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..:: Reflections ::..
By
Alan Schneider
"What I am
saying is that we are living in an insane society, and as
individual human beings we have the choice of participating in that
insanity, or of taking risks, becoming sane, and perhaps also becoming crucified!"
- Fredrick S.
Perls -
The above quotation initially seems
like a harsh condemnation of modern society – surely there must be more
to life than this stark and austere choice! But, Perls (who possessed
both an MD and a PhD) is someone whose words we should ponder
very carefully. As a Jew who fled the Nazi Holocaust, he knew a lot
about harsh conditions and harsh choices – something reflected in the
treatment schema he developed – Gestalt Therapy. As someone who has had
extensive experience with this modality in my youth, I would have to
describe it as having been ultra-confrontive, at least at that time,
when it was relatively new, and Perls was still alive. Ultra-confrontive
here means ultra-painful emotionally – people in my succession of
therapy groups regularly broke down in tears under the frank examination
of the therapists. The goal of this therapy was to focus on the
individual’s “presenting problem” as an issue symbolic of their “root
problem(s)”. By using a variety of therapeutic techniques that
validated the individual’s personal responsibility for their condition
and perception, the root problem was eventually identified, brought into
the light of conscious recognition, and emotionally released. Again, a
very painful process, but highly effective as a treatment regimen.
With the passage of the
decades since the birth of Gestalt Therapy, therapeutic science has
learned a lot about treatment, the long term durability of
treatment, and about the essential nature of life and perception as we
know it. One of Perls’ contemporaries was Abraham Maslow, whose
hierarchy of developmental schema and thresholds over the lifespan is
still taught in universities today. One of the outcomes of therapy in
Maslow’s system was the condition of self-actualization. Maslow
felt that this was the mental state that was the goal of treatment – a
condition in which the individual was in full and valid contact with
both internal and external reality, and expressed optimal levels of
consciousness in all decisions – essentially an Ascended state of mind.
Maslow also felt that, once attained, this condition was
self-maintaining, requiring little or no further augmentation for the
rest of the individual’s life.
As bitter experience has
shown since society and culture have passed into the Post-Modern
Expression in the vicinity of twenty five years ago (or thereabouts!),
the Jungian assertion that life is an ongoing battle is
absolutely correct. Not only is it a battle for survival and privilege,
but also to attain peace and enlightenment, and it is a battle to
maintain either condition in the face of ever advancing age and the
advanced social decay that is the hallmark of Post-Modern living.
The world culture passed its zenith somewhere around 1980, and, although
apparent progress has taken place since then, the burgeoning
human population, economic inflation, and escalating fascism have all
created a real background of social decline for most classes of people
in the world. When the aging Post-World-War-II Baby Boom population is
factored into this equation, an added consideration of decline emerges –
much of the therapy of the sixties and seventies was simply enveloped in
idealistic misconceptions about human nature, human life, and human
potentials that have not withstood the test of time, as increasing age
added new and more problematic stressors to the process of living. And
once the ego has taken form, it tends to revert to that form
across time – no matter how much therapy has successfully been
concluded – requiring consistent, ongoing counter-reinforcement to
prevent this reversion process. This is why monks and nuns of many
religious persuasions live in monasteries and cloisters – those
environments provide a good part of the ongoing spiritual “messaging”
needed to constructively support their faith. This support becomes
increasingly critical as the specter of Death approaches with the
decline of age – confronting death and dying is the ultimate test of any
faith. Essentially, the practice of a positive, constructive lifestyle
has become a requirement of consciousness to combat the
Post-Modern social decline.
The very nature of our human
existence has also been subject to sweeping reconstruction and
reconceptualization in the Post-Modern period, and it is the spiritual
implication of this rethinking that I wish to discuss in this essay.
When we look at the human being as a field of consciousness, as
opposed to a material organism, a drastically different picture of
existence emerges.
The best overall description
of the Psyche of which I am aware remains the Jungian Spherical model so
often described in these pages, because it is the simplest model that
still gives a valid theoretical description of the forces that seem to
be at work in consciousness at every known level of expression, even
including the animal, vegetable, or mineral levels. Anything will “fit
on” this conceptual model, not just the human mind. This model of
consciousness may be viewed on my website in the Gallery link
under "The Holistic Mind".
This model remains the most
scientific depiction of consciousness of which I am aware, although it
still constitutes a theoretical “leap of faith” away from the more
comfortable, and concrete, Freudian model of the Ego/Id/Superego. It is
true that the Hindu Chakra model, the Cabala Tree of Life model, and the
Native American Totem model are also very effective descriptions, as are
many other mythological systems, but there is much variance of
terminology and theoretical valence among these more strictly spiritual
motifs. If we are willing at all to consider the possibility of the
Logos at the focus of the Psyche, and the Archetypal symbols as cultural
expressions of that Logos, then the Jungian model wins the simplicity
contest deemed desirable by the application of Occam’s Razor. The
simplest explanation of a phenomenon that still accounts for all the
data available is always the most desirable one from a scientific
perspective.
