CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORKS
"The art of writing is the art of discovering what you believe." -Flauber
“A word is a bud attempting to become a twig. How can one not dream while writing? It is the pen which dreams. The blank page gives the right to dream.” --Gaston Bachelard
"The art of writing is the art of discovering what you believe." -Flauber
“A word is a bud attempting to become a twig. How can one not dream while writing? It is the pen which dreams. The blank page gives the right to dream.” --Gaston Bachelard
Diamond Body, Iona Miller, 1981
“It is high time we realized that it is pointless to praise the light and preach it if nobody can see it. It is much more needful to teach people the art of seeing. For it is obvious that far too many people are incapable of establishing a connection between the sacred figures and their own psyche: they cannot see to what extent the equivalent images are lying dormant in their own unconscious. In order to facilitate this inner vision we must first clear the way for the faculty of seeing. How this is to be done without psychology, that is, without making contact with the psyche, is, frankly, beyond my comprehension.” --Jung, Psychology and Alchemy
Global emphasis on urgent ecological awareness implies a reflowering of the Neo-Platonic and alchemical notion of ANIMA MUNDI the Soul of the World. Anima Mundi is not an archetype, but an archetypal way of seeing -- seeing through the world. Our narcissistic tendency is self-absorption, over-valuing individual subjectivity at the expense of the real problems of the world. The language of Anima Mundi includes beauty, aesthetics, depth, inner life and political activity -- psychological practices of larger groups.
" The function of art is to provide a sense of existence, not the insurance of some meaning; so that those who need meaning insurance, who do not feel confident or who are shocked when they learn that the system Of meanings that sustained them in life has fallen apart, they must surely be those who have not yet tried, with intensity, with continuity or sufficiently convincing, that sense of existence, spontaneous and voluntary rise, which is the first and more Deep characteristic of being and that is the competence of the ART OF AWAKE.
What is, I ask, the meaning of a Flower? And not having it, then, wouldn't the flower exist? The best way to start the day
Joseph Campbell, The Flight of the Wild Gander. Explorations in the mythological dimension (mia traduzione)
“It is high time we realized that it is pointless to praise the light and preach it if nobody can see it. It is much more needful to teach people the art of seeing. For it is obvious that far too many people are incapable of establishing a connection between the sacred figures and their own psyche: they cannot see to what extent the equivalent images are lying dormant in their own unconscious. In order to facilitate this inner vision we must first clear the way for the faculty of seeing. How this is to be done without psychology, that is, without making contact with the psyche, is, frankly, beyond my comprehension.” --Jung, Psychology and Alchemy
Global emphasis on urgent ecological awareness implies a reflowering of the Neo-Platonic and alchemical notion of ANIMA MUNDI the Soul of the World. Anima Mundi is not an archetype, but an archetypal way of seeing -- seeing through the world. Our narcissistic tendency is self-absorption, over-valuing individual subjectivity at the expense of the real problems of the world. The language of Anima Mundi includes beauty, aesthetics, depth, inner life and political activity -- psychological practices of larger groups.
" The function of art is to provide a sense of existence, not the insurance of some meaning; so that those who need meaning insurance, who do not feel confident or who are shocked when they learn that the system Of meanings that sustained them in life has fallen apart, they must surely be those who have not yet tried, with intensity, with continuity or sufficiently convincing, that sense of existence, spontaneous and voluntary rise, which is the first and more Deep characteristic of being and that is the competence of the ART OF AWAKE.
What is, I ask, the meaning of a Flower? And not having it, then, wouldn't the flower exist? The best way to start the day
Joseph Campbell, The Flight of the Wild Gander. Explorations in the mythological dimension (mia traduzione)
BEAUTY
"Archetypal psychology recognizes that the soul needs a vital relationship to the gods. The soul thrives when it acknowledges a divine factor in any human endeavor. Hillman's psychology of beauty restores sensitivity to one of the most neglected, and therefore, for human life, most troubling of the gods, Aphrodite. He understands her as the divine figure immanent in the world of sense. Naked, jeweled, alluring Aphrodite is nature and culture exposing itself to the soul with its beauty, ornament, and form. The soul delights and, to use a Renaissance term, feeds on this beauty.
