Tag Archives: projection

Chuck’s Place: Participation Mystique

What is that mysterious thing that we are struck by? - Photo by Chuck Ketchel
What is that mysterious thing that we are struck by?
– Photo by Chuck Ketchel

Magically and mysteriously we are emotionally struck by and drawn to the energy of another. That being, whom we hardly know, ruptures our emotional, mental, physical and spiritual homeostasis. We become riddled with fear, obsession, anxiety and awe.

This experience is not under conscious control; this is a seizure of the ego by energies much deeper and infinitely more powerful than our meagre bastion of rationality. We cannot talk ourselves out of it; we are drawn to it like a moth to a flame.

The energies that take possession of us are the energies of individuation, the deepest truths of who we are, driving us to rapturously discover our wholeness. However, these energies require the full participation of consciousness if we are to truly become fulfilled in our human form. In mandala terms, we must consciously “square the circle” if we are to become our wholeness. We begin to square the circle by becoming aware that we are in a state of seizure.

In a state of seizure our unconscious energies have bonded and melded with the energies of another. That is the inner experience and sometimes it is the outer experience as well—sometimes two people meet in an equal state of seizure. More often, though the inner experience is compelling, the seizure is one-sided. We are blindsided by the unconscious power of projection that mysteriously binds us with the soul and substance of another being. It matters not whether the experience is one of adoration, exaltation, love, or utter disgust—we are mysteriously and inseparably enmeshed with this other being. We are completely distraught, as a vital part of our own living essence walks freely and separately in the world apart from us in this other person. Our minds and hearts obsess as we fear the loss of our soul.

Our projection might be something else entirely! - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Our projection might be something else entirely!
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

Though that person may be on the other side of the earth, though they may not even know we exist, it matters not; we are inseparably entwined. Years might pass, but our utter devotion to this soulmate is undaunted. Time is meaningless in our timeless commitment to this transcendent experience; and that experience allows no other soulful being in. We may even marry another, but our soul remains faithful to its nemesis, on the deepest level never embracing our official partner. Such is the mystical participation of our soul with its chosen other.

Consciousness of our state of seizure cannot change the power of our unconscious emotional bondage, but it does afford us the ability to not blindly act in accordance with our unconscious mandate that lies at the root of our passion. The decision to hold back an action may throw us into great despair, or even depression, as the unconscious reacts by withdrawing its energies from even the simplest tasks of daily life. But such a decision does affirm our intention to act responsibly and with consciousness, even if it means banishment to the desert for a spell. The goal here is to establish a conscious relationship with the unconscious, based on a partnership versus a blind allegiance to the dictates of instinct and compulsion.

For consciousness, the task is to unearth and resolve the reason for the compulsive, mysterious tie to an other. This might mean facing issues from earliest childhood or deep woundings from other times in our lives, asking the inevitable questions that might lead to conscious clarification. Why has the unconscious chosen this being? Why am I being asked to take this journey with this person? Why is the unconscious insisting that something about this person so mirrors something about myself? Am I willing to take this journey and consciously face the facts as they unfold? Do I need to completely oppose the outer journey, and cloister myself to a direct inner encounter with the root of my desires?

Participation mystique, ultimately, is the language of the unconscious. It engages us in entanglements with beings in the world whom reflect the jewels of our own wholeness. If we read this language concretely, and passionately act out its energies as they possess us, we are strewn about the ocean waves without the benefit of a navigating vessel.

Consciousness gives us our vessel to navigate the ocean of infinity with. Consciousness gives us the choice to learn our lessons in the outer world or in the inner world. Consciousness allows us to shorten our terms of bondage to obsessive projection. Though we can’t consciously lift the obsession, we can oppose blind allegiance to it, whereby introverting the playing field and allowing for symbolic resolution within the self.

