Monthly Archives: February 2009

Chuck's Blog

#456 Chuck’s Place: Healing or Possession?

Welcome to Chuck’s Place, where Chuck Ketchel expresses his thoughts, insights, and experiences!

One of the greatest contributions of the alcoholism treatment field was the identification of the inner child by such clinicians as Charles Whitfield. Through such techniques as writing with the non-dominant hand and focusing on photographs from childhood an individual learns to form an active relationship with a lost or dissociated aspect of themselves. Though most mainstream psychology dismissed inner child work, Jungian psychology had pioneered the technique of active imagination decades earlier. In active imagination the conscious personality opens to a direct relationship with sub-personalities and, through this interaction, integrates the truths and viewpoints of these other aspects of the self into a more comprehensive, adaptive personality, one that reflects the fuller truth of who we really are. Jung was careful to stress that the conscious ego, the mature adult self, must be strong enough to remain in command during such inner encounters or risk the possibility of being taken over by a sub-personality.

Jung also noted that there are layers to the psyche, both personal and impersonal. The personal psyche begins with the experience of the individual from conception forward. The impersonal or collective psyche is the inherited experiences of humankind stored in the collective layer of the unconscious or the home of the archetypes, what I have previously referred to as the ultimate motherboard. When an individual develops a relationship with their unconscious it is possible to be interacting with a part of the self in the personal unconscious or a part of the self that has drifted into the non-personal collective layer of the unconscious. In the case of the inner child, one might be interacting with an unknown part of the self in the personal psyche, or a part of the self encased in the non-personal psyche by the archetypal lost child. This distinction is critical, and often confused, as the archetypal energies experienced as primal emotions may have attached to a lost part of the personal psyche, one’s inner child.

The personal inner child may be “housed” in what Jung called, the shadow, an unknown region of the personal psyche. This may have resulted from the impact of socialization, where aspects of the self were rejected and forced out of consciousness into this dark region. Retrieving the inner child from this region is consciously experienced in the release of creative abilities and faculties previously lost to the conscious self.

In more traumatic experiences the child completely retreats from life in a dissociated state, sinking more deeply into the protective womb of the deeper psyche, the collective unconscious. In this case the outer world and personal psyche have proven unable to house the child and a retreat to the motherboard becomes necessary. Consciously, the evolving personality may experience actual amnesia toward the experiences and existence of this inner child, so powerful was the impact of the trauma and the need to get distance from it (to dissociate). When the dissociated child enters the archetypal womb it merges with the archetypal lost or abandoned child, that is, the sum total experiences of the rejected child through eons of life on earth. Imagine the bottomless pit of pain this archetypal child feels. It simply cannot and will not ever be healed. It is the archetype of eternal wounded rejection, hell or Hades. That pain is a vortex that will consume and collapse a misguided ego. In other words, the ego must be able to distinguish personal from impersonal and not succumb to the vortex, which is difficult to climb out of without being controlled by the archetypal wounded child.

Herein lies the failure in healing of much inner child work. Often an individual will open to the experience of the wounding of what they believe to be their personal inner child and be swept under by the emotional tide of the eternal archetypal lost child, a wound that can never be healed, from a child entitled to unending attention. The trap here is the archetypal child gaining possession of the personality under the guise of healing. The ego becomes charged with having to eternally make up or compensate for the experiences of the archetypal wounded child, constantly pampering, tending, protecting, rescuing, and in return demanding forgiveness, protection, and parenting from others, who are perceived as re-wounding the child. This is not to dismiss the true traumatic experiences of the child self. These experiences must be honestly acknowledged, along with all of the truths. It is critical to free the inner child from the experiences of the archetypal child or we remain in eternal bondage to the demands of the wounded archetypal child.

