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Craig Deininger, Ph.D. – mythologist, poet, Jungian scholar, and construction worker – joins us this week in Conversations of a Higher Order to discuss “The Way of Art and Two-Way Roads” (click on link to read), his latest contribution to JCF’s MythBlast essay series. In addition to Jungian Psychology, Craig has taught writing, creative writing, and various literature courses at several colleges and universities, and has given multiple presentations on Imagination, Mythology, and Alchemy.
I will get us started with a comment and a question or two, but please jump in to the conversation and engage Craig directly with your questions and comments. Frankly, it’s your thoughts, reactions, observations and insights that expand this beyond just another interview into a communal exchange of ideas – a true “conversation of a higher order.”
So let’s get started.
Craig, before we dive too deep into your essay, would you mind sharing just a little bit about how your discovered the work of Joseph Campbell? Did you stumble across the Power of Myth interviews (which seems the most common Campbellophile origin story), or maybe learn about him through your interest in Jung? Curious if your fascination with the creative imagination, myth, and alchemy came first and led you to Campbell, or did his work awaken a latent interest in those topics?
Turning to your MythBlast, you mention that when teaching creative writing you “emphasize the power of images due to their effectiveness in rendering experiences.” No surprise that, to Campbell, image is primary in myth.
Throughout your essay, you refer to the numinous –numinous force, numinous realm, numinosity. Would you mind expanding on what you mean by numinous? I know that’s perhaps akin to trying to staple one’s shadow to the wall – but not everyone participating in the forums, and especially those who are new to Campbell or haven’t read Jung, may be familiar with the term.
Thanks for tackling this.
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales
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Thank you, Stephen. It’s a real pleasure to be here, getting into the myths and the mythic. And especially in a time when its message can provide much-needed insight into all that we are facing these days as a collective. And great opening questions. I’ll dive right in:
Regarding how I came to learn of Joseph Campbell, you guessed it, was through the Power of Myth. (Campbellophile-status confirmed!). But more so, this is a synchronistic starting point since the circumstances that surrounded this encounter really reflect the content of my recent Mythblast. I was picking up supplies in a small town in Alaska (where I’d spent several summers working and getting into all sorts of wonderful misadventures) when the title and cover caught my eye and I just knew, for no reason I could explain, that it was “important.” Anyway, I brought it back to the base of a mountain where I had set up camp to do my first (and definitely last) seven-day water-only fast. I had previously gotten my hands on some Taoist breathing-techniques literature (written by a contemporary Westerner) which told me if I did these things I’d bust through into some exalted state of consciousness, etc. Well, I was young and ambitious and all that. What’s more important is that the Power of Myth kept me company through those days, and anyone who has been “diminished” through hunger, thirst, sickness, etc knows, whatever your awareness attends to takes on a greater magnitude, or permeates the consciousness more deeply, or at least feels to. Anyway, I think it was a good initial mythic-download, if you will. And I look back on that time with great fondness.
As for the term “numinous,” I’m glad you bring it up, seeing it’s hardly something any of us will hear on a given day. And, yes, it is like “trying to staple one’s shadow to the wall” as you put it. I love that—an endeavor I’d never expect to succeed in, though with things like that I think the real value lies in the attempt. On that note, I know “numinous” denotes a supernatural or spiritual presence, and that its Latin root numen refers to a place’s presiding deity—to the presence that lives “in” the things themselves. Some might classify it as animism (from anima “soul.”). Or in the Hindu tradition, as Brahman. And a physicist might call it gravity. I like to call it “presence,” and sometimes “existence” just to get different flavors of this untouchable content.
I suppose I should pause a moment since I have plenty of associates who would say “Hey, there’s no spirit living in that cinderblock on the side of the road there.” Fair enough. But that I may perceive and experience it as if it does is ample. This is what Jung calls “psychic reality,” which is true to the perceiver. The placebo-effect is a good example of this.
Overall, though, “numinous” is probably my favorite since it emphasizes the presence of a “being” within things whose effects I can experience under the right conditions. And most of all, I prefer “numinous” because the word is itself is only a stone’s-throw away (if that) from “luminous.” And then, all the connotations of light come in, but come in slant, as Emily Dickinson would say. And light is arguably the most widely used metaphor for consciousness and divinity.
So, with all that walking around the subject, I’ll say that “numinous” (whether we approach it as “psychic reality” or “supernatural”) is the spirit or character of presence that exudes from a thing just as a glowing ember exudes heat and light.
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Thanks Craig!
What a wonderful origin story regarding your encounter with Campbell’s work. That seven day water-only fast and Taoist breathing methods certainly enhanced the viewing experience!
I also appreciate your very helpful explanation of “numinous” (we may have to designate you COHO’s official “Shadow Stapler” for that!). Numinous is a term I associate in particular with archetypes, another slippery, difficult to nail down concept. Both are examples of what Campbell called “the best things”:
My wonderful friend, Heinrich Zimmer, my final guru, often said, ‘The best things cannot be told.’ That is to say, you can’t talk about that which lies beyond the reach of words.
