As our self-knowledge expands, so do our ideas about the Mystery of God. For many people today, the Couple, a symbol for the central archetype of the Self, is replacing the old Sky-Father God-image. Dwelling within us, the Self knows who we are and what our lives are all about. It shows us our truths with symbols that emerge in our imagination, dreams, and outer lives. Exploring these symbols helps us like and trust our true selves and creates spiritual meaning.
Connecting with the divine within makes us more aware of the divine in others. As a result, we lose our fear, hatred, and prejudice and contribute to the healing of the world. Trusting the Self also helps us trust life’s processes. We no longer have to know everything, control everything, or be prepared for every eventuality. We lose anxiety in the present moment and anticipate what the next may bring with lightness, playfulness, and enthusiasm. These new attitudes are not planned or forced but the natural result of releasing our resistance to the unknown. Life becomes a delightful gift to be savored; not a contest to win, obstacle to overcome, or ordeal to be endured.
Knowing we possess the authority of the Self also empowers us to break out of our prisons of conformity and blossom into our individuality. No longer do we stifle our gifts, pretend, respond habitually, or conceal our true needs and honest feelings. No longer do we feel the need to prove anything to others. Having lost our fear of the truth about ourselves we make original, authentic choices and lose defensive behaviors such as hostility and hypersensitivity.
As we integrate our inner opposites our thoughts and behaviors spring from healed archetypes, not wounded stereotypes. Thus do we create an original work of art: an authentic, empowered being with balanced energies which flow appropriately between masculine and feminine, here manifesting qualities of the drive for self-preservation, there acting from the drive for species-preservation. In a culture distorted by one-sided worship of the masculine, integrating the feminine brings a refreshing return of feeling and the ability to live with soul.
The Couple balances the King’s clarity and hierarchical authority with the Queen’s caring and sense of community; softens the Warrior’s intensity with the Mother’s gentle acceptance; blends the Wisewoman’s intuition and diffuse awareness with the Scholar’s objective knowledge; and integrates the Lover’s desire to please with the Beloved’s desire to be pleasing. Thus do we live with more flexibility and grace.
Integrating masculine and feminine values fashions a new morality of impeccable integrity and personal responsibility based on universal standards of justice and care for all. Our wish to cause as little pain as possible, combined with our growing ability to see and restrain our own shadows, helps us listen with patience and tolerance while allowing our partners to speak their truths. Creating the Couple heals relationships and establishes the intimacy and compassion for which every soul longs.
With continued attention to our inner condition, we grow more mindful. We can see when we are floating off into yesterday or reaching out to tomorrow and we can choose to return to today. Remembering that this moment is all we have helps us savor our lives and joyfully participate in the sorrows of the world. Thus we find that it is overcoming our ignorance, not our sin, which connects us with the ground of our being and brings us into the presence of the eternal Mystery.
You truly keep the ideal alive and exquisitely described … and yet I somewhat worry about that.
Couple-dom is hard won/integrated in terms of how humans come to recognize they are a subset of Psyche – not the other way round.
I worry about what the de-idealization of couple-dom will look like from your description but then I imagine your desire to glorify integration in this revivified archetype is intended as supremely hopeful, a deep wish to celebrate the loving power of Eros.
Meanwhile in human embodiment, I continue to worry that the Black Sun gets no mention.
The blackest black is surely a worthy path which many couples archetypally discover within the de-idealization experience.
Hi Sharon,
You make an excellent point. I am, of course, setting forth the positive aspects of the healthy integration of opposites in this post without going into the kind of shadow work that is necessary within and between individuals before the integration can occur. I’ve written about some of that in other posts, however.
I agree with you that we cannot attain healthy integration within and without if we overlook the dark side. Just as there is a shadow side to each one of us, there is also a shadow side to the couple. In fact, I’ve written extensively about that in a previous unpublished manuscript. Maybe this is the time to bring out that material and post some of it here! Thanks for the comment and the idea.
