American College of Orgonomy

Anorgonia: The condition of diminished or lack of energy charge in the organism.

Anxiety: The emotional perception of the organism as it is constricted by a contraction against expansion. A distressing sense of oppression or a vague, formless worry.

Armor: The total defense apparatus of the organism, consisting of the rigidities of the character and the chronic spasms of the musculature. Armor functions essentially as a defense against the breakthrough of emotion—particularly anxiety, rage, and sexual excitation. See Character Armor and Muscular Armor.

Antiauthoritarianism The social system that is opposed to both neurotic (irrational) and rational authority at every level of social organization.

Authoritarianism: The social system that operates according to the principle of compulsive moral regulation. Headed by the father, the authoritarian family is reproduced in the authoritarian state.

Biological Core: The autonomic nervous system, from which biological excitation arises to maintain the living functions of the organism.

Bions: Energy vesicles representing transitional stages between non-living and living substance. They constantly form in nature by a process of disintegration of inorganic and organic matter, a process which can be reproduced experimentally. They are charged with orgone energy (life energy) and may develop into protozoa and bacteria.

Bioenergy: The energy in the living organism that provides the ability for functioning. Identical to biological orgone energy.

Biopsychiatry: Psychiatry from the energetic point of view.

Biopathy: A disease process that has its root in a disturbance of biological pulsation resulting from the presence of armor.

Block: A contraction in the organism that prevents the free flow of energy or its excitation.

Character: An individual's typical structure, his or her stereotyped manner of acting and reacting. The orgonomic concept of character is functional and biological, and not a static, psychological or moralistic concept.

Character Analysis: An integral aspect of medical orgone therapy wherein typical modes of behavior and expression are brought to the individual's awareness.

Character Armor: The sum total of typical character attitudes that an individual develops as a defense against anxiety, resulting in character rigidity, lack of contact, or "deadness." Functionally identical with the muscular armor.

Contact: The capacity to emotionally and perceptually relate to another organism as a result of the ability to accurately perceive biological excitation.

Contactlessness: Absence of contact. The inability to make perceptual contact with the biological excitation within the organism and with others and nature.

Core: The autonomic (vegetative) nervous system from which involuntary stimuli arise to maintain functioning of the organism.

Cosmic Feelings: The sensation of being a part of nature and the universe, of belonging to it rather than an isolated entity.

Defense Mechanisms: Specific patterns of psychic action that function to prevent the awareness of any internal or external perception that would be experienced in a dysphoric (anxious or painful) manner.

Depersonalization: The loss of self-perception. Occurs with the loss of contact between biophysical excitation and the subjective feelings of the excitation.

Emotional Plague: The neurotic character in destructive action on the social scene. This form of human behavior is based on a biopathic character structure and makes itself felt in interpersonal (social) relationships. It becomes organized in corresponding social institutions.

Excitation: The objective movement of biological energy in the organism.

Facade: The surface of the armored organism’s bioemotional structure, from which the individual interacts with the environment. Identical with the superficial layer. In health, it is referred to as the “social layer.”

Fixation: The arrest of emotional development or desire, especially sexual desire, upon some person or object.

Formal Democracy: A distortion of work democracy arising from social armor.

Functional Thinking: Thinking according to the way nature functions. In contrast to mechanistic thinking, which is based on viewing nature as if it were a machine, and mystical thinking, which is based on viewing nature as if it were unknowable.

Genital Embrace: The sexual act. Sexual superimposition between two individuals of opposite sex with loving genital contact.

Genital Character: The un-neurotic character who does not suffer from sexual stasis and is therefore capable of natural self-regulation.

Genitality: The manner of functioning of the unarmored individual. Since there is an absence of sexual stasis, the individual has the capacity for natural self-regulation on the basis of orgastic potency.

Hook: A block that for some reason, either in its development or in a particular significance to the individual, is particularly difficult if not impossible to overcome.

Ideology: A set of ideas based on fixed (i.e., mechanistic or mystical) thinking that produces a social force when it is displaced onto the social realm.

Libido: The sexual energy. Energy in the organism above a certain level which is felt as sexual excitation.

Mechanical Potential: Entropy. The tendency of systems to flow from higher to lower energy levels. See Orgonomic Potential.

Mechanistic Thinking: Based on the assumption that matter and its interactions are the fundamental elements in the universe, it is the prevailing form of thinking in science. Correct when it is used in regard to mechanical systems, it is highly destructive when applied to the biological realm.

Medical Orgone Therapy: Therapy based upon the energetic discoveries of Wilhelm Reich. A biopsychiatric therapy that has as its goal the reduction of elimination of armor for the purpose of mobilizing the orgone energy in the organism. The therapy frees repressed feelings and emotions from muscular and character armoring and has as its goal the establishment of orgastic potency. Also called orgone therapy and psychiatric orgone therapy.

