Thursday 30 June 2016

So what happens next?

"So what is that we’re grieving? Have I just been caught up in the hype? Am I over-reacting? I’ve been trying to put my finger on it, and this is what I have so far:
I mourn the triumph of false hope, as so many people have pinned their aspirations on an out vote in ways that reality cannot possibly live up to – hopes for jobs, a foot on the housing ladder, a Britain for the British. There will be further disappointment in store as those false hopes unravel, with anger and betrayal to come.
I see men like Nigel Farage, Donald Trump, and Rupert Murdoch getting what they wanted. I see politicians putting their own careers above the needs of the country and succeeding, the weight of lies on both sides, and it’s hard to escape the feeling that evil has triumphed.
In theory, a referendum is a form of direct democracy. But this one, like the last one, has been called for political gain – a ploy by David Cameron to shore up his own party. On this self-interested gamble we have redirected the whole story of a nation. Democracy has been abused.
Whichever way you voted, how can you not been sad about the ugliness of our media and our public discourse over the last few months? There has been so little regard for truth, for facts, for reason. The biggest decision we have had to make in my lifetime has been made on half-truths and wishful thinking.
I mourn the divisions we have created and the brokenness of our society, the way the exit vote gives a tacit sanction to xenophobia, suspicion, and a turning away from global issues and the needs of the most vulnerable.
Perhaps most of all, I mourn the irreversibility of the decision. Unlike a general election, we can’t change our minds in four years time if it doesn’t work out the way we planned."
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The Soul of Man under Socialism Oscar Wilde

“Man is complete in himself. When they go into the world, the world will disagree with them. That is inevitable. The world hates Individualism. But that is not to trouble them. They are to be calm and self-centred. If a man takes their cloak, they are to give him their coat, just to show that material things are of no importance. If people abuse them, they are not to answer back. What does it signify? The things people say of a man do not alter a man. He is what he is. Public opinion is of no value whatsoever. Even if people employ actual violence, they are not to be violent in turn. That would be to fall to the same low level. After all, even in prison, a man can be quite free. His soul can be free. His personality can be untroubled. He can be at peace. And, above all things, they are not to interfere with other people or judge them in any way. Personality is a very mysterious thing. A man cannot always be estimated by what he does. He may keep the law, and yet be worthless. He may break the law, and yet be fine. He may be bad, without ever doing anything bad. He may commit a sin against society, and yet realise through that sin his true perfection.” 
― Oscar Wilde

Open letter to: Jeremy Corbyn, Tim Farron, Leanne Wood on behalf of Green Party of England and Wales,

Open letter to: Jeremy Corbyn, Tim Farron, Leanne Wood on behalf of Green Party of England and Wales,
In a spirit of openness and transparency, we are writing to you as Leaders of parties which oppose Brexit, to invite you to a cross-party meeting to explore how we best rise to the challenge posed by last week’s vote to Leave the EU.  
Britain is in crisis and people are scared about the future. Never have we had a greater need for calm leadership to be shown by politicians.  
We have a UK Government in chaos, an economy facing a crisis and people up and down the country facing serious hardship. There is an urgent need to make a stand against any austerity and the slashing of environmental legislation, human and workers’ rights, that may come with Brexit. 
With the growing likelihood of an early General Election, the importance of progressive parties working together to prevent the formation of a Tory-UKIP-DUP government that would seek to enact an ultra-right Brexit scenario is ever more pressing.
This is an opportunity to recognise that a more plural politics is in both the Left’s electoral and political interests. This crisis exposes the absurdity of our first past the post electoral system.  Just 24 per cent of those eligible to vote elected the government that called the referendum. The only fair way to proceed is to have a proportional voting system where people can back the politicians who they believe in, rather than taking a gamble and not knowing who they will end up with.  
The idea of a progressive alliance has been floated for several years, and proposals have once again been put forward in the context of the current crisis.  We believe that the time has come to urgently consider such ideas together in the context of a Westminster Government. We recognise the very different political situation in Scotland, given the strongly pro-EU majority there. We hope that co-operation between progressive parties their can ensure that this mandate is respected, and we will support them to keep all options open.
We look forward to your response,
Natalie Bennett, Leader of The Green Party of England and Wales
Steven Agnew MLA, Leader of the Green Party of Northern Ireland
Alice Hooker-Stroud, Leader of Wales Green Party
Caroline Lucas, MP for Brighton Pavilion

Discovery of the Self

"inner powers of the opposite sex, anima and animus; and finally, there is the discovery of the Self.
TO ME IT SEEMS TO MAKE SENSE to talk about the practical side of psychological work first, since in my experience misunderstandings between experts in different fields arise principally from their having too little down-to-earth contact with each other’s specialized material. C. G. Jung’s basic views on the discovery of the Self, which he called individuation, are taken as premises here: the first stage is the integration of the shadow; the second is the assimilation of the
The shadow is a collective designation for the most varied characteristics of the ego personality—in our culture usually inferior, natural or instinctive, or even evil characteristics—that have been repressed through education or personal abhorrence.
The anima comprises the positive and negative—for the most part also repressed—feminine characteristics in a man. In its positive aspect it is feminine empathy or sensitivity, sometimes also the sense of feeling, eros, artistic tendencies, love of nature, acceptance of the validity of the irrational. Negatively, it is moodiness, irritability, subjective judgment, whininess, hypochondria, sentimentality.
The animus in a woman manifests positively as initiative, depth of thought, consistency, courage, sense of religious truth; negatively as rigid opinionatedness, brutality, exaggeratedly masculine behavior, and so on.
The main aspect of the Self is numinosity itself—that which is ultimately supreme, a revelation of “the meaning of life,” the divine inner psychic center, the inner peace beyond all conflict, that which is experienced as the absolute inner truth."
Marie-Louise von Franz, Archetypal Dimensions of the Psyche