"Beauty may not be the primary concern of a literalistic, achieving attitude toward life, but when soul is placed in the center, beauty takes on absolute importance. To the soul, beauty is not accidental or peripheral. Neoplatonic tradition would say that the human soul longs for union with its matrix, the world soul. A vital, sensitive aesthetic sense is the means by which the human soul finds that reunion, that intimacy with the world. When society splits its relationships to the world into functioning on the one hand and entertainment on the other, soulful work and pleasure are lost.
"Admittedly, beauty and aesthetics, like everything else, cast a broad, dark shadow. Hillman writes about certain aspects of the shadow of aestheticism. It can have a pure preciousness and shallowness. It can glorify the beautiful to the extent that it represses the hardness and sharpness of life. It is possible to become a monotheist in the religion of Venus.
"In spite of these dangers, the aesthetic life is particularly important in our time because it is so overlooked and undervalued. Hillman recommends that to revive this aesthetic sense we might look to the animals and see the beauty they reveal in expressing their own natures so directly. Our proper form of display, he says, is rhetoric, our fantasy-filled capacity to speak, tell stories, paint, dance, sing, make music, build buildings, write letters, make movies, and so on. The beautiful, and therefore the soul, is in the everyday display of our natures.
"Narcissus was saved when he saw the beauty of his own face reflected in a pool of water. We are saved from our narcissistic distancing from the world when we see our own beauty in the display of everyday life and in the daily arts of the soul. We find our own face, the unique visage of our soul, in the world's display of itself."
--James Hillman, Blue Fire, ed. Thomas Moore
"Archetypal psychology recognizes that the soul needs a vital relationship to the gods. The soul thrives when it acknowledges a divine factor in any human endeavor. Hillman's psychology of beauty restores sensitivity to one of the most neglected, and therefore, for human life, most troubling of the gods, Aphrodite. He understands her as the divine figure immanent in the world of sense. Naked, jeweled, alluring Aphrodite is nature and culture exposing itself to the soul with its beauty, ornament, and form. The soul delights and, to use a Renaissance term, feeds on this beauty.
"Beauty may not be the primary concern of a literalistic, achieving attitude toward life, but when soul is placed in the center, beauty takes on absolute importance. To the soul, beauty is not accidental or peripheral. Neoplatonic tradition would say that the human soul longs for union with its matrix, the world soul. A vital, sensitive aesthetic sense is the means by which the human soul finds that reunion, that intimacy with the world. When society splits its relationships to the world into functioning on the one hand and entertainment on the other, soulful work and pleasure are lost.
"Admittedly, beauty and aesthetics, like everything else, cast a broad, dark shadow. Hillman writes about certain aspects of the shadow of aestheticism. It can have a pure preciousness and shallowness. It can glorify the beautiful to the extent that it represses the hardness and sharpness of life. It is possible to become a monotheist in the religion of Venus.
"In spite of these dangers, the aesthetic life is particularly important in our time because it is so overlooked and undervalued. Hillman recommends that to revive this aesthetic sense we might look to the animals and see the beauty they reveal in expressing their own natures so directly. Our proper form of display, he says, is rhetoric, our fantasy-filled capacity to speak, tell stories, paint, dance, sing, make music, build buildings, write letters, make movies, and so on. The beautiful, and therefore the soul, is in the everyday display of our natures.
"Narcissus was saved when he saw the beauty of his own face reflected in a pool of water. We are saved from our narcissistic distancing from the world when we see our own beauty in the display of everyday life and in the daily arts of the soul. We find our own face, the unique visage of our soul, in the world's display of itself."
--James Hillman, Blue Fire, ed. Thomas Moore
"The artist’s task is to save the soul of mankind; and anything less is a dithering while Rome burns. Because of the artists, who are self-selected, for being able to journey into the Other, if the artists cannot find the way, then the way cannot be found." --Terence McKenna
"The artists of today tend to forget, sometimes, that they are all— writers, poets, painters, actors—a part of a great tradition that goes back to the stories told about prehistoric campfires, to pictures painted on the walls of caves, to songs sung as parts of rituals. In this modern day the artists have a tendency to deny the audience, insisting that they speak only to and for themselves. In this way they cut themselves off from the continuity of which they are—or should be—a part.
Successful art is that art which has found its way into the mind of the audience and made its home there, adding to the richness and the depth of that mind. Only then has it fulfilled the function meant for it by its creator. This is what every artistic creator seeks, whether he will admit it or not. This is, indeed, the very definition of an artist.
