When dealing with dream interpretation I referred to a "big" dream featuring "Puss in Boots".

      I was driving towards a road junction. While deciding what road to take, I noticed a figure standing on the footpath on the opposite side of the road. It was a cat, standing on its hind legs, which were encased in boots. Its left arm was raised, pointing back in the direction from which I had come.

      "Puss in Boots", an image thrown up by the unconscious, was indicating that I needed to return to the City, to the centre of the self, where I would eventually become Lord Mayor. I needed to continue with the task of centring myself, as a consequence of which I would take control of my life.

Personal power surrendered

      I had surrendered my power to others. I discounted my opinions and showed undue deference to others.

      To compensate for this capitulation I developed the habit of probing for deficiencies in ideologies and communities. I was fascinated with contradictions between professed beliefs and conduct. This prophetic gift was energised by low self-esteem.

Ego and shadow

      Over recent years I have been working on bringing two aspects of myself, the ego and the shadow, together.

      Several years ago I dreamed I was seated across the table from a wealthy magnate, a benign but controlling Mafia boss, who was entertaining guests at a meal. A paternalistic figure, he dominated the conversation. His brother, seated on his right, was undermining his authority by making faces and gesticulating, without our host being aware of what was happening. [245]

      As a consequence of this dream, I realised that it was important for me to bring these two aspects of myself together. As part of my self-talk, I "Encourage the Mafioso and his shadow brother to dance together."

Expectation

      An early indication that I had surrendered my power to others was the fact that I was governed by the expectations of those to whom I was looking for affirmation and acceptance.

My mother

      There are several reasons for my sensitivity to others' expectations. The first was my mother's hesitancy in affirming me. She believed, like others of her generation, that if she praised me she would give me a swollen head. The second reason was that she was dominated by others' expectations, almost to the point of paranoia. I would have begun absorbing this attitude in the womb.

      When I left home to study for the ministry I substituted one mother for another. The Church became a mother, a source of affirmation and security.

A new mother

      I suspect that my leaving home so early was connected with the need to escape a mother whose influence so dominated me that it frustrated my attempts at individuation. My new mother, the Church, was no less controlling, though I was less aware of the influence. This was partly a result of the fact that my choice of ministry as a career was an unconscious attempt to escape my mother's influence. My mother looked with disfavour on my relinquishing law for ministry.

      While my association with the Church signalled a physical break from my mother, powerful emotional ties remained.

      I suffered a breakdown early in my first pastoral appointment, largely as a consequence of the pressure I placed on myself to excel, academically and vocationally, to prove myself to both of my mothers. [246]

Challenging expectations

      Many years later, after I had established a reputation, I was forced to confront the fact that I had not escaped the powerful influence of others' expectations.

      I remember, in my early forties, questioning my suitability for ministry, despite a record of achievement. I was an introvert in a vocation in which extroversion was rewarded.

      This was a moment of truth for me. It led to my exploring the possibility of alternative employment. I spoke with the principal of a local church school, inquiring about the possibility of an appointment.

      While I did not pursue this option further, the experience caused me to reflect on the degree to which I was captive to shared beliefs and expectations of performance.

Women

      In recent years I have come to realise the degree to which women have influenced me and the extent to which I was captive to my need to be accepted by them.

      This should not have surprised me; given my mother's influence and the difficulty she had affirming me. In spite of the strength of this early conditioning, however, it should not bear all of the blame. A further factor was involved.

      For a period, during the 2nd World War, I was alone with my mother in Mudgee, a country town to the West of Sydney, while my father maintained his dental practice in Sydney. I was too young to remember the experience. Nevertheless, the return to Sydney and the arrival of a sibling, when I was three-and-a-half, dislodged me from a position of privilege.

Daughters

      Many women are caught in an equivalent predicament. Their self-worth depends on the way they were treated by their fathers and other significant males.¹

      Even where we free ourselves from the external influence of [247] our parents, we remain hobbled or seduced by anima and animus figures in the unconscious that are modelled on our parents and on others who have deeply influenced us.

My father

      Mature reflection has helped me realise that I have also been influenced by my father. This has been evident in the fact that, for many years, I over-evaluated his positive qualities while overlooking the negative.

      Because I did not assert myself against my father, or become angry with him, I spent much of my early adult years "soning" other men. I would defer to them, as father figures, even when they were my own age or younger. A lack of confidence in my abilities, judgment and power to act responsibly and decisively was responsible for this deference.

      Several years ago, in another archetypal dream, I found myself needing to resuscitate one of these "father figures". The dream indicated that I had the potential to father myself. I did not need to look to other men to father me. Nor was I answerable to them. I needed to become my own father by drawing on the energy of the father archetype.

