Jeb asked me about archetypes and my twitter answer took two tweets. Not a good sign.
Archetype: primordial structural elements of the psyche, ” a dynamism which makes itself felt in the numinosity…/
…and fascinating power of the archetypal image.” Jung, CW8, par 414. (how’s that for a start?)
I wasn’t surprised when he followed up with a request to get that in layman’s terms. So, here we go.
Jung felt that the unconscious was not just personal, the baggage of our forgotten memories, but that it was also collective. Through his explorations of the human psyche certain products of the unconscious kept recurring as patterns of images. Much like the “stock” figures in fairy tales and the characters in mythic systems from around the world, these images could not be reduced to personal experiences or memories.
So what are they? Jung felt these figures, (and note they are not just human or living. The geometric pattern of a mandala is also an archetypal image) gave expression to the ego or consciousness of the energy patterns that lie in the collective unconscious. These patterns are inherited. One way we experience them is in dream images. Jung makes it clear that archetypes lie beyond the ego’s awareness but that their effects are experienced as archetypal images.
“Archetypes are systems of readiness for action, and at the same time images and emotions. They are inherited with the brain structure – indeed they are its psychic aspect. They represent, on the one hand, a very strong instinctive conservatism, while at the other hand they are the most effective means conceivable of instinctive adaptation. They are thus, essentially, the chthonic portion of the psyche…that portion of the psyche that is attached to nature.” Carl Jung, CW9i, par 136
He goes on to say that they are not inherited ideas, but inherited possibilities of ideas. That’s a little bit of a brain twister. Lets look at the image of the mandala above. What if you dreamed this image? What is this pattern giving expression to? All of Jung’s work is an investigation of just these questions.
It’s interesting to see where the images will take you. For instance, why might an opossum appear in a dream. It turns out the opossum is quite the trickster figure in Central American myth. All my observations of these marsupials start to give shape to the image: from playing dead, to hiding the young in a pouch, to raiding the trash cans. And the trickster or joker is clearly an archetypal image.
So if they ever do away with the Joker in the next Batman, I suggest they introduce a new figure, the Possum. What do you think Jeb?
“Solitude and fasting have from time immemorial been the best-known means of strengthening any meditation whose purpose is to open the door to the unconscious.” Carl Jung, Symbols of Transformation, par 519
So much is made of dieting in our culture. Does it ever really work? My slant is this: with dieting the ancient purpose of the act has been subverted for a lesser good which has some admixture of vanity woven through it and the unconscious itself will not have it. We can see the same revolt from the unconscious when drug and alcohol use spirals into addiction, sacraments twisted into nightmares.
The practice of conscious fasting was carried out of our prehistoric times when a sense of plenty was irregular and hunger commonplace, a time when the manifesting unconscious and less developed egos were more unified. It was carried into and maintained in our earliest of cultures as a spiritual practice because it was effective. Out of that collective great wanting of sustenance, much that was magical transpired: miracles and mysteries, intuitions and calamities. Stories that seemed a step beyond the margins of the ordinary, a value outside the spectrum of the visible: encounters with the numinous, visions.
And solitude. How afraid do you think we are as a culture to be alone? Perhaps the greatest service we can bring to our young people is to teach them how to traverse paths of solitude. You know why we avoid it. We are semi-afraid of talking to ourselves, and we’re terrified of talking to the unconscious. The door is always there for each of us. We just tend to set up our televisions in front of it.
Lent’s coming. Could your purpose be to open the door?
Heads Up! Each Sunday morning I’ll be adding a new type of post here at Catskill Cottage Seed. The News Real will provide links to a variety of news sources and provide commentary with one eye turned toward the archetypes. The idea stems from a class that Charles Olson used to teach at Black Mountain College, where he would discuss the unconscious influences to be found in the headlines of the newspaper.
This response on Twitter to my previous post “Leaks” has to be shared.
Matt has an eye for the shadow and his comments on this blog could be the basis of an entirely separate blog. So his point, direct and cutting, is a great place to dig in and continue with some amplification.
The syndrome as I understand it is when a captive falls in love with the captor and will not take the opportunities for escape when they manifest. It does seem that the dynamic I present in “Leaks” has this as the goal. But if the relationship that ensued was built on that type of abuse, I’d want no part of it. So to that end, I’d like to consider the dynamic at play from the other end of the spectrum, just to add a twist.
The story goes like this:
“I had dreamed once before of the problem of the self and the ego. In that earlier dream I was on a hiking trip. I was walking along a little road through a hilly landscape; the sun was shining and I had a wide view in all directions. Then I came to a small wayside chapel. The door was ajar, and I went in. To my surprise there was no image of the Virgin on the altar, and no crucifix either, but only a wonderful flower arrangement. But then I saw that on the floor in front of the altar, facing me, sat a yogi -in lotus posture, in deep meditation. When I looked at him more closely, I realized that he had my face. I started in profound fright, and awoke with the thought: “Aha, so he is the one who is meditating me. He has a dream, and I am it.” I knew that when he awakened, I would no longer be.” Carl Jung, Memories, Dreams and Reflections, pg. 323
So the hunt and the hunted…who’s chasing who?
...Soul Adventurer
Sound of One Hand Clapping
A One Trick Pony
Persevere