Object relations is a complex but fundamental issue today in projective psychology as well as in psychopathology and psychoanalysis. The subject-object relation is not associated with rigid co-existence but, rather, with a dynamic of co-construction. Subjects establish their objects in relation to the experience of satisfaction, the pursuit of pleasure and the desire to maintain their psychic homeostasis and protect themselves against high levels of anxiety. This article seeks to show how projective methods help us to understand the more or less well-established ? albeit still in progress ? ability to differentiate oneself. To what extent do these methods enable us to understand the worth of object relations intermingled with love, hate, scaffolding and a yearning for narcissistic security? To what extent do they enable us to understand how encounters and separations affect renunciation and autonomy? This article will therefore address object relations in the light of the complex relationship between narcissistic and objectal cathexes, a narrow dialectic between narcissistic and objectal components where all individuals are found-created by others. Moreover, this article will contribute to this debate by using protocols collected from subjects experiencing one of the two periods of life deeply marked by considerable psychic issues associated with loving and being loved, and the ability or need to isolate oneself: adolescence (becoming an adult) and ageing.