TWITTER NATION – Hey, Joe Six-Tweets: Sigmund Freud Would Follow You!

Well, not so much that he’d be tweeting.  Or following.  That is, unless the local apothecary was pushing out regular updates as to coca plant shipments . . . but I digress.

Would he be intrigued by Twitter’s meteoric rise in 2008?  Maybe. 753% growth (in terms of unique visitors) is nothing less than astounding.  But the boom in popularity isn’t what would cause our old friend Siggy to raise an eyebrow . . . or two.  If you ask me, he’d likely be fascinated with micro-blogging for a very different reason — the ‘why’ of Twitter becoming the ultimate self-actualization-tool-du-jour.  I’m guessing he’d likely talk about Twitter as the ultimate toy for the “id” (no, not the ego, or super-ego, but our hidden friend, “Mr. id”).

See, Twitter fits in quite nicely with Freud’s “psychic apparatus” model, in which the uncoordinated, instinctual,(Twitter-esque) trends are the “id”; the organized realistic part of the psyche is the “ego,” and the critical and moralizing function the “super-ego.”  That’s right – he’d likely go to town tearing into psychological evaluations of how Twitter satiates the id’s “pleasure principle“, or seeking of immediate enjoyment (if not compelled by reality) through a focus on selfishness and instant self-gratification.

Now, if you’re a businessperson using Twitter for a very specific reason (i.e. you’re a Social Media Consultant, etc.), then you wouldn’t qualify to be one of his test subjects.  And let’s be honest: If this is you, then you’re an exception and certainly not the norm.  The truth is that you’re not like the 99.9% of the rest of us “Joe Six Tweets” on Twitter (myself included).  I can see it now — the rest of us would be in Siggy’s office with a modern-day Pet Scan cap on, instantly drooling for a keyboard to tweet out the next impulsively limbic thought to hit our reptilian brains.

Ironically, I’ve come to love Twitter . . . if only for satisfying my id. I admit getting immense satisfaction from firing off random thoughts, or from tweeting ‘status updates’ that matter little to the remainder of the Human Race.  I also get immediate enjoyment – see, being an analytical person, I have a hard time squeezing things into 140 characters or less.  When I pull it off, I momentarily feel good about myself and how far I’ve come as a communicator.  Kind of reminds me of watching people enjoying successively futile attempts to squeeze into those Bongo Jeans before a night out on the town (Ok, maybe scratch that thought.)

And since Twitter has reconnected me to my Cro-Magnon roots, I’ve come to embrace the newly acquired, yet ever-present, little voice in my head: “Must do a Tweet.  Must Re-Tweet dat.  Need more followers.  Mr. Twitter-Grader’s algorithm needs an overhaul.  Maybe make da fire later . . . after I tweet dat I’m planning to.”  I can see myself sitting in the cave bobbin’ my head to Rod Stewart’s “Infatuation” as I tweet away:

Early in the morning I cant sleep
I cant work and I cant eat
Ive been drunk all day, cant concentrate
Maybe Im making a big mistake

And by the way, I’m not a psychologist . . . and I’m certainly not a Doctor.  But I play one on TV, and yes, I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night.