A Non-interpretive, Experiential Approach to Dream Journeys
Interpretive theories of dreams are called 'Dream Work.' But often they don't 'work,' because interpretive glosses of symbols don't get to the heart of the matter and actually stop the process. That is why it is 'work,' not 'healing.' Symbols are portals to deeper dimensions and do not require outside interpretation but call for deepening. Ancient Asklepian dreamhealing was non-interpretive and led to emergent healing that activates the spontaneous healing of placebo effect through dream journeys. Dreamhealing uses images as portals for consciousness journeys to facilitate transformations ranging from mood alteration to profound physiological changes. Imagery (virtual experience) affects the immune system, activating psychosomatic forces, such as the placebo effect. Chaos-oriented consciousness journeys suggest these states reflect dynamical aspects suggested by chaos theory. More than an experiential process, this is a philosophy of treatment--"Chaosophy." DREAMHEALING Book - http://dreamhealing.iwarp.com/
(An ASKLEPIA FOUNDATION Book) DREAMHEALING CHAOS & THE CREATIVE CONSCIOUSNESS PROCESS by Graywolf Fred Swinney, M.A. and Iona Miller Copyright, 1992; All Rights Reserved
DEDICATION: Stanley Krippner, Ph.D. & Ed Glovinsky, M.D. 1
Stanley Krippner, PhD In 1971, Fred Swinney was told by his physician that he had, at most, three years to live. He suffered from hypertension, heart disease, ulcers, and hypoglycemia. Seeing a connection between his weakened physical condition and his job pressures as an engineer, Swinney entered psychotherapy. This experience not only alleviated his physical problems, but prompted him to enter a training program in Transactional Analysis. Swinney received his license in Transactional Analysis in 1975 and began seeing clients.
In 1976, Swinney was travelling by canoe to James Bay in the northern Ontario wilderness. One night, he feel asleep before the smoldering fire and had a dream in which animal predators emerged from the woods, tore him apart, and devoured him. Waking in terror, Swinney opened his eyes and stared at the coals. Just beyond, he could discern two yellow-green eyes and the shadowy form of a wolf. Much to his surprise, Swinney experienced total surrender instead of fear, he stared at the wolf, the wolf appeared to stare back, and Swinney felt a oneness with all that surrounded him.
Eventually the wolf slipped back into the forest, but Swinney still felt its presence in his mind and body. He realized that in some strange way he had become a wolf. Having been devoured in his dream, he had been reborn a wolf upon awakening. A few weeks later, Swinney left the wilderness and returned to his family and clients. He attempted to forget the episode since it had been remarkably different than anything he had previously experienced. Swinney completed his Master's degree in 1980 and avoided any activity that would again evoke his wolflike nature. 2 Five years after, during a group therapy session held while fire was flickering in Swinney's fireplace, one of his clients expressed extreme anger.
Suddenly, Swinney had a mental image of Libra, the Greek goddess of justice, holding her balanced scales. He asked his client if she could relate to this image. The woman erupted with emotion, telling the group how, during her childhood, her mother had tried to treat her and her sister equally. When the client did not experience this fairness in later life, it upset her and she could not cope with other people very well. Upon working through her memories of her early experiences and subsequent expectations, the client was able to accept the inequities in her relationships. Eventually, she was able to terminate therapy.
Swinney realized that his evocation of the image resembled his experience with the wolf. Similar episodes occurred. Invariably, Swinney's images, hunches, and insights were of great value to his clients. Swinney realized that the wolf had returned and had demonstrated the way in which it could be of assistance, even in civilization. Swinney resolved to learn more about wolves and was surprised to read that in all probability the wolf he had seen in Canada would not have attacked him as he slept before his fire. Two friends gave him books about wolves even though they knew nothing about his resolution or his experience in the forest. Swinney's readings also yielded information about shamans and how they frequently dream about being devoured and reborn during their initiation and training.
Swinney also learned that shamans were the world's first psychotherapists. Shamans often claim to have animal "guides" that assist their work with clients, and often report feelings of unity with their surroundings. After five years of running away from his inner wolf, Swinney again surrendered, just as he had that night in the woods before the coals of his campfire. He took the name "Graywolf" and introduced elements from shamanism into his work as a psychotherapist.
Graywolf used rituals and ceremonies with his clients, both in individual and group sessions. He looked for mythic themes, animal "guides," and spiritual symbols in his clients' dreams. He made use of guided imagery sessions and had clients carve, draw, mold, or paint those images that seemed to possess healing qualities. He encouraged body awareness through breathing exercises, dance, and movement.
Graywolf had shared these experiences with me when we first met. We saw each other again in 1984 at the annual meeting of the Association for Humanistic Psychology near Boston. I was scheduled to give a presentation on shmanism with a colleague who was flying in from out of town. My colleague's flight was delayed; thus I asked Graywolf to take his place.
Graywolf told his story to a group of several hundred people and led them in some breathing and imagery exercises that he had found useful with his clients. Graywolf s comments were very well received and he felt positive about sharing his private experiences with a large group of interested people.
Since that time, Graywolf has shared his experiences with thousands of individuals and dozens of groups. In addition, he has moved from Western psychotherapy to native shamanism to the dreamhealing tradition of ancient Greece and Rome. But this is hardly a step backwards, as he has combined this with chaos theory, arguably one of the most vital models of the upcoming 21st century. 3
Chaos theory is the branch of mathematics for the study of processes that seem so complex that at first they do not appear to be governed by any known laws or principles, but which actually have an underlying order that can be described by vector calculus and its associated geometry. Examples of chaotic processes include a stream of rising smoke that breaks down and becomes turbulent, water flowing in a stream or crashing at the bottom of a waterfall, electroencephalographic activity of the brain, changes in animal populations, fluctuations on the stock exchange, and the weather — either local or global. All of these phenomena involve the interaction of several elements and the pattern of their changes over time. The rate of change of each of the variables or elements involved depends on the other variables, and the rules of the rate of change must be nonlinear for the chaotic temporal patterns to occur. When basic processes of systems are connected interactively, they are called "dynamical systems," which is the parent branch of mathematics of which chaos theory is a subdiscipline. Classical chaos theory deals with a calculus of infinite duration and resolution which, of course, may or may not exist in the actual world, but is beyond the resolution of our knowledge of the actual world. Thus, in the mathematical models of chaos one encounters "sensitivity to initial conditions" where even the smallest difference in initial conditions can lead to a large difference in position later on within a chaotic attractor. Therefore, since our knowledge of initial conditions is never exact but bound to inexact observation, our prediction into the future is limited, more so the further into the future we try to predict. Until recently, it was presumed that chaotic systems, like classical linear systems, tended toward stable equilibrium (fixed point) or period attractors and that the erratic behavior found in actuality resulted from unidentified variables not yet detected. For example, researchers believed that the weather would be predictable if it were somehow possible to gather enough information about all relevant variables. Precision about knowledge thus derives not from insufficient information about the number of processes involved which could be very few to describe very complex chaotic attractors, but from the complexity of their interaction plus the imprecision concerning our measurement information at some arbitrary starting time about the exact state of the system. Our useful knowledge of the system, which is very orderly and deterministic, concerns its behavioral characteristics, i.e. the features of the attractor, rather than making an exact prediction of its future state at an exact time. Geometric patterns with repetitive self-similar features have been called "fractals" because of their fractional dimension, and because of the sheer beauty of these forms. Many chaotic attractors display fractals when sliced, like opening an orange. Thus, fractal dimensions are one of the many numerical properties used to characterize chaotic attractors along with measures of the simultaneously convergent and divergent characteristics which have led many to characterize chaotic attractors as like the stretching and folding of bread dough or taffy. Rapid Eye Movement sleep (the period of the sleep cycle from which most dream reports emerge) could be chaotic in nature and contain this type of attractor. Graywolf grounds his work in chaos theory, but he also claims roots in the ancient Asklepian temples. Here it was the dream experience itself, not the interpretation of the 4 dream, that was felt to heal pilgrims. One of Graywolf s contributions to the field of dreamworking is his facilitation of a healing effect directly from the dream process itself. His client's dream experiences are just as carefully nurtured as those provided by the Greek and Roman priests; Graywolfs contrivances range from dream incubation to white river rafting! Graywolf claims that in some cases only one such intense event may be necessary to produce a lasting positive change in a client's life. Before dismissing this possibility as wishful thinking or self-deception, one should consider that a single traumatic event can have devastating effects; the power of recovery can certainly be as forceful as the tumult of trauma. In addition, one needs to examine Graywolfs 8-step process that encompasses this life-changing event, steps that range from "the pilgrimage" to "the re-entry." Graywolfs Creative Consciousness Process is based on a unique model of the human psyche, and can provide a roadmap for the tribal shaman as well as the dreamhealer. Both frequently travel into the mythic underworld to find and retrieve the lost souls of their clients. I have seen contemporary shamans make this perilous journey on behalf of a person whose soul has been absconded by the forces of addiction, depression, or life- threatening accidents. Sometimes, the soul must be persuaded to return; at other times it does not know it is lost and must be informed; and on still other occasions the soul is held captive by the spirits of cocaine, heroin, alcohol, or other seductive substances. Most contemporary psychotherapists dismiss the concept of "soul" as superstitious, yet they do so at their peril. They may treat their clients' bodies, feelings, and intellects, but may never restore wholeness to them unless they explore the spiritual dimension of the psyche. In Graywolfs model, the shaman/dreamhealer and his or her client emerge from the depths of the psyche through various development levels, beginning with conception and ending with behavior. The lost soul has been found, retrieved, and revitalized, and this new wholeness is reflected in the client's daily activities. The source of dreams, according to Graywolf, is located at primal levels of the psyche as the brain experiences itself during sleep. Like the fractals of chaos theory, brain centers undulate through cycles of firing and rest, processing both externally-generated and internally-generated input, shaping plots and narratives, creating symbols and metaphors. Once more, order is generated from chaos. Another one of Graywolf's contributions is to find the genesis of the Creative Consciousness Process in evolutionary theory and ecological psychology. Rapid Eye Movement sleep probably served an evolutionary function as small mammals formulated strategies of survival during sleep, checking them against the memories of their daily experience. This was the beginning of the brain's capacity to create stories from the morass of internally-evoked images during the night — stories that would often become cultural and personal myths, themselves important determinants of social survival. In our time, as Earth itself struggles to survive the onslaught of human exploitation, the Creative Consciousness process sees its task as reminding individuals and groups of their connection to the rest of Nature, and to awaken them to the fact that the very survival of humankind may rest on honoring this connection, not severing it still further. Tribal shamans recognized the ecology of consciousness; their techniques often were chaotic yet the disorder produced through drumming, dancing, and mind-altering 5 plants induced shifts in consciousness that led to a new order that could be both healing and life-enhancing. I have participated in sweat lodge rites, drumming ceremonies, and dancing rituals where the heat was so intense, the music was so overwhelming, and the movement so exhausting that the only way to stay with the process was to shift into a state of consciousness where my ordinary limitations were expanded or transcended. Again, order can emerge from chaos; today's shaman/dreamhealer takes advantage of this knowledge. Graywolf has facilitated numerous hero's and heroine's journeys for his clients over the past several years, encouraging their departure, validating their discoveries, and celebrating their return. They realize at profoundly deep levels of the psyche where their growth has been stalemated and how flow can be restored. By providing sacred internal and external sites for this change to occur, Graywolf has revived the dreamhealing tradition. Asklepios would be pleased.
PREFACE The field cannot well be seen from within the field. --Ralph Waldo Emerson
In my travels, presenting workshops on dreamhealing and creative healing, I have found that many professionals (psychotherapists, counselors, social workers, addiction counselors, etc.) and paraprofessionals (such as hypnotherapists) state that they came because they experienced limitation in the current forms of psychotherapy and counseling that are available.
They all come with the sense of looking for something more, something that goes beyond the abilities or the models that are currently available. Many of them have been attracted to alternatives such as shamanism, through books, articles, and interviews, describing these forms of healing. Many came to learn more because of the sense that what they were doing had just not been enough. Many have been drawn by an intuition sensed while reading a flyer, feeling it had something special to offer them. These comments are a reflection of my own frustration several years ago, when as a Transactional Analyst and psychotherapist my clients would come to me after we had met their therapeutic contracts. In the exit interviews they would opt to continue in therapy, not because something was wrong, but because they had not yet found what they were really looking for. The solving of their problems seemed to them only a first step in a far deeper and more profound process. It was this that led me to contemplate and explore other forms of 6 healing. I was seeking other forms of answers for myself and others. This book represents the interim or status report of my explorations. Although it does not really provide answers, it does suggest new directions. This book is about my personal encounter with chaos as I struggled to better understand the nature of healing. It is a very intimate story since the development of my work has been a personal odyssey. I share my story because we know that first person accounts and memories have the power to speak to the souls of others. Dreamhealing is more than a method. It is a living process and a philosophy of treatment. Both the fields of psychology and physics have long been interested in the interface of psyche and matter. Another way to put that is the interface of mind and body. Ultimately, they are not separate, but to see that requires a shift in consciousness. Since healing's a matter of mind over matter, and matter's a matter of mind... In matters that matter when healing's what matters, love is the state of the mind. The shift in consciousness is one in which psyche "matters." And psyche includes both order and chaos. Chaos is not an idea. It is visceral, arising deep within. It is part of the human condition. Each of us tends to understand, in spite of what we know about order, that our life is full of chaos. Most of the important things in our life seem to be random. Small changes in knowledge, insight, or experience can impact us in tremendous ways. Things we never expect to happen can bring irreversible change into our lives. For me, chaos was not an idea that helped me develop a model for healing. Chaos theory came later as an explanation for what I was noticing in the process of healing. I do not think healing is a mechanistic thing. I do not think we manipulate the body to heal it. It helps, and it sets an atmosphere and stage for healing. However, I think true healing is a matter of consciousness. Voltaire has said that, " the art of medicine consists of amusing the patient while nature cures the disease. " Perhaps Sir William Osier was even more succinct, noting, "It is much more important to know what sort of patient has a disease, than what sort of disease a patient has. " Healing is not a matter of how we manipulate the body chemistry. It is largely based on the attitude of the individual and what underlies the structure of the body and mind. And what really does underlie the structure of the mind and body is consciousness. The ancient Greeks personified healing consciousness as the divine physician ASKLEPIOS. The core of the art of healing in ancient times came from the inner connection between the divine healer and the divine sickness. The god sent both the affliction and the remedy. ASKLEPIOS HEALED PRIMARILY THROUGH DREAMS. 7 Thus Asklepios, or Aesculapius as he was known in Rome, embodied the paradox of healing. The idea of poison and antidote being contained in one substance is still found in the unconscious of modern man. It is practiced in the art of homeopathy. The therapy process which is based solely on the imagery of the individual means that within the problem lies the solution. In the ancient healing temples, this psychological form of homeopathy was applied to ailments both physical and mental. It involved coming into a right attitude toward the affliction. Our wounds open us to healing. After incubation of dreams within the sacred precinct, the entire art of healing was left to the divine physician, who was embodied in the healing dream, which was the remedy itself. It involved altering states of consciousness. One of the things I noticed in exploring psychology and shamanism was my introduction to chaos, but then I did not have the words. I began exploring my own healing through shamanism and psychology and that evolved into the dreamwork. Then, I began drawing maps of the journeys I was going on with people. I found particular states of consciousness repeatedly came up spontaneously in the healing process. I did not have a language to describe some of those states of consciousness. I would try to describe them scientifically, and felt the reports were flat. It was just not right. It was like using words or mathematics to describe a symphony. I would then get into the mystical, new age, and shamanic explanations, and get turned off by them. They also were not right. It was like using an abstract painting as an instruction manual. Then a conscious awareness of the operative principle of chaos came to me, much like the first trip deeper into dreams. In one of those serendipitous moments, I mentioned to a client that I was getting interested in moments of chaos in the healing process. She brought me an article, which I read about a week later, and everything came together. I realized I had been observing the healing process taking the sense of self deeper and deeper into consciousness to a state that can only be described as an experience of chaotic consciousness for healing. A DEEP EXISTENTIAL IMAGE OF WHO AND WHAT WE ARE CONTAINS THE ESSENCE OF OUR DISEASE. The image is revealed in the continually ongoing inner process of imagery which is revealed in dreams, visions, and gut reactions. Water is a natural metaphor of consciousness. This deep stream of consciousness flows through the labyrinth of the psyche. It is the source of dis-ease and our healing. Water played an important part in the cult of Asklepios. In Greece the springs of the shrine were channeled into circular labyrinths, forming a concrete metaphor of the healing process. Healing "springs" from deep within. However, first the old rigid images must be dissolved, and THE UNIVERSAL SOLVENT IS CHAOS. Clients reported encountering a place, after going through fears and pains, that is totally disorienting, chaotic. They would, for example, enter into a gray cloud, and become that cloud, and the mind would go totally blank. Or they would enter into a spiral, and as they gave over to the motion of that spiral, they became so totally disoriented that there was nothing they could hang onto. And that is what we now define as chaotic consciousness. 8 There is an essential relationship between healing and irrational consciousness. Irrational consciousness "works" the cure. Somehow that chaotic consciousness, the giving up of the order, the letting go of the old structure to chaos changed things fundamentally. The next set of imagery emerging out of that chaotic consciousness was always a healing one. Physical and emotional changes would continue for weeks and even months after a particular dream journey. They would come back and say, "I don't know why I am different, but I am different. I'm behaving differently, I'm reacting differently. I'm treating the world differently. What used to be a physical problem for me is no longer a problem." So chaos seems vitally important at the existential level. In psychology, we have had the idea that we need a "strong ego," that we need a stable structure in order to function and cope. Dreamhealing shows us we actually need to enter a less-rigid process of flow, which increases our adaptability, helping us evolve. Strength is a measure of what force it takes to destroy or break a rigid structure. True power, on the other hand, is a measure of readily-available energy for immediate use. Strength is rigid, while power is flowing. Empowerment flows forth naturally when we come into intimate contact with our stream of consciousness. We are learning from chaos theory that physically and mentally we also need that disorder to function smoothly. We seem to need to dip into that disorder because it shakes everything loose and allows restructuring to occur in the direction of adaptability. All of a sudden we are free, we are flowing again, and that is the natural human condition of health. WE EXIST IN A TWILIGHT ZONE BETWEEN CHAOS AND ORDER. We flow back and forth between them and that keeps us healthy. We build a structure and the structure begins to develop flaws and rigidities, and our illness comes when we hang onto that old wornout, yet rigid structure. But when we let go, we let ourselves flow back into that primal chaos and into total freedom. It is like a heart that periodically develops a chaotic beating pattern to renew itself. We seem to need that within our consciousness, too. To me chaos, healing, awareness, and consciousness are almost synonymous terms. They are important to the human condition. They are crucial to all of it including our health, healing, and ability to move through life. CREATIVITY IS ALSO EVOLUTION. For example, disease is the crisis that forces the organism to expand beyond its limits and evolve. It is part of the evolutionary action of natural selection. Those who adapt, survive. Still, health means more than survival. An individual can create neurotic means of coping and surviving, but they limit and distort the functionality of the person. Of all the new advances to come from the various sciences, perhaps the largest contribution will come from consciousness studies and their relationship with chaos. Even physics has recently been saying that we cannot go much further until we understand consciousness better. The relationship of the perceiver and the object of perception brings us back to the mind/matter issue. 9 The marriage of physics and psychology may delve deeper into the mystery. Physics and psychology have been trying to get together for years and it has never really advanced beyond the speculation stage. This bridge between consciousness and chaos may be more than a metaphor. DREAMS ARE CHAOTIC BY NATURE, AND SO IS MUCH OF SHAMANIC PRACTICE. Dream incubation, as practiced in Greece, Egypt, and Japanese Shintoism, also involved such shamanic practices as divination, trance induction, etc. They intentionally evoked the irrational, and of all the healing modalities, these two reflect chaotic theory. There are many topics to consider in applying chaos theory to consciousness. We hope to show the underlying threads that weave together shamanic practice, the ancient healing cults, the flowing philosophy of Taoism, and various modern psychologies with dreams, healing, and chaos theory. The dreamhealing experience can be used in therapy, or for self-help, recovery, and enrichment. For those who have been through conventional recovery groups, counseling, and traditional therapy, it is a way of creating an intimate relationship with their own Higher Power, which is always molding the soul through the imagery of the river of consciousness. It directly impacts the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual well-being of the individual. Conventional therapy does not necessarily induce creativity, nor open a person to the transpersonal realm. Taking our own "JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH" means penetrating our depths and finding the vast cosmos within. The theory presented here in terms of human consciousness may ultimately be linked with other theories about the nature of chaos and the universe to form a supertheory, or paradigm. In this new paradigm, we are all enfolded within an infinite field of consciousness. It means a fundamental shift in the way we view the world, the cosmos, and ourselves. The problem is that medical science and psychological science still operate largely from Newtonian physics models. Healing science has not made the leap to relativity theory yet, much less quantum mechanics, or chaos theory. There needs to be a way to apply the theory to psychological or other kinds of healing practice. Chaos theory may relativize many of the old approaches, and provide a key for unlocking more of the mysteries of existence. THE PROCESS OF CREATIVITY IS ONE OF NEW FORMS EMERGING FROM THE VOID, NEW FORMS THAT HAVE NOT EXISTED PREVIOUSLY. It is not merely a juggling of existing forms or ideas into a new configuration, but is more of a quantum leap, a disruption into new levels of consciousness and awareness. Chaos theory provides a particularly apt metaphor for this process. In a nutshell, CHAOS THEORY STATES THAT IN ALL APPARENT STRUCTURE IS HIDDEN CHAOS AND THAT IN CHAOS THERE ARE HIDDEN FORMS. This is much like the symbol of the Tao. The white YANG side contains a kernel of darkness, and the black YIN side a kernel of light. In some sense reality is a twilight zone existing in the interplay of chaos and form. It has long been known that all systems eventually break 10 down into chaos (i.e. the third law of thermodynamics, also known as entropy). But what chaos theory has added is the notion that chaos creates new forms. If this sounds metaphysical it is because we are very close to the basic creation myth of most religions—everything comes out of nothing, the primal CHAOS. It applies to the current scientific creation myth of the big-bang formation of the universe. In science myths are fantasized by calling them theories. Chaos as the matrix of creation is a universal mythic theme. It spans from Taoism (from the nothingness or chaos was formed the Yin and the Yang and from these all other things were formed) to Christianity (first there was darkness, nothing or absence of form, and from this on the first day God created light...). CHAOS IS THE CRUCIBLE OF CREATION. In practical everyday ways, chaos theory is adding to our understanding of processes at all levels: weather systems, social systems, traffic patterns, animal migrations, evolutionary patterns, fluid dynamics, cosmology, quantum flux, and on and on. Medical science has discovered that the healthy heart periodically has chaotic or random variations. The heart with completely regular rhythms is likely to malfunction and is subject to heart attack. Similarly with many other physiological systems, including brainwaves, periodic chaos seems to be a prerequisite to healthy functioning. The implication is that form and rigidity need to periodically give way to non-structure and chaos for renewal and recreation. Much as the "dance of Shiva" destroys the existing forms so that new reality can be created, we can foster the disintegration of outworn images of ourselves. This is true on the most subjective levels of our experience also. If you have been faced with a problem, either physical, emotional, or mental which eludes solution, that really means that the forms and structures present in your intellect or other ego coping systems have become too rigid and locked into some form so you cannot see beyond them. This is the condition of impasse, stuckness. In essence, you need a creative solution, one beyond the ego, one emerging from the undefinable creativity of chaos. One way of subjectively perceiving chaos is an absence of any form or structure, a state of no-thing-ness, and when confronted with this the human mind perceives either total blankness, or confusion and discomfort as the existing patterns break down. It is a little death of the old self. For example, after pondering and working on a problem for some time that does not yield to our usual problem-solving techniques, we become frustrated and often confused. Just when it seems we have been defeated and give up feeling overwhelmed, a new and original solution "pops" into our mind out of nothingness. A complete answer, often symbolic or metaphorical in form, represents a novel solution. It is a quantum leap in understanding and consciousness—often a whole new way of perceiving reality. But letting go of the old forms is frightening. We identify with them, and to a large degree define our sense of self by them. To forsake them is to dissolve that part of self, to let it die. Most of us are only comfortable in the known territory within the limits of our belief systems. These beliefs define the limits of our reality and existence. The creative solution often exposes the limits of our beliefs by moving beyond them, and thrusts us into unknown territory, and that is frightening. 11 We try to hang on to the old limits even if it means we are destroyed or have to hang on to our problem rather than letting go to move into a broader awareness and reality. We mark the boundaries of our belief systems with fear and discomfort to keep ourselves safe and enclosed. If we, by chance, stray beyond them ,we doubt and deny the experiences by calling them trite—lollygagging, daydreaming, stargazing. We ignore the images thrust up by our imagination that with some further thought might reveal the creative solution to a problem that has been plaguing us. So we avoid creativity, holding ourselves at bay through fear and discomfort. The more fundamental and rigid, the more tightly we remain ringed in by our fears. Conversely, to embrace creativity we must pass through the discomfort of confusion, and let go of what we know and are comfortable with. It is, in essence, a leap of faith beyond the known into chaos and into the void. It is an inner journey, this leap—deep within each of us. Like The Fool in the Tarot, we stand at the edge of a precipice. Inherent in our being and structure is chaos, just as science has shown. This level of awareness, this state of chaos is our creative consciousness — CHAOTIC ONSCIOUSNESS — the crucible of our creative spirit. Only by entering it, yielding to it, do we allow newly evolved form to come into being—to arise out of chaos. It is a journey through fear to a life in which each moment is an act of personal creation and freedom. In healing, like cures like. The poison is also the panacea. In learning to live with chaos, it becomes not something to be denied nor gotten rid of, rather something to be embraced deeply. In embracing the chaos, and tuning in to its self-directing flow, we feel we have remained true to the spirit of the phenomenon itself. In dreamhealing we move deeper into the images, then become them, rather than interacting with them. So too with other states of consciousness we encounter. The disorienting, dizzying surrender to the tornado or whirlpool is a surrender to chaos, an experience of no-form and total confusion and disorientation. It is like the whirling, twisting molecule of water in the chaotic world of non-laminar flow. The experience of committing oneself to the fire means becoming it, and as the random flickering of the flames, and the torrid heat, disintegrating into pure energy. Becoming the boiling, flowing, ever-changing body of molten magma at the core of the earth is felt as a visceral sensation. These are some of the personal, subjective responses to the experience of total chaos. Always, passing through this state, the new order of imagery, thought, emotion, sensory perception reflected a new and less dis-eased state of being. The deeper self image undercut the old belief system, and began to create a new order of being, a new way of perceiving the self and the world. Chaos provided a new image around which to order the personality and often the physiology. Each of these observations had a counterpart in the new science based on chaos. Order seemed to be present in the chaotic state of mind, just as chaos really seems to underlies even the most rigid and orderly intellect. The images themselves that were from the chaos had their counterpart in the strange attractors described by this radical new mathematical model. 12 The images, the deep primal multi-sensual experiences and perceptions that I was working with seemed to act like psychic magnets, attracting and ordering the energies around them, which echoed their shapes and forms. And like the fractal patterns displayed on a computer screen, the quantum shift came when the attractor values were changed. The old image that lay on one side of the chaos state gives way to a surprising new image that arises out of the chaos. Spirit, soul, beliefs, emotions, thinking, and behavior are all affected. This 'sacred psychology', (a term coined by Jean Houston), and the Creative Consciousness Process thus mirror not only the new models of energy dynamics, but also the ancient dream temples and mystery schools of the healer Asklepios. Here new physics and consciousness meet. —Gray wolf, 1992 INTRODUCTION Psyche cannot be totally different from matter, for how otherwise could it move matter? And matter cannot be alien to psyche, for how else could matter produce psyche? Psyche and matter exist in the same world, and each partakes of the other, otherwise any reciprocal action would be impossible. If research could only advance far enough, therefore, we should arrive at an ultimate agreement between physical and psychological concepts. Our present attempts may be bold, but I believe they are on the right lines. —Carl Jung, AION Scientific revolutions and paradigm shifts happen in various disciplines on a regular basis. Some practitioners in a field are quick to adapt new models into their conceptualizations and work, while others who are reluctant to change cannot make the leap in consciousness. Continuing to adhere to outdated, but familiar philosophies and practices, they represent the established order and its preference for the status quo. The healing arts, both medical and psychological, have not been exempt from this persistent human pattern, even though in our understanding of the fundamental nature of reality through scientific understanding, advances have been phenomenal. The popularity of the alternative health movement, human potential movement, recovery movement, and self-help has shown that a large segment of the population is open to change in their approach to well being. A variety of so-called healing techniques have become available with widely varying credibility and results. 13 Whether they have any scientifically traceable therapeutic effect, or not, most are rooted in the idea of treating the WHOLE PERSON, rather than mechanically treating bodies in a maintenance factory. Alternative health practices encourage preventive maintenance as well as physical and psychological self-care, not just crisis management. OLD SCIENCE/NEW SCIENCE The history of science is one of evolution, whereby old models are integrated into or superceded by more encompassing models which push beyond the old boundaries. For example, in physics, which is generally considered the base science that sets the foundation for others, the mechanical view of reality and the nature of the universe described by Newtonian physics gave way to the "relativistic" concepts of Einstein, which in turn became accompanied by Quantum Mechanics, and now Chaos Theory (CDS). Newton postulated a clockwork universe based on absolute motions. This theory alleged that once the initial conditions and forces were known, all future motion could be predicted infinitely. This seemed to work well for calculating planetary motion and other large-scale phenomena, but in the sub-atomic world the theory was superceded by the inherent uncertainty of Quantum Mechanics. These models have shown themselves to be functionally accurate — that is they account for observed reality -- but only by ignoring or denying chaos. For centuries, science has shuttled chaotic phenomena off to the side, because they could not define or explain it. Current research tells us that there is chaotic fluctuation in the planetary motion and the Universe contains several "strange attractors" of vast proportion. In the sub-atomic reality, chaos is probably the agent behind quantum fluctuation. So it is fundamental. The reality is not one of a clockwork universe, but a flow between chaos and anti-chaos which creates adaptation. Chaos begets order, and order begets chaos (entropy). This holds true at all levels of phenomena, macrocosm to microcosm: "AS ABOVE, SO BELOW" This interplay of chaos and order also influences biological evolution. Darwin could never have guessed the existence of self-organization as an innate property of complex systems, like genes acting as self-regulating networks. Now we are beginning to understand evolution as the marriage of natural selection AND self-organization. The chaos of which we speak is not totally random, but deterministic. We can see its enfolded order now thanks to the advent of sophisticated computer graphics with incredible calculating ability. Now we can separate the signal from the noise, informationally speaking, and find the hidden order. But we still can never predict an outcome for any period of time, but we can predict parameters. And we can visually realize the beauty of these mathematical concepts through fractals. Chaos theory has amplified the classical and quantum worldviews into one in which reality may be seen as a SHADOW OF ILLUSION, existing on the edge between chaos and order. We all have direct perception in our lives of the continual by-play between chaos and order, chaos and order. We are taught that chaos can be catastrophic or 14 barely disturbing, but rarely are we taught that the experience of chaos and the letting go which accompanies it are OK. The interplay of chaos and order represents a fundamental, yet paradoxical state which is a union of opposites at the boundary where they mesh. In the past many cultures developed philosophies which embraced chaos as a welcomed part of growth and healing. For example, in medieval alchemy, the legendary PRIM A MATERIA symbolized both the chaotic beginning of the enterprise and the most primal state of being -- chaos, as initial and most fundamental condition. The return to favor of chaos in science may herald its return in our culture. It may mean a release for some from rigidly ordered lives of compulsivity, perfectionism, workaholism, and rationalism toward a more balanced lifestyle. Established medical and psychological science is still based on the theories of Newton. The human, by and large, is seen as a mechanical collection of parts interacting and following set rules or laws. And in psychology, for the most part, the mechanistic model still prevails, perhaps in its latest incarnation as the cybernetic model ("mind as computer"). Though the shamanic approach to the whole person is just as strongly rooted in tradition, most of medical science does not recognize the role of spirit, soul, or emotional attitudes in healing except in the most superficial way. Alternative health practices are allegedly holistic, but mostly use unorthodox ways of dealing with symptoms or parts of the person. They may strike a deeper chord, yet not get to the core of the problem. Healing science still continues the Newtonian illusion that 1). it is possible to be outside of what is happening, as an objective observer who manipulates the client, and that somewhere is an absolute or non-involved frame of reference against which all can be measured; and, 2). it is possible to understand the whole by reducing it to its parts and studying them. As guiding philosophies, underlying principles, the foundational concepts of the new science of chaos theory are still unknown and foreign territory. But they speak volumes of the true nature of reality. Here lies fertile ground, at last, for planting the seeds to heal the mind/body split fostered by Cartesian duality. Psychosomatic phenomena show the profound synergistic interaction of the physical and mental wo rids--which in fact are ONE WORLD. For example, it is well-known in medicine that arthritis sufferers have a characteristic personality profile, which can be revealed using the MMPI (Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory). It is sometimes referred to as "the iron hand syndrome." Desperate desire for a strong sense of control seems to lead to a permanent position of "holding on" in the musculature and skeletal structure of the hand. Emotions can damage health since emotions and the body are inseparable. The psyche effects the body through the glands, allowing the personality to invite dis-ease. When not brought into consciousness, unconscious conflicts can manifest as symbolic (though real) ailments. 15 BODY LANGUAGE is direct: "I can 't stomach this. " "It's eating away at me." might indicate ulcers. Other well-known psychosomatic disorders include asthma, allergies, colitis, anorexia, bulemia, panic attacks, hypertension, certain skin disorders, and perhaps even some cancers. A woman who longs for her unborn children may develop benign fibroids or malignant tumors, instead. These and other diseases indicate that there is significant emotional conflict within. The arthritic, for example, reacts with unconscious muscular contraction, like an infant instead of an adult. The asthmatic may be drowning in the inner sea of emotional turmoil; the allergy sufferer holding back a reservoir of uncried tears. THE ESSENCE OF BEING HUMAN IS EXPERIENCED AS CONSCIOUSNESS. The entire organism and its functioning is affected by the state of consciousness. In this context, consciousness means a field in which the entire universe participates. In our model of consciousness, this field is described as being not unlike Jung's concept of the collective unconscious. We use the term to mean the essence of existence, the primal matrix of both organic and inorganic life as a self-organizing, self-generating, and self- iterating force. Our essence emerges from this vast pool of force (SOURCE), and throughout growth and development certain aspects of it enter our awareness, while others remain subconscious or unconscious, but affect us just the same. This field is a medium of connectivity which interacts with the time/space field, gravitational field, and electromagnetic fields which create the foundation of our dimension. Thus we experience ourselves as conscious, corporeal entities existing in three spatial dimensions plus time. This is our experience because of the limits of our information input system—the senses. We have extended our senses through technology from incredibly finite realms to the edge or birth of the universe. Our awareness cannot be limited to a view of ourselves as humans in local time and space. Our consciousness can soar, through imagination and creativity, like an eagle far and wide, drawing from the collective to widen our experiential perspectives. Our larger reality is that WE ARE ONE WITH ALL, and we can feel that when we look at ourselves that way. Even science tells that everything in the universe is simply connected, a seamless webwork of waves with intentionality~a sea of consciousness. The bottom line is that reality is not at all like what we have been conditioned to believe up until now. Our concepts are much too narrow, too rigid, too mechanistic, and too confining. Now chaos theory and fractal geometry are pushing the boundaries even further, suggesting a reality that includes the precious component of subjective human experience in the laws of science. Physics has traditionally led the way for the other sciences. Chaos theory is beginning to permeate astronomy, biology, sociology, meteorology, and so many more fields. Researchers and clinicians are exploring and slowly transforming these sciences to the new base, creating new practices and possibilities beyond even our wildest imaginings. The phenomena of healing and parapsychology are some of the heretofore unrecognized 16 markers of chaotic consciousness. THE STUDY OF CONSCIOUSNESS IS A GATEWAY FOR EXPLORING THIS NEW SCIENCE. A NEW PARADIGM Profound healing calls for dealing with the whole of the human condition including the body, mind, and spirit totality. These three elements converge deep within our consciousness at a level beyond our normal awareness. Whole-healing is most effectively accomplished at this level. PROFOUND HEALING INVOLVES AN INNER JOURNEY DEEP INTO CONSCIOUSNESS TO THIS CORE OF BEING. This state of consciousness can be subjectively experienced in the form of a multi-sensory image, In leading clients on these healing quests, we have observed that this state of consciousness is directly connected to the state that can only be described as PURE CREATIVE ENERGY, or the core of our creative essence and spirit. HEALING THE TOTAL ORGANISM INVOLVES YIELDING THE DISEASED FORM OR IMAGE TO THIS 'CREATIVE STATE' AND SUBSEQUENTLY EMERGING FROM IT WITH A NEW, MORE HARMONIOUS AND BALANCED FORM. The outer structure of the body and personality soon begin to restructure, to reflect the new form. In other words, HEALING IS AN ACT OF CREATION. FROM THE DESCRIPTIONS OF THE SUBJECTIVE EXPERIENCE OF THIS STATE, AND FROM OUR PERSONAL JOURNEYS, IT IS A STATE OF FORMLESS CHAOS. This description of the healing process bears a remarkable resemblance to those put forth in chaos theory to describe complex dynamic phenomena. The resemblance does not end there. Explorations of this healing process and chaos theory's descriptions of natural processes show an uncanny convergence in all respects. THE SHAMAN/THERAPIST There are many paths or ways to reach this profoundly healing creative state of consciousness. The shaman/therapist model is one and represents a gestalt, combining the powerful consciousness-altering rituals, worldviews, and visionary experiences of the shamans with the techniques, theories, and practices of depth psychologies. Shamans have existed throughout human history as experts in magic, mysticism, healing and consciousness journeys into altered states. Psychology, based in science, knows how to manipulate and work within the ego. This combination, this gestalt of mysticism and science creates a new dimension in worldview and practice. It transcends the duality of mystical vs. scientific and provides a perspective unavailable to either one alone, one much more than the simple sum of the two. We offer the analogy of binocular, as opposed to monocular, vision. If you close either eye, you get a relatively complete picture of what you are looking at, though it lacks depth. It may be slightly displaced depending on which eye you use, and will shift back and forth as you shift eyes. But no matter how fast you shift, if you are only using one 17 eye, it is a two dimensional view of reality. However, when both eyes are open, the perspective centers, and a new dimension of depth is perceived. Thus, the shaman/therapist model is not just a simple mixing, or borrowing of techniques from one to the other, but instead calls for a quantum shift in worldview, one that moves beyond either alone. Armed with this, we can undertake the creation of a profound healing, through and beyond the ego to this profound and creative state of consciousness that provides our form and the core of our being. Here, we create our healing from within. We experience first-hand that personal power (empowerment) arises from within. DREAMHEALING: A JOURNEY INTO THE HEART OF DREAMS Dreams bridge the gap between the mystic and the scientific worldviews. MOST WOULD AGREE THAT DREAMS ARE A TRULY CHAOTIC PHENOMENON. An object of scientific study and a healing tool of the psychotherapist, they are firmly entrenched in the scientific worldview, albeit on the fringe. On the other side, most religions teach that God, or the nature of God, is revealed through dreams and visionary experience. THIS IS THE ESSENCE OF EPIPHANY OR APPEARANCE OF THE GOD. In fact, most religions report that it is in this way that God communicates with us. High roads to the unconscious, connections to God and the soul, DREAMS ARISE FROM OUR CREATIVITY. Each dream symbol is an expression of our creative energy, shaped by its journey through our psyche. But no matter what its shape, the root of each symbol and THE HEART OF EACH DREAM IS PURE CREATIVE ENERGY. The symbol is nothing more than a doorway opening into a chain of consciousness states that lead us to this creator-creative energy that can heal us. Thus, DREAMHEALING IS NOT AN INTERPRETIVE OR ANALYTICAL WAY OF UNDERSTANDING A DREAM, BUT IS AN INNER CONSCIOUSNESS JOURNEY INTO ITS HEALING HEART. In both these models the therapist is not an objective, outside observer-manipulator of the process. Instead, the therapist is a full participant in the journey, a guide who enters into consciousness states and subjectively participates in it as s/he leads the pilgrim to the healer within. The beauty of this approach is that it empowers. There is no doubt that the healer power is always within the patient, unlike the medical model in which the healing is seen to be rendered to the patient by the surgeon, the therapist, the drug, or the new age approach (where again the healer is from the outside—a shaman, a crystal, a ritual, or the act of a god or spirit acting through a channel). The healer is found to be within, and that direct experience is empowering. We call this healing method by the acronym "SECURE THERAPY." It is a therapy based in creativity, imagination, and intuition. The letters of the word 'secure' reflect the main results of the therapy itself: 18 S - Self Esteem E - Empowerment C - Consciousness-expansion U - Unification R - Re-creating E - Experiential restructuring These are all keywords in this system which will be amplified and reiterated throughout the dreamhealing papers. A TAOIST PHILOSOPHY OF TREATMENT Through the course of developing this system of dreamhealing, certain themes have continued to be of interest. Among them are nature, creativity, holism, existentialism, intuition, relativity, perception, letting go and emptiness. The same themes hold importance in shamanism, Gestalt psychology and Maslow's personality theory. Over time Graywolf noticed that, in retrospect, when he added all his instinctual attitudes, intuitive understanding, mental knowledge, and philosophical speculation together, that the mix comes out fairly close to Taoism. It just happened that Graywolf s style came to reflect these principles as a sort-of philosophy of treatment. In other words, this healing model is not derivative, nor contrived around these principles. It has just evolved over time into a certain resonance with Taoism. Taoism places emphasis on flow, drawing primarily on the metaphor of water's natural behavior. This certainly resonated with Graywolf s personal dedication to the waters of the planet (also, he is a Cancer). His commitment to the planet, and the bliss and serenity he has found river rafting in wilderness areas has given him a profound experiential and observational insight into this philosophy. The Tao, itself, revealed graphically in the YIN/YANG symbol, escapes any attempt at definition. In fact, "the Tao that can be expressed is not the eternal Tao; the name that can be defined is not the unchanging name. " The Tao is the divine way of the universe, a path of least resistance, the essence of all life. In Taoism, divinity is both transcendent and immanent, without and within. In this philosophy, the yin forces are exalted, and the creative force is called the mother of all things. It can only be known through mystical insight. It refers to the way we should order our lives to flow with the way the universe operates. The typical themes and premises of Taoism share much in common with shamanism, Gestalt therapy, Maslow's concepts of self actualization and peak experience, and modern chaos theory. They hold in common the principle of harmonization with nature. They manifest as existential philosophy, nature mystic experiences, and process- oriented therapy. The principle of "flow as health" is fundamental to both Gestalt and Maslow's psychology. The concept of "universe as bountiful parent" is somewhat reflected in the Higher Power model and re-parenting. 19 Contrary to the schismatic, out-dated Western view, nature, man, and God are not separate. Nature obeys the law of effortlessness, and we can too when we tune in with our deeper essence. Taoist thought has the principle of WU WEI, which is that through inaction and passivity (yin forces), true results are obtained. IT IS A PHILOSOPHY OF BEING, NOT DOING. The aim of the wise one is ethical living (integrity), in harmony with the Tao, by living in accord with nature. And nature unfolds or creates through the dynamics of chaos and flow. It is a way of living which minimizes stress, strain, and striving. We can learn directly, experientially from nature. Not just by observing her, but by immersing ourselves in her, becoming one with Her again. This is one reason Graywolf prefers to conduct sessions on the river, an experience we call "whitewater and dreams." The river teaches us about the nature of flow, and has a spontaneous healing influence. Just being on the river with the intent of inner transformation brings about many changes in clients which would be much more difficult in a sterile office setting. Nature provides many natural metaphors which parallel, evoke, and mirror human transformation. Taoism reveres the virtues of water first and foremost as exemplifying the Tao, itself. Parallels with process-oriented psychology are easy to find in Taoist literature. The natural phenomena which the Taoists sa w as bearing the closest resemblance to Tao itself was water. They were struck by the way it would support objects and carry them effortlessly on its tide. The Chinese character for swimmer, deciphered, means literally "one who knows the nature of water. " Similarly one who knows the nature of the basic life-force knows that it will sustain him if he will only stop his thrashing and flailing and trust it to buoy him and carry him gently forward. ... Water, then, was the closest parallel to Tao in the natural world. But it was also the prototype of WU WEI. ... Yet despite its accommodation, water holds a power unknown to hard and brittle things. In a stream it follows the stones' sharp edges only to turn them in the end into pebbles, rounded to conform to its streamlined flow. It works its way past frontiers and under dividing walls. Its gentle current melts rock and carries away the proud hills we call eternal. ...Infinitely supple yet incomparably strong—these virtues of water are precisely those of WU WEI as well. The man who embodies this condition, says the TAO TE CHING, works without working." he acts without strain, persuade without argument, is eloquent without flourish, and makes his point without violence, coercion, or pressure. Though as an individual he may be scarcely noticed, his influence is in fact decisive. ...A final characteristic of water that makes it an appropriate analogue to WU WEI is the clarity it attains through being still. "Muddy water let stand," says the TAO TE CHING, "will clear." ...Clarity can come to the inner eye, however, only in so far as man's life attains a quiet equaling that of a deep and silent pool. 20 In Taoism, nature is befriended. Taoism seeks to be in tune with nature. Joseph Campbell was fond of quoting D.T. Suzuki on western religion. To paraphrase, it went something like "God against man, man against God, man against nature, nature against God...hntmm...strange religion!" The division of spirituality from instinctuality is fundamental in conventional western religion (though not in paganism). It is the source of much psychological distress. Taoism's approach is basically ecological, an organic philosophy of nature. Taoist philosophy just turns out to closely resemble the view modern science has been forced to adopt after three centuries of mechanical materialism. Taoist naturalism combines with an inclination for naturalness to emerge as simple living in touch with nature, nature without and within. Extravagance, honors, prestige, and consumption are of little importance in this philosophy. THE ESSENTIAL THING IS AN EXISTENTIAL RAPPORT WITH THE TAO. The Taoist is concerned with a sort of immediate, inner, intuitive enlightenment. Fundamental to this is the relativity of all values and perceptions, rather than polarized opposites which can never meet. The Tao symbol graphically depicts the paradoxical union of opposites, as discrete yet conjoined, as yin and yang. They express the nature of continuous transformation within the Tao. Taoism shuns all clear-cut dichotomies for a paradoxical union of opposites. The great Mystery transcends polarity. No perspective in this relative world can be considered as absolute. Polarity sums up all life's basic oppositions: good-evil, active-passive, positive¬ negative, light-dark, summer-winter, male-female, etc. But though its principles are in tension they are not flatly opposed. They complement and counterbalance each other.
Taoism follows its principle of relativity to its logical limit, regarding life and death themselves as relative phases of the Tao's embracing continuum. This bears on our attitude towards our own mortality, and our ability to feel and express grief. We have all known those who have gone through life as the "living dead," just going through the motions of life, with little or no connection to their bodies or the greater whole. Also, our attitudes when confronted with catastrophic illness reflect our philosophy of life. The motto for the terminally ill has become the question, " Will you live your dying, or die your living." Living each day anew, as a unique experience, means living with a "beginner's mind."
