As James Carville told Bill Clinton, that “it’s the economy, stupid”, about the election. I finally told myself, “It’s emotions, stupid” after I researched a project on the transformation of consciousness. As a graduate student in the 1970s, I studied psychology at the time when people were interested in altered states of consciousness with biofeedback, acid trips with Timothy Leary and yogis’ ability to stop their hearts. I thought transformation of consciousness was in getting higher. Now Michael Pollen thinks that is the answer, this time with psylocibin mushrooms. However, from my recent research in archetypal identification, I found that the transformation of consciousness wasn’t getting higher but was about clearing the mind of reactive emotions.
I did a workshop where people visualized an archetype. FYI: An archetype is an energy pattern in the collective unconscious documented by the Swiss psychiatrist, Carl Jung. Humans unconsciously align with an archetype to organize their personality. As an adult if a person consciously chooses an archetype, it has power. The archetype creates an aperture to the unconscious to release stored reactive emotions safely. This may all sound a bit abstract and esoteric. But it is really a simple and playful task, almost like creating a cartoon in the mind.
In my workshops, I found that people could easily create an archetype when invited to relax and visualize an outside setting where they had been before and liked. They were to see an entity come to them that wishes them well. This worked and the generated archetypes were diverse and amazing. For example, a father who had past, a Native American wise person, a tree, Goofy, a sea turtle, a butterfly, Barbie, a white light or a river. The famous Jungian analyst, Marie-Louise von Franz said that every archetype contains every other archetype. So, the specific archetype doesn’t matter. I then led participants to visualize a recent uncomfortable event in their life and find the place in their body where they felt something. I asked them to visualize that emotion. At that point, I asked them to visualize their archetype coming into their uncomfortable scene. And magic happened. The sea turtle chewed up the chains around the neck or the elder. transformed the pain in the heart into a feeling of wellbeing.
These are some of the quotes of the transformation:
- The archetype enveloped me and bled blue light into the yellow ball, turning it, sage green sage green ball merged with my heart center increased awareness of what was causing stress (poor communication = blue), and adding it alleviated my tension
- Loves, passion, gratitude, around chest, also something coming out in my throat voice, expanding beauty and healing yes but I don´t remember what the issue was about, what stayed with me is self-confidence, connecting to a great space within, acceptance, love, faith, power
- My Elder transmuted the painful emotion to one of well-being, and the color changed back to a vibrant orange color. I have increased awareness of my own well-being and forces that support my well-being I will more likely work with my Elder to support my well-being in situations where I might experience lack or fear
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The participants didn’t go anywhere or create a high, they became present to see their life in the here and now. The archetype became a salve to their emotions, releasing them. The participants created a perspective on their lives’ difficulties by calming or transmuting emotions. It was not about being high, it is about opening the mind to awareness.