Retrieving the personal inner child from the womb of the collective psyche is a heroic journey. Here the various Greek myths of journeys to the underworld are instructive. Firstly, the ego must, indeed, be in heroic form. That means we must be in strong possession of our adult mature self to undertake the journey. For when we go inward we will be confronted by powerful emotions and trickery. As I have previously stated the archetypes, or the gods, seek life through possessing our lives. We must be able to hold our own when we encounter them, or they take over. In everyday life, we enter the underworld when we are triggered, returning to a place of wounding. The challenge is whether we become possessed and re-enact an archetypal drama, such as deep rejection; or withstand that compulsion or dictate from the gods and arrive at, and stand in, the truth of the present moment, fully integrating the experiences of our personal past. This is healing. The archetypal psyche, with its recurrent drama, will recede from conscious experience if the adult ego consistently refuses its call to possession, i.e., becoming overwhelmed and inappropriately acting out an archetypal drama in everyday life.

Countless techniques have been developed to help people heal their inner wounds, i.e., cathartic psychodrama. This may offer a genuine healing for the inner child; however, it often becomes an archetypal enactment and release, which does not accrue to lasting healing. This would be the equivalent of being deeply moved by a movie that triggers a personal inner wounding. The wounded child is experienced, acknowledged, and offered emotional release, however, continues to resurface, seeking another opportunity to enact its drama. This is archetypal possession controlling the personality, not healing. Healing is final. There are no more triggers. An archetypal drama is eternal and will never be healed, simply re-enacted anew. A personal drama can be healed and moved on from, never needing to be repeated. There is no personal wounding that cannot be healed. If one insists otherwise, I suspect archetypal possession.

To complete healing the adult ego is challenged to withstand the fire of emotion of the archetypal psyche, primal pain, without identifying with it or succumbing to it. The adult ego is, as well, charged with finding the personal child, opening up to the full truth and experience of this dissociated part of the self, in full acceptance, fully owning the experiences, no longer rejecting them. We call this recapitulation. Finally, the adult ego is challenged to merge the truth of the child self with the mature adult self, with the adult self maintaining the leadership or parental role. Here the child is completely freed from the archetypal womb as the conscious self assumes appropriate parental responsibility for the total self.

If one continues to experience triggers of wounding these become opportunities for the adult self to more fully retrieve fragments of the lost personal self, dodging the ever present vortex of archetypal energy that seeks to lure one back into a state of possession in the form of primal pain and eternal woundedness. True healing is final. It may require encountering many triggers as guideposts signaling where to retrieve the lost personal self, but ultimately the personal self can be fully retrieved, as the personality moves forward, unencumbered by any previous wounding, fully healed.

Emerging from the underworld, I bid you adieu,
Chuck

Messages from Jeanne

#455 Where is the Hidden Jewel in the Dung Heap?

Jeanne Marie Ketchel
Channeled by Jan Ketchel

Dear Jeanne,
I must say that in spite of your contention that calmness is reigning in the outer energy it seems to me that it is not so much calmness as a waiting to burst forth kind of energy, as if a lid is sitting on a boiling pot and it is going to boil over any minute. Any comments?

There has certainly been a calmness of energy, for however briefly, yet has it been your challenge, My Dear Readers, to recognize your own place of calmness within. For in spite of your turmoil there have indeed been moments of calm knowing, moments of clarity, and moments of confrontation. Only in accepting your own process, your own issues, and your own actions, in spite of what I contend, will you continually grow and gain awareness. I turn my awareness of the energy right back to you. I place this awareness firmly in your laps and ask each of you to consider your own place along your path at this visceral moment.

As you read my messages are you not also reading your own inner messages? As you respond with awareness to what I contend, do you not also have awareness of place of self simultaneously? Do you not each read my propositions as specific to you and your conditions in life? Do you not understand that even as I speak on a universal level, so do I also speak on an intimate level, with each one of you? The outer energy is not proposed by me, but is already present. I attend to it in order for you to have access to a greater awareness and so that you may use the outer energy to aid you in your daily lives. You see?

Where are you going with all of this?

