Tagged with Archetypes

Far from a thing of the past or an ignorant superstition, demonic possession and evil spells, in our technologically developed society, are an increasing danger. C. G. Jung has given us modern terms for these very real states, uriging us to make exorcizing ourselves "the most vital task of civilization." (more)

When the alchemists had a living experience of God through their relationship with the imaginatively created philosophers' stone, they realized that the whole experience was nothing other than an experience of the divine imagination, which is to say that they were realizing that they themselves were living inspirations of the divine, creative imagination itself. (more)

Since the 1990s there's been much interest in a "masculine spirituality" that offers little more than a thinly veiled patriarchal spirituality. The mythopoetic, evangelical, and Catholic men's movements all promote it, in various forms. Can we envision a masculine spirituality that resists old, patriarchal tendencies? (more)

At the gateway to the Major Arcana stands the Magician. He is the bright, enduring presence on this journey of awakening that we, by virtue of our birth, have chosen to undertake. The Magician pulls the chain on the cosmic lamp switch, beaming the light of pure awareness onto life. (more)

To the alchemists, creating the philosophers' stone was analogous to waking up to the dreamlike nature of the universe. Becoming lucid in the waking dream is seen as a reflection of God's ongoing creation of and incarnation into the world. (more)

God is dead, long live the Alien. Faith in something that has passed (Jesus, Mohammed) has been replaced by hope for something to come. However, this something comes not to replace our reality (earthly paradise) but to expand it (interstellar civilization). The Other is a possible world. (more)

Synchronicities are expressions of the dreamlike nature of reality – moments in time when the timeless, dreamlike nature of the universe shines forth its radiance and openly reveals itself to us, offering an open doorway to lucidity. (more)

How was all of the "stuff" that went along with the study of magic first derived? I wanted to understand the nature of the gods and goddesses from books and esoteric lore that I had come to love and find a pantheon within my own life and experience. (more)

Prior to embracing the Mayan calendar, the author and art historian José Argüelles once espoused that a collective shift in consciousness would come in the form of a new archetypal language. The author and botanist Terence McKenna made similar connections. Is that language now in formation? (more)

Art-making is a sacred act. Art attains its greatest numinosity and ability to affect others when the creator of the work of art is being transformed by the act of creating. One can mimic sacred art for a living (many people get paid for this) but this is mere forgery. There is a world of difference between copying, imitating, and aping sacred art, and living our own creative experience. When we live creatively, guided by our daemon, our life itself becomes a living work of art. (more)

The archetype of the wounded healer reveals to us that it is only by being willing to face, consciously experience, and go through our wound do we receive its blessing. To go through our wound is to embrace, assent, and say “yes” to the mysteriously painful new place in ourselves where the wound is leading us. This is a genuine death experience, as our old self “dies” in the process, while a new, more expansive and empowered part of ourselves is born. (more)