The second best are misunderstood, because they are your statements about that which cannot be told. They are misunderstood because the vocabulary of symbols that you have to use are thought to be references to historical events.
The third best is conversation, political life, economics, and all that.”
(from A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living)
Rafael’s comment in this thread, associating numinosity with the radiance of a work of art (borrowing Joyce’s term), also rings true. What stands out for me in these overlapping explanations is that “numinous” isn’t just a fancy adjective, but an experience.
I find myself returning to Jung. In Man and His Symbols, a work unfinished at the time of his death, Jung describes how
… archetypes appear in practical experience: They are, at the same time, both images and emotions. One can speak of an archetype only when these two aspects are simultaneous. When there is merely the image, then there is simply a word-picture of little consequence. But by being charged with emotion, the image gains numinosity (or psychic energy); it becomes dynamic, and consequences of some sort must flow from it.” (p. 87)
Jung expands on that:
I am aware that it is difficult to grasp this concept, because I am trying to use words to describe something whose very nature is incapable of precise definition. But since so many people have chosen to treat archetypes as part of a mechanical system that can be learned by rote, it is essential to insist that they are not mere names, or even philosophical concepts. They are pieces of life itself – images that are integrally connected to the individual by the bridge of the emotions. That is why it is impossible to give an arbitrary (or universal) interpretation of any archetype…
The mere use of words is futile when you do not know what they stand for. This is particularly true in psychology, where we speak of archetypes like the anima and animus, the wise man, the great mother, and so on. You can know all about the saints, sages, prophets, and other godly men, and all the great mothers of the world. But if they are mere images whose numinosity you have never experienced, it will be as if you were talking in a dream, for you will not know what you are talking about. The mere words you use will be empty and valueless. They gain life and meaning only when you try to take into account their numinosity – i.e., their relationship to the living individual … (p.87-88)
Jung doesn’t mince words. On the same page he describes archetypes as “pieces of life itself,” charged with numinosity – a sacred experience, fully engaging one’s emotions. We can speak of Artemis, see a picture of Shiva, or hear a sermon about Jesus, yet these are not archetypes. If, however, you pray to Artemis, if you feel her breath on your neck in the woods beneath the full moon, or if you dance with Shiva, let your ego, your soul, your being, dissolve into nothingness, dissolve into the Dance, or you experience the transformative power of sacrifice and resurrection as you eat the flesh and drink the blood in communion with Christ, you are living/experiencing/engaging an archetype.
Of course, Jung’s description of “numinous” (and “archetype”) above, like yours or mine or Rafael’s, barely scratches the surface – these are such big subjects! But what seems key to each is a subjective experience. If one has not had the experience, then doesn’t matter what words are used – trying to explain it is about as effective as trying to convey an experience of the color red to someone blind from birth.
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales-
Wow. Thanks for that rich content, Stephen. I’ll be reflecting on that for a long time. And those Jung-quotes are some heavy-hitters!
I love that you address Campbell’s retelling of Heinrich Zimmer’s order of best things. In approaching the question of what is numinous, we have from Zimmer’s quote the bookends and the middle in such succinct form. I suppose the work we do, grappling with words to touch, as it were, “the best things” puts us in “the next-best/misunderstood” category. But in this second tier, I feel like we’re still getting some of that residual numinosity seeping through, evidenced by the experience I have while engaging the words. In short, by how I “feel.” And as you bring up when you emphasize Jung’s correlation between archetype and emotion being inseparable, I get an emotional experience from those words as well.
But there it is, the archetype “charged with numinosity” and whose image is inseparable from the emotion. And that “that is why it is impossible to give an arbitrary (or universal) interpretation of any archetype.” I recognize I am conflating emotion and experience a little here, but will risk it all the same: The archetype is known by the experience. Period. And there I go again, futilely describing. And not sure if the over-confident tone did much to make the description any truer. But I’m just intrigued by the idea that maybe we always get some numinous contact–through even the most mundane content—content that’s not as profound and powerful as the archetype, for example. I guess that’s why I like writing poetry. I recently finished a poem about the cellophane wrapper of a dvd box-set. Now that’s pretty trivial! But the poem, against all odds, is a success. (Or so I’d like to think).
I know I’m leaping around here, but the content we’re in is vast and inspiring. I feel like a dog that’s been inside for a week, and then suddenly set loose in Yosemite or something. I really want to come back to this when I am more centered tomorrow and not fighting sleep and heavy schedule.
But I’d like to close off with this quote from Joseph Campbell in the Power of Myth since it speaks to some of what I’m trying to articulate while running every which way, getting chased by rangers and whoever let me off the leash:
People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive.”
What strikes me as most relevant in this quote, are the words “seeking,” “experience,” and “feel.” Anyway, I’m looking forward to more tomorrow!
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Exactly, Craig!
Can’t help but love Campbell’s words to Moyers – experience trumps “meaning.” Sometimes I describe Joseph Campbell’s perspective as experiential mythology. “Meaning” is head knowledge, which appeals to academics – and that may explain not only why the academy is sometimes leery of Campbell, but also why he is able to reach such a wide, popular audience. Campbell doesn’t just talk to our intellect, but reaches us where we live, in the world of experience.
