Imagination [Resources]+

[Charles]

Morris Berman - Coming To Our Senses His book is about “coming to our senses” and living “somatically.” The books begins with an exploration of the the Basic Fault (coined by Michael Balint, the gap in existence, that we all feel in the west. This self/other split, which is called the nemo by the English novelist, John Fowles. This emptiness the “nemo,” which he describes as an anti-ego, a state of being nobody. “Nobody wants to be a nobody,” writes Fowles. “All our acts are partly devised to fill or to mark the emptiness we feel at the core.” P.20
This is a deep crevice in our soul, our very being, an abyss in our existence, usually unconscious starting with birth as we feel that we are not in harmony with existence. As Berman writes, “we spend the rest of our lives attempting to fill this up.”
He would suggest that one lets go of the need for redemption. Bailey's book talks about becoming enchanted as a "soul-in-the world." He quotes Jame Hillman:
We live in a world that is neither "inner nor outer." Rather the psychic world is an imaginal world, just as image is psyche. Paradoxically, at the same time these images are in us and we live in the midst of them

 

[Sciborg_S_Patel]

 

[Charles]

Fascinating person and ideas. I wasn't familiar with Stephan Hoeller and his work. Been reading The Spell of the Sensusous by David Abrams which is an insightful book. He suggests that language plays a major role in the separation of humans and nature. Here is a interview with David. http://www.childrenofthecode.org/interviews/abram.htm

 

[Sciborg_S_Patel]

The Artist and Past Life Regression

I believe the imagination to be the unsung hero of all therapies. Without it we cannot ask ourselves what life will be like after whatever challenge we might face, whether it’s depression, fear, anxiety, or something else. Positive psychology, neuroplasticity and the continuing momentum of mindfulness are also finding ways to shine light here. When talking and writing about this, I feel like I’m pointing to a truth hiding in plain sight, but there is no perfect word for it (at least in English). I end up prattling on using a thousand words to describe what is self-evident in stillness. Is it new information that creativity would be healing or that healthy sexuality would also have healing and creativity in it? These feel more like reminders of larger truths that are too easily forgotten in between moments of scrolling through inspirational messages in my Instagram feed. These are also abstract forces that will operate differently for each of us. It happens in session, those moments when I’m honored to peer through the fog and engage in a dialogue where I learn again “Oh yeah, we’re different, but the same.”

 

[Charles]

Jeffrey kripal in the book The Super Natural writes about the Imaginal in the chapter - What Evolution Looks Like. Those who know the works of Kripal know that he writes about the idea of hermeneutics in many of his books. Here is a presentation by Kripal about these ideas. http://www.scoop.it/t/mind-at-large...eff-kripal-the-perfect-insect-of-the-imaginal

 

[Sciborg_S_Patel]

Seeking Our Mythologies - Where Did All the Gods Go?

Humanity is being told through these and other related myths that we need to learn how to remember – that truth is re-collection, not cognition. We arrive in this earthly reality full of cosmic glory, only that we lack the key, the crucial guide, to unlock our memories and unleash the flood of knowing. When we come across the scattered symbols and signs of truth, we inherently intuit and sense deep down some great significance. Yet our minds are incapable of grasping the intangibleness of this hidden mystery. And that is how our lives play out, as we slip as souls within a playground of signs that are invested with ultimate meaning. We need to find the Ariadne thread to help us through this labyrinth that we find ourselves in, and to remember that we have our origins in the Primary Imagination. Our lives are not only unique creations but are acts of re-creation. They are attempts at entering once again into a lost remembrance which lies so far and yet so close to us. The 13th century Persian poet Jalāl ad-Dīn Rūmī wrote that ‘The Truth is closer to us than our own jugular vein.’ And yet so vain do we search, as if we have fallen away from true remembrance.

 

[Sciborg_S_Patel]

Vis Imaginativa: The Power of Imagination in the Theory of Magic and its Relationship to The Jungian Collective Unconscious

Carl Jung once noted that “rationalism and superstition are complementary. It is a psychological rule that the brighter the light, the blacker the shadow; in other words, the more rationalistic we are in our conscious minds, the more alive becomes the spectral world of the unconscious.”3In popular culture, there is still a thriving interest in ghosts, demons, and other sorts of undead creatures like zombies and vampires, as well as aliens. Scientific method has been established as the way to “truth,” yet these irrational constructs of the imagination have not disappeared. Indeed, throughout history, the more rationalism is established as the basis for society, backlash occurs in the revival of religious and spiritual movements.4

I would like to take a step back from “superstitious” assumptions and focus on imagination and magic, particularly on the relationship of these concepts to Jung’s ideas about the collective unconscious. Thinking about D. P. Walker’s concept of vis imaginativa, I hope to demonstrate the relationship between the philosophy of magic and some basic Jungian psychoanalytic ideas.