Side-by-side

A new opposite is coming into view.  I realize that when my children are here with their children, I space out on my own interests, and feel that I have to put my life aside.  That is pretty true because there is so much going on.  However I realize this morning that having my life and living with theirs is not either/or, and that I can balance both with side-by-side attention.  Hopefully that will allow time for both in the future.  Actually, each afternoon, we all had quiet time while the little one was sleeping.  There was time for me to transition to my own interests which I was able to do.  

Thinking versus Living

I have been "gone".  My son and his family were here for the weekend, and so my thoughts are all about how much my heart opened to having them here.  It was wonderful:  one of the delights of having children is enjoying their successes and if they have them, their failures.  I am challenged physically when they are here because there is so much going on all the time.  Rarely a moment when something is happening:  breakfast, lunch, dinner.  When one is finished, it is time to start another meal, clean up, then start again.

I was introduced to all the pigeon books by Mo Willems.  They are such fun.  Also time with Dora on the computer was fun.  

No time to think about Jung, heavy thoughts, only time to live.

Opposites

I am back reflecting on the opposites.  I have been reading about the Red Sun which came into a recent dream.  In doing so, I discover that sun and moon, or man and woman are the greatest opposites to ponder.  Sol (masculine) and Luna (feminine).  I am aware that my definitions of masculine and feminine have changed considerably since I have been dreaming and studying Jung. I believe I have expanded their meanings to include far more than I did when I was growing up in the fifties and most everything was pretty fixed:  women were like June Cleaver and men were like John Wayne.  Pretty stilted, don't you think.  Anyway, I like to consider powerful women and thoughtful men, and I hope to consolidate those characteristics in myself:  to become more of both.  Is the ultimate reconciliation between man and woman.  The alchemists seemed to think so.  There are always two sides to every situation:  nothing is either good or bad.  Thoughts to ponder on since much of conscious life is dictated by right and wrong. 

Greatest passion

It still surprises me when I find something that Jung has said which brings me great comfort.  In this case he says that the strongest passion in humans is not hunger, sex, or power, although these are quite strong; the very strongest passion is laziness.  Again this is in Marie Louise von Franz's book on Archetypal Patterns in Fairy Tales.  Several months ago, I went through a period of several months when I couldn't do anything.  My interest was gone, my libido was hiding, and I was so uncomfortable with not feeling connected to any of my common interests.  I think of that when I read what Jung has to say about laziness.  

I am glad to have my energy back:  it feels more familiar.  In our Western Society we have been taught to work hard, and that was certainly true in my family.  Both my parents worked  very hard as did my  brother and myself.  So when I hit a place of no energy and no interest, I became very upset with myself.  Who knew that laziness was a great human passion.

Dreams point in a direction

Marie Louise von Franz says (and I am paraphrasing) that turning toward the unconscious is like taking a new medicine and waiting to see the result.  Most likely a creative process will begin.  I have had patients in psychotherapy who did not want to turn toward the unconscious, and they were committed to finding a solution to a problem that concerned them rather than watching what their dreams were saying.  Often what I am focused on in my waking life has nothing to do with what the Self wants from me as expressed in my dreams.  It certainly brings a new perspective to me to realize that what I am so focused on is irrelevant to my dreaming life and therefore to my purpose in life.  What a concept!!  In my experience, I have found both with myself and others that we spend a great deal of energy focusing on some little or big problem and it turns out that it has not real importance in our lives.

Should I leave a relationship may not have any meaning to the real purpose of our lives, and only if we go to our dreams can we realize what we might better focus on.  Our rational concerns very often are not relevant to the real meaning and purpose of our lives.

Our comings and goings to and from ourselves

I am currently visiting in Los Angeles so my posting has been slack.  However I want to share a quote from Mary Louise von Franz, who talks about the objective psyche and how we come and go in relationship to it.  She talks about how we can become compartmentalized and believe we are truly committed to the unconscious and then all of a sudden, we don't believe anymore.  Yes, it is the same person who feels both these things.  What an amazing complicated system we are:  one day committed to the objective psyche, our dreams, and the messages we get from them and then suddenly we don't remember our commitment and we are off and running "away".  I guess we could say that we are each on our journey which draws us closer to ourselves and then further away from ourselves.  No wonder, we take several lifetimes to get to center.  Any comments will be appreciated.