My biggest lesson

      Learning to trust my own judgement, to be true to myself, to my own insights, in the company of others, has been one of the biggest lessons I have had to learn. The dream, in which Puss in Boots featured, encouraged me to believe that I was making ground and that I should persist. The goal would eventually be realised.

Community

      Others constitute the greatest threat to our integrity. We are naturally gregarious and live in communities that support and nurture us. These communities have shared worldviews, rituals and expectations. Bonding, while related to social systems and organisations, is also psychic. The psychic connectedness is [248] subliminal.

      Communities are the source of affirmation and security. It is difficult to resist their expectations. To be oneself, in the context of community, except where individuality is reactive, or a mere pose, is rare enough to be considered a miracle.

      However, unless we begin the process of earthing ourselves in the uniqueness of the self, we will be diminished. As Charles Schwab argued, if we trim ourselves to suit everyone, we will end up with nothing of ourselves left.²

Influence

      The influence that others exert is not uniform.

      We are particularly vulnerable to the opinions of those to whom we look for affiliation, love and security. There is enormous internal pressure for us to avoid rejection or ostracism. Those who are closest to us have great power. Their emotional proximity, when allied with a manipulative plausibility, enables them to seduce us so effectively that we willingly substitute their opinions for our intuitions.

      The degree of relationship that exists between others and ourselves is a critical factor. Robert Bly confessed that he was much less influenced by others' opinions when he was speaking to an audience than when he was shopping with his wife. He explained that his preference for a particular article of clothing, such as a shirt or tie, would falter before his wife's judgement about what best suited him.³

Powerful personalities

      We may also feel ourselves absorbed by powerful personalities. If a parent has not respected our psychological boundaries, we will be less able to defend ourselves against dominant individuals. The gravitational pull they exert upon us will be greater than our power to resist.

      There will be an even more profound loss of identity where there is an element of adulation in our response to others--if we seek to live through them or if we look to them for protection or [249] enlightenment. Not only are we overawed by their opinions and personalities, but we are also fearful, at a subliminal level, that self-assertion, on our part, will lead to rejection. This rejection will destroy the relationship on which our self-esteem and emotional security is built. When we are in the grip of this transference, we are usually unaware that we are trapped in an unhealthy relationship.

      Those who need to surround themselves with followers lack a strong personal centre. They create a substitute centre by absorbing other people into the orbit of their conflicted energies. Often, those who are drawn into this orbit are themselves without a developed personal centre. Enmeshment with the charismatic leader provides them with a substitute centre of gravity.

      When this sort of relationship breaks down, the devotee will experience a profound loss. The leader, who has less to lose, will continue to be supported by the adulation of other followers.

      Self worth that results from the surrender of integrity and independence is fragile and spurious. True self-worth depends, as Tony Moore argued, on the extent to which we can ignore those who think they know what is best for us.⁴

Popularity

      Popularity is an insecure basis for self-esteem. To become popular we sell ourselves. As a consequence, our self-esteem is dependent, to an unhealthy degree, on those to whom we have marketed ourselves.⁵

Subliminal influences

      Our determination to be true to ourselves can also be undermined by subliminal influences that are far more powerful than we realise.

      St. Augustine, in his Confessions, explained that his friend, Alypius, a Christian convert, became convinced that the worst aspect of the Paganism from which he had been delivered was not the worship of pagan gods, but bloody gladiatorial combat. He [250] vowed he would never again attend a contest.

      However, one day, when passing the arena, he was so affected by the excitement of the crowds streaming into the enclosure, that he was drawn into the amphitheatre. Once inside, he shut his eyes so that he could not see what was happening and be tempted by it. However, when a gladiator fell, and he heard the roar of the crowd, he opened his eyes and joined the crowd in shouting for blood.⁶

      Joseph Campbell recounted a similar incident, in which several of his Dutch friends, who were incarcerated in a concentration camp, found themselves involuntarily joining in the responses of a large crowd that had turned out to listen to a speech by Hitler. Hitler was visiting the neighbourhood and the inmates of the camp had been taken to the area where the crowd had gathered. They were told to stand to attention. One of the friends explained to Campbell how difficult he found it to keep his hand by his side and to refrain from joining in the crowd's "Heil Hitler!" once the Führer had concluded his harangue.⁷

      Jung argued that Germany's corporate shadow manifest through Hitler. In the early 1930's he was warning that unless Germany faced its shadow, that shadow would externalise itself and resolve itself externally.⁸

      Hitler did not merely draw on mythic allusions, but merged his personal psychosis with the energies of the national shadow, seducing and galvanising the nation. Alluding to this phenomenon, Jung argued that, when the individual is submerged in the mass, the shadow is mobilised and may even be incarnated.⁹

      Psychic influence is not always easily discerned, as Jung indicated by drawing attention to several instances associated with a dream seminar group with which he was working between 1928 and 1930.