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales
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Hi Stephen and Craig! This is Rafael, a campbellite originally from Brazil, now into adventure in Norway. I just would like to say something about numinous. Craig took me to James Joyce’s Dedalus revisiting the definition of beauty from the classics in The Portrait. As Joe loved to talk about, Joyce said that for something to be beautiful, it has to have 3 things: integritas, consonantia and gravitas. Craig’s definition of numinous matches my understanding of gravitas. In Portuguese, I always translated gravitas as “radiação” (radiance, in the radioactive sense). In this sense, and in my experience, when presented to an experience-rendering image, I sense something as beautiful when it contaminates me with the numinosity of its artistic manifestation.
Bliss you,
Rafael
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Hi Rafael, I think these are some great connections, and new content, to continue the circumambulation. It’s synchronistic (and there’s that word again) that you say “in a radioactive sense” because when composing my essay I actually used “uranium nugget” as a metaphor to approach dynamics of numinosity. But then I took it out since some of its other connotations are less positive (hyper-sensitive, I suppose). But even those less-positive connotations are archetypally accurate–especially in the ambiguous function of the art/image content that also exposes one to the blast, so to speak. And I’m glad you use the word “beautiful” in your approach to an experience-rendering image. The word is too often avoided, I think. After all, beauty certainly has proven itself to be a way in–a way that stuns or dissolves the egoic defenses and leaves us mumbling, rapt in the wonder of it all. And I hear you on the “gravitas.” You accurately identified my bias on that one. It’s not that I prefer the grounded, Saturnine structure, the “grave”-ness of it. Because I’d rather be doing backflips up in the ether-fields. But on the advantages-side of the gravitas, it adds substance, gives material or body to the ethereal in a foundational way. Bedrock that I can stand on and reach up from. And then, there’s the matter of alchemy and the nigredo-stage, and the prima materia–which in its way is like rocket-fuel for individuation (literally, if we consider fossil fuels). It is perhaps my fondness of the “up-there” (i.e., the numinous experience) that compels me to embrace also the “down-here.” I don’t know who said it first, Thich Nhat Hanh, maybe, though I suspect much earlier: “No mud, no lotus.”
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Rafael – numinosity is a term so closely associated with Jung’s understanding of archetypes that it’s quickly dismissed by academics and others who reject Jungian theory, which is why I appreciate your pivot to Joyce’s discussion of art. Even those who look askance at Jung have had an experience of being affected by a work of art – gets the idea across without the baggage.
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales
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Dr. Deininger,
Thank your for your MythBlast. I enjoyed it. Here is some riffing on the themes I encountered. I hope it’s not to nebulous and convoluted. Just having fun ! With archaic mythic content.
Abstracted creation of phenomena is all that is real eternal True ideal …
for all that is fallen from the ideal is subject to decay and death …
The art of the fallen apotheosis
is a two way road
The receptive consciousness
The concretized imagination
Thought
Stones pebbles seined fallen from the mind
Like sand through the hour glass
Spoken written swimming seed
Inovated
Creating the womb the tomb of the ego’s truth
Upon the halls of eternity the columns of time
Where the precision of a plasma flux from within
Ignites a new star in the universe a new axis of accreted Light
A bridge through the phenomenal darkness
Inception of the bright morning star
Conceived with many possible interpretation
That pop in and out of existence
Condensate condensed from eternity
In the mind of humanity
To enhance our World view
Then vaporize Blast like mana o’er the plain
The Source The Field of all we know …
Within the grey clay maeter Stuff …
That first dimensional synaptic conception
That radiates through the core of all dimension
Creation
The Ray that melts the waxed wing of Dedalus
Is the ray of ascension from the core
the diaphanous lemniscate on the Strand of Sandymount …
A stratified pyramidal volcanic mount of photons
Granular pinnacled light within a tesseract
Crushed on the shore of the infinite … between the many and the One …
Tis a value to perceive
Oh what a web we weave
When first we practice
To conceive
Of love in mind
Of love in deed …
R³
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Hi R³
I’m glad of the play, the theme-riffing here. Thanks for sending this in. And reminding me that all work and no play makes jack and jill dull kids. Similarly you cross the line from exposition to poetry. You’re like,
“Hey, instead of talking about what it is, let’s just do it,” or so it feels to me. We can hypothesize and conjecture all we want, but there’s something to just reaching out with art, hit or miss is a secondary concern. The act of doing it brings it so much more into the experience-aspect of things. But then, I have my bias and am very fond of poetry, which is what this is that you’ve sent on.
