The Neurotic adult represents the mass hive mind, invested in the pleasure principle (autistic state) with no personal responsibility, always justified and right (the crowd), and validated by the leader.
If there is a female psychological castration before the oedipal complex, where the child cannot separate from the idealised parental imago, then the superego is not created. When the superego is destroyed, so are the oedipal wishes and demands.
- Freud’s Superego – nurturing, loving, punishing and castrating when going against its will. Amoral, immoral and moral through choice.
- Civilisation and culture are represented by conformity within the superego.
- Psychoanalysis attempts to free the ego from superego demands
The castration represented by a possible father wound to the ego, where the dynamo of the ego is broken and unable to create energy, highlights opposites are cancelling each other out. The adult/child learns to adopt restrictive roles governed by fear and must develop the strength and courage to transcend the mother complex (castration)
The transmutation mobilises towards increased depth and insight, initiating into something new
The six stages of separation.
- Separation – physical separation from parents or remaining a child
- The symbolic death of childhood and dependency. Loss of innocence
- Rebirth -new being -return to the umbilical waters
- Teachings of practical skills, introduction to the mysteries
- Ordeals – consciousness comes from suffering. Some form of isolation away from the community and societal comfort helps throw away the protection of others
- Return and conquering of the Mother Complex
Outer images of hollow role models have filled the gap between wisdom and experience, and the pain of the soul is pushed inwards or acted out violently. The shadow threatens ego intentions and becomes the split-off part of the soul. The fear of not measuring up during physical and psychological trials (work and war), fear of being able to defend oneself and their family, where impotence and powerlessness are worse than annihilation. When Eros is injured, it surrenders to the gauntlet of power. Eros driven underground becomes rage, and great violence ensues.
Three levels
- Consciousness
- Personal unconscious
- Collective unconscious
Estrangement from the body and others due to contamination, where cultural limitations have blocked self-assertiveness, competition and empowerment. The psychic inflation of men from impaired mothers and the underdeveloped animas of the mother often drives men to achieve a strong mother presence. Macho men fear their feminine side, manifested as a projection onto women and gays. A depleted anima with a disturbed relatedness, feeling and connection with the life force leads to alienation from self and others. The connection comes through sports and politics. When they want to retreat into pain, loneliness and self-pity, the serpent bites; the dual aspect of the mother gives life and seeks to take it back. Others turn to ISMs, simple ideologies with black/white answers and thinking, with no need to deal with the tension of opposites.
Sex works as reassurance and reconnection instead of communication of intimacy, with a compulsive urge to merge. One can become independent and free of anger by confronting the abyss, seeking protection and avoiding domination. Too much protection or fragile boundaries create a sense of powerlessness, projecting negative aspects onto the world of being overwhelmed or abandoned. Other is not there emotionally, the loss is suffered, but the object is still present.
The cognitive dissonance, inability to hold opposites produces sadness and is driven inward.
Anger is the unconscious undifferentiated working through a sequence of
- Feeling powerlessness
- Becoming depressed
- Anger in the body (heart disease, cancer)
- Deferred or displaced anger (repression)
The Father gives light and energy to the positive child experiencing strength, support and energising of his own resources, crushing the negative fragile psyche. Compensation for inner weakness can lead to malignant patriarchy by oppressing other men and raping women. An Inflated power complex due to the castration of personal identity. He fights for what he desires and not what may be right. The concept of an egoic death leads to the conception of the philosopher’s stone and the removal of illusions. This needs to be a voluntary death as the only separation that can unite the free mind from the influence of bodily appetites and heart affections. The Withdrawal of projections seen as death is followed by the birth of the divine child, born out of the body with the development of the concrete level of quintessence. The return of the soul from the clouds purifies and revives the dead body, where the ego, the body of the psyche, is no longer contaminated by external man but can relate to it and not identify with it. The symbolised king and queen united via soul and body unity.