The alchemy of love... - Photo by Chuck Ketchel
The alchemy of love…
– Photo by Chuck Ketchel

Ultimately, love is a conscious process. True, the energies of the deepest human needs must enter a love relationship, but passion without consciousness can never equate to love. To be free to love, we must first be freed of the lessons of compulsion, that which is mysterious participation without consciousness.

Obsessions eventually lift as we integrate into our wholeness our genuine ability to love and be loved, as we square the circle of our being with consciousness. The unconscious will always communicate its secrets, but as full-fledged conscious partners we are freed to mystically participate in ongoing adventures of life and love.

From the mystique of it all,
Chuck

Note from Wikipedia regarding what Carl Jung said about the subject: “PARTICIPATION MYSTIQUE is a term derived from Lévy-Bruhl. It denotes a peculiar kind of psychological connection with objects, and consists in the fact that the subject cannot clearly distinguish himself from the object but is bound to it by a direct relationship which amounts to partial identity. (Jung, [1921] 1971: paragraph 781).”

Chuck’s Place: Energetic Freedom

Painting by Jan entitled "String Theory 1" Notice the cords of attachment dragging down the energy, blocking what lies behind... - Art by Jan Ketchel
Painting by Jan entitled “String Theory 1”
Notice the cords of attachment dragging down the energy, blocking what lies behind…
– Art by Jan Ketchel

Freedom is the ability to journey onward, no strings attached. Strings are projections of our energy that intertwine and attach to outside energy, whereby limiting a portion of our energetic essence’s independent movement. There is no negative judgment about attachment and commitment intended here, it’s simply a statement of energetic fact.

In an ultimate sense, freedom to not reincarnate requires the cutting of all energetic cords to attachments in this world. It’s the only way we can feely move beyond this world as a whole energetic being, releasing all outside attachments and retrieving our full energetic essence to journey freely.

Life in this world insists upon energetic attachment. The human playing field requires energetic attachment outside the self for survival and fulfillment. Refusal to attach while in human form is its own seed of reincarnation. We must have fulfillment in attachment in this world to be freed of our need for that human attachment, the prerequisite to end reincarnation.

The challenge throughout life is to take conscious responsibility, to keep inventory on our energetic attachments. Decisions must be made about the efficiency and value of our energetic investments.

We must examine the contents of our attics and cupboards, where we store our projected energy in the densest and heaviest form—in objects. As we sift through our accumulation of things, we must ask ourselves, why am I holding onto this? Do I ever use it? Do I ever look at it? Do I need it? Where did it come from? What outside energy is attached to it? What would it mean for me to get rid of it?

As we take the journey with these questions we are led into recapitulation. We experience the energetic history intertwined with our own energy, once projected into these dense objects. If indeed the object has no value to our current journey, it may be time to shed the weight of this attachment and free our energy that remains bound to it as long as it remains in our possession, hidden in the attic or otherwise. It’s not enough to simply find a new safe home for an object either. We must release our energy from it, truly let it go if we are to recapture our energy from it.

Do I really need all these things gathering dust and cobwebs? - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Do I really need all these things gathering dust and cobwebs?
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

If we give away an object that we are still attached to we are merely transferring the care of our energy to another caretaker. To release an object fully is to have no attachment to the fate of its outcome once we send it off. We will know that we have truly recapitulated when we can honestly walk away in lightness, granting the object full freedom to take its own continuing journey.

In more subtle form, we must take inventory of our digital energetic commitments too. It is rare that I see a dog being walked or a car being driven where eyes are not cast intermittently downward at incoming digital information. Facebook has become the largest human marketplace, or mall, where energetic strings of attention are deeply embedded.

Where is the freedom to move about fully in this world for 5 minutes unencumbered by the ping of the prison walls of an incoming text or posting that demands immediate attention and energetic commitment? How are we ever to discover and develop to the fullest potential our own energetic capacities of telepathy, clairvoyance, intuition, out-of-body exploration if our energy is completely captivated by digital dependence and servitude? Where is the freedom in such technological advancement if it binds the lion’s share of our energetic attention?

