around opposition rather than growth. Facilitators should watch for this dynamic.

Rehabilitation and Recovery

Recovery from “loving hate” requires recognition that something pleasurable is being given up—not just stopping harmful behavior. Programs addressing hate group involvement, domestic violence, or other hatred-based patterns must offer something to replace what hatred provided. Twelve-step programs for domestic violence perpetrators recognize this in their focus on what anger provides and building alternatives.

Limitations and Considerations

Conceptual, not empirical. Bollas writes from a psychoanalytic perspective that relies on clinical observation and theoretical development rather than controlled empirical research. The concept of “loving hate” is clinically useful but hasn’t been validated through experimental methods.

Individual variation. Not everyone who engages in sustained hatred experiences it as pleasurable. Some are driven by fear, some by tribal obligation, some by genuine grievance that hasn’t been addressed. “Loving hate” describes one pattern, not all hatred.

Risk of misapplication. The concept could be misused to pathologize justified anger—the anger of oppressed groups, survivors demanding accountability, or righteous outrage at injustice. The distinguishing feature is whether hatred serves realistic purposes and is uncomfortable to sustain, or whether it’s sought for its own gratification regardless of circumstance.

Cultural context. What constitutes “loving hate” versus culturally sanctioned enmity varies across contexts. Some cultures have traditions of sustained feuds or ritual conflict that may appear as “loving hate” from outside but serve social functions within their context.

How This Research Is Used in the Book

This research is cited in Chapter 15: Political Narcissus to explain the addictive quality of collective hatred in political movements:

“The psychological high of shared hatred, what Bollas calls ‘loving hate,’ becomes addictive.”

The citation supports the book’s analysis of how narcissistic leaders mobilize followers through shared enmity, creating communities bound by collective hatred toward designated enemies. The pleasure derived from this shared hatred helps explain why followers don’t simply support policies but seem to enjoy attacking perceived enemies.

Historical Context

“Being a Character” appeared in 1992, the third in Bollas’ series of books exploring psychoanalytic theory of self-experience. It built on his earlier “The Shadow of the Object” (1987), which introduced the concept of the “transformational object”—early experiences that become templates for what we seek from relationships throughout life.

The concept of “loving hate” connects to a long tradition of psychoanalytic thinking about aggression, from Freud’s death instinct through Melanie Klein’s work on envy and destructiveness to Kernberg’s work on malignant narcissism. Bollas’ contribution was articulating how hatred itself can become an object of psychological attachment—something loved and sought rather than merely expressed.

The concept has proven relevant beyond clinical settings to understanding political movements, online dynamics, and group psychology. As scholars sought to understand phenomena like the rise of authoritarian movements and coordinated online harassment, Bollas’ concept of “loving hate” offered explanatory power for why these phenomena seemed to generate pleasure rather than merely serve instrumental goals.

Further Reading

• Bollas, C. (1987). The Shadow of the Object: Psychoanalysis of the Unthought Known. Columbia University Press.
• Bollas, C. (1989). Forces of Destiny: Psychoanalysis and Human Idiom. Free Association Books.
• Kernberg, O.F. (1992). Aggression in Personality Disorders and Perversions. Yale University Press.
• Eigen, M. (1996). Psychic Deadness. Jason Aronson.
• Grotstein, J.S. (2007). A Beam of Intense Darkness: Wilfred Bion’s Legacy to Psychoanalysis. Karnac Books.