Archetypes, Mythic Imagination, and Modern Society.
Stanislav Grof, M.D.
I will begin this paper on the importance of mythic imagination and archetypal
psychology for modern society with a brief discussion of the nature and function of the
archetypes and how our understanding of them has changed over the centuries. Following
this, I will address more specifically the implications of archetypal thinking for a variety
of disciplines and its relevance for the global crisis we are currently facing.
According to the understanding that has emerged from Jungian psychology,
consciousness research, and scholarly mythological research, archetypes are timeless
primordial cosmic principles underlying, informing, and forming the fabric of the
material world (Jung 1959). The tendency to interpret the world in terms of archetypal
principles first appeared in ancient Greece and was one of the most striking
characteristics of Greek philosophy and culture.
As Richard Tarnas pointed out in his sequel to The Passion of the Western Mind
entitled Psyche and Cosmos: Intimations of a New World View (Tarnas 1993),
archetypes can be seen from several different perspectives:
1. In Homeric epics they took the form of personified mythological figures, as
deities, such as Zeus, Poseidon, Dionysos, Hera, Aphrodite, or Ares.
2. In the philosophy of Plato, they were described as pure metaphysical
principles, transcendent Ideas or Forms. They possessed independent
existence of their own in a realm not accessible to ordinary human senses.
According to him, earthly things partake in the shape or character of these
universal Forms or Ideas, but they fall far short of the perfect glory or perfect
reality of these transcendent Forms/Ideas (Plato 1961).
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3. In modern times, C. G. Jung brought the concept of archetypes into modern
psychology, describing them primarily as psychological principles.
The existence of hidden invisible dimensions of reality is an idea that is alien to
materialistic science, unless these are material in nature and can be made accessible
through the use of devices that extend the range of our senses, such as microscopes,
telescopes, or sensors detecting various bands of electromagnetic radiation. In addition,
academic and clinical psychiatrists use a very narrow conceptual framework that limits
the human psyche to postnatal biography and the Freudian individual unconscious.
According to them, the experiences of archetypal beings and realms are not ontologically
real; they are figments of human imagination or pathological products of the brain that
require treatment by tranquilizing medication.
Modern materialistic science thus joined the centuries old philosophical
philosophical argument between the
favor of the in favor of the former. The debate between the nominalists and realists
permeated in its many variations the entire history of Western philosophy nominalists.
The nominalists saw the archetypes as “names,” abstractions from human experience of
concrete objects and situations and thus derivatives of the material world. The realists
believed that the archetypal world is ontologically real, although not accessible to human
senses. It was the clinical and philosophical work of C. G. Jung that radically changed
this situation.
Jung’s analysis of the dreams and symptoms of his clients, as well as his study of
world mythology, art, comparative religion, and ritual life of native cultures brought
convincing evidence for the existence of the collective unconscious and for ontological
reality of the archetypes as its governing principles (Jung 1959). However, Jung’s
understanding of the nature and function of archetypes changed dramatically in the
course of his life. In his early work, he saw them as transindividual but essentially
intrapsychic phenomena. He believed that they were hard-wired into the human brain and
often compared them with instincts.
nominalists and realists and emphatically decided in
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It was the observation of a phenomenon that Jung called
radically changed his perspective on archetypes (Jung 1960). He observed that everyday
life often brings striking coincidences that by far transcend any reasonable probability;
they should not happen if the universe were governed exclusively by chains of causes and
effects. He cited as examples the work of the Austrian biologist Kammerer and
Flammarion’s story of the rare plum pudding. Moreover, he observed that in many of
these coincidences intrapsychic events form meaningful patterns with material reality
(Jung’s scarab, Campbell’s praying mantis, my When the Impossible Happens). This
would be possible only if archetypes were cosmic organizing principles governing the
human psyche, as well as material reality.
Joseph Campbell’s comparative studies of mythology brought strong supportive
evidence for Jung’s understanding of archetypes and represent an important complement
to and support for his clinical explorations. Of particular interest in this regard is
Campbell’s crosscultural study of the archetypal motif of the Hero’s Journey that he
referred to as “monomyth” because of its universal and ubiquitous nature transcending
historical and geographical boundaries. He first described this motif in his 1947 classic
The Hero with A Thousand faces (Campbell 1968) and later demonstrated how it
manifests in a variety of situations including the shamanic initiatory crisis, experiences in
rites of passage, mysteries of death and rebirth, and in psychoses.
