My friends, My family is with me in the mountains to celebrate summer’s last hurrah! Writing two posts a week takes more time than I
haven’t exercised regularly this summer and am getting increasingly stiff. Today I did a lot of bending and stooping and weed-pulling in the garden around the root cellar, and soon afterwards felt the need for two Aleves! I know this isn’t unusual for my age, but I also know it’s not inevitable.
The property on which our family’s summer home sits in North Carolina was purchased over 40 years ago by my husband’s 101 year-old father and his second wife! Yes, he’s alive and living comfortably with Winn, his third wife! This amazing man is the son of a poor Italian immigrant who arrived at Ellis Island in the first decade of the 20th century.
A typical Westerner, Carl Jung approached his soul-making work by strengthening his mind with logic and will-power until his ego-spirit mustered the courage to step aside. This allowed soul to move into consciousness, revealing disowned parts of his psyche. In the process, his unique creativity was released. The East historically begins its quest by quieting the mind and practicing physical austerities aimed at humbling and displacing the ego-spirit.
Taking oneself seriously has positive and negative aspects. In my conversation with my friends I was aware, but I was not self-aware. I was taking myself too seriously. But when I reflected on my discomfort later that evening I was feeling my way through my life. I was being self-aware, noticing what I value. I value healthy relationships with my friends.
Religious beliefs are so deeply personal and emotional that it’s taken me a very long time to be comfortable opening up about my own. Not wanting to offend or challenge anyone’s faith, I’ve preferred to stick to psychological issues. Yet, of the many topics I write about in this blog, my posts about religion seem to elicit the most interest and affirming comments.
We live in a remarkable time characterized by revolutionary changes occurring in every aspect of human endeavor. Some are deeply disturbing, especially when they are accompanied by conflict and violence. But this does not necessarily mean the changes themselves are bad. It simply means the collective psyche has not yet grown mature enough to easily accept needed change or always accomplish it peacefully.
An old lady is beating up a boy. She is beating him up really badly, he has a bloody face. When she is done, she comes towards me, moving to my right. I go to the left to see if the boy is still alive. I fear he is not. She comes at me, and I kick her in the stomach and she goes flying backwards, off a cliff.
What is wisdom? As a child I thought all adults were wise and my parents wiser than anyone. In junior high school civics class I decided America’s founding fathers must have had the corner on wisdom. During high school I equated wisdom with good grades, high I.Q.’s, and belonging to the “right” religion.
Sometimes my responses to your comments are so packed with new information that I wish I’d saved them for another blog post so readers who don’t subscribe to my comments won’t miss them. This happened when I stayed up very late the other night to reply to Therese’s comments about the dream in my last post, A Solitary Dance.
Website design and development by Chad Lieberman