Wednesday 29 June 2016

At your low point

At your low point you are no longer distinct from your fellow beings.
You are not ashamed and do not regret it, since insofar as you live the life of your fellow beings and descend to their lowliness / you also climb into the holy stream of common life, where you are no longer an individual on a high mountain, but a fish among fish, a frog among frogs.
Your heights are your own mountain, which belongs to you and you alone. There you are individual and live your very own life.
If you live your own life, you do not live the common life, which is always continuing and never-ending, the life of history and the inalienable and ever-present burdens and products of the human race.
There you live the endlessness of being, but not the becoming. Becoming belongs to the heights and is full of torment.
How can you become if you never are?
Therefore you need your bottommost, since there you are. But therefore you also need your heights, since there you become.
If you live the common life at your lowest reaches, then you become aware of your self.
If you are on your heights, then you are your best, and you become aware only of your best, but not that which you are in the general life as a being.
What one is as one who becomes, no one knows. But on the heights, imagination is at its strongest.
For we imagine that we know what we are as developing beings, and even more so, the less we want to know what we are as beings.
Because of that we do not love the condition of our being brought low; although or rather precisely because only there do we attain clear knowledge of ourselves.
C. G. Jung. The Red Book.

Oh No its politics again' ...........

It's Not Politically Correct To Say, But People Who Say "It's Not Politically Correct To Say, But . . ." Are in most cases generally the type who say they are not political....

An Independent is someone who wants to take the politics out of politics. Adlai E. Stevenson

What, exactly, do people mean to signal when they preface a comment with "I know this isn't politically correct to say, but . . ."? in my experience the person who says they are non political really means that they are not prepared to challenge the status qua either in themselves or in others. They accept things the way they are and moan about those who do not. They is only one exception to this that I know of in Neath so I will not embarrass them to name them but I will point out that they served diligently, actively and politically on Neath Town Council.
In one case I have seen one particular independent move gradually to the right over the last two years of their community activity and now finds themselves indistinguishable from a Tory while at the same time fervently denying it.(No Councillor Hunt I am not speaking about you)
What does it mean to make a group non political/ Does it let the admin off the hook/ Does it mean not upsetting someone? Does it mean that there is a common sense that is agreed at all times and at all places. Or does it mean that there are questions and issues that should not be raided? The personal is always political .I am so fed up with those who want an easy life and to be liked for everything they do. That's not what being political is..it is political cowardice The personal is most political..........
The meaning of the phrase goes further to say that all the choices we make, even the ones that seem totally apolitical and personal, have political implications. The choice to wear particular or not, to watch TV or not, to eat this or that or not, to wear this or that item of clothing, to use a bank or not, and so on, is personal, but it is also political. 


The "personal is political"- meaning that personal outcomes are largely a product of systemic relations and of structures beyond each individual that need to be addressed-came to mean, instead, that all political phenomena arise from the accumulated personal choices of individuals, so that what needed to be addressed to win better circumstances was primarily people's personal choices. 

People who say they are not political raise certain questions. It is boasting? "Please acknowledge that I am brave, a rebel, a nonconformist, by being willing to say the following in defiance of social convention." Is it special pleading? "I recognise that the following may be considered rude, but please pretend that it is not because I have acknowledged it.""You can treat this as not-rude because I have pre-announced that it could be seen as rude. "Nobody would actually be offended by what I'm about to say, but I'm going to pretend that some people will in order to paint them as ridiculous." Is it self-serious cross-climbing? "Contemplate, for a moment, how I will suffer for being willing to share great truths with you."
There are plenty of interesting issues embedded here. Is there some sort of social or moral convention that requires us to keep unsolicited messages private? (
But let's carve out just one issue: what is he y saying with "I appreciate that this is probably horrendously politically incorrect"? I don't see anything to admire about it. It smacks of "I sense on some rudimentary level that this will likely annoy you but I'm going to say it anyway, so deal with it." Or perhaps it means "modern norms of discourse annoy me and I shan't abide by them and I find it necessary to announce my defiance." Saying it strikes me as strengthening the argument that the communication is rude, or uncouth, or aggressive.
Norms about courtesy and rudeness change. Do you disagree with the changes? Are you trying to resist and push back against the changes? Fine. Speak, and let the chips fall where they may. But ask yourself: what are you trying to accomplish by such a preface in any particular communication?






Setting of a dream

Setting of dream = past. Problem of dream = present. Solution = future.
C. G. Jung has shown that most dreams have the same basic structure as the classical drama: (1) An exposition where time, place, and dramatis personae are shown; (2) a naming of the problem; (3) a peripety or several peripeties; and (4) a lysis-solution or catastrophe. 
Owing to a dream which he had, Dr. Paul Walder added to this the idea that the first two parts of dreams deal more with the past, the peripeties with the present, and the last part with the future. He was able to confirm this after studying over one hundred dreams, and I myself have also found it to be often true.
The ego is moving in time from the past to the future. The dream comes up toward it from the unconscious, like a wave containing a cluster of images. The three arrows show the field of perception when we become aware of the dream: first perceiving the past, being hit by the present, and then seeing ahead the solution.
(Not only the past is preserved and still fully alive in the unconscious but also the future.)
Marie-Louise Von Franz, Psyche and Matter

If you depose Corbyn I will vote Green...an Alchemy of the Left?

A letter in the Mirror read “If you depose Corbyn, then I shall leave Labour and vote Green. We are in an alchemical container of the left. What happens next is anybodies guess. I spent last Summer predicating that Corbyn would not make it and I was wrong. So I will not predict what will happen next or speculate too much.......

I know that whatever does happen that a Green Ecosocialist current will be vital. Either there will be an inrush into the green party from departing Corbynistas or there will be a building around the Greens of other groupings and traditions. The problem is you can never tell where alchemical processes go.