The artist is, in the deepest sense, a bearer of the spirit of mankind. The spirit of mankind is borne forward through time by man's artistic creations; they are the distillation of his experience and his meaning. There is no artistic creation in limbo; we are all creatures of our time and our place, and the child that is born tomorrow contains the whole history of the human race within his body and within his mind.
It is the task of the artist, and his responsibility, to create and maintain that sense of continuity of the human community. He formulates and synthesizes and transmits the symbols and the images, in all the various forms of his art, that contain within themselves the sum total of human experience. He is both reservoir and transmitter, for he contains within himself the tradition and, by his creative endeavors, he transmits the tradition to those who will come after him. Most important of all, he is a transmuter of that sum total." ~ Borden Deal, The Function of the Artist.
"The artists of today tend to forget, sometimes, that they are all— writers, poets, painters, actors—a part of a great tradition that goes back to the stories told about prehistoric campfires, to pictures painted on the walls of caves, to songs sung as parts of rituals. In this modern day the artists have a tendency to deny the audience, insisting that they speak only to and for themselves. In this way they cut themselves off from the continuity of which they are—or should be—a part.
Successful art is that art which has found its way into the mind of the audience and made its home there, adding to the richness and the depth of that mind. Only then has it fulfilled the function meant for it by its creator. This is what every artistic creator seeks, whether he will admit it or not. This is, indeed, the very definition of an artist.
The artist is, in the deepest sense, a bearer of the spirit of mankind. The spirit of mankind is borne forward through time by man's artistic creations; they are the distillation of his experience and his meaning. There is no artistic creation in limbo; we are all creatures of our time and our place, and the child that is born tomorrow contains the whole history of the human race within his body and within his mind.
It is the task of the artist, and his responsibility, to create and maintain that sense of continuity of the human community. He formulates and synthesizes and transmits the symbols and the images, in all the various forms of his art, that contain within themselves the sum total of human experience. He is both reservoir and transmitter, for he contains within himself the tradition and, by his creative endeavors, he transmits the tradition to those who will come after him. Most important of all, he is a transmuter of that sum total." ~ Borden Deal, The Function of the Artist.
"Fruit of the Tree of Life", Iona Miller
Know Thyself is revelatory, non-linear, discontinuous; it is like a painting, a lyric poem, biography thoroughly gone into the imaginative act." --James Hillman, HEALING FICTION
Know Thyself is revelatory, non-linear, discontinuous; it is like a painting, a lyric poem, biography thoroughly gone into the imaginative act." --James Hillman, HEALING FICTION
art of inquiry
The Art of Inquiry
POST-JUNGIAN &
ARCHETYPAL MYTHOLOGICAL STUDIES
by Iona Miller, (c)2019
NATURAL PHILOSOPHY
FRONTIER SCIENCE
MYTHOLOGICAL STUDIES
POST-JUNGIAN COMMENTARY
ARCHETYPAL PSYCHOLOGY
AESTHETIC APPROACH
NEW MEDIA ARTS
ESOTERICS
ALCHEMY
DEPTH GENEALOGY
“The future enters into us, in order
to transform itself in us, long before it happens.” -Rilke
We all have a way of pursuing things that, for us, have the most value. Different methods, theories, and worldviews create learning processes involving cross-disciplinary collaboration between established communities of practice, intermingling several different epistemic cultures. Eliade cautioned we should not lose sight "of the profound and indivisible unity of the [spiritual] history of the human mind."
How we approach the whole structure of our lives is critical to survival and quality of life. To see that structure of our own being brings about a transformation. The very perception of what is, brings a radical transformation. To seek self-knowledge we must discover and explore direct experience of universal truths.
This perception is a liberating process that begins in self-knowledge. We focus on the ability to see the big picture, find relationships between seemingly disconnected phenomena, and develop systems thinking skills. Reductionism as a scientific approach is slowly becoming a thing of the past. We introduce the ideas of complexity, emergence, and self-organization.
Theoretical structure of assumptions, principles, and rules hold together the ideas comprising a broad concept. Conceptual frameworks 'set the stage,' and help us identify and understand how the particular variables in our self-inquiry connect with each other. It is our “map” in pursuing the investigation. Esoterics, for example, includes Hermetics, Qabalah, Theosophy, philosophy, religion, art, literature, music, and more.
