Introduction

This chapter explores how omnipotent fantasies find expression in the compulsive pursuit of intoxicating substances. The omnipotence continues to influence sublimations and repeatedly threatens the child's attempts at reparation with destructive impulses. Ernest Becker described omnipotence as an instinctual defense against the paralyzing terror resulting from awareness of inevitable and certain death. Omnipotence theory became increasingly complex in the mid-twentieth century. The omnipotence continues to influence sublimations and repeatedly threatens the child's attempts at reparation with destructive impulses. Instead, the child "resorts to manic omnipotence". In Totem and Taboo, Sigmund Freud wrote about the "omnipotence of thought" in primitive cultures as steeped in the belief that the outside world could be controlled through magical knowledge. Winnicott regarded creativity as a reimmersion in a state of "subjective omnipotence" in which illusions are pursued to the fullest extent and external reality is completely disregarded. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.