If our intent is energetic freedom, we must be frugal in our energetic attachments. If an object or energetic device binds our energy and evokes fear in us at the thought of letting go or being without, we must face the true condition of our servitude and release any illusion of freedom that the device purports to deliver.

Finally, in the area of relationship, we must be ruthlessly honest with ourselves as we inventory our commitments. Are those we journey with truly traveling companions, also energetically intent upon freedom? Are we holding onto sentimental relics or obligations that bind our energy and refuse to allow us to change and evolve? Have we met our archetypal obligations as parents and caretakers? Do we bind our energy to past roles that no longer really exist, and in so doing hinder the resumption of our own journeys to freedom? Do we need to challenge ourselves to go into the world and experience deep emotional commitment, a requirement to fulfillment? Only if we face these energetic facts squarely can we plot our energetic course to fulfillment and ultimate freedom.

In "String Theory 2" release is happening and the way is clearing... - Art by Jan Ketchel
In “String Theory 2” release is happening and the way is clearing…
– Art by Jan Ketchel

As we journey through this life we must attach. Recapitulation allows us to disentangle our energy from attachments that have completed their course and now require deep release for completion. Having our vital energy recouped in recapitulation, we can then apply it toward fulfillment of our potential and, when the time is right, for releasing all the strings as we journey deeper into the unfolding mystery, fully energetically present for what comes next!

Releasing strings,
Chuck

A Day in a Life: The Bardos & The Reality We Create

The consensus reality we all uphold... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
The consensus reality we all uphold…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

“The earth will never be destroyed,” said Chuck to me last night. “It’s a consensus reality.” What he meant was that there are millions of people upholding the idea of earth and everything in it as real. Each person now alive would have to drop their projections, lose their belief systems, free their minds, and release their attachments for the earth to suddenly fade from sight. It would be like taking a mass psychedelic trip or a giant thick fog rolling in, hiding from view all that we consider reality.

Does that idea send shockwaves of fear through you, the idea of having nothing to hold onto, nothing familiar in your life? Personally, I find the idea utterly freeing, the notion of all of this disappearing and there being nothing but the ethers: defined as a formless, infinitely elastic medium, also known as the space above the atmosphere of earth, the heavens composed of the moon, the stars and planets. Imagine the energy we’ve all projected into creating this reality, that we’ve spent our lives upholding, finally released, to be used for something far greater.

The bardos, negative emotional states, beliefs that we project within the consensus reality of this world, are always right next to us, ready to snag us and pull us back, away from such ideas as the one I postulate above. The bardos make up not only our consensus reality, the world we inhabit, but the world within as well, the world of thoughts and ideas that keep us caught in the repetition of our behaviors, habits, beliefs, stuck in the core issues that keep us from evolving, such as rejection, abandonment, entitlement, victimhood. The bardos are where worry, fear, indolence, strife, and negativity reside, popping up to defeat us in endless battles with the projections of this world. We turn to them more often than we turn to our spirits, which seek to be freed of all that is in this world so that we can enjoy “All That Is” in the ethers of infinity.

Our projections keep us bound to the bardos. I create my reality by that which I project. My needs, fears, and worries create my reality. If the consensus reality says that my symptoms indicate a certain condition, then I get sick. If I project my fears into the world, those fears come to haunt me. If I am certain that something bad will happen, then it will happen. In the bardos of my projections, in the thoughts I create, the ideas I uphold and the fears I hold onto, my world is created. If I am aware that I am doing this, however, I can change how I attach to the consensus reality. I can decide that no, I am not sick, I am not afraid, and only good things will happen to me. Suddenly, my reality shifts.