Well, what I am saying here is that, in spite of what I say, the energy exists, but the process of awareness involves you learning to read the energy as well. So if I suggest, as I did earlier in the week, that there is calmness outside of you and you do not detect it, so am I challenging you to find it, for it does indeed exist, and not simply because I say so. Your training in awareness is propelled forward by your own ability to detect and utilize what is available in your world, both your inner world and your outer world.

I know that sometimes it is impossible to relate to the outer energy if you are deeply caught in inner struggles, yet do I contend that even so, you are using the outer energy in a manner that is appropriate and meaningful to you, even though you may not be aware of it. So, no matter what I propose regarding the outer energy, I ask you, My Dear Readers, to allow your own energy to take a moment to read the energy around you for your own purposes of growth, awareness, and inner work.

So, I understand that. You are trying to teach us to be always aware of the energy and you are saying that we already read it properly and use it, even if we are not aware that we are doing so?

Yes, but I ask also that you begin to notice your own innate awareness of the energy and your own sense of how to use it.

Fair enough. What else would you like to talk about today?

I am aware of great struggles now, as shifts begin to take place. Once again, even as I might suggest that calmness is present for a final brief space of time, so do I also know that it will now spiral into an inner space, which each of you must contend with on an individual level. Now is a time of retrospection, but it must not become a time of retribution or discourse wasted upon a past that is no longer necessary.

It is a time to move beyond regret, accepting now as the only place to be. Even as you may need to rehash old events, to discover the hidden jewel in the dung heap, so must you stay anchored in the present. For only in the present will the jewel shine forth and be of value, as you stay upon your path of forward growth.

Do not get caught in what I propose, but look, each of you, deeply into your current situation. Where is your jewel buried? What is it that you have been missing? What have your truths been telling you? Do you not see that within each truth is yet another truth? The truth of your own growing awareness is revealed to you at each confrontation. The truth of your own inner guidance and the acknowledgment of your own inner wisdom, your power of knowing, and your own awareness of what to do next, is fully available to you as each truth is spoken.

Your awareness is being trained. It is showing you what you have inside, what is in every one of you: your ability to guide the self, to open to guidance, to trust it, and to stay connected to it. Your truths are showing you what to trust, how to listen, how to know what to do next, but most importantly, your truths are asking you to trust your process, your journey and, even more importantly, to trust your self.

All of your experiences are valid steps along the way. The challenge, now, is to use your inner awareness more fully to your advantage. Your choices, although often made in blindness, or in routine actions, must now come from what you have been learning about your self. Your truths revealed are meaningful, but they are also showing you your deepest desires for growth and connection.

In conclusion, I ask that you maintain these thoughts over the next few days as you encounter what you must: Where is my awareness taking me? What is it showing me? What is my truth here, at this moment?

With these thoughts may you be grounded in the present even as you continue to contend with the troubles of the past. Continue walking forward, no matter how greatly the past wishes to draw you back. The struggles at such a time of preparation for great change are always great. Keep that in mind, for it will help keep your awareness present in your current dilemma, even as it will provide you with focused momentum as you ask your self to keep going forward. Stay in your truth, but also listen to what it is really saying to you. It is showing you just how truly aware you are.

Messages from Jeanne

#454 What is the Truth?

Jeanne Marie Ketchel
Channeled by Jan Ketchel

Dear Jeanne,
Do you have a message for your readers today? In spite of the calmness that you spoke about the other day there seems to be such inner struggle now to maintain equilibrium. Can you address this?

The test now is to stay innerly focused, but as you know, this is always the test. The inner journey is the one that leads to change and transformation, but it will only lead to such evolutionary growth if awareness is trained. Whether you still struggle with Part I of the training, or if you have advanced to Part II, or Part III, or even beyond, does not matter. For even with all of your accumulated knowledge of how the world works, so is your training constantly being distilled down to a single issue and that is, maintaining balance (inner/outer, spiritual/physical), at all times, with awareness.

Even though calmness may now appear to aid you in your inner work, so is it there, inside your self, that you must also find your calmness in order to continue your steady work on the self. Even as you encounter your demons outside of you, so must you return to your inner demons at the end of each day. In truth, are your inner demons far more powerful than anything outside of you. But I do not wish to speak of inner demons today.

