Welcome to Chuck’s Place! This is where Chuck Ketchel, LCSW-R, expresses his thoughts, insights, and experiences! Currently, Chuck posts an essay once a week, currently on Tuesdays, along the lines of inner work, psychotherapy, Jungian thought and analysis, shamanism, alchemy, politics, or any theme that makes itself known to him as the most important topic of the week. Many of the shamanic and psychological terms used in Chuck’s essays are defined in Tools & Definitions on our Psychotherapy page.
Jan and I drove into our little village of Red Hook yesterday to be greeted at the main crossroad by a pickup truck sporting a huge half- American half-confederate flag blowing in the wind in the bed of the truck. The energy of the war drums pounding is palpable everywhere. How to respond? We turn to some sage guidance from the person we consider to be the wisest of the 20th Century, whose reach has yet to be fully realized, C. G. Jung, from his collected letters Volume 2, p. 502-3.
On April 28, 1959 Jung responded to a question as to why he didn’t protest against the injustice done to Tibet by the Chinese occupation. Here is his response:
“You are quite right: I also ask myself why I do not use the means that appear to be at my disposal to do my bit in combating the atrocities that are going on in the world. I can give no rational reasons for this. In such matters I usually wait for an order from within. I have heard nothing of the kind. The world situation has got so hopelessly out of hand that even the most stirring words signify nothing. It would be more to the point, or so it seems to me, if each of us were sure of his own attitude. But an individual who thinks that his voice is heard afar merely exposes himself to the suspicion that he is one of that band who have said something in order to prove to themselves that they have done something whereas in reality they have done nothing at all. Words have become too cheap. Being is more difficult and is therefore fondly replaced by verbalizing. Unfortunately this is all I have to say on the matter.”
What Jung is suggesting is that we act when we hear the order to do so from within ourselves. That order issuing not from impulse but from the quiet certainty of the heart. In the meantime the real contribution is to take on one’s own being, truly reconciling the opposing energies within the self. This is the playing field for world peace, the holographic solution.
Spirit and Matter are the building blocks of humanity. Spirit is invisible, matter is substantial and therefore observable. We infer the existence of spirit by the effects it has on matter. If I decide to stand up and walk to the door, my invisible mind, the spirit dimension of my being, moves my body, the matter or material part of my being.
Thus, spirit begins with the mental plane, which, granted, uses the physical brain but is not identical with it. Consciousness functions outside the human body as an energy body capable of defying the laws of time and space. This dimension of spirit experience, though a latent potential for everyone, usually remains dormant except under extraordinary circumstances like a physical trauma, which shakes the energy body out of the physical body in an OBE. In a generally less uncomfortable way our spirit or energy body separates from the physical body in dreaming every night.
Matter is all of nature. Nature is governed by instincts and inherited programs, which at the human level are called archetypes. Archetypes are nature’s inherited programs that can assume control of human behavior from a deeply unconscious level. For example, many people who were sexually abused in childhood lose conscious memory of their experiences almost immediately after they occur. Certainly this is not a conscious decision. This amnesic reaction is governed by an archetypal program deeply embedded in nature’s program for survival at such a traumatic moment. That program reactivates—generally in midlife, to facilitate the achievement of wholeness at a mature stage of life—as memory in the form of flashbacks, beckoning reconciliation with consciousness.
Consciousness is fixated on rationality as the governing spirit of our time: spirit intellectis. Juan Enriquez, a scientific visionary, has basically stated what most people really believe: that we are God now, that our intellect is God, and that we are completely in charge of our own and the world’s evolution. Certainly the words bellowed from the United Nations General Assembly yesterday reflect such an attitude.
This kind of inflated spirit erupted with Naziism, which had as its god the creation of the perfect superior human. Interestingly, C. G. Jung stated that Naziism was the eruption of the pagan god Wotan, long suppressed in the human psyche through the impact of Christianity, which had served to help humanity advance spirit over the dominance of its nature roots.
When spirit dissociates itself from matter, matter seeks revenge. That’s where we are now: matter is at war with spirit. Matter, as nature, is deemed irrational. Spirit, as mind, is deemed rational. Thus the war is played out as the irrational versus the rational, matter versus spirit.
Nature is dealing deadly blows to humanity at present. Simply view the state of our islands of paradise in the Caribbean. My heart goes out to all my friends there in the front line of nature’s forward march. The Caribbean is at the vanguard of our changing world. This has archetypal underpinnings as a paradise lost, representing a major shift in human consciousness. We can only return to the garden now with a wholly new adaptive attitude, which is already emerging from this precious part of the world as it braces for nature’s next round of energetic impact.
In human form, nature, as the irrational, has seized control of major world leaders, particularly here in America. These untethered spirits are governed by their own whims, which change dramatically, like the wind, day by day, with no rhyme or reason, as the fate of the world hangs in the balance.
