Archive for the ‘The Real Story’ tag
On the Need for Ego
I have finished the tasks that I’ve set for myself at my middle child’s home. The last of the subflooring is done and the stairs recovered with vinyl. Having finished reading the one book I brought with me, I am reading one that I gave to my son-in-law, a book by Stephen R. Donaldson, the first book in the Gap series called The Real Story.
The book isn’t as good as I thought it might be as I remembered the old Thomas Covenant series as being powerful. Still, the book is better than nothing. Imagine my surprise when I found this in the book:
He’d never had much to do with women. In fact, he’d never doubted that he could live perfectly well without them altogether. But now his brain teemed with lust. Perversions which had nvere occurred to him before now seemed exciting, even compulsory. The more he saw of her helpless beauty, and the more he excercised himself on her flesh, the greater her hold on his imagination became – the more power she seemed to have over him. (Stephen R. Donaldson, The Real Story, 1991, p. 95)
The above quotation captures a human living in the grip of an archetype. The barriers between consciousness and unconsciousness have almost completely disappeared. The unconscious world, a huge and dark expanse of repressed evil as well as repressed positive aspects of what is possible, finds its way into the outer world through a weak ego which has somehow become too enamoured by the images that flood from the unconscious.
In a way, this is what lies at the root of most of our dysfunctional behaviours. The story of Mark Mocha is but one of many who have cracks in the ego that allow the unconscious to emerge. Each of us is a saint and a sinner. The more saintly we become, the more the sinner wants out of the closet so as to be recognized. It needs a strong ego to meet the shadow, and take on the awareness that this darkness is as much “self” as the good stuff. The work of the first half of life is to build this strong ego in order that when the second half of life enters and makes its demands toward wholeness, that one is ready. If one isn’t ready, one either retreats into rigidity, depression and dysfunction – or, one breaks down. Thank god for breakdowns. It is when one is broken that one is forced into dealing, finally, with the work of self-healing.