Yesterday I happened to be in a Pub in Neath. I overheard a group of men talking about the Labour Party and Jeremy Corbyn. One said he is unelectable. Later I heard an interview with David Blunkett. He said the problem with Marxists are they cant tell the difference between what is going on inside their own head and the world. The real problem is that none of us can. The men in the pub and David Blunkett like all of us find that difficult. The problem we all have is that our paradigm is a product of our own prejudices, influences and concerns. Change occurs when the thoughts inside our head change and we act in the world. And I think there is a mighty judgement coming on how we view things......

As for me this at present is my paradigm. Its been there since last year ...perhaps it will change who knows..but reality is an odd thing and common sense is a myth created by a particular person at a particular time abd us entirely self constructed. Here is mine given those limitations......an independent socialist and green Wales. A Wales where power is devolved to the lowest possible administrative unit. A Wakes that is diverse, tolerant, open to all that does not judge or impose conformity on lifestyle, beliefs or identity. A Wales where its people are aware of it culture, history and language and which is fully bilingual and multi cultural. A Wales that supports workers rights, public services and a comprehensive welfare system. A Wales that protects the rights of animals to be free from exploitation. I am opposed to Nuclear Power and seek a Wales powered by renewables that are owned by the communities of Wales. I would like a Wales that is a non-aligned, neutral republic and which is free from the arms industry".





Tuesday 28 June 2016

Jung`s last dream

"Jung's last recorded dream which he dreamed a few nights before his death, we owe to Ruth Bailey. She kindly wrote it out for me at the time: 1) He saw a big, round block of stone in a high bare place and on it was inscribed: “This shall be a sign unto you of wholeness and oneness.” 2) A lot of vessels, pottery vases, on the right side of a square place. 3) A square of trees, all fibrous roots, coming up from the ground and surrounding him. There were gold threads gleaming among the roots. 
This is a very beautiful last dream, in which Jung’s unity and wholeness are confirmed and shown to him in the symbol of a round stone. The pots in the square to the right are also full of meaning, when we remember that in ancient Egypt some parts of the dismembered corpse of the god Osiris were kept in pots, because it was from these that the resurrection was expected to take place. Moreover, the old Greeks kept pots in their houses full of wheat seeds. The pots and the soil represented the underworld and the seed the dead waiting for resurrection. About the time of All Souls’ Day, the pots were opened and the dead were supposed to join the living. Christ’s saying: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit” (John 12:24) belongs in the same connection. 


As to the roots, Jung said in Memories: Life has always seemed to me like a plant that lives on its rhizome. Its true life is invisible, hidden in the rhizome. The part that appears above ground lasts only a single summer. Then it withers away—an ephemeral apparition. When we think of the unending growth and decay of life and civilizations, we cannot escape the impression of absolute nullity. Yet I have never lost a sense of something that lives and endures underneath the eternal flux. What we see is the blossom, which passes. The rhizome remains. Now that the “blossom was passing away” and proving itself, like all mortal life, to be “an ephemeral apparition,” the eternal roots, that were also C. G. Jung, appeared above the surface and spread themselves protectingly over him. This dream tells us with the greatest clearness that Jung was dying at the right time, and was about to be received by that rhizome which he had always known was there as his “true invisible life.” Or, to use the language he used in Memories, his No. 1 personality was dying, but his No. 2 remained unchanged. 
Jung died at a quarter to four on Tuesday afternoon, June 6. There were again some synchronistic events, as there had been in 1944. I remember most vividly that when I went to fetch my car, just before he died, I found the battery, which was not old and had never given the slightest trouble before, completely run down. This puzzled me very much at the time; when Ruth telephoned about half an hour later, it seemed quite natural and as if the car had known. There was, however, no thunderstorm at the time Jung died (as has been reported from time to time). That came an hour or two later, at which time lightning struck a tall poplar tree in his garden at the edge of the lake. This is most unusual, for the water attracts the lightning and therefore trees and houses on its banks are usually immune. The tree was not destroyed, only a geat deal of its bark was stripped off. In fact, it was discovered by the family when they found the lawn covered with bits of bark when they went into the garden after the storm was over."
Barbara Hannah, Jung's Life and Work

Reflections from a year ago

I have been thinking a great deal over the weekend since the Tunisian attack on tourists. What struck me was that in the case of the attack on the South Carolina Church no mention was made of the fact the gunman believed he was carrying out his religious duty from an interpretation that he had made of " Christianity". no one has demanded that Christians make clear their differences with the gunman....so it seems obvious to me that the same rules should apply to Islamic believers. Comparing IS to main stream Islam would be like comparing the Klu Klux Klan to mainstream Christianity.
This week I am starting to teach a course on Medieval Philosophy and we will be looking at European, Islamic and Jewish Philosophy of the period. In particular we will look at the Iberian period in Spanish history when scholars in each tradition shared ideas, debated and existed in a multicultural , multiethnic and multi religious society. If you are interested we start on Tuesday at 10.30 for eight weeks.. I think its going to be interesting.......I have managed to trace my ancestors back to Granada in Spain so I am a product of this culture. I wonder if anybody is going to tell me to go back there.