Detail of the Indolence card, the 8 of Cups from the Thoth Tarot Deck...
Detail of the Indolence card, the 8 of Cups from the Thoth Tarot Deck…

I also know that if I project my needs, fears and worries outwardly onto others then other people in my life will not advance either, even if I hold onto them with my deepest love. My sense of owning or entitlement to another human being only holds them back. We must let all beings go. Others will not move out of my sphere if I hold onto them with negative thinking either, with jealousies, hatred, or even with perceived brilliance, with adoration or worship. I must own and learn from all my projections if I am to free myself too to move on.

We have the power within us to change our reality, but do I really want to see the world obliterated? I don’t believe, as Chuck suggested last night, that it will ever happen at this worldly level, but it is what we are all charged with doing at an individual level. We must accept also that the world we have created is here for us to fully engage and learn from. We must fully live in this world—do our time so to speak—if we are to be at a point of detaching from it for the last time.

To fully live means that as we grow up and seek to make a mark in the world, we must encounter all that we project, all the challenges that belong to us in this lifetime. It’s so easy to fall back into the slumber of the bardos, but the true work of individuation is to journey through life becoming increasingly awake and aware of how things really work, and that takes work.

As we do our deep inner work, as we attempt to free ourselves of our personal projections and issues—in a process such as recapitulation, for example—we do free ourselves of this consensus reality in a step-by-step process of eliminating from our psyches all that once held us bound to the bardos. In the bardo states of this world we churn away overdoing, over indulging, over eating, over drinking, over stimulated to the point where our energy reserves are depleted and our spirits sunk to the depths, far from contact. In this depleted energy state we no longer contribute any energy either to the advancement of this world. As our own energy flags, we become nothing more than entities draining the energy that others contribute to a changing world.

Do I really want my world to disappear? - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Do I really want my world to disappear?
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

If we are to be part of a changing world we must constantly contribute new energy to that change by changing ourselves. It is not healthy to stay in the bardos, dulling our energy and the energy of the world. If we are challenged to do anything during our lives, it is to keep the flame of change burning by adding to its potential by challenging ourselves to constantly shift into states of higher awareness.

Just as the bardos are there always ready to grab us, to sabotage our progress, so too are our spirits right there too, ready to connect with us. Our true work of individuation is the work of gaining knowledge of our spirits, of learning to trust them as we allow ourselves to drop our projections and have experiences of the ethers, of our energetic selves, even while we are living in this consensus reality. It is the work of the human being who is aware of reincarnation to live up to the challenges of each lifetime and gain the momentum to move beyond continuous cycles of reincarnation.

In pulling our heads up out of the bardos long enough to grasp the possibility of the disappearance of this consensus reality as we know it, we offer ourselves new energy and new momentum. Without fear that we are missing out or losing something, as we grow into later adulthood we must learn how to let go of our attachments to all that is in this world, knowing full well that each of us, even those closest to us and whom we love the most, are on the same journey.

Each individual is challenged to move out of the bardos and advance to a higher level of consciousness. In so doing, at our death we do not leave this world a more depleted place but a brighter place, our evolving energy feeding the fires of change. I feel this kind of vibrant energy every time I communicate with Jeanne. Her evolving beyond this consensus reality has left a brightness in my own life, and I have learned more from my connection with her than had I not dared myself to trust her and take up the challenges she gave to me during my recapitulation.

We are all as separate and individual as each drop of rainwater on this leaf... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
We are all as separate and individual as each drop of rainwater on this leaf…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

And I am aware now too that my true purpose extends far beyond this life and this reality. And so I am not afraid to imagine the world disappearing and all that is in this reality releasing—as it will upon my own dying—because I know that all of us are part of something greater, just as Jeanne and her soul group are.

Just trying to add to the energy flame of changing consciousness,
Jan

Chuck’s Place: The Opus of OCD

Alchemy in nature... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Alchemy in nature…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder can be viewed as the psyche’s attempt to achieve its wholeness through the ego’s encounter with its projections upon the outside world. On the surface this might appear contradictory to the debilitating impact of obsessions and compulsions, but a deeper understanding of the psyche’s drive for perfection, through the challenge of sorting through this disorder, may serve to redirect the focus of these powerful debilitations toward the far greater opus of achieving wholeness.