Taoism is a way of PERCEIVING with a blank mind, which therefore knows nothing of limitation. There is a story of Chuang Tzu, the foremost popularizer of philosophical Taoism. (He is the one who dreamed he was a butterfly dreaming he was a man...) While strolling on a bridge with Hui Tzu, the Confusianist, he observed: "Look how the minnows dart hither and thither at will. Such is the pleasure fish enjoy." "You are not a fish," responded Hui Tzu. "How do you know what gives pleasure to fish?" "You are not I," said Chuang Tzu. "How do you know I do not know what gives pleasure to fish?" 21
The nature of perception was also revealed experientially in esoteric Taoism. This phase arose as the Chinese mind was first discovering its inward dimension and was captivated by it. This still happens on the individual level when we come in contact with our process. It is fascinating and captures our attention and creative interest. We become intrigued with our inner drama, the flow of the stream of consciousness. Esoteric Taoists believe that successive deposits of toil and worry had so silted up the soul that it was necessary to work back through their layers until "man as he was meant to be" was reached. Pure consciousness would then be struck; at last, the individual would see not merely "things perceived" but "that by which we perceive." The Tao is ineffable and transcendent, yet also immanent. It is eternal and immediate. It is an infinitely generous fountain, flowing, driving all of nature as the ordering principle behind all life. It is the way of the universe, of ultimate reality. It can be approached through magic, mystical experience, philosophical rapport, and the intuitive existential openness. It manifests as "creative quietude," paradoxically combining supreme activity and relaxation. Every artist has discovered that genuine creation comes from the release of the infinite resources of the deep self. It requires a certain dissociation from the surface self, and most artists have rituals for creating. The unconscious mind must relax, let go, and creativity flows spontaneously. When the art form is therapy, the creative result is healing. Personal ego and conscious efforts yield to a power not their own. Then behavior flows spontaneously; ACTION FOLLOWS BEING. Lao Tze said, " The way to do is be ." Another key element in Taoism is the VOID, or empty space, or emptiness. Taoist skill is seldom noticed, for viewed externally WU WEI—never forcing, never under strain— seems quite without effort. The secret here lies in the way it seeks out the empty spaces in life and nature and moves through these, like water. Tao, as the inexpressible source of being, is spoken of in some sense as non-existence. It is the power of passivity. The Taoist mystic chose to empty his mind, gaining inner perception of the Tao, attaining a oneness with the Eternal. This emptying, non-attachment, or non-involvement was echoed later in humanistic psychology and Gestalt therapy. Like Zen philosophy, Taoism encourages us to grasp the moment before it flies and use it to enter the great Emptiness, that Void from which all the ten thousand things have sprung, and to which they still, and forever, belong. Fritz Peris considered the person who had no fixed character to be the most flexible and adaptable. Dr. Suzuki refers to the everyday mind as the Tao. By that he says he means the unconscious, which works all the time in consciousness. He makes a distinction between the "purely instinctive unconscious" as found in children and animals and that of a mature, "trained unconscious." By this later term he implied the kind of awareness proper to a really mature human being in which the unconscious experiences gone through since infancy are included as constituting a part of the whole being. He spoke of the proper use and understanding of the unconscious as "the fountainhead of all creative possibility," and without denying the 22 importance of the mind, he uttered some warnings against the modern tendency to disconnect the brain from the larger field of man's total humanness. Elsewhere Dr. Suzuki has said, "The function of human consciousness, as I see it is to dive deeper and deeper into its source, the unconscious. And the unconscious has its strata of variable depths; biological, psychological, and metaphysical. One thread runs through them, and Zen discipline consists in taking hold of it in its entirety. ” THE TAO IS UNFATHOMABLE, INEXHAUSTIBLY DEEP, AND UNFATHOMABLE. So many modern scientific and psychological principles are contained in this simple philosophy. It anticipated Einstein's concept that "all is relative." It echoes the ecological philosophy of shamanism and the modern green movement. It speaks directly to the "here and now" perspective of existential philosophy, Gestalt therapy, and humanistic psychology. The pleasure in the simple is a criteria for Maslow's self- actualizers. One of Jung's major themes was the paradoxical union of opposites, and their synthesis in a grander, harmonizing symbol. Taoism is one of the root philosophies of world-wide culture which shows the importance of the intuitive, creative, and reverie states~of letting go to experience our primal being as emptiness or the Void. This consciousness is part of the return of the lost Feminine to western culture. It is Her voice that has been missing for so long, drown out by patriarchal culture. Our culture is now becoming one big, chaotic mix. 23 PART I: THE CREATIVE CONSCIOUSNESS PROCESS CHAPTER 1: CHAOS CONSCIOUSNESS AND HEALING ABSTRACT: Experiential therapy sessions have shown that as consciousness journeys deeper and deeper into the psyche, it eventually encounters a state characterized either as "chaotic" or void of images. Those emerging from this non-ordinary state of consciousness report an increased sense of well-being ranging from mood alteration to profound physiological changes. We known that research has shown that imagery can affect the immune system. Imagery journeys in the autonomous stream of consciousness may activate psychosomatic healing forces, such as the placebo effect. Science thus brings us to the threshold of the ego and there leaves us to ourselves. --Max Plank ...the attractor does not consist of a simple point, curve or higher dimensional manifold, but contains an infinite complex of manifolds. 24 --Edward Lorenz CHAOS IN DAILY LIFE Both the shamanic view and modern depth psychology embrace an integrated view of psyche, soul, and nature. Sometimes this worldview is easier to achieve as an abstract thought than as an on-going perspective about life itself. Try as we might, we are so ingrained with the old mechanical-materialistic fantasy that we find our thoughts and attitudes slipping back toward causal models, perpetually denying the true nature of reality as we experience it. We have been conditioned since birth towards a conformist, orderly behavior that is deemed good for society, but is the death-knell of individuality. Much of the distortion in our worldview comes from our outmoded view of who we are, in terms of consciousness, awareness and perception. Consensus reality doesn't represent any universal truth — so-called "normal" consciousness is more of a cultural trance state (Tart, 1992). Integrating the new science of chaos theory can help us expand our understanding of reality. It impacts our sense of self as well as our concept of "how things work" in the universe. Allowing chaos back into our lives in a positive way also fosters the healing process. We have observed in experiential therapy that clients naturally gravitate in their inner journeys to a de-structured place. While there, they report feelings of rejuvenation and well-being. There are certain primary characteristics of chaos and chaotic systems (complex dynamic systems): CHAOS IS: 1) deterministic 2) paradoxical 3) self-generative 4) self-iterating 5) self-organizing 6) intrinsically unpredictable 7) yet boundaried 8) and geometric 9) and sustained by complex feedback loops CHAOTIC SYSTEMS ARE: 1) sensitive to initial conditions 2) disproportionately responsive to stimuli 3) translatable from micro- to macroscopic proportions 4) attractor centered 5) shuffled time/space 6) apparently acausal (actually enfolded; implicate/explicate) 7) qualitative 8) global phenomena 9) flexible/creative 25 Each of these aspects can be literally or metaphorically illustrated by a consciousness state, particularly if we include dreamlife. In fact, they are all present within each and every one of us when we turn our attention inward. We have observed many dream journeys to which these descriptors could apply. For example, the quality of shuffled time/space is seen in the precognitive or prophetic dream. An attractor-centered dream might focus around a specific psychological complex, which acts like a magnetic center [strange attractor] for emotional conflict. Chaotic systems are also complex, as are dreams. They represent systems that are far- from-equilibrium. Jung contended that dreams help maintain psychic balance. The scientific metaphor provided by chaos theory allows us to describe the psyche in terms congruent with physical reality as presently understood. Old psychological models have placed emphasis on order, and the overcoming of chaos. Yet chaos has a perhaps unrecognized value, in our psyche and physiology. Just as a healthy heart sometime goes into a chaotic pattern, turbulence and chaos help us break down old, outmoded structures in personality. Even the deterioration of mental illness is quite purposeful in that it is the individual's attempt at healing and finding a new emergent order. Chaos theory provides a comprehensive metaphor for uniting physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual realities. It has been said that "any supreme insight is a metaphor ." It has also been said that "the better the idea, the more likely it is to have been extremely vague." While this may not hold true in all cases, it is true that there is a certain quality of ambiguity in chaos and chaos consciousness which must simply be tolerated. For example, this description of imaginative consciousness and "turbulence" from artist Naum Gabo in OF DIVERS ARTS: The artist's mind is a turbulent sea full of all kinds of impressions, responses and experiences as well as feelings and emotions. Some experts on art assert that the artist does not really have more of these emotions and feelings and impressions than the ordinary man who is not an artist. This may be true or false, but what they apparently fail to see and assert is that in the artist these feelings and responses are in a more agitated state. He is more concerned with them, and the urge to express these experiences is more intense in him than it is in the ordinary man. And that, I suppose, is the reason why the artist's mind is not only more turbulent but sometimes, alas, troublesome also... The chaos of our human lives is re-iterated from the subatomic through the cosmic level. Chaos is the matrix of creation. It provides a bridge for unfolding "heaven on earth", a means of manifesting and grounding spiritual energy, that is not only creative but healing. A state-of-the-art empirical foundation is essential for any well-grounded philosophy of life and a realistic self-concept. We create limited subjective fantasies about ourselves and the nature of the universe all the time. Usually we do not examine our a priori beliefs which condition those notions. 26 We grasp our beliefs as though they were the most precious of gemstones, rather than just models or constructs. The true nature of perception dictates that we experience only a simulation of ourselves and the world-at-large (Tart, 1992). From our worldview come symbols and images which a small part of our brain, and an even smaller part of our mind and consciousness clings to, attempting to structure reality out of chaos. By clutching these beliefs, we then limit our experience of reality to that defined by them. For the most part, these underlying beliefs are rooted in notions about the nature of reality which are derived from 17th century physics and philosophy. The old mechanistic view asserts that mind and matter are separate. Newton's discoveries bolstered the notion that reality is a universe consisting of separate objects interacting with one another according to fixed laws of cause and effect. The laws are learned through objective observation and measurement. Causal laws fit with our direct experience of the universe and are therefore supported as feeling "right" by intuition. Einstein said our language requires coordinates. Since we live in a culture which is mostly based on this science and its technology, we generally accept these notions as a given, as axioms too basic to be questioned. We may know about the irrational, counter-intuitive concepts of quantum mechanics, yet it hardly seems to affect us. Our beliefs are still largely rooted in cause-and-effect. From these axioms we also construct our ego and personality which is a collection of secondary beliefs about what we are and how we can relate to and control our surroundings. It seems to work. Using this system of thought and belief, we are able to control much of the physical world around us. That is, until catastrophic chaos intervenes in our lives. It may come in the form of natural disaster, random victimization, the bifurcation of a love triangle [paramour as strange attractor], or a crisis in transition from one phase of life to another. Sometimes the intrusion is a spontaneous unusual psychic or spiritual experience which can neither be integrated nor assimilated into daily life. It also will not be ignored. It may come, therefore, in the form of a recurrent dream, or other means of hailing the conscious mind from the subconscious. Spiritual emergencies, ranging from addiction to near-death-experiences, call for a breaking down of the old system to the primal or fundamental (or chaotic) level. Disintegration is the direction of these processes, which create opportunities for us to "get it back together' at a healthier, more enriched, enlarged level, with a new primal self-image. As powerful as the scientific approach seems to be, it leaves many phenomena unexplained. There are strategic holes in the fortress of classical scientific doctrine. For example, objective observation and the principles of cause and effect In 1938 Einstein wrote, "Physical concepts are free creatures of the human mind and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world. ” 27 Quantum mechanics further attacks the principles of objectivity and separativity. The implications of this theory take us into a strange reality in which we not only influence reality but actually create it from our minds and expectations. Realities exist as possibilities which come into being through our consciousness and intentionality. To put it in other terms, apparently the universe exists only within the context of our relationship to it. John Wheeler, a physicist from Princeton University, writes, " May the universe be 'brought into being' by the participation of those who participate?...The vital act is the act of participation. 'Participator' is the given incontrovertible new concept given by quantum mechanics. It strikes down the term 'observer' of classical theory, the man who stands safely behind the thick glass wall and watches what goes on without taking part. It can't be done, quantum mechanics says." Henry Pierce Strapp, another quantum physicist, states that the world is "Not a structure built out of existing analyzable entities, but rather a web of relationships between elements whose meanings arise wholly from their relationship to the whole." In the field of medical science, there are many cases of healing which conventional or classical medicine or psychology cannot explain. These gaps have been labeled placebo and spontaneous remission. Yet, this does no more than hide our ignorance behind words. There is, however, a striking parallel between healing and the new physics. As in the new physics, healing too occurs in a realm of connectivity and mutual creation. Healer and "healee" are not separate objective entities following fixed laws with the former manipulating the physical components of the latter. They are partners in a process of creating a universe in which mind and body are no longer separate. They establish a flow in harmonious accord with each other and the rest of creation, a state of ease rather than dis-ease. The new paradigm helps us evolve out of the body/mind or nature/spirit split instilled by our culture during the era of mechanistic science and the industrial revolution. We now live in an information society. Information theory describes the fundamental quality of information as an agent of change. Great minds have been moving in these systems-theory directions for some time, but there seems to be a lag-time in the psyche of the general population. Even though some may comprehend it mentally, it rarely transforms into a truly transformative, deep knowledge on all levels of awareness, much less what it could mean in terms of mental health. Chaos theory gives us a visual mathematical language for charting strange attractors in dynamical systems. They can be applied within an individual psyche or to interactive relationships. This technology has already been applied to human behavior. Order and chaos in the emotional realm have been studied by mathematicians and psychiatrists. Their studies produced models of a person's chaotic or unstable behavior in comparison to their stable behavior. Stable behavior can be imagined as being like the sky, unstable behavior like mountains, with little pockets or "caves" of serenity within them. 28 These little sanctuaries could be fostered through therapy. Stability can be increased through therapy within a broader landscape of chaos and pathology. It may also lead to new ways to individualize psychotherapy, like dreamhealing, [see DREAMHEALING: THE HEART OF DREAMS, Miller and Swinney, 1991], Even mental illness may relate to the phenomena of strange attractors in the brain or emotional field. Some researchers believe, for example, that a number of mental disorders, such as manic-depressive illness and schizophrenia, occur when biological regulatory systems cease to operate at their normal, fixed point and change suddenly to another stable but abnormal point. In chaos theory, when an attractor disappears due to sudden catastrophic change, the system becomes structureless and experiences a term of "transient chaos" before another attractor is found. The primal image is the attractor and it forms based on the organism's interaction with the "Not-I" or environment. An individual's personal myth or my theme might be conceived as an activated chaotic attractor. In another phase of life, the focus could change to others. Sometimes these transitions are fairly smooth, other times catastrophic, sweeping the old structure away in an uncontrollable fashion. The ego can suffer greatly from this jerking around by the deep forces within, especially if it doesn't have enough information about its purpose to derive meaning from the experience. For some, the disruption leads to a nervous breakdown or psychotic break, while for others it opens the doors into a new freedom and expanded sense of self. Chaos is part of a greater structure/process, for want of a better title, called evolution. Order emerges spontaneously from chaos, and order tends to degenerate into chaos when forms are obsolete. Chaos is also the root of the creative process. In chaos, the search for information is open. As soon as you think you "know" something, you close down the search for new information and solutions. There are many questions which arise within the model of human development based on chaos theory. We can conjecture why certain attractors or complexes form. We really don't know why some may become prominent and others fade into the background. But we do know that when two or more are competing for divergent behavior and attitudes, the resulting psychic split can be painful, setting up a deep conflict which is not be easy to resolve. If it is extreme, it leads to psychological fragmentation. Free choice may be a factor, but our choices are limited by our attitudes about what we believe is possible for us. The only solution is to dive to the deepest levels, seeking evolutionary transformation -- a quantum leap in consciousness that can contain opposites within paradox. The first step in understanding how these attractors affect us has to do with our personal filters, our distorted experiences of raw archetypal energy. CONSCIOUSNESS AND CHAOS 29 In our studies of healing, and an attempt to synthesize them into a consistent ideal, we have developed a model. Consciousness may be viewed as a field interacting with other fields. In physics, a field is a medium of connectivity, an extent of space within which lines of force (magnetic and electrical) are in operation. It is also called a field of force. When two fields, like electricity and magnetism, interact they create electromagnetic waves which include all forms of radiant energy from light and radio waves, to gamma and cosmic rays. Electromagnetism is magnetism developed by electricity. EM fields interact with the smallest units of matter energetically exciting the components of the fundamental geometry of space in fields which are in a constant state of fluctuation. The consciousness field is not limited to the conscious awareness of human beings, as in the Jungian concept. Rather, it is the creative dynamic matrix behind all life and inorganic manifestation. It is self-generating. Consciousness begets consciousness. It is self-iterating (or repeating—chronic), and self-organizing. When consciousness interacts with the space/time field or electromagnetic (EM) fields, then individual consciousness emerges. Since the consciousness field represents all potential, its qualitative nature must be paradoxical for it encompasses the opposites. Still, once it begins interacting with other fields and begins to "make psyche matter," certain boundary conditions are imposed. The determinism of a chaotic system guides the growth and maturation process. The original site interaction of consciousness with time/space creates not only the material basis, but the organism's strange attractor, which we refer to as the "primal image." It is the blueprint of the entity. Jungian psychologists are exploring the possible relationships between strange attractors and archetypes or complexes [see PSYCHOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES ]. In our view these attractors or complexes are secondary formations, even though the concept of a primal guiding image shares much with the Jungian concept of self. They are merely similar. This view is neither archetypal nor complex-oriented. Rather than limiting exploration piecemeal to a few select archetypes or specific complexes, it approaches the individual as a whole, not as a collection of fragmented parts. Human beings reflect the qualities of chaotic systems. As living creatures we are sensitive to the initial conditions of our genetics and conception. We can easily respond disproportionately to stimuli. A child's actual brain chemistry and neural patterns can be changed by childhood trauma. This creates a rigid structure through the process of conditioning. The trauma may come from an insignificant incident such as parents yelling, for the child perceives them as gigantic, all-mighty gods essential for survival. Needless to say, severe trauma inflicts an even deeper imprint or distortion of the personality. Seeds of change (for good or bad) planted in our lives can quickly grow later to transformations of vast proportion. For example, any choice point we face in life where 30 we leave an alternate "road not taken," leads to a wide variety of different life experiences and opportunities. We are attractor-centered, whether we conceive of that primal attractor as divinity, the higher self, the core self, the Jungian self, the Gestalt self, or that deepest sense of self-- our primal self image (including its unconscious aspects). As an attractor, it contains an infinite complex of forms and images. Elsewhere, we have delved into this more deeply [see EGO AND THE PROCESS OF HEALING, Miller and Swinney, 1991], Our consciousness is capable of experiencing shuffled space/time. It happens during dreams, deja-vu, precognition, and other psychic experiences. We also experience apparently acausal phenomena, termed synchronicity by Jung. Physicist David Bohm calls enfolded information "implicate" when it is enfolded in a latent state of potential. It is called "explicate" when it is unfolded or actualized (observable). Our entire lives are encoded in the initial moment of conception, yet the details of that unfolding potential are inherently unpredictable. Our lives are the explication of the initial conditions present at conception. That initial blueprint is subject to many perturbations along the way. Chaotic systems are qualitative. Even physics proves it is impossible for us to comprehend anything but subjective perceptions. When it comes to human life, quality is generally valued over quantity faced with impairment. We adapt to changing circumstances in our environment because we are flexible and creative. Because of this we have covered the globe with civilization. Our physical bodies and our societies are sustained by complex feedback loops. Our moods are controlled by excitatory and inhibatory brain hormones. The political process is part of the social feedback system. The consciousness field is that which relates us to the entire universe. It may be viewed as chaos, or energy in a primal chaotic state, prior to any solidification into matter. It is a field of energy, not a "thing." It is able to take on infinite forms, including images. Time is also a field. Consciousness may intersect with time at a 90 degree angle, in which case a linear flow seems to emerge. Or, it may fold over in a contiguous way, producing a "bending" or folding of space. In far-from-equilibrium conditions, this folding or kneading would create layers of time/space that are simply connected, like pieces of layered pastry dough. Points in time widely separated in the linear sense, become intimately juxtaposed. In this model, consciousness would have the ability to "pop" around in time. The site interaction with other fields by consciousness is what we view as the intrusion of the strange attractor. Where two fields interact, that is the strange attractor, which then attracts and forms the consciousness around it. The other field, whatever it is interacting with, attracts the energy around it too. And this is what we create our experience from. 31 The strange attractor is the intersection of the fields. We can view it linearly, or in non¬ linear fashion. This is speculation, on the touching of fields creating reality at a profound level. When consciousness intersects with other fields it seems to create matter, or the illusion of matter, and we can manipulate that, change forms, etc. Consciousness evolution equals the process of chaos moving into structure, dissolving back into chaos, and reconstituting into structure. It requires a breaking up or dissolving of old forms back into the primal state. For some reason in dreamhealing sessions, each new structure that comes out of the primal chaos seems to be an evolution beyond, or a superior structure, or a better structure than the previous one that went into the chaos. Now we don't know why this should be, but it does seem to be that way consistently. We can speculate that this generalizes to the whole process of evolution. In any event, it has been observed specifically in dream journeys which move deep into the psyche. Of course, it pre-supposes that the journey gets to the depth where chaotic consciousness is experienced to begin with. Whenever we begin with a structure (the currently defined personality), we commit it back to the chaos (the primal chaotic state of consciousness). The new structure, the new image that emerges is always better, always more healed, more whole, evolved beyond the old structure that was so limiting. Rigidities seem to dissolve and reform in that state of consciousness, like a modern equivalent of the old alchemical maxim —"solve et coagula." This may relate to a deeper, unknown law of chaos. What is known is that we observe it repeatedly in the dreamhealing process. If you take any portion of a fractal and expand it, you find it is self-similar. This reveals a harmony with shamanic law—that organization repeats itself at all levels of organization. Patterns repeat at all levels of organization. It is much like finding the universe in a grain of sand. Evolution in consciousness comes with a quantum shift in awareness. That quantum shift occurs during the period in which the evolving structure is in chaos. So if you are in a dreamhealing process, experiencing for example, the multiple consciousness of the Earth Mother as decay, you may follow that to the point of total disintegration. Since you are identified with that state of consciousness at the time, your personal awareness dives down into the chaos, journeying to the most fundamental or primal state of consciousness—chaos. That is when the shift in primal image of self becomes possible, because it is totally de- structured. During that period of chaos is when it (and you with it) are changed from this to that, in a non-linear state. From that, you can see that you can consign your bound-up rigid energies (whether it is fear, pain, or whatever) to their primal state so that the transformation of that energy frees it to take on a new quality. Again, this is an alchemical notion: "Only that which has been separated can be properly joined." 32 Consciousness healing takes place in quantum shifts. The old model of psychological integration changed and integrated a little piece at a time, building toward a "strong coping ego." The personal experience of the quantum shift is in the imagery of dreams and dream journeys. It appears spontaneously. For example, here is how one client described the journey to the inner healer in a self- guided session: First the dream: I am in a sunny field of green grass. I see an old college friend coming toward me across the field. His name is Mark. I'm also trying to set up a screen to watch a movie on. The screen is two pieces of painted green wood. With the dream in my mind, I choose to become the dream. I am the field of grass. I notice how close to the earth I am, indeed, how I am the earth. I feel an aliveness as grass that I have forgotten as myself. I take in the sunlight to nourish me. I feel drawn into the roots of the grass. I have a sense of the rootedness of the grass, so I let myself go into the earth through the roots. This leads me into a series of colors and textures which I discover as the journey continues underground. I let myself go on, and I arrive eventually at the center of the earth, where a vibrant orange lava surrounds me and penetrates me with its heat. With this main sensation in my body, I find myself settling into the flow and resting, taking in the heat all around me. The journey has come to a momentary ending, but the ending brings movement and flow into my awareness. I have found a place of transformational energy. From the bright green field, I've come to rest in a warm, embracing lava-energy deep inside me. I have contacted the inner healer, the healing state of my dream. The real healing IS this quantum shift in mental, emotional, even physical structure. The approach is one of wholeness and following the image. The dreamhealing process is aimed at addressing this very profound level from the beginning. Progress comes unpredictably in quantum leaps in consciousness. Carl Simonton's work using imagery with cancer patients touches on this. The use of imagery with the intent of bringing about healing seems to mobilize forces deep within us that were formerly unaccessible. Nature as structure is reflected at all levels of organization just like fractal math shows. If you look at a tiny piece of a fractal, the whole structure is reflected within it, much like a hologram. This is because it is self-similar and self-iterative. Any tiny piece reflects the whole. It is much the same in holography where a tiny piece of the negative can produce the whole image, though the detail may be fuzzier. This happens in human systems also. Applying Transactional Analysis to corporations shows that if you look at the pathology of the organization, it is related to the pathology of the individuals within that organization—and very often most to the founder or director. And vice versa. 33 We re-encounter the "holographic notion" in shamanism. The worldview is that we are reflections of the great Mother Earth. What happens to us is reflected in Gaea in the rocks and the trees, etc. At any level of organization nature repeats herself. As you watch the cycles of nature, you observe that things go into life and death and rebirth, as energy changes form. If that is happening all around you, what is to make you think you are any different than that. You are part of nature, unlike in the "civilized" or "scientific" views which set us apart. If you are truly not separate, you can expect, quite naturally, to go through the same cycle yourself, in consciousness as well as in biology. Further, you can trust that and embrace that flow of life, death, and rebirth. Mystics and scientists show us that "change is stability. This is very much part of the shamanic perspective. We find that, in therapy, people get into "earth consciousness" and they perceive that they are healing the earth as well as themselves. This idea may be subjective, but not necessarily grandiose or delusional. It is unusual and perhaps unpredictable from their presenting problem. For example, in one experience a woman became a throbbing like the heartbeat of the entire planet. She felt the healing within herself as that of the planet. From the shaman's perspective, the healing of any component contributes to the healing of the whole, though it may be difficult to substantiate for the rational mind. To some extent this view becomes less subjective if we look at fractal theory in which any change in a part also changes the whole. As further evidence of dream's chaotic nature, a case can be made that dreams are holograms. In using dream symbols for healing work, it seems that "all roads lead to Rome. " A person can enter the dream through any of the symbolic doorways and derive a very different experience of consciousness along the way. Still, following the symbols deeper and deeper one arrives at that healing, primal level. As long as the image is followed back faithfully, the connection can be made from any beginning point in any dream, old or new. That is one reason we never need to go back to a particular dream symbol that has not been worked, but can pick up the process entering through a fresh dream image. The deeper mind always presents the best departure point for current conflicts and turmoil, that which seeks healing. The part is contained within the whole, but the whole is also contained in each part, according to the holographic model of reality. Therefore, by changing the part, therapy changes the whole. So philosophically, it makes sense to approach the whole person, rather than the part which contains less- detailed information. If the therapist chooses the part to work on, it is limited. Psyche has many options to choose from its deeper wisdom. Small changes in therapy can translate into exponential changes over time, since chaotic systems are sensitive to initial conditions. They quickly pump up small changes to larger changes in awareness. Part of the overall healing model is that WE ARE NOT 34 SEPARATE. And, to the extent that we can embrace that model, it becomes more of a reality in the most profound sense. CHANGE IS STABILITY The difference between inanimate and animate life (or consciousness) is only a reflection of the interaction of the conscious field with the time field, or based on the level of observation. Inert matter is alive with subatomic activity. If you look closely enough, or remove the time-bound aspects, the similarity is there. Inanimate objects have a capacity to reconstitute just as organic systems do. Any definition of the difference between animate and inanimate existence is time-bound within a given period of time. Because of the conservation of energy, our constituents will participate in many animate and inanimate processes over the aeons. For example, all the elements within our bodies were cooked in the crucible of some ancient star, which exploded in a supernova millennia ago. When you remove the dimension of time, the definitions "star" and "human" do not hold. We share the same essence. Maybe this is why mystic/magician Aleister Crowley said "Every man and every woman is a star." The similarity of archetypes (pervasive patterns which seem to repeat in nature and the psyche) may be a function of genetic structure. Genetics provides a sense of universality amongst all humankind of senses and experiences of structure. Jung proposed a psychoid nature, (beyond and independent of human experiences), for archetypes. In the deepest sense, these archetypal energies are trans-human, transpersonal. Nevertheless, out of chaotic systems, we see self-similar, though not identical, patterns emerging. This is a property of chaotic systems. Our perceptions of these forms, our sensory patterns, may simply create archetypes out of them. There is that deeper structure of forms that arises spontaneously from chaos. The limitations of our perceptions and senses, based on genetics, conditions what "archetypes" we tend to perceive and live out. Perhaps Jung mistook human perception of archetypes for those being "common" archetypes; whereas chaos may not be bound to that. A tree, for example, has the ability to experience its existence in its own way, at least from the shamanic perspective of animism. We can speculate about trees, or rocks, or fish with their different perceptual apparatus. They naturally will experience different perceptions of so-called archetypes based on their forms of "perception." They may also "notice" and create archetypes of their own out of persistent patterns. But, these will be very different from the kind of perceptions our intellect and genetic organs are capable of focusing on. Therefore, an archetype may be a function of genetic commonality. Strange attractors in this view are based on the genetic structure that attracts the conscious energy around it. Out of chaotic systems we see self-similar patterns emerging. Our perceptions create archetypes by adding words and concepts. 35 When it comes to creating a human being, one of the first things that is created out of that consciousness field interaction with EM fields, gravity and time, is the genetic structure which is the blueprint around which our physical structure evolves [see EMBRYONIC HOLOGRAPHY, Miller and Webb, 1973]. Our physical structure, as dictated by DNA, in turn determines emotional structure, sensory structure, and perceptual structure. Our sensory apparatus arises out of the genetic structure. The strange attractor is that touching of fields which then forms the physical and psychic structure. The relationships of our physical and emotional structure come out of their interaction, that interface, or nexus point. Chaos may also be related to certain forms of divination, based on so-called chance, such as the I Ching, Tarot, or the Rune Stones. Divinatory procedures help us extract personal meaning from the chaotic jumble of divinatory elements. They mirror our subconscious and environment at that specific moment of observation. The structure of divinatory instruments also reveals much about the nature of the human psyche. There may be an infinite number of archetypes in the universe, but a select number are most influential in the lives of humanity. These are what get encoded into our divinatory systems as most relevant. For example, let's examine a just a couple of rune stones, relevant to our theme: "Disruption" and "Odin." The rune for disruption seems like an ancient statement of the laws of chaos -- disruption is where evolution comes from. Disruption is what heralds and brings about change and growth. Dynamic change is actually a more stable condition than the inertia of the status quo. Nature reveals this lesson to us daily, personally and in complex dynamic systems. Without disruption there is no change. "Odin," the blank rune, is NOTHING, and at the same time ALL. When you draw "Odin," you have essentially drawn all the runes and none of the runes. That blankness is the crucible of all and the matrix of creativity. This seems to relate to chaos, also. "Odin" and chaos are also qualitatively the same. THE SOCIOLOGY OF CHAOS At all levels -- personal, societal, and so-forth — we come back to the idea that chaos/order reflects the same structure and problems. All the structures we are, have or experience are constantly in a balance between chaos and structure (order). Moving in and out of that, bathing in that chaos and emerging again, that is our re-creation. One of the main implications of that for our history as a species, as a culture, is that we are moving into a place of intense chaos in our political systems, our social systems, and our financial systems. In reality it always has been that way. There isn't much new about the so-called New World Order. That is part of the point — we are moving into a new order which is unpredictable since it is not logically thought out. It is really nothing new, but we have been enculturated to worship order (through the primary religion of science), and to fear or distrust chaos. Even anarchy doesn't have to imply lawlessness if each individual is consciously self- governing (autarchy). 36 The so-called "Aquarian Conspiracy," popularized by Marilyn Ferguson, can be seen as an introduction of social chaos to break up old forms of thought in an iconoclastic way to make way for rebirth on many levels. So, there is a message of hope for positive change even though things seem chaotic and are becoming more so. It is part of a larger order of evolution. There is going to be a quantum-shift and the new emergent structure hopefully is better. If we trust nature and trust ourselves, we realize this is true. If we re-embraced chaos within our culture, like the old nature religions of ancient times, what qualities would it have? How would this new paradigm—chaos is okay, and even "good"—impact the individual? Another aspect of modern life is that with the population explosion there is naturally increasing stress. How do we learn to live with that? Behaviorists have shown that packing too many rats into a small area leads to increased competition, aggression, and unpredictability. Stress also leads to unpredictability in human behavior. We may need to find new, creative methods of decreasing population density so that stresses are held to a level where quality of life is still attainable. This may come through birth control, or territorial expansion into space, or combined with other solutions as-yet-unknown. But we had better take action. This decade determines whether twice as many, or three times as many people inhabit the planet as it can sustain. Patriarchy suppressed the old chaos cultures, but the return of the Feminine to social importance may herald a new era of co-existence between chaos and order in our culture. The truth is we always have been a chaos culture, but in a state of extreme denial. We tend to see ourselves as ordered, responsible, reliable. This "control fantasy" probably springs from neurotic roots. It may feel safer, but is not necessarily true. Scientific notions of chaos may be difficult for some people to grasp, but not the notion of chaos pervading their daily life—we see it everywhere. Lorenz tells us that an attractor contains an infinite complex of manifolds. It is a complex interaction of fields which forms the attractor and which forms the complex around the structure. It is not a "thing" at the center of a bunch of orbits. Rather, it is a complex infinity of interaction. Field interaction may be the strange attractor. This may be hard to understand — but not the first-hand experience of chaos in our lives affecting our fixations, fascinations, attention, and intentions. Some of us think that science started out with things we could perceive and that it is getting further and further from things we can grasp with our senses. The limits of our observation have been extended down to the void, and out into the far-reaches of the cosmos. As we got into quantum mechanics, physics no longer described our daily experience, so there is difficulty in understanding it, even for the experts. Understanding or comprehending laws or principles, doesn't really tell us what things are. 37 Chaos doesn't imply a complexity beyond human understanding and everyday experience. Because we all perceive the inherent chaos in our mortal lives, we understand it at a deeper level — even more than quantum mechanics, relativity, or even Newtonian physics. We understand how chaos could be fundamental in reality. Chaos not only relates to the cosmic level of the physical universe and the subatomic world, its effects are obvious on the human levels of perception, experience, and understanding. We may not get the mathematics of chaos, but we get the gist of its fundamental role in our lives. No one can deny it exists! Chaos need not be part of the mystification of reality and nature by science. We understand it at a deep, personal, profound level. Physicist Joseph Ford has said that, "to accept the future we must renounce much of the past..." This helps us move toward an evolutionary inclusion of chaos science into our worldview, displacing the outdated mechanistic-materialistic notions. This is not a petty rebellion against the established order, but a quantum leap in awareness which brings our concept of "I" and "Not-I" closer to reality. Everything is of one fabric, seamless and whole. Basically, this involves a "letting go" or "emptying" which frees one up to move into the future. We need to empty ourselves before we can be re-filled. Devolution (regression), revolution, and evolution are three different, related processes. We are not dealing with a revolution in science from chaos theory. The tone is evolutionary. Chaos theory is not overthrowing any old notion, but extending and opening up what was formerly incomprehensible and often incompatible. Mandelbrot [who discovered them] has said that " nobody is indifferent to fractals," and that seems to be true. Because they are based on chaos, they are a deep expression of chaos. The surprise is that they are so beautiful. We see our own essence reflected in them, and they become expressions of ourselves. That is our relationship to fractals. Of course we are not indifferent to them because they reflect ourselves, and all we perceive around us. Their referent is the dynamics of our everyday life and the world about us. We are in a constant battle to hold form and structure (survival) and keep chaos at bay (disintegration). Our bodies and mental processes are based on fractal anatomy or fractal architecture. There is an inherent fascination in that linking. Chaos is the foundation of health in the body, as well as creativity and flexibility. It is healthy to be chaotic sometimes, both mentally and physically. The healthy heart needs to go into that chaoticness and come back out again to remain healthy. We need to do the same with our mentality; it is how we learn and grow. In both the body and the mind dis-ease = too much order = being stuck. Studies of pre-schoolers have shown that they thrive and learn better in a less- structured environment where they can be loud and enthusiastic without the 38 characteristic repression of traditional school. This does not mean an environment that is devoid of structure, but one that minimizes repression and encourages exploration and challenges. Why do we fear chaos so much both in the world and within ourselves? In both religion and government there seems to be a mandate for control~to get away from chaos and cleave to law and order. Sometimes, there seems a certain sort of desperation in it, indicating acute fear over loss of control. The compulsion to control generally arises from trauma in situations where we feel helpless and hopeless. We try to compensate by rigidly maintaining order in any domain which we can rule over. For example, a disgruntled housewife who was abused as a child may not be able to control her drinking husband or her wild children, but her house MUST remain immaculate at all times. Ernest Rossi, Jungian psychologist, has said that "chaos is often seen in terms of the limitations it implies, such as lack of predictability. " We are afraid of that non¬ predictability. This is the fundamental basis of science which, in essence, functions as the prevailing religion of our times. We virtually all "believe" it. Both science and religion are heroic defenses against chaos. We are afraid of chaos, and yet what a dull world it would be if everything was predictable. We would have dull relationships if we could totally predict one another. What a dull life if we could see our entire developmental progress predetermined and predictable; not to mention, knowing the hour of our death. We live in a world governed by deterministic laws. But reality also involves randomness, fluctuation, and irreversible processes. In terms of the human psyche, this bears directly on the concepts of choice and free will. There is a fairly direct flow from consciousness to action which involves perception, awareness, attention, free will, purpose, goals, intention, resolution, creativity, choice, and decision. All these lead us toward irrevocable action and perhaps the results of action: karma, or natural consequences. Fractal images are new models of creative process. Chaos is really the seat of creativity - - the basis from which all of our creativity comes. Einstein would frequently daydream, letting his mind go into the state of chaos, and ultimately came the idea of relativity. Also, there was Newton sitting idly under the tree, and suddenly the apple falls on his head. From that incident he got his notion of gravity. Only small fluctuations in mental processes are required initially to amplify over time into major changes or re-visioning of reality. Chaos doesn't have to be frightening. It can be very beautiful. It is where we create the new structure, the new order. We have been brainwashed out of that by both the religion of science and conventional religion, the patriarchal, left-brain approach to life. They are all defenses against that lifestyle that is in harmony with nature. It is the place of no thoughts, random neural firing patterns, the empty mind, or " beginner's mind." 39 Another reason we fear chaos may be that essentially chaos equals death, i.e. death is a return to chaos. Decay [entropy] is the process of becoming chaotic again. Structure decays into non-structure. It touches on our mortality issues. The return to death happens on many levels. If you simply watch your breathing you can notice a "little death" at the bottom of the breath. Each time we make a change in our thinking, we have the death of the old concept for a new idea. When we go into therapy, there is the death of parts of ourselves, part of our ego, so we can heal. There is no real need to be so afraid of either ego-death or physical death. It rarely changes the dynamics of the process. Sleep equals dreams, and even sleep is a form of death, of going into chaos. This may be why we need to sleep. We become unconscious, we become blank, and our mind has no pattern. Then, out of that arise the dreams, which help us to heal. We move between the delta activity and rapid eye movement (REM), indicating dream activity. We are constantly moving into the structure of our dreams, which are healing and balancing, and then into the chaos of deeper sleep where there is no structure to the mind, and back again. This may be why dreams are so healing, since they are tied to that chaos. The same may be true of the healing power of sexual love, and the "little death" of orgasm. THE QUALITATIVE vs. THE QUANTITATIVE Throughout the centuries the rational mind has developed the language of mathematics as a way of conceptualizing order in the world. It is a way of approaching reality from a quantitative perspective. This ultimately lead to a society based in technology which is dehumanizing (" we are cogs in the great machine"). The qualitative aspect was secondary, so for centuries people hardly stopped to consider whether they liked their job or loved their spouse—it was just the way things were. Now quality of life and lifestyles are important issues for many people who are operating above the gross survival level, or merely existing. Once again the bastions of science are crumbling in regard to this aspect of existence. Consider the statement of Sir James Jeans: The universe begins to look more like a great thought than a great machine. Mind no longer appears as an accidental intruder into the realm of matter; we are beginning to suspect that we ought rather to hail it as the creator and governor of the realm of matter - not, of course, our individual minds, but the mind in which the atoms, out of which our individual minds have grown, exist as thoughts. And Arthur Eddington: I assert that the nature of all reality is spiritual, not material nor a dualism of matter and spirit. The hypothesis that its nature can be, to any degree, material does not enter into my reckoning, because as we now understand matter, the putting together of the adjective "material" and the noun "nature" does not make any sense. 40 Our quantitative consciousness came from the fact that we learned how to count. It worked well for everything from keeping count of herding animals to the rise and fall of rivers in ancient times. It fit a materialistic world, which functioned based on the concept of scarcity of goods, and an "I'll-get-mine-first” mentality. But the development of numbers and the ability to count may have been one of the most destructive things we have ever done in the development of our culture. Its value is paradoxical—both good and bad. It caused us to focus on quantity rather than quality. We have chaos and chaos always seems to go full circle into structure and through decay back into chaos. Coming into structure is the process of counting, its is a process of number, the process of ordering, the process of thinking, the process of manipulating nature until we reach a point of order. This is reflected in the consciousness model which begins with the universal collective consciousness, moving into increasing ego structure and body ego structure. We hit a point of order and then we move into a process of decay. This is just a part of natural order, part of the karmic cycle, part of the consciousness style. Counting, numbering is a human invention. Numbers, even though they describe or symbolize universal dynamics are not fundamental in the cosmos. They are not archetypal in the Jungian sense, of existing apart from humanity. Numbers, rather than BEING numbers, ARISE from archetypes, as ordering processes. In our model of the ego [see EGO AND THE PROCESS OF HEALING, Swinney and Miller, 1991], they are the behavioral, thinking, emotional pattern side of the belief system, rather than on the deep imagery side. They are a function more of the intellect, emerging from the belief system. It has to do with the archetypal theme of the loss of innocence—the Garden of Eden story. Our belief is that numbers are a way of understanding or ordering reality. We started out in the Garden as beings of emotion, open to our intuition and extrasensory perceptions. In the Garden, we were basically in a state of chaos. "The Fall" implied the arrival of the age of intellect, mind, thinking, and language. And mathematics is simply a form of language, information transfer, which addresses its own structure. Therefore, numbers are no more archetypal than letters or words. This doesn't mean they lack a mystical dimension—just ask a Qabalist. Numbers are a different way of expressing ideas—a different translation. Numbers are a function of the space/time continuum, not really a function of chaos itself, or an archetype itself. They are a function of our intellect. Zero and infinity are just different symbols for chaos. The two different faces of chaos that we see are really one and the same thing. They are non-ideas. You get infinity when you divide anything by zero. Zero is inherently a part of zero, one and the same thing. Just ways of describing a chaotic thing you can't really grasp. 41 Jungian, Robin Robertson says, "we think the world is filled with matter and energy (with "stuff"), but it is equally filled with "structure," and that structure is dependent on emptiness, nothingness. Magician and mystic, Aleister Crowley reflected the same thought as "Infinite space is the goddess Nuit ", who represents all and nothing., as primordial matrix. The truth is there is no end to infinity even though we try to quantify it. Chapter 2: DREAMHEALING: THE HEART OF DREAMS ... Why are the [dreams] not understandable?... The answer must be that the dream is a natural occurrence, and that nature shows no inclination to offer her fruits gratis or according to human expectations. — C.G. Jung The paranormal dream that seems to transcend time and space remains no less controversial today than it was in the days of Cicero, the great Roman orator... —Stanley Krippner According to Joseph Campbell, " Dream is the personalized myth. Myth is the depersonalized dream." With the popularization of his work, and more recently that of David Feinstein and Stanley Krippner, many people are becoming more aware of the importance of myth and dream in our daily lives. Awareness of personal mythology is enriching and adds to our self-knowledge. It gives us a deeper meaning to our lives, now that the major myths of our culture and religions no longer form the glue to bind our psychic life and profane experience together. The growing awareness of the value of myth, dreams, and ritual has produced a resurgence of interest in ancient practices and ceremonies to express our modern selves and invoke the aid of higher forces for our pursuits. Myth, dream, and ritual meet in sacred psychology. This infintely expanded and extraordinary consciousness introduces us to a culture of the depths, a larger 42 framework of reality. It is transformative. This experience is substantively real, and has consequences in daily life. It is the source of poetry, music, science, and art which we can tap for inspiration, sanctuary, or healing. Jean Houston cites some physical changes which result from engaging in sacred psychology in THE SEARCH FOR THE BELOVED, pg. 33, (1987): "Part of the work of sacred psychology is to reeducate the brain and nervous system for reception of this nested reality. As you do this work regularly, you may notice some curious physiological phenomena such as energy rushes or perhaps signficant mood changes. Such occurences often indicate a change in your brain and nervous system, the creation of new electrochemical connections, and more dentdritic growth than usual. These changes provide the necessary increase in complexity in your biological equipment, permitting you clearer access to larger realities without going into overload and feeling blown out. Thus this work deconditions you from old habit structures of mind and body and reeducates and refines your biological structures. " For many reasons—spiritual hunger, curiosity, and our natural tendency toward structure and ritual in our lives—people are tuning into the wisdom of ancient cultures and healing traditions. It is within this fabric of mythic awareness that dreamhealing is practiced. Sacred psychology helps us promote growth and transformation. We learn to orchestrate and integrate different states of consciousness, build greater sensory awareness, tap the vast riches of the imaginal realm, incorporate multiple realities, and recognize our spiritual genesis. DREAMHEALING The history of dreams is longer than that of humanity itself. Science now tells us that dream may reflect a fundamental aspect of mammalian memory processing. Crucial information acquired during the waking state may be reprocessed during sleep. Humans have always sought to understand the meaning of dreams, and indeed science verifies that they are meaningful. Throughout the centuries there have been many approaches to the dream. Some of these approaches focused on the individual, others on society at large. The shamanic practice of travelling in dreamtime through non-ordinary states of consciousness is perhaps our oldest lore about dreamlife. Through their dream journeys, shamans garnered the personal power and knowledge to help and heal the members of their societies. The ancient Egyptians believed that dreams possessed oracular power. In the Bible, for example, Joseph elucidates Pharoah's dreams and averts seven years of famine. Possibly the first recorded "dreamwork" was known as Egyptian "temple sleep," in which the participants entered a trance state. Hypnotic in nature, it probably was the prototype of practices re-iterated in Greece in the Asklepian dream healing temples. Modern dreamwork employs various techniques, but trance is common to all the experiential methods. Mostly "natural trance" is employed rather than formal 43 induction. Natural trance is induced simply by focusing inward, taking a few deep breaths, and relaxing the body. Modern dreamwork draws together these two threads of our heritage (dream and trance) in the relationship between therapist and client. This type of work creates a co¬ consciousness of the dreamworld shared by both participants. In the early 1900s, Freud proposed that dreams were the "royal road" to the unconscious. He rediscovered an ancient truth known to many cultures who valued dreams as inspirational, curative, or alternative realities. Together, therapist and client create a shared reality, an altered state of consciousness, using the dream as a doorway to enter on a journey into the unknown depths of the imagination. Allan Hobson of Harvard Medical School had maintained for years that dreams were just responses to random nerve firings in the primitive brain, without purpose or meaning. He has recently revised his theories, acknowledging the deep psychological significance of dreams. The sense or plot of dream results from order that is imposed on the chaos of neural signals, according to Hobson's current view. "That order is a function of our own personal view of the world, our remote memories. " In other words, he is saying, the individual's emotional vocabulary could be relevant to dreams, and that brain stem activation may simply function to switch from one dream episode to another. Jonathan Winson (SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, Nov. 1990) has suggested that theta rhythm "reflected a neural process whereby information essential to the survival of a species—gathered during the day—was reprocessed into memory during REM sleep. ” Theta rhythm has been linked to spatial memory and survival behavior that is not genetically encoded, a response to changing environmental information. Theta is also sometimes associated with meditation states and the regeneration of body tissue. Today our culture is learning more and more respect for the nightly dramas that are so much a part of the fabric of our lives. This has not always been the case. Over the centuries the dream has been feared and maligned, ignored or distorted. Some have dreaded its portentous message, while others refused the notions it contained any meaning at all. Dreams present us with a seemingly chaotic jumble of imagery which all agree is difficult to grasp with the rational mind. In primitive times, people took it for granted that dreams were related to the world of the supernatural beings in which they believed. Dreams served a special service: they predicted the future. As humans evolved out of their more intuitive-instinctual relationship with nature and became more rationally-oriented, dreams came to be interpreted in many ways. The phenomena always remains the same, but theories come and theories go. The extraordinary variations in the concept of dreams and in the impressions they produced on the dreamer made it difficult to formulate a coherent conception of them. 44 The value and reliability of information processed as dreams has gone through as many changes as our culture. To Aristotle, arguably the grandfather of logical thought, the dream constituted a problem of psychology. He alleged that the dream is of daemonic origin, not god-sent. The ancient Greeks believed that nature is daemonic, not divine; that is to say, the dream is not a supernatural revelation, but is subject to the laws of the human spirit, which of course has a kinship with the divine. The dream is defined as the psychic activity of the sleeper, inasmuch as he is asleep. Aristotle knew that a dream converts the slightest sensation perceived in sleep into intense sensations. The dream exaggerates and distorts. Nevertheless, he concluded that dreams might easily betray to the physician the first indications of an incipient physical change which had escaped observation by daytime consciousness. We shut our focus on the inner world of visions, hunches, etc. because we have to tune ourselves into the physical world. In that action we filter out much valuable input. Earlier Greeks realized the inherent healing power within dreams and deified this force as the Olympian god, Apollo, and his son the healer Asklepios (known later in Rome as Aesculapius). When the potions and practices of medicine failed, one sought healing in the sacred dream. There were many dream temples throughout the countryside devoted to this very mission. Here one could end one's pilgrimage with purifications in the sacred spring in hopes that the god Asklepios would visit on his nightly sojourn. Priests attended these temples and the worshippers, but never interfered with the pure healing energy of the god by offering their own rational interpretations. This ancient approach to the dream grounds modern non-interpretive, experiential dreamwork in a rich cultural heritage. Because they have an archetypal quality, these images emerge again and again through the centuries and their dynamic is as relevant for us today as it ever was. There is an archetypal timeless quality, something which transcends both space and time, to both dreams and dreamhealing. None of this means that there is no value in dream analysis or interpretation, but the dream's power is not limited to that. It is the ego, not the larger self, which forms and desires interpretation to give "meaning" to a dream. On the other hand, the meaning of dreams is inherent in the experience, much like the purpose of being IS being. There are many ways the dream symbols help us gain conscious self-knowledge. However, in the last century perhaps too much emphasis was put on the rational side. So today, a lot of people who are interested in growth and healing, emphasize feeling and the heart over the head. They seem to wish to reject anything mental or especially intellectual. Again, this seems one-sided. 45 The mind has its rightful place as an ally. It takes heart and mind to be whole. The proper role of the rational mind in dreamhealing is to surrender to the autonomous flow of the stream of consciousness, and to suspend any analysis of dream material until after the dreamjourney has revealed its unique qualities. After that, the mind may integrate the gut reactions with "what it knows." It matters little if we take the Freudian approach and reduce most of the dream material to repressed sexuality and instinct, or grasp a broader concept of our movement toward the higher self, as the Jungians allege. We can even form Gestalt relationships with various dream aspects and become involved with our myriad of inner parts. There are several systems for accessing a feeling-identification with dream images, but they rarely lead to whole healing of the psyche and body. Some people feel they really "get" a dream when they experience the moment of "a-ha" or integration. The problem here is that stops the process of relating to the dream image by substituting some sort of intellectual inner "click" which may or may not be "right." Dreams have many levels of reality, so no single interpretation can encompass that. A myriad of interpretations contain useful self-knowledge. Even a single dream can continue to unfold over the years since it contains an unfathomable depth of information. Beyond the symbols, beyond the "click," beyond "a-ha" is a healing state. It is a gift from your dream in the form of a healing state—a place which is without dialogue, which is about vision, which is about healing inside, and which is beyond mere psychological understanding. This is Mystery. So much of our time and energy is invested in building up models allowing us to formulate our ego view of the world of relationships and preferences. Where the most profound healing comes in is in the holistic (body/mind) experience of the dream. When you re-enter a dream in therapy, both the conscious mind and subconscious cooperate in a new and wonderful way that you may never have experienced before. Unpleasant seeming dream imagery often transforms into a peaceful, healing place, if you allow the imagery to take your consciousness down into deeper, less structured awareness. The healing comes from simply "being there." This is a far cry from the scientific understanding of dreams. However, Freud was not wrong when he postulated that the dream was the result of the conflict or cooperation of psychic forces. The process that underlies dreams, when studied, can elucidate the nature of these psychic forces. One of the main focuses in modern dreamhealing is on actualizing the healing power within dreams and other visionary consciousness states. There are many things you can do with a dream. One popular pastime now is the development of lucid dreaming, where you become conscious within the dream and direct your activities as in waking life. This may produce an increased sense of personal power and control. However, there is a chance that this is an invasive intrusion on natural corrective forces by an 46 over-active ego. The point of dreamwork is not to take the ego into the dreamworld. We need to bring the dream images into our conscious awareness and waking life. Since the dream state arises from beyond the ego, anything can happen, and natural laws of physical reality do not apply. Unbounded by any physical limits and laws, dream realities broaden awareness so that we can begin to experience our full range of humanness. Virtually anything is possible in the dream reality -- death, rebirth, time travel, out-of-body journeys, enhanced physical or mental powers, even extraordinary effects like healing and balancing. Yet, there is a voice in most of us that wants to discount the dream experience as a less important, inconsequential reality than our waking experience. For example, a parent tells a child, "Go back to sleep; it was only a dream!", after the child has just awakened from a terrifying dream and still experiences the physiological consequences, which are very real. Disregarding the nightmare is one way to ignore the power of the dream as if it did not have impact or validity in the conscious awareness and experience of the child. The truth is that the experience of a nightmare is just as threatening and dreadful as any waking situation that evokes extreme fear and bodily contraction. In fact, the nightmare may usher in an even stiffer fright because it may be drawing on the fantastic and other-worldly aspects of the psyche. What is important to observe is that, in both cases, the fear experience causes bodily feelings and reactions. Our natural reaction to a fearful situation like a nightmare is to turn away and avoid the experience entirely. This avoidance (a version of "out of sight, out of mind") sets our system off-balance and triggers the fight/flight syndrome. To re-establish the balance and harmony, it is usually necessary to stop avoiding the fear and turn around and move toward it, accepting it and owning it as a valid part of our reality. The monsters of our dreams are only alienated parts of ourselves, vying for attention. If we can embrace the fear, we no longer need to run away, and we can experience the peace that comes from having "let go" of the fear. Pain, either physical or emotional, is a marker that indicates where healing is needed within us; but we usually surround our pain with fear to protect us from experiencing it. The fear is usually a base for our anger, or any of the other numerous denial and avoidance strategies we use. The nightmare makes us a gift of the fear and its underlying pain. It leads us to the inner places that need healing, and provides the healing as we experience expansion within of our "stuck", blocked, lifeless parts. At the heart of our approach is the notion that because dreams affect us on our primary experience level — the body — and can stir intense multi-sensual feelings and reactions in us, dreams can be used to enter a bodily place of dis-ease and restore the natural flow and balance to that place. 47 In honoring the dream we draw from the ancient healing tradition of the past, and the best of modern psychotherapeutic technique. The ancient word for therapy, therapeuin, originally meant "service to the gods." In this case therapy facilitates the healing process of the Greek god Asklepios. He was god of both dreams and healing. The content of the dreams -- the characters, the inanimate objects, the activities, the feelings, the colors — can all be doorways into the infinite inner territory of our myriad inner selves. They are states of consciousness that facilitate healing on mental, physical and spiritual levels. If we can go deeply into the experience of a dream such as the nightmare, for example, we can bring a healing to the dis-ease that caused the nightmare. Dreams and nightmares are a unique way to move our awareness into our inner feelings and bodily places of flow and blockage. With a remembered dream, we already have in our grasp a good start at an inner resolution of the process. Borrowing from C.G. Jung, we propose the idea that dream symbols arise from the psychic energies that create us and bind us together with all other life forces, the collective unconscious. However, moving beyond analytical and interpretive methods of treating dreams, it is possible for us to experience directly the timeless and dimensionless primal force that creates dreams. To do so we have to use dreamhealing to travel beyond the symbols to their very source. We call these experiences dream journeys, in the old shamanic sense. The therapist functions as a guide to take the client deeper than the surface symbolism. Symbols are merely a means of capturing our attention — of attracting, appeasing, or scarring our ego's conscious waking awareness. Any illness or disease, as the name itself suggests, has at its source a state of dis-ease or out-of-balance energies. Like the shamans of old, Jung noted that the onset of any serious disease was reflected in dreamlife. In addition to leading to the source of our dis-ease, dreams and nightmares also have within them the potential for expansive experiences which can heal and bring us back to a state of balance and health. They are both diagnostic and prescriptive, in that sense. They reveal both problem and solution, if we only learn how to attend to their clarion call. On the surface and analytical level, dream symbols usually relate to the ego's particular concerns. Some "big dreams" carry a more mysterious, archetypal or collective value. However, each symbol is actually of equal value. They are doorways opening into the formless, chaotic energy underneath it which gave rise to it. Interpreting the symbol gives us a more detailed description and picture of the doorway, but does not give us the experience of going beyond that doorway and exploring experientially what is on the other side over the threshold in those primal energies. Dreamhealing centers around the idea that by going into and then past the experience of the symbols, we can experience the consciousness that created them. This creative state is a source of healing and re-creation. Some symbols offer access to memories of the 48 past, some reveal future events, others can lead us to our inner healer — the part of us that can provide the energy we need to restore balance and harmony within ourselves. Much work has been done lately with imagery and healing, usually importing symbols or images into the client's visualization. The healing tale or teaching tale is used in both spiritual and secular counseling. The "imported metaphor" is part of the stock-in-trade repertoire of Ericksonian hypnosis. The results are inherently stronger when the individual produces their own imagery while the therapist unobtrusively helps the client avoid the pitfalls of self-indulgent fantasy. The client is guided to stick with the metaphors that arise from within to describe what his state of being and experience is like. You can experiment with this yourself, simply by asking yourself a few simple questions: What would you like to have happen ? When it isn't happening, how do you know its not? And where do you feel that in your body? And what's it like? By this means you create your own metaphor for your personal experience, whether it comes from dreamlife or some problem, or a childhood trauma. The therapist functions solely as a guide to the inner realms, since it is familiar territory to the practitioner. We can use the well-known map analogy, noting that the map can only be a partial representation or symbol of the actual terrain. For example, looking at any map of the countryside we can see lines that mark rivers, hills, and other topological features; however, to walk through an actual old growth forest with a compass, climb the hills and pitch camp under the protective canopy of the trees, and listen to one of those rivers imprints a much deeper impression of the forest than the map ever could. It is a full experience of what is behind the map. Trying to experience the terrain through the map is like interpreting the symbol, while the experience of going into and beyond the symbols is as everchanging and alive as an excursion deep into the forest and the mysteries of nature. Another example of the distinction is the difference between reading a recipe and tasting the dish. The savor certainly isn't the same. A dream guide, like a river guide, takes the person through the turbulent (chaotic) waters of the psyche, past the rocks and boulders of their fear, to find the safe passage where the river flows easily into the calm beyond the rapids. The therapist's approach evolves in the moment to keep pace with the flow of the client's process deep in the heart of the dream. Consequently, the client has an active part in the healing process and learns psychological self-care. Flowing with the experience through the progression of multi- sensory images provides the pathway to healing.
The experience of finding an inner healing state is invaluable, as it teaches firsthand that the healer is within. The outer healers are only representations or mirrors of what is already inside. The healing process and myth are deeply engrained in our lives, as individuals and societies.
Each culture evolves its own variations on health and disease, and those able to aid in recovery from physical and mental distress. The problem with the old western 49 healing paradigm is that the perception is that healing comes from without. In our culture now we are developing many alternatives to mechanistic medical and psychological practices.
One of those alternatives is awareness of personal mythology. Jung suggested that each
individual life is based on a particular myth. By discovering that myth, we can live it
consciously and adapt ourselves to our destiny, thus harmonizing inner and outer
experience, and allowing our true individuality to emerge.
But mythic living doesn't necessarily mean living one myth, since the patterns of all
god/dess forms are within us. The myth does not provide us with a blueprint for daily
living concerning what we should or ought to do. Instead, it helps us in the process of
discovering who we are, where we come from, and where we are going. They spark our
sense of discovery and urge us to question and go deeper.
There is a chaotic assortment of mythical images within each of us, but sometimes
certain themes emerge and assert their priority on a life. So, an individual life seems to
strongly parallel a specific myth theme. One way this can manifest is through an
uncanny series of synchronistic events, wherein a particular myth becomes the
paradigmatic model of a life. The quest for actualization of this myth motivates a
variation on the age-old journey of the hero.
In ancient Greece, if you wanted to ensure success in some undertaking you invoked the
god who oversaw your particular endeavor with prayers and offerings. As stated
before, Asklepios was the Greek god of healing and dream. He was the son of Apollo
and the mortal Coronis who was slain by Apollo for infidelity before the child was born.
Taken prematurely from his mother, Asklepios was raised by the centaur Chiron, who
was a master of the healing arts. Asklepios was an able student who soon surpassed his
teacher and incurred both the wrath and blessings of the various gods and goddesses.
To protect him from these whims, Zeus immortalized him as the Divine Healer.
An entire healing tradition developed in ancient Greece based on this myth. The
medical physicians became known as Asklepiads; however, the Asklepian dream healing
temple was the place to go if their medicines and treatments failed.
At the Asklepian temple, the god himself visited mortals in their dreams to bring Divine
healing. At the temple, Asklepian priests oversaw the rites and procedures which
brought the sick mortal into direct contact with the god. These temples were located at
great distances from the cities and populated areas in Greece so that to reach one a
pilgrimage was necessary.
Having arrived at the temple, one was received by the temple priests who began the
sometimes lengthy process of determining whether or not the god had summoned one
for healing. The priests did have a therapeutic function in the temple, but they were not
in any way therapists, nor did they interpret any of the supplicant's dreams.
The priests determined whether or not one had been summoned by Asklepios by making
discreet inquiries about the god's appearance in their dreamlife. An appearance by the
god signified that one had indeed been invited and was ready to enter the temple. The
50
form which Asklepios assumed in dreams was either a snake, or less commonly a dog (or
wolf).
The next steps of bodily and mind purification were begun. Another interview with a
priest was held because it was recognized that unless a person was conscious and
accepting of his present life condition he could not expect a healing from the god. After
the interview, the patient's body went through cleansing in the springs or streams
around which the temples were always constructed. And at last, the supplicant was
prepared to approach the god.
Since Asklepios visited the sick in their dreams, a special chamber, called the abaton (a
Greek word meaning "aplace not to be entered into uninvited"), was provided where the
person would remain alone and asleep. The couch inside where the patient lay was
known as the kline. This period of waiting for the god was called the incubation.
After dreaming the patient was interviewed by the priests who, without interpreting the
dream, would instruct the patient as to whether or not the god had brought the healing.
Sometimes many sessions in the abaton on the kline were necessary to come into contact
with the god and the sick did not leave the temple until they were healed.
As far as interpreting the dream, the belief was that the experience of the dream and not
an interpretation was how the healing came to the sick. The healing was accomplished
through the direct intervention of the god himself with the patient's soul through the
dream.
As a final part of the healing process, a fee was paid to the temple priests as an offering
for the ongoing maintenance and work of the Temple. It was said that a failure to do so
would result in a relapse of the dis-eased condition.
Testimonies were inscribed on the temple walls attesting to the miraculous and powerful
healing which went on in the temples, including cures for afflictions like blindness. In
this way the Asklepian dreamhealing went on for hundreds of years.
This tradition is continued in dreamhealing. The eight phases of dreamhealing reflect
an archetypal healing process. This healing myth is reiterated in the techniques
("ceremonies") of many disciplines.
These steps form the real sequence of inner healing no matter what the outer form,
including traditional medical practice. These phases include: 1) the pilgrimage; 2) the
confession; 3) purification; 4) the offering; 5) dream quest; 6) dreamhealing; 7) work on
dreams; 8) re-entry or integration.
The entire process is contingent on a healing sanctuary, whether that refuge can be
found without or within. Processing is the principle of assisting an individual to look at
his own existence, and improve his ability to confront what he is and where he is for
greater adaptability, wholeness, and health.
THE PILGRIMAGE
51
The pilgrimage satisfies the necessary first step in healing. It is important because one
commits one's energies and resources to healing. It is a notice of intent. The outcome of
the process is directly proportional to the personal energy put into it, as well as the
intent.
As in ancient times, the refuge, retreat, or sanctuary is a place where the seeker can
devote all of their energy to their dreams and healing without worry about the outer
world. That sense of safety is a key factor in healing, because healing is an act of trust.
Sanctuary is being in a state of total safety which supports trust.
Healing involves pushing past old boundaries and negating old confining belief systems
and that too is best done in trust and safety. Disease is a state of deep inner fear and
pain, and it is easier to face fears and pain from a base of safety. Most therapists know
this, but generally conceive of it as a pleasant office, confidentiality and being game and
script free.
But it takes more—a deep respect and honoring of the natural healing process from
within, rather than egotistically claiming to be "the healer." This is why we jokingly
call Doctors — M.D.s — "Minor Deities." Dreams and visions seem so fragile, so
whimsical, and insubstantial in our pragmatic, materially oriented society. When the
substantial and concrete is valued more than the mystical and insubstantial it is more
difficult to validate one's own inner life.
This is perhaps one reason the retreats were located a distance from any city. To live
and survive in the civilized world requires a well-structured, strong ego and intellect just
to deal with its technological complexity and its threat to our sense of self.
But the ego, in defending itself often feels and acts directly opposite to our deeper
wisdom. In a word, we go against ourselves, a case of ego vs. higher self. This creates a
state of tension or dis-ease which eventually manifests throughout our whole organism
as mental and physical diseases that assume the shape of this inner conflict.
For example, most of us have a deep and basic fear and unease over how we are
impacting our planet's ecosystems. We may or may not be aware of it, depending on our
vested interests and whether or not we identify as environmentalists, but it is there.
Yet, in our daily battle to survive we burn fossil fuel driving to work in automobiles that
deplete resources and generate pollution. We support hundreds of other activities daily
that similarly degenerate the ecosystem. This deeply distresses, puts part of us out of
ease with ourselves.
We are torn in opposite directions by the pulls of our survival instincts. It may be out of
our awareness but we are distressed by it. Similarly, a person may continue to smoke
cigarettes fully aware of the building health risks incurred. The fear of cancer may
remain subconscious, but it exists, nevertheless.
Most degenerative diseases reflect this state of distress. Degenerative is also a word that
characterizes what is happening to the ecosystem. For example, cancer is both a symbol
and a physical manifestation of our existential conflict.
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We could describe cancer as living cells in a state of uncontrollable growth destroying
their host organism. This is a perfect metaphor for our relationship as a species to the
ecosystem. Aerial photographs of cities bear a remarkable likeness to photographs of
microscope slides of cancer cells. The outer disease assumes the shape of the inner state
of dis-ease.
Nature and wilderness, however, invite flow and merging of the spirit and soul with the
ego. Nature's threats are not to the ego or self alone, but to the entire organism. They
require instinctual or intuitive responses involving the whole organism. This allows the
ego self and the deeper instinctual self to cooperate in a dynamic balance and that
fosters ease.
That, plus the beauty and serenity of wilderness, takes us back to our grounding¬
founding state. Nothing has the ability to return harmony to soul and ego so readily as
nature. The nature-mystic experience is one of the most easily accessed non-ordinary
states. Untainted wilderness is possibly one of the least realized yet most valuable
healing resources that we have. Water, in particular, was important to the dream
temples, and there was always a healing spring within the precinct.
THE CONFESSION
The confession helps you target where in your life you have missed the mark. The word
"sin" is simply an old Greek archery term ( hamartia ) for "missing the mark." So if you
miss, you simply try again. This self-analysis goes beyond an intellectual review of
wrongs, should and ought-tos. It is a special form of in-sight. It signifies attention is
turning inward, and becoming reflective.
Dreamhealing begins with the premise that each feature of the dream is a part of the
dreamer. One can enter a symbol and speak as if one were that symbol and learn a lot
about perspectives other than the ego. It is a way to experience the multiplicity of
consciousness within each of us.
Many ego parts exist in states of conflict or dis-ease with each other, and by
experiencing or becoming the symbols in a dream, and exploring the relationships
among them, one eventually can resolve, or move beyond the rifts to a 'gestalt' or inner
merging. This signifies the unification of conflicting parts into a state of wholeness or
integrity.
This is a very healing experience for the ego. Occasionally in Gestalt dreamwork, the
therapist-client team slips past the experience of the symbol to some deeper state of
consciousness. These are confusing initially, because they don't compute with
traditional training or experience, but they are intriguing.
If you merely forage deeper into the dreams, following the dream symbols through and
beyond the surface features, they function as doorways into profound states of
consciousness, very healing states of consciousness. There are apparently extremely
powerful energies or forces within dreams. Just getting to them and experiencing them
leads to profound healings.
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What is really amazing is that they seem to have effects on physical levels, resulting in
physical as well as mental restructuring of self image. Perhaps someday we can devise
experiments to track these processes with biofeedback. It may eventually become
possible to monitor physiology and feedback the unique pattern of mental and physical
states that promote healing on an individualized level.
The confession is an extremely important part of the healing and letting-go process. The
Asklepians believed that you couldn't be healed or visited by the god Asklepios until you
were at ease with your own soul. Paralleling that practice, the confessional during a
retreat is more a case of exploring the state of disease at many levels and from many
perspectives.
It usually ends up looking more like psychotherapy. The physical and emotional
diseases reflect or manifest inner states of dis-ease between ego-personal self and the
deeper soul-self, or among the separate parts of the ego.
Identifying these out-of-ease states is the purpose of the psychotherapy-like
confessional. It is a process of becoming more aware of and intimately acquainted with
the disease and one's relationship to it on a very personal level.
Harking back to the meaning of sin as simply missing the mark, you have missed where
you have sinned. So if you sin, try again with another arrow to reach your target. This
is a closed-loop feedback system. It is important for the individual to actually hear their
own voice identifying the problem area.
Another aspect of a psychotherapeutic confessional is that you also have the opportunity
to declare and validate out loud, to yourself and others, what you have done right.
Often in life this simple validation is unavailable or overlooked.
We all need a pat on the back once in a while for our growth and well being. Willingly
taking time to self-reflect on one's positive and negative aspects promotes being honest
with yourself. It implies taking personal responsibility in the sense of recognizing your
personal ability to respond.
The dream guide functions in a manner similar to that of the ancient dream priest who
oversaw the dream temples. A guide helps you make a trip through unfamiliar
territory. They help you prepare for the trip and guide you to the best routes, but they
don't take the trip for you — they just provide the guidance.
The therapist's role, like the shaman of old, is to lead people on journeys deep into the
unfamiliar terrain of the self and to the balancing states of consciousness that ease or
heal. This is likely what the dream priests did. The word "priest" had different
connotations to the Greeks than us.
The role of the Asklepian priest was to prepare, and guide the seekers to meet the
healing god in the dream. They don't claim to be, or to speak for (channel), or interpret
(analyst) the god. They simply guide each individual to their own personal encounter.
PURIFICATION
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Purification prior to entry into sacred ground or sacred space has always been a priority
in all forms of magic. And, make no mistake, the ancient technique was a form of magic
with its own protocols. Today we can use a sweatlodge or sauna to purify through sweat
and heat, a spa for water purification, and a healthy diet of natural foods. Most of these
are easily available.
If dreamhealing is used in a traditional setting, the client may take a ritual bath,
perhaps with herbs, before arriving for the session. It is a symbolic gesture of intent,
and sets the tone that one is on a sacred mission with a higher aim in mind. Both
purification and confession imply relieving oneself of sin. These practices also help
reduce the stress of modern life. Purification of mind and spirit can be an important
symbolic part of the process, preparing one for transformative challenge and change.
When it comes to purifying the body, the cleansing needs to be literal. Most people's
bodies are filled with poisons, pesticides, preservatives and other anti-life chemicals in
food. Nearly all meat is full of steroids and antibiotics, and even amphetamine residues
used in chicken-raising.
A more natural diet cleans up the body chemistry. As you truly come to love yourself,
you desire only the best for yourself both inside as well as outside. Some people use
exercise, music, or drumming, and dancing partly as catharsis to clear out old emotional
baggage. What is most important is not the form of the purification but letting the
creative process flow to take whatever form is appropriate for the individual.
THE OFFERING
The dreamhealing offering may also take many forms. The most surface level, of course,
involves dealing with paying fees for your therapeutic sanctuary. It has ever been so,
since the days of the temples. In fact, the Greeks believed that stinting on this offering
could jeopardize the healing.
Ceremonial offerings invoke a deeper and more personal commitment. Sometimes we
create a more formal personal offering ceremony for individuals on retreat. But the
offering happens at many levels, ceremonial or not.
During a ceremony, the seeker at some point is asked to offer something of themselves to
help induce a healing dream. It is another personal energy commitment to healing, like
the pilgrimage. For example, one might offer to devote time to working with the
homeless, or commit to picking up three pieces of litter everyday, or some other form of
community service. This offering is committing to give some form of service beyond
one's self for the collective good.
