“Our world is in crisis because of the absence of consciousness. We need to explore new ideas of who we are.” This inspires me to ask two questions: What might a new idea of who we are look like? And, what difference could a new idea make to our world crisis?
What does it mean to be unconscious? It doesn’t mean we’re dull, socially clueless, or lacking in intelligence, creativity or passion.
…symptoms of the ego’s death throes include a lack of psychic energy, a sense of alienation from the world, unstable relationships, mood shifts, depression, extreme anxiety, impulsiveness, potentially self-damaging behaviors, intense and inappropriate anger, emptiness, boredom, identity disturbances, and so on.
The Epoch II ego is far too self-absorbed to notice or admit its deepest fears and it will do anything to escape them. Hence, the obsessions, addictions, and abuse of women that are the hallmark of our time.
A primary feature of Epoch II is the ego’s preference for masculine values which gradually supplant our Epoch I condition of pure enjoyment in the Mother’s paradise of dependency and the innocent pleasures of simply being.
As humans gained more control over their environments, travel and communication with other tribes exposed them to other myths with different images and new symbolic meaning. Whose stories were right and whose were wrong? Which god-images and rituals were good and which were evil?
Call me a dreamer, but can you imagine a future when Raising Consciousness is a key plank on the platform of a presidential candidate? When the most important thing the Department of Defense defends us against is the untamed forces within the psyche?
Is it any wonder so many of us, like Peter Pan, continue to long for this lost world and struggle to stay young for as long as we can? In a child, this is a natural and charming way of being, but as we grow into adulthood it becomes increasingly dysfunctional.
Throughout history mothers and grandmothers have dedicated most of their energy, and often their lives, to nurturing and preserving life. Of course, many fathers and grandfathers have done the same. But women’s contributions have been educationally, financially, politically and spiritually restricted, vastly underrated, and largely taken for granted except for occasional lip service.
By ‘sublimate’ Jung meant to unconsciously transform socially unacceptable impulses or idealizations into acceptable actions or behaviors. Freud believed this was a sign of maturity in individuals and civilization.
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