Additional validation of the ontological reality of archetypes came from
psychedelic therapy and powerful non-drug experiential techniques (Grof 1985 and
2000).
synchronicity that
Implications of the new understanding:
1. Archetypes in Psychiatry, Psychology, and Psychotherapy:
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In the light of the observations from psychedelic therapy and the work with
holotropic breathwork, the cartography of the psyche used by academic psychiatry and
psychology, which is limited to postnatal biography and to the Freudian individual
unconscious, has to be vastly expanded. It has to include the perinatal domain and the
transpersonal domain – particularly the collective unconscious with its archetypal
dynamics (Grof 1985, 2000). Modern consciousness research has shown that in nonordinary
states archetypes can be directly experienced and bring new information about
mythologies of the world unknown to the subject (Jung’s example of the chronic
psychotic patient – sun making wind with the movements of its penis as in Mithraic
mythology).
To illustrate this, I would like to describe one of many situations in which the
authenticity of such information could be verified.
It involved one of my clients in Prague, whom I treated for depression
and pathological fear of death (
sessions, he experienced a powerful sequence of psychospiritual death and
rebirth. As the experience was culminating, he had a vision of an ominous
entrance into the underworld guarded by a terrifying pig goddess. At this
point, he suddenly felt an urgent need to draw a specific geometrical design
and asked me to bring him some sheets of paper and drawing utensils. He
drew an entire series of complex abstract patterns and he kept impulsively
tearing and crumpling these intricate designs as soon as he finished them. He
was very dissatisfied with his drawings and was getting increasingly
frustrated, because he was not able to ‘get it right’.
At that time, I was still under a strong influence of my Freudian
training and I tried my best to identify the unconscious motives for this
strange behavior by using the method of free associations. We spent much
time on this task, but without much success. The entire sequence simply did
not make any sense. Eventually, the process moved to other areas and I
stopped thinking about this situation. The entire episode had remained for me
thanatophobia). In one of his psychedelic
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completely mysterious until many years later, when I moved to the United
States.
During our stay at Esalen, Joseph Campbell frequently conducted
workshops there and participated as guest faculty in many of our monthlong
seminars. In the middle of the week, he regularly came for dinner in our
house, because he became tired of the Esalen menu, which he called “rabbit
food.” We had many fascinating discussions over the years, during which I
shared with him various observations of obscure archetypal experiences from
my work that I was not able to understand. In most instances, Joseph had no
difficulties identifying the cultural sources of the symbolism involved.
During one of these discussions, I remembered the above episode and
shared it with him. “How fascinating," said Joseph without any hesitation, “it
was clearly the Cosmic Mother Night of Death, the Devouring Mother
Goddess of the Malekulans in New Guinea.” He then continued to tell me that
the Malekulans believed they would encounter this deity during the Journey of
the Dead. She had the form of a frightening female figure with distinct pig
features. According to the Malekulan tradition, she sat at the entrance into the
underworld and guarded an intricate sacred labyrinthine design.
The Malekulans had an elaborate system of rituals that involved
breeding and sacrificing pigs. This complex ritual activity was aimed at
overcoming the dependency on their human mothers and eventually on the
Devouring Mother Goddess. The Malekulans spent an enormous amount of
time practicing the art of the labyrinth drawing, since its mastery was
considered essential for a successful journey to the Beyond. Joseph, with his
lexical knowledge, was able to solve an important part of this puzzle that I had
come across during my research. The remaining question, that even he was
not able to answer, was why my client had to encounter specifically this
Malekulan deity at that particular time of his therapy. However, the task of
mastering the posthumous journey certainly made good sense for somebody
whose main symptom was pathological fear of death.
Of the many experiences involving the archetypal world I have myself had in my
psychedelic sessions, the most interesting one happened in a session with MDMA.
