I am reading these memoirs of a singular Jungian analyst. There is much food for thought. Johnson is by temperament introverted and solitary, and it draws me into that emphasis in myself. The Hermit archetype, which is full of the inner joy to be found when we let the world recede and honour the abundance within. Out of that I do my best work, which mainly takes the form of astrology readings by zoom, but which is a vehicle for whatever is needed.
For me, the overlap between Jung and Shamanism is seamless. I don't feel any limits or dogmas around Jung's spirit, and Shamanism at its best also has that quality: it is simply the human living in alignment with the spirit of the natural world, which is infinite. Jung knew one or two indigenous elders, and there was an easy understanding between them.
As a young man, Johnson was fortunate enough to meet Jung. He'd had a dream, which he related to Mrs Jung, and she passed it on to Carl. It was a huge lengthy dream involving Buddhas and snakes. Jung laid out Johnson's life before him. Do not join anything. Never marry. Your life is an inner life, and the world may never acknowledge you. That does not matter. What matters is that you commit yourself to that inner life and work.
As it happens, the world did acknowledge him. His books such as He, and Lying with the Heavenly Woman, became bestsellers (I recommend them.) And Jung was spot on. It reminds me of the traditional idea where a young man goes out on a vision quest, has a vision which reveals the course of his life, and an elder interprets it for him.
Never join anything was one of the injunctions. Out of his longing for community, Johnson tried a number of times to join institutions. He even became a monk at one point. It never worked out, and he knew beforehand that it was wrong for him. But still he went ahead. How many times has each of us done just that, one way or another?
Jolande Jacobi founded the CG Jung Institute in Zurich. Jung was resigned to its inevitability, but refused to set foot in it. Groups of people always mess up and dogmatise and literalise the teachings, and put the teacher on a pedestal. Not to speak of the interpersonal politics that arise.
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This has been a theme for me for years. I feel that the universe keeps shoving me away from groups, but still I footle around the edges. I may even try to change them. It always ends in tears. There is usually some kind of falling out because I feel constrained by the unspoken rules and hierarchy, and I say something. That need for community has also driven me to allow people to become close to me who are inauthentic in some way, have an agenda. And I can be naïve enough to try to address it with them.
I am trying now to quietly leave religious groupings – and indeed, the world itself - to their own devices. There is an inevitability to the way they are, and they serve a function. Where does that leave me? I have published a book, The Medicine Wheel. It is full of ideas that are worth chewing on, though I say so myself. But to set up a group based around the things I have to say? I recoil at that.
Many of those who wanted to stay in such a group would be doing so on the basis of aligning themselves with my ideas, with various degrees of dogmatism, depending on their (unacknowledged) need for authority. Now there’s nothing wrong with my ideas, I think many of them are pretty good. But my job is to help people align with their own inner guidance, not mine. That is all that real teaching ever is. But the difference is not clear to most members of spiritual groupings. Of course they think their understanding is their own. But it’s not, it’s the teacher’s. If you are outside the group, you can see that.
It's like received opinion everywhere. It’s what makes the world go round. You hear one opinion from someone, and you can usually guess the next dozen. And there’s usually very little point arguing with it, even though I do, because people get their identity from belonging to some sort of ‘right-thinking’ demographic. Here’s a thing, based on my observation: nearly everyone believes what they want to believe about just about everything, and evidence to the contrary makes very little difference. It is almost the human condition itself. As Blake said, “A man convinced against his will, retains the same opinion still.” This is the North of the Medicine Wheel, the Mind, and it comes last because it is so difficult for people. The ‘wanting’ to believe comes from the opposite point, the South, Emotion, and the North can help bring awareness to that.
So I am much more inclined to go for individual interactions. With the best will in the world, a grouping develops a collective mind of its own, with its own unspoken rules of engagement. We all get drawn into that to some extent when we join or when we lead. I am not saying useful stuff does not happen in that context. It is often the first stage for people, and it may go on for years. It certainly did for myself, even though I was always a bit uncomfortable, always aware that the leader needed me to surrender some of my autonomy, though they would never have acknowledged that. Group leaders are usually very unaware of the real nature of their relationship with their students. That is quite a thing to say, but I think it is nevertheless true.
That is not what I am about. The people running such groupings usually have some kind of ambition for themselves (NOT always!) They don’t seem to see anything wrong with that. I have been unfriended and blocked by teachers over this issue. One guy even claimed that personal ambition was validated by the indigenous Mexicans he hangs out with. It that is truly the case, then that indigenous tradition has become degenerate. It is a fundamental issue, and a good teacher will hold you back and help you unravel those different motivations, which I think we all have. I have had the personal ambition painfully pummelled out of me, incrementally, over the last 30 years. The more I move away from the ego paradigm, the more Spirit has the opportunity to send my way the people I can be of use to, which is by no means everyone.
I am moving to this deep place where I sit quietly and let Spirit call the shots. I love it. It is such a relief. You have probably seen this process in me, as I have been writing on this theme, on and off, for years now. Yes, I will talk about my book with people if they want to, I am very happy to. But purely from the angle of how it helps them align with who they are. That mysterious journey, that just gets more mysterious as we get older. This is Robert Johnson’s approach, coming out of his commitment to his inner life. It has been a welcome reminder.
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