If you don`t fit in.....England leaves Europe twice

Synchronicity
Synchronicity is a concept, first explained by psychiatrist Carl Jung, which holds that events are "meaningful coincidences" if they occur with no causal relationship, yet seem to be meaningfully related. England has managed to leave Europe twice in one week.
Karma(Sanskrit: कर्म; IPA: [ˈkərmə] ( listen); Pali: karma) means action, work or deed; it also refers to the spiritual principle of cause and effect where intent and actions of an individual (cause) influence the future of that individual (effect).
How ironic, how karmic it is, And who was responsible? look at the following table it states it all quite clearly. People over the age of 50, people with a poor educational background meaning those who are most psychologically fixed into an inward looking position, most able to be manipulated and most prone to be stirred up by the racists and the bigots. It is important that our education system should teach us to think, rather than obey. To discover rather than be made into a docile workforce and to realise that the forces who oppress us here are the forces that create international oppression and inequality.
You remember the joke Boris Johnson , an immigrant and a voter were sitting around a table on the table were 20 biscuits. Boris Johnson took 19 of them and shouted out to the voter “ that immigrant is after your biscuit”. The tragedy is that vast sections believed Boris, Farage and Gove. They want you to be poorly educated, to think in a particular way and the collective unconscious has given you a message. They gave it to you via Iceland. It was no accident that on google the day after the referendum the second most searched topic was “What is the EU ? ” It was a little too late...........

Meanwhile as the main political parties move into melt down. We have the delightful Boris Johnson versus Theresa May and for labour we have Jeremy Corbyn versus Angela Eagle. An election looms when will you wake up to what is coming? Yesterday I came across a message in Port Talbot Debate and argue it had the words clearly stated “If you dont fit in fuck off” A great message for the English football team.............

If you don`t fit in.....England leaves Europe twice

Synchronicity
Synchronicity is a concept, first explained by psychiatrist Carl Jung, which holds that events are "meaningful coincidences" if they occur with no causal relationship, yet seem to be meaningfully related. England has managed to leave Europe twice in one week.
Karma(Sanskrit: कर्म; IPA: [ˈkərmə] ( listen); Pali: karma) means action, work or deed; it also refers to the spiritual principle of cause and effect where intent and actions of an individual (cause) influence the future of that individual (effect).
How ironic, how karmic it is, And who was responsible? look at the following table it states it all quite clearly. People over the age of 50, people with a poor educational background meaning those who are most psychologically fixed into an inward looking position, most able to be manipulated and most prone to be stirred up by the racists and the bigots. It is important that our education system should teach us to think, rather than obey. To discover rather than be made into a docile workforce and to realise that the forces who oppress us here are the forces that create international oppression and inequality.
You remember the joke Boris Johnson , an immigrant and a voter were sitting around a table on the table were 20 biscuits. Boris Johnson took 19 of them and shouted out to the voter “ that immigrant is after your biscuit”. The tragedy is that vast sections believed Boris, Farage and Gove. They want you to be poorly educated, to think in a particular way and the collective unconscious has given you a message. They gave it to you via Iceland. It was no accident that on google the day after the referendum the second most searched topic was “What is the EU ? ” It was a little too late...........

Meanwhile as the main political parties move into melt down. We have the delightful Boris Johnson versus Theresa May and for labour we have Jeremy Corbyn versus Angela Eagle. An election looms when will you wake up to what is coming? Yesterday I came across a message in Port Talbot Debate and argue it had the words clearly stated “If you dont fit in fuck off” A great message for the English football team.............

Monday 27 June 2016

From A Green Socialist to a Labour Socialist



I have great empathy and understanding for Jeremy Corbyn at this moment. I experienced a very similar event some 11 years ago. You learn about who is really on your side, you find great personal strength within and you realise who has and who has not any real understanding of what is going on. Events last year after the general election made me realiuse just how little people on the left really fail to understand how individual psychology and personal lack of perception blinds people to the collective nature of a political party. The friends that supported me during that period 11 years ago and this time last year when a witch hunt began over a friend of mine  you have  have my universal respect, effect and care. The question we all must keep is the faith we share in our political tradition and in our self awreness. I support you Jeremy in your unwavering faith in Socialism, animal rights and love of the cultral differences we all share. I salute yoiu as a Socialist from another party and wish you well. Perhaps this alchemical moment is a prelude to left realignment and the building of a mighty force for EcoEco-socialism. There will be many false messiahs, many ignorant little boys of all ages many careerists to be aware of and avoided. Good luck and maintain the faith.



Philosophy Courses at Asclepius starting this week


Philosophy and Culture of the 20th Century
Who were the great thinkers of the 20th Century? They were poets and painters, novelists and scientists, philosophers and playwrights. Their ideas and debates decisively shaped 20th-century European culture and still define our world today.
Who Were the Key Thinkers of the 20th Century?

Poets, playwrights, novelists, and memoirists including Stéphane Mallarmé, Arthur Rimbaud, Émile Zola, Joseph Conrad, Henrik Ibsen, James Joyce, Marcel Proust, W. B. Yeats, Wilfred Owen, Siegfried Sassoon, T. S. Eliot, Franz Kafka, Thomas Mann, Virginia Woolf, George Orwell, Günther Grass, Primo Levi, and Václav Havel
Painters such as Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, and Wassily Kandinsky
Philosophers and theorists including Henri Bergson, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Albert Einstein, Edmund Husserl, Martin Heidegger, Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean-Paul Sartre, Karl Jaspers, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, and Jürgen Habermas
Social scientists such as Émile Durkheim, Max Weber, Marcel Mauss, John Maynard Keynes, Hannah Arendt, Jacques Lacan, Marc Bloch, Fernand Braudel, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Carl Jung, and Sigmund Freud. Course runs for ten weeks in two hour sessions. The course will cost £50 . For more details ring 01792 480245 or 0759233046

Philosophy and Culture of the 19th Century
This course is an opportunity to explore the major thinkers and historic challenges that shaped the mind of Europe in the 19th century. Intellectual history emphasizes the exchanges of ideas and debates that went on among people from other places and times. But it also stresses the importance of a continuing dialogue between the present and the past.
This course in intellectual history, therefore, seeks to expand our capacity for engaging in informed "dialogue" with the intellectual world of 19th-century Europe.
The thoughts of that world are still with us today, powerful forces in the cultural, intellectual, and political debates of the early 21st century.
In fact, 19th-century Europe was the crucible for most of the ideas, institutions, and "isms" that now shape the life of our entire planet, including:
nationalism
capitalism
democracy
socialism
conservatism
liberalism
feminism
bureaucracy.
And the list goes on. The course lasts for 10 weeks. It costs 350. For more details ring 01792 480245 or 07592330467

Let all the poisons in the mud hatch out.........

