The Line that is Not - Drake Spaeth Psy.D
The Line that is Not: Reflections on Mathematics, Mysticism, Dreaming, and Active Imagination
Drake Spaeth, Psy.D.
Mathematics, the scientific method, and classification strategies engendered or impacted by Cartesian philosophical reasoning are extraordinary approaches that offer excellent tools for encountering and understanding the natural world. While the technology that has emerged from their effective utilization ominously threatens our very existence in some respects, it may also facilitate our further evolution as beings, calling to mind the vistas of 2001: A Space Odyssey, or Star Trek in its various permutations.
On the other hand (as I am fond of reminding my students), a rigid, dogmatic, overly reductionistic adherence to the methods of science as the only acceptable means of approaching and understanding complex phenomena—a practice that has come to be known as “scientism”—is needlessly arrogant. It dismisses and disrespects thousands of years of indigenous knowledge and traditions around the world, belief systems that tend to uphold more intuitive apprehension of phenomena as well as the subtle and mysterious connections and relationships among them. Moreover, art, poetry, and other avenues of imagination illumine other experiential facets of reality besides what can be discovered or constructed through facts and data alone.
As tools, math and science reveal their limitations at a surprisingly superficial level of description. For instance, it is difficult to describe in systematic or operational terms the physical reality of a Mobius loop (a loop that twists on itself in a circle), which apparently has only one side and one edge. I love to use the Mobius in Existential-Humanistic Psychotherapy class as a metaphor for how duality can be an illusion—that qualities that appear to be opposites halves are actually a monistic continuum. The Yin and Yang symbol also illustrates this paradox, depicting a relationship between apparent opposites that are flowing continuously into the other, each containing within it the seed of the other. The paradoxical unity of what appears to be dualistic presents a paradox that is not easily or systematically categorized or described.
As another example, one of my favorite childhood conundrums presents an archer shooting an arrow at a tree. In mathematical terms, presumably the arrow would never hit the tree, as at some point it crosses half the remaining distance, then half of that distance, then half of THAT distance, and so forth into infinity.
Statistics, the means by which scientists determine/decide that a given hypothesis is proven or disproven, provide levels of significance, typically described in such terms as p < .01, p < .05, or p < .0001. Essentially these p levels provide line criteria that findings must meet or exceed in order for a given experimental finding or effect to be accepted as “real” in connection with the experimental manipulation. It is convenient to ignore or forget that such criteria were agreed upon at some point by consensus as being meaningful, if subjective criteria for making decisions about strength and acceptability of research findings. There is nothing otherwise special or magical about the numbers except that we tend to give them the power to determine or construct reality in which we live.
Arguably, since the time of Aristotle, proponents of the evolving scientific method have based observational conclusions on evidence collected from sensory input. It is possible, after all, to reach a basic level of agreement that we are all seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling phenomena in similar ways, and to assume from such shared experience that we live in the same world. We can move through the world in similar ways, manipulate objects in similar ways, and experience orientation and disorientation in similar ways. But all of our physical senses can be fooled or manipulated in surprising ways.
If I see or hear something that others claim not present, I can be described as experiencing visual or auditory hallucinations. Drugs, brain trauma, psychosis, or even sleep deprivation can produce hallucinations or distort the experience of visual or auditory reality. Electronic stimulation or the visual or auditory cortex can produce these false experiences as well. Less common are tactile, gustatory, or olfactory hallucinations, but they also can occur through the same means previously described. Interestingly, it is theoretically possible (even if technology has not yet fully risen to the challenge) to fool or manipulate all of the senses upon which a person relies to know and experience living in his or her world. It could produce an all-encompassing but false experience of reality, as the individual whose sense are being manipulated may, for instance, actually be sitting in a chair while believing they are skiing down a mountain in Aspen. Add in the seemingly utterly fantastic notion of manipulating the full sensory apparatus of masses of people, and the plot of the Matrix movies (or notions of Gnostic philosophy) come clearly to mind. The deeper, more disturbing question, of course, is how do we possibly know that is not already happening to all of us?
