Some Jungian stuff today. I’m attempting to read Erich Neumann’s “Origins and History of Consciousness”. The book is beyond me, and I’m having to use a dictionary at some point on every page, which breaks the flow. In one sense it’s a technical work, aimed at the psychoanalytical community. In other ways, it’s a four-hundred-and-odd page poem about coming into being.
It’s about the development of an individual’s sense of “I”, also the psychological development of mankind, since the one reflects the other. What I don’t think is mentioned, since even Jung avoided direct talk of it, is that both are functions of an underlying metaphysics, built into the universe itself, that indeed it is the universe. Thus, psychoanalysis crosses the boundary into spirituality.
It’s heavy going, and this is my second attempt. Neumann, a student of Jung, lacks – for me at least – Jung’s ease with language. That said, it’s instructive to come at Jung from another direction, if only to rediscover old ground in a new light. What I’m reminded of today is how the metaphysical universe communicates in the language of symbols. Symbols are mental shapes given motion, and they arouse feeling. They might look like one thing, but we interpret them as something else. Symbols cloud together, so we can cross-reference, and map their meaning to something specific. Interpreted literally, the universe has no meaning, indeed appears, at times absurd. But when seen metaphorically, archetypally, the way is illumined as something else entirely
Culturally, western man thinks of the universe in physical terms, that what we see is all there is. Even what we can’t see we can glean by our ever more sophisticated instrumentation, by our science and our technology. There is nothing else. But such thinking leads to an impasse. Worse, it results in a breakdown in our natural development, because it’s not the full story. There is the universe as we see it, and then there’s the universe as it really is, and the two are not the same. Denying even the possibility of the universe as it is, we cut our selves off from our natural path and we disintegrate, as people and as a culture.
Jungian thinking posits the notion of a psychical underpinning to the universe. This is not to say the stars, the galaxies, the planets are alive and conscious of themselves. These are merely the bigger manifestations of the universe as we see it, not as it is. We don’t know how it is in itself. All we know of it is what we can perceive upon the screen of our senses. But while the rules governing material processes tend towards ever increasing states of disorder, universal consciousness tends towards greater levels of order, and it finds its greatest order, its sense of self-awareness, in each of us.
The formless aspect of the universe is a realm of archetypal pattern, whose behaviours we interpret through the language of myth. Myths are those stories which form the basis of human culture. They deal with the perplexing mysteries of where we come from, of how we should conduct ourselves while we’re here, and ultimately where we’re going. But since the individual mind is a microcosm of the universal mind, these stories can also be turned inward and used for self analysis. The world’s mythologies have more wisdom in them than any book on psychology.
And what the myths teach is that the individual life is the universe playing hide-and-seek with itself. We are born into the world, immersed in its material complexity, and having forgotten entirely who we really are. But we also have this strange kernel of longing for a greater understanding of the meaning of our lives. A life’s journey then becomes a journey to the realisation we are different versions of the same awareness, that we spring from the psychical ground of being. However, it’s one thing to be told such a thing, to be aware of it intellectually, quite another to feel it, and so to “know” it. To truly “know” it is to awaken.
To awaken, however, is a rare thing, even when you know the destination. But for the ordinary travelling souls, like me, what this also means is that if the road is of interest, we need only declare ourselves open for business, and the universe will co-operate to a degree that suits our personal limitations. It will constellate symbols around us and, if we can interpret them, they will draw us in a direction that is right for us. This is a little like confirmation bias, where we agree with those speakers who reflect best our own dispositions, and dislike those who do not.
The universe communicates by synchronicity. It leads us by coincidence to those things, events, or people that are most meaningful to us. And what is meaningful is that which will trigger the emotions we most need to address, they being of a negative, regressive variety. They cloud our vision, and muddy our minds. Whilst the goal here is not happiness, happiness becomes a more reliable companion, as a by-product of the process, while awakening remains the true goal.
The deeper we are lost in the game, the harder will our awakening be, and the more profound the lived experience. To what end, I don’t know. If I can ever get to the end of Neumann’s book, I may find out. But I’ve a feeling the universe was just having me on when it pointed him out to me, and by so doing is pointing out – symbolically – my own limitations.
And if so, then fair enough, but I remain, as ever, open for business.