I went through it and put together those lines that, for reasons I could not hope to explain, engendered experience in a big way, for me:
The art of the fallen apotheosis
Ignites a new star
A bridge through the phenomenal darkness
Inception of the bright morning star
Crushed on the shore of the infinite … between the many and the One …
To conceive
Of love in mind
Of love in deed …
Of course, this is all just to my ear and all, but if I had lines like this, I’d be building poems out of them. And you bring in love at the end, that’s a big one. Obviously. But why not bring it into the conversation? It is another of those evasive phenomena that cannot be put in a box. And surely, it comes through fullest in experience. I’m always pleased with those rare occasions that the word emerges into one of my poems. And actually works. And it’s never by my skill when this happens, but rather, I like to think, by grace–another one to add to the list, by the way. I once asked myself, “how do I invite more grace into my life?” But quickly realized, grace transcends invitation. Why she’s called “grace.” Anyway, since we’re dealing with the human psyche here and the experiences that it is subject too, and that it produces, then indeed, yes they are part of this wild gestalt we call the human experience. But I don’t want to lose track of the doing. Even though I went on a worthy tangent, but to ground it a bit I’m thinking of why “active imagination” as opposed to “passive fantasy” is the stuff that gets us there, that drives the individuation-process. I’m glad you brought this doing-aspect into the conversation through doing.
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Dr. Deininger,
I enjoy your editing skills. Thank you. The inspiration for my riff was your MythBlast , Plotinus along with archaic syncretism , Neil deGrasse Tyson on quantum physics , James Joyce , Joseph Campbell . I think of my post as a musing , stream of consciousness that flows as a mixed cocktail chilled , spilled , shaken not stirred , served Up . The way spirits should .
Cheers
R³Robert
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R³,
Yes, I could feel the stream of consciousness at work. Just wanted to say regarding my editing, is that I have trained my own ear when it comes to writing, to attend to those moments where the poetry feels most, hmm, poetic, whether in the feels of the sounds of the language, meter, rhythm, etc. and of course come through. It’s an entirely biased process. But I try to steer clear of ‘editing’ per se, when I point these areas out in others’ work. It’s more feedback from “an” ear of what seemed (and in keeping with our numinous theme) most numinous. And when I do that, I risk selecting content that the author may feel the same towards. But regardless of whose ear it resonates with, each line or stanza I highlight, I like to approach as a new numinous kernel, like a symbol, that points in a new direction that may be explored. Or around which an entire new poem may be built, or the poem itself built out more. So, didn’t want my reworking of your poem to come across as definitive, rather as a series of windows into new terrains, all.
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A warm greeting Craig; so glad to be enjoying this wonderful conversation you’ve been having and I would like to add my enthusiastic emphasis on the word: “numinous”; since it bridges the gap between both the religious and more importantly the spiritual dimension of the great mystery that often gets confused that Joseph so articulately separates when discussing terms like: transcendent and experience in reference to meaning. Zimmer’s distinctions; which were brought up earlier; capture this understanding in a way westerners often encounter difficulty with because in western theology and religion there is no context for them to relate to as in Joseph’s description of the “symbol without meaning” or (isness); if you prefer. And to a Judeo/Christian or Muslim often the idea of “you” being the God who defines that experience in terms of: “the ground of one’s own being”; symbolizes blasphemy or heresy as opposed to oneness or as Joseph again might describe as: “the light inside the bulb” that returns to it’s source in terms of a larger universe in which it is enclosed. These concepts are totally alien just as the Buddha’s symbol of a single flower being held up as the wordless sermon delivered as this metaphor.
I want to add one other idea that Joseph emphasized that often gets lost when referring back to him in particular that has to do with his connection to Jungian ideas which I will quote that I used in a separate conversation I had about this misconception of him being a Jungian and will place below:
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Joseph’s conversations with Michael Toms in: “An Open Life” brought up an interesting thing that always grabs my attention in a powerful way when I think about the relationship between Jung’s ideas and how people mistake Joseph for a Jungian which he defiantly refuses. I thought you might have some thoughts about this since you are so familiar with his work and it deals specifically with how one should approach their own myth they are constructing.
___________________________________On page 123 the conversation states:
Toms:
“Jungian psychology seems to be more open than other more traditional forms of interpretation.”Joseph:
“You know for some people, “Jungian” is a nasty word, and it has been flung at me by certain reviewers as though to say, “Don’t bother with Joe Campbell; he’s a Jungian. ” I’m not a Jungian! As far as interpreting myths, Jung gives me the best clues I’ve got. But I’m much more interested in diffusion and relationships historically than Jung was, so that the Jungians view me as a kind of questionable person. I don’t use those formula words very often in my interpretation of myths, but Jung gives me the background from which to let the myth talk to me.If I do have a guru of that sort, it would be Zimmer—the one who really gave me the courage to interpret myths out of what I knew of their common symbols. There is always a risk there, but it’s the risk of your own adventure instead of just gluing yourself to what someone else has found.”
________________________________________________________________________I think this is a huge statement because to me he is saying: (You) are the God that is creating your own life; and you are the one deciding what your myth is to be not someone else. This is the left hand path Joseph talks about that informs the modern hero archetype the individual must listen to in traversing out of and beyond their ropes in order to find and know who and what they are to become. They are not only flying blind making their path up as they go; but they are not obeying any kind of set rulebook on how this is done.
_________________________________________________________________________And I will also like to add a short clip of Joseph describing this distinction in another more succinct way that may better illustrate my point about the individual interpretation of their own experience here.