Jeanie
This post is exquisite. With your words you have created music that transcends mere language, taking the reader to a deeper, more profound understanding. Thank you Jeanie
Thank you, Trish. Your words are music to my ears too! Jeanie
Jeanie,
This post felt inspiring. I love how you talk about the fact that when “our self-knowledge expands, so do our ideas about the Mystery of God.” Yes! I also love the fact that with on-going self-knowledge we “…break out of our prisons of conformity and blossom into our individuality. No longer do we stifle our gifts, pretend, respond habitually, or conceal our true needs and honest feelings.” Yes! And how this makes us less “touchy.” Although I have learned from that part of me too….and from my experience and integration of “blackest of black” as Sharon said.
And as you said that when we do this work then “…our thoughts and behaviors spring from healed archetypes, not wounded stereotypes.” There are so many valuable insights here. For me – learning never ends! Thanks for sharing your earned wisdom! It resonates and I learned.
Just before I read what you wrote, I copied the following quote by Jung from an email I received. It also seemed to fit what you were saying. I love synchronicity.
“I cannot define for you what God is, I can only say that my work has proved empirically that the pattern of God exists in every [hu]man, and that this pattern has at its disposal the greatest of all his energies for transformation and transfiguration of his natural being. Not only the meaning of his life but his renewal and his institutions depend on his conscious relationship with this pattern in his collective unconscious.” – C. G. Jung
Just a few days and your book will arrive. I can’t wait to read it. Best to you!
Love, Sandy
Thank you, Sandy. I love the Jungian quote. I don’t remember reading it before. It’s one I’ll copy and keep too! Jeanie
Beautiful Jeanie, thank you.Yet how painfully I’m reminded of how far I have still to go. But also that at the end of the longest tunnel lies light, joy and grace.
Qestra
It helps to keep in mind that this is a lifelong journey and that nobody is perfect or ever will be. As Jung said, “We can modestly strive to fulfill ourselves and to be as complete human beings as possible, and that will give us trouble enough.”
I was just going to comment on how what you describe so well of the integration of the opposites going for a couple image of God rather than either one or the other, when I read your response to the comment from Qestra “It helps to keep in mind that this is a lifelong journey and that nobody is perfect or ever will be. As Jung said, “We can modestly strive to fulfill ourselves and to be as complete human beings as possible, and that will give us trouble enough.” Right then I realized that the striving is part of the journey and to be gentle with myself when I feel I fall short and to celebrate when I feel like I am close or maybe even feel that, however briefly, I am experiencing the integration.
Yes, yes, yes. You’ve got it exactly right, my friend. That is the way to travel through. Keep trying, but be gentle on yourself along the way, for you are worthy and loved. Thank you for writing.
You are so right on….we need to shout it from the rooftops.
Thank you, Victor. Consider this blog my rooftop!!
Dear Jeanie,
Your post helps me clarify my attempts to balance the masculine and feminine within. I spent younger years cultivating masculine values and many years after that searching for my feminine roots through goddess myths and feminine fairy tales such as The Handless Maiden and Vasillisa. Now, after the death of my husband, I’m dreaming about a new inner masculine and integrating that with the conscious feminine. I will call this the Inner Couple from now on. Thank you for the idea. I expect the dance to continue on, balancing, moving one way, then another, and then returning to center.
Your book, Healing the Sacred Divide, sits on my desk with its inviting cover and the beautiful photo of you inside. It pains me that I am not reading it, but it’s the first thing on my list after meeting a work deadline on June 20–not far away.
I so appreciate your wisdom, productivity, and kindness,
Elaine (www.elainemansfield.com)
Dear Elaine,
Your story is very much like mine, especially the part about cultivating the masculine values in the early years. In fact, I address this exact issue early in the book (I can’t wait for you to read it!). It has to do with the ego’s development, both in individuals, and in our species. There’s a whole chapter devoted to explaining why this happens to women as well as men. Also, the Handless Maiden was a very important fairy tale for me as well, and provided the basis for the fairy tale that opens my first book, The Bridge to Wholeness! No wonder we bonded so well the first time we met!! Actually, I guess that was the only time. I look forward to a reunion.
Good luck with your deadline, and thank you for the very kind words.
Jeanie