 Kohut stated that, with narcissistic patients, idealization of the self and the therapist should be allowed during therapy and then very gradually will diminish as a result of unavoidable optimal frustration.Otto Kernberg has provided an extensive discussion of idealization, both in its defensive and adaptive aspects.He conceptualised idealization as involving a denial of unwanted characteristics of an object, then enhancing the object by projecting one's own libido or omnipotence on it.