Life's task

Today I have some clarity about the dilemma I have been swirling around in.  My dreams have been very powerful, and then I wonder how I can relate to them in reality.  Is having a powerful dream enough or do I have some responsibility to bring that content into the mainstream of my life.  Actually, bringing those dreams into my life is not the issue so much as do I have an obligation to bring them into the world:  a greater life than my own.  Yesterday, I read a passage in Jung's Psychology and Alchemy which helped clarify this problem for me.  "...almost unbearable tension because of the utter incommensurability between conscious life and the unconscious process, which can be experienced only in the innermost soul and cannot touch the visible surface of life at any point."  In truth, the rationality of the cosmos is constantly being violated in some of the same ways that the unconscious process violates our surface life.  This sentence is a paraphrase of Jung.  The task at hand seems to be to accomplish the paradoxical union of irreconcilables.  Sometimes I cannot handle this task without feeling crazy and only when I realize the inherent difficulty of the task can I even approach the questions that I have. 

Frame of reference

After the first half of life, Jung focuses on fulfilling one's life path which is built into our foundation at birth or maybe before.  This is an approach which typically psychology avoids.  Most schools of psychology believe that one can approach life by remembering the trauma of the past and redoing it.  Much of the time is spent trying to pick up the past rather than focusing on what these past experiences have encouraged us to do in the present.  Jung is more interested in finding the meaning in what has happened to us both past and present than in finding what trauma has created what kind of personality.  

I have been practicing object relations psychology for many years, and I find myself looking forward to examining the meaning of my own experiences as well as my clients.  This means that the therapist does not always or ever know what meaning is in each experience, but that the client knows and is able to uncover the meaning with the experience and help from the therapist.  A dynamic flow of energy begins to happen between client and therapist which can be lacking when the therapist considers herself/himself an expert in the life of the client.

Dreams

Pat and I are planning our flyer for our dream group:  actually, Pat is looking up quotes on dreams and I am sometimes helping her.  We are going to advertise in The Door Opener, so she is looking for appropriate quotes.  It makes me feel my excitement about dreams once more.  I stand amazed at how much is revealed in our dreams, and of course, I circle around that excitement off and on throughout the days, weeks, and etc.  

I have not dreamed in the last few nights, and I guess that is because Pat and I have been reading Jung's Seminar in Dream Analysis over the past month.  What a brilliant man that Jung is!  Anyway with my studying and working through the images in my dreams of late, my dream life has slowed down so I can catch up with all the images and symbols.

It feels so important to me to carefully work with our dreams for we have no other objective view of our lives, the purpose of our lives, and how to go about developing a relationship to God, if you will.  Indeed, what could be more important for the second half of our life after we have created all our ego would ever need:  then we can work on our relationship to God and of course the end of this life as we know it.

Lessons from circles

Edinger, Anatomy of the Psyche, says on page 143:"  Psychologically, circulatio is the repeated circuit of all aspects of one's being, which gradually generates awareness of a transpersonal center uniting the conflicting factors."  As I circle around, I am aware of the opposites occurring one after the other.  Eventually, after several times around (perhaps 100 or so) I begin to see some reconciliation between the two.  I become less divided by placing the world into categories and see the fascinating melding of our rich experiences.  This process involves self-acceptance and of course acceptance of others.  Lessons in humility and generally becoming involved with what it means to be human. 

Dancing to the tune of a different drummer

Music, dancing, actually any movement seemed to awaken our souls; especially mine.  There are the witches of fairy tales who dance and chant around their pot, or cauldron, which could represent the vessel we are ourselves.  The cauldron is an image in the I Ching of our own vessel which needs protection and care.  The witches dancing feel protective to me.  When I had cancer and was undergoing chemotherapy, I had a dream in which the medicine was boiling in a pot, and I was told to infuse loving kindness into the chemotherapy medicine.  After that dream, the treatments seemed less toxic, and I was able to bring the opposites together through this wise message from my unconscious.

Walking in circles may also be some protective measure for my psyche while I am so introspective right now.  Concentrating so much of my energy on my inner work certainly challenges my ego which wants me to be active in the outer world rather than so introspective.  I am following where my process leads me which right now happens to be studying in detail the images of my dreams.  Rhythm, dancing, and music are my guides right now.