 We have a crisis in both major parties.Is the Labour answerable to its membership or to its mps.I have nou doubt thats its the members.There is clearly a neo-liberal plot in the wings. Corbyn was was elected by 259,000 members.The next Tory Primeminister will be elected by the 150,000 members of the conservative party.These members are all in their late sixties and totally unrepresentative of the majority of people. The crisis of hegemony is coming.The plot in Labour deepens, Who the hell is Steven Kinnock to speak as he does....the man who managed the lowest Labour vote in Port Talbot? Is he the puppet of his father? the stalking horse of a new Blairite coup? How odd it that Diane Abbot's interview was mysteriously ended by a technical error. In South America the interpretation would be obvious.
The Brexiteers have won the vote but now look anxious,unsure afraid.Whar have they done.Are we about to see a coalltion national government formed by the remain Tories and the non Corbyn Parliamentary Labour Party. Does the shadow of 1931 hang over us all? Will there be a 1919 style coupon election in October.? I feel ill ar ease ...its clear Scotland will be going.....that there is a tnreat of the Troubles returning to Northern Ireland. I am ashamed of the intolerance I see all around me.....what will happen when the leavers realise that nothing can be done about immigration as thi gs are. If you want a european trading market you need free movement of labour and capital and goods. When the voters who are poor on benefits, low pay and disadvantaged see the real face of IDS turned on them then they will learn that they are oppressed by the forces they voted for. Last year wrote these words seen below.....I still feel the same even more so....what have we done and what comes next?



Sometimes I believe life is episodic, some times I believe it is narrative in nature. And my belief varies between saying there is no free will and at other times I think we need the outlook of behaving as if there is free will. When I am episodic Neitzche calls to me stating that we are small particles of fate living out our roles acting upon our natures..this happens when I am a Philosopher. When I am into a narrative belief I read Carl Jung and find myself a Psychotherapist. When I am a political activist I am Gramsci and believe that I could storm the walls of Heaven......its Monday


The Age of Stupid and the Spirit of Schardenfreude

It was Thursday evening. I had a busy day helping Remain. I was wearing a Remain T shirt as I walked past Neath Workies a man standing outside looked at me. He shouted “Good on you mate. If they think that “fucking Farage and that twat Boris is going to look after them then they are stupid” I think that encounter has helped a great deal over the weekend. A friend sent me a message over the weekend it said “Whenever I read how exiteers will suffer due to leaving the EU I have a (not very admirable) sense of schardenfreude. Am I really that nasty? I plead guilty I replied its the only way to stay sane in this the age of Stupid.

Now we know that IDS has denied that leave ever said that the £350 million pounds a day we spent on the EU will go to the NHS. Farage himself has said similar. We wil have a choice of either Boris Johnson or Theresa May as Prime Minister. The revolt of the council estate has led to a victory of the toffs and billionaires. We have a crisis both constitutional and economic. The British state is cracking. This is not Independence day its Isolation day. Scotland is on the brink, Northern Ireland is debating Irish reunification. A petition has been launched for an Independent Wales. In Neath the vote for Remain was just ahead but Port Talbot voted 2 to 1 to leave. Steven Kinnock moans that Jeremy Corbyn did not support the Remain campaign properly, yet Corbyn constituency voted 3 to 1 to remain while Port Talbot voted 2 to 1 to leave. What a hypocrite and arch assassin he is. Does he have his eyes oh a role as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party I wonder? Will big daddy fix it for him?

I know I am possessed by the spirit of schardenfreude. This morning. I know my shadow very well. There are reports of ethnic minorities being threatened, Poles being told to go home, a Muslim woman surrounded by chanting youths. What was it Farge said a victory for “ordinary decent people” no it was a victory, for the isolationist, the little Englander, the billionaire and the prejudiced. There were a few on the Leave side I respect and until Christmas I was considering a leave vote. Then I saw it the demons of hate and prejudice unleashed and I knew what I had to do.

However out of the crisis I hope will come a shattering of the British state, a unified Ireland, an Independent Scotland and a free eco-socialist Wales. Out of disintegrations new possibilities, many silver linings and a massive realignment of the left. The demise of the Union Jack after 300 years I celebrate we in Wales have never been on it . Tonight I will be shouting for Iceland to complete the process.


But I have said it before and I say it again I have never seen so many Turkeys voting for an early Christmas.......this is truly the age of stupid.

Friday 24 June 2016

The Farage Mantra..power from the other side.........

"Today, institutions fundamental to the British system of Government are under attack: the public schools, the house of Lords, the Church of England, the holy institution of Marriage, even our magnificent police force are no longer safe from those who would undermine our society, and it's about time we said 'enough is enough' and saw a return to the traditional British values of discipline, obedience, morality and freedom.

‘It is better to light a candle than curse the darkness’

.

Another Europe is Possible worked tirelessly over the past few months to forge a movement that could progress an alternative vision for Europe. Britain’s decision to leave the European Union opens a world of uncertainty that campaigners in the UK must now try to steer in a positive direction, in spite of the divisions that have been stirred. We don’t pretend that this will be easy. The mainstream campaign to leave the EU has pandered to nationalism, has encouraged a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment and has fostered a notion that outside the EU we can return to an age when Britain was the world’s foremost ‘great power’.
 
We understand and share the distrust many people feel towards the institutions of the EU. The EU lacks proper democratic accountability, negotiates exploitative trade policies like TTIP, visits economic destruction on its own member states, and at times has treated refugees as if they were criminals.
 