Given the fact that colors of objects are reflected light rays that are transduced into neural energy processed by our brains; that sound waves generate vibrations of the tympanum that are also transduced; and that the sensations of touch, taste, and smell are generated by neural phenomena as well; we are constantly swimming in a sea of brain sensations that have no real relationship to the so-called real world. We have no way of knowing that the real world is even “out there”. We live and love through brain chemistry alone. The external world is simply a Mystery that we fail to know through our senses, if it exists at all.
When I consider these reflections in a summative way, I have difficulty accepting the notion that true “objectivity” is possible and feel compelled to seriously entertain the possibility that all human experience is subjective. The Cartesian dichotomy between the subjective and objective only be a distinction of intellectual convenience. Where does the line really exist? I am reminded once of again of the Mobius, where two seemingly separate worlds are actually one, twisted upon itself.
My reading of the Collected Works of C. G. Jung as well his Red Book (Liber Novus), has convinced me that he saw the human psyche (that is, the sum of what we might call conscious personality and unconscious mind), as a sort of Mobius. At the risk of oversimplifying his view, human beings perceive the world through the mask of the persona. This mask is mutable and limited in what is presents to the world and what it perceives, though the ego behind it is somewhat bigger and more constant. Behind the observing ego and bigger still is the personal unconscious, the repository of the Shadow (qualities of our psyche that seem to be opposing or contradictory to what is expressed though the persona or simply those parts of us that are generally never expressed) and the Anima/Animus (opposite gender parts of our being that are not expressed openly in the outer world). Even bigger and behind the personal unconscious is the collective unconscious, or the repository of archetypal aspects of us that are thematically and universally shared by all human beings dating from our deepest origins. The Collected Works hint—and the Red Book reveals— that Jung felt that deeper than the collective unconscious itself is that part of psyche that also participates in what we might understand as universal reality. There is a part of us that is also part of the universe, which also gives rise to this world that we perceive and act upon through the persona. Astonishingly, Jung sees the psyche as inextricably connected to the universe, which twists back on the psyche. The Red Book firmly supports the notion that Jung was a mystic.
Jung asserted often that the deepest aspects of our psyche right down to the collective unconscious are frequently expressed in dreams, which can be (re)accessed through meditation, analytical therapy, art, or active daydreaming. The purposeful, intentional, disciplined, practice of return to the canvas of dreams through these methods he called “active imagination”. He utilized active imagination as one of the chief methods of his analytical therapy work with clients. He encouraged clients to deepen their connection to symbols and figures of dreams, through artwork and mental imagery, with the result that deep insights and understanding of dreams and the contents of their own psyche emerged. Active imagination promoted profound, transformative growth in the lives of his clients. He also indulged in this practice very deeply himself, during the years of personal crisis that followed his bitter feud and schism from his mentor and teacher, Sigmund Freud. Arguably, he and others close to him believed that he may have become for a time definably psychotic in immersing himself so deeply in active imagination.
The Red Book, published in 2009 when his surviving family consented at long last to its release, consists of Jung’s primal descriptions of his chaotic descent into his own soul (as well as stunning symbolic paintings depicting his process). The Red Book details his encounters with entities such as Philemon and Salome, who were products of his unconscious but who also took on a sort of independent existence of their own. It is here, I feel, that Jung most unapologetically reveals himself as a true mystic in his insistence that these entities were both universal as well as psychic in composition. Like many mystics, he participated for a time in experience commonly labeled as psychotic today. Given that he emerged with profound, creative self-knowledge that gave birth to a great part of the Collected Works, the experience apparently did him some good. Even Salome, who demanded of Herod the head of John the Baptist, showed Jung that cutting off his own head would free him of his excessive attachment to how own intellect and open his hear for true compassionate connection with others.
As Lon Milo DuQuette, ceremonial magician says, “It’s all in your head…you just have no idea how big your head is.” Believing what is in the head to be real is widely considered to be delusional or psychotic. Perhaps psychotic individuals in some sense are mystics who do not emerge or return fully form this dimension. A full consideration of the reasons why some return and others do not could be the subject of different essay itself.
Given these reflections, I feel that the line between what we consider to be objective and therefore real, and what we consider to be subjective, and therefore imaginary, is not really a line as much as a suggestion. Therefore, Jung’s active use of imagination seems similar, if not identical, to what occurs for shamans and similar spirit workers around the world when they journey on behalf of others or themselves for otherworldly knowledge and healing. Their knowledge and conviction of the malleability and artificiality of the border between what we typically believe to be subjective and objective, is what gives them the power to work as effectively as they do. It is not easy work either, lest any here mistake me for a proponent of The Secret, which promotes the notion that simply wishing can make it all better.