I hope you’ll forgive my rather clumsy descriptions on this topic for I am certainly no authority on this subject; and again; so glad to have you here among us on these forums and look forward to hearing more on this wonderful discussion!
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Dear Jamesn,
No worries at all on what you call “clumsy descriptions” as I am quite the clumsy descriptor myself.
And here I was thinking that in this forum I’d get some easy stuff to work with, and instead I meet up with others every bit as earnest (if not more) as I am, to get to the heart of it. Well, thank god I don’t have the answers. There, that takes the pressure off.
I just want to preface with your addressing Campbell’s emphasis that he is not a Jungian, parallels so sharply in my mind with Jung claiming that his paintings and other works were (emphatically) not art. And to approach them as such was to miss the boat (like, of the Amduat, if I may). And that opens a whole new frontier of exploration into what art is and, more so, what it is not. But one mountain at a time!
Let me get back on topic with what felt to me the pithiest part of your post, and that is Campbell’s claiming of autonomy in approaching and interpreting the “common” symbols in myth. Of how he employs the work of Zimmer and Jung, sure, but he makes them his own. And Jung, I think, would do nothing less than applaud this.
Campbell addresses the ideas he’s gotten from others, acknowledges them, but emphasizes this business of making these one’s own! If somebody wants to be like their guru, and I mean really be like their guru, then they must do as their guru does, and be precisely themselves. Marie Louise von Franz tells a story of a man who went to Jung to get answers on what happens after death, and Jung told him you have to formulate or encounter your own version. And then von Franz says, with a twinkle in her eye, “You cannot quote Jung in the dying moment. That will not help you.”
And this parallels rather precisely with encountering and interpreting symbols. Since the perceiving consciousness is necessarily involved in what the “meaning” (though I think a better word is “experience”) of a symbol is. It MUST be our own. Sure, there are centers of gravity to “common” symbols (which a Jungian would call “archetypal”), but even those have their varying shades within that commonality dependent on the observer, context, and so on. It is the same, and I guess I’m forming a clumsy analogy here, with ideas. Yes, this is Campbell’s idea, this is Zimmer’s, this is Jung’s. But then the next level is what they are to “me?” Have I made them “my own?” which is the only place they will be alive anyway–in ‘my’ psyche. And Campbell says in that quote you shared, that it involves taking the “risk,” having the courage of claiming one’s own adventure.
Everyone’s so worried about being original and about not taking content that’s not theirs. In academia, it’s called plagiarism. Business has patent rights, and all that. But that’s different from what I’m talking about here, which I would call “assimilation” or “integration.” It reminds me of when I was in my first MFA poetry workshop and a student was worried they had inadvertently written a line that had been written by someone else. And our teacher quoted T. S. Eliot: “Good poets borrow. Great poets steal.” There’s that courage and risk that Campbell is talking about. Sure, there are gradations and all, but the hidden kernel of autonomy is there.
Or on a more practical approach, is when I told my dissertation advisor that I wouldn’t be doing the dissertation because I came for the knowledge, not the degree. I told him I had taken all the classes and done (not quite) all of the reading. In other words, I had it. Anyway, he was a very influential force and dissuaded me. So I wrote the thing over the next five years. And here’s the big discovery from that: by writing it, by translating it into Craig, so to speak, the content of others became, in its way, mine. It was straight up alchemy: the prima materia in the alembic above the slow fire being worked and witnessed by my participating consciousness. So now I emphasize to my students: if you want to learn something read about it. If you want to own it, write about it. And that goes for what one reads.
Anyway, I think the bottom line is autonomy. Which is the work of individuation. I could steal so and so’s olympic gold medal, but then I’d just have an elaborate necklace. Better, I could study his sprinting techniques, practice them, integrate them to my style, and next time around steal the race. And get the gold medal on top of it.
Anyway, it’s late out here and I’m starting to get really clumsy. There’s so much more in what you shared that was left unaddressed, I know.
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Craig; I wish I could find the words to describe how much I was moved by your thoughtful and penetrating insights in this reply. I just want to read them over and over again and let them sink in and savior them. Your sensitive and intuitive understanding; much less your articulation just speaks volumes to what I was attempting to describe. In dark times such as these with Covid and misinformation everywhere once in a while a light shines in the dark; and like Jung’s Telesphorus points the way. You may have seen this but if not I hope it compliments what you so beautifully rendered. (Yes; perhaps I’m plagiarizing a bit here; but I’m also stealing from the best and trying to make it my own.) Seriously; such a wonderful reply and so deeply appreciated. Thank you.