Our argument for remaining in the EU was that, together with the hundreds of millions of fellow Europeans, we have the power to transform Europe and, in so doing, to control corporations, halt climate change and overcome the nationalisms that have haunted our continent for centuries. The campaign to leave the EU has demonised some of the poorest people in Europe. We share the sense of fear that many of those people must now feel.
 
That’s why many of us who have worked to build “Another Europe is Possible” will not stop working towards forging a better Europe, and a better country, with allies and friends across the continent. We commit ourselves to fighting the rising tide of nationalism and racism across Europe and building a campaign to defend the rights and dignity of immigrants in Britain. We will work for the most just transition out of the EU possible, campaigning against the erosion of human and workers’ rights and the type of extreme free trade deals which the leaders of the Leave campaign have threatened.
 
We will not give up in our attempts to build a very different sort of world based on equality, democracy and humanity. In this new Britain, we believe our movement is even more important. In coming weeks we will revisit our work and propose new priorities with those who have worked so tirelessly in the past few months, pounding the pavement across the UK to make our voices heard. We hope some of those who campaigned for a left-wing exit will also join us in this work.
 
It is better to light a candle than curse the darkness. In the months ahead we will try to ensure that we lay the foundations for a better country. We must prove to the world that Britain will not become a byword for intolerance, insularity and despair. Another Europe is poss
ible. Another Britain is necessary.

Jung`s Structure of the Psyche

I propose to start by describing the broad structures of the Jungian model of the self. However I will add as an addendum detailed description of the interrelationship between components and the psychic energy that activates and constellates them throughout the analytical process. This represents my interpretation of Jungian structure and its relation to the transpersonal map. The views expressed are a reflection, fusion and integration of my own interpretation of Jung`s psychotherapy. I recognise that he is a person of his time, a particular political and social outlook . In many ways he makes the subject and gender in terms of binary oppositions.

Jung's analytical Psychology involves both a structure and a dynamic of the Psyche. By Psyche Jung means the whole of our being both conscious and unconscious. It is innately purposeful or teleological, seeking, growth, wholeness and equilibrium. It is distinguishable from the concept of the Self, which stands for the goal towards which the Psyche is oriented.

The Psyche is divided into the conscious and the unconscious and the latter serves to compensate the conscious attitude. Whenever the conscious attitude is too one sided, the unconscious manifests itself autonomously to rectify the imbalance. It does this through powerfully charged dreams or or images. It can also do this through the creation of pathologies or disease.

Frequently an unconscious component can externalise itself and appear from without. This is called a projection. This involves a powerful emotional response to a person or situation. It may involve falling in love or disliking someone intensely. Such powerful emotional responses may indicate that an unconscious content is seeking to break or burst through into consciousness, but it can only appear as externalised or projected onto the other person or situation. It is not the other person or situation we love or hate but part of ourselves projected onto to him or indeed the situation

Locating the direction of psychic energy is a key part of the analysts task and as an aid to such an analysis. To this end Jung developed a series of psychological types to divide this energy into two basic attitudes-extrovert and introvert which is present in everyone in varying degrees. An extroverts attitude is attitude is motivated from the outside and is directed by external , objective factors and relationships.

Using Sigmund Freud as a prime example I observe see that his psychic energy flowed outwards towards the world. In the case of Jung we see attitude motivated from within and directed by inner subjective factors. In other words withdrawing energy from the world This can clearly be seen in the philosophical attitudes and conflicts between Freud and Jung. It shows that the extrovert and the introvert fail to understand one another and disrespect one another. A similar observation could be seen in the tensions and contrast between Hegel and Kierkegaard. Extroversion and introversion are mutually exclusive If one forms the habitual conscious attitude the other one becomes unconscious and acts in a compensatory manner. If the conscious attitude becomes too fixed, its unconscious attitude will break through as “the return of the repressed”. Jung classification has become so influential that the terms “ are now part of everyday speech extrovert” and “introvert” and we commonly use them to describe recognizable forms of social behaviour.

Beside these two attitudes, Jung introduces four functional types, these are a four part structure or quaternity which resembles the mandala. Jung argues that nature has four seasons and four compass points and just like ancient Greek medicine that divided human nature into the four “humours” of choleric, melancholic,sanguine and phlegmatic there were the four qualities of hot,cold, dry and moist that were in turn linked into the four elements of fire, Earth, air and water/ Jung realised that such quaternities could be used to describe the character and structure of the psyche. From this Jung posits four functions of the psyche grouped into two parts of opposites.

Intuition which tells us where a feeling comes from or is going to was opposed by sensation which tells us that something exists.. Thinking which tells us what something is is opposed by feeling and tells if something is good or bad.. Thinking and feelings are called “rational” by Jung and he calls sensation and intuition irrational because neither evaluates but instead depends upon an act of perception. An individuals innate conscious will be towards one of these four. If one of these four types is superior or most differentiated it means that by the process of compensation that its opposite will be unconscious. This is known as the undifferentiated function. The leftover other two are partially conscious or auxiliary functions which may serve or assist the superior function.

The return of the repressed may for example cause the overdeveloped thinking type to experience unbalanced moods and upsets. A feeling type boy could be forced to develop characteristics by a thinking type father, creating a crisis sf unhappiness in later life. Repressed feeling returns as hysteria. Repressed sensation manifests in phobias, compulsions and obsessions. Consequently mental and physical heath depends upon the development of the neglected functions and an awareness of the four types at work in oneself to achieve a rounded personality. The transpersonal map seems to be a good representation of the larger structures of the psyche. My main problem with it is that fails to describe the interaction, effect and dialectical process of both the archetypes in reflection of one another and in the way that it needs far more detail to explain the process of constellation and process.