What is exciting about mysticism as illumined by Jung is its accessibility to everyone. Jung reveals that dreamwork is a fairly easy entry into mystical experiences. Such experiences meet the seven criteria identified by Douglas Shrader, who combines those of William James and H.C Happold (Shrader, 2008). The first is ineffability, or difficulty describing the experience in ordinary language, which is presumably the source of Jung’s tendency to make up his own words to describe them. The second is the noetic quality, or the revelation of hidden knowledge. Dreams, and the material revisited through active imagination, are sourced in deeper, less accessible levels of the psyche and can be a great source of insight and self-awareness. The third is transiency, or the fact that they last for a short time (as dreams do). The fourth is passivity, or the fact that they happen to someone, out of their volition or control. The fact that aspects of imagination take on independent existence from the dreamer and interact with and upon the dreamer would seem to fit this criterion. The fifth is a sense of unity or connectedness. The sense of being inextricably connected to universal consciousness described by Jung would seem to fit this criterion. The sixth is timelessness, or the loss of connection with, or a transcendence of, linear time. Dreams and daydreams that involve active imagination foster a disconnection from conventional time awareness. Last, the criterion of a feeling of connection with a true or authentic self is something Jung achieved with his use of active imagination, as did his clients.
Robert Moss has authored a considerable number of books about the connection between dreamwork and mystical experiences. His classic work Dreamgates describes straightforward techniques for tracking and working with lucid dreams to identify powerful symbols and images. These can be used as portals or gates by which it is possible to re-enter one’s dreams through techniques of active imagination, over and over again. If a dream is recognized as highly significant or important in what it reveals or suggests about one’s life, then locations or symbols within the dream may serve as entry points through which to re-enter it through meditation, daydreaming, or art, expanding upon aspects of the dream for greater self awareness or intuition. My wife and I have even filled our entire house with art objects that bear strong connections to our dreams and active imagination, so that our very living environment surrounds us with ever-present invitations to enter into deeper, more meaningful engagement with imaginative appreciation of the beauty in our lives.
With practice, active imagination helps us see the mystical side of nature in seasonal manifestation as well. Cycles of light and dark teach about the need to expend and conserve energy through different life tasks at different times of the year. Animal behaviors and synchronistic events in the natural work mirror transformational shifts inside ourselves, if we but see them for what they offer us.
Perhaps that is the most important argument of all for the existence, nay the necessity, of engendering mystical experiences through active imagination. They helps us see and experience Beauty, without which we languish from soul loss.
References:
DuQuette, L. M. (2011) Low Magick: It’s All In Your Head…You Just Have No Idea How Big Your Head Really Is. Llewellyn Publications.
Jung, C; Adler, G; Fordham, M.; Read, H.; McGuire, W. & Hull, R. (2014). The Collected Works of C. G. Jung (Complete Digital Edition), Princeton University Press.
Jung, C.; Jaffe, A.; Winston, C.; & Winston, R. (2011). Memories, Dreams, Reflections. Random House.
Jung, C.; Shamdasani, S.; Peck, J.; Kyburz, M. (2013). The Red Book (Liber Novus): A Reader’s Edition (Philemon). W. W. Norton & Company.
Moss, R. (2010). Dreamgates: Exploring the Worlds of Soul, Imagination, and Life Beyond Death (Revised Edition). New World Library.
Shrader, D. (2008). Seven characteristics of mystical experiences. Proceedings of the 6th Annual Hawaii International Conference on Arts and Humanities. Honolulu, HI, 2008.
Drake Spaeth is a former Air Force officer. He is currently an Associate Professor at the Chicago School of Professional Psychology, where he teaches courses in Existential-Humanistic psychology and trauma counseling. He is also an adjunct faculty member of Saybrook University, where he is a writer for The New Existentialists webpage. He is a clinical psychologist licensed in Illinois, shamanic counselor, leadership trainer at the Liautaud Institute, ordained minister, and death midwife. He has authored papers and book chapters on shamanism, spirituality, and trauma.
he Line that is Not - Drake Spaeth Psy.D
The Line that is Not: Reflections on Mathematics, Mysticism, Dreaming, and Active Imagination
Drake Spaeth, Psy.D.
