Iona (15)

Wednesday, June 18 ,2003

Up at 5 a.m., and resolutely back to bed. Up again at 7:30. On days when one might stay in bed indefinitely, there comes a time, pretty quickly, when it becomes impossible. At the terminal, I have a revolting breakfast, buy a two-novel volume of John Buchan, and pass a long tedious time first in the terminal and then in the airplane. Yesterday, a hot day, I wore my only short-sleeved shirt. Today, rainy in Glasgow, cold on the plane, I am wearing my favorite flannel shirt. Good thing.

All the time when I am not eating or reading, I use my sleep mask; and earplugs. I took the aisle seat because it gives slightly more room than the window seat, but the kid on the window chooses to watch the TV in front of him, so keeps the window closed. When the monitor shows that we are passing Greenland, I persuade him to actually open the shade so we can see, and there far off we see the frozen point of Greenland, awe-inspiring. Then he puts the shade down again, to go back to watching television.) It’s a long flight, and seems longer. At 1:15 p.m. eastern time (6:15 Glasgow time) we enter U.S. airspace, the upper reaches of Maine, and we’re down at three. But the flight from Newark to Dulles is delayed by bad weather, so we don’t land till quarter after seven, which means I miss the only bus back to Charlottesville. I call Nancy Dorman, who was going to pick me up, and tell her I’m going to rent a car instead. I’m a little leery about it, but it works out. A nice slow trip, and I’m home at a little after 11. Good thing I slept as much as I could all day. It’s 4 a.m. Glasgow time.

The next day, Thursday, I drop off films, go to work, pick up my photos a couple hours later and put them into an album. I return the rental car at the Charlottesville airport, my daughter Sarah takes me back to the office, and Bob Friedman takes me home. I visit with Rita and Nancy, and pay some bills, including the credit card bill itemizing – already – everything I’d bought on the trip!

On Friday I  get the thought that an article about the lack of future of the churches should include a list of things to be explored about life, including crystals, etc. that they can’t explore because of their own fear.

A possible beginning is to say that when you enter into a new age, even continuing the old ways changes them, because they have to change because it is a new set of circumstances. We’re moving into a new age, and the old forms are breaking down, and the new forms will be created of things that were contained in old forms – plus new perceptions and new ideas. The inability of Christianity to continue in its accepted form is at issue here. Just as the Protestant revolution destroyed the universal Christian western community, because suddenly there were choices among Christians, and it led to wars, and ultimately to indifference, so you have similar processes going on now, and it’s impossible even by choosing to stay with the old, to have the old unchanged, because what does not change when everything else is changing is itself changed in relationship to them.

Of course, if reincarnation and the presence within us of other lives is true, we’re many of us far more connected to the medieval time and middle ages, and monks and priests and abbots, than anyone here would suspect. It is our own inheritance, and can’t be alienated just because it has been taken over by the inheritors of that tradition (i.e. the churches). This, even though those originals monks and priests themselves might not approve.

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A little while after returning home, I wrote up some of my dreams and journal entries and emailed them to Robert. He responded in a long email that I will begin here and finish tomorrow, in the last installment of this long meandering narrative. For ease of reading, I will not put his letter within quotation marks.

Robert wrote:

This is excellent stuff and I hope you develop it into a book as you continue your quest. The latter needs to be more internalised, for that is where the real quest always takes place, i.e. the unconscious. You could tell more about the strange stories surrounding Brendan, Cuthbert, Culumba, and then as you learn more and more from your own inner processes through dreams, go back and explain some of the symbolism surrounding these and other saints.

You need to commit yourself to the inner journey, for that gives you the key to everything and the outer quest then matches the inner one, though the latter must have dominance. Your dreams are telling you that you have great force and can do this, and nothing at all is as important. This is the answer to the needful respiritualisation of Western man, as it was always the answer. Your questions are right, your motivations are right, and your gifts are right, you now need the commitment to gain the keys. At the start of his quest in the Mysteries of the Underworld, the Egyptian initiate would receive the keys from Shu, in this form a type of the Holy Spirit. Jung received them from the spirit Philemon, I received them from Jung.

You need to acquire a few of Jung’s collected works to come to understand the symbolism. What you do is; when you have a dream with certain symbolism, look in the index of the books for the symbol and then turn to the relevant pages. Find out everything you can about the symbol that the dream has given you. For example, one of your dreams is about sand, so look up what Jung says about that. You can also look in The Four Gold Keys for possible further information. As well as religious symbolism, alchemical symbolism has also become constellated in the unconscious and appears in the processes. Jung tells us that sand was a binding agent to the alchemists, because it lies between land and the sea, and therefore symbolically between consciousness and the unconscious, between matter and spirit/soul. As you proceed and learn more, the more the symbolism pours through, but it is ultimately a great religious task, developing the higher Self, which at highest level is Son of God and the World Soul.

Furthermore, it should be understood that as dreams deepen they become a window to spirit/soul reality, to eternity and to God. Jung refused to use the term “subconscious” because it is far too limiting. The unconscious as well as being below is also above and at the sides, surrounding the whole of the physical universe, extending to infinity and eternity. The inner quest is hard and we suffer much through it, having to make sacrifices beyond the normal, but then the rewards are great, in a spiritual way. It depends how far you go, of course, but it means direct experience of spirit and soul, and this is the way that culture is regenerated and renewed.

You could eventually produce a great book out of this, of that I have no doubt, though far more is at stake than a book. I could advise you here and there and now and then if I can –  heaven knows I’m lost often enough myself  —  but the great task must be your own mountain constructed.

Now I’ll make a few comments on your dreams but it’s vital that you get Jung’s books and get absorbed in the processes, if that is the way you want to go. I remember your dream of sailing on the sea, which was followed by a game of tennis. The unconscious was offering you the individuation process, where the tennis ball is passed from court to court, between you and the unconscious, so that rapport develops.

My eye is aching and running and the computer makes it worse, so bear with me while I comment briefly on some of the dreams.