More rhythm

Jung in Symbols of Transformation talks about psychic energy and posits that the first evidence of psychic energy is in the rhythms of the baby when he or she wiggles their arms and legs.  Also the rhythm of their first words:  mamama or dadada and the like.  And...Marie Louise von Franz in her book:  Psyche and Matter addresses the rhythm of time and how that introduces the concept of number.  On p. 71, she states that" time and space are inseparably connected and form a four-dimensional continuum"..."a return to the age old primitive intuition whereby for instance, the Aztec god Omoteotl, with the four Tetzcatlipocas in the four corners of space, created space and time simultaneously.  

We have circular time (our clocks) and linear time (days, months, etc.)  These methods of telling time have developed out of the tides, phases of the moon, and the movement of the earth around the sun.  

It is interesting to me that many of the primitive person's intuitions have now been confirmed by our advanced technology and advanced ability to discern and differentiate concepts through our thinking:  through our separation from the original oneness.

So we begin in oneness, then differentiate to a very sophisticated perspective and once again return to oneness.  Hummmm

Circumambulating

Today I am circumambulating  my way around the opposites keeping in mind the black pearl image and a dream I had last night in which I found myself going around circles outside my office in Kansas City and also around the parking lot at the grocery store looking for my car.  

Having this happen twice in one dream doubles the impact or importance of the circle.  That image has stayed with me all day, and as you know, circles are mandala images so it feels important to honor my walking around the circle as I ponder my day's activities and thoughts.  I am still remembering the drumming and dancing from yesterday and have added the circle today.  My hope is that I will encourage my unconscious to begin to provide more information around rhythms.  And next Friday is the summer solstice so that will be a powerful time for information to come through from the unconscious.

I have felt a bit disoriented today, and I realize this may be due to the new rhythms coming into my system.  I feel somewhat dissatisfied with old routines and haven't yet found my new ones.  More to come.

rhythms

Today I am focused on rhythm.  I had a dream in which a young boy was rocking in a window ledge.  And the rocking sensation touched a place of how we can put ourselves into a trance by performing a rhythmic movement.  This has happened forever:  we did it as little babies, as young children, and still do it today.  Notice it in yourself.  Native Americans have many ways of creating rhythms through drumming, dancing, or any repetitive movement which transfers energy from our bodies to mother earth.

And...then there is the rhythm of our lives, our dreams, and how those interact.  Our daily lives have a rhythm of their own which most often we do without being aware.  And certainly our dreams have their own rhythm which if we look at and study reveals some interesting patterns.  As I have been recording my dreams, I am seeing some dreams now that reflect earlier dreams that I could not understand.  In other words, I am seeing patterns and rhythms.  These rhythms may be the order than underlies the disorder in most of our activities:  at a deep level, I mean.  More to contemplate.  It also leaves room for the possibility of synchronicity.

Coming together of the opposites

Okay, so the process is one of separating the opposites, such as good/bad, masculine/feminine, earth/sky which may be the first step of individuating while the final step is reconciling the opposites so that I can hold one side by side with the other rather than either/or.  In the final analysis (if there could be one), the black pearl image may be pointing in that direction where black and white are united to form the black pearl.  In the bowl which contained ten black pearls they were arranged in Pythagoras' magic ten number where four pearls surrounded one pearl in an equilateral triangle.  More food for thought because Pythagorans believed that number was the key to the mystery of matter.  I don't fully grasp that yet, but perhaps in another decade or so, it will be clear to me. 

They also believed that ten was a number of wholeness. 

Structure of the psyche

I think that what Jung is referring to is that images come from stars, sun and moon as well as inorganic represented by earth, air, fire and water, and also reptilian (cold blooded creatures).  Down deep in our unconscious are the foundations  of life prior to when human (warm blooded) creations came into being.  So we receive images from these layers of our unconscious because they form the structure of our psyche.  When I first realized that my unconscious held all the history of mankind (and now history of life), I felt comforted to know that I had a simple, true, individual place in the whole history of life.

When images of snake, black pearl, or whatever, I know I am in touch with ancient history and that the image has something to share with me about my life now.  Finding the meaning of these symbols is fascinating to me, and I enjoy search until I find a meaning that completes my search for I feel a relationship to the image.