The offering places even more value on the healing. It helps satisfy or ease the soul-ego
conflicts. Further, following through on the offering puts ongoing energy into the
healing process to prevent the dis-ease creeping back. Healing is a mind or mindful
journey and so you have to help the mind to prepare and execute it. The offering helps
invoke that state of mind.
DREAM QUEST
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A "dream journey" uses the mind, in the broader concept of mind, to enter one's
healing states. States of mind or consciousness can manifest, for example, as the
"placebo effect" in medical terminology — or in the evangelist's terms, faith healing.
It is a journey to our ultimate creative state of mind which is the source of our dreams
and imagination. If you are so minded you might even consider this state to be "the
Creator," "Higher Power," or "God force" within. In Jungian terms it would mean an
experience of the healing power of the Self.
Healing is an act of creation, and that part of us, our creative spirit or the god within,
speaks most vividly through dreams and imagination. Even Einstein considered
imagination more important than knowledge. It is not an anti-scientific approach to
dream.
A dream is a mystical expression of imagination and creative mind which is what ritual
and ceremony help invoke. There is safety in ritual and ceremony—secureness in it. It is
another symbolic act of commitment to an inner faith.
Ceremony by-passes the mind or intellect; it boggles it. It is a way of opening to a state
of grace or faith, and these are integral aspects of mystical healing. Ceremony reminds
you of something you already have within you, but don't usually notice. It brings it to
surface awareness.
Because ceremonies are not rational, they confuse the rational mind. They appeal to the
senses and take us outside of our usual ego experiences and beyond the experience of the
rational or intellectual ego mind. This is where you find these healing states of
consciousness, beyond the rational ego mind, in the mystic.
Any time you turn your attention within and become receptive to yourself you enter a
whole new world of experience, which is just as real in effects as the outer world. You
can facilitate change within yourself and cooperate with your personal growth or
evolution. The only problem is getting around the habitual ego identity with its
resistances to change.
Many techniques of hypnotherapy have been used for years to accomplish this. One of
the more famous, the "confusion" technique was popularized by therapist Milton
Erickson, a pioneer in modern hypnotic therapy. Any momentary disequilibrium of
either the mind or body can induce a trance state which by-passes the conscious
censoring ego and creates receptivity in the subconscious.
The ego mind is formed from the sum accumulation of our life's experiences and our
reactions to them. It sets the limits or boundaries of our usual thing-feeling-behaving
patterns. Based on our experiences, at deep levels of mind we form multi-sensory
images of self and world — images that capture their essence and shape our belief
systems which in turn shape our ego and personality.
Not only do these primal sensory energy images and beliefs limits us, they also contain
the "psychic" distortions which form the nuclei of our dis-eases. This structure is the
ego-mind. It is limited, but what lies beyond is infinite mind or consciousness. It is our
source of energy for re-imagining ourselves and healing.
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New or unfamiliar experiences, irrational ones like ancient dream rituals that don't
compute or match with your normal experiences cause confusion and disorientation in
the ego-mind, and can even turn it off. In fact, most of the techniques used in dream
guiding are based on fooling this part of the mind.
In ceremony, the ego either automatically or voluntarily steps aside and becomes willing
to relinquish its fantasy of "control." It becomes more vulnerable and open, particularly
if the environment is safe and supportive. This is when the deep wisdom, the collective
infinite consciousness tapped into through dreams and visions helps transform the old
beliefs and images into more ease-ful, less limiting ones. Then one opens to free and easy
states of mind.
A healing retreat creates a different world image, one in which the inner mystical
experiences, dreams and visions, are held to be equally, if not more important than
outer processes. With sanctuary one is free to explore them — the permission is there in
the environment.
Virtually all religious traditions throughout recorded history held that the deities
communicated with mortals through dreams and visions. Yet, direct communication
with deity is a new, unsettling thought for many people. These experiences are neither
encouraged nor allowed in our culture by its healing and religious institutions.
DREAMHEALING
Healing doesn't happen with a one or two time workshop, nor will one dream
accomplish it entirely. Great progress comes in the initial stages occasionally, but it is
not probable and most likely will only be symptomatic healing. Deep healing or
restructuring takes a full commitment of self, time, and energy.
Most disease has taken years, perhaps a lifetime to develop and permeate all levels of
our organism. By the time it takes on physical or emotional symptoms, it has been
around for awhile and involves the whole person and most of their life patterns.
There is a momentum to each life and that is not usually changed overnight. It might
not take three months, or it may take longer. Still, a retreat gives a person time and
sanctuary and a better chance to explore themselves thoroughly to make deep physical
and mental changes, to change the momentum.
In ancient Greece, the dream priest would look for a sign of the god in dreams. If they
saw a sign of the god, then that was a sign that the healing had already occurred. Then
you simply paid your fee for the upkeep of the temple, and left. As therapists, we can't
say, "O/i, there is a snake in your dream—you've been healed—see you later." The ancient
healings may have been conducted in this manner, but it is not necessarily enough for
the modern ego, because it is a surrender of personal power to an external force which
only visits in certain dreams.
Dreamhealing participants learn to realize that they are really the power behind their
healing, not the therapist. That is much more empowering, and real healing is an
empowering process, an opportunity for personal evolution. Knowledge of self-healing
capacities goes back over the millennia.
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That is a fundamental way dreamhealing differs from the ancient technique, or for that
matter, most modern medical or new age healing practice. Common to shamanism,
psychology, and the medical approaches are their implications that the healing power is
outside of the person seeking healing. Somehow it is the doctor or his medicines and
techniques, the shaman or the God -- someone, something, or somepower outside of the
self who provides the healing. That disempowers.
WORK ON DREAMS
Bringing the awareness or senses of the inner healing process from the dream into the
conscious or rational mind, which is what a dream journey does, helps us to realize the
healing in the outer world also. It draws the ego-mind into a partnership of cooperation
to make outer changes in lifestyle and behavior that compliment or support the inner
ones. The individual is empowered and takes a more active -- pro-active — role. The
pattern is learn, commit, do.
Dream therapy often triggers surprising changes in life patterns without intellectual
awareness of how the change of attitude occurs. For example, some dreamhealing
participants find they are simply unable to eat certain foods, or lose the desire to smoke
after a dream session, even though the work didn't touch on that at all.
It often takes the mind weeks or months to finally understand the depths and changes in
personal dynamics that the dream therapy initiates. But it is still an inner process. We
could describe it as intellect catching up to wisdom.
So, dreamhealing incorporates and expands on Asklepian dreamhealing. It was not
derived from or contrived to fit this archetypal model. It emerges spontaneously,
reiterating the same themes, loud and clear. It is a new paradigm for healing, a model
that incorporates the old but only as part. It integrates science and mysticism yielding a
view beyond the capabilities of either system alone.
Dreams themselves, as the long-forgotten healers, do this. From the scientific side, there
has been much research and acknowledgement that dreams are necessary to health.
They are believed to exert a balancing effect, and without them we soon show signs of
mental and physical deterioration.
For example, studies have shown that sleep deprivation within days results in extreme
nervousness and anxiety, hallucinations, or delusions. Freud, Jung, and Fritz Peris were
among the earliest contemporary scientists who recognized the healing potential in
dreams and used them as therapeutic tools, but they did so more from the superficial
ego and interpretive levels.
Jung hinted at much deeper aspects of dreams, but still remained interpretive in his
dream therapy. Peris recognized that it was the experiences in the dream that were
healing, but limited it to the ego. Most "in depth" psychotherapies include dream
therapy. And, of course, from the mystical perspective dreams come from the deities,
and give us the gifts of prophecy, wisdom, and their unique perspective.
By and large, dreams are the forgotten healer. When healing is needed, very few people
think of turning to their dreams.
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RE-ENTRY
Dreams provide a missing feminine element as contrasted with the characteristically
masculine approach in the medical healing model. It is an intuitive one where the
person needing healing is acted on from the outside by therapists, chemicals, surgery, or
technology. Dreams, on the other hand, are a personal inner healing, a non-intrusive
one that arises from within, a creative healing of faith.
Modern medicine is practiced in bright lights and technically outfitted hospitals.
Dreams are the night's creations from the soul and sleep. The contrast is that of a
masculine quality, with a feminine quality.
This doesn't mean dreams should necessarily replace allopathic healing; they provide a
balance and wholeness it is missing — the yin and yang complementing the whole. It is a
marriage between dreamhealing and medical science that seems most appropriate.
Dream therapy in hospitals might speed recovery rates from surgery and other medical
techniques and treatments. It would certainly empower patients with a sense of
personal and deep participation in the healing process.
For the skeptic, who wonders how ancient practices like Aesculapian mythology could
play a role in our lives today, we suggest an open-mindedness about dreams. We can
learn from them without having to become "true believers."
A new paradigm for healing has to incorporate all the models, but not be bound or
limited to them. This includes the old and new medical technology, psychology,
Aesculapian dreamhealing, shamanism, and anything else with something to offer. But
it needs to be much more than just the sum of all of them.
The old models are incomplete and inadequate, too limited and narrowly focused. They
are entrenched in dogma and habitual ways of viewing reality, and the patient.
Contemporary medical or psychological therapies, perhaps even more so than the
ancient practices, are biased belief systems. Immediate change is imperative because,
for starters, we need to heal our species' relationship with its environment. It is one of
dis-ease.
None of the old models motivates us or shows us how to heal it—creativity will be
required. Healers cannot just focus on only healing parts of the individual any more,
the issues are much broader. The survival of our species is at stake.
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Chapter 3
HUMAN DIMENSIONS OF CHAOS THEORY:
Consciousness, Physiology, Perception, and Psychology
ABSTRACT: A brief introduction to the discovery of chaos theory and its applications to understanding
human awareness and behavior. The mathematics of deterministic chaos underlies the growth patterns of
nature and our nature. There is an implicate order in chaos. But we don't need to understand the math to
see that expression in our physiology and psychology. Chaos is our fundamental essence. It is inherent in
the self-organizing matter within us.
Creation came out of chaos, is surrounded by chaos and will end in chaos.
—Anonymous
Despite their training, psychoanalysts have a dread of unconscious meaning, which really
translates into a dread of chaos.
—Robert Langs
CREATION, CONSCIOUSNESS, AND CREATIVITY
According to classical Greek myth, only Chaos existed in the beginning. The random
element eventually produced Gaea, the deep-breasted earth or matter, from within
infinite potential. For matter to exist, the force of attraction also had to appear (super¬
celestial Eros). Uranus, the starry heavens, is Gaea's first-born child.
In other words, the first descent of matter into the threshold of concrete existence came
from a chaotic matrix. This cosmic trinity of chaos, matter, and attraction lies at the
heart of chaos theory. It bears directly on another Greek archetype that we all share—
the psyche. Just as the ancient pantheon provided a foundational orientation for the
Greeks, chaos theory can provide us with a model for constructing cognitive maps.
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By embracing the chaos in our lives—learning to re-honor the principle—we can begin
balancing out millennia of identification which held that only order equates with
"good." Part of our cultural heritage is the programming that we should stave off chaos
at every point. Some speculate this was a patriarchal reaction against the ancient
matriarchal, chaos cultures.
Sometimes it is psychologically more fruitful to "let go" of control, pass through
de-structured state, and discover what happens on the other side. Chaos is definitelj
part of the process of creativity. It generates the new order spontaneously from
within itself.
What makes it imperative for us to embrace the new scientific paradigm implied by
chaos theory? By rejecting chaos, you reject Gaea. And she is not only the Earth, the
love of the planet, the integrity of life forms, but also love of your own physical
embodiment. Whatever the essence of chaos is, we are that. By rejecting it, we run the
danger of rejecting our selves.
Chaos is the essence of life. Chaos is essential to health. Research has shown that chaos
in bodily functions signals health, while periodic behavior can foreshadow disease.
Whether Eros (the principle of attraction) is evident in the mathematics of a stran;
ttractor or in human behavior, there is a resonance with Chaos and Gaea.
Chaos has laws of its own, which harmonize with order. Chaos describes the structural
growth patterns in nature, and the patterns of breakdown, entropy, or decay. It
describes systems far-from-equilibrium, not just the rarely found stable state. It applies
to all complex dynamic systems, which certainly includes human beings. It provides a
new perspective on reality. Adaption of this perspective into our worldview helps us
understand whole systems.
Chaos theory leads to a new vision of matter, one no longer passive, as described in
mechanistic worldview, but one associated with spontaneous, creative, orderly activity
This scientific frontier is fertile ground for new metaphors and models. It will help
solve some of our practical problems, both personal and global.
n the
ivity.
pus
Throughout history many innovative discoveries have come through the process of
reverie, daydreaming, or inspiration. Research has also shown that the greater the
mental challenge, the more chaotic the activity of the subject's brain (Rapp). After
incubating a solution in the chaotic state, we seem to "get a brainstorm."
Certain brainstates, high in virtually random, chaotic activity are conducive to
creativity. Let's hope that by "letting go" of our old rigid structures and beliefs, and
letting chaos back into our lives consciously, that we can find more of those creative
solutions. Both scientific and intuitive apprehensions of chaos will lead the way.
A NEW DIALOGUE WITH NATURE
Chaos theory came on the scientific scene in the late 1970s. It was introduced by a self-
motivated group of Santa Cruz scientists. As students they had to fight their faculty to
pursue their fascination with this unorthodox subject. After its initial presentation,
chaos became a buzzword in many disciplines, as scientists thought of ways it applied in
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their fields. Even more interesting, scientists began crossing over fields, developing
multidisciplinary approaches.
Chaos is not entirely random, but is an occult, "hidden," or implicate order within
nature. Cosmology, weather prediction, animal migration patterns, quantum
mechanics, and more were affected. We now have terms like "quantum chaos," and
chaotic planetary motion. Chaos is a major influence from the microcosm to the
macrocosm.
Some astronomers even postulate a cosmic Great Attractor toward which all the local
galaxies are moving. Is the earth, our solar system, and galaxy really on a pilgrimage to
the Great Attractor? Technically, the attractor isn't only "out there." Our galaxy is
part of the attractor, whatever it is. With a sphere influence of 300 million light-years, it
is one of the most gigantic known entities in the cosmos. And, it may have relatives!
At the other end of the scale, it appears that chaos is found in the distribution levels of
certain atomic systems and wave patterns (Gutzwiller, 1992). Chaotic systems lie
beyond the description of normal perturbation theory. Quantum chaos may be a way of
linking quantum systems and chaotic systems. One interesting property of chaotic
systems of quantum energy is that they cannot be decomposed. Chaos also shows up in
the way electrons scatter.
Probably the first popular book to discuss chaos theory was ORDER OUT OF CHAOS:
MAN’S NEW DIALOGUE WITH NATURE, by Ilya Prigogine, published by Bantam in
1984. By far, the most widely read has become James Gleick's now-classic, CHAOS:
MAKING A NEW SCIENCE (1987). Others, like THE TURBULENT MIRROR,
Briggs and Peat, (1989), have sought to express the theory more simply, and poetically.
Some books have focused on the computer graphics, known as fractals, which have
emerged from this new science. Their natural beauty holds an aesthetic fascination.
Even the art world discovered chaos through fractals. Images of dynamic fractals are
used in discos, like light shows. Chaos software has brought them to the home PC.
Chaos moved through science into the arts and humanities.
Chaos bears on our consciousness, physiology, perception, and psychology. We can
learn a lot from what chaos theory tells us about the nature of reality. Most of reality,
instead of being orderly, stable, and equilibrated, is fluctuating and boiling with change,
disorder, and process.
Little fluctuations in subsystems combine through positive feedback loops, becoming
strong enough to shatter any pre-existing organization. In chaos theory, this crucial
moment is known as bifurcation. At this point the disorganized system either
disintegrates into chaos, or leaps to a new higher level of order or organization.
Through this means, order arises spontaneously from disorder through self¬
organization.
When a system is far-from-equilibrium, the slightest flux can be amplified into
structure-annihilating waves. Chaos theory helps us think in terms of these fluctuations,
feedback amplification, dissipative structures, and bifurcations. It provides pause for
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reconsidering the nature of time and the role of chance during transformation from one
state to another.
Chance plays its role at or near the point of bifurcation, after which deterministic
processes take over once more until the next bifurcation. But, of course, we can never
determine when the next bifurcation will arise. Chance rises phoenix-like to take its
place among physical processes. Thus, nonequilibrium, the flux of matter and energy, is
a source of order.
In the new concept of matter, matter is active. Paradoxically, matter leads then to
irreversible processes, yet irreversible processes (entropy) organize matter
(negentropy). Chaos theory is therefore a new evolutionary paradigm, based in
dynamics and thermodynamics. Irreversibility seems to be a source of order, coherence,
or organization.
Time, reality, and reversibility/irreversibility are closely related. The implication is that
"time" is a real dimension, not merely introduced through human observation.
Irreversibility is not a universal phenomenon, but it is not necessarily subjective, either.
Our human reality is embedded in the flow of time.
It appears that our consciousness creates that sense of time flow by information
processing, but it may be a given. The question then becomes, "what is the specific
structure of dynamic systems that permits them to distinguish past and future?" If we
can answer that, and determine the minimum complexity involved, perhaps we can be
more precise about the roots of time in nature.
The irreversibility of time is itself closely connected to entropy. To make time flow
backward we would have to overcome an infinite entropy barrier. Natural systems
contain essential elements of randomness and irreversibility. After a bifurcation there
can be no return to the old condition. Time has both linear and nonlinear qualities.
Time might be described, rather than as a flow, as a dimensional manifold of infinite
processes, the ultimate feedback loop.
All biological systems are dissipative structures which are self-organizing (DNA) and
self-iterating (reproduction). The type of system which evolves is critically dependent on
the conditions in which the structure is formed. We can speculate that the gravitational
field of earth, as well as EM fields play an essential role in the selection mechanism of
self-organization [see EMBRYONIC HOLOGRAPHY, Miller and Webb, 1973].
Chaos theory has caused us to reexamine the concept of matter as inert and without
consciousness. It expresses its own quality of consciousness and determinism, a type of
awareness also seen in some quantum phenomena.
According to Prigogine, in equilibrium matter is "blind," but in far-from-equilibrium
conditions it begins to be able to perceive, to "take into account," in its way of
functioning, differences in the external world (such as weak gravitational or electrical
fields), [see THE DIAMOND BODY on scalar physics, Miller and Miller, 1982],
Prigogine and Stengers comment further on the so-called consciousness of dynamic
systems:
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Near bifurcation, systems present large fluctuations. Such systems seem to "hesitate"
among various possible directions of evolution, and the famous law of large numbers in its
usual sense breaks down. A small fluctuation may start an entirely new evolution that will
drastically change the whole behavior of the macroscopic system. The analogy with social
phenomena, even with history is inescapable. Far from opposing "chance" and
"necessity," we now see both aspects as essential in the description of nonlinear systems far
from equilibrium. This is very different than the static view of classical dynamics or the
evolutionary view associated with entropy.
Perhaps this is one intuitive perception the Greeks had when they deified these
principles. "Necessity" is the goddess Ananke, while "chance" and opportunism
corresponds with Hermes. The whole pantheon evolves through these principles from
the pure chaos of the source.
In FACING THE GODS, James Hillman points out the common identity of Necessity
and Chaos with anxiety:
The psychological viewpoint sees Necessity and Chaos not only as explanatory principles
only in the realm of metaphysics; they are also mythic events taking place also and always
in the soul, and they are the fundamental archai of the human condition. To these two
principles the pathe (or motions) of the soul can be linked.
Psychology has already recognized the faceless, nameless Chaos, this "sacred and crazy
movement" in the soul, as anxiety, and by naming it such, psychology has directly evoked
the Goddess Ananke, from whom the word anxiety derives. If anxiety truly belongs to
Ananke, of course, it cannot be "mastered by the rational will. "
This creation process continues to this day, through every moment, a dance of creation
and destruction. It takes place in the quantum flux, as virtual entities pop in and out of
physical manifestation. It takes place in the crucible of new and dying stars, galaxies,
and perhaps our entire universe. Chaos may even be the ground state of multiple
universes.
MEASURES OF COMPLEXITY AND CHAOS
Turbulence was one of the key phenomena that motivated the resurgence of interest in
nonlinear dynamical systems. It was, after all, investigation into the mechanisms for
turbulence that led to the invention of the term "strange attractor" in 1971. The
turbulence that is described by strange attractors is "turbulence in time"—deterministic
chaos, or temporal chaos in current terminology.
In the past decade, a vocabulary for the quantitative characterization of temporal chaos
was developed. It has been used to describe and analyze an incredible variety of
phenomena in practically all fields of science and engineering. The dimensions of
strange attractors, the entropies, and Lyapunov exponents describing motion on the
attractors, have been used to analyze heartbeats, brainwaves, chemical reactions, lasers,
the economy, flames, radiation, and fluid flow.
Yet this vocabulary is not sufficient to describe turbulence, for its complex nature exists
in time and space. Time evolution is seamlessly united with the quantitative
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characterization of spatial complexity. Turbulence is dynamical, nonlinear spatio-
temporal complexity.
Dimensions, entropies, and Lyapunov exponents [don't worry about this one; there is no
test later] have become the standard measures of temporal chaotic behavior.
Dimensions lend themselves to computer modeling of fractal attractors.
Fractals visibly demonstrate harmonies that may not be apparent within the
mathematical formulas. Graphic generators make this beauty visible, where it speaks to
us geometrically, intuitively.
The large variety of fields in which dimensions, entropies, and exponents have been used
to characterize temporal evolution is an indication of the extent to which these quantities
have become elements of a scientific vocabulary that is now nearly universal.
These quantities are used to characterize astrophysical data, dendritic growth,
electroencephalographic and electrocardiographic data, nerve fibers, epidemics, etc. As
one of the most basic applications of these methods, dimensions have been used to
discriminate between chaos and noise.
Nonlinear dynamical systems produce complex temporal or spatial patterns by
stretching and folding regions of phase-space in an iterative way. Space and time get
folded like so much multi-layered pastry dough [more on this aspect shortly]. As a
result of the unfolding procedure, the dynamics is described as a sequence of
deterministic paths (blocks of symbols) which appear as random in time, with given
transition probabilities.
This would seem to imply that chaos underlies the implicate order [see Bohm,
WHOLENESS AND THE IMPLICATE ORDER], It has already been shown as an
influence in quantum probability, the mechanism of quantum flux. Chance and
necessity may not be widely separated phenomena—they may be two sides of the same
chaotic coin.
A large variety of physical systems exhibit seemingly disordered (turbulent, chaotic)
spatio-temporal behavior which, behind its apparent irregularity, hides a high degree of
organization. The observation that low-dimensional nonlinear dynamical systems are
able to generate aperiodic bounded solutions gave rise to an increasing interest in the
study of chaotic behavior, which led to the definition of strange attractors. These
objects have been geometrically described in terms of fractal dimensions and,
dynamically, by means of Lyapunov exponents and metric entropies.
Their future time evolution can be predicted only for finite (relatively short) times,
although they are fully deterministic, because of the exponential amplification of the
uncertainty on the initial conditions. Highly structured patterns can be produced, which
are not necessarily related to chaotic motion.
Examples of "complex" behavior are provided by biological systems, hydrodynamic
flows, spin glasses, neural networks, fractals, cellular automata, and nonlinear dynamic
systems. It is easy to show that entropy and Lyapunov exponents are not useful
indicators for the characterization of complexity.
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THE MAIN FEATURE OF SELF-GENERATED COMPLEXITY IS THE PRESENCE
OF AN ITERATIVE MECHANISM WHICH TRANSFORMS THE INFORMATION
CONTAINED IN THE INITIAL CONDITIONS IN A DETERMINISTIC WAY. IN
THIS SENSE, IT IS POSSIBLE TO VIEW COMPLEXITY AS ELABORATED
SIMPLICITY.
There are mechanisms for the creation of defects. In deterministic systems, several
mechanisms can lead to their formation, including initial conditions and phase
instabilities. VORTICES can be induced by initial conditions, such as dislocations.
Phase instability plays a crucial role in the creation of defects. Transitions which
involve vortices, as for example the Hopf bifurcation, lead to patterns which are
described in terms of a phase. These transitions are in some sense "phase breaking"
transitions.
More complicated patterns, as for example standing waves, require more than a single
phase. In more than one dimension, large enough systems can sustain vortices. Phase
fluctuations eventually become large enough to break, locally in space and time, this
"phase only" description.
In regions where large gradients appear, the creation of defects destroys the quasi-long
range order induced by the pattern. In one dimension, defects are spatio-temporal, i.e.
they occur at a given spatial position, for a given time.
Lastly, defects can be created in the transient process accompanying a subcritical
transition. Defects play an important role in the spatio-temporal destruction of the
order induced by symmetry breaking transition. The most efficient way to create
defects in these non-equilibrium systems is related to phase instabilities. Experimental
evidence of such a defect-mediated picture of turbulence exists.
All this sounds very far afield from human life, but is it really? Aside from the literal
expression of chaos, there is its metaphorical aspect. If we re-read the above with an
intuitive eye, it might provide archetypal insight on depression, nervous breakdown,
personality defects, life transitions, phases of development, and other human realities.
[See CHAOS THEORY AND PSYCHOLOGICAL COMPLEXES, Miller, 1991],
Chaos relates directly to information theory. Quantitative measures of chaos have been
developed and used to connect theory and experiment. All these systems are closed.
Imposing closed boundary conditions means the system "interacts with itself at all
times," so the effects of a perturbation to one location cannot escape, but influences the
dynamics of the entire system. This also holds true for individual human beings.
The primary instability in such systems is absolute and information on the dynamics of
spatially distributed, but closed systems may be obtained by studying the temporal
behavior at a single location. Indeed, the vast majority of experimental investigations
have assumed the observed chaotic systems have finite spatial extent, without
information flows across their boundaries. Again, also applicable to the individual
person.
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In open systems, information may enter and leave the system. It is not always possible
to describe the dynamics by the time series at a single, fixed location. In contrast to
closed systems, open systems frequently possess downstream propagating primary
instabilities. In human life, a trauma at a given point will create exponential problems
(turbulence) further on in time, until and unless one passes through the chaotic
breakdown into a place of healing—into flow.
Technically, spatial development of flow may depend crucially on external forcing, often
by low amplitude noise. For human beings, the healing space is often one with so-called
"white noise," like the flowing of a waterfall or ocean surf, or the rustling or whoosh of
the wind. We create the same state internally when we enter the alpha brainwave state.
These are generated by the dynamics of chaos, and their healing, soothing effect on our
personality is well known to nearly everyone.
THE PARADOX IN CHAOS
There is order in chaos; randomness has an underlying geometrical form. Chaos
imposes fundamental limits on prediction, but it also suggests causal relationships where
none were previously suspected. In chaotic systems, since there is no clear relation
between cause and effect, such phenomena are said to have random elements.
Simple deterministic systems with only a few elements can generate random behavior.
The randomness is fundamental. Gathering more information does not make it go
away. Randomness generated in this way has come to be called chaos.
A seeming paradox is that chaos is deterministic, not probabilistic. It is generated by
fixed rules that do not involve any elements of chance. A paradox is a union of opposites
in a transcendent third. In principle the future is completely determined by the past,
but in practice small uncertainties are amplified. Even though the behavior is
predictable in the short term, it is unpredictable in the long term. This is because any
effect, no matter how small, quickly reaches macroscopic proportions.
Graphic depictions of attractors allow us to map a dynamical system's behavior in
discreet-time or phase-space. It helps us visualize a complex situation. Roughly
speaking, an attractor is what the behavior of a system settles down to, or is attracted to.
Some systems do not come to rest in the long term but instead cycle periodically through
a sequence of states. An analogy might be the cycling between competing attractors in
bi-polar disorder, or manic-depression. What slight perturbation causes the switch? A
system may have several attractors [complexes, archetypes, subpersonalities?] The set
of points that evolve to an attractor is called its basin of attraction.
STRETCHING TIME AND FOLDING SPACE
The key to understanding chaotic behavior lies in understanding a simple stretching and
folding operation, which takes place in the state space. The orbits on a chaotic attractor
are shuffled by this process, much as a deck of cards is shuffled by a dealer.
The randomness of the chaotic orbits is the result of the shuffling process. The process
of stretching and folding happens repeatedly, creating folds within folds ad infinitum. A
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chaotic attractor is, in other words, a fractal—an object that reveals more detail as it is
increasingly magnified.
Crutchfield, et al describe, in SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, how chaos mixes the orbits in
state space in precisely the same way a baker mixes bread dough by kneading it. Just
imagine rolling out the dough and placing a big drop of food coloring in the center. As
you spread and fold the dough, you create many layers of alternating blue and white.
Then finally the dye becomes thoroughly mixed with the dough.
Chaos works the same way, except that instead of mixing dough it mixes the state space.
The state of the system is located not in a single point but rather within a small region of
state space.
The stretching and folding operation of a chaotic attractor systematically removes the
initial information and replaces it with new information. The stretch makes small-scale
uncertainties larger, and the fold brings widely separated trajectories together and
erases large-scale information.
Thus chaotic attractors act as a kind of pump bringing microscopic fluctuations up to a
macroscopic expression. In humans only small fluctuations in mental processes are
required initially to amplify over time into major changes or re-visioning of reality. To
slightly alter experience of a psychological complex is to work directly on the ego. Any
microscopic fluctuations we make in therapy are amplified into real-time.
This reflects on our concepts of transformation, and permission for change to occur in a
nonlinear manner in personality. After a brief time interval the uncertainty of the
initial conditions covers the entire attractor and all predictive power is lost: THERE IS
SIMPLY NO CAUSAL CONNECTION BETWEEN PAST AND FUTURE. There is
also no psychological mandate to adhere to an outworn self-simulation. The change can
be instantaneous, unfolding over time. Healing is an ever-present potential.
Chaotic systems generate randomness on their own without the need for any external
random inputs. Based on this, we can make quite a case for allowing clients to develop
their own therapeutic metaphors in therapy. Some therapists "import" teaching tales
or metaphors into the process which they feel could help the client. The imaginal free
association of dream healing seems to open them to the flow of their own process and
imagery. Facilitating that process, the therapist functions best as a guide.
Random behavior comes from more than just the amplification of errors and the loss of
the ability to predict it; it is due to the complex orbits generated by stretching and
folding. If a system is chaotic, how chaotic is it? A measure of chaos is the entropy of
the motion, which roughly speaking is the average rate of stretching and folding, or the
average rate at which information is produced.
CHAOS AND HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY
Nonlinear chaos refers to a constrained kind of randomness, which, remarkably, may be
associated with fractal geometry. Fractal geometry is the basis of human anatomy, but
it pervades nature. Fractal structures are often the remnants of chaotic dynamics.
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Wherever a chaotic process has shaped the environment (the seashore, the atmosphere,
a geological fault), fractals are likely to be left behind. Fractals consist of varying size
and orientation but similar shape.
Certain neurons (nerve fibers), for instance, have a fractal-like structure. If one
examines such neurons through a low-power microscope lens, one can discern
asymmetric branches, called dendrites, connected to the cell bodies.
At slightly higher magnifications, smaller branches on the larger ones are observable.
At even higher magnification, one sees another level of detail—branches on branches on
branches. Although at some level the branching of a neuron stops, idealized fractals
have infinite detail.
The details of a fractal at a certain scale are similar (though not necessarily identical) to
those of the structure seen at larger or smaller scales. All fractals have this internal,
look-alike property called self-similarity.
Because length is not a meaningful concept for fractals, mathematicians calculate the
"dimension" of a fractal to quantify how it fills space. Self-similarity of a system implies
that features of a structure or a process look alike at different scales or lengths of time.
The greater the dimension of a fractal, the greater the chance that a given region of
space contains a piece of that fractal.
In the human body fractal-like structures abound in networks of blood vessels, nerves,
and ducts. The most carefully studied fractal in the body is the system of tubes that
transport gas to and from the lung. The heart also exhibits fractal anatomy or fractal
architecture.
Fractal branches or folds greatly amplify the surface area available for absorption (as in
the intestine), distribution or collection (by the blood vessels, bile ducts, and bronchial
tubes) and information processing (by the nerves). Fractal structures, partly by virtue
of their redundancy and irregularity, are robust and resistant to injury.
Fractal structures in the human body arise from the slow dynamics of embryonic
development and evolution. These processes, like others that produce fractal structures,
exhibit deterministic chaos.
In the early 1980s, when investigators began to apply chaos theory to physiological
systems, they expected that chaos would be most apparent in diseased or aging systems,
but contrary to what training and intuition might suggest, the opposite is true. For
example, careful analysis reveals that healthy individuals have heart rates that fluctuate
considerably even at rest.
To identify the type of system dynamics (chaotic or periodic), one determines the
trajectories for many different initial conditions. Then one searches for an attractor: a
region of phase space that attracts trajectories.
The strange attractor describes systems that are neither static nor periodic. In the phase
space near a strange attractor, two trajectories that started under almost identical
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conditions will diverge over the short term and become very different over the long
term. The system described by a strange attractor is chaotic.
Recent evidence suggests that chaos is a normal feature of other components of the
nervous system, including those components responsible for hormone secretion. This
might account for a degree of randomness in mood and emotions, related to secretion of
neurotransmitters in the brain. It might also be the mechanism for a dream "putting a
mood on you" after you awaken. It is a real-time effect of chaos reaching out from the
subconscious mind to the conscious.
Chaos can be generated in a model of the olfactory system. This research appeared in
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, February 1991. This model incorporates a feedback loop
among the "neurons" and a delay in response times. There is a recognized importance
of time delays in producing chaos.
Why should the heart rate and other systems controlled by the nervous system exhibit
chaotic dynamics? Such dynamics offer many functional advantages. Chaotic systems
operate under a wide range of conditions and are therefore adaptable and flexible. This
plasticity allows systems to cope with the urgent requirements of an unpredictable and
changing environment.
However, the periodic patterns in disease and the apparently chaotic behavior in health
do not imply that all pathologies are associated with increased regularity. Controlled
chaos may play a roll in the human ability to quickly produce strings of different speech
sounds. It seems biological systems may use chaos, and the richness in chaotic behavior,
to change their behavior on the fly.
Edward Ott, et al speculate (SCIENCE NEWS, "Ribbon of Chaos," January 26,1991),
that just small disturbances can radically alter a chaotic system's behavior-tiny
adjustments can also stabilize their behavior.
The success of this strategy for controlling chaos hinges on the fact that the apparent
randomness of a chaotic system is really only skin deep. Beneath this chaotic
unpredictability hides an intricate but highly ordered structure—a complicated web of
interwoven patterns of regular, or periodic, motion.
Physicists from the Naval Surface Warfare System in Silver Springs, Maryland, have
succeeded in experimentally controlling chaotic behavior in a magnetic ribbon.
Normally, a chaotic system continually shifts from one pattern to another, creating an
appearance of randomness. In controlling chaos, the idea is to lock the system into one
particular type of repeating motion.
William Ditto reports, "We don't avoid the chaos; we stay in the chaotic region. We take
advantage of the system's sensitive dependence on initial conditions." The trick is to
exploit the fact that a chaotic system already encompasses an infinite number of
unstable, periodic motions, or orbits. That makes it possible to zero in one particular
type of motion, or periodic orbit, or to switch rapidly from one type of motion to
another.
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In the past, most scientists and engineers considered a chaotic system's extreme
sensitivity to initial conditions as something to be avoided. To ensure that, say, a
chemical reaction or a bridge would function reliably and predictably, they tried to
design systems that shunned chaos.
However, chaos may offer a great advantage, allowing system designers greater
flexibility and making possible systems that adapt more quickly to changing needs. The
Maryland researchers write, "In particular, the future state of a chaotic system can be
substantially altered by a tiny perturbation. If we can accurately sense the state of the
system and intelligently perturb it, this presents us with the possibility of rapidly directing
the system to a desired state."
If physical and mental states are analogous, imagine what this might mean in terms of
therapeutic intervention. In fact, it is the theory of all therapeutic intervention, but in
practice the effect is unpredictable, both in occurrence and change over time.
Psychologist used to conjecture that one third of clients get better, one third get worse,
and one third stay about the same. This formula is debatable, but the healing powers of
placebo and normal recovery with time of many ailments are commonly recognized.
Understanding the therapeutic nature of chaos might increase positive results.
CHAOS AND PERCEPTION
Walter J. Freeman (U.C., Berkeley) is the pioneer in applying chaos theory to
perception and the interface between sensory-motor information and brain patterns. He
says, "the brain transforms sensory messages into conscious perceptions almost instantly.
Chaotic, collective activity involving millions of neurons seems essential for such rapid
recognition." (SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, February, 1991).
In other words, " brains make chaos in order to make sense of the world." He has created
a new physiological metaphor, where chaotic behavior serves as the essential ground
state for the neural perceptual apparatus. He proposes a mechanism for acquiring new
forms of patterned activity corresponding to new learning. (BEHAVIORAL AND
BRAIN SCIENCES (1987) 10:2).
Researchers speculate that chaos underlies the ability of the brain to respond flexibly to
the outside world and to generate novel activity patterns, including those that are
experienced as fresh ideas (also fresh behavior, emotions, belief systems, mythologies,
etc.). Chaos results in meaning-laden perception, a gestalt, that is unique to each
individual. Chaos is implicated in human perception as a multi-sensory phenomenon.
The controlled chaos of the brain is more than an accidental by-product, like "putting
your brain in neutral." Indeed, it may be the chief property that makes the brain
different from an artificial-intelligence machine. One profound advantage chaos may
confer on the brain is that chaotic systems continually produce novel activity patterns.
The ability to create activity patterns may underlie the brain's ability to generate insight
and the "trials" of trial-and-error problem-solving. These chaotic patterns have been
documented in the olfactory system. This is the system most efficient for recalling a
memory gestalt.
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Just recall how an old familiar scent can bring memories flooding back. Gamma bursts
across large cortical regions involved in recognizing visual images have also been found.
Brain patterns are identical whether experiences are imaginal or real-time. The
stimulation to the visual cortex is identical.
In neuroscience, a new paradigm for the general dynamics of perception is emerging.
The brain seeks information, mainly by directing an individual to look, listen, feel, and
sniff. The search results from self-organizing activity in the limbic system (that part of
the brain that includes the entorihinal cortex and is thought to be involved in emotion
and memory).
It funnels a search command to the motor systems. As the motor command is
transmitted, the limbic system issues what is called a reafference message, alerting all of
the sensory systems to prepare to respond to the new information.
And respond they do, with every neuron in a given region participating in a collective
activity—a burst. Synchronous activity in each system is then transmitted back to the
limbic system. There it combines with a similarly generated output from the other
sensory systems to form a GESTALT.
Then, within a fraction of a second, another search for information is demanded, and
the sensory systems are prepared again by reafference. Excitatory inputs at synapses
generate electric currents that follow in closed loops within the recipient neuron toward
its axon, across the cell membrane into the extra-cellular space and, in the space, back to
the synapse.
The existence of chaos affects the scientific method itself. The classic approach to
verifying a theory is to make predictions and test them against experimental data. If the
phenomena are chaotic, however, long-term predictions are intrinsically impossible.
Chaos demonstrates that a system can have complicated behavior that emerges as a
consequence of simple nonlinear interaction of only a few components.
The ability to obtain detailed knowledge of a system's structure has undergone a
tremendous advance in recent years. Yet, the ability to integrate this knowledge has
been stymied by the lack of a proper perceptual framework within which to describe
qualitative behavior.
The interaction of components on one scale can lead to complex global behavior on a
larger scale that, in general, cannot be deduced from knowledge of individual
components. Chaos may provide the possibility of putting variability under
evolutionary control.
Even the process of intellectual progress relies on the injection of new ideas and on new
ways of connecting old ideas. Innate creativity may have an underlying chaotic process
that selectively amplifies small fluctuations and molds them into macroscopic coherent
mental states that are experienced as thoughts.
In some cases the thoughts may be decisions, or what are perceived to be exercise of
WILL. In this light, chaos provides a mechanism that allows for FREE WILL within a
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world governed by deterministic laws. In other words, Newton's laws are only local
ordinances. Chaos suggests causal relationships where none were previously suspected.
Studies have discovered chaotic activity in the brain. Chaos is evident in the tendency of
vast collections of neurons to shift abruptly and simultaneously from one complex
activity pattern to another in response to the smallest of inputs.
In healing terms, this implies that ONE TRAUMATIC EVENT CAN SHAPE A LIFE;
ONE INTENSE THERAPEUTIC EVENT CAN RESHAPE IT. Trauma can create a
large disturbance both immediately and exponentially over time. Healing spreads out
through the individual life like ripples on a pool of water. This changeability is the
prime characteristic of many chaotic systems. It is not harmful to the brain. In fact, it
may be the very property that makes perception possible.
Consciousness may well be the subjective experience of this recursive process of motor
command, reafference and perception. If so, it enables the brain to plan and prepare for
each subsequent action on the basis of past action, sensory input, and perceptual
synthesis.
In short, an act of perception is not the copying of an incoming stimulus. It is a step in a
trajectory by which brains grow, reorganize themselves and reach into their
environment to change to their own advantage. Consciousness is not confined to the
ordinary state of awareness.
Dreams (and other non-ordinary states) can be used for healing by employing the
imagination to create new realities within the psyche which facilitates multi-state
education. This learning can supercede physical history, according to the "changing
history" principle of NLP, (Neurolinguistic Programming), wherein a reiteration of past
trauma is reprocessed and supercedes the historical version.
The latest dream research has shown that DREAMS HELP US LEARN. Tasks
performed or information gleaned during the day are assimilated into long-term
memory during dreams. Researchers found that those whose dreams were interrupted
experienced more difficulty in absorbing what they learned that given day. The same
holds true if what is learned comes through dreamhealing.
The poet William Blake wrote: "If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing
would appear to man as it is, infinite." Such cleansing would not perhaps be desirable.
Without the protection of the doors of perception — that is, without the self-controlled
chaotic activity of the cortex, from which perceptions spring — people and animals
would be overwhelmed by infinity. The lack of external driving means the activity is
self-generated. Such self-organization is characteristic of chaotic systems.
Chaos theory is based on the mathematics of nonlinear dynamics. But it is also a set of
attitudes toward complexity—a new way of seeing, that moves from fragmentation
toward integration. It evolved through the discovery of strange attractors (remember,
the cosmic principle of attraction, Eros).
Strange attractors can even be plotted in free will, as we have discussed. The concept of
free will as a strange attractor brings up philosophical and theological implications.
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Again, it presents a different relationship than a mechanistic model between human beings and the Higher Power. Chaos theory does suggest that God, in the forefront of science as usual has outstripped us once again. This is less surprising than you might suppose: science of late, arcane sub¬ atomic physics in particular, has begun to implicate a higher presence. The second coming may arrive as fractal geometry on some lab computer screen. That our universe is irrational and unjust has long been a forceful argument against the Higher Power's existence. Yet all the randomness we perceive from Big Bang through Big Whimper may, in fact, contain secret, huge rhythms of creation and destiny. There can be no more tremendous paradox — suitable to an omnipotent creator — than order-from-chaos. No: ORDER-IN-CHAOS. So even chance—still obstinate, still anarchic—is not incompatible with divine arrangement. We have begun to apprehend a new description of certainty. It may have all the traits that characterize disorder and yet be under law, and those who ask, " How can God exist when there is chaos in our universe?" may have answered their own questions. Research on the chaotic brain is yielding new models of behavior. Nonlinear dynamics is being used to focus on overall patterns of behavior, describing how stable or unstable they are and pinpointing the circumstances that make them change. Results are showing that changes in patterns of electrical activity in the brain are linked to changes in behavioral states. What we used to consider as meaningless background noise, output of large groups of nerve cells in the brain, are evidently quite meaningful. They just contain so much information, it blurs together and looks like no coherent message. Our perceptions can't decode it because they respond through an all-or- nothing relay system. For a complementary approach to chaos in the brain, see Karl Pribram's BRAIN AND PERCEPTION, 1991. He speaks there of a theory of nonlocal cortical processing in the brain, and the geometry of neurodynamics. But Pribram is now exploring chaos, as his attendance at the first conference on psychology and chaos theory in 1991 shows. We can eagerly await his conclusions. NEUROANATOMY AND CHAOS World famous researcher, E. Roy John [Brain Research Lab, New York University Medical Center] has edited the definitive book on the MACHINERY OF THE MIND (1990). It includes integrative processes, strange attractors and synchronization, cognitive functions, visual information processing, human development, and brain imaging. All are related to chaos theory and the hardwiring of the brain. Neuroscientists have dissected the brain minutely defining all structure. They have charted the wetware circuits of nerve pathways and identified some 60 neurotransmitters. But they could never explain the synergistics of an emotion, idea, act of will, or consciousness itself. 74 Mathematical metaphors help us visualize the bigger picture. Chaos theory has led to the discovery of amazing variations among vast collections of neurons. This is one application of chaos theory, since nonlinear equations can describe many phenomena from the subatomic to cosmic level. Nonlinear phenomena are sustained by complex loops of feedback in which the outcomes of initial inputs are diverted back into the system at unpredictable points in its cycle. This certainly bears on many aspects of perception, consciousness, and personality. In the cult film, EAT THE SUN, the Videru Telemahandi teaches that, "The ecology of the soul is to recycle one's consciousness" The body uses complex feedback loops to maintain biochemical balance. These "biological oscillators" lead to reactions which reveal nonlinear dynamics. The structure emerges around a strange attractor, and the system may vacillate erratically, but it always stays within a bounded range or norm. The boundaries are strictly defined mathematically, but within the chaos is apparent method in the madness. PERSONALITY TRAITS AS STRANGE ATTRACTORS Chaos is not total randomness, but implies an implicate, "hidden", or occult order within the nature of reality. The strange attractor construct of chaos theory offers a new way to think about personality. It is exceptionally difficult to predict the specific behavior of an individual, yet if we know a person, his or her behavior seldom suprises us. The observation that personality varies within limits may be understood within the context of chaos theory. Specifically, the strange attractor construct is proposed to account for nonperiodic, nonrandom order. Understanding and predicting human behavior remains a fundamental goal of psychology. Personality theory developed for this reason. Yet, accurate prediction of behavior continues to elude personality researchers. Chaos theory provides a framework within which the puzzling inconsistency of traditional measures of personality can be understood. The consistency may be there, but in nonlinear form under the guise of the strange attractor's "hidden order." Personality is inferred from behavior and personality consistency refers to similar behavior in similar situations (cross-situational consistency) and/or similar behavior over time (temporal consistency). Consistency, here, simply refers to the repeated presentation of the same or similar behavior. Some theories of personality stress static or stable traits, while other emphasize states or psychodynamics. Others find that traits and states are virtually indistinguishable and consider the distinction arbitrary. Regardless of whether personality is governed by characteristic dispositions (traits) or an intrapsychic balance of forces, the effect upon observed behavior is the same; that is, stable internal factors generate behavioral continuity. 75 The person's interpretation or "mental representation" is his "true situation," not the actual external environment. Our intuitive belief in the consistency of personality may be derived from a real, but nonlinear, order underlying human behavior. It forms the basis of self-simulation moving through time. There is a nonlinear influence in negative feedback the organism perceives. It molds behavior. Chaos theory provides tools for identifying complex, nonlinear relationships. Behavior is variable, but always within the limits and ranges set by the person's structure itself. Unpredictable variation within limits sounds very much like the operation of a strange attractor. Chaotic systems have a sensitive dependence on initial conditions. For humans this means, any perturbation from conception onward can be a determining factor in structure and personality. If personality or personality traits function as a strange attractor of behavior, then correlations of behavior over time would not be expected to be very high. Exact behavior would be unpredictable from moment to moment, but would remain within loose boundaries—those of the strange attractor. All potential behavior would not have an equal probability of occurence. In contrast, if behavior were random, then every possible behavior would have an equal probability of occurence at any given time. It would not be surprising to discover that personality traits can be construed as strange attractors of behavior. Natural chaos allows adaptation and self-organization so it is an evolutionary advantage. Sensitive dependence on initial conditions ensures that long term prediction of human behavior remains unattainable. Prediction within limits, as probabilities of certain behaviors, may be possible based on the strange attractor characterizing the personality or personality trait of an individual. One may have a particular personality trait that seems to operate like a strange attractor at one time, but later the trait enters a phase of periodicity. Also, types of attractors may differ from trait to trait within a particular individual. Research may reveal that assessments of personality or a personality trait over time generate data that leads to a fractal correlation dimension. Such evidence would confirm that personality or that a particular personality trait may be desribed as a strange attractor of associated behavior. Essentially, the same statements can be made for dynamic states of consciousness, if states and traits are interchangeable. 76 Chapter 4 EGO AND THE PROCESS OF HEALING: A MODEL OF CONSCIOUSNESS ABSTRACT: Experiential psychotherapy is based on the premise of guiding the client through a transition in that "foreign land" we know as the psyche. All guides require maps of the territory if they are to successfully guide others into the hinterlands of experience. Therefore, a working map of the psyche outlining the relationship of the ego to the personal and transpersonal subconscious is useful. Among the vast panoply of symbols, certain imagery is typical of certain "levels" of consciousness. Dreamhealing is the result of reordering images at the deepest levels, correcting distortions. This consciousness map is not necessarily the ultimate accurate picture of the psyche, but it provides a useful working model which seems to cover all observable contingencies as they appear in dreamhealing. This is a map to the underworld: the landmarks, milestones, and signposts along the route to healing the soul. To use dreams in a healing sense, it is necessary to have an orientation for recognizing what depth you are working in. This theme of bringing gifts to the newborn child is part of the myth of the birth of the hero which, we can add, is also the myth of the birth of the ego. -Edward Edinger, EGO AND ARCHETYPE Pain and discomfort are among the earliest factors that build consciousness. They are "alarm signals " sent out...to indicate that the unconscious equilibrium is disturbed. The function of ego consciousness, however, is not merely to perceive but to assimilate these alarm signals.... The ego, keeping its detachment as the center of the registering consciousness, is a differentiated organ exercising its controlling function in the interests of the whole, but is not identical with it. 77 297 -Erich Neumann, ORIGINS AND HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS, p. CHAOTIC CONSCIOUSNESS AND EGO FORMATION Enter a space with us. There are fields. Electric. Magnetic. All undefined pure energy- stuff in motion, existing beyond space and time. In fact, time itself is a field—a dispersion of time-stuff, undifferentiated and evenly dispersed. All these fields occupy all space simultaneously. There is another field of stuff — consciousness — within these fields. In certain places in the chaos of intermingling energy-stuff, the consciousness begins to concentrate. As it does, it interacts with other fields and begins to create order (i.e. strange attractors). Fields begin to interact to create matter and time flow. For example, energy plus mass plus electromagnetism is the basis of Einstein's equation E = MC2. The bit of chaos-consciousness that is us begins to form a structure. CONSCIOUSNESS ALWAYS STRIVES TO TAKE ON FORM. It is still connected to the timeless/spaceless whole, but limits are being imposed on the structure being created. Consciousness is becoming "frozen," concentrated in a limited form. This coming together of fields is the same energy that we call love (cosmological Eros), a primal attracting force. This represents not only the formation of the human individual, but all other matter in our reality. The interaction of fields, and the formation of a vortex of energy, the attractor, represents the beginning of our consciousness structure. This process culminates in the formation of separate identity, the ego. We can conjecture that in the intermingling energy, somewhere and sometime the beginnings of awareness arise synergistically. If we trust the dream and consciousness journeys, awareness begins at about this point. It is the first emergence of individual essence from source. In one sense the strange attractors may be the genetic materials, the DNA spirals that come together in an animate condition. It may also have something to do with the inanimate portion which comes together to create the material part of our bodies and beings. Awareness, perception, and sensing are discrete faculties. Perception is seeing through, like the glasses or lenses we put on to see the world. The senses are far more basic than that. We can feel heat in our finger, but the way we perceive that may have many different impacts, based on circumstances and attitudes. Consciousness is base to our awareness. Dream journeys back to the beginnings of awareness reflect this initial description. Ego arises from this ground state over time through interaction with the environment. Ego is that part of us that is an "I", distinct from a "Not-I". The ego develops a more 78 and more rigid structure over time, as habits and behaviors become "frozen" in the personality. For healing, parts of the ego need to let go and dissolve the old structure. If you can say there is an "I" or a "Not-I", somehow the ego is involved. This even comes in when you are speaking of the soul. There is soul and there is something that is not this soul. That is really just an ego-model of the soul. One of the problems with many psychological models of the ego is that they do not take into account what exists beyond the ego very well if at all. Freud's view of the personality includes the ego, the id, and the superego. His view of the superego depicted it as functioning essentially like an authoritarian conscience for us. The id was considered a mass of unresolved psychic energies (in many cases self- defeating or self-destructive), which nevertheless run us. Freud gleaned some understanding about the id and its effects on the ego through the process of free association. But his conceptual maps were rough. Words are, after all, only symbols. Like a map, they can only provide second-hand information about the complex energy dynamics of the psyche. We can reclaim from Freud his emphasis on the mythological dynamics of Eros and Thanatos. Eros or love is the essence of the prime attractor, the principle or energy that draws from chaos to create the structure and form which we are. Thanatos is the entropic tendency, the tendency of what is structured to break down into chaotic forms of energy. It works on both our thought processes and physical matter itself. Most people who consider Freud's Thanatos concept see it as negative—perhaps it touches their own mortality complex. In reality, it is not only negative, but probably one of the more important aspects of healing — this tendency toward "death." For an ego to change, the old ego must die. Not much attention has been paid in conventional psychological science to that. Most attention is paid to strengthening the ego, to building it up. Jung revisioned Freud's idea of the ego and the imagery of the "Not-I." He came up with the idea of archetypal images from the collective unconscious. In terms of dreamhealing work, one of the most important aspects to come out of Jung's work is his emphasis on the image, and remaining true to the unique presentation of the image in therapy. Jung investigated the transpersonal dimension to understand what existed beyond personality or beyond the self-concept. He stressed the primacy of the archetypal image. The image may be visual or it may be a multi-sensory image. A simple gut¬ feeling is also an image. It may combine many sensual aspects. If you can find what the image of the self is, you find that the person's physical and mental make-up takes on the contours of that image. If a person's image of themselves, their very deep primal image is somehow a faulty thing with deformations in it, then the personality will reflect that, and so will the body. It will be disease-ridden and so will the mind, perhaps twisting even the soul. 79 IN THE CREATIVE CONSCIOUSNESS PROCESS AND DREAMHEALING WORK, WE HAVE DISCOVERED THAT DREAMS ARE SHAPED BY THESE EXISTENTIAL IMAGES MUCH AS THEY ALSO SHAPE OUR LIVES AND DESTINIES. Thus, the surface presentation of the dreams, its symbols and story lines, are doorways that open to a multi-sensory experience of these states. In turn those states of frozen or "differentiated" consciousness can be released or dissolved into the even more primal and base state of "undifferentiated" or CHAOTIC CONSCIOUSNESS. As chaos theory predicts, a new primal existential image (or attractor) emerges, but one more evolved and more in a state of ease with the flow of natural order. These new, more easeful states provide a new model, a new base for healing the entire organism. One of the powers of dreams is that they lead us to the image of the self, and that is where the healing generally takes place. Things transform at that level. Observing a series of consciousness states, and mapping these states, we have noticed over time that there appear to be distinct areas of depth that are identified by characteristic imagery experiences. Dreams can be used in a lot of ways. Examples include using dreams for stepping outside of space and time, to see the future and the past, to visit future lives, to visit futures in this life, because dreams come from outside of time and space. In terms of therapy, dreams can be used as an evolutionary force to take people from a small sense of self and expand them toward a larger image. To use dreams in a healing sense it is necessary to have an orientation within the dreamscape, to recognize which depth you are dealing with. As interesting as the other uses of dreams are, such as lucid dreaming and interpretation, they do not necessarily lead to healing. They may not even access the state of dis-ease that is troubling the individual, much less be able to re-link essence to source. IN DEALING WITH SPECIFIC ILLNESS THERE IS ALWAYS A SPECIFIC IMAGE THAT UNDERLIES THE AILMENT. AND THAT IS WHAT YOU LOOK FOR WHEN GUIDING A DREAM JOURNEY. And when you find it, you guide the self that this state represents into that state of chaos and dissolution—into a death and subsequent rebirth. From this chaos, a new image of self emerges. You can go deep in dreams into transpersonal places where there is no sense of self, into true connection with the universal consciousness field. THIS IS THE PLACE OF CHAOS, OF ALL AND NO STRUCTURE. IT IS THE SOURCE OF CREATIVITY. IT IS THE ULTIMATE SOURCE OF HEALING. IT IS THE UNIVERSAL SOLVENT, THE PANACEA. IT IS THE HEART OF THE DREAM. THERE AND BACK AGAIN For orientation within the dreamscape, we use a model which is simply termed an ego map. With it you can find out where you are within the creative consciousness process. It helps you keep your bearings as you guide someone deeper into their journey. It 80 provides clues to help determine if someone is stuck in a fantasy about their belief system or personal mythology. As a map of consciousness this model evolved from our shared consciousness journeys with people as they descend into the depths of their being—their personal underworlds— using dreams as a doorway. The creative consciousness process flows through the underworld like a powerful river of consciousness, welling up from the subterranean depths. This model is not really specific in terms of psychological theory, but it does help identify the level of imagery you are experiencing. These levels or zones identify levels of ego functioning and development. They are characterized by a quality of imagery and sensory experiences. We can journey imaginally, yet experientially, through the layers of the psyche with this map. This virtual experience affects self-image, emotions, attitudes, thoughts, etc. creating real-life natural consequences. First we will look at the model from the outside in. Beginning with that which is known, overt behavior, we will move deeper and deeper into the unknown. Moving from the superficial to the transpersonal depths, we notice layer after layer of distortions, and perturbations of psychic energy. These include faulty thought patterns, negative attitudes, and self-limiting belief systems. These are the symptoms of the dis-ease. THIS WHOLE PROCESS OF GOING DEEP INTO THE PSYCHE PARALLELS THE SHAMAN’S JOURNEY INTO THE UNDERWORLD TO FIND AND RETRIEVE THE LOST SOUL. It is the natural cure for "loss of self." We seek the lost soul primarily because of the intense degree of wounding in modern culture—alienation. This very wounding has "opened" us to transformation—to healing. The levels of this consciousness map are not firm-boundaried. They are more like landmarks, familiar zones we have noticed on the journeys. The journey to the underworld, or "the center of the earth," is a metaphor for the depths of the psyche and the wonders we find there. What we find there, experientially, certainly qualifies both as a "treasure hard to attain" and as the retrieval of that which was previously lost or unavailable. It is a process of re-membering. By repeatedly diving deep and then re-surfacing, we bring into the daylight world very important experiential material focused around the very core of our being. This promotes healing through the imagination. It is a form of meditation, like the alchemical meditatio, in which psyche "matters." The descent and subsequent ascent, going deep into the dream journey and emerging transformed, is a form of death/rebirth, a powerful archetypal theme which is initiatory in character. Before the core, (or soul), is found there are many adventures in the labyrinthine caverns of the deep psyche. There spirit and soul merge in the union of opposites. BEHAVIORAL ZONE 81 How do you judge a person's personality? The first thing you notice is their behavior. You notice how they behave. Whether it is listening to what is said, noticing what is done, personality is revealed. This is the outer manifestation of self, that being shown and acted out in the social world. It is the level of acting out our scripts and games, the patterns of behavior that reflect the dis-eased primal image. We can use these behavioral impressions to help identify the diseased primal image at its various levels. Sometimes what a person does and what they say are inconsistent. Right away that tells you about a dis-ease. Generally, you can trust the behaviors more than the words. Watch for incongruent behavior and body language. Body language will tell you the basics of adjustment to life and the situation in terms of openness or closedness, approach or avoidance. From this arise issues of safety, security, acceptance, and therefore self-esteem. Scripts, games, ego states, and emotional rackets are the foundation of Transactional Analysis. T.A. looks at the behavior patterns and provides a sense of order about them. The basic behavioral patterns are self-reinforcing. People seem to find a way to reinforce their particular pattern whether it is healthy or not. For example, an ego that has come to believe, think, and feel that it will be rejected by others will engage in behaviors which make that a self-fulfilling prophecy. That helps maintain the (distorted) ego structure. The client's standard games are bound to come up in therapeutic interaction. That is how they relate, cope, and assimilate their experience. You know they are bound to wind up playing the same games in therapy that they play everywhere else. They are going to try to prove the same thing. This is what Freud referred to as the transference, a projection of either/both positive or negative parent. When the energy flows toward the client, it is called countertransference. It is an unconscious, automatic process. For example, clients might come saying, " Well, you can't prove to me that this therapy works ." If you respond, you have fallen into their game. As soon as this happens, both become involved in a power struggle. Clients who try this game essentially use it in most of their lives. This skeptical, confrontive, challenging attitude creates problems in all areas of relationship, but can generally be managed in short business exchanges. In this example, just asking the question is the expressed behavior. And it will reflect, however abstractly, the basic dis-eased primal image. Within the symptom is the shape of the disease. In the dream, this level often shows up in the interpretive level in dream work. In Gestalt experiential dream work, in the experience of being the parts of the dreams, one often notes how well the dream parts and their interactions reflect the dreamer's outer maneuvers. Behavioral psychology tries to deal with change at that level, as do many other superficial psychotherapies. In dreamhealing and creative consciousness work, however, it is merely noticed as providing information about the shape of the diseased 82 consciousness state that we will eventually encounter in the depths of the psyche. It acts as a map to identify the shape of the personality, to help us guide the dreamer beyond this level. Transactional Analysis provides an excellent means of conceptually understanding this level of the personality. It provides structure to help identify the repeating patterns that are the behavioral level, reflecting the dis-ease within. These are probably just symptoms of the dis-ease you will encounter. The literature of T.A. covers behavior patterns quite well. Perhaps the best single source is BORN TO WIN by Muriel James and Dorothy Jongeward, (Addison-Wesley Pub., Philippines, 1977). Conditioned behaviors are catalogued in behavioral psychology which concerns itself with basic instincts like fight/flight, how habits get formed and broken, and manipulation of behavior through punishment/reward systems. THINKING-FEELING ZONE How we behave is largely shaped by how we think and feel about what is happening in the environment. This means "feel" in the emotional sense as well as in the opinion sense. It is a deeper zone than the behavior, which is mostly acted outside the self. This zone lies beneath the surface, a zone of thoughts and emotions, competing and dancing with each other to create patterns that shape our behaviors, but are themselves merely reflecting the even deeper patterns of dis-ease. In this aspect the dream journey reflects the experience of delving deep into the structure of a fractal image, where each layer repeats the basic structure of the levels above it and below it. The probing of the structure of dreams and personality is probing the nature of chaos itself. Cognitive-emotive therapies, such as T.A. and Gestalt, most of the psychoanalytic and Humanistic therapies, and techniques such as affirmations work within this level. They often try to produce changes at this level. Models to explain the structure and function of this zone proliferate, and often contradict one another. But in the creative consciousness process, it just provides the dream guide with another clue, another perspective on the shape of the deeper dis-eased primal image. It adds another sensory configuration to the patterns and shape that will eventually identify the primal dis-eased state to be encountered further on in the journey. IT IS RARE THAT THE SEEDS OF DISEASE ORIGINATE AT THIS LEVEL. This level is encountered and revealed in dream again at the surface presentation level, and slightly below that. It is revealed in the emotional content, plot lines and first levels of symbol experience, as for example, encountered in Gestalt work. The imagery is discreet, that is this dance of emotions and thoughts is experience with easily recognized patterns of imagery—cognitive and emotional process. 