Through a Jungian Lens

A close look at my apple tree in the back yard, actually it’s a crab apple tree.  This tree gives us quite tasty little apples that have a mouth-watering tartness.  For those who prefer sweet and gentle tasting apples, this tree would be a disappointment.  For me, it is perfect.  As I noticed the new buds on this tree, images of returning bird, perhaps robins or cedar waxwings, making their nests in the tree came to mind.  I have watched the cycle of life take place in this tree for a number of years.  Last year’s residents left early and in distress.   Their nest had been invaded by a cat leaving a few broken eggs in his wake.  The unbroken eggs never did hatch.  Nature isn’t always pretty.

I enjoy taking pictures found in nature as you can probably well guess if you have been following these posts for some time.  In nature, I find that the layers we use for the protection of our ego in community, are not very evident.  I have to admit that there is the use of some camouflage by many animals which exist so that the animal’s chance of survival in increased.  In nature, what is up front is not a mask; what one sees is what is.  It is as though the barriers between consciousness and unconsciousness don’t exist.  I can’t imagine nature setting up artificial laws to protect the rights of unborn birds in eggs with punishments given to marauding cats who attack the nests in hopes of getting a free meal.

With consciousness, humans have introduced a different way of being in nature.  That consciousness allows us to look at choices and weigh them in terms of being good for the psyche or hurtful to the psyche – stuff that indicates an ethical or moral nature.  This is also “natural.”  In community we create laws that support those concepts of moral behaviour.  I guess one could call laws that we build in community based on nurturing the psyche, natural laws.  Other laws?  Well, I guess that they are based on advantage – not really about nourishing the individual or collective consciousness.

If we re-think our understanding of given laws, such as the ten commandments, in terms of how the laws nourish the soul and the psyche through avoidance of behaviours that damage the psyche, then we can determine which laws would be more “natural.”  For example, “Thou shalt not kill” is one that can be easily understood in these terms.  The number of soldiers who have participated in warfare which saw them “kill” another human, who have since fallen into depressions, dysfunction, or have committed suicide is startling.  It doesn’t matter what their society tells them about the righteousness of their actions in the theatre of war – their soul and psyche tell them otherwise.

Then if  we look at other laws such as those prohibiting nudism, we begin to see how some laws are based on collective complexes.  I want to give an example based on Canadian history.  At a given time in Canada’s past, the Church was a force in terms of community law.  I guess that churches still are forces of law within their tight communities, but not to the same extent.  That said, the Church in response to behaviours exhibited by the parishioners, created a law banning the playing of cards during a church service.  The issue was not of the actions being hurtful to the psyche or soul of the individual or even the collective, but was more of an issue of collective control.  Such laws are not within the field of natural law.

For myself, I need to respect natural law so that I suffer less in terms of my soul as well as avoiding putting immense roadblocks in the way of my journey towards becoming a more conscious person.  I also need to respect legal codes when those codes don’t contradict natural law.  I am not fond of getting tickets for parking in the wrong thirty square feet of space on the planet even though parking in that spot would not have made a difference in the personal or collective consciousness.

It’s all about caring for the soul in the end, isn’t it?