Monday, August 29, 2016

Carl Jung: There is little use in teaching wisdom

To Chang Chung-yuan

Dear Sir, 26 June 1950

I have read your pamphlet with great interest and I can tell you that I fundamentally agree
with your views.
I see Taoism in the same light as you do.
I’m a great admirer of Ch’uang-tze’s philosophy.
I was again immersed in the study of his writings when your letter arrived in the midst of it.
You are aware, of course, that Taoism formulates psychological principles which are of a very universal nature.
As a matter of fact, they are so all-embracing that they are, as far as they go, applicable to any part of humanity.

But on the other hand just because Taoist views are so universal, they need a re-translation and specification when it comes to the practical application of their principles.
Of course it is undeniable that general principles are of the highest importance, but it is equally important to know in every detail the way that leads to real understanding.

The danger for the Western mind consists in the mere application of words instead of facts.
What the Western mind needs is the actual experience of the facts that cannot be substituted by words.
Thus I’m chiefly concerned with the ways and methods by which one can make the Western mind aware of the psychological facts underlying the concept of Tao, if the latter can be called a concept at all.
The way you put it is in danger of remaining a mere idealism or an ideology to the Western mind.
If one could arrive at the truth by learning the words of wisdom, then the world would have been saved already in the remote times of Lao-tze.
The trouble is, as Ch’uang-tze rightly says, that the old masters failed to enlighten the world, since there weren’t minds enough that could be enlightened.
There is little use in teaching wisdom.
At all events wisdom cannot be taught by words.
It is only possible by personal contact and by immediate experience.
The great and almost insurmountable difficulty consists in the question of the ways and means to induce people to make the indispensable psychological experiences that open their eyes to the underlying truth.
The truth is one and the same everywhere and I must say that Taoism is one of the most perfect
formulations of it I ever became acquainted with.
Sincerely yours,

C.G. Jung

~Carl Jung, Letters Vol. 1, Pages 559-560

Continue reading Carl Jung: There is little use in teaching wisdom

Friday August 5, 2016

5 a.m. At the dentist’s yesterday morning, I had to wait quite a while. (A temporary crown had broken the day before, and they had squeezed me in.) Rather than succumb to irritation or impatience, I – existed. I remained in neutral. Hard to explain. And therefore a couple of remarkable things happened. Can I recapture them?

One thing, I wondered what it would be like to be entirely present, to be fully aware of my life as a 6- or 12- (or however many there are) dimensional being. We have been told that as we become more aware of other dimensions, our experience of time necessarily changes (because those dimensions are crammed into our experience of time in a sort of spare-drawer or junk-closet kind of way). So what if we were fully aware, what would it feel like?

I knew that it isn’t a matter of how we think about things. And yet that isn’t something to be ignored, either, if only because the way we think can get in our own way. If you think guidance is “over here” or is “them,” your opportunities are going to be lessened than if you thought “they” are right here and are not “them.” So, although we can’t think our way into an experience of wholeness (call it), we can prevent ourselves from having it by thinking wrongly.

So I kept that in mind, and tried not to think but to be. What would it feel like to experience myself as I really am, rather than only as this 3D-experiencing machine with a lifeline to the non-3D? Since it can’t be thought into, I couldn’t use concepts to frame it. All I could do was intend to feel it.

Working from that intent, I held myself in an attitude of not-thinking alertness. (Sorry for the inadequacy of description, but I can’t find words for it, or in fact even concepts to try to describe in words. I think a better observer might come back with analogies, at least.) The result was that I “intended” into a clear mental space whose “feel” I have experienced occasionally. I saw a room, with two main objects in it, one closer to me than the other. I can’t remember the objects but the impression was of a very rich room – like a room in a museum, say, with the walls covered with artwork. Nothing moved, nor did my intent. I was being careful not to “move,” myself. I let it be, and held my intent, and tried hard not to start thinking about it, or associating ideas to it.

I don’t remember how it ended – whether it faded, or I started to think, or what. It only lasted a short time. Less than a minute, maybe, though it seemed longer (or perhaps I should say “timeless”) while it lasted.

I remember resolving to try to stay in a state of remembering at least my intent to experience life as fully as possible, and it did seem to affect my day, as long as it lasted. (That is, as long as I remembered.)

Now, by that phrase, “experience life as fully as possible,” I am not talking about what people often seem to mean when they say something similar, which is, roughly, “cram as many experiences, emotions, etc. as possible into my life.” I mean nothing like that. Rather than compiling “external” events and my reactions to them, I’m talking about expanding my moment-to-moment pattern of perception so that I live in the world more as it really is and less as it appears from a constricted 3D perspective. I don’t know how to do it – I won’t know unless / until I succeed – but I think I know how to go about it, focused intent and stillness. But how to remember intent, moment by moment? That’s a big question.