I wish for continued focus to be placed on stable and steady inner/outer connection with the more intense focus now placed on your inner struggles. While outer calmness may reign only for a short period, use this time well to establish who is in charge in your inner world. Is your inner World Bank in charge, your inner spiritual advisor, your inner critic, your inner restaurateur, your inner schoolteacher, your inner child, your inner car salesman, your inner adult self, etc.? I suggest that even as you ponder the world situation, as it continues to deteriorate, so must you question how you too reflect such deterioration, even while you accept your struggles to grow and evolve beyond what is reflected in this outer world. Do not fall into maintaining superiority of ego, but do maintain humility of spirit, focused on truth.

Your lessons now in gaining awareness must remain focused on truth. Keep the word TRUTH always in your mental picture, speaking it silently to your self. Ask constantly: What is the truth? Look for this above all else as you cut deeper into your psyche for the answers to your thoughts and actions on your search for balance. Only with truth present, at all times, will you achieve balanced awareness.

So this is your struggle. You see? You are not so affected by the outer energy so much as you are very affected by the inner energy of your own struggles. The outer energy is merely a reflection of self, yet is it one of your greatest teachers. Resolution of self, and being able to find balanced awareness, is rooted in your desire to evolve.

So, first of all, I suggest that each day you replant your self in your desire to grow and connect with inner spirit, focused on truth. This is your seedling and your nurturing step, each day, as you remind your self to stay in balance. What kind of balance are we talking about anyway? We are talking about the balance of inner and outer awareness. I know it is far easier to plant the self in the outer world, so readily available, and offering such grounding measures. Often the inner spirit slumbers, but now must you remind your self, each day, that this is no longer true. Your spirit is awakened. So shake it awake with you, each morning, inviting it to remain present in your body, even as you go about your daily tasks, looking for your morning sustenance, and as you prepare for your day. Invite it to breakfast, lunch, and dinner, so that it may be present throughout your day. Feed it good conversation and, based in truth, speak about your desires and dilemmas together.

This is how you must constantly rekindle your connection. No matter where you are and how distant you may become during your day, so are you instantly connectable. If you turn inward and ask: where are you, so will your inner self immediately respond. This is how you will find your truths, My Dear Ones, by constantly turning inward.

Do not be afraid of your process. It is but one of purifying the self, of finding the golden self, of understanding the true meaning of life upon that earth, far beyond the mundane. Even though you reside in the mundane, so will it transform and change as you find your place of spirit and begin to observe, study, and learn from a new perspective, from spirit awareness.

I hope this helps in your wanderings and wonderings, My Dears. It is a time of struggle now, but it is a time of struggling to get to the underlying truths, and such times are indeed trying. Think of purity, truth, and balance leading to greater connection and awareness. That is what you seek now, both innerly and outerly.

Messages from Jeanne

#453 Sit Across the Table From Your Truth

Jeanne Marie Ketchel
Channeled by Jan Ketchel

Dear Jeanne,
Do you have a message for us today?

Do not look outside of you for the answers, but turn inward, even though calm may reign now more apparently outside of you. Turmoil, confusion, and disappointment may indeed be present if you continually look outwardly for gratification and purpose. Find your inner balance now, using the outer calm to force your attention into your own psyche, for otherwise is there risk for delay in processing that which is most meaningful.

By this interpretation of inner and outer energy, I propose that although your outer world and its energy may now appear to calm down and become almost boring, and even tiresomely non-available, so will this not be true. Do not look to stir up the energy outside of you now. Allow it to slumber, as it gathers force for future needs upon that earth. Use this time of calmness to attend to your inner work without the distractions normally so prevalent and presented by outer forces.