The deeper issue that all these world happenings reflect is the relationship between the irrational and rational within ourselves. Our ego spirit intellectis simply devalues and dismisses all that is matter, and the laws that govern it. Our bodies and our physical world are filled with food stuffs and objects alien to the true needs of the body and the planet. Our ego spirit cares largely about me and mine; let the world community fend for itself. Our ego spirit identifies with reason and so dissociates from or tries to control, for its own gain, the basic instincts.
The war we are in must be fought within individuals, each of us striving to reconcile our own spirit and matter selves. The ego must ground itself in the body and in deeply unconscious nature. This means facing the truths of body ailments that are expressing nature’s resentments and needs. This means facing, feeling, expressing, regulating and integrating nature’s powerful emotions, which express important needs and send archetypal messages that have the potential, if paid attention to, to steer the spirit in consort with material reality and need, that is, the true needs of the body and the planet.
We are all empowered here and now to make the changes in our own lives that are necessary to reconcile with nature. This is not the time to luxuriate in OBEs, dissociated from our body and our nature. The playing field is spirit-in-body now, doing our best to bring this yin and yang of ourselves into working harmony.
Let’s calm nature by listening to her, within and without, acquiescing to the true needs of self and planet. This is the true spirit of the matter. Have love, compassion, and care without, but seek the needed transformation within.
The truth is that our world leadership does not grasp the heart of the matter. Our greatest playing field is restoring the Tao within the self. As within, so without. This is the spirit that really matters now.
I consult the I Ching, one of my favorite oracles, for guidance as we pause in the destructive wake of hurricanes Harvey and Irma. The I Ching first delivers Hexagram #48, the Well.
Nature’s lessons, water & wind… – Photo by Jan Ketchel
The central feature of this hexagram is the pure water that springs from the earth’s depths to nourish all life. In the plant kingdom nature provides roots to trees and plants to channel this vital resource to sustain life. In the human species this archetype manifests in the building of the well that then serves to deliver this resource to support life in human communities.
Emphasis is placed on the quality of construction of the well as well as the social structure needed to maintain its purity, balanced use, and sustainability. I receive a moving line in the 6th place, actually a quite favorable line. In essence, the message is: the truth flows freely; now it’s up to us to decide what to do with it. Like water raised in a bucket from the depths of the well, the truth is the life-sustaining spring water message of nature, raised to the level of full consciousness.
What are the truths that now flow freely in the flooded waters of these hurricanes? Global warming, climate change, is a fact. The rise in temperature of ocean waters is fuel to hurricanes that are becoming increasingly powerful and destructive. Can we acknowledge this fact, and take actions to change the warming trend?
The social structure that embraces unlimited growth as its imperative results in overpopulation that strains nature’s resources. As well, the high concentration of industrial complexes, with their toxic stores, threaten the purity of natural resources and the ability to sustain life.
These are broader truths presented to our collective species. On an individual personal level the I Ching is telling us that the facts, the changes we need to make in our personal lives, are presenting themselves to us quite clearly. The confusion or ambivalence we ordinarily feel is lifted now; the truth is that we know what we need to do, what is right.
Perhaps these truths are being clarified through symptoms in our bodies, our physical nature, that point to needed changes. Perhaps the messages are delivered from our spirit nature through the powerful emotions or insights we are receiving. Perhaps our truths are manifesting synchronistically in the events manifesting in the events of our personal lives that dramatize obvious need for change.
These truths are staring us in the face. In fact, the I Ching gives the follow-up, Hexagram #57, the Penetrating Wind, to further drive home its point. The wind is the penetrating influence that breaks up the thick clouds that block the truth. These deeply penetrating hurricane winds have been relatively sparing of human life so far, but devastating to the environments that have sustained them.
Nature is asking humans to penetrate the truths revealed. The well represents our modern governance of life’s most precious resource, pure drinking water. We are clearly being humbled, but not destroyed. We must heal our divide by considering the true needs of our planet, by being willing to sacrifice our power and special interest drives in the service of survival. To survive we must respect and uphold the vital balance nature requires to sustain life.
In the hologram of our individual lives we are being shown that the truths we must acquiesce to, to bring ourselves into sustainable balance, are abundantly evident now. The eclipse has passed, the storms have revealed the truths.
Time to penetrate the facts and forge a plan of action. Like the rebuilding of devastated communities progress will be slow but deliberate, but can be built now upon a secure foundation of truth.
The great changes we must make in our individual lives are upon us. Nature in some form has prepared the way for them, what awaits is consciousness to align with and be nourished by the pristine, spring water truths freely flowing to us now.