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In the first part of this session, I experienced scenes of unimaginable
destruction. Scenes of natural disasters – volcanic eruptions, earthquakes,
crashing meteors, tidal waves, forest fires and floods were combined with
images of exploding atomic bombs, burning cities, collapsing highrise
buildings, and horrors of wars. Heading this wave of total annihilation were
four terrifying horsemen, I realized that I was experiencing the archetype of
the Apocalypse. This experience coincided with a stage in my spiritual
development when I recognized the illusory nature of the material world and
started seeing it as a play of Cosmic Consciousness – lila.
In the final sequence of the session, I had a vision of a large brilliantly
lit stage that was located somewhere beyond time and space. It had a
beautiful ornate curtain decorated with intricate patterns that seemed to
contain the entire history of the world. I intuitively understood that I was
visiting the Theater of the Cosmic Drama, featuring the forces that shape
human history. I began to witness a magnificent parade of mysterious figures
who entered the stage, presented themselves, and slowly departed.
I realized that what I was seeing were personified universal principles,
archetypes, that through a complex interplay create the illusion of the
phenomenal world, the divine play that the Hindus call
protean personages condensing many identities, many functions, and even
many scenes. As I was watching them, they kept changing their forms in
extremely intricate holographic interpenetration, being one and many at the
same time. I was aware that they had many different facets, levels, and
dimensions of meaning, but was not able to focus on anything in particular.
Each of these figures seemed to represent simultaneously the essence of his
or her function, as well as all the concrete manifestations of the principle
they represented.
There was Maya, the magical ethereal figure symbolizing the world
illusion, Anima, embodying the eternal Female, the Warrior, a Mars-like
personification of war and aggression, the Lovers, representing all the sexual
dramas and romances throughout ages, the royal figure of the Ruler or
lila. They were
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Emperor, the withdrawn Hermit, the facetious and elusive Trickster, and
many others. As they were passing across the stage, they bowed in my
direction, as if expecting appreciation for their stellar performance in the
divine play of the universe.
The work with non-ordinary states of consciousness (their important subgroup
that I call “
experiences are not erratic products of brain pathology of unknown origin (symptoms of
“endogenous psychoses”), but creations of anima mundi emerging into individual
consciousness (Grof 2000). It has also revealed the existence of the perinatal domain in
the unconscious that contains a unique mixture of fetal and archetypal elements. This has
profound theoretical and practical implications for psychiatry, psychology, and
psychotherapy:
a. Archetypes play an important role in the genesis of emotional and psychosomatic
symptoms as part of multilevel dynamic systems that consist of biographical,
perinatal, and transpersonal material (COEX systems). Conversely, archetypes can
also play an important role in healing and transformation (the extreme being
emergence and integration of a demonic archetype)
b.This is closely related to inner healing intelligence of the psyche (Jung’s
individuation process) and healing potential of archetypal figures or cosmic energy
that ancient and native cultures see as divine (Apollo of the Greek temple
incubation, deities of the Caribbean and South American syncretistic religions – the
loa in Voodoo or orishas in Umbanda and Santeria,
holotropic”) has shown beyond any reasonable doubt that archetypalpneuma of the Gnostics, prana
of Kundalini Yoga,
c. The discovery of the ontological reality of the archetypal realm and the inner healing
intelligence supports the concept of “spiritual emergency” (emergence of perinatal
and transpersonal material into consciousness) as an alternative to the medical
ntum of the Kalahari Bushmen, mana of the Polynesians, etc.)
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understanding of “endogenous psychoses” as mental diseases, caused by a
pathological process (Grof and Grof 1989, Grof and Grof 1991).
2. The Role of Archetypes in Science:
a. Archetypes play an important role in the genesis of scientific theories and in
scientific discoveries. As Phillipp Frank has shown in his book Philosophy of
Science (1957), the source of the basic axiom of a scientific theory or the source
of a scientific discovery is often an archetypal motif. In the history of science
revolutionary ideas often emerge long before there is sufficient evidence to justify
them or support them. Examples are the Ionic philosopher Anaximandros with his
protoevolutionary theory suggesting that all life originated in the ocean,
Demokritos and Leukippos with their atomic theory of matter, Copernicus and
Kepler who drew their inspiration from the solar archetype, Friedrich Kekule
inspired by the vision of Uroboros in his discovery of the benzene ring, Einstein’s
preoccupation with the unified theory, etc.
b. There is also increasing awareness of the importance of archetypal patterns in
various scientific disciplines: Goethe’s fascination by the building plan of plants,
Gregory Bateson’s preoccupation with the “pattern that connects” in nature and
with evolutionary theory, Sheldrake’s concept of morphogenetic fields, Ilya
Prigogine’s theory of dissipative structures, chaos theory, etc.