As I sit here writing this
essay, I am mediating my field of consciousness through the action of my
ego. This is one of the most valid functions of my ego – the process of
intelligent discourse is fundamentally desirable as a mode of human
interaction. This is perhaps the best use of my remaining time in
incarnation, with the possible exception of meditation. Meditation has
made my current level of understanding of the Psyche possible.
Meditation makes all understanding possible through ego
transcendence – those who do not meditate are living in darkness even on
the most brightly lit day, and no matter how intelligent they may
be.
The Jungian Sphere is a
“picture” of the Psyche and its constituent parts. This model of the
Psyche is based upon a completely holistic perception of the totality of
existence as conscious expressions – even rocks are conceived of as
having a minute amount of consciousness because they exhibit a limited
repertoire of “behaviors” in our human perception – just laying there is
still a behavior, after all! The Archetype of “Rock” is the origin of
the perceptual building block that enables the identification of all
subsequent material “rock” expressions we encounter on the Physical
Plane of manifestation. I can say “we” encounter because, even though I
am enclosed in my personal expression of the Psyche for life, my culture
enables me to “compare notes” with my fellow creatures through spoken
language and writing. This is perhaps the most valid function of culture
– human communication. In this way, I have come over the years to the
cumulative understanding that the Logos is not only my
consciousness, but all consciousness, and that existence is
consciousness as well. If we follow the rock back far enough into the
Psyche, we arrive at God, and realize that God is everywhere in
all things through the experience of Samadhi.
A number of considerations
enter into the view of consciousness as consciousness,
most significantly the implication of the symbolic component of
entities perceived on the Physical Plane. Jung referred to entities
that demonstrated an unusual degree of symbolic significance as
synchronicities – meaningful coincidences. Eventually the
realization is attained in life that all coincidences are
meaningful in the Cosmic Dance of the Logos – there are almost no
real coincidences. In the Field of Consciousness, the symbol is more
real than any discreet manifest expression of that symbol. In most
cases, conflicts and misunderstandings of all kinds are traceable to
symbolic deficits among the communicators involved – one
communicator simply has a different symbolic conception of a given
entity or condition than the others, based upon Karma and total life
experience, and may have little or no knowledge of this. The use of the
term “poverty” has vastly different meanings to one born into wealth and
luxury than one born in a ghetto. For the first, it is a remote,
abstract conception, for the other, a brutal daily reality.
As long as conscious
perception is relegated to the physical senses, the world is experienced
as “concrete” and literal in nature, and we experience ourselves that
way as well. We enjoy (or, more commonly, suffer) our secure
little island of the mind, bounded by the coral reef of the personal
unconscious, and do not venture out into the deep. This is the world of
the first three Chakras in Hinduism, and the Malkuth of Cabala, a safe,
secure world, but fundamentally an illusion. This world is an illusion
because it is composed of reflections of the deeper reality that
exists beyond the reef. The vast majority of people choose to live in
that reflective illusion simply because it is the habit of the ego to do
so, nothing more. And this habit is maybe not so bad – the reef is
perilous, and so is the deep water beyond. But, if we do not challenge
the assignment of living by taking risks, we fail as human beings,
crucifixion or no crucifixion. Perls was fundamentally correct in his
view of society and the primary choice we must make. He simply did not
extend this to the logical conclusion of Post-Modernism – life itself is
insane because we die in battle regardless of what choices we make – and
the crucifixion is inevitable. For this reason, contemporary
therapies tend to err in the direction of cautious risk taking and
conservative living, and this is most certainly a good thing.
Meditation constitutes such a
method of cautious risk taking, particularly in contrast to some of the
other options still around like brutally confrontive group work,
invasive hypnosis, and hallucinogenic drug use! If we are going to
maintain the realistic awareness that we are going to go through the
Gate of Darkness (regardless of what might lie beyond) at death, and
life itself, at least as reflectively experienced on the Physical Plane,
is insane, then we need to modify our understanding and expectations
accordingly. As long as we continue to cautiously investigate beyond the
reef, this will be sufficient to answer the call of the Logos for most
of us. Gone are the days of complete self-actualization and therapeutic
conclusion, and enter the day of monastic moderation!
The world that we encounter in the senses is, in fact, a cosmic mirror
in which we see God pouring God into God at the gross physical level. In
meditation it is possible to pass “through the looking glass” and work
directly with the archetypal symbols beyond and beneath the surface of
material perception. Done in moderation, this also is most certainly a
good thing, and can show us the deepest meaning of life as
consciousness. We are all this field of consciousness whether we know
this or not, even though we may chose to perceive a field of objects
instead – we still are making a perceptual decision. When the
field of consciousness that I am becomes aware of that condition as its
fundamental nature, and begins to investigate itself from that
perspective, the process of Enlightenment has begun. When this
investigation begins to include meditation, the process of Enlightenment
is enormously enhanced. When meditation is carried to its ultimate
conclusion, the Logos is encountered, and the Truth of Consciousness is
revealed in the Divine Light at the center of Creation. Namaste!
- With Love, Alan -
(CR2008, Alan Schneider)
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