Recognizable world views and approaches to knowledge continue to influence our culture and personal lives. We discuss the importance of modeling and the lack of human intuition when dealing with complex, interconnected systems. Our inquiry extends to ourselves, in genetics and genealogy. It is the heart of who we are -- a direct connection to the archaic past and deep time.
Our current civilization lacks connection and consciousness of what is transmitted between generations, while "traditional" societies respected these unwritten laws of life. In the middle realm of soul, we lose neither imagination nor our physical existence. Sensation, too, is a form of imagination that allows us to engage the soul figures.
Conceptual frameworks help us make category distinctions and organize ideas. We can model multiple perspectives and making mistakes to help develop habits of critical thinking. Strong conceptual frameworks capture something real and do this in a way that is easy to remember and apply, including philosophical and methodological models for self-exploration. Probability and uncertainty are factors in physics, art, and spirituality. They are the core of art and science.
Two desirable functions of art beyond spectacle are performative: art can make us want to do things, and it can make us think. In other words, it can be political or stimulate us toward philosophy. And just as a lot of philosophy today is almost a branch of physics, and certainly vice versa, art can be considered as part of philosophy and physics.
Phillip Pocock has proposed a quantum media model as "a poetic art-world equivalent to the Standard Model of Quantum Mechanics." All seek understanding of the entanglement of consciousness and computation.
The electron and atom lack any degree of physical reality, joining the subquantal world of virtual and imaginal entities, such as virtual photons and archetypes. Lacking visibility, they cloud our classical understanding of reality with a subjective observer.
All structure is a matter of frequency or superpositions of frequencies, entangled with and resonating with potential realities. Light converts to sound creating matter, echoing ancient notions of vibration and McLuhan's notion that we are immersed in the subtle auditory space of the foundational acoustic medium - including the artificial ubiquitous environment of media culture, structured by resonating intervals. Auditory space is always in dynamic flux with no preferred focus.
The attraction toward either polarity is really a death-drive. Art, and here quantum art especially, quivers in the middle and postpones or suspends this momentum. Life flickers between nonexistence and pointless agitation.
Manic pursuit of certainty is destructive, of life and everything. The powerful fragility of the flickering challenges the rigid, binary or black and white ways of thinking and acting. Uncertainty is power. Suzuki Roshi comments on Naturalness: "Moment after moment everyone comes out of nothingness."
Soul Made Visible as Authentic Self
When I write, it is my own reflections. I write so I can reflect on them later. Art is a spiritual practice and window to self-discovery. The hallmark of such thinking is new wisdom, new thoughts, new fusions -- an open-systems approach.
Cybernetics taught us about the nature of information transfer. Physics taught us the nature of probability matrices and emergence. Psycho-physiology reveals that our sensory system doesn't recreate but calculates reality. Unconscious decisions precede conscious intent. Meaning is inherent in interaction. It probably isn't meaning we lack, but the reception of meaning without the overburden of interpretation.
"Know that the Self is the rider, the body the chariot, the intellect the charioteer, and the mind is the reins. The senses, say the wise, are the horses and the roads they travel are the mazes of desire. The enlightened call the Self the enjoyer when it is united with the body, mind and senses." --Bhagavad Gita
Even new paradigms and metacognition revise or revision traditional disciplinary research methods using a syncretic integration of heuristic and practice-based inquiry. Systemics sees things together, rather than separately. Extreme poles are in fact impossible because in-betweenness is all there is.
That in-betweenness is psyche in which we immerse ourselves by descent into the unconscious through immaterial arts of inquiry, ritual, philosophy, magic, alchemy, and depth psychology. Perhaps Friedrich Nietzsche referred to this descent when he said, “Whoever, at any time, has undertaken to build a new heaven has found the strength for it in his own hell.” (On the Genealogy of Morals).