A human being would certainly not grow to be seventy or eighty years old if this longevity had no meaning for the species.The afternoon of human life must also have a significance of its own and cannot be merely a pitiful appendage to life’s morning.
The significance of the morning undoubtedly lies in the development of the individual, our entrenchment in the outer world, the propagation of our kind, and the care of our children.
This is the obvious purpose of nature
But when this purpose has been attained -and more than attained-shall the earning of money, the extension of conquests, and the expansion of life go steadily on beyond the bounds of all reason and sense?
Whoever carries over into the afternoon the law of the morning, or the natural aim, must pay for it with damage to his soul, just as surely as a growing youth who tries to carry over his childish egoism into adult life must pay for this mistake with social failure.

In CW 8: The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche 
The Stages of Life
Page 75



Addendum


Additional information on structure and dynamics of the Psyche


Jung combines these two attitudes with the four functions and creates eight psychological types. By locating the persons type we are enabled to see the clients world-view and value system. These types describe personality and relationship patterns or career choices.

Extrovert thinkers direct themselves and others according to fixed rules and principles. They are interested in “reality, order and materiel facts. Darwin s search for natural laws or Marx's creation of theoretical formulations illustrate such types Extroverted thinking types might be illustrated by the Philosopher Wittgenstein when he asked the question, What is thinking? They formulate questions and seek to understand their own being. They tend yo neglect the world and dwell on their own ideas. Extroverted feeling types could be seen as chat show hosts or celebrities. They are conventional and well adjusted to their time and milleau. They are concerned with personal and social success. They are prone to create and end relationships quickly. , yet also can be sentimental and moody surprisingly. A prime example would be Rod Stewart,.

Introverted feeling types might be someone in a withdrawn community or indeed a musician They appear inaccessible and self sufficient. They can become involved in poetry and music. We might think the phrase “Still waters run deep is the impression they give. They can appear mysterious and enigmatic like Chopin and they attract powerful extrovert individuals for in close relationships.

The extroverted sensation type focus on external facts, are practical hard headed and accept the world as it is. They may be affable enjoyers of life, but they can slip into obsessions and compulsions. They seek pleasure through the senses or perhaps could be best illustrated by Casanova. The introverted sensation type might be a connaisseuror the aesthete. They feed on sense impressions and feed on their own inner sensations. They can be aesthetic . Appear unassuming and bemused. They often have difficulty in expressing their own vision or creativity.

The extroverted intuition type might be a political leader like Tony Blair. Unconscious insight keeps them on the scent of future novelty. They are often charismatic but their ruthless adventuring makes them unfit for long term stability their projects or relationships often tend to go haywire. Introverted intuition types are often poets or mystics. They follow an inner vision are day dreamers and are often clairvoyants seeing themselves as misunderstood geniuses struggling wit ha unique esoteric experience. Individuals like William Blake is a prime example and to others may appear to be a crank.

Jung argued that different types form relationships even unconsciously relying on the other to take care of their own inferior functions. Contrasting types might put each other down and so complementary unions are not the solution to individual psychic wholeness. Same type relationships can double up on the superior function and increase the disruption and challenge of the inferior function Jung was aware that typologies do not express the unique structure of anyone persons structure of the psyche. Individuals are a mixture of types which need lengthy observation and analysis. An individual can also change types through the course of life., however this typology is useful in describing how an individual will respond to archetypal figures and constellations.

The Psychological types are part of a broader dynamic of psychic energy within the structure of the psyche as a whole. There are four main archetypal figures. These figures work together in pairs, one of which is conscious and one unconscious. They are each compensated by their own unconscious counterpart. The first pair is the ego and the shadow. Jung remembered a dream from his own student days. In the dream of a dark night and high winds he remembered that he had a struggle to protect his candle from a high wind. In the dream a gigantic black shadow followed him. Jung identified these experiences as revealing the related archetypal figures as the Ego and the Shadow. He said “The Ego is the fragile . Precious light of consciousness that must be guarded and cultivated”

One of the first step in analysis is to make the client aware of the ego-shadow relationship. The shadow is always the same sex or sexual orientation or sexual identity. The ego is an individuals sense of purpose or identity. A healthy ego organises and balances the unconscious and unconscious elements of the psyche. A weakened ego leaves the individual in the dark and in danger of being swamped by unconscious images. The shadow is our own dark side characterised by our own uncivilized, primitive qualities which the ego wants to hide from others.. Jung described the shadow as “ not wholly bad, but primitive and unadapted. It can vitalise life, if we honestly face up to it”

The Ego and Shadow are personified by Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. This occurs because that whilst the Ego is the centre of consciousness, it should not be confused with self which is the final goal of the individuation process that leads to the wholeness of the personality. The ego which identifies with the self becomes inflated, dangerously god like. An inflated Ego project sits own irrational Shadow onto others and identifies them as evil. The individual patient in the early stages of Jungian analysis who encounters the shadow faces a crisis. The more he recognises and withdraws from the shadow projections, the more he feels his ego. Jung stated “The less I can say `They do this, they are wrong, they must be fought-the more I become a serious problem to myself”. He said that the more we realize that whatever is wrong in the world is in ourselves, the more we deal effectively with our own shadow enabling us to contribute effectively to the real world..

The ego is related to what Jung calls the persona, that part of consciousness which negotiates with the outer world on the Ego's behalf. Persona originates from the Latin word for theatre mask. We like Eleanor Rigby keep it in a jar by the door for wearing when we venture out. The Persona is conditioned by Social Class, career and ethnicity. There are often many different persons we use to suit different situations. However we adopt a general persona based on our superior functional type because it comes more easily to us. Psychic health and equilibrium depend don a well adapted Persona because it makes social interaction possible. Jung states “ the danger is in identifying totally with the persona being nothing but the role you play” The perfect persona can lead to a one sided, rigid and alienated personality. Jung says 2 You are afraid of dropping the mask and finding nothing behind it”. In Ibsen`s " Peer Gynt" this idea is illustrated bysaying that the individual is no more than the numerous skins of an onion.. This almost suggests the case for the non existence of the self if it purely depends upon these layers of masks. Neurosis arises from the “wrong answers to life from empty success and confinement within too narrow a world view. Neurosis disappears by developing into a more complex and varied awareness of personality.