Carl Jung spent much of his professional career rescuing the archaic texts of alchemy from obscurity and through channeling alchemical information from the Akashic Records through various alchemical characters of his active imagination. Many astute clinical scholars have been utterly perplexed at the clinical usefulness of these musings. Jung never cared much for making his discoveries easily understood; he was an avid explorer of the unconscious who left for the future the task of discerning their pragmatic utility. Hardly a scholar, I find myself nonetheless tasked with making some of his discoveries relevant. And so, with OCD I find incredible alchemical relevancy.

Alchemy was, in an outer sense, the precursor of modern chemistry. But at its inner core, alchemy was the mystical tradition of many renowned scientists—Sir Isaac Newton among them—who sought to experience and resolve the mysteries of the soul. The opus of the alchemist was to take matter and transform it through a series of processes into gold, the symbol of ultimate value. These processes involved the differentiation, purification and synthesis of opposing elements into a cohesive whole. Similarly, the goal of human life is to reconcile the great polarities of living in this world with the energetic dimension beyond this world to achieve a golden wholeness of completion.

The alchemist started with matter in all its impurities—called the nigredo—that is, matter in its completely contaminated, mixed up state. It was then subjected to a series of alchemical operations to reach the full purity of gold. These purification processes included such functions as solutio, the dissolution of matter in water, as well as calcificatio, the burning off of impurities by fire. Jung saw these steps in the process as the alchemist’s projection of their own psyches onto the matter, and their ultimate art as a process of transformation. Transformation requires a sealed container where these operations can be securely housed.

In OCD, the psyche frequently projects the impurity of its internal polarities onto the contents of the material world. This intermingling is analogous to the mixing of the contaminated material at the beginning of the alchemist’s opus. In OCD, powerful compulsions elicit behaviors to separate out this contamination through ritual practices. An individual under the influence of these powerful projections is tormented by the potential danger of contamination and frequently engages the alchemical function of solutio—excessive hand washing, for instance—to rid the self of the impurities of contamination. Eventually, these unconscious projections inundate and ultimately overwhelm and severely restrict even the simplest of functions in daily life.

Beginnings of transformation... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
Beginnings of transformation…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

The opus for OCD treatment becomes one of detaching from the control of, and the automatic infliction of, the projections onto the outer world. The ego cannot control the projections, but it can take a behavioral stand against the compulsions that issue forth from the unconscious. Thus, although an obsession insists that “I’m contaminated” after a handshake, I can refuse to do the cleansing behavior that the compulsion insists upon as a means of relief. The true cleansing, the true purification process rests here, in the ego’s stand for reality over the projective veils of illusion. Here the ego acts as the sealed container for the alchemical process by bearing the tension of the urges of the projective psyche through not following its commands.

In its contained retort, the ego seals in the energy of the projective psyche and bears the mounting tension of its energetic pressure. This mounting pressure, seeking release, is the fire that then burns through the veils of the projective illusions. The substance is clarified and true reality is readied for synthesis into gold. The ego, thus having passed its test, accrues a piece of its lost wholeness. The Opus of OCD meanwhile moves on to its next mysterious projective challenge.

Eventually, the energies of the psyche transform OCD itself into a fact of a former life, no longer an energetic determinant. When that happens, the clarified energetic awareness thus achieved moves forward, freed to see and be in the world as it truly is.

Everything matters,
Chuck

Chuck’s Place: The Nature Of Defense

Nature's defenses in control, oppressing life... - From the Thoth Tarot deck
Nature’s defenses in control, oppressing life…
– From the Thoth Tarot deck

The core intent of defense is to protect. Defenses are the actions of the survival instinct; they are nature at work. Both Freud and Jung agreed that psychological defenses originated beneath consciousness, a product of the instinctual or archetypal psyche.