83 The first step in a dream journey is to re-experience the dream. In that re-experiencing, these emotional, cognitive and action sequences are experienced by both the guide and the dreamer. These sequences usually reflect the behavioral and script game patterns noticed prior to the journey, and round out as well as reinforce the emerging sensory image the dream guide is developing out of the state of disease. Dream interpretation deals with this level of the dream and is a well-developed art. Surface symbol manipulation, as practiced in techniques such as Gestalt, or dream psychodrama also explore this level and promote change at this level of personality. But in the creative consciousness process, the dream guide only notices this level of experience and these dynamics. The patterns experienced at this level are models that will help identify deeper patterns and eventually the "source." Let us present an example, an illustration of a typical journey: In the dreamer's dream, he is continually frustrated as helplessly he is drawn into an impending disaster that it seems cannot be averted. At this level of presentation, the dream is noted to reflect the dreamer's outer emotional-thinking dynamics and patterns. In outer life he feels like a helpless loser who is constantly beset by crisis and disaster. He is constantly in no-win situations. Most dream therapies, analytical, interpretive, etc., would attempt to deal with changing these patterns and dynamics at this level by whatever therapeutic techniques they espouse. Even experiential Gestalt would seldom venture any deeper than exploring this level of dream experientially. But in the creative consciousness process, the dream guide instead co-experiences these patterns and energies. If the mind is involved at all, we may speculate that the deeper experiences and patterns of disease may exhibit a sense of "stuckness" or something like that. Having noticed, and speculated, the guide then lets go to journey even deeper into the dream and the psyche. BELIEF SYSTEMS ZONE The next zone we encounter in our journey into the ego, and what is the same thing, into a dream, is the belief system zone. The answer to "What shapes the thinking-feeling patterns?" is what we believe about self and the world. This is still a somewhat intellectual zone in that most beliefs can be succinctly stated with a few words or sentences. But beliefs arise also from much deeper levels of sensations. Deep feelings, senses of credulity, rightness, wrongness, all help identify the boundaries and shapes of our beliefs. Of course, in the dynamics of life, experience of this zone is a dance with the emotional- cognitive level. That is how it affects the pattern of the dance. But functionally it can be justified as a discrete zone. Again, many conventional therapies from T.A. to Freud deal at this level of ego functioning. Indeed changes in belief systems is an integral part of depth therapy 84 healing. In T.A. this is the level at which deeper script and existential patterns are revealed and re-decided. But seldom does the diseased state originate at this level. However most therapies attempt to deal with the disease at this still somewhat symptomatic level. The creative consciousness-dream guide again just notices these sensory patterns. They provide yet another, deeper and new way of identifying the essence of the primal dis-eased image that will eventually be encountered. At this level the imagery as we approach the boundaries of the beliefs, or the area of the known often takes the shape of dangerous paths, or other fear-filled images. At this deeper sensory level, images appear such as walls felt as solid barriers, or ugly sensations and colors, or perhaps odors or sounds, monsters or evil creatures of cold and dark. These are energies that keep us in bounds, and trapped in our belief systems. At this level the dream journey is indeed the hero's journey. The dream guide must lead the dreamer through fears to even deeper levels. It is often sensed as a journey into death or worse. For example, the frustration in the dreamer's dream might suggest a deep red color, which when experienced takes on the feeling of sticky pools of blood on a cold tiled floor. In essence, the message and belief is that it is death in a cold sterile place to go beyond this point. In essence the outer message is that it is better to be a failure and be stuck than to die. On this outer level the dream guide might speculate about a child having these deep feelings and deciding in essence to never surpass their father because...well, it doesn't really matter why. The point is that it is an experiential memory of a reaction to something that happened once. What that is does not matter to the dream guide. What is important is that this represents the energy or psychic boundary that keeps this person trapped in their belief system of helplessness and failure. We are getting closer to the primal image now—to the state of disease. There is an essence of woundedness and death in it, maybe even a sense of drying up and becoming sticky. But again, to the creative consciousness-dream guide, it is only speculation what this all means. In fact that is often far from mind, as the quest is to push on ever-deeper to the source of this pattern-form. If anything, it is now stored in the guide's deeper senses to emerge later to support the intuitive feeling of "fit" that identifies the deepest level of the diseased primal image, when it is reached. PERSONAL MYTHOLOGY ZONE The next zone can be best characterized as the "Personal Mythology" or Archetypes Zone. This is the level from which our belief systems are formed. To the ego, there is still some slight component of rational process. For example, this level is often revealed by the fairy tales (personal mythology) that underlie the scripts (belief patterns) in T.A. The imagery in this zone is, in most cases, significantly more superficial than the archetypal images suggested in Jungian psychology. In a sense they are distorted versions of the archetypes (complexes). These are the distortions caused by the 85 organism's very early interactions and experiences with its environment. In some cases they are direct representations of archetypal energy patterns (remember the strange attractors we discussed earlier). WE ARE VERY CLOSE NOW TO WHAT FORMS US OUT OF CHAOS. The archetypal patterns or myths adopted are the ones which most closely reflect the organism's shaping experiences. Stanley Krippner and David Feinstein have described this level of consciousness and its impact and role in the human condition in their book, PERSONAL MYTHOLOGY. It does not conflict with what we find in dreamhealing experiences in any important way. They speak of five stages in the process of integration with one's evolving mythology. Their work is one of the first serious forays of traditional psychotherapy into the mystical realms, other than anecdotal reports. They are actively working at the mythic level with therapeutic interventions. The five stages include the following: 1). Identifying areas of conflict in the person's underlying mythology. 2). Bringing the roots of mythic conflict into focus. 3). Conceiving a unifying mythic vision. 4). From vision to commitment. 5). Weaving a renewed mythology into daily life. Krippner and Feinstein have used Gray wolfs life story to illustrate their model on many occasions, including Krippner's DREAMTIME AND DREAMWORK , (Tarcher, 1991). It is probably no coincidence that this closely resembles the four stations of the Medicine Wheel: identifying the problem, letting go, new vision, and empowerment or actualization. This is the archetypal healing model operating at the mythic level, no matter how it is stated. We don't seem to automatically jump into a belief system from an experience. It has to go through a mythologizing process, and thereby become entrenched as an image. That is an important part of how the image gets in there. We turn an experience into a belief through the process of mythologizing. The mythological layers form a sort of border between the ego and the personality, separating it from the deeper collective psyche. THE MYTHOLOGICAL LAYER IS THE BOUNDARY LAYER BETWEEN THE PERSONAL AND TRANSPERSONAL. That is why the archetypes are so clear there, yet they are also in a logical context, story, or drama. It is the melding of rational and irrational. Mythology is a precursor of evolution. New guiding myths are arising today, such as the new myth that "personal power arises within." We follow an image or myth of who or what we expect ourselves to become. This is our existential myth. Identity crisis follows if it doesn't work, creating an evolutionary crisis. This level of consciousness is profound and indeed AT THIS LEVEL THE GUIDE MAY ENCOUNTER THE PRIMAL DISEASED STATE ITSELF. Most often one must forage deeper, but sometimes it rests in this level. These consciousness states/images are frozen into form very early in life, within the first year or so. They manifest as deep sensation and sensation patterns and are a level of memory experienced pre-verbally, or at barely verbal levels of cognition and 86 experience. In a way they can be viewed as the time when the organism is beginning to shape its "self." The organism has rudimentary experience at the sensory level, but no cognitive-emotive existence. It seeks the archetypal energy forms rising from its chaotic origin, and selects the ones which most accurately match its experience so far. It modifies those archetypes to match its experience and this provides a strange attractor that becomes the nucleus of personality. This zone holds very little "mind" content and is purely sensual in nature. The visual imagery (if there at all) is simple, perhaps surrealistic — disembodied eyes or faces, frozen statues, pools of molten red lava, animal faces, jaws full of sharp teeth, etc. ARCHETYPAL ZONE But still deeper strata exist—a deeper zone of psychic energies and patterns that represent memories of even more primal levels of consciousness and experience. When we reconnect with them experientially, we re-member our deepest self and heal our fragmentation. Here we find experiences of the WOMB, back even to the dance of energy, matter, and consciousness at CONCEPTION. These images are close to the stuff of our creation, the primal chaos or consciousness field that seems to underlie all matter. This zone is one of archetypal ENERGY WAVES AND PATTERNS, existing on the edges of infinite creation. In this zone the imagery is beyond surreal. It is PSYCHEDELIC or mystically sensual, much as described by individuals in the deepest of L.S.D. experiences, or during moments of ecstatic healing, or religious experiences. These strata are catalogued extensively by Stan Grof in his works on LSD therapy and Holotropic Healing. Here are revealed shifting, dancing energy patterns that sometimes only suggest forms, or may assault the senses — deep whorls that suck one down in spinning spirals, black holes in black space, gray clouds of nothingness. Senses are extraordinary and seemingly infinite in variation (including the controversial psi phenomena such as extrasensory perception (ESP) and the sensory melding of synesthesia). IF THIS ZONE IS CLEAR, THE DIS-EASE EXISTS AT MORE SUPERFICIAL LEVELS. It is a zone of great ease, and an experience of timeless flowing creation. It resonates as deep rightness and peace, ageless antiquity. If the dis-ease exists at this deep level, the experience is similar to the above, but somewhat modified. For example, a deep red stab wound with a black center might become a swirling vortex pulling the dreamer and guide into a blackness. It is cold and empty, and the spinning of the vortex has dismembered the dreamer. In fact, he has experienced a sense of being disintegrated. In this state of nothingness a throbbing sensation of pulsating red becomes a sphere of softness surrounded by a shell of resistance. At the same time spikes are puncturing the shell. Becoming both the punctured and the puncturer leads to a deep-felt sense of 87 flowing togetherness and peace. There is acceptance of conception and creation as deep- felt senses adjust to this yielding. CHAOTIC (OR CREATIVE) CONSCIOUSNESS The zone of chaotic consciousness underlies all of the foregoing. Within our theory this is the level at which all structure dissolves and from which all structure comes. It is the "universal solvent" of alchemy, the liquid form of the Philosopher's Stone. It could, in fact, has been called by many other names. It is a sea of universal consciousness, timeless and infinite. It is chaotic consciousness, a level of being and energy that is virtually random and unformed. It is a state of pure creative energy with infinite possibilities. ItistheTao. It is the timeless, spaceless quantum leap. It is a higher order dimension of self — existing in hyperdimensions or virtual realities. It is the healing, creative HEART OF THE DREAM. It is the selfless Self. The imagery? To borrow from Taoism, "the Tao which can be described is not the Tao." It is remembered on returning as being all that has ever been, all that is now, and all that is yet to be. Here lie buried memories of conception, the instant we begin to develop a "consciousness" of the self from the collective consciousness. In so many of the conceptions we hear about in dreamhealing, the energy is wrong. For instance the mother is being raped, or nobody cares, or it is an accident, or father was drunk, etc. Conventional psychology has not dealt with this phase as an experience of trauma very much. Even the alternative therapies focus more on the birthing experience. Eric Berne, founder of T.A. used to pose the question, "Make up a story about your conception." That was part of the script questionnaire. You can discover a lot from that simple exercise. We are only beginning to realize just how much of a person's form and structure, not only genetically, but also psychologically, comes out of that initial experience. The dreamhealing method has a big advantage in that it views memory differently than most people view it. It is more than the conscious process of recall. "/ remember this happened," is usually a visual or auditory memory. When you begin to leave that perspective, you can perceive that the deep memories come to you in other forms. Genetic memories come to you in different forms. They are not discrete memories. They are sensory imagery, and structural characteristics. Then memory expands to include a lot of recorded experience you just cannot get at in other ways. Just to process, re-experience, and reorder those memories is therapeutic. IT MEANS GOING INTO PRIMAL CHAOS TO BEGIN THE PROCESS OF REFORMATION FROM THE MOST FUNDAMENTAL BEGINNING. The process of conception parallels chaos theory in that these initial conditions are very critical, and slight changes in those conditions can bring on the exponential disruptions of the "butterfly effect." Chaos theory uses the metaphor of a butterfly in the orient flapping its wings thereby causing a gigantic storm on a far-away part of the globe. 88 During conception, we have the initial chaotic conditions which begin forming the initial structure. The slightest things that are wrong here may have horrendous effects down the line. HAVING DESCENDED TO THE FORMATIVE DEPTHS, WE CAN NOW BEGIN TO ASCEND THROUGH THE CONSCIOUSNESS MAP THROUGH THE TYPICAL STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT. LEVEL 0: THE SPACE/TIME CONTINUUM AT CONCEPTION Conception occurs with the interaction of the space/time continuum with collective or universal consciousness. The ephemeral soul enters real-time experience as a tangible entity. Yet we are still totally immersed in the unified web of awareness. Direct experience of this level is a true sense of oneness with all. It is not just a metaphysical ideas, but a real field that exists — a permeation of space/time with consciousness. The collective or universal consciousness may be seen as an all-pervasive consciousness that exists through all of space and time. Each one of us is a part of that, and connects intimately with that. Jean Houston has called this the I AM experience. Our consciousness is only a manifestation of this larger consciousness. It is spoken of as a union of opposites, or God, Unity or the Tao, etc. It exists in stars, in ourselves, in all things. It is also totally undifferentiated. In it there is no sense of separation of self, or anything else. LEVEL 1: COLLECTIVE OR UNIVERSAL CONSCIOUSNESS AWARENESS This level where we are ALL ONE is a very healing state of consciousness. Consider the idea of the space/time continuum, with the three spatial dimensions plus the fourth dimension of time. If our consciousness is trapped in space and time, we essentially live a Newtonian cause/effect life. This happens which inevitably results in that happening. At surface levels we experience a causal world. At deeper levels of the psyche we can make the quantum leap in consciousness to a seemingly timeless/spaceless realm where we can experience ourselves differently. In this acausal awareness we are reconnecting our essence with our Source. Consciousness exists like an ocean. Jung spoke of it. The mystics call it the Father (or Mother), the Source, Great Spirit, etc. Communing with this energy, experiencing this state of consciousness, was the practice of shamans from the beginning of human history. They developed many techniques for "getting there." Consciousness always strives to take on form, and spirit urges us to cast off gross form and return to primordial unity. What creates the space/time continuum may be the interaction of consciousness with the other fields that exist, such as the time field, EM fields, gravitational fields, and the "strong" and "weak" force within our atoms. These fields are virtually inseparable; they nest within one another. At the level of the still- elusive unified field theory they are one — and we are that. In fact, Jean Houston terms this experiential level, WE ARE. 89 No matter how we define it, this is the core or source from which we come. What happens is that as we enter four-dimensional space, we develop increasingly complex dynamic form and structure over time. These energies crystallize around the nucleus of consciousness interacting with the space/time continuum, and perhaps other (hyperdimensional) dimensions. If you can consider a dimension beyond that of space/time, it is without form — a vast non-linear, pre-geometric ocean of disintegrated virtual energy — pure potential. IT IS CHAOTIC-A CHAOTIC DIMENSION—A CHAOTIC CONSCIOUSNESS. Everything is de-structured here, dissassembled. It is hard to envision form or structure existing beyond that. From this infintely vast ocean of potential arises a wave. It differentiates like a wave on the ocean — a "standing wave" in four-space. As this consciousness differentiates and begins to enter local reality, we can CALL IT THE SOUL, if you like. We are not solid matter at all, as the materialistic view teaches us. Rather, we are dynamic wave fronts in the ocean of the continuum. At the moment of conception, the organism begins to exist in the space/time continuum, in the physical world. It begins to be trapped by the deterministic laws of cause and effect, and is still subject to the bizarre-yet-determinstic laws of chaos. Within these parameters, the entity begins to have experiences which develop awareness. The organism somehow stores this "pre-experience." LEVEL 2: ENTRY INTO SPACE AND TIME With entry into space and time, the unconsciousness wave enters the realm of material reality, and hence duality. The genders merge in act of love (or merely sex). The dynamic interaction creates an attraction (an attractor) or agitation in the virtual energy of the collective consciousness, which becomes a "wave" in the ocean of consciousness. Conception takes place as the wave finally enters into material reality- sperm meets egg. The wave might be considered an individual soul, but the embryonic soul has the dual nature of being purely collective at this point yet invested with the potential for individuality through ego and personality. The divine collective interacts with material reality and begins the process of forming the physical and psychic self. Since at this point, we don't have much of a body, or mind, or form, or structure, this early experience cannot really take on much of a sensory memory. We can't remember much of how it felt, or how it sounded. But we can remember it in terms of energy itself. SO MEMORIES OF THESE VERY EARLY IMAGES AND IMPRESSIONS ARE STORED IN TERMS OF ENERGY. With this conception we envision a metaphorical rebirth, a rising from the depths of the underworld. WE HAVE FOUND THE LOST SOUL-THE LOST SELF. This process of remembering the deep self, the core self, heals dismemberment. By re-membering, we re-create, and re-new ourselves. 90 Conception takes place when the attraction of love draws a wave of consciousness into interaction with space/time, as the sperm symbolically pierces the egg. "Love" in this sense is the power of primal attraction, mythologically the cosmic Eros, not necessarily love of the partners in the sex act. Love is a creator, healer, and unifying force in all human experience, spanning both scientific and mystical reality. Love energy is "sex- red," similar to the red of Buddhist reincarnation theory. LEVEL 3: PRE-SENSORY, GENETIC CONSCIOUSNESS CONCEPTION IS THE AWAKENING OF GENETIC CONSCIOUSNESS. ITS DYNAMIC MANDATE IS SET IN MOTION AT THAT POINT. At this instant of creation, prenatal awareness begins and memories begin at the molecular or cellular level. The collective consciousness is given the material with which to create its body, but it is now restricted by the laws of material reality. At the same time, energy experiences (the situation in the womb) begin to form the psychic body or the ego. At the moment of conception, the collective consciousness begins to exert its influence and create a body and an energy, and/or psychic shield to give it both protection and to allow for the perception of and interaction with material reality. Thus, two "bodies," physical and psychic, are now forming in the womb. There are pre-sensory images. These appear at the deepest levels of dreamwork as a totally expanded sense of self — no boundaries or limits. Another way to say it is that consciousness first intrudes and then limits part of itself to the constraints of space/time. Input to the fetus is very basic at this point. Nutrient input yields a sense of getting or not getting. Emotional input from basic chemicals borrowed from mother and mother's body sensations are stored as pre-sensory images. If mother's chemistry is toxic it sends the message that the physical world may not be a safe place to be. If mother is an alcoholic, the fetus is exposed to poisonous blood. It damages self, causing it to see the world as poisonous. It is a sensory image based on the whole environment being poisonous. Or, if the moment of conception is a moment of hate, violence, or rape there is going to be a lot of energy attached to that moment of conception. The very creation of self, the very act of formation of self is based on that, whether or not these circumstances of conception are later made conscious or not. The process of personality formation covering soul is like an oyster forming a pearl around an irritant. The subsequent layers of personality that overlay on top of that take on these very early shapes. Early hormonal reactions of both mother and child are also experienced at this level. If you guide a person to this level so they are experiencing it directly, they can actually affect their hormonal balance. If you start with dreams, they sometimes heal physical problems, too. 91 When their awareness enters this level, you can help them to change some of these images. They reenter this state of consciousness and come back out to build a new sense of self, a new personality, even a new body and chemistry. If you penetrate to the primal level, you touch back into the collective matrix. In the womb there are experiences which leave imprints, such as chemical memories. As the fetus grows, it develops early sensory apparatus -- nerves — so that these memories are stored now as basic sensations. These are pre-visual sensations. This is usually a very basic visceral or gut-level perception. It signals the awareness of comfort/discomfort. This awareness provides the earliest sense of value for physical existence. Is it nurturing and friendly, or does it abandon and reject the well-being of the fetus? Is initial sensory experience comfortable or uncomfortable? During the time in the womb, sensory abilities become more and more complex. So, the pre-sensory level takes on the form of colors and heat, without any visual form or imagery. The impression is of drifting things, maybe a void. Very subtle sensations, color, and elusive impressions characterize this level. Clients have trouble describing what they are experiencing in the dreamwork when they reach this deep level. It is based on very early experience. It is a conceptual experience, a womb-like experience. It is so basic it comes before the brain is even formed, so it is totally raw. The genetic consciousness is acting on the genetic material supplied by the mother and father. Following the laws of genetics, it creates a physical being which can sense and interact with material reality. As the embryo grows new senses are added to visceral awareness including sound, sense of color, and images, etc. Memories of space/time consciousness are stored in this way. It is still an undifferentiated sense of being. The psychic consciousness is creating the various aspects of the energy body. They are connected to the physical body through such structures as the ego, the astral body, and the meridian system. Our conscious awareness is usually limited to just a segment of the ego, but the ego reacts with material reality also. Around the second or third month of life, we develop nervous systems which exhibit some discrimination. Then the pre-sensory images evolve toward sensory images. A new way of storing experience is developed. In process work, people can explain their experience more in terms of the known senses, excluding vision. These sensory images still have a lot to do with throbbing, pulsations or sounds, and colors like pure red and black. This is very often the fetal heart or placenta beating rhythm. Experiences of this phase can impact how a person forms or builds a personality in a very profound way. LEVEL 4: BIRTH AND SENSORY IMAGES Birth occurs during this phase, and the sense images increase in complexity. The undifferentiated slowly becomes differentiated into images of self-world as shapes, 92 colors, tastes, motions, feelings, emotions, sounds, and acts. This is how memories are stored. Birth imagery includes tunnels and caves, feeling pushed or expelled. As the differentiation sense grows, the perception of I and Not-I, and sense drives come into awareness. Comfort/discomfort perception continues and becomes even more acute. Another impression becomes perceivable which we will term EMPATHY. Images begin to take definite shape via sound, taste, odor, etc. The birth experience may be stored deep in the subconscious, and sometimes becomes the subject of a dream. Frequently these dreams come up in midlife when psychological re-birth becomes an inner urge or drive of personal evolution. The original birth experience can characterize or color the rebirth experience, whether it comes through dreams or process work. For example, one client who was delivered by Caesarian section had the following dream, which for her amalgamated the images of both birth and rebirth. "CRA WL-AWAY": I'm with a group outside looking at a house. We watch a person struggling to get through a hole or opening in the foundation. There are lots of comments about WHY he's having such a hard time. We go inside and look around (apparently there's some problem). For some reason the men in the group are going somewhere, in or out of the house, to do something. Something happens (explosion or earthquake or something) and the problem is much worse, and there is little or no light. I tell them that I will go and look for the/a way out, the problem or something. I go down a hallway (with another female, closely, quietly and apprehensively behind me). king it for some safety reasons or something.//^ have some kind of illumination (not very bright). The hall changes into a smaller passageway and then very small, like the crawl- way beneath a house, and it gets smaller all the time. The one behind me gets more frightened and pushes closer making it a lot harder for me to move along at all. I come to a slight turn on my right and find that the regular way out is blocked by cement blocks and rubble. Passage through there is impossible, and there is absolutely no way to turn around and go back!!! The one behind me is so close and won't move back at all. We remember that WE, the group, have something to do with blocking it for some safety reasons or something. The passage is so very small at this point. I noticed that there is a small crack in the foundation to my left and behind my shoulder, but I've passed it a little and it's sooo small I'm not sure that my head will even fit through it! For the first time I'm scared! The one behind me crowds even closer if that's possible, and makes it even more difficult! WE CAN’T GO BACK...OR FORWARD!!! There is no more illumination...our only chance is to go through the crack. I squirm around and maneuver so that I can try to squeeze out. I manage to get my head near the crack and put it up to it...and all of a sudden I'm in the bright light on the outside. I look back at the crack and remember the other having a hard time getting out. 93 The first thing that came to my mind and feelings was that I had just been born, again? I was in an adult body all the time even when I got back into the light, on the outside. LEVEL 5: THE DEVELOPING SENSES During the first months of life, the eyes and ears develop completely, and the brain discriminates more and more. As time goes on, we get more and more from the senses, learning how to use them more in the outer world. We then begin to form sensory imagery. These images begin to put things together, to create associations and natural metaphors. The organism strives to define self. Primal images of world-self begin to form. Body ego and much of personality ego will reflect this shape, (perhaps contour is a better image). The edges may be softened by later experiences but it still will determine the base shape of the personality/body. This level is the basis of physical disease and susceptibility. It is the level of predisposition. At this time using a combination of genes, even basic body chemistry, processes are set in motion which may result later in cancer, heart disease, etc. Here it becomes established and becomes a strong potential. At this stage of development, material reality is filtered through both body and ego- mind. At first, it is mostly just impressions of images of the immediate environment. It forms a layer of sensory images of the world, a base range, against which all future ones are checked. Clients often describe imagery of this level as a paradoxical union of opposites, such as a full/empty or hot/cold feeling. There are also many extrasensory impressions from this level, which are often contradictory. Language is virtually inadequate to describe these dichotomies. More structuring of the original chaotic consciousness of pre-conception orders a personal reality as the baby develops. Senses become discrete perceptions. Sight, taste, and odor become differentiated rather than melded in synesthesia. There is finally a glimmering of the separation of mother and self. This takes place at the pre-intellectual, pre-conceptual stage, but the awareness comes into being and is the seed of ego development. Some people's entire basis for a fear of the world is the image of an angry face. When they go back, they eventually discover it is usually a parent's angry face, maybe just impatiently telling the child to go back to sleep. But the child sees that annoyance, senses that, and internalizes that anger. A small child stores that impression, as a physical and psychological (psychophysical) gestalt. It becomes encapsulated in that vision of the angry face, which seems to reappear in later situations, creating the same automatic response of disproportionate fear. All angry authority figures somehow become that angry parent. Each repetition reinforces the image. Later, the person walks in to see the boss, and he's got an angry face, so immediately the individual folds. 94 Psychology is good at sometimes reaching down to this level to resolve those issues by helping the person realize there are alternatives. There is usually an image that is stored in the mind that is a complete image, that has emotions attached to it. These are olfactory, visual, auditory, and kinesthetic sensations that encode its essence. It involves more aspects of your total sensory being, or sense of being. These images can be processed with NLP techniques such as the "re-frame" and "change history," but the results are limited and sometimes do not "stick." Changing imagery at this level is not necessarily the whole answer, because it is just a reinforcement of more primary belief systems. LEVEL 6: MYTHOLOGICAL LAYER Underlying the ego layers of personality is the mythological phase of development. It directly underlies the personal belief system, and is instrumental in its formation. The other component is experiential—the interaction of the personal and transpersonal. Much of the appeal in myth derives from the fears and fantasies every child experiences as part of the way he defines himself. This is also the level of fairy tales and heroic epics. Our role models and cultural heroes glean their appeal from their identity with the mythic characters. The structure of the heroic, upwardly-striving ego also resonates with this imagery which is influential in its formation. One of the realizations we need as modern people is that this heroic, perfectionistic, overachieving ego model may rob us of our humanness. There are many other, gentler archetypal tales. A favorite fairy tale can condition an entire life. Many a Cinderella laments that, " one day my prince will come." This is the old rescue fantasy. Our youth-oriented society asserts it will "never grow up," and rejects wholeness by disowning its shadow like Peter Pan. Another example of the mythological layer is the tale of the Emperor's New Clothes. Embarrassment might be encoded something like this: "Somebody pulled a fast one on me. Here I am walking aboutnaked, and someone pulled a fast one on me. " And that is how we store it; as a child that is how we experience that. This is why fairy tales enchant children through identification with the metaphors behind the story. The identification begins with personal experience and is validated in the story — "Hey, that’s what I felt, thought, imagined, believed. " For example, this embarrassment ("bare-ass" ment) might have its precedence in earlier childhood when parents insisted a child perform. They may want something simple, like saying DaDa, but the child can become the object of derision. When he can't perform, and receives ridicule instead of praise, the small child may feel betrayed, exposed, and abandoned emotionally. Many incidents repeat the essence of the experience, basically confirming the more basic existential beliefs. How many adults today would freeze with fear asked to speak before a small group of people, because of shaming in school? 95 These levels tend to be stages of memory stored in images of the senses we pay the most attention to. As we get deeper and deeper in the mythic script, we begin to get into other senses than the normal five we use to deal with the outer world. This is the psychic aspect of psyche, and involves phenomena like telepathy, clairvoyance, and synchronicity. In dreamhealing practice, these are spontaneous aspects of the co-consciousness journey. They arise within a no-boundaries or no limiting expectations condition. LEVEL 7: BELIEF SYSTEMS AND INTELLECT In the more surface level of belief systems, beliefs are stored in the form of actual memories, stories which are almost mythologies. They become mythologized over time much like our real culture heroes become the stuff of legends. To continue our previous example, the memory of being laughed at in class can develop into a memory of the world as a place that is always going to ask me to do things and then laughs at me for doing them. This embarrassment can lead to introversion or avoidant behavior, and negative self-talk about self-esteem. Images stored around that memory become a whole belief system about "who I am" and "what the world is," and "how I behave." At the sensory level colors, sounds of throbbing, warmth/cold, comfort/discomfort are typical experiences we hear about in session. As we continue to grow we add intellect to this imagery and begin to form belief systems. They are our minds' way of making sense and putting things into a structure. A desire for order is basic to our survival instinct. Structure gives us an easier way of dealing with things. Belief systems form as we begin to make a structure with basic existential beliefs and later fairy tale beliefs. As abstracting ability begins (programmed genetically), the images take on aspects of a dynamic story with interactions. These are fairy tales and basic personal mythology- archetypal shapes and sequences. This is the level of Freud's id. Identity is a key issue here. The sense of who one is leads directly to emotions, thought patterns, and behaviors. Of course, behaviors always feedback and reinforce the beliefs, which reinforce the behaviors, ad infinitum unless there is intervention. As perception sharpens and words and ideas are processed by the brain to add to sensory impressions, word images are formulated and create the very first and most basic belief system against which all future experiences are compared. In later life the touchstone of familiarity is generally chosen over well-being, so this imprint is extremely important. In T.A. this layer of beliefs is known as life scripts. This thinking activity later becomes a resource for the adult self. Conceptualization and generalization begins and images of experience form the foundation of belief systems. As the brain begins to develop abstract ability, it tries to organize experiences. First comes the level of personal image, the mythology of infinite self-god, a solid world 96 relationship. As the intellect develops still further ability to abstract, there is emergence of a belief structure about self. This is the earliest form of SCRIPT DECISION. This level summarizes all experiences of self-world interactions. It may take on attributes eventually of several "intellectual" belief systems as intellect cannot describe the entire sensory gestalt by a single belief. Belief systems give rise to how we react (feel, think, and emote). As we perceive what is around us we compare it to our stored impression of what reality is, what is I and Not-I. We determine its nature, make a judgement, and this determines how we think-feel, and this in turn determines how we behave. These games and patterns manifest on the ego level. LEVEL 8: EMOTIONS The unique emotional reactions of the individual are directly based in the belief system. It gives rise to certain emotional patterns which are coupled with or complexed around each belief. For example, a "mother-complex" conditions all other relationships and keeps the inner child infantile. A "father-complex" may inspire a rebellious attitude which also creates dysfunction in other areas of life. Each belief generates an emotional response that surrounds it. This forms the core layer of the ego. We can speculate that all experiences that separate us from universal self are uncomfortable, chaotic, painful, and fearsome to some extent. Sorrow, pain, and suffering are inherent in the nature of a self-reflective consciousness. Both psychologists and mystics share this notion. This pain of alienation leads us to question, wonder, and experience awe. Fear "freezes" us rather than allowing our energy to flow in a balanced manner. In fear, the I is hurt by the Not-I, even at the earliest ontological point. Pain helps us define I and Not-I; a hot stove lets us know right away. Circumstantial pain may not be useful at the time. But pain can lead to fear, which leads to a belief which complexes as a fear of pain. In dreamhealing the remedy is to go through the fear and pain to get to the heart of the multi-sensory image. Past the fear and chaos is a peaceful, calm center, a special place, a transcendent state which is naturally healing. In Transactional Analysis this layer is represented in the racket system and emotional aspects of games. LEVEL 9: THOUGHT PATTERNS Almost back to superficial reality, we find that emotions in turn give rise to the thought patterns that cluster around these emotions -- belief clusters (complexes). This is the next ego layer of thinking, which may not be an entirely separate layer from emotions. They interact in lock-step. 97 For example: Through the senses I trigger 'belief system A' which triggers the set emotional response. At the same time, by my intellect, I give myself the thoughts that rationalize the belief which is also combined with the emotional trigger or particularbehavior response. The body tells the mind it is not safe, and the mind iterates to the body that it is not safe. Through this mutual negative feedback the whole individual is destabilized. According to Transactional Analysis., the adult self uses the game patterns and the script patterns. The organizational activity is the parent self. At a higher level of organization this results in individual complexes. So, levels 7-10 are script-game-racket patterns. We can further speculate that when we experience self as "I/Not-I" we are into the above. LEVEL 10: BEHAVIORS This level gives rise to behaviors and the use of the body. Behavior is the interface of the organism with the world. So are the senses, but they are inwardly directed. Behavior is an outwardly directed dynamic. This creates a reaction in the outer world which the senses can perceive and then back to re-evolve belief systems. If this feedback system is flawed or closed, or based on false assumptions, negative beliefs about the self become self-reinforcing. In this manner we create a solid reality that is familiar, predictable, and one with which we can cope. And we find ourselves now back at the surface, having dived deep and discovered experientially the nature of the pure soul and chaotic consciousness. Changes at these deepest levels effect even the surface layer of behavior in a sure and profound way which unfolds over time. THE SOURCE OF DREAMS IN THIS MODEL IS THE MOST PRIMAL OR RUDIMENTARY LEVEL OF THE PSYCHE. They are a pure spontaneous phenomenon of the brain's experience of itself, turning itself on and off during sleep, sorting and processing input from without and within. They originate in the collective consciousness level as pure consciousness which, as it passes through the layers of self, picks up shapes and plot at all levels to create the dream as we experience it (symbols and plot). Dreams may be the leakage, or extrusion, of this consciousness to the surface level. This basic, healthy, undifferentiated, collective God-force within percolates into the upper levels of our consciousness. And as the dream images filter through each of the levels, they take on shapes which become the images and the plot you see at the surface of the dream. The strength of dreamhealing is that it gives us the shapes of the dis-ease, the discomforts, the shapes of fears, and of pathology. Playing with just the images of a dream tells us a whole lot about different aspects of the ego, such as how we get along. The dream symbols are portals which you can follow back down into deeper levels. Awareness which has made this journey gains a self-transformative power which can be applied to recreating the personality and changing behavior. Then awareness is 98 changed fundamentally. THE LOST SOUL IS LOUND, AND RETRIEVED, AND RESTORED. A new sense of wholeness emerges, which is reflected in the personality. Dreamhealing takes the sense of self (-awareness) back into symbols to its root levels without interpretation. The interpretation has led in the past to distortion of the information or message from the primal source. The surface level of dream is reflected by plot and symbols. Freud and Jung tended to interpret and intellectualize about dream reality. Fritz Peris approached the dream experientially, with the goal of unifying the elements. Peris remained at the ego levels in his dreamwork. But now the dreamer can learn directly, experientially that (s)he is all parts of the dream. CHAPTER 5 SPECULATIONS ON THE CREATIVE CONSCIOUSNESS PROCESS ABSTRACT: We can speculate on certain aspects of the Creative Consciousness Process. We describe it in theoretical terms that unite many previously unassociated elements. It is sort-of the unified field theory of psychology. But we stress this process is not a theory, but an experiential phenomenon. This process seems to repeat itself at all levels of scale, like the fractals of nonlinear dynamics. It seems to have an over-riding purpose and intent shown in the progressive movement of evolution. It is reflected in the nature of dreams as a meaningful adaptive process which facilitates survival. CCP can help us gain a deeper understanding of our Personal, Environmental, and Transpersonal states of consciousness. For convenience, history is often viewed as a conflict between the instinct for order and the impulse toward chaos. Both are necessary: both are manifestations of the need to survive. Without order, nothing exists: without chaos, nothing grows. And yet the struggle between them sheds more blood than any other war. The instinct for order is an expression of humankind's devout desire for safety (which permits nurture), for stability (which permits education), for predictability (which permits one thing to be built on another) — for equations of cause and effect simple enough to be relied upon. Indeed, without resistance to change, growth itself would be impossible: resistance to change creates safe, stable, predictable environments in which change can accumulate productively. The instinct for order is therefore aggressive. It actively opposes any alteration of circumstance, any variation of perspective, any hostility of environment or intention. It fights to create and defend the conditions it seeks. The impulse toward chaos is a manifestation of humankind's inbred knowledge that the best way to survive any danger is to run away from it. The instinct focuses on the resources 99 of individual imagination and cunning, rather than on the potentialities of concerted action. Its most common overt expression involves an insistence upon self-determination (freedom from restriction), individual liberty (freedom from requirement), and nonconformity (freedom from cause and effect). However, such insistence is primarily a rationalization of the desire to flee — to survive by escape. Therefore the impulse toward chaos is also aggressive. The very act of escape breaks down systems of order: it contradicts safety, avoids stability, defies cause and effect. Like the instinct for order, it fights to create and defend the conditions it seeks. Nevertheless stability and predictability themselves would be impossible without chaos. Chaos exerts the pressure which requires order to shape itself accurately. Without accuracy, order would self-destruct as soon as it came into being. For these reasons, the struggle between order and chaos is eternal, necessary — and extremely expensive. By nature, human beings are at their most violent and belligerent in self-defense. The cost of their survival would be prohibitive in any less fecund universe. -Stephen R. Donaldson, FORBIDDEN KNOWLEDGE THE EDGE OF CHAOS ECHOES EVOLUTION Nonlinear dynamics is the basis of chaos theory. Chaos theory is a subset of Complex Dynamics. In the dance of order and chaos in the process of natural evolution there are three patterns: 1) an ordered, static, subcritical state; 2) a random, dynamic, supercritical state (chaos); and, 3) a complex, dynamic, critical state (true complexity). This process takes place through nonlinear dynamics. Yet chaos is only part of the behavior of complex systems. The transition, both ways, between order and chaos is the place where important shifts, changes, and developments take place. It is where evolutionary dynamics comes into place. Systems performing a range of simple tasks can flexibly adapt rapidly simply by accumulating useful variations. In other words, they can make creative "choices." More and more science speaks in terms of systems and describes interactions in terms of systems theory. Human beings are one of the most complex, dynamic systems we know. Systems science also applies to the study of relationship at each level of a human system, including cell, organ, organism, group organization, society, and psyche It relates to the personal, environmental, and transpersonal self. Current research indicates that both nonliving and living systems seem to evolve toward a boundary between order and randomness. They seem to naturally evolve away from both extremes of complete order and complete randomness. Echoing evolution, there is a drive in the natural world toward complexity, which creates the need for adaptation. There are patterns and fundamental principles in the way various systems organize themselves, learn, remember, evolve, adapt and persist 100 and eventually disintegrate and disappear. There are varying degrees of complexity in systems, each building on what has gone before. The study of complexity goes beyond the explorations of chaos theory, which provides the mathematical tools for the study of complex dynamical systems. Complex adaptive systems from single-celled organisms, to individuals, to societies learn and adapt to changing conditions in the environment with which they interface. Chromosomes endow us with encoded offensive and defensive strategies, including the prospect of cooperation. Positive and negative feedback, both external and internal is a complex dynamic system. Input is both experiencial and self-generated. There is evidence to show that self-organized criticality plays a role in many complex systems, from chemistry to geology and perhaps biology. Darwin never suspected the power of self-organization in conjunction with natural selection. If we look at the "edge of chaos" which self-organizing systems naturally evolve toward we find four plausible principles, as expressed by Stuart Kaufmann of Los Alamos National Laboratory (SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, Jan. 1993): 1) A system goes through a phase transition from order to randomness if the strength of the interaction between interconnected agents is gradually increased. Intensification. Dis¬ ease. 2) A system can perform the most sophisticated computations at the boundary between order and randomness. Adaptive agents can develop good solutions to extraordinarily difficult problems. Transition. Dissolution. 3) Complex adaptive systems tend to evolve toward the boundary between order and chaos. Liminality. Solution. 4) Organisms change how strongly they interact with others in such a way that they reach the boundary between order and randomness, thereby maximizing the average fitness of the organisms. Dynamic adaptation. Stabilization. So, amplifying a situation, intensifying it, leads to de-stabilization. This leads to a phase transition (bifurcation). Passing through and beyond the threshold of chaos, the system de-structures which allows the new adaptation to emerge. Order is self-generated from chaos. Each of us has access to limited resources, and our survival strategies are encoded in our genetic material and nervous systems. We can change our strategy, individually and collectively, in an attempt to maximize our fitness, which can arguably be defined as the chance we will survive. We have strategies that yield fitness levels, depending on whether we are in a phase of ordered (subcritical), chaotic (supercritical), or complex (critical) existence. Kaufmann claims that "...the highest mean fitness is at the phase transition between order and chaos. By selecting an appropriate strategy we can tune our coupling to the invironment to whatever value suits us best. If we adjust thhe coupling to our own 101 advantage, we will reach the boundary between order and randomness — the regime of peak a verage fitness." Kaufmann says that "complex adaptive systems adapt to and on the edge of chaos. It now begins to appear that systems in the complex regime can carry out and coordinate the most complex behavior, can adapt more readily and can build the most useful models of their environments. I have this feeling that there is something very general going on about how far from equilibrium systems have organized themselves. I don't know what that something is yet. But I can taste it." Dreams are complex dynamic systems. Modern research tells us they are influential in adaptation by processing short-term memory information into long-term storage. Dreams help us survive. They take us into that edge of chaos each and every night. They are uncensored messages from the twilight zone of chaos-order, reaching into our awareness and communicating with us at the most sensory levels imaginable. According to neuroscientist, Jonathan Winson (SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, Nov. 1990): Based on recent findings in my own and other neuroscientific laboratories, I propose that dreams are indeed meaningful. Studies of the hippocampus (a brain structure crucial to memory), of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and of a brain wave called theta rhythm suggest that dreaming reflects a pivotal aspect of the processing of memory. In particular, studies of theta rhythm in subprimate animals have provided an evolutionary clue to the meaning of dreams. They appear to be the nightly record of a basic mammalian memory process: the means by which animals form strategies for survival and evaluate current experience in light of those strategies. The existence of this process may explain the meaning of dreams in human beings. Later in the article, he reiterates and amplifies: Dreams may reflect a memory-processing mechanism inherited from lower species, in which information important for survival is reprocessed during REM sleep. This information may constitute the core of the unconscious. Because animals do not possess language, the information they process druing REM sleep is necessarily sensory. Consistent with our early mammalian origins, dreams in humans are sensory, primarily visual. Dreams do not take the form of verbal narration. Also in keeping with the role REM sleep played in processing memories in animals, there is no functional necessity for this material to become conscious. Consciousness arose later in evolution in humans. But neither is there any reason for the material of dreams not to reach consciousness [as Freud alleged]. Therefore, dreams can be remembered—most readily if a wakening occurs during or shortly after a REM sleep period. Consistent with evolution and evidence derived from neuroscience and reports of dreams, I suggest that dreams reflect an individual's strategy for survival. The subjects of dreams are broad-ranging and complex, incorporating self-image, fears, insecurities, strengths, grandiose ideas, sexual orientation, desire, jealousy and love. 102 Dreams clearly have a deep psychological core.. .1 propose that the unconscious is a cohesive, continually active mental structure that takes note of life's experiences and reacts according to its own scheme of interpretation. Dreams are not diguised as a consequence of repression. Their unusual character is a result of the complex associations that are culled from memory. CREATIVE CONSCIOUSNESS PROCESS AS A META THEORY Graywolf s quest to better understand the nature of healing led him to develop SECURE dream work. Unlike lucid dreaming or interpretations, the point is not to take the ego into the dreamworld. We need to bring the dream images into our conscious awareness and life. Dreamhealing was the natural expression of his experiences with both psychology and shamanic work—a practical method that represented the Shaman/Therapist model. The results of this new approach to dream work were mind-boggling, and seemed to reveal a natural evolutionary aspect inherent in the journey to the edge of chaos. The method and maps he was developing from the work seemed to formulate more than just a practice or healing technique. He began to see it as a specific case for what seemed to be a deeper and more universal process. His first task became to formulate a more general theory to explain the processes and results that he observed. The cutting edge of mathematics and physics shows us a theory that bridges and joins all the sciences as well as embraces the mystic and spiritual. It teaches that perhaps we don't always need to fear and avoid chaos. In fact that is impossible since it is an integral aspect of natural order and change. Chaos theory reveals through computer graphics that there is great beauty hidden in the heart of chaos. And it teaches that all chaos eventually yields to deeper orders. Indeed, there are chains of order that reach into the infinite depths of pure chaos. Its implication is that we exist in a twilight zone between structure and chaos, and constantly flow back and forth between the two. It is the permanence of either that is the illusion. These words also describe what we have learned about the nature of consciousness and the healing process in dream journeys. Chaos is a very personal experience. We relate to it viscerally as well as emotionally and intellectually. It often begins as a crisis that draws us into a seething cauldron of events, and tosses us about at random until all that we have known or counted on disintegrates. Then as chaos theory predicts, we find that in passing through the chaos we have somehow come to a new sense of order and self. In mythology, it is the archetypal journey of the hero or heroine. We are surrounded by chaos, indeed we always have been. But we create illusions of order, and then come to confuse that with reality. It is the loss of our illusions that seems so frightening to us when we perch on the edge of chaos. Yet it is relinquishing our illusions that can set us free and empower us. 103 This modeling of chaotic consciousness took several interim steps: developing a new ego or personality model, new consciousness models, and a theory of dis-ease process. Eventually it led to a more generalized understanding of what we now call the "Creative Consciousness Process," (CCP). It is a theory which also describes a number of other depth therapies as well as many other phenomena. CCP theory is consistent with—in fact, it is really just another expression of—the new sciences of chaos theory and CDS (complex dynamical systems), as well as quantum and relativity theories. It is their expression in the human psychophysical organism. Graywolf s intuitive perceptions about the nature of reality as witnessed in co¬ consciousness journeys has been echoed in scientific pursuits including evolution, fluid dynamics, chemistry, cosmology, sociology, biology, and medicine. Within CCP, the ego or personality model integrates, and is in general consistent with most ego models, including Freudian, Jungian, Gestalt, T.A., Humanistic, Family Systems Theory, etc. Counselors and therapists from all schools of thought find an affinity for it, because it dovetails with their own models, theoretically and in practice. Yet it also goes further than most in integrating the spiritual or transpersonal aspect of the human condition, and providing a practical method. Growing from an experientially-based process, CCP theory is highly existential in its orientation. But this is not the old existentialism with its fundamental assumption of alienation. This existential view sees man as deeply rooted in the ecological ground of the universe. The old psychological notions of man as an isolated, alienated, fragmented ego floating hopelessly in the vast emptiness of the void of space sounds very much like the old mythic theme of the king/ego in the wasteland. This notion was rooted in the cultural and scientific belief of the time (2nd law of thermodynamics) that entopy rules the universe, which would end in heat-death. In this mechanistic model, life, mankind, and mind were meaningless aberations in nature. This view creates existential angst. But in the last few decades this old mechanistic paradigm has been radically disproven in many scientific fields. A brief look at even non-controversial scientific ideas shows that we are deeply rooted in nature and the cosmos in the most fundamental way. And whatever it is, we are that. Scientists are beginning to speak in more poetic metaphors about the "life" of the cosmos, and we see the fundamental form of consciousness in the behavior of sub-atomic entities. The ENVIRONMENTAF SELF is rooted more deeply than the surface pathologies. It is our primal relationship with the natural environment, which extends to the farthest reaches of the universe and down into the deepest depths of the sub-quantum reality. The sense of primal connectedness promotes a new ecological vision — ecosophy. We are not separate. When we experience the TRANSPERSONAL SELF, we realize we don't end where our skin does. We are not discrete from the environment. Our brainwaves are out there, we radiate heat, we are constantly emitting gases and other molecules. We intermingle with the environment in unconscious ways—at the level of being our environment. There are tremendous implications if dreams can help us do that. 104 In the consciousness journeys, people become the mother planet, the molten core of magma at her heart, or they feel themselves making mountains. This has major implications for philosophy and how we view ourselves. It heralds a basic philosophical change in how we view ourselves and reality. When we realize we are this transpersonal self, carried to its natural conclusion, we are basically interacting with the entire universe at some level or another. Cosmology tells us that only a universe of a certain age and size can support the growth of life-bearing planets such as Earth. The universe must be within a certain temperature range, and subject to certain laws. We live in such a fortuitous situation, and are a natural product of that evolutionary course — the "fruit" of the process. There appears to be purpose and intent behind all systems, revealed by the choice to cooperate. Experience of the transpersonal means going back below the ego, into this infinite place, back into this basic formless consciousness. We become All, become infinite possibility. It completes the circle. Chaos, the mirror image of a constantly decaying universe (entropy), shows us that a simultaneous creative process is going on which has to do with consciousness. This negentropic principle is the matrix of evolution. Of course it is an infinite process—constantly creating itself and destroying itself at all levels. Dreams reflect that, and so does the natural philosophy emerging from the New Sciences. This philosophy incorporates the human condition, rather than vilifying or pushing it away. Chaos helps us feel our way through an unstable world. The impact on our planet and in terms of our culture might find us defining ourselves differently. This is being expressed now in the Gaea Hypothesis and the Anthropic theory in cosmology. This approach is born out by shamanic and mystical worldviews. It is poetic, yet likely to end up being "the Truth." When we are not viewing ourselves as isolated organisms, we can experience multiple states of consciousness. A simple change in perspective, with experience to back it up, can allow a person to move from a feeling of isolation, anxiety, and alienation to one of connectedness, rootedness, and belonging. It is a relative viewpoint, one of many ways of viewing the world and our place within it. We can experience a sense of that multiple system Being which constitues the universe through experiencing various states of consciousness.
CCP theory maps and describes areas of the subconscious and collective unconscious that Freud and Jung were only able to understand through inference and indirect methods. CCP theory may provide a better means of understanding the formation, structure and processes of the sub- and collective consciousness states.
This process suggests a means to access and attain more direct multi-sensory experiences of these formerly untouchable areas and states. It provides immediate personal experience of various strata of the unconscious. It is a meta-ego model in that it explains and integrates previous ego models, but also goes beyond. The old cartographers labeled unknown regions with the phrase, "Here there be Dragons". Freud's way of saying that was "Here be the Id". 105
We have also found that CCP theory explains a large number of other healing
phenomena such as the placebo effect, which have been described and acknowledged but
never understood nor adequately explained. These phenomena include the archetypal
elements of shamanic philosophy and practice (holism, shamanic flight, magical healing,
trance, visions, spirit guides, elemental forces, etc.)
The theory seems to integrate and explain most of the mystical and spiritual elements of
healing, not just shamanism, but also alchemy, witchcraft, magic, reincarnation,
Taoism, Buddhism, and any number of other philosophies and practices. So, the theory
reflects in mysticism and philosophy, as well as bridging the gap to science.
It is based in the notion of a "Consciousness Field," which underlies all observable
reality. The holographic universe (Pribram; Bohm) is essentially a three-dimensional
image containing matter/consciousness in a single field which is projected into space.
This undifferentiated consciousness stuff or energy field interacts with other
undifferentiated energy fields such as electric, magnetic and time fields to create the
material reality within which we function—the spacetime continuum. It is virtually the
intangible essence which is the matrix of the material universe.
This consciousness field meets the criteria defined in alchemy for the Universal Solvent,
the liquid version of the Philosopher's Stone, the Panacea or cure-all. This water of life
was also called the universal medicine, elixir vitae, or "philosophical water." In
shamanism the consciousness field underlies the belief that all is alive and connected, in
a vast webwork or interconnected net of life.
Before quantum mechanics, physicists sought a material universal ether as a medium
for the propagation of light waves. The notion of the ether returns as the virtual field of
consciousness as the basis for all existence. Quantum mechanics confirms the
interrelatedness and information sharing that connects every atom in the universe. The
probability field defines which of the infinite number of possible realities comes into
existence (Schroedinger Wave).
HEALING ECHOES CREATION AND EVOLUTION
A return journey to this primal, chaotic consciousness field is a return to the state in
which realignment of physical and emotional structure occurs—the healing state.
More than being merely a method or therapy, CREATIVE CONSCIOUSNESS
PROCESS is a generalized, perhaps a meta-theory of healing. It identifies, for example,
that healing and health is a process rather than a goal or end state as it has largely been
modeled — static equilibrium or homeostasis. It further introduces the radical notion
that all healing is a creative process, a process of evolution, rather than the mere
correction of something that is wrong. This leads directly to the philosophical
implications of the theory.
CCP links consciousness to healing, and provides a new definition or concept of
consciousness itself. It provides insight on the nature of some unexplained phenomena
such as placebo and spontaneous remission. It relates all of that to the natural process
as defined by Chaos, Quantum, and Relativity theories.
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As a meta theory, it spawns a philosophy of healing as an internal, self-generated, self¬
organizing creative force. It integrates with the new natural philosophy of order/dis¬
order that is being defined in physics. Contemplating chaos and the processes that CCP
generalizes and describes soon yields notions about the nature of life and reality, and the
roles and purposes of life. These notions automatically work in the mind, readjusting
old perspectives, leading to different understandings of the nature of self, reality, and
existence.
The essence of all creation myths is revealed when we contemplate chaos theory or
watch fractal geometries unfold spectacularly beautiful nonlinear, ordered systems.
Chaos is the matrix of creativity. We intuitively sense that chaos is the ultimate state of
creativity, as our myths show. It is the philosophy that underlies evolutionary process—
indeed all processes of change and creation. It is a philosophy of reality being an
ongoing creative process from infinite possibility.
It is also a philosophy that allows contemplation of the nature of creativity itself at all
levels of reality formation. It is a philosophy that touches the essence of all religious and
scientific myths about our origin and the nature of Deity. It is a philosophy that allows
us to reclaim the other side of ourselves and reality that we have pushed away and
ignored even though it has always played a part in our lives and history: the opposite
side of order itself, chaos. Agents of chaos are also agents of creativity, and agents of
evolution. It is a philosophy that explores the mirror-side of entropy — self-renewal.
In specific terms with respect to healing it defines a new philosophical paradigm that
disease is a crisis that is presented to an organism that creates the opportunity to
dissolve the old structure and evolve into a new one, better adapted to survival. This
process is the nature of profound healing and indeed, as noted, is the process of natural
flow that creates the changing nature of reality itself. It is also evolution.
The CCP theory ties healing process to all the spiritual and scientific myths, providing a
means of seeing how they fit together. It spans the healing process from the scientific
model to mysticism, the arcane, religion and the nature of reality itself. We have been
viewing the same phenomena for centuries with the eyes of spirituality, the mystic arts,
and science, attempting to describe fundamental operational principles for what we see
and our experience of our existence. Each discipline is a translation of the subjective
experience and observation of those deeper states of consciousness.
CCP theory attempts to define or place in context, the consciousness field, a new concept
emerging in consciousness studies. It posits that what we are defining scientifically as
Chaos and this primal consciousness field are one and the same. Is this a valid
connection? Graywolf intuitively believes so, seeing it reflected in the experiential
journeys. Scientific proof? The concept of proof itself is perhaps an illusion. Go there,
and see for yourself!
Thought experiments allow us to test our theories, in principle. Einstein "rode" on a
beam of light and developed relativity theory. We can ride the stream of consciousness
back down to the most primal layers where we find chaos reigns supreme. As in thought
experiments, we can observe conceptually evidence which helps formulate and correct
theory. If the theory allows us to confirm, explain, predict, or tie in other facts that have
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been previously inexplicable, unreliable, or unrelated, it is a good workable model. CCP
theory meets this criteria.
These processes and states are directly experiencable phenomena that can be reached
and described in dream journeys and by other means. They have been described by
countless others who were attempting to convey the essence of their own deep spiritual
or healing experiences. They also have been encountered during clinical experiments
with L.S.D., in religious experiences, and as the states entered and described by those
working with alternative healers.
The Creative Consciousness Process is a meta theory of the process of natural order and
change as encountered in deep healing. It reveals our deep bond with nature. Trust the
natural process. It allows a direct-awareness type experience of the states of
consciousness we believe are responsible for healing. CCP explains a broad variety of
healing phenomena from placebo and visual imagery work to Holotropic Breathing,
T.A. Redecision and Reparenting work.
Within the broader CCP theory that evolved from Dream Journeys, we are not limited
to any specific technique or practice for healing, but use a deeper understanding of the
nature of the healing process itself to create whatever technique is needed for the client
at whatever level we are working.
For example, Graywolf s holistic practice includes using breath work and other
shamanic practices, as well as dream work, standard psychology, and allopathic and
homeopathic medical methods. In conjunction, he also employs diet and nutritional
approaches, as well as prayer, and river adventures. Each is used only if they evolve in
the course of treatment as a natural part of and reflection of whatever level of CCP and
personality is being worked on.
THE IMMUNE SYSTEM, ADAPTABILITY, AND SURVIVAL
The immune system helps an organism adapt, survive, and thrive. It is therefore an
agent of the evolutionary force. For many years science studied systems in isolation. So,
orthodox medicine considered the immune system as functioning on its own, simply
because it could not find its physical links to the brain or mind. Now those connections
have been directly observed.
Signals and chemical messengers are exchanged, and through this means the state of the
mind directly affects the state of the body and vice versa. This affect is not always
beneficial. Stress, grief, separation, isolation, and depression can suppress the immune
system. The simple expression of feelings and a sense of connectedness and community
leads to immunity.
