ABSTRACT
J. Lacan used the opportunity to assert that "Clinical psychoanalysis must consist not only of analytic examination but also examination of the analysts". A glance at working relationships within the analytic institution, for example, can leave one wondering in regard to the effect that psychoanalysis has on the analysts themselves. Lacan's initial definition of libido aided him in constructing the "mirror stage", the stage at which the ego becomes fixated. Lacan defined the essence of the drive as the trace of the Act. Sexualization introduces death—the trace of an Act rather than the Act itself. The movement of drive, the jouissance and satisfaction involved, are the movements of an automaton. Lacan was very much against the idea that psychoanalysis should reinforce the ego. The ego therefore constitutes the principal source of resistance to analysis. The connection at the imaginary level interferes most foully with the intersubjective connection, blocking it, making it fixed and repetitive.
