Man & space /4
Repetition, similar, identical. What is the difference? And what it is its significance ?
Around the age seven or eight, children start playing a game of mimicking each other. One child starts repeating the other's movements, gestures and utterances. This is great fun for a while, until it becomes so annoying that the mimicked kid wants to escape the situation. If the kid is smart enough, he or she will find some error, some deviation in the imitation and use it to turn the tables and start mimicking the dysfunctional mimicker. If, however, the imitation is perfect, then all that remains is screaming "stop it already!" as a result of extreme annoyance.
Psychodrama also uses this game element to achieve self-awareness. Our gestures and speech tone sometimes become so natural to us that we fail to see/hear ourselves from outside, but a mirrored self can help us recognize our actions. The more people there are and the more accurate the mimicker is, the more efficient the game will be.
We are put into roles, but we also choose roles ourselves. Being fully aware of the behaviour of the self in roles is difficult at every level. The solitary self, the self in a work environment, the family self, the collective social selves... The dynamics of each of these can be different, even if we may discover similarities/repetitions between them or see them as identical.