Relaxation training, or deep relaxation, has been shown to enhance cellular immune
function. This response is part of the prophylactic nature of dreamhealing. It is deeply
refreshing, rejuvinating, yielding a sense of re-creation. Humor is also a way of coping
with the stress of life which has beneficial effects.
Dreamhealing influences the body directly through the immune system, (ref. Ernest
Rossi’s THE PSYCHOBIOLOGY OF MIND-BODY HEALING; MIND-BODY
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THERAPY by Rossi and Cheek). It may be applied as a form of preventive medicine, or
psychological self-care. It may not be self-administered but we choose to participate.
We adapt through creative choices, and one of those choices is to seek healing in
therapy.
The least we can say about dreams is that they are diagnostic. This has been noted since
ancient times, and Jung and later researchers have re-iterated it, (ref. Robert C. Smith's
"Traumatic Dreams as an Early Warning of Health Problems" in DREAMTIME AND
DREAMWORK, 1990). What comes up in the dream is shaped by the underlying dis¬
ease states, regardless of whether symptoms are present yet, or not. So, any dream, any
time is going to lead there. It might make more sense to do dreamwork before dis-ease
becomes literalized or concretized in symptoms or chronic conditions.
Regular journeying into dreams might be a part of preventive medicine. In the
beginning of therapy, dreamhealing seems to deal with very deep images. After a while
the issues are not so deeply buried, and the dreams deal with surface images again.
Once the initial images have been dissolved, we still have this tendency to create frozen
structures within ourselves. Periodic dreamwork, outside the crisis situation, helps
maintain general well being by reducing stress.
Usually, after the initial course of therapy, we don't have to go as deep. For example, in
getting into a dream early in therapy, it may take an hour. Later, it seems to happen
quicker, easier. It is right at the first or second level that the healing occurs. The lower
levels seem to be cleared out.
This honoring of our dreams and recognition of their role in our adaptation has a deeply
spiritual aspect. The acknowledgement of the spiritual side of ourselves is an on-going
process, not just something we do in a crisis. Regular dreamhealing helps us resolve
internal conflicts and thereby reduces stress.
If we approach the healing process, crisis or state of disease—not as something that is
wrong—but as a process of evolving into a new form, that process of recreating oneself
makes a difference as to what happens to us. We see the disease process in a new way.
A small change could make a phenomenal difference in outcomes, which are most often
attached to expectations. This gives us a model for a positive expectation. It is not a big
implication, perhaps, yet a profound one.
We are no longer helpless and hopeless, not heroically curative, trying desperately to
"get rid of our symptoms." The healing potential is there within our system all the time,
if we let go and open to it. There is evidence we can strengthen the mind/body link in
adaptive ways.
Does the brain "know" about the immune system? On certain levels, yes, definitely.
The brain is just one of the organs of the body coordinated through the immune system.
The brain regulates the body to preserve the well being of the whole organism. It directs
the body's responses based on external and internal changes.
Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) has shown that the mind directly influences the immune
system and therefore well being. The immune system is one of the most complex in the
body, consisting of many different cells and molecules distributed throughout the entire
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body. The state of the immune system is the heart of resistance of the organism, and
functionally more important than exposure to disease agents or toxins.
The immune system interfaces through nerves which come into direct contact with its
mobile agents. The immune system is not autonomous, but it does have its own decision¬
making capacities. It adapts and learns. We can even be conditioned to produce
specific antibodies, or not, through experience and internal states. When suppressed,
the immune system does not fend off invasion, and the process of natural selection runs
its course.
It gets instructions from the brain and talks to the brain. It has its own memory and can
instantly create new cells in countless combinations. It responds to the mental state of
the individual and influences whether we adapt and survive to our stressful conditions,
or not. When we are not adapting, for example to grief or stress, the mind/body makes a
choice toward greater vulnerability.
The link between severe psychological stress and the immune function has been
established. Under stressful conditions, we learn to suppress our immune functions.
Dreamhealing breaks this cycle, providing positive support, which has been shown to
buffer the effects of stress. Experiments have shown that our immune systems can be
trained to defend more vigilantly or to relax defenses.
The immune system is essentially another sensory organ, which digests outside
information and regulates the body accordingly, by responding in a variety of ways. It
senses what is foreign to the body and normally defends against it. It is always scanning,
and always on full alert, ever-vigilant and ready to spring into action with a cascade of
reactions. Sometimes it over-reacts to harmless agents (allergins) or attacks the native
cells of the body (autoimmune disorders). Yet this miraculous system which patrols
constantly can make millions of duplicate cells on demand.
Does a healthier immune system influence us medically? There is evidence we can
voluntarily improve our immune function through visualization, and dreamhealing goes
even deeper. Perhaps it won't cure a full-blown tumor. But a small one, or any group of
pathological cells, might easily be sent into remission through the chemical and
autoimmune systems of the body following the positive input from the mind.
Changes in the immune system may be small, but when their source is primal chaos,
these effects are pumped up into large-scale changes in the organism. By "getting into"
the disease, rather than "getting rid of" it we follow nature's call to healing~to notice
our disease and open ourselves to new patterns, new awareness. Healing is a process,
not a state that can be attained. This natural philosophy almost eliminates the idea of a
cure—but there is a curative process. "Curing" is symptom-oriented, while healing is
person-oriented.
DREA MH EALING IN SOCIETY
We can speculate on how dreamhealing and CCP might percolate into the fabric of our
society, our culture. Some of it may take place at a grassroots, self-help level. But an
infra-structure could also be developed.
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Some venues for dreamhealing, other than standard therapy include its inclusion in
health spas and hospitals and nursing homes.
The plethora of health spas are well-placed to include a dreamhealer among their
numbers. Doing so would essentially bring back, or re-create, the old Aesculapian
dream temples. Retreats and sanctuaries in beautiful natural settings provide that sense
of protection and safety which facilitates healing.
In terms of hospitalization it could be used as preventive medicine and for recovery. It
might fit in while waiting for surgery, or coming out of it. Nurses might be trained in
the process. After surgery, dreams could be useful for healing of the body, and the
healing of scars. Since cellular changes take place with imagery work, dreamhealing
might go even deeper. It might cut down hospital stays, bringing down the high cost of
medical treatment.
For example, with heart bypass surgery, dreamhealing could be useful for implimenting
deep lifestyle changes. Our self is our lifestyle, so we have to give up ourselves in that
sense to change. Techniques like biofeedback for stress management only change the
behavior, not the underlying images, much less clear them. We can use dreams as a
process of changing lifestyle—the dreams lead there.
Yet our medical system is highly invested in the technology of healing. The mythical
split in healing approaches is basically Apollonian vs. Dionysian—technology vs. nature.
It is a question of intervention and technology compared with deepening our
relationship to the greater whole.
Lots of money, hardware and jobs are tied up in the medical system, which it is loath to
give up. Doctors don't have much stake in referring clients for alternative therapies.
Dreamhealing relies on the patient himself to initiate the healing process, which the
medical team merely supports.
This is where medicine began, but it has become something else. The doctor used to "set
the scene" for healing, but didn't claim that the treatment was the thing. To change
current philosophy might mean resistance from the medical establishment, drug
companies, etc.
If chaos theory ties into the healing process, it would dramatically change medicine's
role to a supportive one. The stabilizing is done by medicine, while real healing happens
internally. For example, viruses adapt, mutate, and resist our drug therapies. The more
we fight them, the stronger they become.
Medicine is a static, causal system (we do this and that happens...), while a virus is a
chaotic system. So it adapts and ultimately overcomes any medical treatment not based
in chaos. Medical science is all protocol, prescriptive. Dreamhealing is chaos based. It
follows a homeopathic principle of healing like with like. Homeopathy is a system of
using minute doses of medicines that produce the symptoms of the disease treated.
CHAOS, CONSCIOUSNESS, AND BRAIN WAVES
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Recent developments in the theory of nonlinear dynamics that have been applied to
brain theory have substantially expanded our understanding of the neural mechanisms
by which large-scale patterns of brain activity are self-organized. Walter J. Freeman is
the leading researcher in this area.
In particular, these new concepts give us fresh insight into the neurodynamics of goal¬
seeking behavior (purpose, intent), how it emerges within the brain, and how it regulates
the influx of sensory information into the cerebrum. It has become clear that the
stimulus-response paradigm fails to address the most basic properties of biological
intelligence, which are its autonomy and its creative powers.
According to Freeman, chaotic dynamic systems not only destroy information, they also
create it. Brains are chaotic systems that do not merely "filter" and "process" sensory
input; they use sensory stimuli as "instructions" to create perceptual patterns that
replace the stimuli.
When a neural activity pattern emerges by chaotic dynamics that express a drive toward
a goal, it has two facets. One is in the form of a motor command that activates the
descending motor systems. The other is a set of messages to the central sensory systems
that prepare those systems for the consequences of motor actions that are about to take
place (reafference).
Philosophical and psychological considerations suggest that the cyclical process of
emergent goal-seeking, reafference, and sensory feedback constitute the basis for what
we perceive as subjective consciousness.
This cycle suggests a further inference: the physiological basis for our human conception
of CAUSE AND EFFECT lies in the mechanism of reafference; namely, that each
intended action is accompanied by motor command ("cause") and expected consequence
("effect") so that the notion of causality lies at the most fundamental level of our
capacity for acting and knowing.
This trait results in the blocking of sensory stimuli by self-organized activity patterns
that are contingent on past experience, present motivational state, and expectancy of
future action.
The intuition of causality is essential for human understanding and action but it cannot
validly be applied to the process by which the intuition emerges. So, consciousness
cannot be said to have a cause, an origin, a seat, or beginning in time and place within
the brain. It is fallacious to seek for its cause, location, or time of onset in phylogeny and
ontology.
According to Freeman, consciousness is bidirectional: it simultaneously reaches out into
the world as an expression of the brain's goal-directed dynamics and folds in reflexively
upon its own operations.
Consciousness is always in rapid change, for it marks the place where the formed
disposition and the immediate situation touch and interact. It is the continuous
readjustment of self and the world in experience.
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"Consciousness " is the most acute and intense in the degree of readjustments that are
demanded, approaching the nil as the contact is frictionless and interaction fluid. It is
turbid when meanings are undergoing reconstruction in an undetermined direction, and
becomes clear as a decisive meaning emerges.
John Dewey, 1896
The concept of EMERGENCE is central to any understanding of consciousness and the
brain. As a technical term, it describes a process by which order appears
"spontaneously" within a system (Prigogine, 1980). When many elements are allowed to
mingle, they form patterns among themselves as they interact.
This emergence of order from a network of interacting parts may appear sudden to a
casual observer, but it is in fact the result of a sequence of small steps, each based on a
preceding step and leading to the next—a continuum, in other words. What seems fast to
us may to the process itself be slow and vice versa.
Brains are self-organizing. Behavior is determined not by the motor and sensory
cortices found in the outer brain shell but also by systems inside the shell. The
combination of corollary discharge with the burst of sensory input, both proprioceptive
and exteroceptive, produces a transformation of neural activity patterns that have been
established by and within the cortex.
It is this transformation then that we call perception. It is also molded by the
innumerable influences during past experiences with the same and similar stimuli. That
is, the basis for remembering a particular experiences lies embedded in the modified
strengths of neural connections.
Order emerges from chaos on limbic command. The world image is built on ordered
patterns that emerge from the chaos in which the brain is immersed by its own hand.
Everywhere throughout the brain is disorder—chaos—from which order emerges.
There has been considerable interest lately in the role played by chaotic generators in
the origin of neural activity. This kind of activity, although it looks erratic, random, and
unpredictable, does have structure. We should not think of brain waves as "noise", but
consider them as manifesting forms of nerve cell activity deliberately generated and
shaped to meet the brain's requirements.
CHAOS IS AN INTRINSIC PROPERTY OF LARGE MASSES OF NEURONS
INTERACTING WITH OTHERS OF A SIMILAR KIND AND THUS IS A
CHARACTERISTIC OF THE NEURAL SYSTEM AS AN INTERACTIVE WHOLE.
A chaotic generator can create information, as well as destroy it. We should look to
these patterns of activity for information about the neurological origins of consciousness
and the creative powers of the brain.
A conscious "willed" action begins as a self-organized pattern of neural activity in the
limbic system. It links with kinesthetic and visceral sensation and becomes conditioned.
Consciousness is the flickering process that combines corollary discharge with the
messages on all the sensory lines. These sensory lines at once carry fresh input and are
shaped by previous experience.
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CONSCIOUSNESS BEARS THE IMPRINT OF BOTH THE RECENT PAST AND
THE EXPECTATION OF FUTURE ACTION, REAL OR IMAGINED. Herein lies the
influence of the consciousness journeys in the creative consciousness process. A multi-
sensory imaginal journey is just as real in terms of producing natural consequences in
real-time as an actual physical journey. It may be slightly different, yet just as real.
The purpose of consciousness is to report in the brain on the consequences of that
organ's actions, thereby preparing the next step in the brain's evolution. We experience
consciousness just as we do time, force, space, and the extension of our own bodies.
These are the unarguable givens that form the basis of being human.
Consciousness is an intrinsic and essential attribute of a functioning brain operating in a
responsive body. Consciousness occurs in a continuum accompanying the flow of matter
and energy in and through brains. IN THE BEGINNING IS THE CHAOS OF
NEURAL ACTIVITY, WHICH IS ALREADY PRESENT IN THE WOMB WHEN
THE BRAIN IS NO BIGGER THAN A GRAIN OF RICE.
When we address the dynamics of systems, each with many elements and many reflexive
pathways for the exchange of energy, matter, and information and when these putative
actions and reactions reach far over time, distance, and sequential stages, we can only
comprehend relationships within the whole, and the cause-effect metaphor is
overwhelmed.
Any circular relation that we can characterize as a reflexive or feedback loop will
ultimately surpass our metaphor. The search for an "origin" for consciousness is an
anthropomorphic fallacy. The process is much too complex, contradictory, and chaotic
to be so treated.
EEG is a quasi-deterministic sensory-cognitive activity. EEG represents an integrative
signal stemming from deterministic processes and is a strange attractor. The brain does
not always operate with strange attractor states (or deterministic states). In the waking
stage there are also "noisy states" during long periods of time. All EEG microstates are
not due to deterministic processes.
But some EEG reflects properties of a strange attractor. If a brain structure under
study is in a desynchronized states, then excitation (sensory stimulation) puts its activity
into a temporary attractor, an instantaneous attracting cycle.
The theory of nonlinear dynamic systems states that nonlinear systems are able to
generate determinsitic chaos under selected conditions. Chaos in the sense of nonlinear
dynamics means that the behavior of a system is not predictable over longer periods of
time, but nevertheless there exists a prescription (i.e. in terms of differential equations)
for calculating the future behavior from given initial conditions.
AN ATTRACTOR IS THE QUANTITY OF SELECTED STATES OF A DYNAMIC
SYSTEM THAT ARE DETERMINED UNDER VARIOUS BUT DELIMITED
CONDITIONS. IN SOME CASES THE SEQUENCE OF THESE STATES, CALLED
A TRAJECTORY, SEEMS TO BE CHAOTIC OR UNPREDICTABLE.
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In dreamhealing we follow the dreamstream back and down from the surface symbol
through a labyrinth of imagery to more primal levels leading to chaos consciousness. In
Chaos Theory, transition from one attractor to another is called a state change or
bifurcation. In dreamhealing it means a state change in terms of consciousness states, a
quantum leap in consciousness.
Sensitive dependence on initial conditions means similar causes do not produce similar
effects. This statement refutes the causality principle of natural philosophy. However,
by examining the properties of a strange attractor more precisely, one finds that it may
have a strong conformity, called SELF-SIMILARITY, which is an invariance with
respect to scaling. It repeats its conformations from the most fundamental to the most
complex level.
We can link the concept of the strange attractor with physiological and behavioral
changes of the CNS. Two different brain structures may show various degrees of
freedom. There are a number of independent strange attractors simultaneously
recorded (Babloyantz, 1989). There is a strong chaotic Alpha attractor at 10-Hz.
Reproducible Alpha is the most convincing demonstration of this finding. The greatest
power in studied cases is in the Alpha frequency range.
The experimental cognitive task consisted of mental marking of an omitted signal and
not a physical stimulation. The EEG of a subject can reach such patterns as a constant
template during a constant mental task. This pattern has a defined phase-reordering
and alignment during the execution of the mental task, which start approximately 500
msec before the event. Expectation and experience influence the response.
Researchers focused on EEG rhythmicity in a frequency range of around 8 to 13 Hz
during the described cognitive task. Earlier studies found activities of slower (1-7 Hz)
and higher (40 hz) frequency with phase-reordering could also be observed during
cognitive tasks. We also assumed that synchronization of the electrical activity in Delta
(1-3 Hz), and Alpha (8-13 Hz) frequency ranges seems to occur during operative stages
of the brain in which the brain processes information coming from sensory and
cognitive signals.
By using a sensory-cognitive paradigm the EEG can go over to coherent and ordered
states that are of a repeatable nature. Linear and nonlinear analysis show that the
transition from a disordered state to an ordered state occurred in the range of 40 Hz and
4 Hz. When the probability of occurrence of a target signal is increased, the 10 Hz, 40
Hz, and 4 Hz EEG goes over to coherent phase-ordered states WITHOUT THE
APPLICATION OF PHYSICAL STIMULATION. (Ref. dreamhealing phenomena).
The Theta rhythm is also interesting. Jonathan Winson's research showed that when
animals were awake, Theta rhythm seemed to show when they were behaving in ways
most crucial to their survival. In other words, Theta rhythm appeared when they
exhibited behavior that was not genetically encoded—such as feeding or sexual behavior-
-but rather a response to changing environmental information.
He further suggests that theta rhythm reflects a neural process whereby information
essential to the survival of a species—gathered during the day—is reprocessed into
memory during REM sleep.
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These COHERENT STATES depict almost phase-ordered patterns. The manifestation
of a strange attractor has an activity that appears to be random. However, this activity
is deterministic and reproducible if the input and initial conditions can be replicated.
(E. Roy John, MACHINERY OF THE MIND, 1990)
When we think about something, intend something, expect something the molecules in
our brain shift slightly. That in turn changes their gravitational attraction. According
to chaos theory, this effect will be pumped up. The slight ripple is felt in the
gravitational web of space. This incredibly tiny disturbance will grow following the
butterfly effect. Thus the real yet intangible (virtual) experiences of dreamhealing and
consciousness journeys have a physical effect which is pumped up by chaotic dynamics
from a micro- to macro-effect.
PART II: DREAMHEALING -
THE HEALING HEART OF DREAMS
Chapter 6:
THE SHAMAN/THERAPIST:
IMAGINATION, CREATIVITY, AND VISION
ABSTRACT: The shaman/therapist is a hybrid of mystic and scientist. This model provides a nonlinear
approach to the chaotic mysteries of the psyche. Included in this model of binocular visionary experience
is the distinction between fantasy and imagination, chaos and dreamhealing, creativity and the healing
process, inner vs. outer healing, perception and healing, shaman/therapist as dream guide, chakras in
dream therapy, and the Medicine Wheel as a model of healing. Also included are instructions for dealing
with transference for lay people or peer counselors.
Shamanism is the medicine of the imagination.
—Jeanne Achterberg, Imagery in Healing
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He descends into chaos and tribulation, into the realms beyond the limits of convention and
human laws where the seething magma of raw transformative energy resides in its
unrefined and undiluted state.
-Stephan Hoeller, THE GNOSTIC JUNG
Shamans were the first dreamworkers...if someone could imagine or dream an event, that
action was considered to be, in some sense, real.
—Stanley Krippner
VISIONS OF CHAOS
Graywolf s search for the meaning of life led him from conventional life as an engineer,
into psychology, then into the mystical phenomena of sacred psychology and chaos
theory. As he trained as a psychotherapist, he found the limitation in psychology which
led him to shamanism. Shamanism included the experience of many unusual states of
consciousness. But there were inherent limitations within the pure shamanic model also,
most notably an accent on superstition and fantasy.
The pitfalls of superstition are pretty obvious and come from our belief system, but
many of us don't make a distinction between fantasy and imagination. We say, " Oh, it’s
just your imagination ," reducing it to a trivial position. IMAGINATION IS OUR MOST
POWERFUL FORCE FOR CHANGE. Unlike ego-serving daydreams, or fantasies of
wish fulfillment which we make up, imagination is something that happens to us; it is an
autonomous force or energy, welling up from the depths as the water of life.
Fantasy is escapist and does not impact our reality; it is non-transformative. It is a self-
serving circle. Imagination, on the other hand, is intimately linked to creativity, and can
impact the personal self, the environmental self, and the transpersonal self.
IMAGINATION IS THE PRIMARY WAY WE EXPERIENCE SOUL. It is the only
way to experience the inner world. Our creativity is expressed through multiple states
of consciousness. And we open to inner consciousness through images.
Imagination gives us entree into the inner world of eternity. CREATIVITY
EXPRESSED IN THIS WAY MEANS WE CAN EXPERIENCE MULTIPLE STATES
OF CONSCIOUSNESS. Imagination seems to emerge out of nowhere. The
shaman/therapist acts as a guide to encourage the client to follow imagination, rather
than get stuck in a loop of fantasy material. When images flow freely they are healing.
Jung called images the primary activity of consciousness, a sort of natural reflex, and yet
the only reality we apprehend directly. Images lead into the realm of soul, which joins
those of matter and spirit. They do not require symbolic or interpretive methods or
meanings because to do so depotentiates the power of the imagination. By sticking to the
image as presented and flowing with its continually transforming nature, more is to be
found.
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In therapy, we learn a form of love for images which consists of watchful attention or
sustained attention. Through this attention or love for images we can connect with the
transpersonal dimension of life which is the source of chaos, dreams, visions, myths,
tales, ritual, and spiritual beliefs. There isn't much value to analyzing any image from
just one point-of-view, because images have many inherent meanings which may
continue to unfold over years. It just depends on how you look at them.
THE PSYCHIC IMAGE EMBODIES ITS OWN REALITY; IT IS SELF-
REVELATORY. THE MEANING DWELLS WITHIN THE IMAGE LIKE
CONSCIOUSNESS DWELLS IN THE BODY. Multiple meanings may carry an
ambiguous quality for the rational mind, but are expressive of the dynamic complexity
of life. Images pertain to imagination, while hallucinations pertain to perception.
SACRED PSYCHOLOGY is an ongoing operation with the soul's images. It means
joining a greater life; dying to our current selves and being reborn in our eternal selves,
finding our emergent potentials. By analogizing, rather than interpreting, we simply
ask, " What is this image like?" Analogies carry us into many meanings, amplifying, not
restricting the image.
Some people are ashamed of their fantasy life—that they even have fantasies at all. They
have been conditioned to mistrust imagination. This is because the imaginal world
opens us to the chaotic, uncontrollable, spontaneous, divine world of the soul. But when
attention is focused and diffuses into the imagery that is beyond self-gratification, the
power of transpersonal energies can initiate deep healing. The imagery is actually the
finer basis of our material existence. So, in a sense, we are our images. IMAGINATION
IS REALITY. We orient ourselves to internal and external reality through multi-
sensory images.
Research has shown that ESP information is also mediated through mental imagery.
Weak imagers often mis-identify targets because they misinterpret fragmentary images.
The mediating vehicle for psi communication is the imagination, a psychological
function we all possess.
Therefore, theoretically, ESP communication should be enhanced under conditions
which promote imagery, especially in those whose cognitive style is dominated by
imagery perception. For example, dream recall or creativity can be shown to relate
positively to psi performance. The image may not be visual. Thinking, feeling,
sensation, and intuition converge in imagination. Images can be kinesthetic, olfactory,
auditory, tactile, visual, etc. Imagination is a "direct expression of psychic life,"
according to Jung.
IF IT IS THE TASK OF THE SHAMAN TO FIND THE STRAYED SOUL OF THE
CLIENT AND RESTORE IT, THE SHAMAN NEED ONLY RECONNECT HIM
WITH IMAGINATIVE LIFE TO SET THE HEALING IN MOTION. He is the
psychopomp, or guide to the inner depths. The psychic crisis of an individual needs to
seek its own unique solution within. It is a deepening process. It may be an ordeal, or
more like a quest, but the investment of energy and attention is a sacrifice that must be
made.
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We can conceive of a psychotic in the shaman's terms as one whose soul has been stolen,
lost, or seized down into the underworld. Their conscious awareness is focused in a very
narrow beam revolving around delusions and fears. They are enmeshed with the spirit
and intuitive consciousness, overwhelmed by and drowning in it.
How does the shaman or therapist help the person broaden the beam, to expand
awareness of self to include more and more of consciousness, so that a stabilized
personality can learn to experience itself as ONE WITH ALL?
The shaman/therapist uses old and new techniques like dreams, visionary work, vision
quest, imagery, colors, drumming, meditations, letting go, breathing, body work, mental
grasp of the physical nature of the universe, opening to nature, and standard therapies
like Transactional Analysis and Gestalt. In various ways we can give in to the pressures
which we have been investing our energies in fighting. Lighting disempowers us and
validates the rigidities. Letting go leads through chaos to flow.
THE MEDICINE WHEEL is the primary healing model of western shamanism. It
shows the synergy of chaos and order. It has four primary stations, corresponding to
the four cardinal directions. It is therefore a mythic model for the creation and a device
for magical orientation and protection. Its motif lays out the phases of a healing
process:
1) . INITIATION corresponds with the East and means seeing the problem or the need
for healing; breaking through ignorance or denial.
2) . LETTING GO corresponds to the South, and means surrendering to the Higher
Power, or the process. This ego-death leads directly into a period of chaos before the
new vision is found.
3) . NEW VISION arises within the place of dreams and creative imagination. Self
esteem grows as dreamhealing presents creative solutions. It means connecting with
powers without and within which are seen as ONE. It is the West.
4) . ACTUALIZATION is a phase of integration and empowerment. In the North
quadrant you make your dreams come true. It is a new emotional maturity. Newly-
learned skills are put into fruitful practice, connecting one to self, community, and
Universe, restoring balance and rectifying karma.
For Graywolf, the shamanic model was different from, but not really any better than the
psychological method. Many therapists and new age healers have found this out for
themselves. He didn't really find any benefit from shamanism other than a different
worldview until he was about to fuse the shamanic and psychological views.
THIS LED TO THE IDEA OF THE SHAMAN/THERAPIST. Neither one on its own
was comprehensive or flexible enough. But looking at reality with the eye of the scientist
and the eye of the mystic simultaneously creates a sort of BINOCULAR VISION which
adds depth and meaning to the vision.
The psychotherapeutic approach to healing essentially represents order. The shamanic
approach represents chaos. These worldviews seem divided. Yet the true nature of
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reality represents the merging of chaos into order, and chaos and order, back into
chaos. Both lie within each other, and there is a consequent flow between the two. The
essence of the shaman/therapist model is that it takes in both sides.
Most shamanic techniques are essentially chaos-producing, including sweats, drum
journeys, and other means of inducing non-ordinary states of consciousness. For
example, someone in the sweat lodge gets so hot that their normal methods of processing
and input simply fail to work. They are so busy dealing with the stress on their body
caused by the heat that their mind essentially turns off. And that is where the chaos
comes in and changes things. The same is true for becoming lost in the throbbing drum,
letting consciousness soar. A beat with disruptions is very hypnotic and promotes the
temporary disequilibrium which is known to deepen trance.
Dreamhealing is the practice of the shaman/therapist, combining the process and
dreamwork of psychotherapy with the traditional form of shamanic flight. The shaman
is a traveller between the worlds of ordinary and nonordinary reality. The dreamtime is
a sacred space which the shaman/therapist can share with others through co¬
consciousness.
Perception, how we perceive ourselves and the world about us is at the base of our
experiences of reality. The essence of psychotherapy is the changing of perception. In
fostering this change the modern psychotherapist and ancient shaman share a common
mission. No matter whether the transformation is attempted through drugs, behavior
modification, or emotive talk therapies, the purpose is to change perception of reality.
Each one of us creates our own reality by our perceptions. The reality is created
through a filtering process, and is continually subject to modification by fantasy and
imagination. Each of our individual realities undergoes constant modification. THERE
IS AN INFINITY OF REALITIES AND STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS. These are
created out of only a small portion of what we perceive, and what we perceive is but a
small fraction of the input available to us through the senses.
We exist among a chaos of realities, yet we also exist within and among a consensus of
"reality." Another way of saying it is that this chaos of realities contains within it
hidden, consensual structure. Our perceptions are attracted to certain types of order.
Yet there are myths underlying our perceptions of 1) permanence, 2) objective
individualism, 3) collectivism, and 4) symbolic reality.
ONE HALF OF THE PROBLEM IS BEING ABLE TO LET GO OF THE FOCUS OF
ATTENTION AND ENTER INTO THE CHAOS. THE OTHER HALF IS BEING
ABLE TO SEIZE THE NEW ORDER THAT ARISES FROM IT.
It is the role of healers to help others find the doorways to the opportunities that crises
can offer, as traditional guiding models break down. The guiding myth of the shaman is
that "personal power arises within ." The blending of the traditional and the innovative,
the mystical and scientific, the masculine and feminine elements in healing, can guide
our culture towards a balanced approach to healing.
One driving force is bumping up against boundaries and then going past them. There
are limitations in science and shamanism, but we need not remain perplexed if we
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incorporate the best each system has to offer. By recognizing our boundaries, we can
move beyond them. This is equally true for the dreamhealing practitioner and for those
seeking healing.
Shamanism and humanistic psychology share common aspects in their worldviews. The
first is the view that " WE ARE ALL ONE”. The primitive belief is one of the web of life,
while the other calls it holism and deep ecology. FOR SHAMANS THE SECRET OF
THE UNIVERSE IS THAT IT IS ALIVE. Science is validating this perspective more
each day that nothing is truly separate from the whole. Wholism affirms the unity of
life.
The GUIDING VISION is another premise shared in common by both camps. Jung
certainly wrote extensively of his visionary experience and how it affected his life and
gave him a mandate for his work. The vision quest is the native model for facilitating
and honoring this experience. These visions "work" because we are not separate from
the universe, nature, each other, our bodies, or hidden aspects of ourselves.
This brings us to the third commonality of REVERENCE FOR NATURE. We are not
separate from the creation, and perhaps this is one reason for the profound healing
power of wilderness. Maslow spoke of this awe of the nature-mystic as one of the
emergent qualities of the self-actualized person.
Perhaps the main distinction between shamanism and conventional psychology is the
consciousness state. Shamanism promotes co-consciousness where you are no longer
separate from the person you are dealing with. The shaman goes into the underworld
(subconscious) to help the person bring their lost soul or spirit back, which is the
healing. That is really different than a psychologist who, in the old scientific model,
maintains an objective distance.
CHAOS AND DREA MH EALING
WHEN THE MIND LETS GO OF ITS RATIONAL ORDER AND ENTERS INTO
UNSTRUCTURED CHAOS IT EMERGES LATER WITH A NEW STRUCTURE. It
is a quantum leap from what went before. Each journey into the unstructured chaotic
consciousness leads to the seat of our muse and creativity. Therapy at its very best is a
matter of changing consciousness, and so is shamanism. Though the perspective may be
different, both seek to change consciousness about the states of dis-ease we experience.
Graywolf came upon the work of Paul Rapp, a researcher at the medical college of the
University of Pennsylvania who experiments with chaos, at a crucial point in the
development of his models. He discovered the technique in his therapy practice and
refined it, but its description required a model of how and why it works. He was
searching for a language to describe what he had been observing in the consciousness
journeys he was conducting, trying to discover the nature of the healing process. Rapp's
research showed that problem solving led to an increase of chaotic patterns in the brain,
which led to a creative chaotic renewal.
Graywolf had observed this state in his clients empirically over and over again, in the
underlying order to the apparently random or chaotic flow of multi-sensory imagery
that formed the core of the method. He developed his ego model to describe the states in
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general. (See EGO AND THE PROCESS OF HEALING). They reflected not only a
static order of imagery, but a deeper dynamic component.
Before finding the language of chaos theory, he tried relating these states to the medicine
wheel, the chakra system, and other healing models. But no matter what language he
used, ancient, shamanic, eastern mystical, new age, or scientific, each only seemed to
capture a portion of it, as a pre-biased limited view.
But upon reading about Rapp's finding, he recalled a discussion many years earlier with
a client who was a mathematics professor. On a working hike down the lower Rogue
River in Southern Oregon, he described a new form of mathematics that was
integrating a fractured science. In a moment of personal integration, Graywolfs
memories and experience from the dream journeys came together. He saw that chaos is
the underlying concept that brings it all together.
In each dream journey we encounter a state of consciousness that is a personal
experience of primal chaos. These states might be different on the surface, but the
underlying essence is the same. The empty drifting in the fog, that empty mindless place
where there are no thoughts, emotions, or images were common reports. This is not
news in depth psychology, but the reliable manner of accessing the state is new. We
have known for a long time that the secret lay within dreams, as Max Zeller points out
in THE DREAM - THE VISION OF THE NIGHT.
Depth psychology speaks of the unconscious. The term refers to the unknown hidden
realm of the psyche about which we cannot make any direct statement. If not manifest, it
looks like nothing at all, a void; the invisible, or not yet visible. But when vision and dream
appear and reveal what was hidden, then void and emptiness give way to meaningfulness
and to a feeling of being in touch and being connected...to those lost springs for which we
all search and from which all life comes.
The unconscious lends itself to the language of chaos. The whirling, twisting motion of a
molecule of water in the chaotic world of non-laminar flow through a pipe is analogous
to chaos consciousness. The disorienting, dizzying surrender to the vortex, tornado, or
whirlpool is a surrender to chaos, an experience of no form and total confusion and
disorientation.
It is like the experience of committing oneself to the fire and becoming it, and as the
random flickering of the flames and torrid heat, disintegrating into pure energy. It
means becoming the boiling, flowing, every-changing molten magma at the core of the
earth, or the root of a volcano. These are all descriptions of the personal, subjective
experience of total chaos.
Always, after passing through this state, the new order which emerged of self-image,
thought, emotion, and sensory perception reflected the new and less dis-eased state of
being. The deeper self-image undercut or superceded the old belief system, and began to
create a new order of being, a new way of perceiving self and world. The new image
provides a magnetic nucleus around which to order the personality, and often the
physiology.
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Each of these observations had a counterpart in the new science based on chaos. Order
seems to be present in the chaos of mind just as chaos really seems to underlie even the
most rigid and orderly intellect. The new primal image has its counterpart in the
strange attractor described in this radical new model.
DREAMS THEMSELVES EMBODY THE VERY NATURE OF CHAOS. Very few
will argue with the chaotic nature of dreams. As we journeyed deep into the heart of
dreams, the free-association of multi-sensory images led us to the energies and
consciousness states that birthed and shaped its surface symbols and plots. The
journeys were chaotic, impressionistic.
The imagery jerked and changed in chaotic ways, and we encountered states of
consciousness which embodied total chaos within their experience. Always a state of
consciousness emerged that soothed the tortured ego or body, healed the organism in
some way, providing a balanced flow from deep within the chaos. Graywolf felt sure he
was touching the very essence or source of the creative energy within us.
CREATIVITY AND DREAMHEALING
The relationship between healing and creativity is implicit. It means different
phenomena on different levels. This state has been linked in research with the reverie
state and alpha brainwave state. Rapp's findings showed large amounts of alpha
discharge as the brain went into a chaotic pattern for problem solving.
Elmer and Alyce Green, who have done original research in biofeedback, have defined
creativity at various levels:
Creativity in terms of physiological processes means then PHYSICAL HEALING, physical
regeneration. Creativity in emotional terms consists then of establishing, or creating
ATTITUDE CHANGES through the practice of healthful emotions, that is, emotions
whose neural correlates are those that establish harmony in the visceral brain, or to put it
another way, emotions that establish in the visceral brain those neurological patterns
whose reflection in the viscera is one that physicians approve of as stress-resistent.
Creativity in the mental domain involves the emergence of a new and valid synthesis of
ideas, not by deduction, but springing by ''INTUITION” from unconscious sources.
The entrance, or key, to all these inner processes we are beginning to believe, is a
particular state of consciousness to which we have given the undifferentiated name of
"reverie."
The creative process runs parallel to the healing process. In fact, healing is a special
case of creativity, or creative problem-solving. Consciousness is the author of both
processes. Creativity, healing, and illumination are equivalent processes operating at
different levels — mental, physical, psychic, and spiritual. The process includes a
prelude ritual, an altered state, and a postlude, or emotional affect.
We can draw a direct analogy between the dreamhealing process and the creative
process. We have adapted the description from Silvano Arieti's CREATIVITY: THE
MAGIC SYNTHESIS, Basic, 1976.
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Dreamhealing begins with THE PILGRIMAGE, which expresses one's intent or
commitment The creative process begins with RECEPTIVITY, which includes interest,
preparation, and immersion in the subject matter.
Next in dreamhealing comes THE CONFESSION, or the identification of the problem,
where you have missed the mark. Creativity also requires the ability to identify the
problem, see the right questions, to use errors, to have detached devotion.
The PURIFICATION or cleansing of dreamhealing parallels the generalized
SENSITIVITY TO PROBLEMS that comes during creativity, an attunement to the
realization of what needs to be done.
THE OFFERING is a sign of letting go, sacrifice of the old ego form, the commitment to
healing. Creativity requires the SURRENDER OF TIME AND SELF TO THE
PROCESS OF FLOW; fluency of thinking; flexibility; abandoning old ways of thought.
The heart of the quest is DREAM INCUBATION, a reverie which seeks connection with
higher power. Creativity also requires INCUBATION, reverie, serendipity, spontaneity,
adaptation, tolerance for ambiguity, and originality This permits uncommon responses
and unconventional associations.
Healing occurs in a moment of oneness, CHAOTIC CONSCIOUSNESS. In creativity it
is paralleled by the moment of ILLUMINATION, redefinition, invention, vision.
Dreamhealing requires AMPLIFICATION, or work on dreams and validation.
ELABORATION is its counterpart, the use of two or more abilities for the construction
of a more complex object or theory, plus verification.
RE-ENTRY implies actualization, renewal, grounding, maturing. Creatively it means
REAL-TIME APPLICATION, follow through, product, exploitation of the result.
In all cases, guided or not, the creative or healing process follows approximately this
model. The resources are contacted deep within and they well-up in sometimes
unexpected ways from the deep Source.
INNER VS. OUTER EMPHASIS ON HEALING
The conventional outer focus on healing tends to get caught up in methods, techniques
and the purely material side of healing. It causes division both in the approach to and
view of the patient. Inner focus tends to lead to a collective or unifying state of
consciousness. THE SPIRIT OR EMERGENCE OF HEALING ARISES FROM
WITHIN. It not only integrates the patient but also the divided methods of outer
healing approaches. It unifies patient and professional. In this sense it is synergistic.
Thus, if the real healing energy or power or force comes from within, the patient can
choose from tools such as surgery, imagery, and lifestyle changes to repair a damaged
heart. They are not forced to choose between tools, but can use all of them
harmoniously.
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Inside each of us, and common to us all is a force we have called PLACEBO,
homeostasis, or will-to-live which is a state of consciousness. The placebo effect lies in a
crack between the known and the unknown. We know it works, but we have no clue
how. In reverse, used against people, it is the basis for sympathetic magic and curses.
Without it, even physicians agree healing simply cannot occur. This force comes from
deep within, but can be focused and facilitated through awareness.
One of the powers of dreams and dreamhealing is that they arise from non-ordinary
states of consciousness, and out of the powers of the chaotic collective matrix. The
dream guide takes consciousness into this altered state and facilitates access to it for the
whole being, rather than putting a bandaid on a symptom. Once we find it, we see we
can reach it in many ways. These include imagination, imagery, meditation, faith in the
doctor as healer, prayer, etc. Once we reach it, it affects our perception of reality from
that point forward.
PERCEPTION AND HEALING
How do we perceive the world? One obvious answer is through the five known senses.
We see, hear, smell, taste, and feel. Some people seems to have other, more subtle
information input systems—extrasensory systems. Stanley Krippner cites sixteen
sensory (among them kinesthsia and balance) inputs. Our internal experience of these
comes through intuition and imagery. They are internal perceptions, interpretations of
input which lead to other psychological processes, such as emotion or intellect.
There are uncountable bits of information in any given environment, yet only a small
part of those are registered through the known senses. Chaos contains too much
information to process so it appears as a void or overwhelming. The senses overload.
Chaos is a form of order or structure rational mind is incapable of comprehending.
Chaos is really just a definition of mind, otherwise its a natural nonlinear order. Most
natural phenomena, like a river in flow, the atmosphere, or the wilderness, are
essentially chaotic, an expression of chaos. The struggle of mankind over the years has
been to create some structure from that chaos. But we can accept it, and flow with it
also. Learning to live with chaos, we can learn to EMBRACE THE CHAOS.
E.S.P., intuitive perception, the five senses, and our belief systems act as filters of
immediate phenomenal experience. These perceptions function as overlays on the direct
experience of empirical reality. Putting a twist on the old cliche, we can say, "I wouldn't
have seen it if I hadn't believed it." Our habitual way of seeing the world conditions our
experience. Zen monks and yogis are trained to be in the "now," and thus retain that
freshness and spontaneity that comes from an unconditioned perspective, the
BEGINNER'S MIND.
How do we perceive self? Are we caught in a conformist attitude, or open to infinite
possibilities? Of course, we perceive through the sensation related to the usual five
senses, but we are also driven by deep, early self images, i.e. existential images. They
condition our environmental self, our personal self, even our transpersonal self.
Dreams, visions, daydreams, fantasies, and other imaginal experiences are merely other
ways of perceiving the world (or universe) and self. The physical body is only a small
part of our actual makeup.
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We are also complex fields of dynamic energy. We have an electromagnetic body that
interacts intimately with other fields of energy. We emit gases and electrons which
exchange with the environment and each other. Our skin is not really a barrier, but a
very permeable membrane. At the sub-atomic level, we become even finer creatures.
The elements of our bodies were cooked in the crucible of some supernova. Within those
elements are electrons that fluctuate at the threshold of matter and energy.
Those electrons and atoms actually have relatively vast amounts of space between them,
so that our seemingly solid matter actually contains a great deal of void. In physical
terms, we ultimately reduce down to not much more than a wave-front in space. And
with that rarified perspective, it isn't difficult to see why the Buddhist viewpoint stresses
the gross illusion of separation in corporeal life.
SHAMAN/THERAPIST AS GUIDE
The shaman and therapist facilitate subtle changes in perception to bring about healing
from the deep resources within. Shamans have always used great scope in their healing
efforts, even using such tools as rivers, meadows, or the tops of mountains. That is
where they take people to initiate healing or visionary experience.
We tend to think small in psychology in terms of tools. The whole earth, the rivers, all
of nature is a tool to be used by the shaman/therapist if she is open to that. On a
wilderness excursion, a day of silence can be profoundly transformative. Many times
people won't begin talking for hours after the silence is lifted. Preparation at a retreat,
like sweats and offerings can also enhance the wilderness experience. Dream incubation
at the retreat opens the mythic dimension to enhance the effects of a client's experience.
Taking people on therapeutic excursions also allows the guide to span a broad spectrum
of the client's awareness by demonstrating a guiding ability that is both literal and
metaphorical. Once again this opens the client to a less-rational mythic dimension. The
archetypal image of the GUIDE TO THE UNDERWORLD, (deep subconscious), is a
very powerful symbol when activated in the psyche of an individual. Finally there is
someone to show the way in the netherworld of inner life.
The shaman/therapist takes the client far below the personality levels, down to the
psychic origins of life. There they may experience the primordial, chemical, genetic, or
sub-atomic realities which usually escape our notice. Through the process of co¬
consciousness the guide brings the client's soul back out into the light of day (rational
consciousness) after many challenges are met and overcome.
The lost soul is found and retrieved through a healing process. The formerly "dead"
personality is now enlivened in the process of psychological rebirth and resurrection.
Wilderness excursions feed into the trust-building process in a way that can never be
achieved in an office or clinic.
Reflecting on his experience with people on the whitewater rivers, Graywolf has noticed
that he doesn't have to do nearly as much to be actively therapeutic with people on the
river. Just taking them there, and being there with them as Graywolf, it becomes very
powerful. The intent is a transformational voyage. A lot of the personal results depend
on their own expectations and the power they tend to project on the shaman.
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In Graywolf s case he feels a lot of it has to do with going down the river and his
consecrated relationship to it. If a person has an issue, for example, with their feminine
side, they seem to dream of women while they are on the river trip. Becoming that in
the dream journey, they begin changing their striving nature to a sense of flow,
harmonizing more and more with the river. The river takes them to an edge of personal
challenge and transmutes them automatically.
IN DREAM GUIDING, ALL THE ACTION LIES IN GOING JUST BEYOND THE
BOUNDARY FROM THE KNOWN AND COMFORTABLE TOWARD THE FEAR
AND CHALLENGE. Being at the edge is where we can confront our issues. The
emotions which carry us to that edge become more and more intensified as the personal
limits are challenged. Attitudes, values, and thoughts may be transformed in a moment
of existential challenge. Many people report they never felt more alive than at a moment
of personal physical and mental challenge.
The concept of THE BOUNDARY is also relevant to physics, chemistry, and
engineering. The boundary is where opposites meet; it is always paradoxical in nature.
The boundary layer is where all the interesting things happen in fluid flow and chemical
reactions. The transition points, both ways, between chaos and order seem to be the
places where important shifts and developments take place. So in the physical or mental
journey, the times of entering the chaos and re-emerging into order are when you can
observe the shift.
In ancient times, Seneca said, "The secrets [of nature] open not promiscuously nor to
every corner. They are remote of access, enshrined in the inner sanctuary. " Opening to
nature is healing. Swept-up in the rapture of nature's beauty, we experience oneness
with Her. This response has been described as oceanic or a peak experience, referring
metaphorically to depths and heights.
Natural mystic-ecstasies can happen spontaneously to anyone. They often have an
uncanny or supernormal quality. They involve euphoria or bliss to an extent unknown
in most usual activities. They seem important in some strange way. There is also some
element of transcendence. They remain in memory longer and more vividly than
ordinary events. But not all experiences are of equal depth. Some lead directly to the
loss of sense of self and time, and a reduction in mental activity. It is a form of cosmic¬
consciousness.
In most cultures the basic elements — fire, air, water, and earth — are revered in some
manner, or at least considered fundamental to existence; some systems contain even
finer distinctions. This has resounded through history in a variety of mystic arts
ranging from alchemy to astrology, to Native American shamanism. In yoga they are
known as the tatvas. Always this doctrine of the four elements symbolized a sense of
wholeness with nature and self. The mystic fifth element appears as the essence, or
quintessence, spirit or ether. It represents the synergetic effect of the primary four
components of natural existence.
In opening to nature the self is purified, fear and shame vanish, replaced by the sense of
brotherhood with all life. It is an experience of oneness with the creation. Because
nature always reflects the archetype of death/rebirth, the psychological response to a
profound experience in nature may be one of rebirth. This can be particularly true if
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there is a close brush with death. The transport may also occur witnessing a birth which
can evoke a strong sense of awe and wonder at the miracle of life.
In the nature-mystic experience there is always a mixture of instinctive awe and delight,
a thrill usually felt most deeply in utter solitude, which fills the heart with a Presence. It
is a form of enlightenment or illumination, where the divine element is veiled by nature.
The experience is characterized by a deep feeling, rather than knowing. It is a life¬
changing event, with many further repercussions and adjustments. One gains a new
perspective as when standing on a majestic mountain, surveying the panorama.
The mind calms, becoming tranquil and still, in regard for the beloved. All things seem
pristine, perfect, and eternal. Conflicts are transcended or resolved in self-
forgetfulness. The world "looks different." Maslow likened it to a "visit to a personal
heaven ." One feels more alive, loving, accepting, blessed, and happy.
A peak experience can be "grounded" by working with it in a journal and meditation,
reclaiming those states for future nourishment. They are sources of sanctuary and inner
fortitude, providing a foundation for further excursions into mystical dimensions. You
can use them for stress management by recalling a special place and time in nature
where you felt open and secure. Deep relaxation provides many benefits for health and
well being.
CHAKRAS IN DREAM THERAPY
Chakras are wheels or vortices of energy in the subtle body, and have long been
recognized in Ayurvedic and Chinese forms of medicine. Their physical counterparts
are the nerve plexes of our anatomy. The free or impaired circulation of energy among
these centers directly affects our physiognomy.
The quickest way to an understanding of the human energy body is probably through
the chakra system. The colors of the rainbow have been associated with the centers in
the subtle body for thousands of years. It is a symbol system with an internal coherency
which works well in practice. The color system is usually visual, but may be an
impressionistic perception of immersion, permutation, or pervasion.
One way of moving people quickly to a non-rational place with their feelings is simply to
ask them what color they are now...and what color they would like to be. This is a very
simple diagnostic almost anyone can learn.
When we invite someone to visualize a feeling or symptoms, or whatever as a color, we
are really inviting or guiding them to use a new and different perceptual mode to see
themselves and the world. Color literally reflects differing vibrational patterns in the
EM spectrum.
Symbolically, color is a visual symbol of the energy body. To become the color is to tie
together the normal self perceptual faculties (means) with or to perceive the state of the
energy body. The same goes for the other senses — sounds, odors, taste, sensations.
Also, internal states such as emotions or thoughts or images can be similarly perceived
by a different modality.
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Chakras are vortices of energy in the human astral body. Their appearance in the
dream journey shows where blocks in the energy flow and psychology are located.
Chakras are not physical, but are associated with nerve plexes in the body. They create
tangible effects on body and mind. They represent a continuum of evolving
consciousness from the most base level to the highest degree of mystical insight and
illumination. Each chakra, when blocked, represents a different psychological issue.
While the system and color correspondences presented here are not necessarily
"universal," they are useful. You will notice in your own mentoring certain
manifestations which hold true from session to session, and you can deduce what they
mean. In any group setting, you can deduce what people feel like fairly accurately, as
well as their psychological problems and state. Asked the color question, they usually
respond fairly quickly. For example, one person identified with a muddy yellow-green.
Intuition suggests there is a problem in the relationship area, which manifests as
confusion between power (yellow) and love (green).
This person was startled at how accurately that summed up his present situation. The
muddiness indicated the problem, yellow is the color of the power chakra (spleen or
solar plexus), green the color of the heart center. So, you can deduce that there might be
a perceptible "block" or symptom in that area of the body between the two chakras.
RED: The root or base chakra is red. Its position is the anus or feet. It is concerned
with birth, survival, instinct, stability, grounding, stillness, common sense, and
attachment. Its element is earth; it is associated with the coccygeal spinal ganglion. In
dreamhealing it is analogous with the primal sensory images, or sensation levels. Its
issues include individuality and survival. It can indicate fear of bodily harm or
extinction. Flow here means thriving, not just surviving; freedom from role-
boundedness and exclusive identification with persona or social mask.. It is very
common for dreamhealing clients to become the essence of red in the first few dream
journeys. It is a fundamental aspect of being which needs to be worked through. Then
it will not block the way to higher awareness.
ORANGE: The chakra for the sex center is orange. It is the seat of our personal sense
of power, magnetism, creativity, emotions, pleasure, passion, and rejuvenation. It is the
level of social or group consciousness. Therefore, the issue here is fear of alienation, or
being left out; desire, procreation, attachment, envy, frustration. Polarity, change,
sexuality, nurturance, movement. Its element is water; its nerve center is the genitals.
In terms of the dreamhealing model, it is the level of personal mythology, belief systems,
personal images.
It especially concerns how we feel about the opposite sex. At this level the client may
encounter the inner mate, ANIMA or ANIMUS. The inner mate can be a powerful soul
guide to deeper levels. On the return side of the journey, this chakra or level is an
opportunity to balance masculine and feminine energies through an inner marriage.
This kind of integration promotes androgyny. Flow here means blending the opposites.
Animosity is not projected, for in re-owning the opposite sex within, we become
reintegrated.
YELLOW: The power chakra is yellow. The issue here is how we express our outer
power. Because it is planning or analytical consciousness, it involves intention, will,
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movement, and doing; combination, interaction. It is fear of rejection and
dissatisfaction. Its element is fire; its nerve plexus is the solar plexus. It is an energy
which requires grounding; negatively it can manifest as overworking or manic activity,
a constant search for stimulation and excitement. This implies the need for constant
affirmation and approval from others.
Negatively, this is the source of aggression and hostility that originate in unmet
emotional needs. The energy that cannot flow in the next-higher center is turned back
and builds to the boiling point since the heart center cannot function. In therapy you
will find many people confused about the difference between strength and power,
especially in relationships. Dominance and personal power are confused. The cycle of
victim-victimizer feeds on itself. Alternatively, it can lead to inertia, stagnation, inability
to connect, lack of self confidence, recoiling from challenge, or unwillingness to change.
Hypervigilance, intimidation, estrangement, separation, isolation, invalidation,
resistance, denial, lack of enthusiasm, and low self-esteem result from dysfunction here.
This chakra is blocked also for those who feel disempowered. Suppressed rage may take
the place of laughter and joy, humor and transformation. When we begin to assume
responsibility for ourselves we reclaim that power. Self-responsibility eliminates the
need for manipulating the environment to get one's needs met. It is more direct. It
breaks the cycle of fear, self-criticism,, and withdrawl. It also lessens the likelihood of
being manipulated by others.
Flow here means freedom of choice, self-assertiveness, the ability to put oneself first
when it is appropriate to do so. In some mystical systems it is known as the HARA, or
empowering core. In dreamhealing it is the emotional patterns, thought patterns, and
behaviors. At this level it reveals how what is inside is expressed outside and determines
what comes back in, through a feedback process. Positive expressions include
reorganization, coordination, momentum, efficient use of energy, will, vitality, volition,
responsibility, attunement, effortlessness, discipline, engagement, purpose, confidence,
courage; future-oriented, "I will do this.”
GREEN: The heart chakra deals with emotional energy and is green. Its issues are
empathy, intimacy, love, security, balance, equilibrium, acceptance, generosity,
harmonization, freedom, integration, self actualization, compassion, affinity,
relationship, unity, and healing. Its element is air; the nerve plexus surrounds the
heart. When blocked, this chakra means fear of loss, even loss of integrity or that sense
of wholeness, "the heart of the matter."
In dreamhealing, green is a color where you may let the client linger, embracing the
healing gift of the dream journey. Flow here means love: acceptance of self and others,
democratic nature, reintegration, balance, integrity, restoration, brotherly love and
connecting with nature; aspiration, fulfillment, intentionality, clarity, lucidity, self-
realization, creativity, solutions, rebirth, emergence, inspiration, transcendence,
vocation, metaphorical perception, charisma, spontaneity, autonomy, serenity, trust,
synergy, relaxation, inner peace, validation, revival, insight, surrender to Higher Power,
sense of the sacred, grace, self-love, expressed love, spiritual connection, cyclical time.
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When clients first perceive a color or become a color, ask them where they experience
that in their body. There is a spontaneous, uncanny relationship to the chakras,
whether they know about them or not.
You can tell a lot by the purity of the colors clients report. In the prior example with the
mixture of green and yellow, for example, you might explore the confusion between
intimacy and power. So, a basic knowledge of color mixing can help your intuition.
Also, realize that the chakras can "mix." For example, if the sex center is dominated by
the emotional center, it results in false intimacy. If it is dominated by the power center,
it means grandiosity, egotism, martyrdom, or a host of unhealthy co-dependent
behavior.
The higher chakras deal with expression, intuition, contact bliss, and transcendence.
They are largely transpersonal in nature, and are the true "home" of the mystic. They
cannot be open channels until the work of clearing the blocks in the ego and lower
chakras is done. Here again, it is a matter of energy flow. Flow expresses the open,
healthy, spiritual individual related to the personal and transpersonal world, outer and
inner life.
The primal energy of healing and enlightenment, KUNDALINI, flows through the open
chakras. Once again we are met with the creative energy of the SERPENT POWER,
which we encountered as the central healing image of the Asklepian method. When
blocked, it creates physical and psychic problems. Its free flow is a healing panacea, the
universal medicine. Again, like cures like.
BLUE: The throat center is blue. It is intimately concerned with self-expression,
allowing oneself a voice, and issues relating to things said and unsaid. Positively it is
communication, connection, innovation, flexibility, creativity, purification, rhythm,
resonance, rapport, transport, meaning, telepathy. It is a frequent point of symptomatic
constriction in abuse victims or those with unfinished grieving. Its dysfunction means
fear of change. Open it means the free flow of self-expression; the gateway to the future.
INDIGO: This is the color of the Third Eye, representing intuition, clairvoyance,
imagination, vision. Blocked it means fear of spontaneous response, or doubt. Flow
here means insight, memory, visualization, assimilation, comprehension, wisdom,
visions, psychic awareness, meditation, consciousness expansion, metaphorical
perception that is largely visual, creative imagining, perception, timelessness,
synchronicity, light.
VIOLET: Violet is associated with the crown center and pure information, true
imagination, knowing, wisdom and understanding. It is the ground state of being,
ultimate openness, the source of consciousness itself. It is non spatial and non temporal.
When blocked, it is the fear of vulnerability or chaos. Flow here means nonlocality,
emptiness, unconditional acceptance, connectivity, knowing, simultaneity of time, bliss,
"withinness," immaterial consciousness, and even cosmic consciousness, transcendent
consciousness, or illumination, (as a discrete experience, if not as a stabilized state).