"Some identify 'life' with psyche. But only an insignificant minority regards the psychic phenomenon as a category of existence per se and draws the necessary conclusions. It is indeed paradoxical that the category of existence, the indispensable sine qua non of all existence, namely the psyche, should be treated as if it were only semi-existent. Psychic existence is the only category of existence of which we have immediate knowledge, since nothing can be known unless it first appears as a psychic image. Only psychic existence is immediately verifiable. To the extent that the world does not assume the form of a psychic image, it is virtually non-existent." --C.G. Jung, "The Difference Between Eastern and Western Thinking", Psychology and Religion, Pages 480-481.
https://www.scribd.com/doc/307675242/Philip-Pocock-Flusser-McLuhan-Matrix-and-Wave-Toward-a-Quantum-Media-Model-Videopool-2012
Ernst Cassirer *The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy*
http://web.eecs.utk.edu/~mclennan/Classes/US310/On-Hillman.html
POST-JUNGIAN &
ARCHETYPAL MYTHOLOGICAL STUDIES
by Iona Miller, (c)2019
NATURAL PHILOSOPHY
FRONTIER SCIENCE
MYTHOLOGICAL STUDIES
POST-JUNGIAN COMMENTARY
ARCHETYPAL PSYCHOLOGY
AESTHETIC APPROACH
NEW MEDIA ARTS
ESOTERICS
ALCHEMY
DEPTH GENEALOGY
“The future enters into us, in order
to transform itself in us, long before it happens.” -Rilke
We all have a way of pursuing things that, for us, have the most value. Different methods, theories, and worldviews create learning processes involving cross-disciplinary collaboration between established communities of practice, intermingling several different epistemic cultures. Eliade cautioned we should not lose sight "of the profound and indivisible unity of the [spiritual] history of the human mind."
How we approach the whole structure of our lives is critical to survival and quality of life. To see that structure of our own being brings about a transformation. The very perception of what is, brings a radical transformation. To seek self-knowledge we must discover and explore direct experience of universal truths.
This perception is a liberating process that begins in self-knowledge. We focus on the ability to see the big picture, find relationships between seemingly disconnected phenomena, and develop systems thinking skills. Reductionism as a scientific approach is slowly becoming a thing of the past. We introduce the ideas of complexity, emergence, and self-organization.
Theoretical structure of assumptions, principles, and rules hold together the ideas comprising a broad concept. Conceptual frameworks 'set the stage,' and help us identify and understand how the particular variables in our self-inquiry connect with each other. It is our “map” in pursuing the investigation. Esoterics, for example, includes Hermetics, Qabalah, Theosophy, philosophy, religion, art, literature, music, and more.
Recognizable world views and approaches to knowledge continue to influence our culture and personal lives. We discuss the importance of modeling and the lack of human intuition when dealing with complex, interconnected systems. Our inquiry extends to ourselves, in genetics and genealogy. It is the heart of who we are -- a direct connection to the archaic past and deep time.
Our current civilization lacks connection and consciousness of what is transmitted between generations, while "traditional" societies respected these unwritten laws of life. In the middle realm of soul, we lose neither imagination nor our physical existence. Sensation, too, is a form of imagination that allows us to engage the soul figures.
Conceptual frameworks help us make category distinctions and organize ideas. We can model multiple perspectives and making mistakes to help develop habits of critical thinking. Strong conceptual frameworks capture something real and do this in a way that is easy to remember and apply, including philosophical and methodological models for self-exploration. Probability and uncertainty are factors in physics, art, and spirituality. They are the core of art and science.
Two desirable functions of art beyond spectacle are performative: art can make us want to do things, and it can make us think. In other words, it can be political or stimulate us toward philosophy. And just as a lot of philosophy today is almost a branch of physics, and certainly vice versa, art can be considered as part of philosophy and physics.
Phillip Pocock has proposed a quantum media model as "a poetic art-world equivalent to the Standard Model of Quantum Mechanics." All seek understanding of the entanglement of consciousness and computation.
The electron and atom lack any degree of physical reality, joining the subquantal world of virtual and imaginal entities, such as virtual photons and archetypes. Lacking visibility, they cloud our classical understanding of reality with a subjective observer.
All structure is a matter of frequency or superpositions of frequencies, entangled with and resonating with potential realities. Light converts to sound creating matter, echoing ancient notions of vibration and McLuhan's notion that we are immersed in the subtle auditory space of the foundational acoustic medium - including the artificial ubiquitous environment of media culture, structured by resonating intervals. Auditory space is always in dynamic flux with no preferred focus.
The attraction toward either polarity is really a death-drive. Art, and here quantum art especially, quivers in the middle and postpones or suspends this momentum. Life flickers between nonexistence and pointless agitation.
Manic pursuit of certainty is destructive, of life and everything. The powerful fragility of the flickering challenges the rigid, binary or black and white ways of thinking and acting. Uncertainty is power. Suzuki Roshi comments on Naturalness: "Moment after moment everyone comes out of nothingness."