Matter and Spirit

In Jung's Seminar in Dream Analysis, he spends quite a bit of time exploring the relationship between the patterns of the stars and the patterns of our human lives.  I find this interesting because it brings together for me a parallel cycle between the stars and us:  for example women menstruate according to moon cycles:  certainly not every woman having her period at the same time as every other woman, but there are cycles in each individual woman which are fairly constant.  Perhaps there is not such a difference between matter and spirit as I have thought.  What Jung talks about in these pages brought to my attention an interaction between matter and spirit.  Or perhaps a facet of the same process.  That matter and spirit are the same energy seen by my eyes and ears as different when in fact they are the same.

I am holding these thoughts to see what comes of them.

Symbols: sun and moon

On page 404 of Jung's Seminar on Dream Analysis, he states the sun and moon have something to do with the structure of the mind.  To me, that is a powerful statement, one that I don't completely understand.  I do understand that we have projected qualities onto the sun and moon such as sun being masculine and active and rational and the moon being mystery, irrational, feminine, and passive.  And certainly these characteristics are part of my own individual makeup. Even if I don't completely understand what he means, I do relate to the characteristics of each and can find relevant aspects in my own psychology.

I like that Jung searches through our past, both near and far, to uncover deeper and deeper associations to images.  It brings a certain richness and depth to those images that come to me in my dreams.  And, then I can find the certain characteristics of these images which touch me with their meaning.  In order to travel these paths, I have to yield up my scientific demands and my Western way of approaching meaning.  That is not easy to do because it is so ingrained in me.  My friend, Pat, has been helping me with this understanding and how challenging these views are to my scientific frame of reference.

Black Pearl: Moon

After a great deal of research, I have completed for now my information on the black pearl.  The symbol of the moon has sustained the most interest for me because the moon symbol is really a movement from black (new moon) to white (full moon), and also represents the mother, feminine, and perhaps an integration or certainly movement from one to the other:  black to white as process.  In my own experience, I find myself moving from darkness and chaos to fullness and light and places in between.For me personally, I like the black pearl and moon symbol.

Now to answer "onthepath"s question about four, I say as we move from chaos to begin to form our identity, we move from the one to "I" which indicates a separation of masculine and feminine as well as spirit (upper) and lower (human, animal).  These four cardinal points help us grow into our uniqueness.

One last remark:  the moon is more irrational than the sun which is more rational:  it moves across the sky each day as itself while the moon comes in the night (mystery) and has rhythms.  I have profited by becoming more irrational and demanding less rationality.  Good for me.  I am also more aware of my own rhythms of activity, rest, inactivity, and how these cycle through my months and years.

Black Pearl: Individuation

Today, I am struck by how the black pearl could suggest the individuation process which starts in chaos and confusion (black) and through our spirits separates into the four:  upper and lower, feminine and masculine.  This involves a wedding of sorts, and parallels the alchemical process of turning metals into gold.  Jung has likened the alchemical scientists to early psychologists although that was not a conscious awareness on their parts.  He feels that they were projecting the individuation process onto their chemical work.  

Heraclitus suggested four colors which were reduced to three in the 15th or 16th century (see Jung, vol.14, para. 333.  In paragraph 334, Jung compares the individuation process as moving from the black to white as a moon condition which then arises to sunrise (red).  I know this is becoming somewhat academic, but I want to share the depth and richness of just one image from my dreams.

I have been wanting to find themes and patterns in my dreams for several years, but I have not tackled the research necessary to do that until now.  I am very excited.  

Tomorrow, I want to explore the black pearl and the moon.

Black Pearl: Ghost Ship

An interesting case of synchronicity occurred last night when "Pirates of Caribbean:  Black Pearl" was shown on television.  Many of you have probably already seen this film, but I had not.  Last night I was fascinated because this is a ghost ship that is invested in returning gold coins to their original owners who were Aztec.  Anyway I saw some evil/good meanings in the film.  So at least Hollywood is on the same track as my understanding of the dream:  that black pearl implies some coming together of good and bad:  one of the first opposites we face when we separate from our parents.  Actually the ratio of good to bad is what helps us develop a healthy ego to go into the world.  If there is too much bad, we seem destined to a life of difficulty and suffering.  However, again, some people find their way through that challenge and achieve some integration and sometimes greatness.

Aside:  Jung believes that psychologically we should be looking forward rather than backward in our life journey, and I am comforted by this belief.  Our dreams help us to stay on the forward-looking path.  More later.  