BLACK: Black is not associated with a chakra but may indicate the level of self
annihilation, or be an abstraction of the future, unknown self. Too much information
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looks like none. Dreamhealing participants often report a "black blacker than black " which leads into yet deeper states. Encourage them toward that deepening. In dreamhealing, you do not need to accept the entire chakra model as a metaphysical reality. This version is only one form of chakra description, and a very brief one at that. We simply suggest that experience has shown that the attribution of these colors to various centers in the body has proven useful in understanding and guiding the client's journey. The experience of "becoming a color" leads to some very profound experiences. There is rarely any resistance to becoming a color; it can quickly lead within to a very deep place. For example, one apprentice in the dreamhealing technique was merely describing the process after listening to a dreamer who had recurrent dreams in a very "yucky, muddy color." Even though they were only discussing the use of the dreamhealing process, the dreamer spontaneously put her hands to her eyes in identification with that color. She automatically slumped down to the floor in the fetal position in a deep, natural trance. Of course, they finished the dream journey on the spot since it was the appropriate thing to do. THE SHAMAN/THERAPIST AND TRANSFERENCE Because dreamhealing lends itself so well to peer counseling situations, we are including some detail on the pitfalls of transference and counselor's issues for the lay person. It may save you from some sticky situations or help you out of another. Working as both scientist and mystic means that each approach provides a check and balance for the other mode of perception. Working as a mystic means working in the realm of essentially magical thinking, which carries its own pitfalls. Certain belief systems are developed about the way things work, which may not be based in any kind of consensus reality. While this produces powerful transformational energy, it is prudent to do a reality check on one's shaman self, that it is not in fantasy-land. The first obvious danger is identifying with the archetypal power of the "healer." When the ego claims that power as its own, it gets all puffed up with grandiose ideas about itself, and falls into an inflation, commonly known as an ego-trip. The next temptation for the personality is that others perceive you as the healer or junior guru and flock to the wise one's feet. This is the basis of the personality cult, which can rob others of their power instead of helping them seek in their own way within. This doesn't mean you can't guide or help anyone, just don't get carried away with proclaiming the truth as you see it. Don't become a "dreamhealing missionary." Another pitfall comes from listening to the subpersonalities which claim to be channels to higher power. Only the development of discrimination will teach you how to discern the true voice of intuition within. Just because the voice comes from within, doesn't mean it is all-knowing. That is the problem in seances, etc. Just because these spirits are dead does not means they are smart! Intuition appears to emerge out of the blue, but is actually built up of your intentionally developed skills and extra-sensory perception. It is the natural synthesis of both. 132 Freud noticed that in the client-therapist relationship certain dynamics went on below the level of conscious awareness. He called this process the transference when the energy flowed from client to therapist, and counter-transference when it was reversed. It basically revolves around the fantasy life developed between the two during treatment. It is virtually inescapable as the client transfers positive or negative family feelings onto the therapist, and the therapist reacts to that. This is also a place that the emotional baggage of the therapist will surface with the client. Both client and therapist may find themselves "acting out" or "acting in" during and outside of sessions. Problems that can arise include dependency, enmeshment, resistance, and sexual confusion. In dependency there is a compulsive, unhealthy reliance on the care-giver, even to the point of self-neglect. Enmeshment means a pattern of tangled thoughts and feelings between therapist and client which leads to a loss of boundaries. Enmeshment can lead to sexual involvement, if the therapist's needs are not being met elsewhere. In resistance, the client consciously or unconsciously avoids getting into the flow of the process in order to avoid or inhibit wellness and maintain the status quo. As therapist, if you identify your issues, you do not contaminate the treatment. In any event, you cannot take a client further than you yourself have gone. Especially in peer counseling, transference can mean the risk of relapse or regression for the therapist, and damage to the client. Though a certain amount of fantasy interchange is unavoidable, too much is self indulgent, frustrating, and opens both client and therapist to self doubt. It increases stress, liability, and even may jeopardize an agency job. Chemical dependency counselors are especially vulnerable to counter-transference when they become identified with their client's drug use patterns. It brings up conflicting feelings and thoughts about present and past experiences. Needy recovery counselors over- and under-react to clients' feelings. This is one place to seek the help of the Higher Power or the mystical side. The therapist must embody a certain amount of integration which comes from a firm relationship with one's spirituality. Counter-transference only gets out of hand if there are non-integrated personal issues coming up. Supervisors should help identify these issues and suggest skill-building alternatives to working these issues through with the clientele. It is difficult not to trade addiction for codependence in some settings. But it ultimately leads to increasing stress, therapist burnout, and relapse. Therapist's issues and dysfunctions are too numerous to mention. However, just a few include projection of personal experience, inadequate qualifications, lack of trust or assertiveness, conflict anxiety, boundary confusion, judgementalness, rejection anxiety, intimacy dysfunctions, moral and value biases, health problems, self-esteem or self- identity conflict, lack of confidence, self-absorption, denial, unbalanced lifestyle, and domestic dysfunctions. The point to remember is whose needs are being met in the therapeutic session, and it is a one-way street. Focus must stay on the client's needs. There is no need to be a robot 133 in your approach. That is an over-reactive denial of the obvious emotions that must be present for effective work. Impersonal detachment can further damage a client's self esteem. Clinging to rigid techniques also shows a fundamental need to stay in control and lack of spontaneity, and unwillingness to pick up on the client's cues about where their process is heading. Clues to counter-transference will appear if you look for them. Some are in and others out of session work. Some which come up prior to sessions include agenda setting, apprehension, fear and dread. The therapist can act out this behavior by being late, or avoiding therapy with excessive socializing. Acting in is accomplished through emotional absence. During the session are you judgmental, fearful, or envious of the client? Are you frustrated, angry or resentful? Do you feel inadequate or impotent, sexually distracted by the client, or distracted by thoughts unrelated to the client? Are you too sympathetic? Does your client withhold personal feelings and information? How strong are these thoughts or feelings? Are you apathetic or really tuning into the client's communications? Do you ignore opportunities for interventions or feedback? Are you trying to protect the client from experiencing their own pain? These are ways of "acting in." You may "act out" through too much self disclosure, seeking approval or praise, name-dropping, using technical terms, being demanding or impatient, aggressive or blaming. After the session is wrapped up do you have persistent, lingering thoughts or feelings about the client? Do you daydream or gossip about the client, or continually replay sessions. Do you seek outside contact or socialization? Do you find yourself lying or exaggerating the positive or negative changes in the client when charting the case and communicating with supervisors? If so, you had better get into your own process work and resolve the underlying issues before continuing. If these behaviors get excessive or obsessive, the client must be immediately referred elsewhere for treatment. Physical contact should be limited to that which is therapeutically supportive, but does not have erotic overtones. Both client and therapist should behave as if in public. Follow-up should remain on a strictly professional basis, and self disclosure limited to social pleasantries. The experienced counselor can take a few more liberties. We all have the power to self-heal in supportive, collaborative therapy. There are many ways you can help, simply by active listening, being patient and calm, yet curious and interested. Put the client and yourself at ease. Give them "breathing room," empathy and support. Learn to recognize and respond to signs to create rapport. The signals are territorial (locomotor), behavioral (psychomotor), emotional (expressive) and verbal. This gives you an immediate impression. During the interview, help them overcome suspiciousness, but feel free to curb intrusiveness, competetiveness, or rambling. Express your intent to help, be genuine and reliable. Try to get clarification where you are unclear. Check symptoms. Ask what they would like to have happen. Summarize for clients who are vague, but avoid 134 leading language. Nevertheless, "steer" in the desired direction through techniques such as continuation, echoing, curbing, and transitions. Keep your language so basic it matches that of the client. Use metaphors to move past resistance and denial. Also display acceptance and confrontation. Search for the other's stressors and suffering (both facts and associated emotions), respond with empathy and show compassion. If they don't want to talk about it, "looping" techniques help you approach the problem from a variety of angles, one of which will work. The DSMIV lists eighteen defense mechanisms: acting out, autistic fantasy, denial, devaluation, displacement, dissociation, idealization, intellectualization, isolation, passive aggression, projection, rationalization, reaction formation, repression, somatization, splitting, suppression, and undoing. You can handle most of them with bypassing, reassurance, distraction, confrontation, interpretation, or changing vantage point or scope. Be very careful with interpretation as it can overwhelm the client, and you may be very wrong, or reductionistic. Rather, seek to enlighten them with insight and understanding. Stanley Krippner identifies fourteen mythic polarities: creation vs. apocalypse; nurturance vs. deprivation; achievement vs. failure; completion vs. fragmentation; affirmation vs. cynicism; acceptance vs. debilitation; hope vs. despair; reconcilation vs. polarization; wisdom vs. ignorance; celebration vs. betrayal; rebirth vs. death; questing vs. passivity, and intimacy vs. separation. Some of these will come up in the journeys. Understanding their point of view gives you insight, a cognitive appreciation of their suffering. Issues often revolve around love, redemption, identity, and acceptance. They, themselves, may have full, partial or no insight about their condition. Consider that level of personal insight as you set therapeutic goals together. Balance the roles. Help the client clarify and express issues. Listen empathically, but set limits when indicated. Be open with your questions and body language, don't create the feeling that there must be a "correct" response. Let the client help you understand their dilemmas, even their paradoxical aspects. Explore their goals, values, faith, and beliefs about self. Discourage black and white or all-or-nothing thinking and help the client determine intensity, duration and frequency of problem areas. Explore alternatives, Help them find their strengths through empowerment. Collaborate, inspire, and encourage. Chapter 7 THE DREAM JOURNEY AS HEROIC QUEST ABSTRACT: There is a parallel between the phases of the heroic quest and the process of personal transformation encountered in therapy. Experiential therapies, such as dream journeys, provide permission to immerse oneself in the imagery of the deep subconscious psyche. Each dream journey is based on the archetype of the hero's departure and return. It is a metaphor for the growth and maturation of the ego in its spiritual quest. By the creative process we mean the capacity to find new and unexpected connections, to voyage freely over the seas, to happen on America as we seek new routes to India, to find new relationships in time and space, and thus new meanings. 135 --Lawrence Kubie Whether our work is art or science or the daily work of society, it is only the form in which we explore our experience which is different; the need to explore remains the same. What science has to teach us here is not its techniques but its spirit: the irresistible need to explore. --Jacob Bronowski The real voyage of discovvery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. --Marcel Proust Come along on a journey deep into the center — deep into the core of all being. You are in a space of shifting and roiling colors. They are boiling around you. You are in a place of undefined and pure energy "stuff' that exists beyond space and time. In fact, time itself is merely one of the colors that is mixing and boiling. The colors are more or less uniformly, but not quite uniformly distributed in space. And yet where the colors come together, they begin to create something new. They begin to create images. They begin to create structures and forms. And these structures and forms begin to attract around the "mother” energy (matrix) which takes on the shape of the structure or form. This structure is your new self image — your rejuvinated self. How you arrive at this place is through the dream journey, whether it is done through active imagination in therapy, or lived out in real-life challenges. Sometimes finding that chaotic place means "hitting bottom." Others would call it "finding myself." Whatever we call it, this dimension is open to explorers and those impressed into the service of the psyche. It is an adventure—the path of your life. DREAM JOURNEY AS HEROIC QUEST The mythic dimension of the dream journey, like any voyage of discovery, is a variation on the classic heroic quest. Joseph Campbell has popularized this mytheme, outlining its principle phases. Jung called this inner adventure " the night sea journey ," wherein one learns to navigate in the profoundly deep waters of the collective layers of the psyche. The purpose and value of the entire journey is to relate the hero or heroine (which is actually the person's ego) with the primal, paradoxical forces of the transpersonal world. The ego learns that while it may be the center of the personality, it is not the center of the whole being. On the inner quest, the ego learns first-hand about its relative position within the vast dominion of the psyche. A dream journey uses mind, in the broader sense, to enter that domain, to find healing states of consciousness that manifest, for example, through the placebo effect. 136 The deep layers of the psyche have been described in mythic terms throughout the ages. They are the realms not only of transpersonal divinity, but also of the chthonic or earthy gods who have a dark nature. Therefore, the journey is as often associated with a descent into the depths as with a soaring to mystical heights. Many of the identifications in dream journeys are earthy—the fertile promise of decay, the penetrating heat of a volcano's core, the depths of a turbulent whirlpool, etc. Other images of the profound nature of the inner depths are symbolized by such natural metaphors as a deep ocean, or a cave, or the underworld of the dead. In ancient times there were many sanctuary caves used for spiritual purposes. Sometimes the openings were small and aspirants were pulled in feet first to symbolize a reversal of the birth process. An old alchemical maxim suggests the aspirant "visit the interior of the earth," for there one could find the philosopher's stone, symbol of wholeness and healing. Water within the deep cave symbolizes the waters of life which spring forth bubbling with new life-giving properties. Aesculapius [Roman god of healing] , even though he was the son of the god of light, Apollo, has a dark, chthonic side. That is why he was associated with springs and groves of trees. There is a close connection between the water of life, the tree of life, and the renewal of life, as symbolized by the serpent shedding its old skin. All yield a rejuvenating effect. In the ancient Greek myths, Asklepios is associated with the Eleusinian cult of Demeter, the Earth Mother and her daughter Persephone, queen of the underworld. Reflecting the mother/daughter identity, Demeter and Persephone are really one in the same: "my mother/my self." In the ancient incubation rituals, it was Mother Earth who sends dreams. In some mythic sources, Persephone is identified with Coronis, mother of Asklepios. In the Egyptian version of the dream healing cult, Serapis (Asklepios) is identified with Osiris, lord of the underworld and husband of Isis. The ancient doctrine of the soul speaks of visions with the quality of a "great dream." These visions, revolving around the symbolism of disintegration and reintegration, bear all the marks of an initiation into the mysteries of death and rebirth, which is the hero's quest. In the dreamhealing cult, Asklepios was often imaged as a newborn infant in swaddling clothes. In this form he was identical with the incubant seeking healing. The incubants were frequently fed infant food such as milk, honey, and cheese. Because incubation deals with the soul, it confers healing not only of physical ailments, but also of bad fate or destiny. The dream or vision itself is the cure. It is only a slight perturbation, but it has the power to change everything. Another form of "healing" came through imaginal reunion with the ancestors. Reunion has the connotation of "making whole." Practically, it may involve a journey down to the genetic levels of awareness, or it may imply giving one's less-remote ancestors a voice through the therapeutic process. 137 One dreamhealing client, a recovering alcoholic, focused a great deal of her efforts at personal integration around giving her ancestors a voice. She wanted to finally be able to express all the unspoken dreams of her female ancestors, in particular. She gave vent to their fears, frustrations, and grief through many generations of dysfunctionality and compulsive behavior. She gave her mission a broader cultural value, also. Because she works in the recovery field, she is publishing papers on the spiritual significance of giving ancestors a voice, so others may benefit from her trailbreaking effort. These ancestors dwell deep within, in the realm of the dead, the underworld. Dream incubation is a mystery. One is summoned to initiation by dreams, then reborn or healed, after a visit to the underworld. It is especially valuable to do this work around mid-life when the ego has the opportunity to develop a deeper relationship with the religious function. One may be bidden by the god to sleep in a sacred precinct, but that alone does not assure a cure. Courage is an expressed requirement, for Asklepios has vowed he will not cure the cowardly who fear the treatments, such as a cold bath. The underlying meaning is that one must undergo the initiatory ordeals in order to receive the boon of healing. For example, that innocuous bath is more likely a symbolic "drowning." THE HEROIC CYCLE OF DEPARTURE AND RETURN Many people are familiar with Joseph Campbell's THE HERO WITH A THOUSAND FACES, which describes the basics of the hero's cyclic journey. It begins with the call to adventure, which is not always answered voluntarily. Many of us are reluctant to go where none have gone before. This reflects the state of an individual who is summoned to therapy by dreams and symptoms. The pressing problem provides the incentive or drive to get the process in motion. Some heed the call from the subconscious, others try to repress or ignore it. Some "heroes" are actually abducted into the journey, somewhat like what happens in a chemical dependency intervention and detoxification. Even in the beginning of the journey, s/he encounters helpers and opponents along the way. The hero enters the kingdom of darkness either alive or dead (or in the living death of addiction), and journeys through a world of unfamiliar and threatening forces. Once the threshold of adventure is crossed, the game is afoot. It may involve symbolic dragon-slaying, crucifixion, or dismemberment. Dragon-slaying may mean breaking free of old negative, critical parent tapes, that play over-and-over in your mind, inhibiting you and creating guilt. Crucifixion may mean being pulled in opposite directions between equally compelling, but exclusive, choices. Dismemberment may be a metaphor for psychic fragmentation. There may be imagery of apocalypse and natural disaster as the ego glimpses its immanent doom. This ego-death is a requirement for opening to the broader realm of transpersonal reality. For Freud, being the hero meant slaying the father, like Oedipus. 138 To Jung, the heroic battle meant slaying the "dragon" for deliverance from the mother. In psyche's "union of opposites," both interpretations are "right." These images are relevant to addiction in its broader symbolic meaning. We also become addicted to our rigid patterns of behavior and response—addicted to particular, limited, conditioned emotional patterns. In other words regressive tendencies, our childish self [NOT child-like, or inner child], which was randomly programmed in our earliest years. Addiction can be seen as a regressive decent back into the maternal womb and the original bliss of unconsciousness. It is incestuous in nature. Slaying the dragon here means escaping that regressive tendency. Although most-frequently pictured as a snake or dog, Asklepios was also worshipped as a dragon on the island of Cos as late as the fourteenth century A.D. The homeopathic principle of like-curing-like means that the poison is also the remedy. In HEALING AND WHOLENESS, John Sanford recounts how Athena gave Asklepios the dual-natured blood of Medusa: that from the left side killed, that from the right healed. In dealing with addiction (chemical or otherwise), this means divine intercession, building relationship with the Higher Power, curing the alienation which led toward self-defeating or self-destructive behavior. After the conflict, trials, tests, and ordeals, the hero gains his reward, which is a new sense of enlarged mystical and mythical reality. The hero discovers the "New World." It transcends the boundaries of normal space, time, and mortality. According to Erich Neumann, in "Mystical Man": ... What makes the battle perilous, and thus establishes the ego as heroic, is the descent into the depth of the unconscious, the encounter with the nonego. ...It is characteristic of the creative process that in it the ego cannot cling to its position in consciousness, but must expose itself to encounter with the nonego. ...This encounter, wherever it may occur, we designate as mystical. Ultimately, it matters little if one mythically "slays" the mother or the father. The imagery of both the personal and transpersonal parental figures are met within. The hero comes to awareness that both are contained within, and they become harmonized on a new level so the person develops a more androgynous quality. This androgyny is different from gender confusion, or unisex. Androgyny is one of the qualifying characteristics of the shaman, who is an exemplary culture hero. The merging of masculine and feminine energies within is symbolized as the sacred marriage, or hieros gamos. To become a mystic, the hero must cease identifying with either the light or the dark exclusively, and re-own the unlived positive and negative aspects of self. This creates atonement, or at-one-ment. So after a period of seemingly endless wandering, overcoming obstacles sometimes by divine intervention, and gaining the treasure which is difficult to find and hard to hold onto, the hero (or heroine) returns to ordinary life with the wisdom and renewed vision 139 of the sage. The healing comes during the expansion of consciousness, which means freedom, illumination, transfiguration. The hero re-emerges, is resurrected from the kingdom of the dead, the transpersonal domain, and brings along the elixir of life. The hero expands consciousness both regressively and progressively, uniting history and futurity to live out a unique destiny. However, the dangers along the way, both entering the depths and returning with the treasure to normal life are very real. Therefore, a guide who is familiar with the way is a good helper to have along. A dream guide or therapist can lead you into new territory with assurance, since they have travelled there many times before. In every dream journey we recreate the hero's quest. We have the opportunity to respond to the call or to wander aimlessly, to show our courage or falter, to make allies or succumb to opponents, to plumb the depths, to secure the boon, and make a successful return, integrating the wisdom we find into our daily life. THE OVERACHIEVING HEROIC EGO There is little doubt that the hero carries a double-edged sword in his superachieving nature. Like any other tool, it depends largely how it is used whether it is creative or destructive. Western man has paid a very high price for identification with the hero, including lack of feeling awareness, fear of intimacy, and authority issues. The cost for men of living up to the old heroic ideal has recently spawned the men's movement, which even transcends the role of the so-called sensitive man for an authentic masculinity that embraces, integrates, and transcends the opposites. The defensive compensations can be let go, reducing the tension between grandiosity and true greatness of the self within. Mature masculinity is not abusive, domineering or grandiose, but generative, creative and empowering of self and others. Women have encountered the same loss of feminine values entering the workplace. The overachieving superwoman, seeking to have it all, is an over-reactionary caricature of the hero, also. And society has willingly pushed her into this until many men and women have become equally driven by this inner archetype. Maybe the philosopher, Geothe instigated this drive to be superhuman into our culture—but it is a restatement of myths like Hercules and Prometheus. The problem seems to come in when this urge or drive for questing and self development is turned outward into the world of daily life. This probably is not inappropriate in the stages of career-building and family rearing, but the emptiness that surfaces in mid-life shows its shortcoming. When the drive is turned inward to the quest for self transformation, it assumes its rightful place in the psyche and functions in a balanced, noble way. Many Jungians, such as Marion Woodman and James Hillman, feel that the myth of the heroic dragon-slaying hero has moved into overkill. Yes, we must struggle to win our consciousness from the regressive pull of the Great Mother's world. We cannot escape our spiritual destiny by unconsciously sinking back into her oblivion with our drug of 140 choice. The Great Work was the ancient name for transformative pursuits. It requires active conscious effort-work. But, this transformative urge, taken to excess and misplaced has resulted in the technological rape of the planet, nearly killing Mother Earth. We have "conquered" our horizontal world, rather than the vertical dimension of spirit. Theodore Roszak has covered this topic extensively in his works on Eco-Psychology, such as SONG OF THE EARTH. In our misplaced spiritual zeal, we have exploited and ravaged the earth, with our ravenous hunger for resources. The missonary zeal of Colonialism repressed femininine values and cultures. This tendency of the hero within toward overachievement — too much, too soon —is one reason why it is prudent to go slowly in dream healing. For some clients one or two sessions a month are quite sufficient, since they require time to digest and integrate. Dragon-slaying must be understood as a symbolic process of transformation, then the feminine is not torn asunder from matter. We are not really free of the mother when we worship her in concrete materialism, consumerism, compulsive behavior, and spiritual materialism. As we learn to truly honor the feminine and find balance within our own personalities, we learn to stop repressing it and allow it fully into consciousness. This is one way of nurturing the growth of your own soul and creativity. The soul is the embodiment of spirit, the receiver of spirit. It is the split between matter and spirit that is the sickness of our modern society. We heal this split by taking a stand against our compulsive appetites, and power drive, according to the Jungians. The psychological goal of the hero is to train the ego to function at the threshold of the conscious and subconscious worlds effectively. As hero, your first feat is to clarify your psychological difficulties, clear the blocks, voyage to the edge of your own known world, and win the treasure of direct experience and assimilation of the archetypal images. Interaction with these same images was the goal of the mystic arts like magic and alchemy. It takes place in dreamhealing automatically. We learn the difference between our dream-ego and waking-ego [two different complexes]. Both experience emotions and subjective choice. Both feel like "me," but the dream-ego compensates the waking ego with its inner view. Both are subject to distorting their perceptions of reality. Dream life is an ongoing dialogue between the ego and the unconscious mind. The dream ego, especially in a "waking dream" or dream journey, does have a real-time "impact on the complexes of the unconscious and can alter their structural arrangement ," according to James A. Hall. The waking ego has these complexes for its foundation. When they change, this is reflected in the waking-ego, especially as alterations in mood. Dreamhealing is therefore a direct alteration of the waking ego itself. The Self acts through the dream directly on the ego. This process is not without its dangers, at least in the early stages. It creates crises and dangers (such as abreaction) which have the potential of destroying the personality as it 141 has been in the past. When the hero descends into the underworld (unconscious), he must discard the defenses of conscious development, such as intellect. He gains a mythical type of awareness which allows him to directly experience the paradoxical aspect of the inner world without going insane. For example, he comes to understand, first hand, that he contains both his parental images as well as the primordial archetypal parental archetypes. This leads to a true understanding of androgynous nature, which is one form of wholeness as projected by the transcendent function. It is a way of uniting opposites within oneself, rather than overcoming them through fighting. The goal of the hero's quest is a higher synthesis of the ego, with access to both conscious and unconscious. Maturing through the hero means you learn to transform your conflicts into a nobler and more stable personality with deep roots in the sources of life. As hero, you are involved in a paradoxical process of ordering, which is precisely why you may be susceptible to breakdown and wounding. You are assaulted by the forces of chaos, entropy, and disorder. It is a paradoxical truth that acts of ordering can result in potential weakening of the ego. As hero, you learn to withstand the effects of the disorder which your creative efforts manifest. You'll have to battle your own personal and historical limitations to obtain the vision of the well-springs of human existence. Then, your second task, of returning to normal life as a transformed example of the way begins. In the initial stage, you assimilate, then you disseminate. If a would-be hero does not submit to all the initiatory tests and steals the treasures, the powers of the unconscious are mobilized to blast him from within and without. This can be imagined as crucifixion or eternal torment. And how many of us have our crosses to bear! One face of the hero is the martyr who must learn how to give up. However, a self- centered ego can become centered in transpersonal reality. Then one may emerge as a culture hero or heroine in their own small way by making a truly unique contribution to life on the planet. Your inner hero-self may at first refuse the call to adventure. The rough, unfamiliar terrain, the crossroads, and the gauntlet of initiatory barriers mirror the ordeals of the inner quest. But over time you come to realize that you can overcome your infantile sentimentalities and resentments. You may realize that the good and bad are contained in the law (masculine) and image (feminine) of the nature of being. The agony of breaking through your personal limitation is the very process that leads to spiritual growth. To complete your task, however, you must return with the treasure to your mundane life, with an increased sense of integration, no longer merely ego- oriented. You may seek a path of spiritual or religious devotion in order to continue the deepening process begun in therapy. The mystic communes directly with the divine, or Higher 142 Power. Spirituality bears on your integrity, how you conduct yourself in all areas of existence, outer and inner. Further Reading: IRON JOHN, Robert Bly FIRE IN THE BELLY, Sam Keen THE HERO WITH A THOUSAND FACES, Joseph Campbell THE POWER OF MYTH, Joseph Campbell THE SYMBOLIC QUEST, Edward Whitmont PERSONAL MYTHOLOGY, David Feinstein and Stanley Krippner LINKS: Joseph Campbell Homepage Chapter 8 THE DREAM GUIDE: NAVIGATING THE STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS ABSTRACT: The dream guide is one who has navigated the river of consciousness many times before. Aware of the nuances of the territory (s)he can invite others into that deep world, providing a sense of confidence and safety. Preparation for being a dream guide includes experience on both sides of the process. It involves working through one's own issues and letting go of personal agendas. Along with the 143 DREAM JOURNEY GUIDELINES here is the basic "how to" for intuition to play with. These are not strict protocols, but guidelines or suggestions for moving through the levels of the psyche as described in the ego model. He will manage the cure best who has foreseen what is to happen from the present state of matters. —Hippocrates As a dream guide, it helps to empty yourself of knowing, let the dreamer choose the image that opens the work and leads the way. A good dream guide does not lead but rather follows the dreamer's process to the dreamer's own definition of satisfaction. METAPHOR —Ann Sayre Wiseman, DREAMS AS ANATOMY OF A DREAM A dream is a stream of chaos, a river of undifferentiated consciousness and creativity, flowing through the self-scape of the psyche. It is shaped by the frozen states of consciousness, the existential images, that define and mold the self and the reality of our perceptions. And, when it finally emerges into awareness, the images and plots that are presented to our almost-waking self are reflections of these states. They are another way of seeing the self and the reality we create, except one less prejudiced by our ego. When we are asleep the ego is asleep. The ego is turned off and free consciousness has reign. Awake we order all we sense into the conformations of our "pre-ceptions"; but asleep, chaos reigns, and the structure that emerges as the dream is like a holographic image (in multi-dimensions) of the deeper self. As has been speculated about the brain and its functioning, a dream too is very much like a hologram. A hologram is a three-dimensional image that is created by bouncing a laser light off an object and recording on a negative the interference wave pattern as the source light waves interact with the ones reflected from the object. The image of the object is reproduced by passing the original laser through the negative. Unlike a regular photographic image, if you walk around the back of a hologram, it is also reproduced. This is because it is the interference pattern that is recorded, and it contains all the 3-D information needed to reproduce a whole image of the subject. If, for example, you were to drop a rock into a pond, the waves produced would soon reach the shore and reflect back. As the source waves and the reflected waves interact, they create an interference pattern. This pattern contains all the information about the original event, from the shape of the shore, to the the weight, shape and speed of the rock as it entered the water. So does the pattern recorded on a holgraphic negative. Interestingly, the entire image is in any part of the negative. If you cut the negative in half, the whole image is recorded in each half, just somewhat fuzzier. The whole image is in any part of the negative, the universe in a grain of sand. 144 The dream is also just like the hologram. The passage of the consciousness stream through the psyche, and its encounter with the frozen consciousness states, cause ripples and patterns that when they reach our awareness, create images of the deeper self that formed them. The whole is in any part of the dream. FLOWING WITH THE DREAMSTREAM To the shaman/therapist, nature repeats at all levels and in all ways. In chaos theory, this principle is expressed in the self-similarity of fractals. Like the hologram, fractals repeat the basic conformation of their "parent" pattern. They repeat that same basic form over-and-over on different scales. The broad-strokes of nature appear at all levels. A guiding metaphor of dreamhealing is the concept that a river and the stream of consciousness have much in common. Guiding a dream journey is like guiding a white water river adventure, except on the river of inner consciousness (dreamstream) that flows through the dream-scape and self¬ scape. Both are full of rapids and turbulence, back eddies that trap one in circles going nowhere. There are calm, deep, peaceful and serene stretches and unexpected twists that open new vistas. Both the river and dreamstream inexorably flow to the primal ocean, the sea from which all life has arisen, the ocean of chaotic consciousness. Water always seeks its own level through flow along the path of least resistance. In the river the flow of water is part of a cycle. It is a process—and that is what the stream of consciousness is—it is a flow. Within the river what makes rapids are the rocks, the obstructions. They are the hazards. They create turbulance around them. The psychic equivalent are frozen states of consciousness, the frozen existential images, which obstruct the free flow of creative consciousness. They are what create the turbulence within our psyches. Each dream journey is like running one set of rapids, and each rapid is different from the last or the next one. Basically, a rapids is a turbulence, where the flowing system is far-from-equilibrium. Of course, that is where all the excitement is on a river trip, and also on the dream journey. You have to get into the turbulence to get the benefit. In a river, eddies or backcurrents are created around rocks. If you get into these eddies you just spin in a circle, going around and around. You remain trapped until you can get back into the flow. In creative consciousness work it is the same. Rather than eddies, there are fantasy loops. They are always right in the middle of the crises, the rapids, and always reflecting this rock or this frozen consciousness right in the middle of the river. This is where the idea of being imaginative as a guide comes in within the dream journeys. Typically, people will come for help when they are in a crisis. In dreamhealing the eddies are the games they play, the patterns they get into, their self- serving fantasies, their wish-fulfilling daydreams, or excursions in the "heavens" of their belief system. These basic "go in circle" patterns appear at all levels in the dream journey. 145 A river is always the same, yet totally different in every moment. It is constantly changing, becoming different than it has ever been or ever will be again. It is virtually random. The water you see moving past in this instant will not be the same as the next. That complex, dynamic flow is also the description of the consciousness flow—always changing, yet always in essence the same. And it is also the description of chaos- determinate indeterminacy or indeterminate determinacy. Always the same, yet ever- changing also describes fractal programs which model natural processes. They are self¬ similar, self-generating, and self-iterating. The source of a river's water and its goal are the same—the ocean. The source of the creative consciousness flow is the vast sea of consciousness, that primal field of pure potential. We seek immersion in that creative consciousness for renewal and healing. The creative consciousness or dream guide and the river guide are also much the same. No river guide can learn the skill from a book. Training is as much visceral as intellectual, and best learned from those who are experienced themselves. Guides learn from other guides whose voices are rich with experience. They go down the river themselves, hands on, running the rapids. Again and again, they repeat the process until it becomes second nature and a matter of intuition as much as intellect. They are themselves guided by an experienced guide the first few times to teach them the river fundamentals, but they constantly learn by doing. That is also how the dream guide learns, by experiencing both sides of the process, by experiencing first-hand the flow of the dreamstream. Facing their own fear and pain means that any sense of anxiety is personally transformed into a sense of excitement. The essence of the psychic rapids becomes familiar, even in its ever-changing appearance. The training needs to be a total experiential training—not a rule-book training. Yet there are some guidelines (guide's lines) for river running which parallel the creative consciousness or dreamhealing process. Good consciousness guides are intuitive. They intuit their way through rapids sometimes, reading the river and responding instantaneously with the right moves, easily and automatically. That is what the guide does in the dream journeys. The whole idea of going down the river, if you are a river-runner, is to "stay in the current." It is when you get out of the current that you get into trouble. If you are in the current you miss the rocks, and flow through most rapids. You've got to learn how to flow in the current. There are some rules that river guides use, such as "follow the bubbles." Bubbles usually indicate where the current flows. This is also an essential aspect of being the dream guide, being in the flow of consciousness, and staying in the current. Any good river guide knows that how you "set up" determines how you go through a rapids. Setting up is the key to a successful run. You've got to set up where the flow is the greatest, where the most water goes. That is the best place (most of the time). 146 It is exactly the same with the dream guide, who also has foreknowledge of some possible obstructions, based on the interview, and his/her knowledge of the personality of the one being guided. Guiding includes preparing the self and the client for the journey, listening to and healing the whole dream, sensing/intuiting which symbol or event in the dream represents the flow that leads to the dis-ease state, and providing a safe, relaxed environment for the consciousness journey. The point where you enter is important, and depends on your intuition, your imagination. Once in a river's rapids you always keep your bow pointing toward the trouble. You always face the danger. In river running you can power-pull away from the rock and avoid a problem. In creative consciousness guiding you always face the fearful things, the danger, the pain, the frozen consciousness that appears in the journey as fearsome or uncomfortable images. You always face the frightening moment, the dangers, as in the rule of river-running. We wouldn't send anyone down the lower Rogue River without a guide. They might get trapped in those back eddies, spinning in circles. In the creative consciousness process they might get caught in a fantasy loop instead of the consciousness flow, because they don't know how to set up. Guides look at where the bubbles are to set up for the run. That is like the intuition in dreamhealing, and not a bad way of describing the sometimes effervescent feeling of intuition. Reading the patterns and the hidden variables in the river becomes automatic to a river guide. The dream guide reads the shapes of the frozen images, of the feedback loops, and from that he senses the patterns of the stream of consciousness, of the fluid psyche. Yet, the rules are not set, for either a river guide or dream guide. They use them, but let go of them in any particular situation. Each journey is different, unique. That is what makes a guide, sensing and instantly responding to changing conditions. In a sense you can't have a textbook for either profession. You just have to listen to the river, the River Teacher, and see what she is telling you. The river always teaches about life and flowing, dynamic process. The river provides apt metaphors of life, which encapsulate life's patterns. The river teaches without doing or acting, like the Tao. So too does the river of consciousness; just letting go and flowing with it is a healing experience. When Graywolf accompanies people down the lower Rogue, or some other river, the experiences on the river teach, change, and heal as much as do the nightly consciousness journeys around the fire. One such journey was taken by a woman who was fearful, frightened of almost eveything in her life. She was trying desperately to maintain control of everything. Through most of the journey she couldn't let go, and rode in the raft with him. But on the last day of the journey there were only a few Class II rapids (rapids that are of little danger but with a few good waves) ahead. Since it was nothing beyond her ability, at Graywolf s invitation she finally decided to try it on her own in a tahiti (inflatable kayak). Graywolf went ahead and she followed. Half way through one set of rapids she lost her paddle. The tahiti began to toss and spin at the mercy of the waves and current. 147 She was out of control and began to act terrified, although there was really nothing to fear. Graywolf was waiting at the bottom of the rapids to pull her into the raft in case she should capsize and have to float through with her life vest. It was like the rest of life but here, in the river, being frightened did no good. There was nothing she could do and no where to run or hide. She prepared to die, so she simply let go and floated through fine. In camp that night, she accused Graywolf of making her let go. But Graywolf, in his usual way declined any responsibility for her experience. It was the river. Following the river adventure the lessons continued. Her first night home she felt like she was still in the river, and that it was also flowing through her. She felt sensations of rocking and loosening and eventually, through a chain of imagery, she saw herself as a fetus. As that, she experienced being unattached and floating, watching, as the witness. These experiences continued, and in her words, "It was a week before I got back from the river." Since then she has found a new courage and is less fearful and able to let go and flow through situations which she would have previously avoided or fled from. And still the lessons continue from that months later. Her experience with the river changed her life in a profound way. And yet neither Graywol nor the river did anything more than be there in their being. It is the same with the journey on the inner river. The guide does little more than invite and go through first. It is the process that is the healing. Another adventurer from Mexico, 'Fernando' was prone to getting "stuck" in places in life. He would get trapped in situations and not give up or let go. He'd been working on an anima issue, his feminine side. They came up to Blossom Bar rapids; one guide went through one to show the way. Even with instructions on how to get through on the current, Fernando got trapped on "Picket Fence," with water pressure so strong the tahiti was stuck. It wrapped around a big rock, and he could not dislodge it no matter how hard he tried. He climbed onto a rock, clinging for dear life. Graywolf waited for the other guide, while the client continued his efforts to free the boat until he was exhausted. The guides finally shot through "the chute", pulled hard and got into the back eddie closest to where he was stranded. They could only get part way there—enough to throw him a line so they could pull him around to climb into the raft. He had to jump into a raging torrent of water. It took a great deal of faith to trust the guides, himself, and the equipment. But he did. It really took "letting go." When they got back, he began examining his self-defeating "fatal attractions" to certain kinds of women whom he knows are bad for him. He decided to let go of that, too, generalizing what he learned. The role of the guide is the same in river guiding and dream guiding. In either case they accompany the person through the rapids. They instruct how to get through. They watch, prepared to help if their charges get stuck on a rock or trapped in a back eddie. 148 The river guide provides safety. He doesn't take anyone places he is not prepared to help them through. It is exactly the same for the dream guide. The guides keep one away from those dangerous rocks that could flip one over, or hurt one. The guide has been through many rapids before. Perhaps they were not these particular rapids, but we know he survived many others, and has developed skills. S/He's been through enough of them to read the currents, back eddies, and rocks. The dream guide is there to provide that security and that sense of safety in the process. The guide carries the person through their fears. Another obvious link is that river running is done for recreation. You run a river of consciousness with a dream guide for re-creation. Dreamhealing is for re-creation, and the difference is only a hyphen. Re-creation is deep play in the most profound sense, and it is healing. By re-creating, re-forming ourselves we access new potentials, new possibilities, new vistas. If someone is running some rapids and gets in trouble, it is the role of the guide to intervene. The river guide is always prepared to leap in if he or she has to. They have to be prepared to jump into whatever river is there if necessary and deal with whatever comes up. The river guide or dream guide will often go through first to show how it is done. The guides never push, rather they invite or beckon others through. "Come on, let's go; I've been here; it's O.K." There is a need for trust; if you're going to be a guide you've got to be trustable. The guide can't say "I've been there," when they haven't. They can say, "I've been through lots like it; let's go. " The guide lets you know when there is danger, and admits that it is scary, yet OK. The guide always has that sense of scared excitement in the most challenging runs, but still gets through. Both the river guide and dream guide prepare the client with this awareness. In terms of the journey itself, the river guide tells people what is coming up. Before they even leave he will teach about safety. "Ifyou fall in the water float on your back and keep your feet pointing downstream; trust your vest. If your feet are out you can fend off or push off any rocks. Keep your feet pointed toward the danger. " In terms of preparation, for the dream journeys the dream guide might say something like, "Ifyou get in trouble, I'll remind you to breath," or "Use your out-breath. " In preparing for a creative consciousness or dream journey, the guide lets go of any ideas that they have about what this particular journey is going to be like. Its the same with the river guide—they know that river is always different. One never goes through rapids just the same way twice. They know that. It's always a new experience and one lets go of what one knows to experience it anew. The chaotic nature of a river itself assures that. The good river guide doesn't go into the rapids with a preconception at all —"Well, I came through here last time like this." Instead, they still keep their bow pointed to the danger, they still have to pull off from rocks, they still have to stay with the current. Its 149 the same with the dream guide. They must let go of anything they ever thought they knew. Each journey, no matter how many, is on a new river. The unexpected is expected, and is what defines the imagination process. This is where the dual-consciousness is important to a dream guide. They are in the flow of consciousness but there is still a dual-awareness of participating in this adventure, yet remaining outside it, too. They don't take the trip for the client who experiences it for himself, but facilitate or expedite the journey. NAVIGATING THE RIVER OF CONSCIOUSNESS Preparation: What goes into preparing to guide people through their dreams and into the river of consciousness? There are just a few basic directions, but the finesse with which they are applied makes all the difference in keeping the process moving. When preparing for such an expedition the first step for the guide is to talk to the dreamer in an exchange of information. This is in part getting acquainted and a trust¬ building exercise, but the information exchanged is also important. The guide here is getting information to help in forming internal intellectual and sensory images of the nature of the dis-ease or problem and the nature of the ego structure itself. Using T.A. for example, or exploring a symptom, (s)he defines the disease operationally as a system or pattern. The guide is getting an overview of the shape of the frozen consciousness states or patterns that will be encountered in various guises at the various levels of consciousness they will pass through. This helps provide direction and identifies the psychic rocks that form the disturbances and turbulence within the consciousness flow. Understanding the psychic terrain helps in identifying openings to the next levels of consciousness, and also helps in identifying fantasy loops that support the disease. Similarly the guide is becoming acquainted with the dreamer's personality and sensory patterns. This information may become useful in various ways later in the journey. This information process is not limited to the preparations but continues throughout the journey in one way or another. To a first-time journeyer, the guide is also giving information that will be useful in the journey itself — preparing them for what might lie ahead. Some of the most important points the guide gives about the upcoming journey, and again this may also be done at appropriate times during it, might include some of the following: * It is a journey of the imagination; don't discount that. In the words of Albert Einstein, "Imagination is more important than knowledge." It is the voice of creativity. * Each aspect of the dream, symbol or action, is really a part of the dreamer and shaped by deep as well as recent memory and experience. It is these memories that also shape the dis-eases. 150 * The dreamer will be moving towards fear and discomfort, but with reassurances that the guide will be right there and will not take the dreamer where they haven't been themselves. * Dreamers learn to trust themselves and the process. There is nothing inside that will really hurt them. * The guide speaks about not letting the intellectual process or interpretation interfere with or take over in the journey. The dreamers can communicate what is going on but don't need to worry if they can't find words. They will probably be experiencing senses beyond the ones normally encountered. * Guides will understand from their own experiencing of these states where they are. If the dreamer gets stuck, it is because they are holding on. Letting go and trusting is the act of faith that will carry them through the stuck place no matter how scary it is to let go, or what the mind predicts may happen. * The guide may ask permission to touch during the journey. It is very important to get this permission and not assume it is OK even if the permission has been given on previous journeys. * Experience and intuition will teach the guide the kind of information each journeyer needs and when to give it. Each guide's personal preparation is just as crucial. This is a case of centering and breathing fully. It includes emptying the mind of any preconceived prejudices about the dreamer, the dream and its symbols, or where the journey might lead. The guide doesn't want their own personality to get in the way of the process. They create a neutrality within themselves and paradoxically by not being there are more totally there. Contemplation of blankness or chaos, deep breathing and meditation can help shed any attachments to the meaning of the dreams or the outcomes of the process. To arbitrarily assign a particular meaning to a dream before the dream journey, and before hearing all of the dreamer's personal associations to the imagery or deciding where some particular journey may lead is comparable to "mind rape." A dream guide lets the drama and the journey have all the time it needs to unfold before venturing any amplifications from their own stores of knowledge and wisdom. Another important reason for emptying the mind and the self is that the journey is a co- conscious one, that is one in which the guide enters and shares the consciousness states of the journeyer. Dr. Laurence LeShan, in his book, THE MEDIUM, TH E MYSTIC, AND THE PHYSICIST, identifies that it is becoming one with, sharing consciousness with the client that is the key to healing phenomena. Dr. Milton Erikson identified co-consciousness as the state in which his most powerful work and the most significant leaps in his therapy occurred, (see THE COLLECTED PAPERS OF MILTON H. ERICKSON, edited by Ernest L. Rossi, 1980). And the key to entering this co-consciousness state is: first to empty one's own mind of the self, and then to fully attend to the client using all the senses to do so. 151 This is the purpose, for example, of touching the client. It is not to heal or manipulate energy, but to better sense the client. Scanning, passing the hand several inches over the body of the client, can also help with this. The palm of the hand may pick up pressure or temperature sensations and changes as it passes over certain areas of the body. This is not interpreted, but merely serves to help the guide enter more into the oneness and co-consciousness state with his charge. Sometimes matching breathing rates and depths, or eye blinking frequency, can help the guide enter co-consciousness, although forcing this won't really work. More often, an outside observer would be able to notice that the guide and guided one were naturally breathing and blinking at the same rate. This is natural rapport. One trick that can be useful is the "putting myself into their place" game. In this scenario, the guide imagines being the client by seeing and sensing the scenes described by the client. If this is painted on the blank mind of the guide, it leaves them open to an entrainment process in which they begin to experience what the client is experiencing, perhaps in the context of their own sensory system, but in all important ways, the same state. Using techniques like this, Graywolf has noticed that sometimes he senses what state lies ahead in the journey and later that they arrive there. It is just as important for the guide to help the dreamer to empty his or her mind of what their intellect and emotions want to make of the dream. Relaxation and deep breathing techniques can help with this. " Breath deeply and let the out-breath empty you ," or "Notice the empty space at the bottom of your breath, and let your mind empty into it each time you pass through it," are examples of some of the ways the guide might invite the dreamer to do this. The environment in which the journey is to occur is also important. The guide should provide a pleasant, quiet, and safe place in which they will not be disturbed. The journeyer and guide should both have a comfortable place to sit or lie. Graywolf often lies beside the journeyer during the process as he finds it can help him enter the co¬ consciousness state more easily. Our experience is that the journey is usually facilitated by the prone position, but not in all cases. Soft lighting is more conducive to the process than harsh or florescent lights and candles may also help set a mood. Remember as a guide one is dealing with soft night-time phenomena in which the emphasis is on internal rather than external sensings. Absence of extraneous cues from outside the therapeutic setting will help keep their attention inside. So time spent readying the abation (name of the cell in Aesculapian Dream Healing where the supplicant slept to dream and heal) is well spent. Demonstration journeys have often been led in sterile classroom workshop environments with success, but these demonstrations are by intent superficial, and deeper expeditions are enhanced by safer more pleasant environments. In summary then, preparation is a time of trust building and information sharing. But most important is the emptying of the mind of intellectual and emotional interpretations and shadings for both the dreamer and the guide. It is this preparation that sets the "tone" of the journey and is as important as the journey itself. 152 Launching into the Consciousness Stream through the Dream: Once both are relaxed and emptied, the guide invites the dreamer to recall their dream. Borrowing from the Gestalt techniques, they are invited to share it in the first-person present-tense as if they are "experiencing the dream now." Often this will induce R.E.M. (rapid eye movement) and this is an ideal condition although not necessary. If this occurs the dreamer is in altered consciousness re-experiencing the dream but on the waking side of that state. This is similar to but not exactly what has been described as lucid dreaming, the difference being that the dream experience has been brought into waking awareness rather than the ego entering into dream awareness. This is a subtle but important distinction. It is more important to bring the dream's healing energy into waking reality for it to manifest than it is to enter the dream space with the ego. The absence of rapid eye movement does not necessarily mean that the dreamer is not in altered consciousness. The very recall of a dream with eyes closed in a state of deep relaxation is a non-ordinary state. It is both the guide and dreamer working in this altered consciousness that makes this work different from other psychotherapeutic work. Here, the guide is totally attending to the recounting of the dreamer's experience of the dream. They are listening with dual consciousness, that is, part of their awareness is entering a co-consciousness state and sharing the dreamer's experiences and sensations, while a part of their awareness is also observing the dreamer and themselves. The client is usually in this dual consciousness too, with part of them being in the dream while part stands outside of it and describes the experience. Here, or later in the journey, the journeyer might become confused by this duality of awareness and interrupt their journey as they try to reconcile it. If this happens, a few words from the guide can help, such as " You may find that this is like watching a movie; part of you is actually experiencing it and fighting as the hero(ine), but another part of you is sitting in the audience and capable of commenting on or describing what is happening. We'll communicate verbally as the audience but don't let that remove you from the movie's action." A symbol may appear in this initial description which the guide thinks is "fraught with meaning," maybe a personally charged images comes up such as the guide himself or the guide's totem animal, if they have one. As tempting as this image can be, it may or may not be the best doorway for the dreamer to enter. When opening to what they are drawn to in the dream, guides keep their personal likes or expectations out of the process. They remember that the dreamer is doing this work for their own benefit. This is a danger area for the guide, and simply put is a case of separating one's intuition from one's personal issues. A digression and discussion of this topic is appropriate here. THE DREAM GUIDE'S PERSONAL ISSUES - THE WOUNDED H EALER 153 As has been observed and noted by Dr. Stanley Krippner and many others who have studied shamans, initiation into being a shaman is often through the healing of their own affliction. It is also a well known phenomena that many psychotherapists enter the profession because of their own disturbances and as an attempt to better understand and deal with them. In the field of addiction work, many, if not most counsellors come from the ranks of those who have had to deal with their own addictions. The individual who has worked out all their own issues is indeed a rare phenomena and may be a mythical creature, particularly in the healing profession. We all have our personal wounds. Inside of us all are unresolved issues based on our life experiences which we have not quite worked out yet. Most therapists know when they are touching their own "stuff" because they are drawn to it. When your "stuff" is up you are drawn to it in another person. The same mechanism operates in romantic relationships where people with the same or complimentary issues, even though deeply hidden in the subconscious, couple up. Different than "true love," this forms the basis of co-dependence or symbiotic relationship which exerts a strong draw on both. In the important work of consciousness guiding, one does not want such co-dependence or symbiosis to develop. Therefore, the issue of making a clear distinction between the draw of intuition and the draw of one's unresolved "stuff" is crucial. It reflects in therapy at each choice or decision-making point. After all, intuition is very important in this work and is in fact "the guide's guide." A knack for this discrimination can be developed. The issue of whether or not the consciousness guide has worked out all of their issues is not the point. The point is that the guide has developed means of doing so and is aware of personal unresolved issues. It is a therapeutic or counseling axiom that therapy will get stuck when the client gets to the therapist's issues. By one of the corollaries of Murphy's Law, this will happen with about the same frequency as "if anything can go wrong, it will." As with the client, the guide's dis-ease is hidden behind fear and pain, and if the guide has not been through that or faced it in themselves, they will not likely be able to guide the client through. An example from one of Gray wolfs training sessions illustrates the point: In this instance a student was leading a dream journey and kept avoiding the client's dark place, a shadowy place of deep blackness that seemed ominous and full of hidden dangers. Very quickly each time this image came up in the journey, she guided the client into some other aspect of the sensory experience that eventually led to very beautiful fantasy images of flying, lightness and freedom. It was a very pleasant experience for both, but no real transformation happened because the ominous shadow was still lurking, once again ignored and relegated to the obscurity of the dungeons of the subconscious. The student's life experiences had exposed her to abuse by addicted co-dependent parents and mate. She had come to a "Pollyanna" way of dealing with this using 154 affirmations and other superficial thought and emotional techniques as ways to create a safe and comfortable fantasy for herself. But positive thinking is not necessarily healthy thinking. She had not dealt with the pain and darkness at her deeper levels of memory and consciousness states such as those typically reached in creative consciousness process journeys. The client was facing similar issues and so in this case what the guide felt was her intuition was in reality her own avoidance mechanisms for escaping, or perhaps one might say "flighting" into lightness and the illusions of freedom. But the darkness was still there, untouched and unresolved for both. And this is the danger: unresolved personal issues appearing disguised as intuitive feelings, hunches or attractions that fool the guide and lead only to fantasy loops or mutual self deception. The guide does little more here than teach the client a new fantasy for avoiding the issue. This illustration emphasizes the necessity for guides to have, themselves, been guided by one more experienced who has taken them into their own "forbidden territory." With this experience, novice guides develop attitudes of courage so that when other unknown and frightening territories are encountered in a journey with a client, they will enter the scary places with faith in themselves and the process knowing that they can win through, rather than avoiding and digressing from them. On the other hand, a novice guide may again be attracted to the client's darkness, one that is like the unresolved darkness in themselves. In good faith, in spite of their fear, they may even guide themselves and the client into that place. But since it is "in spite of," rather than a full embracing of the fear, they may panic and bolt. Because they have not yet "funded" themselves with the experience, courage and visceral trust in the process, they seek escape and pull the dreamer with them. Again we emphasize the importance of the guide having personally experienced their own deep journeys to develop trust in the process. You only learn about going down a river by going down the river. We are not implying that the guides need to be perfect and have worked out all their own issues. Yet they must know themselves well enough and have enough personal experience with the process that they are prepared to resolve whatever of their own dark places, fears and pains might be induced by the client's experiences. The guide must willingly enter this unknown common territory, embracing the fears with their fund of courage and experience if the client is willing to do so under those terms. Beyond this unresolved stuff however, lies the most profound level of internal processing for the guide which comes from genuine intuition or intuitiveness. The question is how does one identify it. It is relatively easy to discriminate intellectual process from it, but it is not easy to tell the difference between intuition and personal unresolved stuff. Both have an essence of attraction and seem to come from deep within. There are some important distinctions, however. The difference is a qualitative one and not easily quantified. Being in the co-consciousness state is more likely to invoke intuitive process since it is based in an internal letting go of the self. Like imagination, intuition is often very surprising, for the guide perhaps a new experience or perception not previously 155 encountered. But personal "stuff' takes place within a context, it is quasi-logical, and develops in a cause-effect based way. Yet we cannot always use this touchstone since the mind can often take intuitive insight and place it in a context of cause and effect. The surprising, acausal, or "does not follow" nature of the insight is the most reliable clue. There is really no objective "every time is true" answer to the question, but if the guide knows him or her self well enough, that and experience will help them develop a sense of the qualitative difference between genuine intuition and their own "stuff." Much of the dreamhealing process involves making such subjective choices and distinctions and acting on them with faith, courage, and trust. Back to the Stream and the Dream: Where we left off before our digression, the guide had invited the dreamer to share their dream. After attending this and looking at the attractions in the dream on the first time through, the guide then invites the dreamer to recall or share the dream a second time. The guide may at this time want to help deepen the dreamer's relaxation even further, or may just proceed with the second telling. This time, however, the guide is prepared to open a doorway into the deeper consciousness stream. How does the guide pick the doorway to the next level? Following are some general guide's lines. Keep in mind, however, that there are no "cookbook" instructions. The dreamer and the guide are in a process of mutual co-creation and this process is best characterized by its lack of rules or consistency. Like running rapids, the route is as much determined by seemingly random variations in the currents of the consciousness flow, and they are usually subjective and intuitive calls as to riding these currents. In retelling the dream, the guide may notice that the dreamer has left out or added some symbol or component of the dream from the first telling. The omission or addition is usually important and may be the way the dreamer's deeper self has of alerting the guide to the best doorway. A color, sound or some other sensory component of the dream may "leap out" at the guide and be the doorway they are seeking. During the retelling, the guide is sensitive to nuances in the body language, tone of voice, or other artifacts such as a "Freudian slip" which may also provide arrows for entries. Sometimes entry is through one of the dream's actions, or perhaps the intense emotion that it or some symbol evokes, it is not always necessarily through a symbol. Sometimes Graywolf uses what he calls "the drone technique." In this technique the guide uses "soft ears," which is the equivalent of "soft eyes" or looking at something without a focus. The sound of the dreamer's words becomes in essence a drone, but out of this background of white noise certain words, symbols, feelings or some other aspect of the dream will emerge. Standing out in their clarity, perhaps emphasized by a tone or body language, they are again a message from the dreamer's wiser self to the guide indicating a possible entry into the dream's deeper levels. Often, as with Gestalt dreamwork, inanimate objects or symbols in the dream are good launching ramps. The more inanimate the symbol, the more the dreamer has disassociated from this aspect of consciousness, and so the more likely it is to be out of awareness, control, and ease. 156 Discomfort and fear mark dis-eased states, and the dreamer will often experience these feelings more intensely as they get closer to it. So symbols or images in the dream and later in the journey that cause discomfort or fear are like arrows pointing the way to the dis-eased consciousness pattern. Sometimes fear and discomfort are so intense that no matter how reassuring or supportive the guide is, the client will not venture into this area. So while providing direction, they may or may not be the doorway actually taken to the next level. In this case other doorways may be used and the nature of the fear or discomfort noted. It is perhaps useful here to state what may by now be an obvious fact. THE GUIDE IS IN REALITY BEING GUIDED BY THE CLIENT, BY THE DEEPER SELF OF THE CLINET FROM A COMMON CONSCIOUSNESS AND CO-CREATIVE RELATIONSHIP THEY SHARE DURING THE JOURNEY. The messages and clues are often very subtle or obscure. What goes on at the verbal and ego levels is often of minor importance. The guide realizes that a very wise and powerful part of the client — the healer, soul, or whatever name is given this reality — is directing the work and journey. It is the part that wrought the dream and brought it to awareness. It does not speak with words, nor necessarily openly. It is the guide's job to look beyond the obvious and the superficial, which are often ego constructs and self-serving to the client's and guide's ego and fantasy structures, to the deeper and wiser Self of the client who knows exactly where to go and what to do. The guide is a mirror, reflecting back and translating this part of the journeyer to themselves. Once the guide selects the launching ramp, they invite the dreamer to enter into the consciousness and experience it directly. They may invite the dreamer to " Become that symbol, and re-experience the dream as it," or to "Imagine what it would be like, how you would experience yourself as the ... " They invite the dreamer to fully explore that part of the dream as the self, and as before the guide listens, intuits and observes both the client's and their own co-consciousness experiencing of this state to find the next clue, the next doorway into even deeper levels. Thus, step-by-step, from consciousness state to consciousness state, from level to level until it eventually becomes a flow, the dreamer is led deeper and deeper into their imagination to confront their dis-eased primal consciousness self images. As was noted in an earlier chapter, the deeper one gets, the less definable the imagery becomes and the more multi-sensory its nature. Visual stimulation and auditory stimulation are among the last to develop discrimination. Pure color or sound indicate deeper and earlier experience and memory. tuck places in the journey, like on a river, indicate to the guide they are hung up on a rock of frozen consciousness. Changing the sensory experience from say emotion to color, or visual to tactile, will often help the guide take the journeyer past stuck places and on to deeper levels. (S)he may remind them that they, the guide, are there with them, know this place, and will accompany the journeyer into it. 157 They might provide reassurance by reminding them that there is nothing that will hurt them and that the fear is illusion. They might suggest flowing into the place of fear with the outbreath, or to imagine breathing in the color and filling the insides with it as they immerse themselves in it on the outside. Changing the focus from a visual image to sound or taste is another possibility. The guide naturally develops a repertoire of tactics over time to help the journeyer beyond the stuckness. Fantasy loops is another form of stuckness that may sidetrack a journey. Like back eddies in a river's flow, psychic fantasy loops are caused by the solid rocks of frozen consciousness. The current is disturbed by the blockage, and flows back on itself, moving upriver against the flow and back again in circles. They represent the game, racket, and script patterns that we get caught in within our lives. In essence, the loop is an ego phenomena, a means by which it sustains itself and its identity in the familiarity of its known experiences. In these loops the imagery leads in a circle, in fact, often this is the first awareness the guide has. They find themselves back at the same essential imagery they noticed earlier. They will notice that the loop's patterns of imagery, although more primal, mirror the behavioral, thought, and emotional patterns noticed in the earlier information-gathering part of the preparations. Getting out of a loop is often quite tricky. They can be tenacious and hold the travelers trapped and going around and around but nowhere in particular, just like back eddies do in rivers. Often the hardest rowing a river guide has, is pulling out of a back eddy, and the same is true for the consciousness guide. Several doorways will be noticed and tried, but each leads back to the loop. It is here that both the patience and ingenuity of the guide are most exercised. And there are no rules other than persistence. On occasion Graywolf has guided people back into more surface aspects of the dream journey and opened other doorways. Sometimes the loop itself becomes the lesson of this particular journey and provides fuel for future dreams and journeys. But usually the guide can find a new aspect or essence in the imagery experiences reported by the journeyer, or may intuitively pick up on some aspect the journeyer has neglected to mention. The guidelines for getting out of any stuck place apply in general to breaking out of a fantasy loop. As indicated earlier in this chapter, the stuck place may also indicate the guide's own unresolved "stuff." We come back to this point because it is very important to realize it is the most likely reason for a consciousness journey to be limited or ineffective. The guide must remain unattached to the outcome of the journey. Experienced guides avoid controlling the process, flowing instead with the dreamer's imagination and imagery. Above all they must be prepared to venture with the dreamer into the very jaws of dismemberment, dissolution, or death. It is only the guide's unresolved issues and fears that will interfere with this, and this is a necessary step that leads into the healing and creative consciousness. RUNNING THE PSYCHE'S RAPIDS The crux of creative consciousness process is reaching this creative state of undifferentiated or chaotic consciousness. It is in this state that the old primal self 158 images dissolve, and it is the consciousness from which the new ones form. Yielding to a process of ego death leads to this consciousness. It is a death because at the deepest levels we define ourselves by this image and what it has created and frozen into our lives. We are it and it is our death when it dissolves into the infinite possibilities of chaotic consciousness. We suggest as a useful motto for the dream guide, "Know thyself well, and be prepared to enter into the jaws of death with deep-funded faith in the creative process." This unformed consciousness is the essence of our vitality and life force. It is really a consciousness field from which we create and recreate our reality every instant of time. It is a complexity of infinite consciousness possibilities and forms and is the essence of our ability to adapt, change, transform, and evolve. It exists deep within us, hidden behind the opacity of what we know, and what we cling to. It reaches into our awareness through dreams, and in the flow of our imaginations. This is the essence of our being; it is the essence of all being. To become aware of it, to get there, we must navigate through the psychic rapids caused by the rocks of our dis-eased states and our knowings. It is on these rocks of frozen ego that we get stuck. No matter how scary the imagery, the guide realizes that this is the true nature of the journey. It is in her faith and nature, in faith in nature. She knows the flow is found in her imagination and intuition. She invites the dreamer into this river. They will float it together. As guide she will navigate them past the rocks, helping the dreamer to find the flow to carry him through. She will help him to dissolve into his imagination, knowing it is the flow. She knows this last dissolving is a death but that it also opens into a field of unformed consciousness with infinite recreative possibilities. She has learned to let go and trust the healing nature of this state. She knows that from it will emerge an evolved new state of being and that this is the process of healing. It is in her own experience to trust this. GUIDES AND STRANGE ATTRACTORS: "MAGNETIC PERSONALITY" An important question in learning to trust creative consciousness process is how do we know new images and consciousness structures emerging from the chaotic consciousness are always improvements over old; that indeed they do lead to healing. It is, in fact, the crux of this process. In all our work the new primal state indeed represents a remarkable improvement over the old dis-eased state that it replaces, and continues to break things loose and manifest changes in the journeyer far into the future. In this sense the creative consciousness journey ends more in the opening of a process rather than the attainment of a state. It is not unusual for us to hear from people six months or a year after a journey reporting that whatever they did in their journey has changed their old patterns completely for the 159 better in a seemingly permanent way and is still somehow working on them and changing them in yet more profound ways. Here chaos theory provides food for thought both metaphorically and mathematically. Although answers as to how new consciousness structure emerges from the chaotic consciousness field are speculative, chaos theory offers some ideas. For example, it is known that "certain complex systems tend toward self organization and are marked by the capacity to evolve," (Kauffman, 1991). Indeed the process of evolution is a statement of the healing process we are outlining. An organism or species faced with a threat to its survival, goes into crisis. Out of the chaos, this disruption, new forms emerge which have better survival potential. A system must go through a period of chaos or loss of structure in order to change, even a psychic system or consciousness system. Chaos theory goes on to describe a force, an energy, or perhaps a principal, known as the Strange Attractor. These attractors operate on chaotic systems and influence the shape of the pattern that emerges. In a sense they are magnets drawing structure from chaos. We can speculate about the consciousness journey and the nature of the strange attractor that draws the new primal images from chaotic consciousness. At the inaugural 1991 meeting of the Association for Chaos Theory in Psychology, the idea of a therapist being such an attractor was discussed. Based on observation, this is true, and indeed is an accurate description of the role of the guide in a consciousness journey. The shape or nature of the new image emerging from the nothingness of chaotic consciousness is influenced by its environment. In this sense the environment is the strange attractor. The environment a person was conceived in, born into, and developed in provides the strange attractor that shapes the ego or personality. Experiences of pain and fear, experiences of dis-ease, in this environment shape free consciousness energy into its form. There are of course other factors that influence how the environment was sensed, for example genetic factors. Still the organism's experiences and the nature of the environment act on the emerging consciousness structure much as the strange attractor acts on a chaotic system. In the consciousness or dream journey the guide influences the environment and the experience by which these old images are brought into awareness and dissolved into chaos. Except in the journey the environment is one of ease and flow. Fear and pain are transformed by courage and imagination into a flow of creativity. The guide's image of the client is as a powerful being with all the resources needed for healing. The therapist in a state of co-consciousness is sharing this image as well as the experience of the journey and will very much influence the new consciousness process that emerges. It will be more creative and courageous and flowing if that has been the experience of the journey itself, and it is the example (s)he sets and the image (s)he holds. 160 There are also other influential factors; it is not all the guide as the attractor. There may, for example, be other consciousness structures in the client's ego that may exert magnetic influence on the emerging consciousness. These may be other unresolved issues, images, or other dis-eased consciousness structures. They may also be healthy flowing states that are not affected by the disease. We are all a mixture and provide our own strengths and creativity to influence our evolution. But, in so far as the dis-eased states, we emphasize the benefit of deeper journeys, since the more primal the imagery, the more symptoms of dis-ease it is responsible for. The corollary to this, however, is that the deeper the journey, the more influential the guide is as a strange attractor. This is a very considerable responsibility, one the guide does well to consider carefully. It brings us back to earlier discussions of the importance of the guide's preparation and state of mind. It is crucial to have worked out, or have a means of working out, their own issues. The guide's attitudes and process will be as important in the shaping of the new being, not through any manipulation or intent on their part, but by the very essence of their being. The unconscious absorption of the guide's traits happens automatically to a greater or lesser extent as both the self image and the worldview of the client is changed, broadened, and enlarged. In the process of therapy, the client is clearing emotional blocks, reclaiming frozen feelings, and lost or abandoned parts of the self. This is experienced in creative consciousness process largely through images and sensate experience which fuse mind, imagination, and feelings into a gestalt. The training process of the guide grants access to a deeper experience of the self which is contagious. The therapeutic personality has the emergent capacity for curing dis-ease because the mere presence of a healthy personality acts as a tonic or general medicine for those who contact it. In other words, if you are truly individuated, you can trigger off the same process in other people. To be individuated as a therapist or guide means you express your unique essence most fully, rather than learning and practicing by rote. It means you have and still are exploring the heights and depths of your own inner world, integrating that into the context of your life, and freeing up your creativity. The process is contagions because when a person meets someone whose worldview is more expansive, their limitations begin to dissolve too, provided they don't get threatened and run. It is the guide's obligation to conduct themselves and the journey in a non-threatening manner. There is a tendency in the helping professions for people to consider themselves "healers." This is an especially popular term among alternative health practitioners whose practices range from body work, to crystal healing, to channeling, breathwork, rebirthing, naturopathic medicine, and ghostbusting, to transpersonal psychology, and more. Each "healer" or system speaks of the myth, magic, and mystery that characterize their model, and offer this up as their healing balm. Thus they are likely to capture and contain the projections of others. Their unique personalities act as a "hook" for 161 archetypal projection of the client's inherent healing resources. This projection mobilizes healing. There is great responsibility which comes with declaring oneself a healer. For those who depend on them, it is their task to carry that projection for a while, until the client can re-own it and develop a relationship to the inner healer. All too often this is not done. If the ego of the "healer" needs reinforcement of its grandiose self image, the illusion of being "healer" needs to be seen through for what it is — an ego trip. In fact, it is really the inner healer which truly does all regenerative work in therapy. The therapist simply helps the client access it, provides the environment, as it were, for the client to evolve. The therapist as a strange attractor functions as the nucleus of an unpredictable yet deterministic process of growth and healing within the personality of the client. The guide does this without doing it. GETTING INTO AND OUT OF CHAOS As stated earlier, the crux of the creative consciousness journey is to enter into chaotic consciousness with the old existential primal self images so that they might be transformed. The closer one is to the chaos consciousness field, the more undifferentiated the imagery is. At these levels of consciousness, there seem to be two kinds of chaotic imagery. Here we are in a very cloudy area, so the question of whether one really experiences chaotic consciousness or merely the archetypal states defining its borders, has no clear answer. In the descriptions we get and our own experiences, one could argue either way. However, there seem to be two types of imagery that we can associate with entering into chaotic consciousness. One is total blankness or lack of any form, the other is an overwhelmingness of sensation. The first type is characterized, for example, by black space. Sometimes there is a black hole within the blackness. This is a black blacker than the blackest black imaginable. Sometimes it is a grayness or a gray cloud. There are usually sensations of falling or falling-floating experienced within this emptiness out of which eventually the new images emerge. The other type is characterized by, for example, a spiral or a vortex. It exerts a magnetic draw and the journeyers are drawn into it. Sensations of spinning and being drawn deeper often cause the journeyer to report intense dizziness and disorientation. Often there are feelings of flying apart, limbs and eventually all parts of the self flying off in the centrifugal forces experienced in the vortex. This dissolution sometimes leads into the first type of imagery. Sometimes other solid colors, laser-like in their purity might be presented. For example, a deep red might lead into a magma-like flowing sensation in which intense heat melts or dissolves the journeyer. We are not really sure they are different. Rather they are probably just different sides of the same circle seen from different perspectives. On the one side it tends to zero, and 162 on the other, infinity. It is not unlike the Gnostic concept of the plenum and the void being one paradoxical union of opposites. A plenum is the opposite of a vacuum, being fully occupied in this case by the imagery swirling in a chaotic way so it is not differentiated. So much information is there, it is chaotic and overwhelms the senses. It is a fullness rather than emptiness. It is also like the Yin (feminine principle of yielding and emptiness) Yang (masculine principle of seeking and filling) creating the complete circle. Yet within each is the seed of the other. Indeed, in journeys the dismemberment in the spiral often leads to a sense of being "no thing," while the empty blackness is often found to be full of swirling colors. The imagery is far broader in scope than the examples given, but the guide learns to identify this step by its essence. There are feelings of transformative forces at work, and a feeling of almost palpable relief at this final stage. The guide encourages the journeyer to enter these patterns and to yield to them. "Letgo and let this vortex suck you in... What are you experiencing?" Or, "Go ahead, fall into this black hole, even if you 're afraid. I'm with you and I've been here many times before. Come with me! " The healthier new states and primal images that emerge from the chaotic consciousness tend to share some common characteristics. The new images are much more flexible, free and flowing. It naturally becomes easier to let go and face things with more courage even if afraid. There is an essence of deep peace and ease. Indeed this sense of peacefulness and security is the essence of the journey itself and what the guide brings to it. Many other aspects of this "right brain" state have been described such as feelings of dimensionlessness, timelessness, and boundarylessness. Many senses are involved such as the experience of bubbles or effervescence and tingling sensations in the body, often at the site of a symptom. We usually let people know that "this is a healing state; stay in it and let it work on you now," we /nvite. "Stay in it as long as necessary...when it is time to come back, you 'll notice that your eyes are opening. Just let that happen and you 'll be back." If the guide has any insights that might help the client find order or connections in the work, this is the time for those to be shared. For example, "I noticed that the red color you saw was throbbing and pulsing. That sounds almost like how a fetus experiences being in the womb. And the throbbing led to that queasy sensation in your abdomen. That might tie in with what you told me about your mother's heavy drinking and smoking while she was pregnant." The journeyer may be assured here that what they experienced were in reality memories, but sensory, cellular, or genetic memories of how they experienced their forming. Much information can be exchanged at this phase while the client is still relaxed and close to the journey. But again we advocate caution about rampant interpretation or analysis. This may impose too much structure and direction on an emerging free consciousness pattern and define its limits too soon. In general the guide is content to allow this unfolding to freely develop as he did the rest of the journey. 163 Sharings at this time are as likely to be counterproductive as helpful. The guide operates from the principle that the guided one is really the healer and has the intelligence and deep wisdom to become aware of what they need to be aware of. It is a delicate balance. The guide does not want to control the emerging new structure, yet sometimes a piece of information or a connection may be a useful piece to which the guide can steer the journeyer. Once again these are subjective calls and as much, if not more intuitive than rational. A DIFFERENT REALITY: ITS ALL IN THE PERCEPTION Our perceptual systems, our sensory systems have as a prime function the task of creating some kind of order out of an otherwise totally random, confusing morass of information that is available at any moment of time. We actually have trillions of bits of information bombarding us at a given time. Our senses and perceptual patterns create some type of reality structure out of that. In this sense you can consider our perceptions and our senses, our genetic makeup, how our senses operate, as a strange attractor. Because this is essentially what creates some kind of order out of totally overwhelming input. IN OTHER WORDS, WE LIVE IN A TWILIGHT ZONE, IN ESSENCE, BETWEEN ORDER AND DISORDER. What creates order is our presence, our being, our perceptual patterns, our own sensory systems. As we share common genetic backgrounds, we tend to have senses which are very similar. Maybe we taste things a little differently than someone else, but basically, unless medically impaired, we taste vinegar about the same. We taste sugar about the same. And so we create similar realities. We come to a consensus about reality. Yet our common agreements about reality are conditioned by our shared cultural trance (Tart, 1992). They may be based on that essence of strange attractor. Deep down inside what holds our view of the world together? What makes it consistent? How we store that information then becomesimportant -- and more fundamentally, how it forms. The reality we form basically emerges from how we are living. How do we get that view of reality? When we begin to form we don't have any consistent prepared pattern. Yet almost everyone has seen that babies have distinct personalities even as newborns. Formative experience begins in the womb. We've got all our perceptual mechanisms; we've got the senses. But we form our existential position, or view of reality, our beliefs about self and world, essentially from our experiences. They are based on how we perceive, and how our senses react to those experiences. That stores inside of us. Especially in the preverbal stage, it is stored as images. The nucleus of that memory, that position, that consciousness, is a multi-sensual imagery which describes the nature of the self and the world. If the world is a really threatening place, and Mom and Dad are terrible, and they beat me a lot, I grow up with the existential belief that the world is a dangerous place, and is going to hurt me all the time. I'm somehow deficient or unlovable. It's more than words. It is an image, and not the normal image you might think of. It is a multi- 164 sensual image and is stored as a sensory memory rather than an intellectual or thought memory. It might just be colors; it might be a swamp! Who knows what that image is like in the dream? When you get down to it, it may surprise you first how complete it is, and how utterly alien it is to any thing you think of as an image of the world. And that essentially is the order that has been created out of chaos at a very formative stage, a young age. The strange attractor has been essentially a combination of a person's sensory patterns, perceptual patterns, and the environment and what is happening to them. It forms the basis of an individual's personal mythology, which forms the basis of the belief system, which forms the basis of how we think and feel about things. This in turn determines how we behave, which then feeds back in a circular way from our belief system to our behavior. The circular pattern makes sure everything, positive or negative, gets confirmed. This circle is a reflection of the deeper dis-eased image. If you go deep beneath that belief system, down to the deepest existential image, then you are at a place where very profound change can happen. We've noticed in dream journeys and other consciousness journeys, that WHEN YOU GET DOWN TO THAT EXISTENTIAL IMAGE - THE VERY BASIS OF THE IMAGE OF SELF - IT IS USUALLY SURROUNDED BY FEAR AND PAIN, BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT USUALLY FREEZES STUFF IN PLACE. When you get deep down to that image, there is always a doorway to another deeper level. At the level where the existential image is formed, at the boundary where order and disorder dance the dance of creation, profound changes can occur. At that level the existential images that we use to order our reality can change through the dance. We can change our most fundamental perceptions of reality and in this new reality we can be at ease rather than diseased. It's really all in how we perceive it. Chapter 9 DREAM JOURNEY GUIDELINES: THE PRACTICE OF DREAMHEALING ABSTRACT: Here is the "how to" instruction for dreamhealing. As well as the basic directions, we have included suggestive phrases for each phase of the journey. These phases include entry, initiating and guiding, sharing, feeling, releasing, accepting, deepening, intensifying, amplifying, healing, integrating, and returning. These guidelines (found at the end of this chapter) are meant to help you come up with your own way of guiding, rather than providing a canned "script". We hope they help you make the process your own. Use the crib notes initially, but get rid of them as soon as possible. You will be a far more fluent guide when the process becomes internalized and spontaneous. 165 You know a dream is like a river Ever changin' as it flows. And the dreamer's just a vessel that must follow where it goes. —Garth Brooks THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE When you are learning to become a dream guide there are probably going to be times you feel lost within the process. This is why signposts, milestones, and landmarks are useful. You may go down a blind alley into the client's belief system or go awry some other way. For example, a client with a new age belief system worked with an apprentice. She had a "nice" session, wandering around idealized utopian landscapes with light beings from her own cosmology, but nothing happened in terms of dreamhealing. The apprentice was sucked into her confabulated world. It is impossible to reduce dreamhealing into a typical process with pre-set specific stages. However, once again it is possible to provide some guidelines which may help orient you within that process so you can determine where to go next. In the above example, simple deepening procedures would have taken her below her belief system constructs. The "Dream Journey Guidelines" contained here are only meant to provide you with some rudimentary cues for conducting the process. As you practice you will develop your own phrases and style. When you come upon a new phrase that works well note it down for future use. In this way you form a repertoire of responses, a therapeutic language which is ready for you to draw from intuitively. Keeping your language neutral or "clean" allows the client to remain immersedin the process. It insures that your guidance is congruent with their perceived experience. Some aspects of the dream journey we will cover include the following: entry, or beginning the journey; initiating and guiding; sharing experience as it is happening; feelings, visceral, and kinesthetic response; releasing or surrendering (letting go); accepting; intensifying; deepening levels or states of consciousness; amplifying; healing; integrating the experience; and returning or re-entry. THE BASIC DIRECTIONS BEGIN BY HAVING THE DREAMER RECOUNT THE DREAM. Then have them re-tell it in the present-tense. Have them "walk you through the dream" as if it is happening now. Those familiar with Gestalt dreamwork will recognize this method, from which dreamhealing grew. This experiential way of re-entering the dream sets the process of co-consciousness in motion, as the therapist begins to see through the eyes of the dreamer. Have them repeat the dream as many times as you need to get a "feel" for it. Watch for the images which attract you, check the source of that attraction, and direct the dreamer to enter the dream through the doorway you are intuitively drawn toward. Check the authenticity of that draw within yourself. Invite the dreamer to become some aspect of the dream, or let dreamers grant themselves permission to experience 166 something unpleasant from the dream unfolding in a scary or undesirable way. Remember to stay in the present tense—these scenes did not happen—they are HAPPENING, right now. For example, a threatening snake scares the dreamer. Invite them to let it go ahead and begin biting them. What happens next? Or the dreamer is falling and falling, and finally hits bottom. What happens next? Or, the monster that is chasing the dreamer finally does catch them. Then what? As guide you help carry the action forward, but not too quickly. Just invite the dreamer to "be that aspectX," or to "go ahead and let X happen " and the journey begins. Of course, they can close their eyes and take a few deep breaths to induce relaxation and enter a natural trance state. Instruct them, if they don't do it spontaneously. This inner focus creates a natural trance or non-ordinary state of consciousness. If feels very much like a guided visualization, hypnosis, or waking dream. Yet it requires no formal induction or script. It is deeper than a daydream. Ideally, imagination is happening TO the dreamer. The dreamer is not constructing a story consciously. Rather, they enter or immerse themselves in the on-going stream of consciousness. Their surprise at the fluid imagery indicates its authenticity. Freudians see this work as free association, Jungians look at it as active imagination. It is also a deeper form of Gestalt dreamwork. It has much in common with Ericksonian hypnosis. In fact, in teaching dreamhealing to a variety of practitioners, they all seem to find an amplification of their favorite techniques in the procedures. It has universal appeal in many schools of thought. If the client should appear to be making up a story, invite them to go deeper within, into the experience of themselves, deeper into the essence of that experience. Then use guiding suggestions to move on, from one inner space to another. For example guide the client from looking at an image, to becoming it, to becoming a color, to becoming even more fundamental or primal. Guiding is also used to bring the dreamer back to the surface of the dream to enter another aspect of the original dream.