Soul Made Visible as Authentic Self
When I write, it is my own reflections. I write so I can reflect on them later. Art is a spiritual practice and window to self-discovery. The hallmark of such thinking is new wisdom, new thoughts, new fusions -- an open-systems approach.
Cybernetics taught us about the nature of information transfer. Physics taught us the nature of probability matrices and emergence. Psycho-physiology reveals that our sensory system doesn't recreate but calculates reality. Unconscious decisions precede conscious intent. Meaning is inherent in interaction. It probably isn't meaning we lack, but the reception of meaning without the overburden of interpretation.
"Know that the Self is the rider, the body the chariot, the intellect the charioteer, and the mind is the reins. The senses, say the wise, are the horses and the roads they travel are the mazes of desire. The enlightened call the Self the enjoyer when it is united with the body, mind and senses." --Bhagavad Gita
Even new paradigms and metacognition revise or revision traditional disciplinary research methods using a syncretic integration of heuristic and practice-based inquiry. Systemics sees things together, rather than separately. Extreme poles are in fact impossible because in-betweenness is all there is.
That in-betweenness is psyche in which we immerse ourselves by descent into the unconscious through immaterial arts of inquiry, ritual, philosophy, magic, alchemy, and depth psychology. Perhaps Friedrich Nietzsche referred to this descent when he said, “Whoever, at any time, has undertaken to build a new heaven has found the strength for it in his own hell.” (On the Genealogy of Morals).
"Some identify 'life' with psyche. But only an insignificant minority regards the psychic phenomenon as a category of existence per se and draws the necessary conclusions. It is indeed paradoxical that the category of existence, the indispensable sine qua non of all existence, namely the psyche, should be treated as if it were only semi-existent. Psychic existence is the only category of existence of which we have immediate knowledge, since nothing can be known unless it first appears as a psychic image. Only psychic existence is immediately verifiable. To the extent that the world does not assume the form of a psychic image, it is virtually non-existent." --C.G. Jung, "The Difference Between Eastern and Western Thinking", Psychology and Religion, Pages 480-481.
https://www.scribd.com/doc/307675242/Philip-Pocock-Flusser-McLuhan-Matrix-and-Wave-Toward-a-Quantum-Media-Model-Videopool-2012
Ernst Cassirer *The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy*
http://web.eecs.utk.edu/~mclennan/Classes/US310/On-Hillman.html
"It is our task to seek art, for without seeking it we shall never learn
the secrets of the world." --Paracelsus
“A work of art which did not begin in emotion is not art.”
--Paul Cézanne
The process of Individuation is what Jung called initiation by the Self as the totality of psychic processes. The soul calls for expanded experiences and can function as guide without gurus, priests, or psychologists for support. Treating life poetically allows us to deliteralize notions such as goals, success, and endings. Psyche's labyrinthine nature allows deeper into imagination without forcing conclusions upon us.
Anima is the poetic basis of mind. Hillman's imaginal soul-making suggests the daimon or soul-guide enables us throughout the necessities of our inherent unfolding, our fate. In The Trumpets of the Apocalypse, Jean Cocteau suggests, ''Mystery has its own mysteries, and there are gods above gods. We have ours, they have theirs. That is what's known as infinity.''
Works of art take impressionistic images and make implied assertions about reality, morality and values. What really exists, and what is its nature? What constitutes right and wrong behavior? What really matters, and what matters most and least?
Art constructs realities that prevail in human life. Surrealism he[ed us admit the dreamworld, the irrational. The avant-garde sought to erase the distinction, the boundaries between life and art. Expanded Cinema gave us a rearrangement of the senses, feedback, and non-linearity. You didn't know what you were looking at.
When art and computers met, both artists and scientists used the similar patterns and concepts. The history of the future depends on the future we imagine, plan for, and established as a vector throughout the history of new media arts.
the secrets of the world." --Paracelsus
“A work of art which did not begin in emotion is not art.”
--Paul Cézanne
The process of Individuation is what Jung called initiation by the Self as the totality of psychic processes. The soul calls for expanded experiences and can function as guide without gurus, priests, or psychologists for support. Treating life poetically allows us to deliteralize notions such as goals, success, and endings. Psyche's labyrinthine nature allows deeper into imagination without forcing conclusions upon us.