3. Archetypes, Religion, and Spirituality:
The discovery that the archetypal world is ontologically real gives legitimacy to
the spiritual worldview, spiritual quest, and to religious activity that involves direct
experience. It makes it possible to distinguish organized religions based on belief, with
their dogmas, ritualism, moralism, and secular ambitions, from authentic spirituality
found in the monastic and mystical branches of religions and in groups emphasizing
spiritual practice and direct experience.
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Spirituality is based on direct experiences of non-ordinary aspects and
dimensions of reality. It does not require a special place or an officially appointed
person mediating contact with the divine. The mystics do not need churches or
temples. The context in which they experience the sacred dimensions of reality,
including their own divinity, are their bodies and nature. And instead of officiating
priests, they need a supportive group of fellow seekers or the guidance of a teacher
who is more advanced on the inner journey than they are themselves.
Another important distinction to make is the difference between idolatry and
mysticism; According to Joseph Campbell (echoing Karlfried Graf Durckheim), “a
useful deity (archetypal figure) has to be transparent to the transcendent;” it has to
point to the Absolute, but not be mistaken for it. Making the archetypal figure opaque
and worshipping it as the ultimate is idolatry; it results in a religion that unites within
its radius, but divides the world into rival groups - Christians/pagans,
Moslems/infidels, Jews/goyim.
The realization of the ontological reality of the archetypal world validates the
ritual and spiritual life of pre-industrial cultures – shamanism, rites of passage,
mysteries of death and rebirth, and the great religions and spiritual philosophies of the
East and West. Of these, rites of passage are of particular importance for modern
society. According to scholars, such as Margaret Mead and Mircea Eliade the fact that
the industrial civilization has lost meaningful rites of passage contributes significantly
to the ills of modern society, particularly of the young generation – sexual acting out,
drug abuse, and violence.
Margaret Mead and Catherine Bateson organized in 1973 a small working
conference in Burg Wartenstein in Austria, entitled Ritual, Reconciliation in Change.
Several years ago, Christina’s attended a conference, convened by a New York state
legislator on the same subject – importance of rites of passage and the possibility of
recreating and reinstituting them. Participants discussed the possibility of combining
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such elements as ropes courses, outward bound, fire walking, and holotropic
breathwork (since all native rites of passage involve non-ordinary states of
consciousness). the authors of the strategic doctrine refer to members of their
community as the “nuclear priesthood,” the first atomic test was called
unity of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the male forces of creation. The
worked on the
"It was as though we stood at the first day of creation.” And
Trinity -- thescientists whoatomic bomb and witnessed the test described it in the following way:Robert Oppenheimer
thought of Krishna's words to Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita: "I am become Death, the
Shatterer of Worlds."
4. Archetypes and Sociopolitical Movements in History:
Archetypal forces govern not only processes in the individual psyche, but also in
the collective psyche, they are forces of history.
sacrifice their lives for Jesus and participate in the Crusades to recover the Holy Land
from the Mohammedans. The Bohemian Hussites called themselves “Warriors of
God” and sung their powerful chorale “Ye Who Are the Warriors of God” with such
intensity that it allegedly wreaked havoc among the enemies they were about to
engage and made them flee the battlefield.
influence his followers – the Vedic images of the swastika and the solar eagle, the
Thousand Years’ Reich, and the supremacy of the Nordic race.