REMEMBER ALL ASPECTS OF THE DREAM IMAGE ARE THE DREAMER, INCLUDING THE BACKGROUND. To explore all the symbols and background of only one dream might be done over weeks. However, this is not necessary, as consecutive new dreams will bring the same issues to light in a different, evolving way. All roads lead to Rome in dreamhealing. The conflicts will be expressed in a variety of characters, dramas, and themes. Sometimes the story stays the same, and there is a recurrent dream. Simply keep your suggestions neutral in tone or specifics, and permissive or inviting in style. Emotional inflection or variety in your voice could influence the client's mood and feeling in the journey. It might be totally incongruent with their emotions at that point in the process. So keep your tone somewhat "flat." As you are in the act of responding to their last comment, their process will continue to flow forward, and may not match your words. 167
Because the process is a flow with many non-verbal times in it, there are time you may not know what is happening within the client. Use your extrasensory talents here, but do reality checks on yourself. The way to find out neutrally is to ask them to share what they are experiencing or what is happening. Once again, always use clean language that keeps the process in the present tense, as if it is always NOW. That is why you ask, "what is happening," not "what happened." If the client is in the visual mode, seeing something inside, you can usually tell by the flickering in their eyes which indicates they are in a R.E.M. state. This rapid eye movement is characteristic of dream states, and shows you they are visualizing. Not all clients are experiencing the imagination through visualization all the time. If you tend to be a visionary, remember the importance of other representational systems. They may be in another "channel" just perceiving a feeling, or listening to, or smelling something. Under these circumstances, if you ask them what they are seeing you pull them into another, totally different experience. SO BE SURE YOUR INTENT MATCHES YOUR GUIDING SUGGESTIONS. If they are incongruent with the client's experience you may divert them from an important path. Even if this happens, the issue will probably tend to reappear in other forms until it is worked out. It is also important in the dream journey that the mental abstractions be linked with the body for a total experience and grounding. This is the kinesthetic aspect of perception. It includes feelings and visceral responses. IT IS ON THIS LEVEL THAT YOU WILL EITHER GAIN OR LOSE YOUR CLIENT’S TRUST. Part of the way humans "know" what they know is through visceral or gut-reactions. The mind and body are indissolubly linked so that thoughts and emotions manifest simultaneously in the body. Part of how you know what you know and feel what you feel results from physiological changes in muscle tension, heartrate, breathing rate and volume, and hormone levels. People can interpret changes in their bodies in a variety of ways. For example, the quickened heartbeat and shallow breathing of one person may get interpreted as anxiety, by another as excitement, and by a third as sexual arousal. When a client shares a feeling from the process never add your own modifiers to it. Never assume it feels either "nice" or "bad" to them. Even a very positive feeling can be uncomfortable to a client if it is alien or unfamiliar to them. To get deeper in touch with a feeling ask them where they feel it in their body. On occasion it may seem to be located outside the body, such as an alienated heart. The body area they refer to may be symptomatic. It may even be the presenting problem if they are seeking pain management help for psychosomatic disease. The spot may become spontaneously tender, revealing a deep tissues memory that would like to find a voice. Some gentle physical pressure applied to the spot may intensify the experience or imagery for the client. Use your judgement about touching them. Always let them know verbally before you do it. Once frozen feelings thaw, the client is faced with having to deal with or accommodate those feelings in their life. Now that it is up, what do they do with it? There are many 168 things within us that we know, but don't know we know. When they come to the surface, they require many adjustments as they impact our coping mechanisms. Letting go and releasing is an important part of the process in many forms. The client can let go of old outworn attitudes and behaviors during the dream journey. They may be guided to just let go of a train of thought or awareness by the guide. They may be instructed to let go of the last image, or even to let go of body or form itself. "LETTING GO" IS THE INSTRUCTION FOR SHIFTING FROM ONE IDENTIFICATION TO ANOTHER. This sense of release leads directly to the opportunity for acceptance. Unlike shock, disbelief or denial, accepting means allowing, surrendering, just being, trusting, flowing. It lets what was formerly unacceptable happen. Physiologically it means a deep physical and mental relaxation which automatically takes the process deeper. When there is nothing left to fight or flee the body just turns loose and consciousness dives even deeper. Blocks to letting go and accepting manifest physically as jerking or unstressing motions of muscles in conflict, working against themselves. When the conflict resolves the relaxation is profound. Chronic emotional trauma frequently stores in this way as deep muscle tension. The process of deep relaxation allows the client to descend another level of the consciousness map into themselves. This is a good time to consider if you are following the consciousness map by leading down through the successive layers. Pop out of co¬ consciousness into your rational mode if you feel frustrated or stuck in the process. Become your neutral self once again and immerse yourself in the journey once more. There are many different suggestions for deepening the client directly or indirectly. You may simply request the deepening, or ask the dreamer to change sensory modes, or get them slightly confused. For example, you may ask them to "taste" a color, or some other form of sensory-melding or ask them to become a color they have mentioned. In any event the journey is into the "center of the earth," the very core of their being. You can intensify the experience for your client in several ways. You can validate their experience by feeding back what they have said last with no editorial changes in content or inflection. Some people missed this mirroring and validation as infants. Now they can feel heard, acknowledged, and OK. This rapport is important because while you intensify them, they are becoming willing to enter close to the pain and the fear which surrounds the primal image. They must trust you to go into the chaos with no guarantee or control Reassure them that you will be there all the way through the whole process, and it is OK since you have been there many times. But before things get better, they usually get worse in the process. To help that become ultra-real to the client, you can amplify their experience by evoking more detail. Let them create their own virtual reality. What you ask may determine which aspects of the image they focus on. The more they notice, the more real it becomes. However, don't get bogged down in an endless cataloguing of details. Let your intuition and their responses guide you here. 169 Many times they just need more time; convey to them that they will have all the time they need to explore, and that they may return in the future. If you are puzzled over what to ask concerning a given image simply ask, "What could be a question I could ask about that?" Many times they will disclose a vital aspect. In general, try to evoke a multi-sensory report about the experience. Sometimes though, they may be just a disembodied mind floating in a void, or even be overwhelmed by swirling imagery. You are heading toward chaos consciousness if that is the case. Both of you are letting go and dissolving into the chaos. LET IT HAPPEN. Give them plenty of time before you ask for any verbal description or report. If you have been there in your own sessions, you have a fairly good idea what the experience is like, but it can vary tremendously. Some must learn to navigate through the chaos, while others take to it like a duck to water. What attitude do you experience when you find yourself there as dreamer or guide? If you cannot navigate this region, both you and your client may flounder here. But, if you just let go and trust the process, you will come out the other side of this psychic "rapids" having already begun the process of healing change. THE HEALING IS VERY FREQUENTLY FELT AS A TINGLING SENSATION, OR AN EFFERVESCENCE. It may be located in a specific region or generalized. Frequently it feels very pleasant. It may be expressed as a new primal image that is seen, heard, or perceived in a deeply felt way. The healing manifests as a new emergent order. What was implicate deep within, becomes explicate. It occurs at the shift from chaos to the new, unfolding order. It is a new perception of self and one's relationship to the whole. But it still needs to be integrated with one's other experiences. Integration of what is learned on the journey is essential to grounding the experience within the fabric of ordinary life. For example, if in your dream you are being suffocated by oppressive males, you might reflect on how that is occurring in your daily life. The process of integration continues after the dream journey, sometimes for many months as the natural consequences unfold. During the dreamhealing, integration simply means letting that new image become a felt experience by consciously and subconsciously realizing it. It may be an alienated, frozen, lost, or forgotten part of the self. As you re-own this part, you experience a new sense of wholeness, which is synonymous with integration. This is another phase of the healing process. Healing and wholeness are equivalents. Integration after the session can include learning the cultural and mythical meaning of some of the dream symbols. This amplification isn't necessary for healing, but some people are drawn to it. This information can come from the guide and be supplemented by the client's own search. No meaning for the dream symbol is imported. It is not to be extracted from its dream context. Only an expanded awareness of its meaning across cultures is found. Integration also goes on for months and can be expressed as a series of "a-ha" 170 experiences which give feelings of deeper meaning and value. You begin to see how the whole experience fits into and describes your life. The returning or re-entry phase provides a sense of re-orienting to the here and now of ordinary consciousness, yet somehow changed. It is well to inform the client it is approaching the time to come out of the inner process. But do not abort their journey in mid-stream. Ask them if they are ready, or let them know it will soon be time. Give them the chance to come to some sense of closure for the process. Then have them take some deep breaths and let their eyes open. Give them a few moments, watch what they do (stretch, rub a body part, look away, etc.). Then ask them to tell you about the process while it is still fresh. This de-briefing is important. They will be more verbally fluent and accurate about what went on at this point than any other. It is much like recounting a dream immediately upon awakening. You can compare notes about your co-conscious experience and find if indeed you were tracking together. Talk about what this journey means in their daily life, both how they feel, and what they think. Some people will want to record their experience in their journal at this time. DREAMHEALING SIGNPOSTS We've already spoken of some of the dreamhealing signposts. They include both empty and full voids, monochromatic imagery, spirals and whirlpools. Another variation of the spiral motif is the vortex, tornado, or cyclone. These images seem to recur spontaneously in this work in their infinite variation. In the WIZARD OF OZ, Dorothy entered the chaotic land of Oz through the spiraling winds. These, and other elemental images, are some of the clues along the journey, which help the guide to orient and determine how to proceed further. A select group of images have proven useful indicators of the right direction. They seem to be doorways to a very primal level of response from deep within the essence of the traveller. Primarily these include the elements of nature, various kinds of snakes, and the experience of various colors and their combinations. If EARTH, AIR, FIRE, OR WATER appear prominently in a dream, or arise on the journey, this can be an interesting experience to explore. As in other guiding, invite the dreamer to become one of the elements, to identify with it and let it begin describing "its" experience and reality from within that consciousness. If an element is being experienced in its benign or fury form, let that experience intensify and follow the process to find out "what happens next." A tidal wave, ravaging fire, great wind, or earthquake may lead through to a place of calm and regeneration. Follow it through the chaos and out the other side. Since Freud, "snake dreams" have been viewed with the pseudo-knowledge that they are probably all phallic symbols and somehow relate to sexual maladjustment. In Asklepian dreamhealing, we look at SNAKE DREAMS quite differently, since the serpent was sacred to the cult. It is ridiculous to assign all snakes in dreams to penis envy or some other reductionistic view. Even viewed positively what does it mean to call 171 a snake "emergent female wisdom?" One needs to experience that particular dream snake, become it, " grok " it. Snakes have always played a prominent role in the history of mysticism since ancient times. There is the Egyptian Uraeus, sacred serpent of wisdom. This cobra was a symbol of sovereignty. The Greeks revered the symbol of Hermes's caduceus with its intertwined serpents. They symbolized balanced force, the union of opposites leading to a state of higher awareness and healing power. The serpent Ouroboros, the snake eating its tail, is a glyph for the circular eternity of the cosmos. Half dark and half light, it symbolizes passive and active energy in motion, like the Chinese YIN AND YANG. The serpent in the Garden of Eden brought the knowledge of good and evil. Pre-columbian America worshipped the feathered-snake, Quetzalcoatl. A great serpent challenged Buddha. Yogis speak of the Kundalini serpent power which rises through the spine and culminates in enlightenment. In India and Burma there are snake cults. And in the U.S. there are those whose religion dictates that they "take up serpents" to show their faith and receive healing. Of course, the snake, in particular the python, was the sacred animal of the Asklepian healing cult. Here the snake symbolizes the raw life energies, in fact, pure energy itself. The nature of snakes is that they must shed their old constricting skins many times in order to grow. This and other metaphors of its existence and essence make it a pregnant symbol. In dreams, snakes take on many aspects like their sinuous movement, underground life, and associations with other aspects of nature. Is there one snake, or many in the dream? Is it benign, or threatening? If snakes threaten, let that occur and see what happens next. Does the snake inhabit the woods, the water, or the desert? "Snakes are the guardians of the springs of life and of immortality, and also of those superior riches of the spirit that are symbolized by hidden treasure ," according to Cirlot's DICTIONARY OF SYMBOLS. They appear in the myths and religions of almost all societies, in different roles. Because snakes live under rocks or in holes, they are associated with the underworld, the dead, fertility, and the unconscious mind. Because they shed their skin, they are connected with rejuvenation and longevity. There is a great mystery about snakes that strikes deep into the reptile brain of a human being at the most primal level. Even though we have a genetic revulsion to them from our ancestral memory, they are not always forces of destruction to be loathed or avoided. The snake is automatically associated by its nature with the feminine principle and flow. To the extent that we reject this in ourselves, we fear the snake and fear its appearance in ordinary life or in our dreams. What does the snake do in the dream? Shedding its skin may symbolize resurrection. If it is coiled it may indicate stored dynamic energy waiting to be unleashed. Does it want to bite, or do something supernatural? How vicious is it? In snake cults, people even kiss snakes. Snakes can both kill or cure, act negative or positive. Much depends on your relationship to the snake energy, especially as it reflects on your physical health. 172 IN THE ASKLEPIAN CULT, JUST THE APPEARANCE OF A SNAKE IN THE DREAM SIGNALS AN EPIPHANY WITH THE GOD AND HERALDS THE HEALING PROCESS. It requires no interpretation, and neither do dreamhealing symbols. However, cultural amplification can strike some deeper, mythic chord. Sometimes this satisfies the conscious mind and brings it into the process, but after the session only. The Gnostics noticed an obvious relationship between the snake and the spinal cord of the central nervous system, as did the yogis. It is central, with the brain to the skeletal structure and nervous system, and helps form a structural core for the body, the point of origin for most operational signals. As an agent of the parasympathetic system, it lets the subconscious regulate and act upon the body in many ways which bypass rational thought or direction. It is the core of our emotional reactions through biochemistry. This internal snake can also be an image of inner strength. THE ELEMENTS OF NATURE Nature has a spontaneous healing effect. Just take someone from the city to a splendid wilderness vista and they can have a mystical experience of awe and expansion of self. We respond to Her beauty and power from deep within. Therefore, the elements of nature are important symbols to enter in dreamhealing. They are the metaphorical building blocks of our universe, and irreducible to more fundamental symbols. EARTH stands for solid material existence, WATER for all liquids, AIR for gaseous matter, and FIRE for the transformation of matter. There is no need to interpret the elements for yourself or the dream journey client. But it is useful to have some knowledge of their archetypal meaning. If you've studied astrology, or shamanism you may already be aware of their essence. Always bear in mind with the elements that the context in which they appear modifies them considerably. With time and experience you can expand on these thumbnail sketches of the elements. EARTH: Earth symbols come in many forms like soil, mud, clay, dust, rock, sand, and minerals. A client may enter the earth through another symbol like sinking down through the roots of a tree. They may sink deeper through the layers of the earth's crust, experiencing themselves as lava, or the whole planet itself. Earth may be experienced as the floor of a house, or the general background of a dream image. Qualities of the earth include grounding, the pull of gravity on every fiber and atom of your being, stability, endurance, rootedness, and reality. It can be a metaphor for the body. Earth may be barren, or fallow, or fruitful. It reflects on material need, survival issues, and consumption. Keywords: pragmatic, concrete, stable, physical, material, sensual, reliable. AIR: Air is frequently an invisible element. It takes many forms such as wind, breeze, breathing, sneezing, hurricanes, and tornados. Your capacity to breath and smell connects you vitally with air. You may also fly using air as the medium of flight. It can feel like an expression of freedom, and allow a whole new perspective from the heights. 173 A journey through the air may evoke feelings of inspiration. The act of smelling is intimately connected with memory. According to Cirlot, "air is essentially related to three sets of ideas: the creative breath of life, and hence, speech; the stormy wind, connected in many mythologies with the idea of creation; and, finally, space as a medium for movement and for the emergence of life- processes. Thoughts, feelings and memories concerning heat and cold, dryness and humidity and, in general, all aspects of climate and atmosphere, are also closely related to the concept of air." Keywords: mental, communicative, verbal, mobile, perceptive, curious, sociable, objective, relational. WATER: The waters of life circulate throughout existence in the form of rain, sap, milk, lymph, and blood. In modern psychology, it is a symbol of emotions or even the unconscious as the dynamic, motivating female side of the personality, and intuitive wisdom. Birth is associated with water symbolism, and so is rebirth. There are many kinds of water: clear water, spring water, running water, stagnant water, dead water, fresh and salt water, reflecting water, purifying water, deep water, and stormy water. It is an element of mediation and dissolution. It appears as ocean, sea, spring, river, stream, body fluids, rain, liquids to drink, pools, lakes, and tap water. It cleanses, baptizes, refreshes, blesses, purifies, and sometimes overwhelms. Water carries waves, eddies, and turbulence. Water never rests; it is an image of flow and change, and can also be reflective. Keywords: mobility, fluidity, adaptability, empathy, sensitivity, psychic, receptive, supportive, subjective. FIRE: Fire may appear as anything from a flame to the sun or a supernova. It mediates between forms which vanish and forms in creation. It is an image of energy which may be found at the level of animal passion as well as on the plane of spiritual strength. To pass through fire is symbolic of transcending the human condition. It is the Holy Spirit, that light burning within us. It means immortality, purification, and judgement. We experience fire in many forms such as a campfire, hearthfire, homefires, lava, lightening and electricity, and glowing candlelight. Fire cooks what is raw in both our kitchens and our psyches. Fire throws light on the darkness, and provides warmth and illumination. Keywords: spirituality, abstract concepts, ideas, intuitive flashes, physical activity, pioneering, taking initiative. DREAM JOURNEY GUIDELINES BASIC DIRECTIONS: 174 Listen to the dream in the present tense; what draws you. Let imagination flow and emerge organically. Lead (invite) the dreamer toward the fear and pain with reassurance. Lead away from fantasy to deepen past belief systems. Enliven the experience by repeating key elements. Use "confusion techniques" to short-circuit the rational mind. Change sensory channels to overcome resistance. ENTRY-BEGINNING T H E JOURNEY: CLOSE YOUR EYES NOW...AND SPEND THE NEXT COUPLE OF MINUTES BREATHING...RELAX YOUR BODY...AND...AS YOU'RE READY, FILL YOUR MIND WITH THE DREAM...BRINGING IT BACK IN AS MUCH DETAIL AS YOU CAN...AND WALK ME THROUGH THE DREAM...THIS TIME...AS YOU ARE EXPERIENCING IT... BECOME...GO DEEPER NOW. BECOME THE ESSENCE OF "X"...FEEL IT IN YOUR BODY. BECOME THAT...EXPERIENCE YOURSELF NOW. BE THAT "X"...FEEL IT. BEGIN THIS JOURNEY. DIVERT A BIT FROM THE DREAM NOW...ALLOW "X" (fear or pain cue) TO HAPPEN. JUST LIE DOWN AND GET COMFORTABLE...START BY JUST BREATHING...RELAX AND ENTER YOUR DREAM...RE-EXPERIENCE YOUR DREAM...AND THEN WHEN YOU’RE READY, WALK ME THROUGH THE DREAM. INITIATING AND GUIDING: BECOME...GO DEEPER NOW... BECOME THE ESSENCE OF "X"...FEEL IT IN YOUR BODY... BECOME THAT...EXPERIENCE YOURSELF NOW... BE THAT "X"...FEEL IT... BEGIN THIS JOURNEY... DIVERT A BIT FROM THE DREAM NOW...ALLOW "X" TO HAPPEN... NOW I WANT YOU TO EXPERIENCE "X"... WHEN YOU'RE READY, MOVE ON... BECOME THAT COLOR...THAT SHAPE... I DON’T KNOW HOW TO SAY IT, BUT ALL AT ONCE BECOME THAT FEELING OR NATURE... BE WHERE YOU WANT IN YOUR CONSCIOUSNESS... JUST GIVE OVER TO THAT SENSATION OF "X"... JUST EXPERIENCING...AND TELL ME WHAT YOU NOTICE... BRING YOUR ATTENTION TO THAT SENSATION OR FEELING...DOES IT HAVE A SHAPE...ANY DISTINGUISHING THINGS YOU NOTICE ABOUT IT... JUST GIVE OVER TO THAT NOTION...THAT THOUGHT... JUST STAY WHERE YOU'RE AT...STAY THERE... 175 WHEN YOU DO COME BACK JUST COME BACK TO THE SURFACE OF THE DREAM...AND I WILL MEET YOU THERE BECAUSE THERE IS ANOTHER PLACE I'D LIKE TO TAKE YOU... SHARING: SHARE... TELL ME WHAT'S GOING ON... WHAT DO YOU EXPERIENCE... WHAT HAPPENS (NEXT)...WHAT'S HAPPENING... WHAT DOES YOUR IMAGINATION DO WITH THAT... WHAT DO YOU SEE... WHAT ARE YOU AWARE OF... WHAT’S YOUR SENSE OF THAT... LET ME KNOW WHEN YOU'RE READY TO SHARE... FEELING: WHAT DO YOU FEEL... FEEL THAT...FEEL YOUR (QUALITY "X")... FEEL THAT..AS YOU BECOME THAT...AND GO THROUGH THAT... FEEL IT VISCERALLY...WHERE DO YOU NOTICE THAT IN YOUR BODY... FEEL YOUR ESSENCE...TRUST YOUR IMAGINATION JUST EXPERIENCE THAT NOW...FEEL THAT ENERGY... RELEASING: LET "X" GO... LET GO OF BODY...LET GO OF FORM... JUST GIVE OVER TO THAT NOTION...THAT THOUGHT...LET GO NOW OF ANY OTHER SENSE OF SELF YOU HAVE... AND JUST BECOME THAT "X"... BECOME NOTHING BUT THAT (KIND OF) "X"... LET GO OF THE REST NOW AND JUST BECOME THE "X"... ACCEPTING: ALLOW THAT TO HAPPEN... LET IT HAPPEN... (RIGHT NOW JUST) GIVE IN TO (THE) "X"... YIELD TO IT... LET "X" TAKE OVER... NOW RELAX INTO IT... JUST ACCEPT IT...ACCEPT THAT... LET IT BE... GIVE IN TO ALL OF THAT VISCERAL SENSATION OF... (GIVE IN) TO THE SENSATION...THE BODY FEELING...THE SENSE OF BEING A ... TRUST THAT ABILITY...ACCEPT... TAKE IT IN NOW...JUST ACCEPT...ACCEPT IT... 176 TRUST YOUR IMAGINATION...GIVE OVER TO THAT...FEEL IT...NOW STAYWITH IT... THERE'S A PRESENCE IN THAT DREAM...A GUIDE...DO YOU FEEL IT?... JUST LET "X" ENTER YOU... DEEPENING: GO DEEPER NOW... GET INTO THAT... GET INTO ALL THOSE FEELINGS...LET THEM DEVELOP... STAY WITH IT...DEEPER...DEEPER...FEEL THIS EXPERIENCE... EXPERIENCE WHERE THAT TAKES YOU... STAY WITH THE IMAGE... EXPERIENCE THE VISCERAL FEEL... STAY WITH THIS (THAT; IT) CONSCIOUSNESS... FEEL IT VISCERALLY... LET WHAT YOU EXPERIENCE TAKE YOU WAY DOWN... EXPLORE...EXPLORING YOURSELF... BREATH DEEP... JUST GO A LITTLE BIT DEEPER NOW...AND FEEL THE ENERGY THAT YOU RADIATE... INTENSIFYING: EVEN THOUGH IT SCARES YOU, LET IT HAPPEN... RIGHT NOW STAY WITH "X"... BE THE ESSENCE OF "X"... I'LL GO WITH YOU INTO THE PAIN...COME WITH ME INTO THE PAIN... I'LL BE WITH YOU... AMPLIFYING: EXPLORE THAT NOW...EXPLORE THAT A LITTLE WHILE LONGER... THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT THAT...AN ENERGY... WHERE DO YOU FEEL "X" WHEN YOU FEEL IT IN YOUR BODY... IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE ABOUT THAT..ABOUT THAT "X"... ANY SOUNDS...SMELLS...TEXTURES... WHAT'S IT LIKE...WHAT KIND... DOES IT HAVE A SHAPE OR SIZE (also COLOR, TEMP, WEIGHT, MOVEMENT)... AND IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE ABOUT THAT "X"... AND WHAT COULD IT BE MADE OF... AND TAKE SOME TIME TO KNOW ABOUT "X"...AND ALL THE QUALITIES OF "X"...AND WHAT "X" IS DOING... AND WHAT COULD BE A QUESTION I COULD ASK ABOUT THAT... AND WHAT WOULD "X" LIKE TO HAVE HAPPEN... AND WHAT WOULD "X" LIKE TO DO... HEALING: 177 ENJOY IT... THAT'S THE HEALING ENERGY... ENJOY THIS... THIS IS ONE OF THE GIFTS OF THE DREAM TO YOU...IT'S A HEALING PLACE FOR YOU... JUST ALLOW THAT TO BE...LET THAT WORK ON YOU...THAT'S THE HEALING...IT COMES FROM WITHIN... THAT'S THE HEALING...JUST STAY WITH IT NOW...STAY WITH IT...AND FEEL IT AS LONG AS YOU NEED... INTEGRATING: LET IT BECOME A PART OF YOU NOW... IT'S JUST AS MUCH YOU AS ALL OF THE OTHER EXPERIENCES... FLOW WITH IT..TAKE IT IN... NO ENERGY INSIDE OF YOU IS NOT OF THIS "X"... STAY WITH AS LONG AS YOU WANT... BRING "X" TO THE SURFACE WITH YOU... FEEL IT AS LONG AS YOU NEED...WHEN YOU ARE READY TO COME BACK...BRING THE HEALING WITH YOU... RETURNING: TAKE A COUPLE OF DEEP BREATHS AND RETURN BY LETTING YOUR EYES OPEN (WHEN READY)... ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS JUST TAKE THREE DEEP BREATHS AND LET YOUR EYES OPEN...BUT DON’T COME BACK UNTIL YOU'RE READY... ARE YOU READY TO GO BACK UP TO THE SURFACE OF THE DREAM NOW... COLORS AND CHAKRAS IN DREA MH EALING Colors of all types come up frequently in the dreamhealing process. Depending on the journey, some of these colors are pure, but many times they are in combination. It is commonly recognized in psychology that there is a relationship between colors and feelings or states of mind. Pink, for example, is calming, while yellow tends to make people argumentative. Mystics noticed the relationship between colors and states of consciousness centuries ago. One of the primary systems relating color to the mind and body is the chakra network from yoga. This system not only relates to color, it echoes the Asklepian myth of a healing serpent power. In yoga, the Kundalini, or serpent power, resides as coiled energy at the base of the spine. When awakened it surges upward through the seven spiritual centers, culminating in enlightement. 178 This network is an important group of signposts in dreamhealing. Since each chakra is associated with a color, the appearance of these colors in the journey can be an indication of where blocks in the energy flow and psychology may lie. For a complete description of colors and chakras in dreamhealing, see THE SHAMAN/THERAPIST. Chapter 10 CASE STUDIES IN CREATIVITY Some split between the inner world and the outer world is common to all human beings; and the need to bridge the gap is the source of creative endeavor. —Anthony Storr (The creative process) is the emergence in action of a novel relational product, growing out of the uniqueness of the individual on the one hand, and the materials, events, people, or circumstances of his life on the other. —Carl Rogers 179 Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. —Goethe Creativity may be conceived of as an exercise of the configurative powers of the whole psyche, involving all its substances, the play of its entire energy. —Brewster Ghiselin Nature is constantly unfolding new forms, in the tangible physical world, and in the imaginal world of the psyche. Dreamhealing means navigating the ever-flowing river of imagery which wells up within us all. Of course, the best way to learn dreamhealing is through apprenticeship. But to provide some guidance and to demonstrate the scope of the method, we have included several of Gray wolf s sessions with various clients. These journeys show the different depths of working. Some are entered through the drumming, others use dream doorways, symptoms, or feelings for entree. Each seems to focus around a specific issue. Comment is included for some sessions, while others simply speak for themselves. Within these transcripts you will find many of the signposts of dreamhealing theory, such as colors, chakras, the four elements, snakes, and other symbolism. They are common enough to appear in this random sample of issue-oriented sessions. RELATIONSHIP TIDAL WAVE In this session a young woman, who has been separated from her alehoholic husband for some time, recounts a dream which comes up when her divorce proceeding go to court. During the session she re¬ owns her projected ANIMUS (inner male) and finds new power in her center. Graywolfs comments are recorded in ALL CAPS, while her responses are lower case. WHEN YOU ARE READY TO LET THE DREAM COME IN, JUST ALLOW IT TO ENTER INTO YOUR MIND...THE IMAGES...FEELINGS...AND SENSATIONS. THEN, WHEN YOU ARE IN THE PLACE WHERE YOU ARE READY TO SHARE THE DREAM, DO IT...BUT TAKE YOUR TIME. I can see John lying on the couch...all I can see is the couch and him. And he's pretty drunk...he can't sit up. I wish he'd just pass out... 180 BE THIS DRUNKEN MALE...BE THAT BODY...BECOME...AND AS YOU BECOME, SHARE...[she describes her state of consicousness ending with the word "toxic"]...THAT IS A VISCERAL SENSATION...THAT TOXICITY. FOCUS ON THAT NOW. WHAT COLOR IS IT? WHAT SHAPE IS IT? WHAT CONSISTENCY DOES IT HAVE? It's a yellowish-green, sort of like a blob...sort of frozen. WHAT KIND OF BLOB? IN YOUR IMAGINATION, NOW, BECOME THIS BLOB...THIS YELLOWISH-GREEN BLOB. EXPERIENCE YOURSELF...AND WHEN YOU ARE READY...SHARE WITH ME WHAT THAT EXPERIENCE IS LIKE. [She gives an obviously mentalized description so the therapist urges letting go and she becomes "blue-green"]. SO YOU’RE FEELING THE POTENTIAL OF THE ENERGY? LET GO OF MIND AND INTERPRETATIONS...AND JUST FEEL THE ENERGY AS ENERGY. JUST NOTICE HOW YOU FEEL NOW. There's a huge, huge tidal wave...STAY WITH IT...STAY WITH THE ENERGY...There's things floating in it, obstructions...there's a lot of power in it...WHERE DOES THAT CARRY YOU? STAY WITH THAT AND TELL ME [Graywolf] WHAT YOU NOTICE...Down at the bottom are little things that swim through it, small particles at the mercy of the tide...little things...(AT THIS POINT WE DON’T KNOW IF SHE WILL REGRESS INTO THE HELPLESSNESS OF CHILDHOOD OR DISCOVER SOMETHING NEW). BRING ONE INTO YOUR MIND NOW...BECOME ONE OF THOSE REALLY TINY THINGS...They're like little pieces of grass, and... BECOME ONE...It's really pleasant— the force—swimming...I AM...I am...FEEL THAT...I am absorbed by the tidal force, it's like a spiral. I DON’T KNOW QUITE HOW TO SAY THIS, BUT BECOME BOTH THE STUFF FLOATING IN THE BOTTOM OF THE TIDAL WAVE AND THE WAVE...THAT RELATIONSHIP...BECOME THAT VISCERALLY. It's very physical...GIVE IN TO THAT PROCESS AND EXPERIENCE IT...JUST NOTICE, AND REPORT WHEN YOU WANT...[long pause]. I see a shiny black thing...its like an opeing I can go into...it opens into another place..and it seems to open into forever...JUST FEEL...THE SENSATIONS...THE VISCERAL THINGS...WHAT IT'S LIKE IN THERE...[pause]. STAY WITH IT AS LONG AS YOU WANT...WHEN YOU'RE READY TO BRING IT BACK JUST TAKE TWO OR THREE DEEP BREATHS...DON'T HURRY...TAKE YOUR TIME... It feels like everything is in there [she indicates her abdomen, her power chakra]. THIS IS ABOUT EXPRESSING FEAR...Its like some huge ocean..in there...like in Journey to Center of the Earth, when there is that giant ocean...with power.... AND THERE IS A SENSE OF MALENESS IN THERE WITH THAT, TOO?...Yes...BE AWARE THAT YOU FOUND THAT POWER IN THE PART OF YOURSELF WHICH YOU GAVE THE SYMBOL OF BEING A DRUNK EX- HUSBAND...Rejecting maleness?...UH-HUH! OUT-OF-CONTROL MALENESS...SCARY, LIKE THE TIDE. FROM THE OUTSIDE, IT LOOKED TERRIBLE, BUT WHEN YOU WENT INSIDE, YOU FOUND SOMETHING. I WOULD SAY THAT SOMETHING ON THE SURFACE, YOUR PERSONALITY AND YOUR EGO, KEEPS YOU FROM THIS PLACE. IT IS AS CLOSE TO BEING 181 ABLE TO FOCUS ON IT. IT IS ALREADY IN THERE, IT IS YOU...IT IS A STATE OF YOUR CONSCIOUSNESS. I CAN’T TAKE YOU ANY PLACE THAT ISN'T IN YOU ALREADY. YOU'D BEEN SCARED OFF BY THIS POWER WHICH WAS HIDING BEHIND THIS IMAGE OF A DRUNKEN MAN. That's right. Now my whole body breathes with it. Being in the blob was not a pleasant thing...later it felt good, but I didn't see colors at that time. It became pleasant when I became the tidal wave. The pain turned into pleasure. THAT IS CHARACTERISTIC OF THE DREAM JOURNEY. YOU HAVE TO GO INTO THE PAIN, FEAR, OR DISTRUST TO FIND THE POWER. *We are a really a powerful form of energy which takes on the form of a mind and body. That form is based on the kinds of experience this life energy encounters, and it stores that experience in the form of images. Essentially that is the essence of this work, to go to those images, and change or transform those images, to make the energy available for us. In this case, the toxicity was where the energy was being held. As we hit traumatic experiences in childhood, they rob us of some of our power, manifesting as defenses which just keep us from getting there. In the image itself is where all the stuff is stored. The purpose of the work is to get to that image. For this client, this was tied up in the image of the drunken man. Within that was this image of toxicity or poison. The poison had the shape, the essence of an unpleasant green color. What that yellow-green told me was that it has to do with love expression and power expression. That fits in with the fact it was expressed as a male power-figure she was once intimate with. That is an image she had carried around in her. She chose to express it that day as a sort of blue-green, which when she became it, gave her access to the tidal power. Those images that we store need to be transformed, because when we restructure the images, our personality and body take on the actual new shape of these images. Change the image and you change the attitudes associated with it. If you only understand it intellectually, it just changes the defense systems. We go deeper into the image, into CHAOS, and shake it loose. That brings catharsis. GENETIC ODE This client ("Ed") was seeing Graywolf every second or third week. Prior to this session about a month had gone by, due to travel on their part. When he arrived, Ed was aware of being extremely tense, very stressed, to the point where it was bothering him quite badly. He had a large number of dreams since the last time Graywolf saw him. But two of them stuck out in his mind very clearly. They were both essentially dreams of global destruction. There were common features to the dreams, on the surface at least. In both dreams during the global destruction, he was in a city, one time Portland, the other in the Berkeley-Oakland area. There was a divine or religious aspect to the dreams. In both dreams he was in contact with divinity, with God, in his mind. Graywolf considered it a "Noah archetype," a profound piece of personal mythology. It was up to him to try and save people and help people through it. But he did not have any information about how to do that. 182 As for the difference, in the Portland dream, the destruction was by means of nuclear attack. The most interesting feature of this dream turned out to be a sense of "a dry, gritty dustiness." That becomes important because it existed in the other dream, except at a different level—that same sense. In the second dream, the Berkeley dream, Armageddon was going to happen by means of an earthquake. One feature struck Graywolf most and became the symbol he chose to go with. Ed said that all of the buildings were made out of a limestone or sandstone. There was a sort of color to them, an opalescent, sort-of pearl color. When Graywolf asked him to become that limestone and that color, Ed said it had a timeless feeling about it. But it was not a particularly good feeling. In a sense it was one that made him feel "almost nauseous." At the same time he felt shifting throughout his body. He could feel muscles shifting from the tip of his toes, right into his neck, but it did not seem to include his head. As he stayed with the image, he bacame aware that the opalescence had a grittiness to it, a gritty feel after the timeless feel, then the nausea. Of course, I had him become the energy of the nausea, which was a black, black hole. In the middle of this hole was, I think, a very bright yellow. I just had him move towards the hole. As he got closer and closer to this hole, he felt an increase in energy until it just sucked him right in. When he was in there, deep in this, I asked him what he was aware of. He replied something about a checkerboard pattern surrounding him. A checkboard band, that was slowly rotating around him. He said it was alternately black, red, and green, or yellow-green in color. I asked him to become that pattern and then become that rotating. Firstly he was aware of the interplay, almost the dance of the black, the red, and the green. The second thing he was aware of was that in the essence of experiencing that image, he became a spiral— yet not really a spiral—more of a HELIX. Rather than the normal kind of spiral I usually encounter in this kind of work, it was a very slow moving, a very deliberate motion. It was not really circling, because it never came back to the same place. It was a spiral and it never tightened in on itself. It was just that—a spiral. I had him experience the dance of black, green-yellow, and red. I had the sense that essentially we were looking at an experience of self at the molecular and genetic level. In my mind, the black is associated with the carbon atoms, the red is associated with the hydrogen atoms, and the green with the oxygen atom. They are essentially the building blocks of life. The way they dance in a spiral is the basic genetic pattern. I think the dreamer was experiencing a sense of his genetic self, a sense even of his atomic self. There is, of course, no way to prove this allegation. However, in the dream journey he could really identify with the notion. He did admit that confirmation of his subjective awareness was reassuring during the dream journey. He had actually perceived it that way to begin with. But when he came back, the rational mind said, "no way." All that eventually gave way to a pure green. The only words that described it were "primordial ooze." And he just stayed there, and this is as far as the journey went. I kept him there. He came back out feeling much better than when he arrived. For me the interpretation usually comes after the journey, and even then it is far from 183 complete. But I put together from that journey that he came with a really heavy discomfort and distress. Somehow it appeared in his dreams which are probably the true, underlying cause of the stress—this sense of Armageddon, a sense of global cataclysm. He has expressed this many times, both verbally in sessions and in social situations. He always feels pressed for time, even though his life is not scheduled to clock time. He feels like there is not enough time for him to deal with all of it, and to help keep it from happening. Of course, he takes this all on as a very personal responsibility, and of course, it is quite stressful. He seemed to drop some of that sense of pressure through this journey. What struck me was the perfectness of the image for paradoxical healing. One of the things I mentioned to him was that perhaps he was touching a timeless part of himself, touching the part of his creation where inanimate matter such as carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen came together in a primordial ooze to form the basic building block or genetic structure that all of us have as part of our evolutionary heritage. Each one of us has parts of those original life molecules that first formed into that primordial ooze and DNA spiral, which gave rise to "Adam," or life as we known it. In essence, that is what he most needed to touch. That part has always survived. That part of the self has survived all the cataclysms of the world—the death of the dinosaurs, cataclysms of the ocean—life has survived, though not necessarily in the same species form. To touch that part of oneself, to actually experience oneself at that level of awareness has to be a very empowering thing. For me, it takes the sting out of the prospect of the species not surviving as a race, which is something we all have to face as a potential future reality. POWER VS. STRENGTH This dream journey deals with one man's issue surrounding the distinction between power and strength. As a lifelong weightlifter, he had spent much time in the pursuit and exercise of his strength. In the dream, he was talking to a friend on a two way radio. The friend was flying in an airplane with his wife. They were in fog, and they were not instrument-rated. Their instruments were not working anyway. They were going to crash... In the dream, the client's main frustration revolved around talking to someone who was about to die, and there was nothing he could do about it. [He is a private investigator in real life, with a specialty in investigating mitigating circumstances for those accused of capital crimes]. He felt impotent, so I had him go into the feeling of being totally impotent. He's a big, tough, macho guy. Psychologically, a lot of that is compensation for feeling impotent. As I had him go into it, he expressed feeling really uncomfortable. I asked what color it was, and it was white. So I said, " let's focus on the white. What do you see, and what do you notice about the white?” He said, "Well, it is taking the form of a ram's head... " 184 He noticed at the beginning of the journey that the whole feeling of impotence was through his neck and shoulders, which is where he has most of his physical problems, like rheumatism. And the impotence was like a shaking, a trembling. When I had him go into the white, he saw the ram's head. I said, " What is the ram doing now." He said, "It's tearing my skin off. It is exposing the muscles over my right chest. Interesting, it's changing now into a horse, and the funny thing is it doesn't really feel bad. The horse is pulling the muscles away. He is stripping the muscles off the bone." I said, "Become the whole system that is the muscles and horse all together." He replied, "Actually, it feels good. It feels like being freed or something. It feels like the lifting of a load." I suggested, "Really be the horse now, and just experience what you notice. " One of his complaints is the problem caused in nearly all of his joints from weightlifting. He said, "As the horses I can feel mostly the hooves, pounding on the earth, which is hard and solid. And it feels like it's fluid power. [This is an approximation of what was said]. It is shaking the muscles, and it feels really good. " I invited him to be with that for a while, to experience really "being the horse." Well, he was silent for nearly half an hour on his experiential journey. When he came back, he expressed how phenomenal this journey was for him. He met this other horse, a brown horse which he nuzzled. They felt like old friends. Perhaps this indicates meeting someone, previously known or unknown, yet like this brown horse. It probably suggests he is becoming ready for a really good relationship. This has been one focus of his work. As the horse, he just felt free and fluid and powerful. He also encountered a bear. In his last session, during his journey he had found a really intense yellow color, focused in the midsection area. This journey also revolved around the distinction between power and strength. This image was for power. The bear in the following vision had a golden yellow chest. He may choose to explore that in the future. As the horse he encountered that, but he didn't want to be that. He wanted to stay as the horse. I think he has found a totem for himself now. He likes it. He relates to it. He feels good with it, comfortable with it. It is freeing for him; he is free with it. I asked him how he could bring this horse into his everyday life. One of the things he can do in situations is to ask, " What would the horse do? As the horse what would I do? " Instead of being his normal confrontative self and irritating others, he imagined that the horse might shy away. He commented, "There is no dishonor in that." This is not the old person speaking. He noticed having two voices inside for some time. One was saying, "F — them, go get 'em," and the other saying, "Take it easy, be calm." He concluded, "that other voice is my horse, and I just have not been listening to it—but I think I'm going to now. " His other voice seems to have lost a lot of power. [Chiron was the mythic centaur, half man/half horse, who was teacher and adoptive parent of Asklepios. This horse taught him the healing arts] I learned about the difference between strength and power as an engineer. When engineers talk about strength, essentially what they are talking about is the relative 185 strength of materials, a system, or an object. What force does it take to break it? Really that is the measure of strength, the measure of its resistence to breakage. It is a form of rigidity. When engineers talk about power, they are talking about a fluid ability to do something. Power is energy that is put to useful work, rather than tightening up in order to resist breakage. To me that is really profound. Some people spend all their time trying to be strong, in the engineering sense. By trying to be strong they end up tightening themselves and defending themselves to prevent breakage. They tie up all of their power in this strength, rather than letting it flow. You can't really hurt power. It flows, it is fluid, it moves around just like water. To me, that is the difference, and it is a big one. In a prior session with this client, strength was represented as a frightening whirlpool, sucking him down, while strength was more of a golden spiral and sphere. He ended up in a place of golden light, centered in the solar plexus chakra. The same analogy came up in this dream journey as the horse. He perceived the stripping away of the muscles as the stripping away of the armor, the strength. He had worked on building those muscles and that armor for a very long time, investing lots of emotional as well as physical energy in holding up/back the flow of his true power. It became a process of letting go, trading in armor for true power. AN EXAMPLE OF PROCESSING SYMPTOMS The dreamhealing process can also be applied for giving physical symptoms a voice. Rather than beginning with a dream image, you may begin a journey from a feeling of discomfort, or an actual physical ailment. Sometimes clients will not come with a dream ready for processing, but they can still generally find some area of either chronic or acute dis-ease. One client presented a physical problem for processing which involved long-standing lower back pain. Her chronic backache comes and goes, and is sometimes stress related, but also come on without stress. It began really intensifying and became noticeable during her first (and only) pregnancy. It has become much worse since then over the ensuing four or five years. As I continued asking questions, we went a little bit further in regard to her general health. It turned out that she also gets these canker sores in her mouth, and they are very painful, too. I noted that mentally, and kept asking her almost medical-type questions, as well as psychological questions. This was not because I needed most of that information, but, as she noticed, I was "just fishing." That is one way my intuition works. I ask informational questions because I was trained in more conventional psychotherapy to be scientific in the interview. However, I mostly use it as a "ground" for my intuition. During one of the questions she indicated an urge or desire for stretching. She felt like she needed to stretch. It seemed both physical and metaphorical. Right away I suggested she move deeper into that desire for stretching, and she spoke of feeling really confined, and so on. 186 In the next stage of her journey there was an image of whirling, of spinning, and that led to an image of a canker feeling in her jaw. As she moved into that image, she said it was like the feeling of a dentist drilling through the dense tooth. I had her stay with it long enough to drill right through the tooth and into the gum. The hardness of the tooth made a sharp contrast with the softness of the gum. At that point the image transformed into a totally different image of a very, very tiny dark black hole, which suggested an image of the canker sores. That image actually became a black hole, in physics terminology. She had the experience of entering into a black hole. I said, "Enjoy this new reality, this new universe you are in which conforms with a physics theory . It is a connection between alternative universes. ” She went into this black hole which was a total absence of all things, and the blackest black she has ever seen or experienced. One kind of black is a nothingness, but there is a black so deep that it pulls everything into it. That was her subjective description of the experience. As she went into that black, there was a feeling of totality, completeness, and depth within it. She felt power as she became that black hole. When she came back from her journey several things happened. First, her back problem had eased. Her back had been really sore, but upon return she barely felt any twinges. Being in the blackness, for her, was like velvet. She said, "I feel like velvet!" It was very sensual, one of the most sensuous experiences of her life. It involved such total physical stimulation, this wrapping of velvet, being that velvet. Such total receptivity is a very sensual thing. Stimulation-wise, all receptors were open and responsive. That led to the thought that THIS WAS HER FEMININE SIDE, her feminine self, that total receptivity. A black hole may be seen as part of the feminine expression of the universe, as is infinite space. In ancient Egypt, this energy was known as the goddess Nuit. That journey put together the hole in her gum, the canker sore, with the back pain. She then saw the relationship. For most of her life, she had put away her femininity, and behavedin a masculine manner. She began armouring early in her life. When she had her baby, she could not ignore her femininity on a very deep level, and that is when the back problem exacerbated. It brought forth the dis-ease. Even though her chiropractor told her it was a genetic deformity, it never was a problem until them. She came up with her own unique healing which we never could have consciously come up with for lower back problems. In this journey, she experienced her femininity deeply. She decided she wanted to go home and really do something to ground the experience. She did not want to paint it, since it was not that visual type of imagery. We agreed she could just spend time meditating, and being there in that space. Being is feminine, while doing has a more masculine quality. CONCEPTION DREAM JOURNEY 187 This healing took place over a two-day period during our annual gathering on CHAOS AND CONSCIOUSNESS. This is a mature, cosmopolitan woman, with a beautiful poetic spirit. She recounted her dream the morning after her arrival. I go into a bedroom where Jeannie Eagle is sitting on a large bed in a flowing white dress. Her dark locks of hair fall around her shoulders, and the contrast is like a photo negative of Mt. Shasta. I go forward and lightly kiss Jeannie on her forehead. There is a shadowy presence in the room that I take to be Graywolf Gray wolf initiated the process: JUST LIE DOWN AND GET COMFORTABLE...START BY JUST BREATHING...RELAX AND ENTER YOUR DREAM...RE-EXPERIENCE YOUR DREAM...AND THEN WHEN YOU'RE READY, WALK ME THROUGH THE DREAM WITH YOU. I'm approaching the bed...slowly, not cautiosly...just very confidently...I'm seeing a person sitting on the bed [a woman]...I'm experiencing contrasts...the pristine whiteness of the clothing, and the very somber, dark and black hair...I'm feeling...ahhhh, the edges of the white and the edges of the black meeting, kind of jagged... JUST GIVE OVER TO THAT SENSATION OF JAGGED MEETING PLACES NOW...JUST EXPERIENCING...AND TELL ME WHAT YOU NOTICE...I'm coming to where they...ah...possibility of interchange...the black becomes white and the white becomes black. JUST EXPERIENCE THAT...BE THAT...FEEL THAT AS YOU BECOME THAT AND GO THROUGH THAT...FEEL IT VISCERALLY...WHERE DO YOU NOTICE THAT IN YOUR BODY? In my stomach, here. BRING YOUR ATTENTION TO THAT SENSATION OR FEELING...DOES IT HAVE A SHAPE?...ANY DISTINGUISHING THINGS YOU NOTICE ABOUT IT? It's like it comes and it goes...The black is blacked and the white is frozen... JUST GIVE OVER TO THAT NOTION...THAT THOUGHT...LET GO NOW OF ANY OTHER SENSE OF SELF YOU HAVE...AND JUST BECOME THAT FLOW...FEEL YOUR SIDES...YOUR LEFT SIDE, YOUR RIGHT SIDE... JUST FEEL THE FLOW NOW...BECOME NOTHING BUT THAT KIND OF MOTION... The black side's getting very violent like dark waves lashing...its like shark's fins, the jagged part. GIVE IN TO THAT BLACKNESS, THE SHARKNESS, THE ANGRYNESS...BECOME IT...LET GO OF THE REST NOW AND JUST BECOME THE BLACK...THE SHARKNESS...Feels like a sword...darksword...FEEL YOUR ESSENCE...BECOME IT NOW...TRUST YOUR IMAGINATION. I press into soft flesh...BREATHE DEEP...IS THAT IN YOUR STOMACH, TOO? It's in my legs, in my thighs...GIVE OVER TO THAT...FEEL IT NOW...STAY WITH IT...I'LL GO WITH YOU INTO THE PAIN...COME WITH ME INTO THE PAIN. It feels like penetration...OK...JUST EXPERIENCE THAT NOW...It's very painful...STAY WITH IT...I feel I'll cry...IT'S OK...It's myyyy...JUST FEEL...DEEPER, DEEPER...FEEL...WHAT'S HAPPENING NOW? I'm feeling like there's a knight with armor on...it's blackball of its black...BECOME THAT...BECOME HIM...COME INTO YOUR SHADOW WITH ME...STAY WITH IT...WITH MERIT'S OK, I'M WITH YOU...STAY WITH IT. Hmm...I'm seeing a lot of yellow flames; its like I want to jump in...DO IT!...I walk in and its just like red coals (YEAH) and I feel like a devil 188 dancing on them...FEEL THAT ENERGY...FEEL YOUR HEAT...Horns!...I'm all red, and...STAY WITH IT. WHAT'S HAPPENING NOW? It's all turning into ashes and turning into snow!...it's a lot cooler ...FEEL THAT...it's very soft to touch...Hhhmmmm...I'm going into the ground like a seed...FEEL IT NOW....JUST FEEL IT VISCERALLY...hmmmm, roots...going down ... deeper ... DEEPER ....deeper...ALL THE WAY NOW, WITH THEM...AND BECOME THE ROOTS... I'm finding gold down under the earth...it's some kind of light...BECOME THAT LIGHT NOW ...MOVE OVER TO IT ...LET GO OF BODY, LET GO OF FORM...BECOME THE LIGHT...DEEP, DEEP LIGHT...It's all like a ball, very white, and all around is the darkness...like a void...and the lower I get, the lower it goes, and I can't quite reach it...but I'm trying...JUST STAY WITH WHERE YOU'RE AT...EXPERIENCE THE VOID...BECOME THE VOID...LOOK IN NOW...BECOME THE VOID ...FEEL YOURSELF AS THE VOID...WHAT YOU'RE EXPERIENCING...[she breathes very deeply]...SHARE WITH ME... Ah...I was there...I think I thought that if I breathed it would go away, but it's still there, and I could breath and it's still there...WHERE ARE YOU?...I'm like in a...ah, a quarry hole all filled with water and the sun shifts down it, and I'm inside it and I don't need to breath, and I'm just like part of that water, and at the same time, its like air...it has a lot of little motes...motes...STAY WITH THAT... JUST ACCEPT THAT...FEEL...THIS IS ONE OF THE GIFTS OF THE DREAM TO YOU...IT'S A HEALING PLACE FOR YOU... MY THOUGHT IS THAT THERE IS A SENSATION OF TINGLING WITH THIS...yes!...JUST ALLOW THAT TO BE...LET THAT WORK ON YOU...THAT'S THE HEALING...IT COMES FROM WITHIN. Wow!!!...hmm,hmmmm that was the primal energy! Oh, I can feel it in my whole body as I said that, all the way up my legs! I can feel my whole body tingling!!! THAT'S THE HEALING...JUST STAY WITH IT NOW...Hmmmm....STAY WITH IT, AND FEEL IT AS LONG AS YOU NEED...WHEN YOU ARE READY TO COME BACK, BRING THE HEALING WITH YOU...AND ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS JUST TAKE THREE DEEP BREATHS AND LET YOUR EYES OPEN...BUT DON’T COME BACK UNTIL YOU'RE READY...WHEN YOU DO COME BACK JUST COME BACK TO THE SURFACE OF THE DREAM, AND I WILL MEET YOU THERE BECAUSE THERE IS ANOTHER PLACE I'D LIKE TO TAKE YOU. I feel like a very fuzzy caterpillar...MMM-UHUH....that's eaten a lot...it's so fat and it's soft....hmmmmm. ARE YOU READY TO GO BACK UP TO THE SURFACE OF THE DREAM NOW?...hmmm...Uhuh. THERE'S A PRESENCE IN THAT DREAM...A GUIDE...DO YOU FEEL IT? I'm seeing all of her now...a woman like a fairy with butterfly wings. DO YOU FEEL THEM ON YOUR OWN SHOULDERS?...Yeah, Ok, Ok, uhuh...they're sprouting...irridescent wings! OK...STAY THERE...those wings, its like the same irridescence as those motesMOTES [spoken simultaneously], [NOTE: in Greek, PSYCHE means butterfly] 189 GO JUST A LITTLE BIT DEEPER NOW...AND FEEL THE ENERGY THAT YOU RADIATE...THESE COLORS...Uhuh...what's in my mind is that passing over the clouds over the mountains coming into Medford there is a double circular rainbow around the shadow of the plane...below. The shadow of the plane is in the exact middle always, and I'm sitting right beyond the wing, and I'm looking down and seeing this rainbow...and it's now like I'm in the center of that rainbow...mmmm-huh...two rainbows...I see all these colors over here. JUST LET THEM ENTER YOU...FEEL THEM...FEEL THE CENTER...I'm the center spot...MAY I TOUCH YOU?...Yeah...[touches heart center].