Anima is the poetic basis of mind. Hillman's imaginal soul-making suggests the daimon or soul-guide enables us throughout the necessities of our inherent unfolding, our fate. In The Trumpets of the Apocalypse, Jean Cocteau suggests, ''Mystery has its own mysteries, and there are gods above gods. We have ours, they have theirs. That is what's known as infinity.''
Works of art take impressionistic images and make implied assertions about reality, morality and values. What really exists, and what is its nature? What constitutes right and wrong behavior? What really matters, and what matters most and least?
Art constructs realities that prevail in human life. Surrealism he[ed us admit the dreamworld, the irrational. The avant-garde sought to erase the distinction, the boundaries between life and art. Expanded Cinema gave us a rearrangement of the senses, feedback, and non-linearity. You didn't know what you were looking at.
When art and computers met, both artists and scientists used the similar patterns and concepts. The history of the future depends on the future we imagine, plan for, and established as a vector throughout the history of new media arts.
"If our life lacks a constant magic, it is because we choose to observe our acts and lose ourselves in consideration of their imagined form instead of being impelled by their force. No matter how loudly we clamor for magic in our lives, we are really afraid of pursuing an existence entirely under its influence and sign." --Antonin Artaud
“Sooner or later something seems to call us onto a particular path. You may remember this “something” as a signal moment in childhood when an urge out of nowhere, a fascination, a peculiar turn of events struck like an annunciation: This is what I must do, this is what I’ve got to have. This is who I am.” --James Hillman, The Soul’s Code: In Search of Character and Calling
Snakes & Ladders
A "complete" life does not consist in a theoretical completeness but in the fact that one accepts without reservation, the particular fatal tissue in which one finds oneself embedded, and that one tries to make sense of it or create a cosmos from the chaotic mess into which one is born. If one lives properly and completely, time and again one will be confronted with a situation of which one will say: "This is too much. I cannot bear it anymore". Then the question must be answered: "can one really not bear it?"" --C. G. Jung.
Hillman thinks we grow naturally, but can avoid a sort of dictatorial heroic ego striving or manic self-centered development, self-aggrandizement, with a root in not feeling 'good enough.' That is, don't be workaholic about our culturally-pushed 'improvement', which can be egoic at root. I think that is why his emphasis is on art and aesthetics which can enrich and ennoble us while allowing for self-expression. And yes, "spirituality" been 'done to death', elsewhere, not only by the Jungians and Self centrism as a 'goal', but in the culture at large with its workaholism, 'shoulds' and 'ought to's'.
This doesn't mean we can't strive for excellence in some of our projects, but it might be de-humanizing to turn ourselves into one, in some sense. I still have an interest in both approaches, but if a developmental model is 'spiritual,' Hillman chooses to be a voice for soul and soul-making, enlivening our human potential.
Weaving those opposites doesn't seem 'wrong' -- we just don't need to make our personalities a whipping post, which could be its own form of pathologizing. I think hierarchical models are sort of his pet-peeve, perhaps since they are such a cultural mess, and frankly 'made up,' often by 'powers that be' for control purposes. Then, they are static, enforced, and taken literally. You can almost feel him provoking our thinking in this direction, at least, which might be fruitful -- to question that, especially as an idealization...especially striving for elusive perfection.
Fundamentalism and even new age is riddled with such paradox and even self delusions around self-image and ascending off into the aethyrs leaving body behind. He encourages us to be informed by dreams and death, as if 'there is nowhere to go and we're all going to get there.'... We attend to the voices from down below and the gaps in between, allowing our confusing, not masking it with concepts and categories.
That said, it seems each life passage has its natural tasks and orientations rooted in nature and our nature. A young adult might be inclined to strive, whereas an elder could be more contemplative, but all such distinctions appear in all phases, as we retain our inner adult, parent, and child, in this sense ... so, we can inquire of ourselves 'who wants to strive' and who wants to remain in the vale of soul-making, among our many options for Being. Perhaps some of you have more to say about that -- and how it informs our Being.
It's not a linear one-way street as we make quantum leaps, or act out unconscious atavisms, regressions, and pathologies... all grist for the mill -- even what has been called "regression in the service of transcendence" (solutio?).