Black Pearl: Alchemy

I have been researching black and pearl for two days now, and I feel like I am just beginning to scratch the surface.  Certainly my search has directed me back to alchemy, and the stages of the process of individuation which include black, white, and red.  Since black and white are included in the image of the black pearl, I am looking into the first two stages of the individuation process.  The first stage, as I mentioned the other day, involves the very beginning of our development, when we are one with the whole of all.  We are one with our mothers, etc.  Then the next stage happens when we begin to separate into "I" and face the multitude of opposites:  good/bad; hot/cold; etc.  The final stage would bring the opposites together, and this stage is red because the blood of life, the reality of living in the world and expressing ourselves as individuals involves action and vitality to our understanding.  

I am fascinated by all this, and want to continue to explore the meaning of the "black pearl" image as it translates into my individual life.

More to come.

Black Pearl

I posted a picture of me today to further my awkwardness and I feel shy.  I am trying to upgrade my site to become more available to whatever audience I have.  I am also trying to include some links to other sites you might find interesting.  I am still doing research on the black pearl.  Most of what I am reading energizes my interest in what this dream is all about.  What I have discovered so far is that a black pearl really does exist.   They come from Tahiti, and they do not really look black to me:  they look more iridescent to me.  

Black refers to the beginning of existence where everything is chaos and there is no one individual.  So black refers to the initial phase of development, psychologically.  Pearl might refer to the stone hidden in the blackness.  For Jung, the stone is the goal of development when we have developed a solid center from which to live.

Anyway, so far so good, and more to come.  In this dream of the black pearl, I was on a sail boat outside of Vancouver, and there were ten black pearls in a bowl which was floating along side the boat.

Holding the tension of the opposites

This morning, I am thinking of opposites such as black pearl which was a symbol which came up in a recent dream of mine.  I have been researching the various references to pearl in Jung's many volumes, and next I want to see how black fits in.  One of the challenges that Jung proposes is that our job as human beings to hold the tension of the opposites:  that means for me right now to hold the tension of black with the beauty and purity of the pearl.  I am open to comments from you readers about what you think.  However let me hint that black refers to the feminine and earth and mystery and the unconscious so I have to find the pearl hidden in the earth, the feminine, and how to understand the mystery of the "black pearl".  

Today I feel a deeper commitment to my dreams: instead of just taking them at face value, I want to elaborate the richness of the symbols that appear in them.  So research is in order, and right now I feel excited about doing just that.  It feels like the next step in taking my dream life seriously, and it also feels like the beginning of finding links between dreams.

It has been a challenge to move from an outer-directed person to an inner-directed person, and today it feels like it fits me more than usual.

Honor my mother

If my mother was still alive, she would be 105 today.  Whenever it is near her birthday or her death day, I feel her presence acutely.  Today is like that.  I have many regrets about our relationship because she was a very important person in my life, and we always seemed to be a odds with one another.  I know that is not unusual in mother-daughter relationships, and I find very comfort in knowing that.  I was so full of myself, and she was insecure and troubled.  She had many talents, and she didn't realize that.  She was a perfectionist as were so many women in that time of history.  I just want to honor her today and wish her a happy birthday.

Fate

Long ago when I was married to a paranoid schizophrenic, my father told me that if I weren't such an emotional stick, he (my husband) would be alright.  How is that for taking responsibility!?  So you can see why having a concept and now an experience of fate has been so important to me.  Jung has said that God is anything that crosses your path and changes your life substantially.  That has happened for me many times:  marrying a schizophrenic, losing my first son, and breast cancer to name just a few of the major events of my life.  

Also good things have happened such as getting hired at the University, having two more children.  There were times in my life when it seemed like everything I touched turned to gold.  I never felt that I had orchestrated those events.  My experience told me that these opportunities came my way, but I had no understanding of fate.

What if there is a blueprint of our lives that we come into the world with, and then our job is to actualize that blueprint?  Based on my life experiences, I know this to be true.