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Your response so encourages me, Jamesn, thank you. If it was intuitive, it was because I was in fatigue and I suppose, just as Marie Louise von Franz says, the inuitive must dim the sensations or precision or alacrity to let what’s unseen come through (I’m paraphrasing here, but that’s the general theme of it). Sometimes encouragement is like that, and as you aptly point out, in these days of misinformation and covid and a long list of other things: Telesphorus a star out of the dark places. I watched the video you included the link to, and no, I had not seen it. So glad you posted that. I am very fond of Jung’s stone at Bollingen and have gazed on it (in pictures) cumulatively for hours. I am somewhat of an astrologer in the Jyotish (Vedic) version and so all the planetary symbols, especially the Mercurius-Hermes Telsesphorus figure in the center, as messenger of the gods, liaison, intermediary, and guide, really moves me for some reason. Perhaps because he is at the center–of the mandala really, which as Jung said is really “man” replacing what once was the empty center “God.” And in a way, this may speak to the individuation and claiming of autonomy you inspired me to express on in your first post. I think Jung’s “Answer to Job” says much to this idea. But I think in all this, that it is important to emphasize that with all the “claiming” business going on, that it is not “inflated-claiming.” No, I think it is a much deeper, more sincere, subtle kind. My goodness, such nourishing content all of it. I wish I could stay in and continue tonight, but my workload is so heavy this week. And am fighting sleep as I write, but really wanted to respond. I really look forward to picking back up tomorrow night after the workday is done and sets in the west as Telesphorus directs or shows. Will think though on all that as I pass into the land of dreams.
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Craig; Wow; just Wow! Thank you so much for your thoughtful and deeply considered response. You’ve given me a great deal to reflect on with these posts; and I will look forward to hearing the rest when you can come back. I hope all goes well for you until then; and again; thank you so very much for taking the time to share such kind encouraging insights. Namaste
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Thanks, Jamesn.
I am just now coming back from the work which always seems to take longer than how I envision it will. Well, Saturn’s in his own sign these days, so that settles that. Anyway, being a bit clearer, there was one thought I wanted to build on a moment, which deals with all the claiming of autonomy/individuation business and the risk/courage aspect, too.
As I reread what I had written, I heard a some inflation in the tone (even if I did say this kind of claiming is not the inflated type…). And I hold to that as a principle. But lately been feeling that if one is not in Samadhi/enlightened status, and not holding that supreme Middle Road, razor’s edge between the opposites, then one is to err in one direction or another. Or even if the enlightened do go off the middle road, I bet they take that not-middle road very middle-roadedly!
Anyway, inflation and deflation. With my creative writing students I respect both, so when I nudge them a little to the inflated side, they question it. Rightly so. I’ll call it “attitude” both in lay terms and in Jungian, though with the latter, deflation equally qualifies as attitude. At its worst, inflated expression is narcissistic, indulgent, and smug. But at its best it can make for pretty damn interesting writing! And outside of writing, surely it often can accomplish valuable things in the day-to-day, and in its lighter form, could we simply call it “confidence?” Confidence accomplishes things. Just look at athletes. How likely to see the task through were the baseball player to say: “Oh, he’s throwing 90 mph, I don’t think I’ll be able to hit it.” So, in seeking out things like what on earth “numinous” means, I think it can open some ways that otherwise would not have been opened. Or, to quote Wendy Doniger: “It is impossible to define myth, but it is cowardly not to try.” And perhaps connect on that fastball.
By the way, to reveal my bias, although it doesn’t sound like it I’m sure, I do prefer the deflated, or even humble side. Since there is a sincerity to that, and since I prefer the quiet spaces where the resonance is on, and volume is simply redundant, or worse, it just cheaply drowns out the subtler, deeper aspects of a thing. And also there’s the virtues that accompany the humble (and now I’m conflating deflated and humble, but will be inflated enough to press on): thoughtfulness, patience, acceptance, are usually associated with this humility/deflation. And archetypally, it pairs well with wisdom and spiritual development (Buddha and the begging bowl, the less or “emptier” of the Tao: like how the walls make the room, but the empty space that the walls define are where the value resides. Or “He who does not know speaks. He who knows speaks not.” (Maybe I should be mindful of that last part–ha).
I guess the whole point is that sometimes, against all wisdom, (or perhaps a greater wisdom?) inflation is the side to err on. Perhaps, just a little bit. Too deep into it and an Icarus crash and burn, or crash and sink, rather, is inevitable.
I remember one time in Los Angeles, a young man, maybe 15, was testing out his inflated attitude. He had the pants cinched by a belt at his thighs, boxers up to the waist, arms swinging, stomping like an elephant down the sidewalk. And he ruled that sidewalk! because we got out his way! But then the hem of his pants tripped him up and he went down hard–like a board. He quickly got up and scurried off. We all quietly smiled at each other. No one laughed out loud, though. We felt ambivalent. I mean, it was amusing as hell, but also empathy was activated. But on top of that, even if it was overdone, there was a courage involved in just commandeering the sidewalk like that. Only in this case, it didn’t quite open out into some profound mythic discovery. But then, maybe it had.
Okay, been going on long enough, Anyway, I think embracing a position of imbalance between the opposites is valuable. Life regularly pushes us into having to anyway! So bottom line, I suppose embracing imbalance is a balancing act. And knowing when to mildly inflate or step down in a particular context, a kind of wisdom. And bottom bottom line, I think there are times when all parties involved lose when we don’t take a little risk and step up into it, like approaching “what is numinous,” for example. And if we miss, strike out, fall hard on the concrete, well, in the solid, confident, courageous words of Jack Nicholson’s McMurphy: “Well I tried, didn’t I? Goddammit, at least I did that.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cxx8RC4iQvI
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Hello,
Great food for thought,
It would take Murfy’s law and an American Indian a indigenous native of the the land to get the job done. Such great symbolism … detaching … raising up … the plumbing from the underworld , throwing it through the window to provide an escape. Very iconic.
