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Can Angels Survive in a Disenchanted World? · This Jungian Life Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: That's an incredibly comforting idea that there is some transpersonal
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: entity out there that is watching over you. I mean,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: the Jungian analyst, James Hillman, likens the Ardaimon, which we've
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: talked about, to a guardian angel, that we each have
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: a kind of transpersonal counterpart that has some responsibility for us.
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: Welcome to This Jungian Life. Three good friends and Jungian analysts,
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: Lisa Marciano, Deborah Stewart, and Joseph Lee, invite you to
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: join them for an intimate and honest conversation that brings
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: a psychological perspective to important issues.
• 0:41
  Speaker 3: Of the day.
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  Speaker 1: I'm Lisa Marciano, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Philadelphia.
• 0:47
  Speaker 4: I'm Joseph Lee, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: I'm Deborah Stewart, a Jungian analyst in Cape Cod.
• 1:07
  Speaker 4: Today, we're going to talk about angels from a historic perspective,
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  Speaker 4: but with a Jungian lens. They are ubiquitous. They show
• 1:17
  Speaker 4: up in people's dreams. They show up in religious texts.
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  Speaker 4: They show up in art all over the place. But angels,
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  Speaker 4: from a purely Jungian standpoint, are symbolic figures that transmit
• 1:30
  Speaker 4: unconscious content into consciousness. They're often mediators when meaning has
• 1:36
  Speaker 4: to cross a boundary that the ego can't cross by itself.
• 1:41
  Speaker 4: Their wings and luminosity express Psyche's experience of thought and
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  Speaker 4: spirit as mobile, autonomous, and transpersonal. They belong to a
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  Speaker 4: psychic polarity rather than a kind of moral idealization, which
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: often they fall into in our ideas. So they are
• 2:00
  Speaker 4: necessary counterforces. and they confront consciousness with what must be faced,
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  Speaker 4: no matter how uncanny. So let's grab our own angels,
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  Speaker 4: such as they are, and wade into the divine waters.
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  Speaker 4: I love that.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: And for those of you who are on Instagram, Joseph,
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: you mentioned angels in art. I took the liberty of
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: collecting many angel images on a recent trip that I took.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: And I welcome you to check out that post. I
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  Speaker 1: think I posted 16 or 17 angel images. And by
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  Speaker 1: the way, if you want to take a guess about
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  Speaker 1: where any of those were taken, I'll entertain your guesses.
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  Speaker 1: It was more than one place in the same city, though.
• 2:51
  Speaker 4: So. Fun.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: But yes, I mean, and of course, angels are very cross-cultural.
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  Speaker 1: We think about them in the Christian context, but in fact,
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: and Joseph, you can weigh in more here, but they
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  Speaker 1: actually kind of come to us through Hebrew scripture and
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  Speaker 1: through other cultures as well, through the Semitic religions. So
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  Speaker 1: they're very, very ancient. And in fact, You don't find
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  Speaker 1: them much in the early books of the Old Testament.
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  Speaker 1: It's only in the later books of the Old Testament
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  Speaker 1: that they start coming forward. And of course, now in
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  Speaker 1: the Christian iconography, they're kind of ubiquitous, but they sort
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: of seeped in, didn't they, through these other cultures?
• 3:44
  Speaker 4: Yes, they got their due.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: On Sunday, January 18th, We are hosting a special free
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: seminar called Dreams for Change, a Dream School Taster. Jung
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: tells us that our dreams are an expression of our
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: inner life, and they can show us which false attitudes
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: have led us into a blind alley. Perhaps you're feeling
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: stuck navigating a big life change like finding a new career,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: facing an empty nest, or trying to figure out who
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: you are after having children. If you're navigating something like that,
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: your dreams can help. Dreams offer a medicine that is precise, personal,
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: and attuned to your deepest truth. Understanding their symbolic language
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: will help you home in on the information that truly
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: matters in your moment of change. At this session, we'll
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: discuss doing dream work in times of major life transition.