C. G. Jung noticed that the archetypal motif of Ragnarok
(Goetterdaemmerung or Twilight of the Gods) kept appearing in the dreams of his
German patients. He concluded that Germany was facing a national catastrophe and
that it would be destructive and self-destructive in nature. He also analyzed the
archetypal aspects of Hitler and Stalin (Jung 1950) and discussed the political
implications of the Wotan archetype for Germany (Jung 1964). Marie-Louise von
Franz discussed in her article The Transformed Berserk the importance of the
experience of Nikolas von Flue, the patron saint of Switzerland (his vision of the
Wotanic Christ), for the future of her homeland (Franz 1988). James Hillman
amassed in his brilliant book A Terrible Love of War convincing evidence that war is
Medieval knights were asked toHitler used archetypal symbols to
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a formidable archetypal force that has irresistible power over individuals and nations
(Hillman 2004).
Ronald Reagan made in his speeches references to the Apocalypse and called
the Soviet Union the “Evil Empire.” George Bush called his fight against Moslem
terrorists a “crusade”; in turn, Moslem extremists use for political purposes the
concept of
reward for their suicidal attacks on infidels the delights of Paradise, including the
virginal black-eyed
World War believed that they sacrificed their life for the living god – “Emperor of
Heaven” Hirohito.
The authors of the strategic doctrine refer to members of their community as
the “nuclear priesthood.” The first atomic test was called Trinity -- the unity of
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The scientists who worked on the atomic bomb and
witnessed the test described it in the following way: "It was as though we stood at the
first day of creation.” And Robert Oppenheimer thought of Krishna's words to Arjuna
in the Bhagavad Gita: "I am become Death, the Shatterer of Worlds."
Work with holotropic states of consciousness, with and without psychedelics
offers fascinating insights into the archetypal and perinatal roots of war and bloody
revolution, The images of violent sociopolitical events typically accompany the reliving
of biological birth and appear in very specific connection with the consecutive stages of
the birth process (BPMs). Each stage is connected with specific archetypal imagery
mixed with corresponding fetal elements (Grof 1985, 2000).
While we are reliving episodes of undisturbed intrauterine existence (BPM I), we
typically experience images from human societies where people live in harmony with each
other and with nature. The archetypal domain contributes images of paradises and heavens
of various cultures, Disturbing intrauterine memories, such as those of a toxic womb,
imminent miscarriage, or attempted abortion, are accompanied by images of human groups
jihad, the Holy War against the infidels, and Moslem terrorists’ expect ashouris. Similarly the Japanese kamikaze warriors in the Second
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living in industrial areas where nature is polluted and spoiled, or in societies with insidious
social order and all-pervading paranoia. Corresponding archetypal images feature insidious
demons.
Typical archetypal images associated with the onset of delivery are ominous
whirlpools, engulfing or constricting monsters (dragon, Leviathan, whale, Tarantula,
octopus), or entries into the underworld. Regressive experiences related to the first clinical
stage of birth (BPM II), during which the uterus periodically contracts but the cervix is not
open, present a very characteristic picture. They portray oppressive and abusive totalitarian
societies with closed borders, victimizing their populations, and “choking” personal
freedom, such as Czarist or Communist Russia, Hitler's Third Reich, South American
dictatorships, and the African Apartheid), or bring specific images of the inmates in Nazi
concentration camps and Stalin's Gulag Archipelago. While experiencing these scenes of
living hell, we identify exclusively with the victims and feel deep sympathy for the downtrodden
and the underdog. Underlying all these is the archetype of hell – extreme physical
and emotional suffering that will never end, complete with the images of devils and
sinners.
The experiences accompanying reliving of the second clinical stage of delivery
(BPM III), when the cervix is dilated and continued contractions propel the fetus through
the narrow passage of the birth canal, feature a rich panoply of violent scenes -- bloody
wars and revolutions, human or animal slaughter, mutilation, sexual abuse, and murder.
These scenes often contain demonic elements and repulsive scatological motifs. Additional
frequent concomitants of BPM III are visions of fire - burning cities, launching of rockets,
and explosions of nuclear bombs. Here we are not limited to the role of victims, but can
participate in three roles - that of the victim, of the aggressor, and of an emotionally
involved observer. When the third matrix approaches resolution, the archetypal images
feature figures representing death and rebirth, such as Osiris, Dionysus, Quetzalcoatl,
Inanna, or Jesus, Phoenix, or deities associated with fire (Moloch, Pele).