The Rivendale Review 
A lot to think about, there, Michael! And a clever ending…
Thanks, Steve. It was one of those where I needed to write it out to see if it was what I really thought. And I think I do.
I agree with Steve, Michael. I’m glad you wrote this out and posted it here.
Thank you, Audrey. I shall persevere with the book and see what else sticks.
Wasted on me with my short attention span.
But I wonder re being awakened – is it possible to be awakened in some senses but not in others?
Eg, if the pandemic was a real concern of something that would seriously disable society, I see that our response to it has become a lingering distraction obsession with, and rejection of mortality. The distraction itself has become disabling such that society is now useless. I feel very “awake” to this, it seems crystal clear in my mind, but to others, perhaps, I’m becoming a bore!
I guess with society one of the problems is getting sucked into the petty squabbles and feeling the need to pick sides. As the consciousness develops we can awaken, as you say, and in a sense rise above it, seeing things others who are still lost in the squabbles cannot see. I think you’ve mentioned this idea before, that we have rejected mortality, and I think it’s true, we do seem to hide from it and are less accepting than other cultures.
Yes, I was right! I am a bore!
“Rise above it” –
I am probably confusing your rare “awakening” with something far more trivial.
At the moment, at work I am exiled to the garage, and spend my days In the company of two drivers, being chaperoned by them when out, and idling with them when not. One is as mad as a coot, talks incessantly, following each opinion with the opposite a minute later, the other is a cooler customer but also talks non stop and thinks he is dispensing valuable wisdom. I consider myself cleverer than either, and try to keep quiet, but still I get drawn. I might have a lot to learn on this subject, but as I say, I don’t have the attention span. I can only dream of enlightenment!
Thank you once again for a provoking read.
As in : ‘Note to self – find Erich Neumann’s books’
The marvellous thing about retirement is that it has brought time for reflection.
I wish that some 70 years ago someone had told me, ‘No one can “teach” you anything. All others can do is provide an environment and material and give you the opportunity to learn.’
Learning brings pain, confusion and takes time.
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“He who learns must suffer
And even in our sleep, pain that cannot forget
Falls drop by drop upon the heart…
And in our own despair, against our will,
Comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.”
–Agamemnon; Aeschylus
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When pursuing a career one has never enough time.
One comes upon Jung, Thoreau and now Neumann almost by chance.
I never ‘understand’ what they are saying whilst reading. But days or weeks, sometimes years later, I will be walking along with my mind in neutral and a thought comes in ‘Wow. So that is what he meant’. Of course I am probably wrong, but it becomes what he meant to me. It is an awakening as some new previously unknown (to me) idea becomes part of my universe, and “My” universe is all I can know, or can create.
I find myself rejecting the ‘Unity’ or ‘Unified’ Universe idea, where we are all part of some Cosmic entity. I cannot see why a life has to have purpose or meaning.
Does every individual ant have a purpose and meaning in it’s life? What about a Cabbage? I am leaning toward the idea that existence is sufficient unto itself.
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I love the concepts (precepts?) of Sufism, but without the God figure.
…. “but beyond that you have what is called Ihsan, which means literally ‘philanthropy’ but which means a belief in God as you see him and as he sees you all the time.
So, for example, if you are walking along and you see broken glass, you pick it up – not just because you worry that someone might tread on it, but because it is the right thing to do, and it will please God.”
Shaker Aamer Guantanamo
Classical Sufi scholars have defined Sufism as “a science whose objective is the reparation of the heart and turning it away from all else but God”.[7] Alternatively, in the words of the Darqawi Sufi teacher Ahmad ibn Ajiba, “a science through which one can know how to travel into the presence of the Divine, purify one’s inner self from filth, and beautify it with a variety of praiseworthy traits”.
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“… But because it is the right thing to do …”
” …. purify one’s inner self from filth, and beautify it with a variety of praiseworthy traits”
Who says it is the right thing to do? I do.
Who says these traits are praiseworthy? I do.
Thank you for your beautiful prose and the opportunity to create new thoughts.
Thank you. I know what you mean about perseverance with reading, even when you think it’s not going in. It seems to work at a subliminal level and makes its own connections later on. I find thinkers of the stature of Jung and Neumann daunting if I’m stupid enough to try to meet them at their own level.