Sixty years ago, C. G. Jung predicted: “…The trend of the time is one-sidedness and disagreement, and thus the dissociation and separation of the two worlds will be accomplished. Nothing will prevent this fact. We have no answer yet that would appeal to the general mind, nothing that could function as a bridge.” *
The sunrise, a natural bridge between night and day… – Photo by Jan Ketchel
Through her fury now, nature is forging a path of heart to bridge the great divide. Nature’s floods are pressing the human spirit to rise to the oneness of overarching love.
Nature’s strategy is apparent: Saturation. As one storm passes the next will soon arrive. In rapid succession the floodgates are overwhelmed. Human resistance is leveled as nature exacts her toll and reshapes our world.
Ego is slipping in empty rhetoric. Exhaustion and utter necessity are compelling ego to shift from its tales of power to instead see the true needs of the self, the populace, and the world. Survival now requires dedication to the truth.
In truth, nature teaches that a city founded on the principle of unlimited growth, with such an extreme concentration of resources and toxins, is no longer safe.
The time of the metropolis is over. No walls can hold back nature’s guiding imperative. Human ingenuity must learn humility to make peace with nature. This is living in the Tao. In the Tao one recognizes and occupies one’s proper place. To resist what is is merely a sandcastle bridge. Going with nature’s flow is the only way to go.
Within the self, the fire and fury of the animal disrupts cerebral hegemony. The floods of passion and emotion stir beneath the belt and threaten even the greatest defense, reason. Reason is no match for anxiety and fear. It’s time to bridge the divide within with a sustainable bridge. The ego metropolis is slipping. Time to make way to solid ground.
Would that the fire and fury of aggressive energy could be contained by reason and détente! But the joint rhetoric and escalating nuclear tests join nature’s fury with hair-trigger threat.
The dissociation and separation of worlds that Jung speaks about in the above quotation are the pairs of opposites within the human animal, the inner worlds of the rational ego and the unconscious, nature’s way. Sixty years ago Jung was worried that we would not find our way to reconciliation of these dissociated parts before it was too late. Indeed, the human animal has been neglected for far too long while the ego and reason have ruled. The apocalyptic release of the stored energies of the animal, previously satisfied in the cinema, can no longer be vicariously contained in theatre or fantasy. Nature demands attention.
How can we reckon with nature within our personal hologram?
To begin with, we must claim ownership of our own animal nature. When our boundaries are violated we must recognize the fury of the animal within us. When we are hungry we must recognize the primal hunger of the animal within us that perhaps craves a juicy fat steak on a bone. We must recognize our animal narcissism—me first, I have no interest in sharing. We must acknowledge the depths of our sexual desire, perhaps the most disowned instinct of our modern time. We must acknowledge our insatiable power drive that always wants to dominate, or wants more of something.
If we can acknowledge the passions of the animal within us we can bring it home, as opposed to hating it and projecting it onto those we would like to blame for our woes.
Of course, owning the barbaric, murderous, philandering, self-centered impulses of one’s inner animal creates a tense inner domain when pitted against higher reason and the values of the human spirit. A most tense opposition is sure to arise. But if spirit can suspend judgment and appreciate the instinctual knowledge of its rowdy animal partner, and safely live its needs, an inner bridge of balance might be achieved.
The technology of the Greek and Roman Dionysian festivals, as well as the Christian traditions that followed them, found a way to ritually act out the orgiastic impulses of sexuality, murder, and eating of the flesh and bring them into spiritual harmony with the higher values of the human spirit. Even today, Carneval is still celebrated in many countries. And Mardi Gras, within the boundaries of our own United States, offers the opportunity to bring into balance the desires of the flesh and the desires of the spirit, days or weeks of revelry followed by days or weeks of spiritual contemplation.
Nature now is delivering a barbarous onslaught through floods and rage. The human spirit finds itself communing with nature’s impulses by reacting in loving concern and heroism. Such loving response balances and bridges the divide.
Inwardly, we can personally express the fullness of our passions in our creativity. Perhaps we must allow ourselves to write about or paint the forbidden, the unacceptable. Perhaps we need to commit to the ritual of sacred sex in a contained yet fully lived way. Perhaps we must allow our rageful impulses to be expressed, setting boundaries and allowing our true feelings to be spoken. Perhaps we must devour our food with the frenzy of a wild beast—to hell with civilized decorum! Belches included! Perhaps at least ritually once in a while!
Perhaps, as well, we must learn to sacrifice. Sacrifice is an inherent imperative in our own nature that must also be lived. For parents to let their children go into the world they must sacrifice them to life. Fasting, letting go of something, not acting upon an impulse, acquiescing to the flow of life are all forms of sacrifice. Nature demands limitation and sacrifice of spirit ambition that is not in accordance with her laws.
Through creating personal rituals we can contain our raw impulses until a set-aside sacred time and space, where we can then allow ourselves to live them out in some ritual symbolic way. Spirit containment of animal impulses that joins sacrifice with lived impulse forms a solid bridge to joining spirit and animal in higher communion.