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The events characterizing the third clinical stage of delivery (BPM IV), the actual
moment of birth and the separation from the mother, are typically associated with images
of victory in wars and revolutions, liberation of prisoners, and success of collective
efforts, such as patriotic or nationalistic movements. At this point, we can also experience
visions of triumphant celebrations and parades or of exciting postwar reconstruction.
Archetypal motifs that belong here are rainbow spectra, peacock designs, Great Mother
Goddesses, and images of deities appearing in light (angelic beings, gandharvas and
apsaras, etc.)
In 1975, I described these observations, linking sociopolitical upheavals to stages
of biological birth, in Realms of the Human Unconscious (Grof 1975). Shortly after its
publication, I received a letter from Lloyd de Mause, a New York psychoanalyst and
journalist. De Mause is one of the founders of psychohistory, a discipline that applies the
findings of depth psychology to history and political science (Mause 1975).
Psychohistorians study such issues as the relationship between the childhood history of
political leaders and their system of values and process of decision-making, or the
influence of child-rearing practices on the nature of revolutions of that particular
historical period. Lloyd de Mause was very interested in my findings concerning the
trauma of birth and its possible sociopolitical implications, because they provided
independent support for his own research.
For some time, de Mause had been studying the psychological aspects of the
periods preceding wars and revolutions. It interested him how military leaders succeed in
mobilizing masses of peaceful civilians and transforming them practically overnight into
killing machines. His approach to this problem was very original and creative. In addition
to analysis of traditional historical sources, he drew data of great psychological
importance from caricatures, jokes, dreams, personal imagery, slips of the tongue, side
comments of speakers, and even doodles and scribbles on the edge of the rough drafts of
political documents. By the time he contacted me, he had analyzed in this way seventeen
situations preceding the outbreak of wars and revolutionary upheavals, spanning many
centuries since antiquity to most recent times.
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He was struck by the extraordinary abundance of figures of speech, metaphors,
and images related to biological birth that he found in this material. Military leaders and
politicians of all ages describing a critical situation or declaring war typically used terms
that equally applied to perinatal distress. They accused the enemy of choking and
strangling their people, squeezing the last breath out of their lungs, or constricting them
and not giving them enough space to live (Hitler's “Lebensraum”). We could illustrate
this by a recent example – Osama bin Laden threatening in his videotape that he would
turn United States into a “choking hell.”
Equally frequent were allusions to dark caves, tunnels, and confusing labyrinths,
dangerous abysses into which one might be pushed, and the threat of engulfment by
treacherous quicksand or a terrifying whirlpool. Similarly, the offer of the resolution of
the crisis comes in the form of perinatal images. The leader promises to rescue his nation
from an ominous labyrinth, to lead it to the light on the other side of the tunnel, and to
create a situation where the dangerous aggressor and oppressor will be overcome and
everybody will again “breathe freely.”
Lloyd de Mause's historical examples at the time included such famous
personages as Alexander the Great, Napoleon, Samuel Adams, Kaiser Wilhelm II., Hitler,
Khrushchev, and Kennedy. Samuel Adams talking about the American Revolution
referred to "the child of Independence now struggling for birth." In 1914, Kaiser Wilhelm
stated that "the Monarchy has been seized by the throat and forced to choose between
letting itself be strangled and making a last ditch effort to defend itself against attack."
During the Cuban missile crisis Krushchev wrote to Kennedy, pleading that the two
nations not "come to a clash, like blind moles battling to death in a tunnel."
Even more explicit was the coded message used by Japanese ambassador Kurusu
when he phoned Tokyo to signal that negotiations with Roosevelt had broken down and
that it was all right to go ahead with the bombing of Pearl Harbor. He announced that the
"birth of the child was imminent" and asked how things were in Japan: "Does it seem as
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if the child might be born?" The reply was: "Yes, the birth of the child seems imminent."
Interestingly, the American intelligence listening in recognized the meaning of the “waras-
birth” code.