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: You'll be able to ask us questions, and we'll also
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: invite you to send in a dream for analysis during
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: the seminar. These free seminars have proved really popular, so
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: please do book your place soon so you don't miss out.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: Find the link to sign up in the show notes
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: for this episode.
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  Speaker 3: This is an archetypal image that appears in many guises,
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  Speaker 3: but as archetypal images, angels come in light and dark
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  Speaker 3: from the perspective of our egos. So we have all
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  Speaker 3: the good, loving, helpful, guiding, comforting. Look at that mug
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  Speaker 3: you have, Lisa.
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  Speaker 4: Wait a minute. What does that say on there? Oh,
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  Speaker 4: look at that. What did you dream about last night?
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  Speaker 1: Last night, right.
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  Speaker 4: Where did you get that from?
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  Speaker 1: Well, I'm so glad that you asked. This is some
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  Speaker 1: of our new merch. I love this mug. I have
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  Speaker 1: a bunch of T-shirts that also say, what did you
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  Speaker 1: dream last night? And I love wearing them to the gym.
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  Speaker 1: And then my trainer says, oh, can I tell you
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  Speaker 1: my dream? And I say, yes.
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  Speaker 4: Perfect.
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  Speaker 1: So, yeah, it's a perfect mug to drink your coffee
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: in because, of course, you, like us, are interested in
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: everyone's dreams and you want to invite your breakfast mates
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  Speaker 1: to tell you what their dreams were. So you can
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: hop on over to our website, thisunionlife.com, and just follow
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: the links for our merch store and get yourself a
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  Speaker 1: What Did You Dream About Last Night mug.
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  Speaker 4: Yes. What a perfect stocking stuffer.
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  Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yes. It's a wonderful gift for Christmas.
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  Speaker 3: There it is, a gift from our marketing angel.
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  Speaker 4: That's right.
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  Speaker 3: I am determined to take us back to angels.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, we need to go back there right away.
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  Speaker 3: There are the, you know, obviously the angels that we
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  Speaker 3: perceive as, you know, loving and helpful guides and reassurers,
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  Speaker 3: such as the angel that appeared to Mary at the Annunciation.
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  Speaker 3: who says, it's going to be all right.
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  Speaker 1: Deb, we're going to have to have a conversation about
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  Speaker 1: the Annunciation. But why don't we set that aside and
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  Speaker 1: you keep going, and I'm going to come back there.
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  Speaker 3: It's an experience of awe.
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  Speaker 1: Yes.
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  Speaker 3: But also one of reassurance. You have a special destiny.
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  Speaker 3: This has meaning. But we'll come back to that, perhaps.
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  Speaker 1: We'll duke it out in a second. But often they
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  Speaker 1: are protectors or comforters, right?
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  Speaker 3: Yes. Exactly. And then we have the dark angels, of
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  Speaker 3: whom Lucifer is first and foremost and certainly most famous.
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  Speaker 4: It's our celebrity angel.
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  Speaker 1: Our angel influencer.
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  Speaker 4: Yes, yes, yes. The first influencer. I don't know if
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  Speaker 4: you guys were raised with this, but My Polish grandmother,
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  Speaker 4: who is a devout Catholic, I mean, passionate. This is
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  Speaker 4: a woman who would look at a picture of the
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  Speaker 4: Pope and cry.
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  Speaker 3: Oh, my goodness.
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  Speaker 4: I mean, really intense. And she had this big framed
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  Speaker 4: illustration of a guardian angel. And it's very ubiquitous from
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  Speaker 4: the 40s. You've got this big angel and two little
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  Speaker 4: kids crying. crossing a rickety bridge or maybe about to
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  Speaker 4: step on a broken bridge and the angel is hovering
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  Speaker 4: protectively over them. It's very iconic, but that was very
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  Speaker 4: meaningful to me as a child to imagine that there
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  Speaker 4: is something celestial that is watching out for me and
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  Speaker 4: perhaps everyone else. So that's another depiction of angels that
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  Speaker 4: is kind of modern and ubiquitous.