Mathematics, the scientific method, and classification strategies engendered or impacted by Cartesian philosophical reasoning are extraordinary approaches that offer excellent tools for encountering and understanding the natural world. While the technology that has emerged from their effective utilization ominously threatens our very existence in some respects, it may also facilitate our further evolution as beings, calling to mind the vistas of 2001: A Space Odyssey, or Star Trek in its various permutations.
On the other hand (as I am fond of reminding my students), a rigid, dogmatic, overly reductionistic adherence to the methods of science as the only acceptable means of approaching and understanding complex phenomena—a practice that has come to be known as “scientism”—is needlessly arrogant. It dismisses and disrespects thousands of years of indigenous knowledge and traditions around the world, belief systems that tend to uphold more intuitive apprehension of phenomena as well as the subtle and mysterious connections and relationships among them. Moreover, art, poetry, and other avenues of imagination illumine other experiential facets of reality besides what can be discovered or constructed through facts and data alone.
As tools, math and science reveal their limitations at a surprisingly superficial level of description. For instance, it is difficult to describe in systematic or operational terms the physical reality of a Mobius loop (a loop that twists on itself in a circle), which apparently has only one side and one edge. I love to use the Mobius in Existential-Humanistic Psychotherapy class as a metaphor for how duality can be an illusion—that qualities that appear to be opposites halves are actually a monistic continuum. The Yin and Yang symbol also illustrates this paradox, depicting a relationship between apparent opposites that are flowing continuously into the other, each containing within it the seed of the other. The paradoxical unity of what appears to be dualistic presents a paradox that is not easily or systematically categorized or described.
As another example, one of my favorite childhood conundrums presents an archer shooting an arrow at a tree. In mathematical terms, presumably the arrow would never hit the tree, as at some point it crosses half the remaining distance, then half of that distance, then half of THAT distance, and so forth into infinity.
Statistics, the means by which scientists determine/decide that a given hypothesis is proven or disproven, provide levels of significance, typically described in such terms as p < .01, p < .05, or p < .0001. Essentially these p levels provide line criteria that findings must meet or exceed in order for a given experimental finding or effect to be accepted as “real” in connection with the experimental manipulation. It is convenient to ignore or forget that such criteria were agreed upon at some point by consensus as being meaningful, if subjective criteria for making decisions about strength and acceptability of research findings. There is nothing otherwise special or magical about the numbers except that we tend to give them the power to determine or construct reality in which we live.
Arguably, since the time of Aristotle, proponents of the evolving scientific method have based observational conclusions on evidence collected from sensory input. It is possible, after all, to reach a basic level of agreement that we are all seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling phenomena in similar ways, and to assume from such shared experience that we live in the same world. We can move through the world in similar ways, manipulate objects in similar ways, and experience orientation and disorientation in similar ways. But all of our physical senses can be fooled or manipulated in surprising ways.
If I see or hear something that others claim not present, I can be described as experiencing visual or auditory hallucinations. Drugs, brain trauma, psychosis, or even sleep deprivation can produce hallucinations or distort the experience of visual or auditory reality. Electronic stimulation or the visual or auditory cortex can produce these false experiences as well. Less common are tactile, gustatory, or olfactory hallucinations, but they also can occur through the same means previously described. Interestingly, it is theoretically possible (even if technology has not yet fully risen to the challenge) to fool or manipulate all of the senses upon which a person relies to know and experience living in his or her world. It could produce an all-encompassing but false experience of reality, as the individual whose sense are being manipulated may, for instance, actually be sitting in a chair while believing they are skiing down a mountain in Aspen. Add in the seemingly utterly fantastic notion of manipulating the full sensory apparatus of masses of people, and the plot of the Matrix movies (or notions of Gnostic philosophy) come clearly to mind. The deeper, more disturbing question, of course, is how do we possibly know that is not already happening to all of us?
