Through a Jungian Lens

This is a Yellow-Crowned Euphonia, a bird I have never seen before.  I managed to get its photo yesterday morning when I took a solitary walk in mid-morning.  There is no doubt that this bird’s colours seemed to animate the otherwise flat intense light of the morning’s walk.  It was a walk that produced a few surprises in terms of photographs and in terms of good thinking time.

I have been spending a bit of time thinking about anima, about soul.  I am finding that as I do so, I invite her presence and in return, my life becomes more animated, my life has more colour, more passion and more joie de vivre.  Is it simply the switch from the cold of the Canadian Prairies?  Is it simply the intense heat of the sun here in Costa Rica?  Likely it is neither of these and both of these.

My partner has noted the difference in my way of being, has commented on how I have somehow left the darkness and lack of ambition and passion that I was experiencing on the prairies.  Instead of waking up lethargic at 8:00 am as I did in my Canadian home, here I am up somewhere between 4:30 and 5:30 every morning.  The difference shows up in many ways, especially in my increase in enthusiasm to do things.  I have become more animated.   These are sure signs that I am taking care of my soul.  Now for a few words from Daryl Sharp on the topic:

Jung had a number of descriptions and definitions of the anima, such as soul-image and archetype of life itself, but in this essay he focuses on her as the “projection-making factor” in a man’s psyche.  She saves a man from being a stick-in-the-mud, prods him to adventure and the taking of risks, alternately enlivens and maddens him.  And everything she does to him inside is reflected and amplified, through projection, in his activities and relationships in the outside world. (Sharp, Jung Uncorked:  Book Two, 2008, p. 12)

Now, if you have noticed, I have been taking risks here in terms of transparency and authenticity.  I guess I could blame the influence of anima for this.  It is as if I am being submersed into a cauldron where the heat is being turned up so that the transformation process pace speeds up – literally and figuratively.  Are the manifestations showing up here influencing my relationships with the outside world that meets with me on this blog site?  Are the manifestations showing up in the physical space where I am now found influencing my relationships?  I can answer the last question without hesitation – yes!  It is too early to say whether or not these changes are welcomed or acceptable in the “other,” but that is for time to work out one way or another.  But for this space?  I honestly don’t know.  Only you can answer that question, and only in terms of yourself.  I look forward to your responses.

Other than an hour in the basement cutting baseboards for the bathroom, it has all been about being outside in the warm sunshine.  A good part of the day was spent on the golf course followed by a quick drive out to another location for a photo I wanted for the book.  Once back home, it was enough just to sit on the deck reading in the sunshine until it was time to barbeque.  It’s important not to live one’s life fully in the head.  Today, the research and writing was put on hold.  Not much left to do on the book so there is time to relax and “think” about what I have yet to say.

This photo was one of today’s catches.  You will notice that it is “normal” in that I didn’t use the “tunnel vision” style .  I took this one from the parking lot of the golf course.  I wanted, somehow, to share with you the experience I had while on the golf course.  There was no one else golfing on the course.  It is farming country and all are busy.  Part way through the round of golf, I sat on a bench in the sunshine, listening to a meadow lark which was sitting on top of a tree, a rare tree on this golf course.  Other than her song, there was nothing but silence.  Sunshine, silence, warmth, and the panorama of hills and the lake holding it all together as if in a cauldron.  It was a special moment, a holy moment.  I stopped a few more times during the round of golf to enjoy more of this.  In the end, I walked off the course with my best round of golf in a few years and not just in terms of the score.

Another photo from India, this time from Jaisalmer.  Actually, the photo was taken just outside of the city at a cenotaph.  It was January, 2008 in the late afternoon when the sunlight was accentuating the golden colour of the sandstone used to build most of the buildings in Jaisalmer which led to the city being called the Golden City.  Besides the ornate memorials, there were a number of small piles of rock marked with a single stick, often with a red rag attached which indicated where ashes had been interred.  The urn above is a symbol of sacred containment, a feminine symbol.

The psychoanalytic/psychotherapeutic encounter is also a place of sacred containnment.  The dialogues between other and self in the pyschoanalytic/ psychotherapeutic container are held as sacred, not the stuff of common communication.  There would be no purpose is taking the contents out of the container with the intention of engaging others in a dialogue about the contents as context would not be present.  By context, I mean the tension of the moment being shared in the psychoanalytic encounter.  For me, this carries on to most of my interactions with others.  I have learned to keep my counsel.  The sacred containment, temenos, of authentic “I-Thou” interactions prevents contamination.  Translated, when dealing with the psyche of others, keep it confidential.  It’s more than about therapist ethics.

Like Icarius flying into the sun, one becomes reduced, sent back to earth after being scorched by the rays of the sun when one approaches too close.  Back on earth one rebuilds out of the ashes and what remains is somehow changed, forever.  This is what Mexico has done for me these past three months.  I have been immersed in a giant cauldron and slow-cooked.  The feathers have fallen off the old retired eagle and something new emerges.  Other than a bit of new colouration, outward appearances suggest that I am still mostly the same.  But I know that the laws of alchemy have wrought changes, most of which can’t be seen.

I am returning to my Canadian home and will not be posting for a few days.  However, I will return here when the time is ripe and I will bring more images and more thoughts to this thin line of connection with both “self” and “other”.