Joseph Campbell would be proud an American Indian was Chosen to part the waters !!! Release the waters from below of the deep !!! Actualize exodus from the Institution .
The hospital was a hot bed of Freudian and Jungian complexes. A microcosm of the human mind and its weaknesses.
The Chief experienced quite the departure, initiation, and return !!! From the Institution.
R³
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Craig; thank you for refining this last part for indeed in each of our journeys it is the: “riding of the leopard without being torn to pieces”; on which our trajectory puts us that makes this: “at least I tried damn it” so critically important. This thing Joseph Campbell called: “One’s Bliss”; that push out of our own existence that Joseph informs us takes us out on the razor’s edge path into the dark unknown forest by ourselves where we have no idea of where we are going except we know we have to go. That dark night of the soul’s journey filled with self-doubt and constant struggle which contains moments of deep despair and yet in the distance there is a “numinous” glow; that “Telesphorus Lantern” that leads us on telling our heart and soul this where I have to go because this is who and what I am. The answers I am seeking are there because the experiences I am having tell me so in a language that only I can understand.
Thank you for this incredibly illuminating set of posts that have been so exhilarating to partake with you. (I have left a private message in the top left side panel of this forum where you click on the bottom right corner to open which I hope is self-explanatory on how much I have enjoyed it.)
I will leave a separate link here that may better explain my thoughts on why I think these things we’ve been talking about are so extremely important in today’s Covid moment in time.
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We would like to extend our thanks to Craig Deininger, Ph.D. for spending the week with us in Conversations of Higher Order.
Craig, thank you for giving so generously of your time, and the thoughts you have shared. Though of course we understand you do have other commitments you must attend to, don’t be surprised if the conversation continues on without you (which is part of the fun – indeed, I’m likely to add a comment or two myself).
We look forward to doing more of the same with your next essay, should you be willing.
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales-
Thank you so much, Stephen. It was a pleasure–or rather, has been so far, since I will remain attentive to the posts and respond, although perhaps in a little-bit-less-timely manner. The process has been fulfilling and inspires me to think more on the mythic. It is refreshing how “real” the explorations and voices have been in our conversation, and I look forward to more.
Before I dive into 170 pages of my students’ creative writing projects that await feedback and grades, I wish to leave off with one of my favorite Campbell quotes, and one that I think is quite pertinent to the times we are now facing (and since this topic came up earlier in the conversation). The quote is from the Power of Myth (again), and although I’ve read plenty of Campbell’s more scholarly work, it seems that during this thread I’ve come full-circle back to favoring this one—perhaps because our first posts reminded me of where and how I first “met” Joseph Campbell. Or, perhaps because it is an interview, and therefore, spoken-word, on-the-spot, and sincere in its spontaneity and simplicity. Speaking of simplicity, the quote is from the opening moment of that interview, where Campbell is responding to the very first prompt: “Why myths?”
And he says: “One of our problems today is that we are not well acquainted with the literature of the spirit. We’re interested in the news of the day and the problems of the hour” (3).
And I think that quite sums it up. He does not say “spiritual literature,” but rather, “literature of the spirit.” A very big difference, there. Certainly, the news of the day is necessary. But the myths are essential (emphasis on that word’s root: essence). The news is urgent and uncertain. But the myths are timeless and stable, and I think we could use a good dose of those sorts of influences these days. In fact, I daresay it is urgent! So, sure, here’s a good, urgent-news headline that I’d love to see on some front-page:
WE SHOULD ACQUAINT OURSELVES WITH THE MYTHS SO WE CAN NAVIGATE THROUGH THIS MADNESS AND GET BACK IN STRIDE WITH THE GOOD-LIFE
Oh, and by the “good-life,” I really just mean “life,” which, as anyone acquainted with myth will agree, is precisely as good as it gets.
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Craig,
You mention returning to The Power of Myth interviews “perhaps because it is an interview, and therefore, spoken-word, on-the-spot, and sincere in its spontaneity and simplicity.”
Indeed, over the years I have found myself dividing Campbell’s work into two broad categories, which in my mind I call “written Campbell” and “spoken Campbell.”
I love “written Campbell” – e.g. The Hero with a Thousand Faces, The Masks of God, etc – well written, densely packed sentences and paragraphs, with exhaustive footnotes.
But what most strikes a chord with the public seems “spoken Campbell” – whether the Power of Myth and other interviews (e.g. An Open Life: Joseph Campbell in Conversation with Michael Toms) and discussions (The Hero’s Journey; A Joseph Campbell Companion, etc.), as well as books edited from lectures (Myths To Live By, Pathways to Bliss, etc.).