[long pause].[eyes open]...WELCOME BACK! INTEGRATION Now I'm feeling...oh, I'm feeling like integrating the feeling of the movement of the plane and all those vibrations...and at the same time the rainbows and the shadow of the plane are constant. That's what I'm feeling. I'm feeling like there is a constancy in the movement, you see? UHUH...H can't be but it is...THAT'S A GOOD LESSON, ISN'T IT? Yeah, yeah...yeah....THERE IS WISDOM THERE, YOU'VE TOUCHED SOME WISDOM THERE...Yeah, I'm a very wise person...YOU BET...Oh wow! THE STRUCTURE IS THE ILLUSION; IT'S THE MOVEMENT THAT IS THE REALITY. THE STRUCTURE OF THE PLANE, THE THINGS WE THINK ARE PERMANENT, THEY ARE THE ILLUSIONS. Yes. FEEDBACK....COMMENTS? Thank you...I've got my mama's tit again. When I was saying I'm a wise person, I usually can't say that, like its not good to be presumptuous, right. And it's like its OK to be yourself...UHUH, THAT'S A NICE GIFT FROM THE DREAM, TOO. She recalls her song where she wrote, "Woman trust your body's wisdom..." Graywolf asks her if she has had trouble in her legs. She says "No" but refers to month-old distress on the bottom of her forearms, slight arthritis, etc. THE TINGLING IN THE BODY, THOUGH, THERE WAS SOMETHING WITH THAT. Oh, [emphatically], the tingling was...SEEMED INTENSE...yes, it was very intense, yea. At the beginning of this session I was asking myself what this is about. And its about coming here. It's about my mother going 50 years ago to Farther South Camp, a forerunner of Outward Bound. I stayed home on the farm to cook, sweep, and wash for my father and brothers. And my mother went galavantin' off, just like I am now. Only no one has to cook and sweep for me. My kids are grown. Still, though, I was having the image of the woman going off to the wilderness to find herself. THAT’S SOMETHING OF THE ESSENCE OF WHY YOU'RE HERE THEN. Hmmmhuh. And I was hearing this morning a poem that my mother loved, I think by William Blake or John Dunn, someone of the mystical faith. It goes: Every morning lean thine arms upon the windowsill of heaven; And contemplate thy God. And then with a vision freshen thy heart and go forth into the day. 190 I am not knowing if I have permission to lean my hands on the windowsill of Heaven, [she rubs her arms where she has complained of the distress], YOU JUST DID...SO YOU MUST...Like I just did right now...So I do...So I don't need that! [She makes shaking motions as if to let go of that energy]. SO AGAIN, JUST ON THE OTHER SIDE OF FEAR IS THE POWER. JUST ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FEAR AND THE PAIN. JUST EXPRESSING THE FEAR AND THE PAIN DOES NOTHING MORE THAN HONOR IT...IT DOESN'T TAKE YOU TO THE OTHER SIDE OF IT. ALSO, THERE WAS AN INNOCENCE OF SHADOW IN THIS DREAM. YOU WENT INTO THE SHADOW SIDE IN THE SHARK...aimed at the light...I had a momentary flashback to a time when my husband with Alzheimer's tried to make love to me. It was scary, but I saved myself from that situation. Before that fear of my father that summer my mother went to camp. I'D LIKE TO SUGGEST THAT YOU EXPERIENCED EVEN ONE LEVEL DEEPER...THIS IS CONJECTURE AT THIS POINT...I THINK YOU EXPERIENCED THE MOMENT OF YOUR CONCEPTION. Hhmmm...the sperm, yes...going into the egg...the motes. I HAD VERY MUCH THE FEELING OF THAT WHILE YOU WERE THERE. Uhuh, uhuh. That thought was the penetration there— that's very interesting-AHA! THAT’S WHERE SOME OF THE INITIAL IMAGES WERE FORMED. SOME OF THE VERY MOST PRIMAL IMAGES THAT SHAPED YOU. Hmmmm. Graywolf...Now that I just am this ovum being penetrated by the sperm, I'm no longer violated...how about that! I'm created, I'm not violated! THAT'S A BIG CHANGE IN IMAGE, ISN'T IT. Uhuh, tremendous! Tremendous, tremendous. ITS A VERY FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE IN YOURSELF IN TERMS OF WHO YOU ARE NOW. I feel like Jesus when they pierced him in the side...aha, aha, aha. That tingling...now its in my back and it's in my arms. I was still resisting until now that sperm penetrating, and until it did, I couldn't be whole. Now I'm feeling like I'm in the Fallopian tube, and going into the uterus, and I can implant, and grow to where I am now. Its a wonderful feeling, because I can be inside my mother and here at the same time. I can be in all of those places. It's wonderful! CASE HISTORY: Larry Heals the Masculine and Feminine Larry is an easy subject, in part based on his background as an actor, screenwriter and producer. It is easy for Larry to engage his imagination in the journeys and let go of existing structures. In his outer life he has found that easy to do also and has had many unusual careers and experiences from truck driving to pumping iron and running a gym-health spa. He is currently working as a private investigator, investigating for mitigating circumstances in death penalty trials. He is also working on a screenplay, and making plans to pursue a career involving shamanic and other consciousness forms of healing work. 191 I first met Larry about eight years ago when he came to a men's consciousness group that I had started. He was going through a divorce, a rather painful divorce, at the time, but in that group was looking more for solace than to make changes within himself. We lost contact for a number of years, until he called asking what it would take to become an apprentice shaman. I invited Larry over for an interview. During the interview we discussed the idea of the wounded healer and that any powers that he would have as a shaman would come from his ability to heal himself. In this sense I undertook a dual role with Larry, to be his teacher and his therapist. He sought this path after the break up of a relationship with a woman with whom he had been living for some time. He had come to see a pattern and the "fatal attraction" that drew him into harmful relationships. He was rebounding into what his intellect knew was another disastrous relationship with a woman less than half his age. So our earliest contract revolved around exploring his relationships with women. He also found that in the relationship he had with his clients on death row, that they came to trust him and treated him as their friend-father. To a large degree he found he was helping them more than any therapists and he sought to sharpen these skills and become even more effective in that role. His trust in more conventional psychotherapy was low. His last relationship was with a psychologist and his relationships with other psychologists through his profession had soured him to the effectiveness of more conventional therapies. Yet his experiences with another more "spiritual" healer had been quite positive but limited. He contacted me because of his previous experience with us. Larry's dream life was very active and so we have naturally worked mostly with dreams during the sessions we've had to date. In the first sessions we spent considerable time just talking and establishing trust often for as much as one to one and a half hours before we would actually begin to work on one of his dreams. During these sessions the trails all lead to his relationship with his own ANIMA, his feminine side. He had a basic distrust of women who he felt were all manipulative and would somehow end up hurting him. This existential view of himself and the feminine side of the world, of course, was based on his early relationship and experiences with his mother. We did spend sometime discussing some aspects of that. However the dream work took him to some very experiential understandings of his relationship with the feminine side of himself which in turn was being projected onto the women around him and represented the type of woman that he was attracted to and sought relationships with. Larry has come to the understanding that to a large degree he would enter into these relationships with "flawed women like his mother" to somehow heal them and get what he had missed from his mother. During these first four sessions as a result of his dream work, he has become much more comfortable with the feminine side of himself as his images of that side of self changed. 192 He is now finding himself less and less attracted to "rescuing", and less attracted to the type of women he would normally be attracted to, and more and more adopting a neutral position with respect to women. He is currently at a point where he has decided not to seek any further relationships with women to feel complete within himself or to heal them, but is open to healthy relationship should it come along. Sexuality represented an important part in his relationships with women, and during the dream sessions in the first four appointments an intensely sensual-sexual state of consciousness was part of each journey. These sexual states of consciousness involved both experiences of his feminine and masculine sides of sexuality. The experiencing of the latter suggested to me that there was work for him to do on his male side. In our discussions it came out often that his relationship with his father also left very much to be desired. FEBRUARY, 1991: The dream had two parts: 1) grandiose with S&M erotic visions, and 2) a naval scene in which he is boarding the other boats and searching there, directing the boat people to do his bidding. I invite him to be the potentate in #1, and he is having everyone do his bidding but as he goes deeper he feels a falseness, and feels as though someone will find him out. This reminds me of the naval part and so I invite him to partake of that. The scene continues and he becomes the "potentate" boarding the ships. The scene unfolds and he is aware of one trouble maker. "/ want to kill him like a precise surgical cut ," he says. "/ have a gun in my hand and I'll shoot him." I invite him to become the gun, the bullet, the explosion. "It is like I'm a stroboscopic flash. Now I'm passing through the barrel, the air, and I hit him in the chest, the breast bone." The client then tries to move on but I don't pay attention. "Now become the man who was hit," I urge. "Feel the wound, the impact of the bullet." The dreamer begins to grimace, his face contorts. ''The blood, I feel guts spilling out and falling all over." "Stay with it," I urge, as he begins to choke and cough. Tears stream down his cheeks and drip off the end of his chin. His whole body goes limp and somehow rigid at the same time. I gently touch him on his breast bone as the "fit" continues. In a few seconds that seem to last forever it passes. Soon a look of ease melts the muscles around his eyes and jaw. What are you experiencing now?” I ask. "I see an image of a valentine's heart,” he says. "Become that now, its colors, the essence of how it affects you! Feel with all your senses ," I invite. 193 "I'm now experiencing a warm pink color that seems to fill my chest," he says. "Relax into it...yield to it. . What do you now experience?" I ask. "It is now two colors. A chartreuse that fills here [he indicates the upper portion of his head], and the pink fills here," as he sweeps his hand over his chest and heart. ''Its warm and soothing," he says. His face and body are now soft and a smile plays with his lips. "This is a gift of the dream, a healing state," I tell him. "Enjoy it and feel its effects on your head and in your heart... When you are ready to move, let me know. " Several minutes pass, and his eyes finally open. He stares at me, and I ask, "What's happening now?" "It was good," he says, "but the color in my head...I feel a sharp pain in my rectum. " "Take your awareness there now, sink into the pain, deeply...deeply. " His face once again reflects pain but soon turns to fear and puzzlement. "What's happening now," I say. "I am walking through a large hall," he says. "And I'm surrounded by electric blue gargoyles. I feel small and diminished, almost threatened," he reports. "Now become those gargoyles, become the essence of their colors, the energy expressed in their faces." There is silence for a few moments and then with a deeper and softer voice, he begins. "Ifeel a deep enduring quality and wisdom that stretches back through the millennia. I'm very old...very, very old." "Sink deeper," I invite, "deeper... and deeper....into the sense of what you are now feeling. " It is in you, it is a state of your being, this wisdom...not words, or thoughts, but an even deeper wisdom." "I am now connected to the whole planet," he reports. "My sense of self and age is connected to all that is here. " "The healing is not only for you, but at this moment embraces our entire planet." His already relaxed body lets go even further. "I see a striped cat. " "Become it. Feel what it feels, sense as it senses. " "I feel the jungle around me, its dampness and its life. I am safe and secure..." 194 His body begins to stretch and his hands and fingers take on the energy of claws as the king of the jungle stretches in relaxed readiness. This goes on for a while and then he reports passing visions of naval history, the Phoenicians, the Vikings, the Europeans, and once again the pirates. "I have a couple ofphrases for you," I offer. "If they fit...wear them. I AM PREDATOR...IAM WARRIOR.' He smiles, "I am in the hall with the blue gargoyles, and there is a peace. We have communicated." Eventually, his eyes open. We will talk further about this, but for now I watch a warrior cat glide out of the chair and into his dinner. LATE JUNE, 1991: This session presented his animus, or inner masculine side, for work. It is quite long and involved. It begins with a fairly detailed dream sequence: I’m in an apartment, or motel, not my house...I was naked...I didn't have any clothes on...two guys came into that room and they wanted to fuck me up; I think they wanted to kill me...and they were dead serious. And they grabbed me and, uh, I remember I was scared...and I didn't have any clothes on...that's even worse. They started to get me and somehow I got away from these two guys, and I went running out of my apt, motel or whatever it was, and there was a restaurant. I ran into this restaurant, and I was stark naked, and it's full ofpeople, and it's pretty bright in there. And I'm yelling ''Help! Help, they're trying to kill me, help." Well, in this restaurant all the people that are in there fortunately were like rebels, some kind of revolution thing going on, you know. Not like Fidel Castro, but some kind of underground revolutionary thing going, and these were like anti-social rebellious people. And I distinctly remember, when these two guys came in there chasing me there was a female, a girl, sitting down at a booth. And she had a shotgun or rifle laying down across that table. These people were armed, and it was crowded; they were all of the same mindset. And they did help; I remember that gal specifically. I don't remember any other specific people. I remember that gal and that shotgun rifle she had. And that stopped these guys from getting me. And then a guy, one of these rebels, grabbed one of the guys that was after me and killed him with a pocket knife, like a Swiss army knife. Out of this dude's throat, or something man, righteously killed him. And I remember the thing that struck me about it is he didn't give a shit... he did it easily. I mean he didn't easily kill the guy, but he didn't even think twice about it. And he threw the guy's body outside. And I remember the knife was covered with blood. And he threw the knife out the door with him. Then, I got real brave. I figured I was surrounded by my people here. So, the guy that was left, I wanted to find out why these two guys were after me. Why they were trying to kill me, who they were. I started questioning this guy, and I started torturing this guy sitting in a 195 chair. I started jumping up and down on his legs, and bones, and putting a world of hurt on thisdude. And I was getting into it. I was enjoying torturing him. And he wouldn't talk. Everytime he wouldn't talk, I'd do something worse to him. He wouldn't talk. Well, finally all these rebel-types, these revolutionary types started admiring this guy's ability to hold his mud, and not talk, after I really put the hurt on him. And they turned on me. And I was the bad guy now, you know. This guy was the good guy. So I let the guy up, and I remember that when I let him up he had a big smile on his face, and he said his name was Gus McGinnis???, something like that. GRAYWOLF: Close your eyes now...and spend the next couple of minutes breathing...if you can, relax your body...and, as you're ready fill your mind with the dream...bring it back in as much detail as you can...and walk me through the dream. This time, as you experience it... LARRY: I'm in this room, like a hotel room; it's dark in there...the lights are out...I guess I'm getting ready to go to bed...I don't have any clothes on. And, uh, I get attacked by these two guys...I don't know if they were in there already; I don't even know where they came from. I really can't see what they look like. It's dark but I can tell there are two of them. I can also tell they're real serious about getting me. That pretty much panics me out. The one thing I want to do is get away from these guys. I manage to break loose and as I run out of the room, I'm being chased. They're right on my tail. GRAYWOLF: Stop at that point in the dream...and back up...back up to where they have you...tell me what's going on...what do you feel? LARRY: Well, these guys have got me, they're grabbing me both of them. I think they're trying to get me down. And, I don't know how I know it, but I know they want to kill me. I know if I don't get away from them, they're going to kill me. And it just panics me out, and that gets the adrenalin shooting through my system. GRAYWOLF: I want you to divert a little bit from the dream now...and I want you to allow that to happen...tell me what you experience...feel your nakedness...the threat...what happens...what does your imagination do with that? LARRY: It scares me! GRAYWOLF: Even though it scares you, let it happen...what do you experience? LARRY: I experience a sense of weakness in my legs, and a lot of tension up here in my head area, tightness in my stomach... GRAYWOLF: Get into all those feelings...let them develop. LARRY: It's hard to breath...something is kind blocking my throat now. GRAYWOLF: Stay with it...deeper...deeper...your breathing stops...what do you experience? 196 LARRY: Like a tightness in the throat. GRAYWOLF: Give in to the tightness. Yield to it. LARRY: It's like someone's got their hand on my throat, squeezing it. GRAYWOLF: Stay with it. LARRY: There's a weakness in my legs...it feels like pins and needles in my legs...like they don't want to work too well. GRAYWOLF: Stay with it...Feel this experience. LARRY: I don't know who these guys are... GRAYWOLF: Feel the tightness...explore that a little while longer...right now just give in to the tightness...let it take over...experience where that takes you... LARRY: Now it's like, like being up real high and looking over the edge. That feeling. GRAYWOLF: Stay with the image...experience the visceral feel of it...what do you experience? LARRY: It's a dam, I'm falling over the edge of this dam. It's down and away...I'm gonna smash right on the concrete. GRAYWOLF: Stay with it...what do you experience now? LARRY: Smashing on the cement is like just breaking open, but it feels good. GRAYWOLF: Get into that...feel it...just relax...now relax into it...deeper...what are you aware of? LARRY: I'm laying on the cement...and, uh, I'm like a suitcase that's thrown open. I feel a tremendous freedom now. GRAYWOLF: Just accept it...accept that...let it be...stay with this consciousness...enjoy it...and when you're ready to move on, let me know...take your time. LARRY: I'm seeing a lot of weird things right now. GRAYWOLF: Share them. LARRY: I'm in some kind of a crudely-built small cabin. I see three yellow oil cans— they're hanging from a rafter...they'respinning around...at least the first one is spinning around...the second one is kinda turning, spinning pretty fast...and then over here there's a window, and the wind is blowing through the window...and some kind of light blue, lacey curtain is being blown in...inside the cabin. There's a guy in the cabin...he is wearing, like a red checkered jacket, like a hunter, and a red cap. He's almost a cigar store Indian. 197 (NOTE: This could be a past life or collective consciousness memory, and I thought about exploring it, but the color and spinning of the cans attracted me more. The spinning often leads to "CHAOTIC CONSCIOUSNESS," and yellow inevitably seems to introduce issues of how one's power is expressed.) GRAYWOLF: Now I want you to experience what it is like to be the spinning oil can...and especially be the color. LARRY: The oil can changes color; it's not yellow anymore...it's kind of...almost black... GRAYWOLF: Stay with it, experience the spinning and the blackness. LARRY: As I'm spinning, shooting off mushroom-shaped little puffs like light grey or light blue grey smoke...out the top. GRAYWOLF: Stay with the flow of your experience. LARRY: I don't see those puffs anymore...I see more of a flat square, kind of a dirty yellow object, seems to be floating blackness that looks a little like a piece of Swiss cheese...it's square, flat, and got some holes in it. GRAYWOLF: I invite you to become that color, that shape, use your imagination to experience being full of holes and floating in the blackness. LARRY: I become this thing...I wanna go...and I do...I become upright...I'm on the edge now...I'm trying to move...going like this; I'm flexible... GRAYWOLF: Feel that, feel your flexibility...give in now to this sensation. (NOTE: Larry suffers from severe joint pains and stiffness most of the time, result of his weight lifting too early in life). LARRY: I'm feeling a frustration, like I'm pretty much trapped. I'm trying to move but I can't. I'm only able to move myself...I'm not in one position...I'm not able to move away from where I am...basically, I'm just hangin' there. GRAYWOLF: Trapped? LARRY: Trapped and kinda flappin'. (This is a good summary of how he feels generally in life). GRAYWOLF: Give in to all of that as a visceral sensation...sensation of entrapment...I don't know how to say it...but all at once become that feeling or that nature... LARRY: I see a big face up here to the left...the dominating thing about this face is that it's wearing glasses..and they're square glasses...I can't see through...I think this face is me...it looks like me... 198 GRAYWOLF: There's something about the glasses...an energy to them...become the glasses...look at yourself.. GRAYWOLF: When I become the glasses, they change shape. They were square almost like Benjamin Franklin glasses...and they became very slanted like eyes, like cat's eyes. GRAYWOLF: Uh Huh. LARRY: They're not glasses anymore, they're eyes... GRAYWOLF: Become them...feel that...give into the sensation...the body feeling...the sense of being the eyes...the cat's eyes. Stay with it. What's happening? LARRY: They were just cat's eyes...the huge head of this black cat... GRAYWOLF: Become it...feel...let me know when you're ready to share... LARRY: I'm this cat...I've got a lot of energy, like a lot of tension...kind of nervous energy and tightness, and hungry...hunger. I got these really sharp teeth...I really like these teeth...take great pride in these teeth. They're so big, and so sharp, and so white. They, like, give me a feeling of power! GRAYWOLF: Become the power...become the teeth. Experience yourself now. LARRY: I have the feeling of invincibility...uh, I have these extremely powerful jaw muscles. I feel real aggressive, and, and I...kind of almost like some kind of huge machine that can crush things....and I want to crush things. That's my job...what I'm supposed to do and what I want to do... GRAYWOLF: Stay with that now...let what you experience guide you...take yourself way down...trust the process you're in...crush...feel the crushing and being crushed. LARRY: Now I see a...it's like a snake...it's a long, white snake...long and thin...it's like a water snake. Black water... GRAYWOLF: Become...become both the essence of the snake and the water...become...feel it in your body...feel it viscerally... LARRY: Well, when I was teeth, it was like I was trying to bite down on this snake...but it could just, slip between the teeth and get away. GRAYWOLF: Feel that...be that...feel your whiteness...flexibility....get into that...give in to it... LARRY: I have a feeling of weightlessness...bending and, you know...like dancing around on the water...pretty good....doesn't feel like I weigh anything. I see what appears to be like a squid or an octopus, or half and half...with way more legs than an octopus would normally have. 199 GRAYWOLF: Become...go deep into the water now...deep into the water...become the octopus...when you are ready...share... LARRY: The thing that I like about being this octopus is that I can move...in directions that I want to...by going like this with my legs...go wherever I want. GRAYWOLF: Let go, be with this flow...it's just as much you as all of the other experiences...what do you experience now? LARRY: Just kinda toolin around in this kind of black water...feels pretty good, actually. GRAYWOLF: Get into it now...what you're experiencing...let it become a part of you now...become a part of you...explore...exploring yourself... LARRY: I see a pair of hands...hands holding namchucks, one in each hand...all I see is the hands and the namchucks. GRAYWOLF: Let go of that visual image...we can explore the hands later if you want...but right now stay with the sea and the black water. LARRY: Changed color now...I'm gold instead of that light blue grayish color...I'm orange now. GRAYWOLF: Good...be the essence of the color, the orange...feel it in your body... LARRY: It feels a lot warmer than it did a few minutes ago. GRAYWOLF: Give in to that sensation... LARRY: Feels like I might be closer to the surface... GRAYWOLF: Where do you feel the orange in your body? LARRY: I feel it in my lower body. I feel it in my legs...I feel it in my groin. GRAYWOLF: Ok, give into it...feel... LARRY: I feel it in this general area a lot (indicates genitals, upper legs, and lower abdomen). GRAYWOLF: Take it in now...just accept...accept it...give into it...what you get from the dream, Larry...whatever you get from the dream...accept it..flow with it...take it in...take it into who you are... LARRY: I'm looking up at this pool of water...I'm looking up and the water's blue...I can see through the water and I can see people up above...they're jumping off a cliff into the water right above me...I can see them jump, and I can see them in the water. The one thing that I notice is they're having a lot of fun doing this. The water is real bright blue... 200 GRAYWOLF: Become the water...become that water...become the essence of water...no energy inside of you is not this water...become the water itself... LARRY: I have a tremendous feeling of flexibility...like I'm just able to just kind of go out and fill every little crack, and I have no boundaries. GRAYWOLF: Is there anything else about the water...feel the water filling all of the cracks, and all of the spaces in...feel it viscerally...any sounds?... LARRY: I see my Dad here, sitting around at the table...looks like Thanksgiving dinner or something...the only one I can really recognize here is my Dad. He's eating corn and roast beef....there's a red and white checkered table cloth on the table...I think it's a card table... GRAYWOLF: What's your experience? LARRY: Good, it's good. I see, uh, like a carved wooden small statue of the Virgin Mary, and she's inside of a carved wooden heart. Very small. GRAYWOLF: Stay with your experience and the flow of your imagination. Trust your process. Be the feminine virgin in your heart... LARRY: I see a barrel...someone's made a drum out of this barrel...laying...it's not upright; it's laying down...there's drumheads on each end of it. GRAYWOLF: Now be the drum...the drum...be this drum...something new begins with this journey. [Long pause] GRAYWOLF: There's more to it...there's more in your dream...but this is far enough for now...enjoy this...be the drum and itsrhythm into your heart...stay with it as long as you want...bring the drum to the surface with you...and when you're ready to do that, take a couple of deep breaths and return by letting your eyes open. It's important for you to bring this consciousness with you. [Long pause] LARRY: I think I got pretty deep there... GRAYWOLF: How was it? LARRY: Pretty good...I didn't fall asleep, did I? GRAYWOLF: No. You were right there the whole time. LARRY: It's hard to say, because this has been different than the other ones. This was harder. I think it has something to do with my attitude lately. I get pissed off...I think that's caused some barrier. 201 GRAYWOLF: Yeah, that's the teeth. You went past the teeth...and found a deeper source of power. You're dealing this time with the MALE SIDE of you. On other journeys we've been dealing with the female, the ANIMA. This time you explored the male self, the ANIMUS, a whole different sense. LARRY: That fits in with what's been happening lately to me. Like this guy "George"...he's got me by the balls. He's male authority, the guy with the power, I've had a feeling of powerlessness. GRAYWOLF: Yeah, your dream really spoke to that. That's why I had you go and let them catch you, and take you into that, because that was the thing you feared most. And that's where your power is. What is holding your power hostage is your fear. LARRY: Yeah. GRAYWOLF: But I think the most powerful force is water...the essence of the water within you. You can't hurt water...the essence of the water within you. You can't hurt water...you can try to crush it...you can do whatever you want to it and you can't hurt it. It's flexible, and flows, you see that state of consciousness, being is a part of you. It's even a big part of your physical self, actually about 95% of you. LARRY: Yeah. Well, obviously when I run into guys like Leutenant "Powers" I should turn into water... GRAYWOLF: Instead of the teeth...you see that's the choice and why I didn't have you become the fist with the nanchucks; you were given a choice at that point. I took over a little bit there and asked you to stay with the water rather than take the choice of the fist and the nanchucks, because that would be back up to the outer self you're used to—the teeth—and I wanted you to godeeper, instead. You always have that choice. LARRY: It's funny now, just thinking about the nanchucks, man (laughs heartily). I'm going yeah, yeah, it's an addiction, man. GRAYWOLF: Yeah, so it'll tempt you even when you're in a place of power. It'll tempt you away. LARRY: Yeah, I forgot about the water completely. (Laughs) It's scary! GRAYWOLF: You went back to it though, did you notice that? You went back to it immediately. It didn't take much. LARRY: Yeah, it was just that little orgiastic thought that popped in there (laughs). That could be conditioning, you know. GRAYWOLF: Yeah, it could. The other thing I was really impressed with was we had this talk earlier in the session about your father your relation to him. Yet, in here in this vision you had a new sense of yourself and him, a satisfying experience of a nourishing meal with him. LARRY: Yeah. 202 GRAYWOLF: That was important, I think...it's a beginning of making peace with that part of yourself. LARRY: I had a strange experience with my father over the telephone. I called him up, and I sent him IRON JOHN for Father's Day, and I called him up to see if he got the package. You know he's a real linear thinker who probably wouldn't even understand. But, you know I'm 48 years old, and I have never talked with my Dad about sex, NEVER! (NOTE: He goes on to recount a recent phone call with his father where they do discuss sex, and he finds out about his father's prudishness about some aspects of sex which he had automatically assumed were his mother's hang ups). GRAYWOLF: There's a lot in this dream still left to explore. If we get a chance we'll do more with it. A couple of things intrigued me. In terms of the journey you took tonight, I guess I want to plant a couple of seeds. I'm sure there is a lot more that will percolate out of it—this feeling of water—that essence. But one of the things that I'm aware of is the water these guys were jumping into was a source of great fun, great pleasure. LARRY: Yeah! GRAYWOLF: "You" were the source of greatest safety. If someone would have jumped off a cliff and fallen into you, they would be safe. That to me is repeating a theme that has come up with you many times which is this theme of healer, this theme of being safe, of giving to the world. That's something to pay attention to...in yourself. You first approached me about apprenticing to become a shaman and that is what I was speaking to. It's very powerful and has appeared in almost every journey you've taken. LARRY: I have another issue. I don't trust what I see anymore. I don't trust what others tell me, maybe they are manipulating me. An acquaintance told me he could only spend his limited time on people who could do something for him. Well, if I was writing a screenplay with a character I wanted the audience to despise, I would use dialogue like that. I told him when you start using people as objects you lose some of your own humanity. In the movie business, it becomes addictive, and everyone including myself has to watch that. It's hard to trust people's sincerity. GRAYWOLF: It makes sense because you're very sensitive. You get hurt easily. You have to hide that behind the teeth. You have to hide behind the macho tough guy, the iron pumper and all that. But you've got the sensitivity. It shows in your urge to be a healer and help people, and in your creativity. I just wanted to acknowledge it and honor that. LARRY: Right... [Pause, then the client initiates closure of session with drumming]. JULY, 1991 SESSION: 203 As follow up, the next session he came in for was quite different. We didn't work on a dream but he really opened up and revealed a long-term deep set depression. In essence he sees very little reason to live, makes it through each day as best he can and feels essentially helpless in coping with life. This is the most honest he has ever been with anyone by his own report. Following that, about a week later I received a call from him. He was going to be out of town but wanted some re-enforcement. He met a new woman but found that his whole approach to and attitude to her was different than anything he has experienced before. He caught himself in magical thinking and rejected that to more realistically assess his feelings about her. She makes drums, is interested in shamanic work, and is either Indian or Mexican, perfectly designed for his "fatal attraction" hook. He is however more passive in this instance and willing to wait and see. (NOTE: nothing ever came of it). He indulges in magical thinking when there appears to be synchronicity involved in meeting a woman as happened in this case, and takes it as a sign that this is "The Magic Woman" for him. I think this is progress and a result of his dream sessions with animus-anima. From the previous session, we've already seen that Larry's attraction is to "flawed women," that is, women who he believes he can help or "save." But he ends up basically being hurt by them. That is a transactional analysis perspective of it: Rescuer-Victim. In reality he is trying to save the female side of himself, which goes back to his mother. He had issues with his mother, her sexuality, etc. She was a "really flawed and dominant" woman, and the father was sort of a wimp. There is some indication in the latent manifest content of the dream of hidden fears of homosexuality in the dream he may yet need to deal with. What it boiled down to is dealing with the feminine side of himself, which he inherited from his mother, which is very damaged. By trying to take care of them "out there" he is trying to heal himself, and of course my work is to help him deal with it within himself. His profession as a private investigator specializing in mitigating circumstances for death penalty cases is further indication of the savior or rescuer role. He's noted quite a few times to me that his female clients inevitably fall in love with him. He's working on a case now and when he called he was partly down because a female client for whom he had spent a lot of energy finding mitigating circumstances had turned on him and thought he was the most terrible thing happening. AUGUST 28,1991: THE CORE SELF In this session Larry explores his issue of the "fatal attraction" women, and its relationship to his thrill-seeking desires for the adrenalin rush. Graywolf points out that in his own exploration the attraction had a certain location in his body, inner signs, sensations, and feelings. 204 Graywolf suggests that the adrenalin in the situations is a sign there is some kind of threat happening, and Larry agrees. He notes that in the few relationships where the adrenalin was absent he felt more secure. Trust builds in relationships that develop slow and easy. The inner side of the relationship develops. Larry speaks further about his idea of commitment involving waiting for someone, who was "captured in war, or thrown in jail for years." "Ifyou love somebody, you should wait for them" He speaks only in terms of a love-addicted woman being unable to wait because of their compulsion. Yet, he also notes that "everytime I come in here I have some gal that I'm head over heals with... You know, that is pretty ridiculous; everytime I see you I'm with a different gal." He felt silly telling it each time. Graywolf tries to keep the issue moving, pointing out "script laughs" and "gallows" script interspersed in Larry's comments. He suggest he is an adrenalin freak who "courts the edge, and that's where the real attraction is, which is always the danger, whenever the adrenalin is going. " Larry says he is trying to pull back from that, but in fact has been jumping off a 45 foot bridge without even a bungie cord. Larry confesses that living on the edge is probably tied into "authority, resentment, and it probably goes back to my Dad. ” He realizes, "I'm real abrasive with certain kinds of people, so I can utilize that to get this adrenalin rush I crave, and it's real destructive, I know." He thinks, "Larry, shut your mouth, walk away from this. This is bad. It will only end in disaster." He literally shakes with adrenalin. Graywolf inquires what life would be like without that. Easier, Larry thinks, but the flirting with danger still attracts him. Yet he claims to be trying to get away from the adrenalin rushes which "zaps all my energy." He reminisces about early childhood and being unjustly blamed for things he didn't do, and being called a liar. The first three incidents had to do with women scaring him and getting that adrenalin rush. Graywolf gets him in touch with the feelings of anger, being cheated and pushed around in life. Even though everybody may, each person feels and reacts to it in their own unique way. Larry updates him on the current injustices in his work situation. Graywolf points out "how you would come out of all of that wanting to be a rescuer." They go on to explore the paradox of the adrenalin rush and feelings of helplessness, and what that feels like inside. The script is, " Wait a minute, I didn't do that. ” That impotence leads to all sorts of things such as rescuing people, getting into lousy relationships, the adrenalin rush, lighting authority figures, maybe prison ("gallows") eventually. Larry asserts, despite the "script laugh" that he won't go to prison, that he has already curbed the behavior to some extent. He refers again to the dark, mysterious woman with a touch of evil, then goes on to yearn for "a normal life, normal relationship," and settling down. He's tired of being on the edge, tired of flirting with danger. He speaks of a "midnight rambler" in one of his screenplay plots and how two characters "represent the shadow self of the other." Graywolf asks him, "where is that touch of evil in you, or danger, the shadow side?" 205 They go back to the motel dream, where he ends up in a restaurant. Graywolf invites him to explore "the guy who you ended up jumping all over and trying to get him to confess and he never did. " GW: Do you remember that dream? Just breathe and take time and remember it. Don't rush, just take your time and remember it. LARRY: I'm trying to remember if I was in a motel, it was a restaurant or something. GW: You started out in a motel. And they tried to come in and kill you, and you chased them out, and into a restaurant that was full of rebels. LARRY: And a woman with an assault rifle, and one guy killed one of the guys, cut his throat with a knife. No big deal right. And then they grabbed this other guy, and they had him in a chair. GW: This was another case of almost impotence where you were jumping all over him and... LARRY: Yeah, and the guy wouldn't talk. Interestingly enough I remember one of the things I was doing to this guy, and I don't know if it has anything to do with sexuality or anything, but I was spreading, and maybe his feet were tied together, but I was like spreading his legs apart, his knees apart, like I was trying to break his legs, like a wishbone. And I was jumping on him and I can't remember if I'm jumping on his balls or what. But I remember spreading his knees apart and just trying to break his legs. GW: Yeah, I remember the words you used, you were ' jumping his bones." LARRY: Is that what I said? W: Yeah. Just take time and bring the dream back now. Bring that scene back, that part of the dream...breathe...breathe...empty your mind out...just let it fill with as much as you can remember about that... LARRY: I remember this guy smiling, during all this; it was almost like he thought it was a joke. GW: Use your imagination and replay the scene now as him...what it would be like from his perspective. LARRY: As his character, I discover that by smiling at this guy who is beating on me, it infuriates him, he gets frustrated, and the more frustrated and infuriated he gets the weaker he gets, and he can't hurt me...and the more he can't hurt me, the more I smile, because it's almost funny...it's like I'm in this, tied up in this chair an in total control of this guy. GW: And that feeling, that sense, that effect, feel it and tell me what you notice about that now. 206 LARRY: It's like I'm sucking his energy into me, the more outa control he gets, the stronger I get... GW: Let that happen...where does that take you; where does that go? LARRY: Well, obviously it wins over these other people, they feel my power and his weakness, and join me. They are on my side now. GW: What’s that like? LARRY: It feels good. Like I won. GW: Stay in that feeling...enjoy it, be with it... LARRY: It's hard to enjoy this feeling because there is a sense of guilt about it, because even though I won and zapped all this guy's power, I feel that I've manipulated these people and it's not real, you know what I mean? GW: Yeah, there is an insecurity within that; there is no solidity within the power. LARRY: It's like a bunko power, you know, a scam power, more like a technique than a real power. GW: Go to the smile now, go back to the smile and tell me what you notice about it. LARRY: Well, the smile is not real; it is designed to push this guy's buttons, because it does. And so I'm using it to manipulate this guy, and take his power away. But as I take his power away, it becomes enjoyable and the smile becomes more real, but it didn't start out real at all. GW: Go into the sensation of the smile...go into the physical feeling of it...the original smile...gradually let that take your whole attention now. LARRY: The smile was a signal to this guy, that he can't hurt me no matter what he does... GW: Go more with that...stay with that for a minute...what do you notice about that now? LARRY: It's not a real smile...an acting smile...the reality is this guy is hurting me, and I'm pretending he is not hurting me. GW: Go into the pain...feel the pain...okay, feel the pain now...sink into it. LARRY: When I smile at this guy, like when I smile at him, he blows and his power becomes ineffectual. GW: Uhuh. LARRY: So this smile is a defense mechanism against that pain. 207 GW: Exactly, yeah...that is why I want you to go into the pain...Iet yourself feel it in the dream...use your imagination. What color is it? LARRY: A bluish-grey. GW: Imagine sinking into it, into that color, into that part of your body...let yourself become assimilated by that color, become the color, what do you experience? LARRY: An isolation, an isolation... GW: Go deeper, stay with it, trust where you are going...go deeper into it...let go now...what do you experience? LARRY: I feel totally alone; I feel kinda like in the middle of a black void, alone... GW: Leel that...feel it more deeply, go deeper into it, into the blackness...let go now..let go, go deeper...What do you experience in there now? LARRY: I see a series of like little blue lines and circles, and mixing, kinda like a big insect of blue lines, like a big, giant bumble bee... GW: There is sort of an essence, an energy with those lines, a sense of something...become them, yeah, become them...feel the movement, be the movement...be them... LARRY: There is a kind of frenetic feeling, kinda like electricity... GW: Good, give in to that, just become that entirely...let go of everything else and become that...just experience now...let go... LARRY: It's like a, kinda like a, it's like energy, but not real comfortable energy...it's like time-stressed energy... GW: Yeah, stay with it...stay with it for a little while longer...just ride with it...be it...see where it takes you...go deeper into it...What are you experiencing? LARRY: Well, I'm seeing these, I'm seeing more blue lines and I'm trying to be the blue lines, but maybe I'm some blue lines but not other blue lines... GW: That's okay. LARRY: And black void, and these blue lines are forming a male penis actually, not just hanging down... GW: Stay with it, stay with it...trust where you are going...you are almost there...just be with it. Don't try to figure it out, just be with it, feel the effect on you...just notice what is going on inside now. LARRY: This male penis is like, it's not shooting anything out, but this, again made outa blue lines, this shark swam out of it. 208 GW: Uhuh. LARRY: And it's swimming...in the black void... GW: Stay with that, see what happens... LARRY: Now there was an image coming in from the left, of another male penis, uncircumcised, but not blue lines anymore. It's surrounded by a yellow aura, like going down at this angle here, now I'm seeing this yellow... GW: Yeah, give in to the yellow now...just become the yellow now, let it overtake you. let it absorb you, let it act upon you. What do you see? Just notice. LARRY: This yellow aura, is forming a shape of like a cloud with yellow petals and surrounded by this black, and then the interior of the petals are black and just the edges are yellow, and they seem to be drawn to the middle of this thing. GW: Yeah, follow that, trust that, let it pull you in; just experience it viscerally. LARRY: I seem to be surrounded by this grass, this green tall grass; it's swaying back and forth, but everything beyond that is black... GW: Become the grass Larry, become the motion, feel it...feel it viscerally, let your body dissolve and become the grass, feel the sensations of the grass—the movement—just get into it and tell me what it's like, when you are ready. LARRY: I'm going back and forth, rubbing against other grass, and I can feel on one side of the long skinny blades of grass are real smooth and on the other side it's rough, you know I can feel it going back and forth, both sides of it... GW: Yes, it's okay, just be with that, trust that, stay with that now, see where it takes you, see where you go with that...just feel...feel also your color. LARRY: You know I'm getting smaller, and the grass is getting bigger, the blades of grass almost look like palm leafs, with that kinda thick stem running down the middle of them... GW: What's happening now? What are you experiencing, what are you feeling? LARRY: I'm seeing some other kind of a plant, it's kind of a brown, fuzzy plant and it's got green grass, like at the base of it, kinda oblong and yellow behind it... GW: Yes, as much as you can now become that plant, feel those colors, feel their locations in your body, just feel the effect of that. Let them work on you, don't say anything until you are ready, and let me know what you experience with it. Let go of the visual part now and begin to focus in on the sensations... LARRY: The brown part feels kinda fuzzy on the outside, feels kinda solid, and the bottom part, the green part, feels kinda like going back and forth...skinny.,.1 can feel the 209 breeze blowing these green leaves I have, and I can feel the yellow must be the sun, the brown part feels warm... GW: Just enjoy those feelings: solidity, your featheriness, thewind, the sun...just let them work on you. Let them heal...this is a state of your being...this is an essence of who you are...stay with this part of your being as long as you want. LARRY: I guess the sun, it's like giving me energy up here, and it seems like down here where the wind is blowing, it's like I'm sweating a little bit, down here from this energy I'm getting here, the breeze is like cooling me off, it's like working perfectly together, you know... GW: Yeah, know that about yourself. This is you...This is your real power...YOUR CORE. This is much deeper than that false smile and taking power, robbing it from someone else that was on the surface of the dream, this is the place of real power, this is what was underneath the pain. This is what you were robbed of as a child. This is you... DECEMBER, 1991: THE "HOLEY" GOLDEN BAND Larry continued working on the concept of anima/animus, and finding ways of reowning the very powerful feminine side of himself that he, until now, had essentially given up. The session before this one, the work changed suddenly, in that he started getting in touch with energies, with parts of himself which represent the healthy, masculine side of himself, as symbolized by the horse. [NOTE: see POWER VS. STRENGTH, also Larry's session] That led me to think he was finishing up this round of his work with his anima, and when he came in for the session this is exactly what he started talking about. He mentioned the work he has been doing on his own outside therapy, such as the books he has been getting on anima/animus, and the feminine side of self. He had come to some very remarkable conclusions. He came up with the idea of having a talk with his anima. In essence, one of the outcomes was that he got down to asking her what she wanted. This reminded me of Freud's famous question about what women really want from men. It turned out she replied that she just wanted to be happy. So Larry said to his anima, " Well, that is what I want to be, too." They have now arrived at a place where they scratch each other's back, which is quite remarkable for the few processing sessions he has had to date. The other thing he became aware of in meeting his anima as an actual image in his mind, is that his anima has all of the physical characteristics of the women he usually gets into the most trouble with. His so-called "fatal attractions " usually have long black hair, and are dark and mysterious, maybe even a little foreign looking. He sees now quite clearly how he invests the characteristics of his anima onto those women. He does not see them for who they really are, but creates an image in his mind, which of course, always leads him to his problems with these women. By reowning the projection, and forming an internal relationship with her, many changes can be expected. This is a recap of how he has come along in therapy until now. 210 In this dream journey, he begins at a very shallow level of work for this particular dream. The dream itself was full of black men, guns, shooting, murder, and violence. Guns and violence are fairly characteristic of a lot of his dreams. In this particular dream, he had all of his guns ripped off from the house he was staying in. Apparently his landlady had just allowed this to happen. As he was walking around the house he entered his bedroom. The only thing left in there was this chest. And as he opened this chest [note play on words for the body part], all he found was this one snub¬ nosed 38 revolver. This gave me a kick, because of all the weapons, the 38 Special is so stereotypical for a 'private eye.' At one point in the dream, he was out on the porch. There was something coming down between the cops and these black guys, and the blacks were not going to give in to the cops. They were running around shooting people. As the dreamer, he shot this black guy who came up on the porch after him. Then, he ended up shooting some others. My initial thoughts about this dream indicated a shift in the work. I thought, "Oh my God, he's starting to explore the shadow side of self." It looks like this is probably going to be true. It is important, since "acting out" shadow elements has been a source of confusion and risk-taking behavior for him. Many times it has been disturbing and disruptive. This dream represents the first step of exploring that shadow side, at least more consciously. He has a collection of guns he says is much smaller now than it used to be. But he said he still has a significant number of guns, yet claims he is not interested in them, and would never use them. I suspect his reaction in the dream would tend to belie this. And this may represent the part of the shadow he has to go with. I am including this analysis because it is part of the process that I go through sometimes. I cannot help but get some prejudices about what a dream is about, and this is where it becomes really important for me to empty my mind. I have to say, "Okay, Gray wolf, now let go of the idea that the black man is representing the shadow side of Larry's self, and let's see where the process really goes ." So I took a couple of minutes after listening to the dream, just to clear these thoughts, as I usually do. I tell people to just empty their minds and breathe deeply. The reality is, I am probably telling myself that just as much as I am the person I am working with, so I can truly enter into co-consciousness. What struck me in the dream was that there was an energy with these black men in the dream, and the energy was vague. He simply, " knew they weren't going to... there was a danger to them...there was something going on with them. " To cut through the mental confusion, I had him essentially tell me what color this energy was—this energy field he associated with the energy of the black men. Immediately he said, "Red! Even in the dream I felt that it was red." The gist of his process led into that red and it was a very relaxing place for him which took on a very rich overtone. Then within the red, he found a green. The green became a bird. 211 Remember, one of his main physical complaints because of iron pumping has been centered in his back and shoulders, which have almost constant arthritic pain. As the bird, which eventually became a parrot and then a woodpecker, he felt most aware of the wings, coming out from the scapula across his back. He was aware of the wings stretching and relaxing to the point it all focused in the middle of his back where his arthritis is worst. It felt very relaxing, and that is when the image changed into a ram, or rather the face of a ram. The green ram face reminded him of the horse from a previous session, where the horse was tearing away the flesh from the muscles, and the muscles from the bone, which felt very good to him. So, his journey proceeded through a series of bird images, then the ram, then the image of a lizard. This indicated an even deeper level. Even physiologically, you could see he was deepening his process as his breathing was changing. As he became the lizard, he was fascinated with the fact that he could actually climb walls, and he was even walking across the ceiling at one point. This too passed. The green lizard gave way to a deep green pond or pool of water. As the lizard, he eventually went into the color, and became that pond, and was drawn to go deeper and deeper into the base of the pool. And when he got there he saw this band—this sort of flat-surfaced band of gold that was wavy in appearance. As an aside later, he told me of his abhorrence for gold. There are connotations he has with it from his religious upbringing, and the way THE BIBLE paints it as the root of all evil. He might have been reminded, it is not the intrinsic property of gold that makes this so, but the lust for it and the power it brings that is the corrupting influence. However, the equation gold = evil is something he has embraced and has maintained as a real aversion to gold most of his life. I didn't realize his associations with it at the time, but I asked him to become the gold. Had I known of the aversion, I surely would have pursued it. He immediately went into it. There were two properties of the gold that he immediately sensed. One of them was that it was a wave, it was bent and flexible, and flexing. He felt this viscerally throughout his entire body. The other sense that he picked up immediately out of being the gold was that it was perforated—it was full of holes, holey, and this green water was flowing freely through these holes, [remember the Swiss cheese of a previous session] In terms of process work, what I've come to in my understanding of colors, if I can put it into plain terms, is that gold represents the expression of power into the world, and the green represents love. First, the heart chakra is right in the front of the back area which was healed in the earlier part of the dream—the chest, solar plexus. That represents the old way of his expressing power through his iron pumping and physical body. His abhorrence for gold indicates a deep dissatisfaction with that mode of expression. The new way, representing the green energy of the heart chakra, speaks now of a new perception or kind of power that is interwoven, penetrated, or permeated with love. That love flows throughout his new means of expressing power. 212 After he returned from the dream journey, we spoke of the fact that this was a very shamanic journey for him. We wondered how he was going to begin expressing the shamanic powers. What emerged was that as a script writer and director, it will probably come out in movies he could make with deeper meanings. He is speaking with a producer, and staunchly defending the position that, as film makers, they have a real commitment to help create the new myth that the civilization and country are going to be following. He takes this very seriously. And this gives me hope for our culture. Those were just the first things he experienced being the gold. He then began to experience, quite viscerally that the gold began to glow. And the glow was emanating out from within him. At one point he said, "I realize as this golden glow that I can reach out and touch anything." Again, in light of our conversation later about his ability to reach out through the media and the movies, he is now interested in themes revolving around the Jungian archetypes of animus and anima, and the discoveries of men and women going through those kinds of journeys.
The shadow theme is another of his current writing interests. Of course, both of those are the key to his psychological work now. He is coming along remarkably well, even though I see him only every two or three weeks. I find that if I work with someone every week, I am getting away from working on dreams with them everytime. That seems to work well and give people time to assimilate this deep work. It takes the mind a period of time to assimilate this deep work. It takes the mind a period of time—weeks—to begin to notice the effects and influence of the work.
In that time he can find out what a "holey" golden band would like to have happen...and what a "holey" golden band like that one would like to do. 213