ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author focuses on the way in which the psychological intricacies of drug ingestion might be seen to bind together at the point where the creation of euphoric mental states hovers close to a repeating urge towards death. He develops the idea further with a theory that he call the "pleasure paradox", where he try to show how the pleasurable effects of a mind-altering act such as drug ingestion might run a close parallel with its dangerous consequences. The idea of the nirvana principle was quickly developed by Barbara Low, one of the founder members of the London Institute of Psychoanalysis, who published one of the first introductory books on psychoanalysis. The author illustrates the process of residential treatment of shifting dependency with reference to a clinical case. M. Balint described how a therapeutic relationship has the potential to engender an addiction-like dependency in the patient.