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  Speaker 1: And I agree with you, Joseph. I think that's such
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  Speaker 1: a common idea and it is a very comforting one.
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  Speaker 1: And I've heard some incredible stories about, you know, kind
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  Speaker 1: of people being under extreme duress, you know, sort of,
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  Speaker 1: for example, in a car crash and then something kind
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  Speaker 1: of magically, almost inexplicably happens to save them.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: And there is this sense that, like, I must have
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  Speaker 1: a guardian angel, which is an, you know, and that's
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  Speaker 1: an incredibly comforting idea that there is some transpersonal, entity
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: out there that is watching over you. I mean, the
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: Jungian analyst, James Hillman, likens the Ardaimon, which we've talked about,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: to a guardian angel, that we each have a kind
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  Speaker 1: of transpersonal counterpart that has some responsibility for us. And
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  Speaker 1: in a sense, you know, in a sense, we do, right?
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  Speaker 1: It would be the transpersonal self that Jung capitalized, you know,
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  Speaker 1: with an S. It's It's something greater than ego that
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  Speaker 1: has access to our destiny, that knows what road we
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  Speaker 1: should be walking, that is watching out for us and
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  Speaker 1: communicating with us when we need to change course a
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  Speaker 1: little bit to protect us and to oversee our unfolding.
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  Speaker 4: I think that beautifully captures it. Was that from Hillman's work?
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  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm. He just mentions the daimon. He says, you know,
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  Speaker 1: the Greeks called it the daimon, and the Christians call
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  Speaker 1: it the guardian angel. He makes that connection.
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  Speaker 4: And I think we've all had that, where even as moms,
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  Speaker 4: you know, you're somewhere else, and all of a sudden
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  Speaker 4: there's this, like, bell gets rung, and you're then running.
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  Speaker 4: You just know something's going on with the kids. You
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  Speaker 4: show up. right in the nick of time to intervene.
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  Speaker 4: So what is that messenger that mediates between the ego
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  Speaker 4: and the unconscious and telling us help is needed? We
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  Speaker 4: need to watch out in some way.
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  Speaker 3: Well, in a way, it is like it is a
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  Speaker 3: transcendent function.
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  Speaker 4: It is.
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  Speaker 3: The thing that brings together the polarities of a dilemma,
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  Speaker 3: an unresolvable ambiguity, that now, thanks to this angelic intervention,
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  Speaker 3: the messenger... Mm-hmm. Okay, now I know. I'm thinking that
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  Speaker 3: it's not so surprising in this context. I've heard stories,
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  Speaker 3: and I'm sure you have too, of people that are
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  Speaker 3: in just... Dire, dire straits.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: And hear a voice.
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  Speaker 4: Yes.
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  Speaker 3: Of one story that moved me very, very much was
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  Speaker 3: a man who was in the depths of grief and
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  Speaker 3: went out along a very, very long pier, sat on
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  Speaker 3: the pier, and realized he was sort of slowly, you know,
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  Speaker 3: inching toward you know, getting a little closer to the edge.
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  Speaker 3: And he heard a voice that said, you are loved.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, my gosh.
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  Speaker 3: I've heard some number of stories of this kind of
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  Speaker 3: thing coming in and....
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  Speaker 4: Making all the difference.
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  Speaker 3: Making all the... It is a mystery. Did that come
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  Speaker 3: altogether from Psyche? Did it come from the outside? But
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  Speaker 3: when these things happen, when you're visited by an angel,
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  Speaker 3: you don't doubt it.