Muscular Armor: The sum total of the muscular attitudes (chronic muscular spasms)that an individual develops as a block against the breakthrough of emotional and organ sensations, in particular anxiety, rage, and sexual excitation. Functionally identical to character armor.

Mystical Thinking: The belief system based on the idea that nature is unknowable through the physical senses. It has an objective basis in that armor distorts sense impressions and prevents direct contact with nature.

Neurotic Character: The character that, due to chronic sexual stasis, operates according to the principle of compulsive moral regulation.

Orgasm: The unitary, involuntary convulsion of the total organism at the acme of the genital embrace. This reflex, because of its involuntary character and the prevailing orgasm anxiety, is blocked in most humans of civilization, which suppress infantile and adolescent genitality.

Orgasm Anxiety: Anxiety produced by final and complete surrender of the organism giving in to its involuntary convulsion. Seen in the final stages of analysis. In the final analysis orgasm anxiety is behind all armored manifestations.

Orgasm Reflex: The unitary involuntary contraction and expansion of the total organism seen when the organism is at rest and energy flow is uninhibited. Also seen in the acme of the sexual act, suppressed in most humans.

Orgastic Impotence: The absence of orgastic potency. A pathologic condition that is almost universal in individuals raised in patriarchal societies. Dammed up biological energy in individuals is the cause for all kinds of psychic and somatic symptoms and for social irrationalism. The somatic aspect of armor.

Orgastic Potency: The capacity for complete surrender to the involuntary convulsion of the organism and complete discharge of the excitation at the acme of the genital embrace. It is always lacking in neurotic individuals. It presupposes the presence or establishment of genitality, that is, the absence of pathological character armor and muscular armor. Orgastic potency is usually and erroneously not distinguished from erective and ejaculative potency, both of which are only prerequisites of orgastic potency.

Orgone Energy: Primordial cosmic energy, universally present. It can be demonstrable visually, thermically, electroscopically and with the Geiger-Mueller counter. In the living organism it is biological energy. Also called bioenergy, life energy, c'hi, and prana. Discovered by Whilhelm Reich between 1936 and 1940.

Orgonometry: A system of thought that is closely aligned to the natural operation of functions and functional processes. Orgonometry is capable of relying on orgonometric notation to convey function processes.

Orgonomic Functionalism: The application of functional thinking to natural processes.

Orgonomic Potential: The tendency of orgone energy to go from lower to higher levels, in contrast to the mechanical potential, which moves in the opposite direction (see Mechanical Potential).

Orgonomic Sociology: The application of orgonomic functionalism to the study of social processes.

Orgonomy: The natural science of orgone energy and its functions.

Orgonotic Pulsation: The pulsation of orgone energy in living and nonliving orgonotic systems. Also measurable by oscillograph, it consists of an expansive and convulsive phase.

Parasympathetic Nervous System: That division of the nervous system where excitation produces an expansion in the organism.

Paresthesias: Distorted sensations arising out of the blockage of energy flow through a part of the body. Felt as prickling, tingling, or creeping.

Plasmatic Shrinking: The gradual lowering of the organism's energy level through depression or disease, such as cancer.

Pleasure Streamings: The perception of pleasant wavelike movements of energy in the body, much as a soft breeze flowing through. They produce a three-dimensional perception of the body.

Pregenital: Pertaining to the erogenous development, developmental levels or stages and neurotic fixations, which occur before genital primacy is attained.

Primary Drive: The natural expressions that occur when there are no enforced inhibitions.

Rational Politics: Political activity originating from the biological core and in the service of protecting life.

Secondary Drive: The distorted expressions that occur as a result of armor. They are forceful and destructive.

Sex-Economy: The body of knowledge within orgonomy that deals with the economy of biological (orgone) energy in the organism.

Social Anxiety: Anxiety manifested in social activity resulting from the breakdown of individual or social armor.

Social Armor: The pathological social functioning of armored humans. It interferes with all rational social functions. It gives rise to the opposing forces of mechanistic and mystical thought that are manifested socially, politically, and economically as the ideological forces on the Left and the Right.

Sociopolitics: Irrational political activity arising from the displacement of intrapsychic conflicts onto the social and political sphere.

Stasis: The damming up of sexual energy in the organism, thus the source of energy for the neuroses.

Substitute Contact: The contact that is made when real and direct contact is wanting; contact that is stilted and artificial.

Superficial Layer: The surface of the human bioemotional structure.

Sympathetic Nervous System: That division of the nervous system where excitation produces a contraction in the organism.

Sympatheticatonia: A continual state of unbalanced sympathetic over-excitation associated with continuing anxiety.

Warded Off: Prevented from expression.

Work Democracy: The functioning of the natural and intrinsically rational work relationships between human beings. The concept of work democracy represents the established reality (not the ideology) of these relationships, which, though usually distorted because of prevailing armoring and irrational political ideologies, are nevertheless at the basis of all social achievement.