We do not choose our defenses; they are the automatic compulsive actions the deep psyche employs to protect the self against real or imagined threats. Two of the most powerful and deeply-rooted-in-nature defenses are projection and dissociation.

If we feel uncomfortable within ourselves about something we’ve said, done, thought, or felt, our protective psyche might assess this as a threat to our self-esteem or ego integrity. Its response might be to employ the defense of projection whereby it literally projects blame outside of the self, rearranging our conscious perception of reality to keep the culprit at a safe distance, securely planted in someone else. On a grand scale this is how America keeps itself safe from facing its own deviousness: the bad guy is always the devil somewhere else, who we have to eliminate, thus our moral superiority is preserved.

Dissociation is perhaps nature’s most powerful defense. When we are confronted with a danger inwardly or outwardly—that our unconscious deems potentially lethal—dissociation will save us by splitting us into pieces, preserving our most precious and vital self by submerging it deeply within the safekeeping womb of the unconscious. Outwardly, parts of our ego self remain at the surface as an adaptive or survival self, functionally charged with navigating life disconnected from its wholeness. The English psychoanalyst Winnicott called this self the false self because it always senses that it is just functioning or pretending to be engaged in life, secretly knowing that its most vital parts no longer participate in outer life.

Projection and dissociation are archetypal defenses of the instinctive psyche. These are the default settings of our self-preservation. Unfortunately, when life is governed by these defenses it may be safe but totally unsatisfying, as life’s deepest needs go unmet. If the adult self attempts to raise its vulnerable parts and bring them into life, the instinctive psyche frequently opposes this action and sabotages the effort using negative thoughts, guilt, or shame. The instinctive psyche is invested in survival; wholeness threatens survival, as we are challenged to own fully our projected and dissociated parts, which may be laden with traumatic experience that could threaten ego integrity.

The solution to this dilemma lies in recapitulation. In recapitulation the adult self takes 100% responsibility for healing, releasing the instinctive psyche of its automatic protection. As the adult ego bears the full tension of encountering and integrating its parts, the instinctive psyche simultaneously tests the adult self, confronting it with all that has been projected and dissociated from and all of its accompanying terrors of disintegration. This testing process of the adult ego’s ability to manage the fullness of the self is a necessary interaction between archetypal defense and conscious ego. This may result in a one-step forward two-steps back kind of process for a while, but ultimately, once the instinctive psyche sees the ego’s ability to manage its own healing, the higher self is freed to support the ego in the recapitulation process through increasing synchronicities, dreams, and visions that lead to retrieval of its lost wholeness.

The ego unfettered and assuming full responsibility, in alignment with the grail, the true self... - from the Thoth Tarot deck
The ego unfettered and assuming full responsibility, in alignment with the grail, the true self…
– from the Thoth Tarot deck

Evolution is really about assuming full conscious responsibility for our lives so that we may be available for all else that is. If we allow our unconscious nature to merely keep us safe, it will, but only through its compulsive defenses and at the expense of our wholeness, our fulfillment, and our evolutionary potential. Is that really satisfying? Or are we ready to do the work to free ourselves from the divisiveness of our instinctual defenses and claim our true wholeness?

Recapitulation is work that is evolutionary for the individual—know thy self—and the world-at-large too. In moving beyond our personal projections and dissociations we open ourselves to more fully experiencing and participating in life in ways that we are unavailable for while under the control of nature’s defenses.

There exists another aspect to nature as well, the interconnected oneness of everything, and that’s really the nature our evolutionary self is striving to discover and cultivate. In fact, the collective charge of our time seems to be pushing us all to go beyond the self. That is really our greatest evolutionary endeavor.

Going beyond, with love and gratitude,
Chuck

Note: We pulled these two cards this morning, certainly in alignment with the publishing of this blog and our pursuit of truth and spirit.