You are being offered a reverie over the next few days, perhaps stretching into a few weeks if you are lucky, as some very important data is processed. Take advantage of this time to process your own inner data. This includes, but is not limited to, what you have been shown and learned about your outer self, your outer life, your relationships, dilemmas, and false propositions over the past several weeks and months of turbulence. Use the knowledge of self that you have so diligently gained, taking it inwardly now, meditating upon its significance as you seek your next step.

Each day are you offered the opportunity to step in a new direction, to make a new choice about something; an opportunity, in fact, to change. This may simply be a change in attitude, a change in perspective, or a change in tone of voice, or a change in viewing what is presented to you by the voice of another. Your daily opportunity is showing you the way to begin making changes in your life, each step leading you to experiencing your own life, and life in general, differently.

Now, after all the energetic twists and turns of recent weeks, after the inner and outer turmoil, I suggest that you sit in quiet contemplation, in inner meditation, allowing for calmness to enter you, to enter your very bloodstream, slowing you down, down, down to a calm flow, to your own energetic resonance. Find this familiar inner calm again. And use it now for personal growth and change.

Now is the time to surrender to the facts, of self and others, that you have learned so well, so painfully, so joyfully, over the past weeks and months. Now is the time to sit and face your hard earned truths, to acknowledge them, and to speak to them, in inner calmness. If you are looking for a plan of action, go to your inner self, who knows the truths, and ask for advice on what comes next. You will not be disappointed by the answers you receive, though you may be greatly challenged and greatly surprised. Know that it will be the answer of truth, speaking plainly and directly, if you allow your self to go to it, sitting calmly across the table from it, and allow it to tell you what it knows.

This process must happen in inner calmness. Though your own voice of truth may be speaking all the time, you may not be able to hear it, until you dissolve your outer world, shutting your curtains, and going into your inner sanctum.

Recognize your truth by its deep resonance with your inner spirit self. You know your own truths. Do not even doubt this. But whether or not you are ready to accept them, and act on them, is another thing. That is what I suggest you use this energetic calmness to accomplish, to go innerly and find your truth, discovering how to fully accept it, and use it to guide you forward now in your inner life, but eventually in your outer life.

Decisions made now, based in truth, will allow for lessons in trust to be fully realized, while lessons in participating in life’s unfolding will emerge from the inner acknowledgment of self as guide. Use your calmness well, My Dear Ones. Find time now to visit your truths, meeting across the discussion table, calmly listening and speaking to each other, relying on your mutual acknowledgment of each other to show you something new.

It is not a time to act yet; it is a time to accept your truths. Taking action will only be right once you are clearly in alignment with the truths, of self and others, as they are revealed in your contemplation. Action will follow, but it must be right action or you will end up back in the meeting room again, to rehash the same truths over and over again, until they are more clearly defined and spoken. And later on, the energy may not be so cooperative as it is now.

Now is the time to take your seat at the table and have a calm talk with your self, freed of outer distractions. Your plans for the future must be hashed out innerly, or they will not be fully available, in energetic alignment for right action to move you forward. You are looking for distillation and purity of truth, for only then will you have clarity of purpose and love at your heart center to move forward with as your underlying energetic component and companion. Without clarity of truth, will your progress remain foggy and unclear. Your truth unaccepted, will keep you wondering and foundering upon your path. Think truth. Seek truth. Acknowledge truth, accepting it as your true guide now, as you go into inner calm, and see where that leads you now.

News and Notes

A Pilgrimage

Dear Readers,

We have added a few new books to our store, under the journeys category. The Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho and The Camino by Shirley MacLaine are two accounts of adventures along the same trail, the legendary Road to San Tiago, 500 miles across Spain. It has been our pleasure to read these two books back to back, experiencing the shamanic and the spiritual journeys each of these writers experienced on the long trek from France to the Atlantic Ocean by foot. To understand what it means to take a journey, to follow the signs, to be guided from within and without, to encounter our fears, our petty tyrants, our archetypes, to be confronted with letting go of this world, and more, are all beautifully encompassed in these books. If you are looking for something good to read on a cold winter’s weekend, you might find more than just that in these books.

Until next week,
Jan and Chuck