Depth Psychology & Spirituality - Thoughts?

[HitchWithMe]

 

 

My narrative therapy class has stretched me.

 

I know that professors love to hear this kind of statement; to be assured that he or she is doing the job they set out to do and extend the neural pathways of students' minds. In my final paper I wrote that I have been experiencing a bit of a existential crisis. I have been unable to decide my stance on the topic of the collective unconscious that Jung described as a wealth of human knowledge we all have access to. The idea of a reality "beyond this realm," gets me nervous because, while it may be true, the possibility is often utilized by hucksters who use the unknown or disprovable to assert something. Sure, I do think that we are all connected in some way and this goes deeper than science can seem to explain in the present moment. However, I am not ready, in the face of a knowledge / understanding gap, to throw up my hands and let any idea in as if they all have equal validity.

 

This realization came to me while summarizing an exercise in my final paper. I was asked to participate in a narrative therapy assignment which I might find useful and choose use with clients in the future. The assignment began by imagining or envisioning someone from my past whom I trusted because of our relationship. I took time to imagine this person down to details in clothing, posture and mood. Then, as best I could, begin to "have dialogue" with this person. The final step was to assume the "role" of this person and write a letter to myself while wearing his identity. Each step was an increasing challenge as I found that the further along I went in the assignment, the more liberties I was taking unfairly.

 

In the final thoughts of the paper I admitted that I had hit some kind of a wall. I had to admit the power the exercise held; to have kind and affirming words of a close friend encourage me in areas which were nearest to my being. But this was the exercise's greatest strength as well as its greatest weakness. I still can't decide if there is something in the exercise beyond myself. Am I touching something benevolent and altruistic beyond my scope of perceived reality or am I fooling myself? If I say yes to a beyond reality, I can accept a type of therapy which has the power to transform lives in an incredibly passionate way. If I say yes to fooling myself I am both huckster and the willing duped.

 

The ironic thing is I will never be able to answer this question...so maybe all this squirming is for nothing

[VacuumFlux]

My personal experiences make me think that the subconscious is quite powerful, and that it's good to have tools to use to interact with it. If nothing else, it's important to have a way to force your conscious mind to deal with things its been repressing, before the stress gets so bad that you start acting like an idiot. I have not had any experiences that lead me to believe that this unconscious is shared between humans, or is a way of reaching other planes of reality, even when I've tried to find them.

 

And yes, it does seem like some of the best tools we have involve a lot of make-believe. I can make my conscious mind ok with this by assuring myself that this is all an exercise in imagination and that I don't have to believe in spirits to play the game. I don't see this as dishonesty; it's more like LARP (Live Action Role Playing - sorta like D&D but with costumes and foam swords). And if it actually helps people without having unhealthy side effects, I don't see anything problematic with teaching other people how to play the same game. We have all sorts of smart phone apps that advertise themselves as exercise for your brain; this is just a way to exercise the imaginative part of your brain instead of the logical.

 

The part I'd have to figure out for myself before trying to guide others through this is to figure out what the negative side effects could be; for example, I'd be very hesitant to suggest this to a schizophrenic person who is already upset by the unreal voices they hear. On the other hand, I've heard that some schizophrenics have had good luck with making friends with, or at least accepting, the voices as a way of managing them. And then for neurotypical people examples, I've heard that some fiction authors spend so much time thinking through their characters that when they try to force them to do something uncharacteristic as a way to advance the plot, the character pops up in their head and says "no". Or they try to flesh out their ideas by interviewing the characters in their head and letting them tell the author what needs to happen in the book. I'd probably be uncomfortable getting fictional advice from my mental construct that's based on a real person that I knew, but I'd be fine with talking things over with an imaginary trusted person. I already do this sometimes when I'm stressed; I catch myself running through horror story scenarios in my mind about people hating me. I can fix that by taking control of imagined conversations, pointing out to myself that that's not how that person would actually react, and forcing myself to imagine a more realistic scenario.

[Orbit]

My narrative therapy class has stretched me.

 

I know that professors love to hear this kind of statement; to be assured that he or she is doing the job they set out to do and extend the neural pathways of students' minds. In my final paper I wrote that I have been experiencing a bit of a existential crisis. I have been unable to decide my stance on the topic of the collective unconscious that Jung described as a wealth of human knowledge we all have access to. The idea of a reality "beyond this realm," gets me nervous because, while it may be true, the possibility is often utilized by hucksters who use the unknown or disprovable to assert something. Sure, I do think that we are all connected in some way and this goes deeper than science can seem to explain in the present moment. However, I am not ready, in the face of a knowledge / understanding gap, to throw up my hands and let any idea in as if they all have equal validity.

 

This realization came to me while summarizing an exercise in my final paper. I was asked to participate in a narrative therapy assignment which I might find useful and choose use with clients in the future. The assignment began by imagining or envisioning someone from my past whom I trusted because of our relationship. I took time to imagine this person down to details in clothing, posture and mood. Then, as best I could, begin to "have dialogue" with this person. The final step was to assume the "role" of this person and write a letter to myself while wearing his identity. Each step was an increasing challenge as I found that the further along I went in the assignment, the more liberties I was taking unfairly.

 

In the final thoughts of the paper I admitted that I had hit some kind of a wall. I had to admit the power the exercise held; to have kind and affirming words of a close friend encourage me in areas which were nearest to my being. But this was the exercise's greatest strength as well as its greatest weakness. I still can't decide if there is something in the exercise beyond myself. Am I touching something benevolent and altruistic beyond my scope of perceived reality or am I fooling myself? If I say yes to a beyond reality, I can accept a type of therapy which has the power to transform lives in an incredibly passionate way. If I say yes to fooling myself I am both huckster and the willing duped.

 

The ironic thing is I will never be able to answer this question...so maybe all this squirming is for nothing

There is nothing beyond yourself that you are not part and parcel of. Don't worry about it. Just experience what you experience and take from it what wisdom you can.

[Ellinas]

Does it matter whether there is anything beyond yourself?  As long as the exercize works, why worry about the mechanics?  You don't have to understand how an engine works to drive a car.

[FreeRadical]

I find it curious that the expression of emotion is universally demonstrable in stable patterns across all types of mammals and among humans. Of course, not all are capable of expressing the same emotions, but they are all expressed in the same general ways. That's a form of "connection." It's not spiritual, it just points to a common path of mental development even across different evolutionary paths.

[HitchWithMe]

I'm having trouble with the idea that was reinforced by the comments from my professor.  Comments like: "clearly this (deceased) person is having and influence on you"  And this sounds just a little to close to religious talk or something that each person who goes to a medium has to hear again and again.  If feels like a point at which people make themselves vulnerable to something which could clearly be an extension of their own cognitive processes disguising themselves as "something more" or "something from beyond"

 

I think in the simplest of terms, I don't want to feel gullible again...

 

Thanks for your comments folks 

[Orbit]

I'm having trouble with the idea that was reinforced by the comments from my professor.  Comments like: "clearly this (deceased) person is having and influence on you"  And this sounds just a little to close to religious talk or something that each person who goes to a medium has to hear again and again.  If feels like a point at which people make themselves vulnerable to something which could clearly be an extension of their own cognitive processes disguising themselves as "something more" or "something from beyond"

 

I think in the simplest of terms, I don't want to feel gullible again...

 

Thanks for your comments folks 

That might not have been meant in the way you are thinking. I read the meaning as more like "clearly you are thinking a lot about this deceased person and it is influencing you". It doesn't sound overtly religious to me, more a statement of the obvious.

[Ellinas]

Anyone who loses a close relative will find themselves affected by the deceased - the memories and their absence makes this inevitable.