These are tools for the individual to employ to bring animal and spirit into new balance. Though nature has taken the lead in forging a new bridge with spirit through the storms we face, we are all empowered to contribute to this bridge in the privacy of our own lives. Perhaps we can give Jung the answer he longed for, before it’s too late.
The Archetypes as they might appear… – Photo by Jan Ketchel
Father’s sperm sows Mother’s egg. Mother’s body fleshes out Father’s spirit. All human life issues from this primal happening. The basic archetypes of mother and father traverse the full breadth of human life, from creator to created to beloved.
Children first encounter these powerful building blocks of human life in their personal parents who generate, sustain, and protect their lives. Freud enshrined this primal nursery scene of dependence and love upon omnipotent parents as the core playing field of life, such was his conviction of the immutable powers and attraction of one’s family of origin.
Jung went on to demonstrate how the mother and father archetypes are projected beyond parents onto gods, the sun and the moon, kings and queens, presidents, authority figures, friends, lovers and spouses. As children grow, the numinous energy of the mother and father archetypes extend into encounters with people and objects in the world beyond the family crucible.
With the dawning of adolescence and the emergence of sexuality young people begin to experience desires and compulsions that generate fixations of falling in love. The object of these projections, the one wanted, is imbued with the numinous energy and need that harkens back to the primal archetypes of life: Mother and Father.
This numinous energy projected upon a desired other may be experienced as ecstatic bliss, terror, anxiety, paralysis or even aggression, the drive to conquer that which feels too powerful. Way beyond adolescence we may still tremble at making contact or feeling worthy enough to approach the one who embodies the god/goddess energy of these projections.
In ancient times rights of initiation to facilitate an individual’s ability to mature into an adult capable of making contact with a coveted other were commonplace. The Dionysian Mysteries of Ancient Greece and Rome were just one of the many cults serving this function.
In our modern rational world, we no longer value the transformative power nor the necessity of formal initiation rites to facilitate the maturity needed to take on the deeper challenges of meeting and fully connecting with a blessed other. The task of initiation in the modern world takes place in the inner sanctuary of the human psyche and body, often through the guidance and support of a knowledgeable therapist.
The call to initiation is frequently encountered in the anxiety, terror, longing, and excitement—all numinous energy—of a potential relationship. The stages of the initiation process are directed by the problems encountered in approaching a relationship.
Often, the first problem is the power of the projection itself. The desired other may be experienced as a god or goddess whose glow is so powerful that you feel unable to actually look directly into the solar rays experienced as emanating from this human form. Perhaps the heart pounds so hard it can be heard out loud; perhaps the vocal cords seize up, unable to make a sound. These are the presenting problems.
Perhaps this desired person appears in a dream with a loving, welcoming smile and you are drawn into sensuous embrace. Upon awakening you feel warmed, in a state of grace. Perhaps you spend the day immersed in the communion of the dream-memory, generating more and more fantasies of delight. Perhaps this secret romance goes on for weeks, a love affair with an inner god/goddess image in your private world of fantasy.
Suddenly, one night, this dream lover may appear in a new dream with another date. You are no longer desired! The impact: devastation and depression.
What is the lesson here from the god/goddess?
Perhaps you have been lured into the trap of feeling entitled to own this living figure whom you have enslaved in fantasy to attend to your sensual desires. Perhaps the god/goddess is teaching that this is infantile behavior, an adult expecting the one-sided attention appropriate only in the nursery.
Furthermore, the god/goddess may also be pointing out that nothing has really been achieved, as no real or substantial contact has been made with the human being so powerfully pined for.
Another dream may then issue forth that signals you to be a hero, to cross a raging river despite the odds. The prompting of such a dream might be challenging you to be your own hero, to shield your eyes from the overpowering projection of the god/goddess and actually make small talk with the real human person of interest, to go beyond your comfort zone and put it out there.
And so, the initiation proceeds with the waking task to approach the desired one, as well as the private task to cease indulging in infantile fantasy and face the reality that genuine contact with a human being requires getting to know them, in a down-to-earth way.
The various tasks of initiation are many sided and are determined by the specific needs of each individual unique personality. The temples of initiation are alive and active within our own inner beings. We encounter the gods and goddesses of those temples in many of our human relationships.
If we remain uninitiated we will experience ourselves as children, still needing the sustenance and protection of others. This returns us to the vicissitudes of Freud’s Oedipus complex, projected onto our adult relationships, which will continue to present us with all kinds of challenges.
Best to take up the journey of adulthood, launched successfully by an active engagement of ego with the vicissitudes of the primal archetypes that guide us all on the road to maturity.
That’s what it’s all about, folks!
Chuck
A blog by Chuck Ketchel, a man of knowledge; one who knows that he doesn’t know