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  Speaker 1: Well, and Deb, I mean, the thing about that experience,
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  Speaker 1: which of course is also a very similar thing, is
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  Speaker 1: portrayed in the appealing holiday classic, It's a Wonderful Life,
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  Speaker 1: with Jimmy Stewart, who has this relationship and is saved
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  Speaker 1: at the end by this angel, is it offers a
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  Speaker 1: higher perspective. I have to say I'm not one of
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  Speaker 1: those people who watches that every year, so I'm a
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  Speaker 1: little fuzzy on it. But it's sort of like the
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  Speaker 1: angel tells the Jimmy Stewart character, like, you have this
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  Speaker 1: narrow perspective about who you are and what your life
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  Speaker 1: has meant. Let me show you a different, wider, broader
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  Speaker 1: perspective on your life, which is very similar to the
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  Speaker 1: story that you told, Deb. You know, the angels bring
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  Speaker 1: a different perspective, the perspective that's much bigger than the
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  Speaker 1: perspective of just our little ego.
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  Speaker 4: And what is required.
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  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
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  Speaker 4: That there's nothing superfluous. The angels don't, you know, show
• 13:24
  Speaker 4: up to have coffee.
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  Speaker 1: Right.
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  Speaker 4: Although that would be lovely.
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  Speaker 1: Although if they did, they would probably use this mug.
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  Speaker 4: Well done. Well done. Worked that in there.
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  Speaker 1: Worked it in there again.
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  Speaker 4: Absolutely. I love that. Yes, there are angels of coffee,
• 13:46
  Speaker 4: and coffee is an alchemical stage, as you said once
• 13:49
  Speaker 4: in our training, the caffeinatio stage. So I'm with you totally, 100%.
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  Speaker 4: But in at least sacred literature, they seem to arrive
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  Speaker 4: by necessity and play pivotal roles, as you were saying, Deb,
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  Speaker 4: when required. Yeah. And sometimes with devastating consequences, the angels
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  Speaker 4: that go into Sodom and Gomorrah and decide that it
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  Speaker 4: must be destroyed, the angel that announces the birth of Christ,
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  Speaker 4: the angelic presence that kills the firstborn of the Egyptians
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  Speaker 4: to liberate the Hebrews, that they are dispassionate is one
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  Speaker 4: of the qualities.
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  Speaker 3: Yes. They are morally ambiguous. And Jung says that they
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  Speaker 3: are soulless. I'm going to read this. He doesn't have
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: a lot of comments about angels, but here is the
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  Speaker 3: one I found. The angels are a strange genus. They
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  Speaker 3: are precisely what they are and cannot be anything else.
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  Speaker 3: They're in themselves soulless beings who represent nothing but the
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  Speaker 3: thoughts and intuitions of their Lord. Angels who fall, then,
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  Speaker 3: are exclusively bad, in quotes, angels. These release the well-known
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  Speaker 3: effect of inflation, which we can also observe nowadays in
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  Speaker 3: the megalomania of dictators. So there's a lot of interest
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  Speaker 3: right there that they are soulless. They represent nothing but
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  Speaker 3: the thoughts and intuitions of their Lord. So they have
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  Speaker 3: a function. And they do their function. They're sort of like,
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  Speaker 3: you know, on automatic pilot or automatons. They do as
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  Speaker 3: they're told. And they have functions. They can be warrior
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  Speaker 3: angels or savior angels or protector angels, helpers. They do
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  Speaker 3: have that kind of soulless quality.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: You know, I want to go back to something you
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  Speaker 1: said in the introduction, Joseph, that I really liked. You
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  Speaker 1: said something like angels bring forward contents from the unconscious
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  Speaker 1: into consciousness.
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  Speaker 3: Yes.
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  Speaker 1: And so, you know, we think about that all the time,
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  Speaker 1: like archetypal reality, as we've said many times before on
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: the podcast, is too overwhelming for the ego to relate to.
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  Speaker 1: There's this idea in a lot of mythology that if
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  Speaker 1: the individual has an unmediated experience of God, the individual
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  Speaker 1: will be destroyed. And so we can think about the
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  Speaker 1: angels kind of playing that function. I mean, I think about,
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  Speaker 1: you know, the raw power of the archetype. It's almost
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: like a current that has to be stepped down before
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  Speaker 1: we can relate to it. And that's part of, I think,
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  Speaker 1: the function of the angel. And to go back, Deb,
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  Speaker 1: I want to have this out with you about the enunciation,
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: because I love that image, right?