Obviously this way of proceeding won’t be for everyone, if it is even for me. But it seems worth a try, and now I’m wondering if this is that people aim for by meditating. The trouble with all this exploring is that so little of it can be expressed, and such little as can be expressed can be so misleading. Still, it seems worth pursuing.

Reliving the Fall

by John Dorsey Wolf

Occasionally my experience of September 17, 2007 gets relived in some form.

In the early evening in a side canyon of the Grand Canyon, I slipped and fell 35′ feet backward off of a ledge into a small pool of less then 1′ of water and smacked onto a gravel bottom.  The area was surrounded by massive rocks, and since I was facing the sky I assumed death was a given.  I’ve made the calculations and it was like flying unprotected (except for a fanny pack) into a pile of gravel at 30 mph.  A dozen witnesses experienced it with me, and all saw me get up and walk out (very shook) with absolutely no physical sign of damage, not even a tiny bruise.  I have a picture of me sitting in the water on the gravel.

This kind of event sticks with you, as many people associated with this site who have had their own awakening experience know.

Twice during this month it has come up in conversation with friends, including one couple who were next to me on the trail when it happened.

My experience of unexpected survival garners three kinds of reactions in people.

Continue reading John Wolf — choosing your explanation

[By John Dorsey Wolf]

This thought came through to me: “To illustrate a point about the difficulty describing an ever-changing reality, try writing down who you are.”  (After all, we are part of the total.) This comes along with the age-old question, “How can you fully appreciate your daily life experience, if you don’t know who you really are?”

I found several interesting aspects to this exercise:

• Putting it into words brought out elements that I tend to gloss over when I just think about it and not actually write it out in detail.
• I was surprised how my view of myself has changed, even over a relatively short period of time, and it’s not just my perception that’s changed; I believe I actually am different.
• I realized how much my self-definition colors my perspective on everything else.

thinking it may be far more interesting and helpful to anyone reading this to write out their own self-definition than to read mine.

I can only suggest it of course.  If you do choose to give it a go, I suggest you do it before reading any more of this.

Continue reading Try Defining Yourself In Words

Our age isn’t much into poetry, perhaps, and our memory of American saints such as Emerson is dimmed by so much that has happened since his day. But this morning a familiar fragment of Emerson’s poem “Terminus” came to mind: ““Lowly faithful, banish fear,” and i thought it would be well to share it. He wrote this when he was 64, younger than I am now, but his creative life was more or less over, and he knew it. Did he kick against fate? Judge for yourself. Emerson’s life, and Thoreau’s, are almost miraculously appropriate examples of living lives in close connection to guidance.

To recast it in a form perhaps more accessible to those unused to poetry:

Terminus

It is time to be old, to take in sail:— The god of bounds, who sets to seas a shore, came to me in his fatal rounds, and said:

“No more! No farther shoot thy broad ambitious branches, and thy root. Fancy departs: no more invent; contract thy firmament to compass of a tent. There’s not enough for this and that, make thy option which of two; economize the failing river, not the less revere the Giver, leave the many and hold the few.

“Timely wise accept the terms, soften the fall with wary foot; a little while still plan and smile, and,—fault of novel germs,— mature the unfallen fruit.

“Curse, if thou wilt, thy sires, bad husbands of their fires, who, when they gave thee breath, failed to bequeath the needful sinew stark as once, the Baresark marrow to thy bones, but left a legacy of ebbing veins, inconstant heat and nerveless reins,— amid the Muses, left thee deaf and dumb, amid the gladiators, halt and numb.”

As the bird trims her to the gale, I trim myself to the storm of time, I man the rudder, reef the sail, obey the voice at eve obeyed at prime:

“Lowly faithful, banish fear, right onward drive unharmed; The port, well worth the cruise, is near, and every wave is charmed.”

Terminus

It is time to be old,

To take in sail:—

The god of bounds,

Who sets to seas a shore,

Came to me in his fatal rounds,

And said: “No more!

No farther shoot

Thy broad ambitious branches, and thy root.

Fancy departs: no more invent;

Contract thy firmament

To compass of a tent.

There’s not enough for this and that,

Make thy option which of two;

Economize the failing river,

Not the less revere the Giver,

Leave the many and hold the few.

Timely wise accept the terms,

Soften the fall with wary foot;

A little while

Still plan and smile,

And,—fault of novel germs,—

Mature the unfallen fruit.

Curse, if thou wilt, thy sires,

Bad husbands of their fires,

Who, when they gave thee breath,

Failed to bequeath

The needful sinew stark as once,

The Baresark marrow to thy bones,

But left a legacy of ebbing veins,

Inconstant heat and nerveless reins,—

Amid the Muses, left thee deaf and dumb,

Amid the gladiators, halt and numb.”

As the bird trims her to the gale,

I trim myself to the storm of time,

I man the rudder, reef the sail,

Obey the voice at eve obeyed at prime:

“Lowly faithful, banish fear,

Right onward drive unharmed;

The port, well worth the cruise, is near,

And every wave is charmed.”

One who attains really spiritual perception does not become a dreamer