Particularly chilling was the use of perinatal language in connection with the
explosion of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima. The airplane was given the name of the
pilot's mother, Enola Gay, the atomic bomb itself carried a painted nickname “The Little
Boy,” and the agreed-upon message sent to Washington as a signal of successful
detonation was "The baby was born.” It would not be too far-fetched to see the image of
a newborn also behind the nickname of the Nagasaki bomb, Fat Man. Since the time of
our correspondence, Lloyd de Mause collected many additional historical examples and
refined his thesis that the memory of the birth trauma plays an important role as a source
of motivation for violent social activity.
The issues related to nuclear warfare are of such relevance that I would like to
elaborate on them using the material from a fascinating paper by Carol Cohn entitled
“Sex and Death in the Rational World of the Defense Intellectuals” (Cohn 1987). The
defense intellectuals (DIs) are civilians who move in and out of government, working
sometimes as administrative officials or consultants, sometimes at universities and think
tanks. They create the theory that informs and legitimates U.S. nuclear strategic practice -
how to manage the arms race, how to deter the use of nuclear weapons, how to fight a
nuclear war if the deterrence fails, and how to explain why it is not safe to live without
nuclear weapons.
Carol Cohn had attended a two-week summer seminar on nuclear weapons,
nuclear strategic doctrine, and arms control. She was so fascinated by what had transpired
there that she spent the following year immersed in the almost entirely male world of
defense intellectuals (except for secretaries). She collected some extremely interesting
facts confirming the perinatal dimension in nuclear warfare. In her fascinating paper, she
mentions eight historical examples, where coded messages and other communications
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about development and testing of atomic and hydrogen bombs involved references to
birth and newborns.
Further support for the pivotal role of the perinatal domain of the unconscious in
war psychology can be found in Sam Keen's excellent book The Faces of the Enemy
(Keen 1988). Keen brought together an outstanding collection of distorted and biased war
posters, propaganda cartoons, and caricatures from many historical periods and countries.
He demonstrated that the way the enemy is described and portrayed during a war or
revolution is a stereotype that shows only minimal variations and has very little to do
with the actual characteristics of the country and culture involved.
He was able to divide these images into several archetypal categories according to
the prevailing characteristics (e.g., Stranger, Aggressor, Worthy Opponent, Faceless,
Enemy of God, Barbarian, Greedy, Criminal, Torturer, Rapist, Death). According to
Keen, the alleged images of the enemy are essentially projections of the repressed and
unacknowledged shadow aspects of our own unconscious. Although we would certainly
find in human history instances of just wars, those who initiate war activities are typically
substituting external targets for elements in their own psyches that should be properly
faced in personal self-exploration.
Sam Keen's theoretical framework does not specifically include the perinatal
domain of the unconscious. However, the analysis of his picture material reveals
preponderance of archetypal images that are characteristic of BPM II and BPM III. The
enemy is typically depicted as a dangerous octopus, a vicious dragon, a multiheaded
hydra, a giant venomous tarantula, or an engulfing Leviathan. Other frequently used
symbols include vicious predatory felines or birds, monstrous sharks, and ominous
snakes, particularly vipers and boa constrictors. Scenes depicting strangulation or
crushing, ominous whirlpools, and treacherous quicksands also abound in pictures from
the time of wars, revolutions, and political crises. Juxtaposition of pictures from
holotropic states of consciousness that depict perinatal experiences with the historical
pictorial documentation collected by Lloyd de Mause and Sam Keen represents strong
evidence for the perinatal and transpersonal roots of human violence.
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According to the new insights, provided jointly by observations from
consciousness research and the findings of psychohistory, we all carry in our deep
unconscious powerful energies and emotions associated with the trauma of birth that we
have not adequately mastered and assimilated. The symbolism associated with them is
drawn from deep archetypal sources. For some of us, this aspect of our psyche can be
completely unconscious, until and unless we embark on some in-depth self-exploration
with the use of psychedelics or some powerful experiential techniques of psychotherapy,
such as the holotropic breathwork or rebirthing. Others can have varying degrees of
awareness of the emotions and physical sensations from the perinatal and transpersonal
level of the unconscious.
