The Crack in the Cosmic Egg (13 page)

There is a catalystic quality in autistic thinking, and this catalyst
hinges on its very "non-judging" aspects. The
Eureka!
is traceable to
its parts for genesis, yet is larger than their sum, or else attainment of
radically new viewpoints, producing dramatically new results, could become
a commonplace formula. The unconscious autistic continuum is a sort of
total wealth where all things, or any thing, are true, where the energy
of thought and the energy of adhered-to forms of matter appear to merge.
There are no polarities in this "ultimate reconciliation of opposites,"
as those people falling into the mystic states have reported. In autistic
thinking nothing is either true or false, it simply
is
.
The rationale of consciousness is what gives a particular value; that makes
meaningful by limitation; that gives the form of a necessarily limited
fact to the unlimited formlessness of fantasy. Thus a revolutionary
idea that has no possibilities within the context that triggers it, and
is thus stillborn or a failure, is still as valid within the synthesis
function of mind as is anything else. On the other hand, ideas that are
highly irrational, such as the atomic notion with its vast interplay
of particle physics, can, if adhered to by true believers long enough,
build up an ecology giving them the necessary possibilities for expression
and realization.
Jung talks about unconscious processes being in a continual state
of synthesis, which brings to mind Poincaré's hooked-atom collision
process. David Bohm, seeing the world from the eyes of a convert to the
physicist's brotherhood, contends that all processes of nature are in
a constant state of change. If we ourselves could shake off a Cartesian
dualism, we might see the full shape of the procedure. Descartes believed
that God was the mediator between a mechanistic world and the non-involved
thinking mind. Since God was presumably honest, he would not deceive the
mind with perceptions that were illusions -- provided, of course, that the
mind under question were equally honest and open to the mediator. Jesus,
on the other hand, said God judged not at all, and that we reaped as we
sowed -- a notion that does not fit the Greek orientation, but does fit
quite well the question-answer function under consideration.
Carl Jung observed that a psychology reflected the background of the
psychologist propounding it. Jung did not see how a Chinese psychologist
and a Swiss one would reach the same conclusions. Cohen mused on the
curious way the Jungian analyst's patient confirmed the fondest Jungian
theories when under LSD, while the drugged Freudian patient gave back
the proper Freudian symbol -- verifying the therapist's own most basic
assumptions. The patient "senses the frame of reference to be employed,"
suggests Cohen, and his associations and dreams are molded to it.
Kline of New York University, for several years head of the Society
for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, observed the same interaction
between a hypnotist and his subject. Kline found that the unconscious
mind of the subject made every effort to comply with the demands of the
hypnotist. The hypnotist serves as the logical value-selector in the
resulting relation. Material ordinarily inaccessible to consciousness,
forgotten or subliminal impressions, synthetic combinations of childhood
fantasies, dreams, secondary percepts and so on, all become available
as valid events and "real" contents under hypnosis. The association
between hypnotist and subject takes on a marked affinity over a period
of time. Material can be exchanged unconsciously between the two. The
unexpressed desires of the hypnotist may affect the subject, who begins
to fabricate from the unconscious of both parties, finally giving valid
responses to the hypnotist's hidden desires. (In amateurs such desires
are most often esoteric and cultic.)
The experience of Fellin and Throne, the two miners mentioned before,
shows the extent to which unconscious exchanges can occur. Cases of
folie
à deux
, or shared hallucination, bear a relation to hypnosis, where
fantasies from the unconscious may be built into logical and airtight
structures creating non-ordinary states. This is particularly evident
in cults (though of course a cult is a discipline not in the current
acceptancies). For instance, insistence on the part of the hypnotist
that the subject "rediscover a past life" can plant a seed of suggestion
in the unconscious around which related materials, that is, materials
that can be used for such a synthesis, gather into a coherent pattern
and finally present themselves as a valid memory of an actual occurrence.
In variations of this, a person's own desires, particularly cultic,
can produce the same kind of unconscious synthesis which then breaks
in automatically as verification. (Someone might make a study of the
personality backgrounds of subjects seeing flying-saucers.) The conscious
mind of the subject, since his desire has to some extent suspended his
ordinary system of judgment
in favor of
the experience, suspends the
ability to distinguish the "remembered" synthetic event from a "real" one.
William Butler Yeats's biographer, Ellman, wrote that had Yeats died
in 1917 at the age of 52, instead of marrying as he did, he would be
remembered as a remarkable minor poet who "achieved a diction more
powerful than that of his contemporaries," but who did not have much
to say with it, except in a handful of poems. The difference between
his being a minor poet or a major one rested, strangely enough, on
the talent for automatic writing which Yeats, an enthusiast of the
occult, found in his new bride. With great excitement Yeats drove her
to hours of automatic writing daily, to her general weariness. Out of
the results Yeats found emerging the crystalized metaphors with which
he had struggled, with only partial success, all his life. Mrs. Yeats
uncovered his thought in a synthesized and clarified imagery beyond his
own abilities, and it was this esoteric venture that produced those last
fruitful decades on which Yeats's greatness lies.
Under the spellbinding situations hypnotic interplay often creates,
the questions asked will tend to be in keeping with desire for esoteric
or cultic knowledge. Conscious value judgment is precisely what is set
aside by the subject in order to enter the hypnotic state -- a point to
which I will return later. Value judgment is often willingly suspended
by the hypnotist himself, if half-unconsciously, in his desire for
conviction. Thus there is set up a possibility for
folie à
deux
, and a ready granting of authenticity to the revelatory content.
Laski dwelt at some length on P. W. Martin's
Experiment in Depth
. The
major premise and purpose of Martin's book is to bring to those who
treat life responsibly and with devotion, an experience of the
deep
center
of mind that has in the past been available only to the "highly
percipient man or woman, the mystic, the saint, or seer."