Campbell’s writing is beautiful (he read every word aloud to Jean, which helps when I come across a complex passage that I don’t get at first: I’ll read it aloud, paying attention to the rhythm provided by the punctuation), but there is a spontaneity and charm to Joe just talking. I believe “spoken Campbell” is much more accessible than his more scholarly work, though both draw from the same well.
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales
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I must first admit that I am maybe a little out of my league here. Everyone’s insights are so beautiful. But I am moved by this discussion and would like to share the few thoughts I have had.
I am new to Campbell, although, his teachings feel familiar in a way that is not simply a recollection but rather what has been there all along. Truths that live readily available if only they could be spoken aloud. And Mr. Campbell seems to do just that.
With that said, I am reminded of a lesson by Caroline Myss gave where she explained the difference between thinking about God and experiencing God. That when the stuff that animates all things, animates within us, we break through some sort of barrier. I wonder of this obstruction perhaps is our own sense of individualness, a separation from all that is, that instead dissolves into all that is. Even if for but a brief moment. One time, my mother and I were at a Joann Fabrics perusing the aisles. Seemingly at the same time, we both saw this spool of dark blue ribbon with tiny strands of gold weaved into it. It took our breath away, we were completely taken by this beautiful, mysterious, sensual color. An experience I think we are always trying to get back to with one another. A place where we were of the same. Was it not the numinosity evoked by that simple object that connected us beyond ourselves?
I am not sure this is on track, but I’m sending my thoughts forward anyway.
With love and honor,
Whitney (vitalumen)
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Whitney,
Carolyn Myss is right on with her distinction between “thinking about” and actual experience of the transcendent – and I love your personal example (a mystical experience in a fabric store!).
But what really speaks to my experience is your observation that
his teachings feel familiar in a way that is not simply a recollection but rather what has been there all along. Truths that live readily available if only they could be spoken aloud. And Mr. Campbell seems to do just that.”
When I first read Joseph Campbell, and even more when I viewed the Power of Myth, it was an “aha!” moment for me – not because he was speaking “new truth” or was telling us “This is the way – walk ye therefore in it,” but because he was articulating things I had felt and known for a few years, but had never quite been able to put into words until Joe came along.
I believe he helped so many of us find our own voice – which seems clear from your comment (you are not “out of your league” at all).
Thanks for adding your voice to the discussion (and please feel free to jump into any other threads in these forums that draw your interest, even those that may seem to have faded out – all it take is one new comment or observation to breathe new life into a conversation)
Namaste
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales -
Hi Whitney and Stephen,
At last I find a moment of leisure to respond to your words. Whitney, I hear you on what Caroline Myss shares regarding thinking about “God” and experiencing “God.” And how the ‘stuff that animates things, animates within us.’ And in the case you shared, all this through a dark blue ribbon with strands of gold woven into it.
From there paths of inquiry open up, like symbol, or beauty as a catalyst, or equally, the rational investigation of the distinctions between thinking and experiencing. But I don’t want to follow any of those and instead jump to the end of your post where I think you provide an answer as good as any for all of us (ironically in a question): “Was it not the numinosity evoked by that simple object that connected us beyond ourselves?”
Not to intentionally complicate matters, but I don’t even think I’ll follow the “numinosity evoked by the object”-part, even though it offers itself to the wide world of symbol-approach, the whole connotation (or experienced connotations) behind or beyond the image, which is of great value. And I think you have a priceless symbol here, and will leave it at that.
The reason I keep writing about everything I don’t want to write about is because these topics are precisely what I do want to get to the heart of, and I’m thinking on this Sunday morning that in going beyond them, I may perhaps get nearer to them (which is a procedure that your insights inspired).
How is this? Specifically, it is with the phrase you shared: “connected us beyond ourselves.” Wow! What that means, well, I could make some decent guesses, I suppose. But what it does when I read it, now that’s where it opens up. For one, it feels like it reminds me of something I’ve always known but rarely remember. I am attentive to it also because it’s a paradox, and paradoxes seem to provide some of the deepest truths, whether in the form of Zen koans or the uncertainty principle in quantum physics, or in literary irony, etc., etc.
And now I have to digress to progress. Again! (last time, I promise). Just to get into the spirit of paradox, into the beyond-ourselves, instead of defining what one is and flattening it out, let me share my all-time favorite paradox so it can simply “do” what it does and let that be the definition:
A monk asked his master Tozan, who was weighing some flax: What is Buddha? Tozan said: This flax weighs three pounds.
…(ten minutes later)… I just love that. Anyway, back to your paradox of connecting beyond ourselves. If a dark blue ribbon with gold threading is somehow involved in transporting you and your mother beyond youselves where you connect in some “beyond-you” space, then I think you are also getting into that “all that is” region that you mention earlier. Which I think we all have tasted of to whatever degree, and each in their own unique circumstances (otherwise everyone would be lined up around the block for blue ribbons threaded with gold). Lucky for you, they’re all yours.
So, “connecting beyond ourselves?” I have no idea what it means or how it works. But I know it’s true. And it’s that kind of knowing that we could never prove. And more importantly, it’s the kind that we’d never need to. And so, as your write in the very beginning of your post: “The difference between thinking about ‘God’ and experiencing ‘God.'”
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