Activation of this material can lead to serious individual psychopathology,
including unmotivated violence. It seems that, for unknown reasons, the awareness of the
perinatal elements can increase simultaneously in a large number of people. This creates
an atmosphere of general tension, anxiety, and anticipation. The leader is an individual
who is under a stronger influence of the perinatal energies than the average person. He
also has the ability to disown his unacceptable feelings (the Shadow in Jung's
terminology) and to project them on the external situation. The collective discomfort is
blamed on the enemy and a military intervention is offered as a solution.
Historical and astrological research of Richard Tarnas threw fascinating new light
on de Mause’s idea of the collective tension originating in the perinatal unconscious
which typically precedes onset of wars and revolutions. In his meticulous explorations,
Tarnas recognized the deep correlation between the phenomenology of what I call Basic
Perinatal Matrices (BPMs) and astrological archetypes (BPM I and Neptune, BPM II and
Saturn, BPM III, and Pluto and BPM IV and Uranus). He also was able to demonstrate
throughout human history deep correlations between the periods of wars and revolutions
and hard Pluto/Saturn aspects (Tarnas 2006).
5. Search for a New Planetary Myth.
18
Scholars, such as Arnold Toynbee and Joseph Campbell noticed that all cultures
of the past were governed by an underlying myth or a combination of myths. Joseph
Campbell often raised the question: “What are the myths that are driving the Western
civilization?” He himself emphasized the importance of the Search for the Holy Grail
myth in its relation to individualism characterizing Western society. We can also think
about the two major myths of the modern era: Paradise Lost vs. Ascent of Man. Equally
appropriate seems to be the motif of the Abduction and Rape of the Feminine,
Death/Rebirth Struggle, and a variety of others - Faust, Sorcerer’s Apprentice,
Frankenstein, Prodigal Son, Tower of Babel, etc.
Joseph Campbell also often asked: what will be the myth of the future and he
expressed his hope that it would involve overcoming fragmentation and creating a
planetary civilization, where people would live in harmony with others and with nature,
benefiting from the astonishing discoveries of science and technology, but using them
with wisdom coming from a deep spiritual place (New Atlantis). Achievement of this
goal would also involve psychospiritual rebirth and liberation and return of the feminine.
Since we are talking about planetary civilization, I would like to mention a very
interesting observation that seems very relevant in this regard. One of the most
surprising discoveries in my work with psychedelics and with the holotropic breathwork
was the ease with which individuals in holotropic states of consciousness (including
myself) transcended historical and geographical boundaries and experienced archetypal
figures, motifs, and domains from just about any culture in human history. Over the
years, I have myself have experienced in my own psychedelic sessions episodes from
many different mythologies and religions of the world – Hindu, Buddhist, Tibetan
Buddhist, Moslem, Christian, Egyptian, Shinto, Australian Aborigene, Native American,
South American, and others.
This has to be a new phenomenon. Many other cultures had and used powerful
mind-altering technologies, including psychedelic plants. Had the collective unconscious
19
in its entirety been as easily accessible for them as it seems to be for modern subjects,
we would not have distinct culture-specific mythologies. We have to assume that, for
example, the Tibetans experienced primarily Tibetan deities and Huichol Indians in
Mexico Huichol deities. There are no descriptions of the Dear Spirit or Grandfather Fire
in the Bardo Thodol or those of the Dhyani Buddhas in the Huichol lore.
It seems that this increased accessibility of various domains in the collective
unconscious parallels what is happening in the material world. Until the end of the
fifteenth century, Europeans did not know anything about the New World and its
inhabitants and vice versa. Many human groups in remote parts of the world remained
unknown to the rest of the world until the modern era. Tibet was relatively isolated until
the Chinese invasion in 1949. Today telephone, short-wave radio stations, television, jet
travel, and more recently the Internet have dissolved many of the old boundaries. Let us
hope that what is happening in the inner and the outer world are indications that we are
moving toward a truly global civilization.
6. Consciousness research, archetypal psychology, and astrology.
The new understanding of the nature and function of the archetypes that has
emerged from the study of holotropic states of consciousness has important implications
for the field of astrology. On the one hand, it brings strong supportive evidence for the
worldview underlying astrology (Grof 2009), on the other hand it opens new exciting
perspectives for psychiatry, psychology, and a broad range of other disciplines. This is a
complex topic that has to be reserved for another time and place.
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