Responsibility

While I have been growing up, I have felt like it is my responsibility to take for all those happenings in my life.  And there have been some tragic ones which then left me with heavy guilt. In 2004, I was diagnosed with breast cancer, and this "taking responsibility" for everything that happened to me was challenged.  I began to look for the meaning in my cancer rather than brooding over how I had caused it.  A whole new world opened up for me, and eventually led me to Jung.   Shortly before my diagnosis, I had a dream of being a shark in a zoo.  I was sitting with other sea "people" and we were discussing how the electric fences that kept us enclosed probably were not charged anymore.  I said I was willing to test the waters and I did.  I found that I could swim out into the sea, and there was no charge to keep me from doing so.  I called back to my friends and told them we were free, and they wouldn't come join me.  The question that kept coming to my mind was the relationship between freedom and cancer.

Jung believes and now so do I that each event in our lives has both a cure and a injury attached.  I did have to go through a mastectomy, chemotherapy, and now arimendex to keep the cancer under control.  But also I was given insights about my life and the direction I needed to take form this point forward.  

Fate has a role in our lives:  not just each self struggling with the lessons. 

Projection

I like that Jung reminds me that projection happens to us.  We are not in charge of it.  However when it does happen (whenever we have a strong positive or negative reaction to someone else), it is an opportunity to discover something about ourselves which we have kept in the dark.  I know how hard this is:  we are certain that that  trait is about the other, not at all about ourself.  However if the goal is to become conscious, then I know that my strong reaction is telling me something about claiming another part of me.  Ahggg.  

The price of consciousness is that we need to reclaim all the parts of ourselves.  We can't just determine to be conscious of how good we are; we also need to reclaim how we can be the one who steals, murders, lies, etc.  This post sounds a little preachie, and I suspect that is just so I can distance myself from what I am saying.  It does take a big commitment and a continued one to be able to welcome home all those parts of me that I either love or hate in someone else.  Amen!

Shadow

If the goal of this human incarnation is to become conscious, then learning about my shadow is a big step in that direction.  Jung uses shadow to refer to the fact that these parts of me are in the dark:  the unconscious.  In a dream, if I am hanging out with someone of the same sex as I, then I know that my unconscious is pointing me toward something about me that I have not been aware.  This can be either positive or negative.  For example the other night, I dreamed about an old friend of mine who lives in unreality, lives an arbitrary life, stalks others, etc., so I had to begin to recognize how I am those parts as well.  It is not easy to face those parts of myself that I have felt belonged to someone else, but when the unconscious "puts" it to me in a dream, I really have no choice.  

The advantage of knowing all the parts of who I am is that I can become a whole person, be able to take more responsibility for myself, and to live a fuller life.  Without projecting my parts onto someone else, I came to know myself, be more conscious, and HAVE A SHADOW.  I become a three dimensional person:  not a cut-out figure.

Dreams

My dreams have been challenging lately.  When my dreams introduce me to my shadow side, I have such mixed feelings about them.  Of course, I want to know my dark side, and of course, I would rather not have to face those parts of myself that have been hidden in the dark.  Here is the deal!  Life is about becoming conscious:  I can't become conscious without facing all the parts of me.  So that said, I thank my dreams for confronting me with those parts of myself I prefer to deny.  

Whenever there is a person in my dream that is female, I know that is  a part of my shadow. Whenever there is a male person in my dream, I know that is an animus figure who represents my relationship to the unconscious.  These are Jung's views, and I use them as guides to my dreams.  Lately I have had what Jung calls personal dreams which are dreams that inform us about our dark side.  In the past I have had impersonal dreams which are dreams that inform me of a much greater world (psychic) and how I relate to that.  You have probably heard of the collective unconscious and the personal unconscious.  So our dreams come from one of those two places according to Jung.

First Day

I have wanted to start this blog because I have been searching for something to do in my spare time.  And I have wanted some contact with the outside world.  As I have grown older, my world has collapsed some:  this has been an active decision on my part.  Actually, in this part of my life, I have moved from an extrovert to an introvert.  Rather a shock because I find I am much more vulnerable than I was as a young professional.  All of these comments I am sharing will be revealed in more detail as I go along.  I just wanted to begin somewhere.  I am not blogging about my children, my grandchildren, or my personal connections:  I am blogging about the thoughts, ideas, and memories that reside in my psyche.  I almost said "brain" but I don't mean brain, I mean psyche which is a more complete description of what goes on in my inner world.  

I am calling my blog trueerror because I wanted to highlight the fact that there is no universal truth, only the close approximations that each one of us makes to our individual truths.  That is what this time in my life is about:  seeking my own individual truths and my own individual taboos.