The unconscious side of the persona is the soul image. Jung uses the Latin male and female names for the soul, the animus and the anima.. The Soul Image is always represented by the individuals opposite gender.. The Soul Image is an archetype one which can represent the whole of the unconscious. It is inherited, collective and ageless. However it is modified by an individuals experience of the opposite sex, especially the parents. Soul images appear in dreams, myths and fantasies but are also subject to projection, giving a distorted impression of the opposite sex.. The males soul image has appeared in many forms throughout history but always with the compelling and fascination nature known as Eros, as an archetype of life itself, represented in image of earth and water,. Conventional masculinity in western society have seen this aspect in the notion of virgin or Whore, or as the lady the knight loves chastely or as a source of wisdom or indeed a muse.. Jung in the context of the time claimed over identification could lead yo homosexuality or transvestism. These are clearly a historically sense of fixed gender and sexuality roles. They grate with me but I clearly understand we must see Jung as an individual at atime of a particular facticity and outlook.

The woman's soul image takes the nature of logos9reason or the word), the search for knowledge, truth and meaningful activity. Often represented by image sf fire and water. This too is largely an identification with genders attitudes of the time. According to Jung the animus is projected onto men with whom the woman is involved. This may be a father father figure in a young woman , a heroic man as she matures and a comforting figure like a doctor or a holy man as she grows older still.

Over identification with soul image produces the soul Niger or Black Sun, the animus dominated woman is obstinate, ruthless and domineering craving power and is rationally opinionated. I am tempted to say here that this once more is a product of patriarchy's view at the end of the 19th century . I think is particularly illustrated in jJngs` sexist comment “ sol Niger is prejudiced and as unteachable as a blind tom Cat. I wonder here that Jung may well reflect upon his own shadow.

Jung believed that men were polygamous in their conscious attitude, and so the anima compensates as only one woman in the unconscious. The anima may appear to the male as a cave, a ship,bowl, purse or as a cat amongst other images. He argued that because women were monogamous in their conscious attitude , the animus appears in compensatory form as a group of men. Symbolically appearing as a tower, sword ,tree, lion , eagle or bull amongst many others.

The pairing of conscious Persona and unconscious Soul Image is coloured and given texture by the two attitudes and the four functions. The conscious persona is based on the dominant attitude and superior function. Hence the unconscious Soul Image counterpart will be imagined along the lines of the opposite attitude and inferior function. So besides an extrovert/introvert switch the following happens.. The intuitive persona gives a soul image that is feeling. The feeling persona gives a thinking soul image and the sensation persona an intuitive soul image. Persona

A thinking type man, cut off from the realm of feeling may dream of mermaids, or he may project his unconscious, undifferentiated feeling function onto a feeling type woman type woman with whom he falls in love . By embracing her, he indirectly embraces his own feeling nature. But as he becomes more aware of his own unconscious feeling through the relationship, the anima image holds less fascination for him. His projection will be withdrawn and he falls out of love. As an individual goes through life we become less likely to fall in love in a romantic way because the process of self development and our knowledge of the structure of the psyche and its dynamic leads to self development and knowledge and we become more integrated and aware of our unconscious contents.






Bibliography and Reading List


Freud, Sigmund and Carl Gustav Jung, The Freud-Jung Letters, the Correspondence Between Sigmund Freud and C.G. Jung, Ed. William McGuire. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1974) Main Library 1 BF 175. Rather depressing: these two great men very very mean to each other towards the end.

Jung, C. G., 
Symbols of Transformation, an Analysis of the Prelude to a Case of Schizophrenia, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 5: Main Library 1 s BF 175. This is the book that broke with Freud.

Jung, C. G., 
The Practice of Psychotherapy, Essays on the Psychology of the Transference and Other Subjects, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1954) 16: Main Library 1 BF 175. Contains the valuable Analytical Psychology: its Theory and Practice: a short introduction to Jung's analytical practice.

Jung, C. G., 
Psychology and religion: West and East, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1958) 11: Main Library 1 s BF 175. contains the brilliant lectures Psychology and Religion East and West. A very good introduction after Memories dreams .

Jung, C. G., 
Memories, Dreams, Reflections , Ed. A. Jaffe. (London: Collins and Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1963) Main Library 1 s BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
Aion, researches into the phenomenology of the self, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1959) 9(2): Main Library 1 BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1960) 8: Main Library 1 s BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
Freud and Psychoanalysis, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1961) 4: Main Library 1 BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
Mysterium Coniunctionis, an Inquiry Into the Separation and Synthesis of Psychic Opposites in Alchemy, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung.(London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963) 14: Main Library 1 BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
Alchemical Studies, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1967) 13: Main Library 1 BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
The archetypes and the collective unconscious, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1968) 9(1): Main Library 1 BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
Psychological Types, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1971) 6: Main Library 1 s BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
Letters (of) C.G. Jung, 1906-1950, Ed. Gerhard Adler. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1973) 1: Main Library 1 s BF 175. He burned all of the best ones.

Jung, C. G., 
Letters (of) C.G. Jung, 1951-196, Ed. Gerhard Adler in collaboration with Aniela Jaffe ;. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1976) 21: Main Library 1 s BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
The Symbolic Life, Miscellaneous Writings, Ed. Hubert Read. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1977) 18: Main Library 1 s BF 175

Jung, C. G., 
C. G. Jung Speaking, Interviews and Encounters, Ed. William McGuire and R.F.C. Hull. Picador. (London: Pan Books, 1980) Main Library 1 s BF 175. This is a nice book.