The Embodied Fool
Then, naturally, outer circumstances, accidents,and the environment can send us in wildly different directions, often not of our choosing, which Hillman might recognize as necessity or fate, following our uncertainty, or the influence of anima mundi or daimon. He, at least, provokes us to consider such notions, including their collective aspects in society with which we inhabit the living world.
Hillman said “the true revolution begins with the person who is true to their own depression”. Our consciousness is dominated by heroic ideas of transcendence or integration. Dionysos is an older god.
Depression here becomes a search downward into the immanence of the body, it’s moistness, it’s vulnerability. Down into the roots, into the Earth, through the labyrinth, not slaying feelings but honoring them, bringing them back to life. Like Dionysos came back to life in his myths, after dismemberment and descent.
“Sooner or later something seems to call us onto a particular path. You may remember this “something” as a signal moment in childhood when an urge out of nowhere, a fascination, a peculiar turn of events struck like an annunciation: This is what I must do, this is what I’ve got to have. This is who I am.” --James Hillman, The Soul’s Code: In Search of Character and Calling
Snakes & Ladders
A "complete" life does not consist in a theoretical completeness but in the fact that one accepts without reservation, the particular fatal tissue in which one finds oneself embedded, and that one tries to make sense of it or create a cosmos from the chaotic mess into which one is born. If one lives properly and completely, time and again one will be confronted with a situation of which one will say: "This is too much. I cannot bear it anymore". Then the question must be answered: "can one really not bear it?"" --C. G. Jung.
Hillman thinks we grow naturally, but can avoid a sort of dictatorial heroic ego striving or manic self-centered development, self-aggrandizement, with a root in not feeling 'good enough.' That is, don't be workaholic about our culturally-pushed 'improvement', which can be egoic at root. I think that is why his emphasis is on art and aesthetics which can enrich and ennoble us while allowing for self-expression. And yes, "spirituality" been 'done to death', elsewhere, not only by the Jungians and Self centrism as a 'goal', but in the culture at large with its workaholism, 'shoulds' and 'ought to's'.
This doesn't mean we can't strive for excellence in some of our projects, but it might be de-humanizing to turn ourselves into one, in some sense. I still have an interest in both approaches, but if a developmental model is 'spiritual,' Hillman chooses to be a voice for soul and soul-making, enlivening our human potential.
Weaving those opposites doesn't seem 'wrong' -- we just don't need to make our personalities a whipping post, which could be its own form of pathologizing. I think hierarchical models are sort of his pet-peeve, perhaps since they are such a cultural mess, and frankly 'made up,' often by 'powers that be' for control purposes. Then, they are static, enforced, and taken literally. You can almost feel him provoking our thinking in this direction, at least, which might be fruitful -- to question that, especially as an idealization...especially striving for elusive perfection.
Fundamentalism and even new age is riddled with such paradox and even self delusions around self-image and ascending off into the aethyrs leaving body behind. He encourages us to be informed by dreams and death, as if 'there is nowhere to go and we're all going to get there.'... We attend to the voices from down below and the gaps in between, allowing our confusing, not masking it with concepts and categories.
That said, it seems each life passage has its natural tasks and orientations rooted in nature and our nature. A young adult might be inclined to strive, whereas an elder could be more contemplative, but all such distinctions appear in all phases, as we retain our inner adult, parent, and child, in this sense ... so, we can inquire of ourselves 'who wants to strive' and who wants to remain in the vale of soul-making, among our many options for Being. Perhaps some of you have more to say about that -- and how it informs our Being.
It's not a linear one-way street as we make quantum leaps, or act out unconscious atavisms, regressions, and pathologies... all grist for the mill -- even what has been called "regression in the service of transcendence" (solutio?).
The Embodied Fool
Then, naturally, outer circumstances, accidents,and the environment can send us in wildly different directions, often not of our choosing, which Hillman might recognize as necessity or fate, following our uncertainty, or the influence of anima mundi or daimon. He, at least, provokes us to consider such notions, including their collective aspects in society with which we inhabit the living world.
Hillman said “the true revolution begins with the person who is true to their own depression”. Our consciousness is dominated by heroic ideas of transcendence or integration. Dionysos is an older god.
Depression here becomes a search downward into the immanence of the body, it’s moistness, it’s vulnerability. Down into the roots, into the Earth, through the labyrinth, not slaying feelings but honoring them, bringing them back to life. Like Dionysos came back to life in his myths, after dismemberment and descent.