Given the fact that colors of objects are reflected light rays that are transduced into neural energy processed by our brains; that sound waves generate vibrations of the tympanum that are also transduced; and that the sensations of touch, taste, and smell are generated by neural phenomena as well; we are constantly swimming in a sea of brain sensations that have no real relationship to the so-called real world. We have no way of knowing that the real world is even “out there”. We live and love through brain chemistry alone. The external world is simply a Mystery that we fail to know through our senses, if it exists at all.
When I consider these reflections in a summative way, I have difficulty accepting the notion that true “objectivity” is possible and feel compelled to seriously entertain the possibility that all human experience is subjective. The Cartesian dichotomy between the subjective and objective only be a distinction of intellectual convenience. Where does the line really exist? I am reminded once of again of the Mobius, where two seemingly separate worlds are actually one, twisted upon itself.
My reading of the Collected Works of C. G. Jung as well his Red Book (Liber Novus), has convinced me that he saw the human psyche (that is, the sum of what we might call conscious personality and unconscious mind), as a sort of Mobius. At the risk of oversimplifying his view, human beings perceive the world through the mask of the persona. This mask is mutable and limited in what is presents to the world and what it perceives, though the ego behind it is somewhat bigger and more constant. Behind the observing ego and bigger still is the personal unconscious, the repository of the Shadow (qualities of our psyche that seem to be opposing or contradictory to what is expressed though the persona or simply those parts of us that are generally never expressed) and the Anima/Animus (opposite gender parts of our being that are not expressed openly in the outer world). Even bigger and behind the personal unconscious is the collective unconscious, or the repository of archetypal aspects of us that are thematically and universally shared by all human beings dating from our deepest origins. The Collected Works hint—and the Red Book reveals— that Jung felt that deeper than the collective unconscious itself is that part of psyche that also participates in what we might understand as universal reality. There is a part of us that is also part of the universe, which also gives rise to this world that we perceive and act upon through the persona. Astonishingly, Jung sees the psyche as inextricably connected to the universe, which twists back on the psyche. The Red Book firmly supports the notion that Jung was a mystic.
Jung asserted often that the deepest aspects of our psyche right down to the collective unconscious are frequently expressed in dreams, which can be (re)accessed through meditation, analytical therapy, art, or active daydreaming. The purposeful, intentional, disciplined, practice of return to the canvas of dreams through these methods he called “active imagination”. He utilized active imagination as one of the chief methods of his analytical therapy work with clients. He encouraged clients to deepen their connection to symbols and figures of dreams, through artwork and mental imagery, with the result that deep insights and understanding of dreams and the contents of their own psyche emerged. Active imagination promoted profound, transformative growth in the lives of his clients. He also indulged in this practice very deeply himself, during the years of personal crisis that followed his bitter feud and schism from his mentor and teacher, Sigmund Freud. Arguably, he and others close to him believed that he may have become for a time definably psychotic in immersing himself so deeply in active imagination.
The Red Book, published in 2009 when his surviving family consented at long last to its release, consists of Jung’s primal descriptions of his chaotic descent into his own soul (as well as stunning symbolic paintings depicting his process). The Red Book details his encounters with entities such as Philemon and Salome, who were products of his unconscious but who also took on a sort of independent existence of their own. It is here, I feel, that Jung most unapologetically reveals himself as a true mystic in his insistence that these entities were both universal as well as psychic in composition. Like many mystics, he participated for a time in experience commonly labeled as psychotic today. Given that he emerged with profound, creative self-knowledge that gave birth to a great part of the Collected Works, the experience apparently did him some good. Even Salome, who demanded of Herod the head of John the Baptist, showed Jung that cutting off his own head would free him of his excessive attachment to how own intellect and open his hear for true compassionate connection with others.
As Lon Milo DuQuette, ceremonial magician says, “It’s all in your head…you just have no idea how big your head is.” Believing what is in the head to be real is widely considered to be delusional or psychotic. Perhaps psychotic individuals in some sense are mystics who do not emerge or return fully form this dimension. A full consideration of the reasons why some return and others do not could be the subject of different essay itself.
Given these reflections, I feel that the line between what we consider to be objective and therefore real, and what we consider to be subjective, and therefore imaginary, is not really a line as much as a suggestion. Therefore, Jung’s active use of imagination seems similar, if not identical, to what occurs for shamans and similar spirit workers around the world when they journey on behalf of others or themselves for otherworldly knowledge and healing. Their knowledge and conviction of the malleability and artificiality of the border between what we typically believe to be subjective and objective, is what gives them the power to work as effectively as they do. It is not easy work either, lest any here mistake me for a proponent of The Secret, which promotes the notion that simply wishing can make it all better.