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  Speaker 3: I do, too. That was my image for the archetypal exam.
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  Speaker 1: Was it? Was it? I love it. And someday, there
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: must be a book out there that's just all these
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: paintings of the Annunciation.
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  Speaker 3: I have that book.
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  Speaker 1: In many of them, Mary looks horrified.
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  Speaker 3: Oh, yeah.
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  Speaker 4: As one would imagine.
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: And I, you know, and especially like some of the,
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  Speaker 1: some of the paintings from like medieval Sienna, she like,
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: she looks really like stricken. And I think some of
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: that might be the artist's intent and some of it
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: maybe they didn't mean for her to look quite that bummed. But,
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  Speaker 1: but there is a sense of, it's like, and you know, this, Deb,
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  Speaker 1: this goes to something you said when we were prepping this,
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  Speaker 1: like the angel comes to give you a task and
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: it might be an unwelcome one. But it's, you know,
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  Speaker 1: so anyway. All right, that's my take on the Annunciation.
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  Speaker 1: Now you go.
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  Speaker 3: The image that I chose for the exam was a
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  Speaker 3: painting by El Greco. Oh, yeah, yeah. And that was
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: not a pretty painting. Right. I mean, wouldn't you be
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  Speaker 3: kind of terrified and awestruck and, ah, what the hell?
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  Speaker 3: Some angel came down in all this magnificence. Radiance, wings,
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  Speaker 3: larger than life. I mean, of course it would be,
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  Speaker 3: but that's the both and of it.
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  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 18:27
  Speaker 3: That it is, you're just in awe and shocked and stunned,
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: and you're given a meaning here. Yeah. That the unalterable
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: task is, you're pregnant and you're going to be our child.
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: And that's nature. But also, this has huge meaning, much
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: bigger than you.
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: And Mary would come away from that encounter, as would
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: we all, with also a sense of meaning and reassurance
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: that it's somehow there's more to this then my ego
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: can see it matters, it's important, I have a job
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  Speaker 3: to do. So it's a both. It's like heads and
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: tails of the same coin.
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that you would feel enlarged by it in some way.
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: That's great. I love that. Enlarged.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: You have to submit to it, right? You have to
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: submit to it. I mean, and if you don't submit
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: to it, you get in trouble, right?
• 19:43
  Speaker 4: Sometimes.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: Well, the other example that Deb gave was Jonah, right? Jonah,
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: an angel came and said to Jonah, you will go
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: to Nineveh and preach. And he said, the hell I will.
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: He said, not me. You got the wrong guy.
• 20:02
  Speaker 4: It's like you being told you have to move to Camden,
• 20:05
  Speaker 4: New Jersey.
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 20:06
  Speaker 4: No way. Not going to do it.
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: But let's walk around that a little more slowly. What
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: did you mean, Joseph? Or how does it work if
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: you don't do what the angel tasks you to do,
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: or you don't believe what the angel tells you? Then
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: what happens? Because I think then you're a fallen, you've
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: made a big mistake.
• 20:37
  Speaker 4: I'm leaning very much into the Jewish and Christian tradition.
• 20:41
  Speaker 4: And the whole hierarchy of the heavens that the Catholic
• 20:46
  Speaker 4: Church adopted comes from the Jewish tradition, which is still
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: alive in Kabbalah. And in that way, that there is
• 20:56
  Speaker 4: a hierarchy of administration and that angels are seen more
• 21:00
  Speaker 4: like natural law. So, for instance, if we thought of
• 21:05
  Speaker 4: angels as being like wind, is agreement or disagreement even relevant?
• 21:12
  Speaker 4: That the angel could come and give you information, whether
• 21:16
  Speaker 4: or not you say yes or no, is not actually relevant.
• 21:20
  Speaker 4: Once the information's been delivered, I think the assumption is
• 21:24
  Speaker 4: you're still going to do whatever it is you're going
• 21:26
  Speaker 4: to do, but you can't claim that you were uninformed.
