Symptomatology In The Waking Life

Symptomatology The main character within The Waking Life is one who is active within an environment and seemingly fully conscious of the world around himself. However throughout the course of the film, several events lead the viewer to believe he is “stuck” within his own perception, unable to “wake up” from a cyclitic existence of relevant experiences. The film uses notions of a lucid dream to represent the dissociative nature of his experiences throughout the film, questioning whether he is wake or asleep, essentially stuck in a dream. Within this dream, visual distortions are present, not typical of the type of hallucinations that occur with an episode of psychosis, but rather a cloudy, uncertain series of visual concepts being crudely represented. The main character, who is never named, serves as a placeholder for a man with a dissociative disorder, specifically Depersonalization disorder. Treatment Treatment for Depersonalization/Derealization Disorder is under-studied and considered a …show more content…
There are means of treatment that can help one cope, some of which could be considered found in the movie. The article Life With Depersonalization suggest that treatment begins by supporting patents with statements of “cognitive certainty”. The movie accomplishes this as its cast of characters try to find this “certainty” through various philosophies such as existentialism. But this is just the start of the therapy, as the disorder doesn’t improve, but the patient “becomes aware of different and complex phenomena of depersonalization [they have] been experiencing”. A sentiment mirroring the main character in the movie when he realizes he has dreamed this entire time. Finally, the article suggests the therapy move to an analytical view which allows the patient to find the root of the disorder in their past, and realizes that their disorder is permanent, as they can't repress the