What is exciting about mysticism as illumined by Jung is its accessibility to everyone. Jung reveals that dreamwork is a fairly easy entry into mystical experiences. Such experiences meet the seven criteria identified by Douglas Shrader, who combines those of William James and H.C Happold (Shrader, 2008). The first is ineffability, or difficulty describing the experience in ordinary language, which is presumably the source of Jung’s tendency to make up his own words to describe them. The second is the noetic quality, or the revelation of hidden knowledge. Dreams, and the material revisited through active imagination, are sourced in deeper, less accessible levels of the psyche and can be a great source of insight and self-awareness. The third is transiency, or the fact that they last for a short time (as dreams do). The fourth is passivity, or the fact that they happen to someone, out of their volition or control. The fact that aspects of imagination take on independent existence from the dreamer and interact with and upon the dreamer would seem to fit this criterion. The fifth is a sense of unity or connectedness. The sense of being inextricably connected to universal consciousness described by Jung would seem to fit this criterion. The sixth is timelessness, or the loss of connection with, or a transcendence of, linear time. Dreams and daydreams that involve active imagination foster a disconnection from conventional time awareness. Last, the criterion of a feeling of connection with a true or authentic self is something Jung achieved with his use of active imagination, as did his clients.
Robert Moss has authored a considerable number of books about the connection between dreamwork and mystical experiences. His classic work Dreamgates describes straightforward techniques for tracking and working with lucid dreams to identify powerful symbols and images. These can be used as portals or gates by which it is possible to re-enter one’s dreams through techniques of active imagination, over and over again. If a dream is recognized as highly significant or important in what it reveals or suggests about one’s life, then locations or symbols within the dream may serve as entry points through which to re-enter it through meditation, daydreaming, or art, expanding upon aspects of the dream for greater self awareness or intuition. My wife and I have even filled our entire house with art objects that bear strong connections to our dreams and active imagination, so that our very living environment surrounds us with ever-present invitations to enter into deeper, more meaningful engagement with imaginative appreciation of the beauty in our lives.
With practice, active imagination helps us see the mystical side of nature in seasonal manifestation as well. Cycles of light and dark teach about the need to expend and conserve energy through different life tasks at different times of the year. Animal behaviors and synchronistic events in the natural work mirror transformational shifts inside ourselves, if we but see them for what they offer us.
Perhaps that is the most important argument of all for the existence, nay the necessity, of engendering mystical experiences through active imagination. They helps us see and experience Beauty, without which we languish from soul loss.
References:
DuQuette, L. M. (2011) Low Magick: It’s All In Your Head…You Just Have No Idea How Big Your Head Really Is. Llewellyn Publications.
Jung, C; Adler, G; Fordham, M.; Read, H.; McGuire, W. & Hull, R. (2014). The Collected Works of C. G. Jung (Complete Digital Edition), Princeton University Press.
Jung, C.; Jaffe, A.; Winston, C.; & Winston, R. (2011). Memories, Dreams, Reflections. Random House.
Jung, C.; Shamdasani, S.; Peck, J.; Kyburz, M. (2013). The Red Book (Liber Novus): A Reader’s Edition (Philemon). W. W. Norton & Company.
Moss, R. (2010). Dreamgates: Exploring the Worlds of Soul, Imagination, and Life Beyond Death (Revised Edition). New World Library.
Shrader, D. (2008). Seven characteristics of mystical experiences. Proceedings of the 6th Annual Hawaii International Conference on Arts and Humanities. Honolulu, HI, 2008.
Drake Spaeth is a former Air Force officer. He is currently an Associate Professor at the Chicago School of Professional Psychology, where he teaches courses in Existential-Humanistic psychology and trauma counseling. He is also an adjunct faculty member of Saybrook University, where he is a writer for The New Existentialists webpage. He is a clinical psychologist licensed in Illinois, shamanic counselor, leadership trainer at the Liautaud Institute, ordained minister, and death midwife. He has authored papers and book chapters on shamanism, spirituality, and trauma.
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