• 21:32
  Speaker 4: And so then there is a responsibility because you can't
• 21:36
  Speaker 4: say that you didn't know. And there may be repercussions.
• 21:41
  Speaker 4: Just like, you know, the app on your phone that
• 21:43
  Speaker 4: says hurricane warning down in North Carolina, I pay a
• 21:46
  Speaker 4: lot of attention to that. It's like an angel. It
• 21:49
  Speaker 4: is like an angel of enunciation that says, you know,
• 21:53
  Speaker 4: in three days from now, the winds will be 180
• 21:56
  Speaker 4: miles an hour. Could I decide to ignore the angel
• 21:57
  Speaker 4: of my.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Weather app.
• 22:04
  Speaker 4: Absolutely. Is there a repercussion? Probably for that. Does the
• 22:09
  Speaker 4: app care? Probably not, but it served its purpose, which
• 22:14
  Speaker 4: was to announce information that is crucial. So it's not
• 22:19
  Speaker 4: so much that there's not repercussions, but does the universe
• 22:23
  Speaker 4: punish us for choosing whether or not we will organize?
• 22:32
  Speaker 4: Which is an interesting question, because then it begs, Are
• 22:35
  Speaker 4: the symptoms that we experience when we are misaligned relative
• 22:42
  Speaker 4: to the self a form of punishment, or is it
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: simply natural law?
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: What I'm thinking about, though, is the requirement or the
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: implicit idea that angels require our obedience because the message
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: is the task, the directive comes from a superordinate source.
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: So yes, having free will, any one of us like
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: Jonah can decide yay or nay, and then there will
• 23:20
  Speaker 3: be a natural consequence for not serving the higher purpose,
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: psychologically speaking. I mean, Jonah's only reason for not going
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: to Nineveh was he just didn't want to. It was scary.
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: And he didn't think he could do it, and he
• 23:40
  Speaker 3: didn't like those people. So he basically just chickened out.
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: And so we can imagine psychologically that the natural consequence
• 23:53
  Speaker 3: is he made the decision for the wrong reasons on
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: the wrong basis. And so... All the imagery around being
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: swallowed by the whale is a way of saying, here's
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: what happens when you serve your lesser self rather than
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: a higher purpose. And so I'm teasing out that when
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: an angel comes to visit you, it is a call
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: to obey something that comes from a higher order of understanding, purpose, destiny.
• 24:30
  Speaker 4: Perhaps, but just bouncing this around, many people have believed
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: that dreams are messengers from God, which puts in the
• 24:41
  Speaker 4: word angel means messenger. So when we think about dreams,
• 24:49
  Speaker 4: they are providing information. There may be a consequence if
• 24:52
  Speaker 4: we don't interpret the dream or we dismiss what we've learned.
• 24:57
  Speaker 4: Is the sender of the dream demanding our compliance? And
• 25:03
  Speaker 4: is it threatening us if we don't? Yeah. Now, that
• 25:06
  Speaker 4: anthropomorphic telling, I understand it. It's the Old Testament's full
• 25:09
  Speaker 4: of this, you know, the jealous God that's going to,
• 25:13
  Speaker 4: you know, ruin you. But a little more psychologically, there
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: are consequences. You could take it, your dream, for instance,
• 25:22
  Speaker 4: as an absolute directive. You must do something. The dreams
• 25:27
  Speaker 4: come from the divine. But Is it really?
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: But we're talking about, I think, really two different things.
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: That if we're talking about an experience of a visitation
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: from an angel, you know, like the man who was
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: sitting on the edge of the pier, that's very different
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: from having a dream that may have some imagery that
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: is numinous but it's a different order of experience. And
• 26:01
  Speaker 3: we all know that then our next task is to
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: understand the dream, whereas with an angelic experience, it is
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: numinous and seems to come from without and therefore is
• 26:21
  Speaker 3: a whole different order of experience in my mind.
• 26:27
  Speaker 4: I can understand, certainly literature and art conveys it with
• 26:31
  Speaker 4: that overwhelming awesomeness.