      In the first instance, the group was exploring the significance of the Christian cross and the Muslim crescent. One evening, when one of the participants arrived home, she discovered that her 17 year-old son was ill. She gave him a toothbrush and asked him to mark it. When she returned, sometime later, she discovered that, [251] instead of writing his name along the shaft, he had drawn a number of crosses and a crescent.¹⁰

      The second incident, which occurred early in the life of the group, was concerned with a disturbed atmosphere, observable when the group broke from its intense concentration for refreshments. Commenting on the experience, Jung explained that communities are symbiotic organisms, subject to group-think. When a disturbance occurs, someone in the group picks up the energy and alerts others.¹¹

      Adi Da similarly argued that we are influenced by a range of unconscious forces that operate at a deep psychic level.¹²

Unauthentic living

      While it is the rare individual who is aware of pervasive subliminal influences, most of us are conscious of the temptation to live duplicitous, unauthentic lives. As Boris Pasternak suggested, most of us fall victim to this temptation.¹³

What can we do?

      How can we counter these influences? How can we be truly ourselves?

      Few appear to make much progress. Most, as Emerson suggested, settle for a style of life that is dictated by others, by society. Our choices are made for us.¹⁴

      Those few who identify the foe, and enter the battle, are not rewarded with an instant, outright victory. They progress slowly.

      The centredness we achieve is only ever partial. One reason for this is that damaged aspects of the self take time to heal. Another is that we often overlook areas that do not cause us pain. Either way, there will be elements, wounds or potentialities, which we will neglect.

Inadequate approaches

      Very often the means we use to counter others' expectations are inadequate. Nevertheless, they may be the only means available to us at the time. [252]

      Sometimes we outwardly comply but inwardly resist. This causes us to drag our feet. At other times we withdraw, physically, mentally or emotionally. While we withdraw to preserve ourselves, we pay a high price for self-isolation.

      Another approach we sometimes adopt is to conform in a minimalist way to the rituals expected of us, while working the system to our advantage.

      At times we strike a defiant pose. However, where this defiance masks a fragile ego, we remain captive to those we taunt. The fact that we spend time and energy protesting our independence indicates that we remain unsure of ourselves.

      Intelligence is an inadequate defence against expectation and ideological pressure. If our intellectual faculties are well developed, we will use our intelligence as a shield against assault. However, an over-developed intellect can diminish our ability to feelingly appraise influences impinging on us.

      The fact that we are out of touch with our feelings, and, by implication, with our bodies, indicates that we are out of touch with the deeper self. As group pressure influences us unconsciously, a disconnected ego is not in a position to recognise or counter this influence. Highly intelligent people have been seduced by pathological cults. Well-educated and highly respected professionals were taken in by Rajneesh!¹⁵

      In a late work, The Undiscovered Self, Jung argued that the only defence against illusion and propaganda was for people to be centred in the self, to be as well organised in their individuality as society was in its corporate identity.¹⁶

Being centred in the self

      When we are centred in the self we are more likely to be aware of what is happening in and to the self.

      While religious belief has furnished some with a formidable means of resistance to seductive expectations, it is experienced truth that truly anchors us. This truth is not necessarily inconsistent with religious or philosophical orthodoxy. Nevertheless, it is important for us to take personal possession of [253] the latter. This involves the questioning of inherited beliefs. It may include walking away from them and later returning to them. It is in this way that we appropriate the riches of a religious or philosophical inheritance.

Passion

      We will not penetrate to the core of reality if we are half-hearted. We need to be passionately engaged in life, to feel deeply with our whole being; otherwise we will be mesmerised by society. This involves us working our way through issues; free from the contamination of received opinion, in a process Krishnamurti described as "choiceless awareness".¹⁷

Centredness

      Jesus discerned and lived his truth, exhibiting freedom from dogmatic prescription. Religious reformers, prophets and mystics lived their truth in the face of orthodoxies their truth challenged. The truth is within us. It lies beneath layers of illusion, self-deception and inherited misinformation.