Some idea of the goals of the experiment is made known immediately. The
focus has narrowed. The reader who continues with Martin's book will have
acknowledged tacitly that the prospect of such a goal is intriguing enough
to warrant further investigation. Perseverance along the actual path
outlined in the book would further the expectations and the desirability
of the end product.
Laski notes that the entire venture is cast in Jungian terms, and that it
will be Jungian terms in which the final overbelief is expressed. Martin's
process for arriving at the deep center entails working with a small
group (two or three gathered together). It is far better to have one
member of the group be someone who has already gone "some way along the
search." This means, of necessity, someone of the Jungian bent. According
to Martin the group would need to read and discuss appropriate literature,
such as William James's
Varieties of Religious Experience
, Jung's
Two Essays on Analytical Psychology
, the
Journals of George Fox
,
or such related materials. (Bertrand Russell, for instance, would hardly
be in keeping with the desired end.)
Needless to say, no one will involve themselves in such reading and
discussion without implanting the necessary material needed for synthesis
of the desired goal. The time and energy would only be expended for
a desirable reward. Some suspension of ordinary criteria will have
unconsciously been made. Some expectation for renewal or reshaping will
have been nursed from the outset.
As a part of the preliminary training, members will find it helpful to
work out their psychological compass bearing according to Jung's "four
functions." Threading their way through this elaborate, complex, and
intellectual system would of itself necessitate considerable understanding
and adoption of Jungian ideas.
Other ventures for opening to the unconscious are "active imagination," a
kind of conscious entry into autistic realms, automatic drawing, painting,
writing, the inward conversation, and so on. Watch for the appearance of
the 'Friend,' the symbol of the helpful figure of the unconscious. (The
Spritualists have "Indian Guides" as mediators between the two worlds, and
their use of pidgin English was probably the esthetic offense that kept
my own hardness of heart quite intact.) If the helpful figure appears,
the seeker must establish contact with it and not let go. Finally, if the
deep center itself appears in any of its forms,
by then readily known
,
hold on to it.
Thus will the shadow of the unconscious appear, and then the anima-animus,
and finally, the active archetypis. This is the great possibility and the
perilous encounter. Perilous, because the unconscious content can engulf,
seize, and dissolve the ego-centered person. Jung speaks of the psyche
being flooded or inflated by the contents of the collective unconscious.
However, the man centered in depth (knowing what he is doing), the man
who has properly prepared himself and has the right attitude toward
the venture, can
hold
. (Rather as the fire-walker, whose attitude of
mind
holds
, is not burned. ) Since experience from the "other side"
of consciousness goes by like the wind, a journal should be kept of
one's subjective impressions. Thus the psyche will be vastly enriched.
Laski asks: "Who can doubt but that the technique will work?" After all
that effort, no small investment, something recognizable as the desired
experience will be achieved. Laski feels that preliminary training
has ensured that those who persist with the experiment know explicitly
both the question and the answer. The steps taken are those necessary
both to clarify the question and bring about the answer. They further
ensure that the answer will be lasting and felt to deepen progressively
in significance. Laski observes that these very steps have been tried
and true procedures from time immemorial. All the older disciplines have
used the same procedure. (Education is but a confused, fragmented form
of it.) Future catechumens, she feels, will have their own sectarian
"confession" and journals to get the initial group discussion going
along the right lines.
Were you to undergo an "Experiment in Depth" along some other line than
Jungian, without those indications of what to expect, it is hard to see
how the Jungian pattern would develop. (Should the "Friend" appear to
a non-Jungian, he might not seem so friendly.) The stylized archetypes
might not occur, but something would. The energy of all the effort
could only be generated for a reason and the reason would have given the
nucleus determining the end result. There is no possibility of opening
to some unconscious level except through a technique of opening, and the
technique determines the nature of what is found. Such an experience
would shape around the individual's background and the trigger of the
seach device itself.
The illumination resulting would have been synthesized by a catalyst
giving something larger than the sum total of the background, however, and
would move the subject beyond himself. That the end result is arbitrary
does not affect its realness. Approximately the same procedure gave
atoms and atom splitting which are real enough.
Consider again Russell's observation that mystic revelations prove to
be pretty much shaped by our culture and training, not by great cosmic
powers "out there." Mr. Russell's purpose, of course, was to disparage
religion. I think some basis has now been given for saying he was right
for the wrong reasons.
Mozart was born to an Austrian family and "ecology" of rich artistic
bent. No Mozarts have been found in Bedouin tribes. Bach was a
fifth-generation musician, not an Eskimo. And my truisms are no more
fatuous than Russell's. Sartre's truth and Kazantzakis' truth are mutually
exclusive, but equally valid within their respective frameworks. Adopt
either viewpoint, invest your life in the sets and expectancies involved,
and your life will bend to make good the investment. Then you may live
with your gains. We seek and we find. What we find is up up to us. We
knock and the door opens to us. There are an unlimited number of doors. We
choose some, even as we are born with others ajar and absorbing us into
their interiors, whether we like it or not, or
know
it or not.
So I would say to Russell: "Were God to speak to me from the burning bush,
He had better use English, not some heathenish Semitic tongue." I should
be even more perturbed than Clarence Day to find God speaking French
or something, like a
foreigner
.
In my next chapter I hope to show how this question-answer function shapes
not only those subjective things so much beneath Russell's contempt,
but also that very scientific structure that seized him, and which he,
in turn, has made into the same kind of idol he disparages in other casts.
In
Life with Father
, by Clarence Day (Alfred Knopf, N.Y., 1935,
p. 132). Day writes of finding a Bible which " . . . was in French
and it sometimes shocked me deeply to read it . . . Imagine the
Lord talking French."