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.