      The fact that we experience self-alienation indicates that there is a deeper self, a deeper truth, from which we are alienated. As Vaclav Havel suggested, the statement that we are living a lie only makes sense if it is acknowledged that we are capable of living the truth and that this capacity is more fundamental to our essence than living a lie.¹⁸

The bodyself

      The bodyself will lead us to its truth. One of the most fruitful means I have found of dialogue in with the bodyself is working with my dreams, with images thrown up by the unconscious. The more significant of those dreams--dreams whose import I have understood, however tentatively--pointed a way forward. The self-talk resulting from them has encouraged me to seek and live my truth. [254]

Self-talk

      Messages from the self, arising from my dreams, that have encouraged me to ground myself in my own truth, have suggested that I:

• Establish my ground, my territory
• Work at disentangling myself from the unhelpful aspects of the unconscious connection I have had with my mother.
• Be aware of the continuing seduction of the nurturing, but devouring mother.
• Do not need to be validated by anyone.
• Do not need to be validated by my achievements.
• Address directly, and assertively, rather than indirectly and ineffectively, those factors that threaten to rob me of my power.
• Confront the bully toe to toe, but with sensitivity.
• Work at being unfazed by others' expectations and at doing what I feel to be right.
• Follow my guidance and my feelings in the ordering of priorities and the carrying through of tasks.
• Make my reactions cleaner, less contaminated, more direct.
• Embrace the gift of courage coming from the unconscious
• Be comfortable with and cultivate the unpretentious Rumpole in me.
• Replace anxiety with anticipation.
• Throw my keys (means of exploring the deeper self) at my fear.
• Confront my anxiety and stand my ground.
• Work from the centre of the self.

The Spirit

      Connection with the deeper self will bring us into touch with truth that is directly apprehended by the self, or truth that is [255] incarnate in the self. Our capacity to intuit the truth will be enhanced through a conscious discernment of the Spirit-Presence behind all phenomena.

      As this Spirit is the constituent reality of the self, and as the truth discerned in, and incarnated in the self, is the gift of that Spirit, an intuitive embracing of this all-encompassing spiritual reality will bring us even more directly into touch with the essence of life.

      Being in touch with this Spirit will sharpen our discernment and strengthen our commitment to our truth.

      Over time, as we learn to flow with the Spirit, we will more effectively incarnate its energies and its truth. As Emerson argued, we are embraced by an immense intelligence that gifts us with intimations of the truth and the capacity to follow its directions.¹⁹ The Apostle Paul, writing to Christians in Rome, urged them to surrender to this intelligence. When they did this, he contended, their hearts and minds would be transformed.²⁰

      As a consequence of our engagement with this Spiritual Presence, we will become more truly centred in the self, because we will be centred in the Self beyond the self, in Emerson's Overself. As a consequence, we will trust our judgement more. It is also possible that we will live our truth recklessly.

Life in the Spirit

      To live under the inspiration of Spirit takes us beyond mere existence. As the 13th Century Sufi mystic, Rumi, commented, conventional knowledge is stultifying. We must be true to ourselves, even if it means that we destroy our reputation.²¹

      Oscar Wilde commented that if an American were given the chance to choose between going to heaven or hearing a lecture about heaven, he would choose the lecture.²² Many of us make this choice.

      While the insights of others assist us in the early stages of our quest, we need to be careful that we do not so highly esteem these authorities that we are discouraged from seeking the truth for ourselves. [256]

      Another danger in placing too much weight on what others say is that we pay too much attention to their incidental trivia. Jung once suggested to a group of professionals, who were hanging on his words, that they were not distinguishing between his mature thought and incidental comment.²³ We should heed the old proverb that encourages us to drink from our own wells.²⁴ The importance of remaining faithful to our own truth was expressed with brevity and great force by Meister Eckhart, who argued that, if God turned from the truth, he would hold to the truth.²⁵

Don't expect perfection

      We should not expect a perfect score. However far we progress, our insights remain partial.

A call to authenticity

      Nevertheless, we are all called to realise and live this truth. It is our vocation, a vocation that is in our genes. This vocation, as James Hillman has argued, is a call to character.²⁶ Others are healed through the example of an authentic life.²⁷

      However, while authenticity will enrich our lives, some, like Socrates and Jesus, who lived authentically, came to a sticky end. The reason was that others found it difficult to cope with this authenticity. Pointing out that the emperor has no clothes is embarrassing. Jung, alluding to the effect he sometimes had on others, suggested that those living artificial lives may be irritated by him, because he crystallised their latent self-criticisms.²⁸

Madness

      There is a certain element of madness in this commitment to our truth. We must be willing to be lost in this madness.²⁹ As Andrew Harvey commented, quoting from Rumi, we go mad into the divine. When we have the courage to remain with this process, we find ourselves caught up in a process of endless transformation.³⁰ [257]

Genius

      This ability to believe our own truth, and to follow it wherever it leads, Emerson called "genius".³¹

Common sense

      The Last word on the subject belongs to an inscription etched into a crumbling tombstone in Boothill Cemetery in Tombstone, Arizona. It is the epitaph of an old gunslinger and suggests that we should be what we are, because, if we try to be what we are not, then we are no longer ourselves.³² [258]

[LS 245-258]