• 26:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's what we're talking about is the experience of
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: awe versus, you know, a dream that says, you know,
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: you must move to, you know, some remote region of
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: the world that you never even thought about before. That
• 26:50
  Speaker 3: we all know, like, okay, let's see if we can
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: understand what this might symbolize rather than, You know, packing
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: up and moving to wherever.
• 27:00
  Speaker 4: I totally understand the perspective. I'm kind of opening up
• 27:06
  Speaker 4: into a slightly different way about how we might find
• 27:11
  Speaker 4: the divine messengers. Synchronicity, for some people, can feel angelic.
• 27:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely.
• 27:17
  Speaker 4: I just walked out the door and then all of
• 27:19
  Speaker 4: a sudden this thing fell and it was exactly what
• 27:22
  Speaker 4: I needed or strange, uncanny things. But you're right, they
• 27:26
  Speaker 4: don't always register, register with the same power, even though
• 27:32
  Speaker 4: it might carry or have originated from that same numinous field.
• 27:39
  Speaker 4: But sometimes we can register it more powerfully than others, absolutely.
• 27:43
  Speaker 3: So I think what you're going for here, if I'm
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: getting this, is that there are degrees, like there's a
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: whole range of angelic presences that maybe go from, you know,
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: the awesome appearance of something to the more minor angels
• 28:07
  Speaker 3: that come along every night and say, hey, I got
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: a message for you.
• 28:13
  Speaker 4: Yes, I think one of the poets, which I can't
• 28:15
  Speaker 4: bring back, says, every blade of grass has an angel
• 28:19
  Speaker 4: next to it saying, grove! Oh, oh, oh.
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: So that's nice. We're surrounded by angels.
• 28:28
  Speaker 4: We are. If we live in that universe, which has
• 28:31
  Speaker 4: to do with the re-enchanting of the world.
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's great.
• 28:34
  Speaker 4: If one were to live in a world where the
• 28:36
  Speaker 4: angelic symbolism is alive, then angels really are everywhere because
• 28:42
  Speaker 4: the divine is everywhere. That the God in all life
• 28:49
  Speaker 4: matters and is present and is right everywhere. next to us,
• 28:54
  Speaker 4: whether it's whispering, do the good thing, do the bad thing,
• 28:57
  Speaker 4: which comes out of, you can find it in Islamic
• 29:02
  Speaker 4: fairy tales, even the whispering.
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: I thought that was from Bugs Bunny.
• 29:08
  Speaker 4: No, I think they took that from something more profound,
• 29:10
  Speaker 4: but turned it into an interesting cartoon that still had
• 29:14
  Speaker 4: lots of ramifications, right? So it's a way of perceiving
• 29:24
  Speaker 4: the transpersonal active in the immediate world, if one can,
• 29:32
  Speaker 4: which can lend a kind of numinosity, a shine, to
• 29:37
  Speaker 4: what might have been mundane, and I think Jung was
• 29:40
  Speaker 4: interested in this. Where have the archetypes hidden? And do
• 29:45
  Speaker 4: we have images, ideas, art, stories, so that we can
• 29:53
  Speaker 4: conceptualize the numinous all around us? And it is unique
• 29:59
  Speaker 4: to each person, as you were saying, Deb, that that
• 30:01
  Speaker 4: voice that said, you are loved, was enough to reorient.
• 30:06
  Speaker 4: But it wasn't a demand. It was information. And he
• 30:11
  Speaker 4: could have decided, that doesn't even matter. Something inside of
• 30:16
  Speaker 4: him decided to believe it and to be guided.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: There's something about the message.
• 30:24
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: And, and then the fact that it's our ego that
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: has to decide what to do with the message.
• 30:31
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: And, and so, and, you know, Jung talks about that
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: quite a bit, you know, it's not, and that's where,
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: you know, sometimes people come to Jungian analysis and they,
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: they really think that they're going to be told what
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: to do by their dreams and And they'll come in
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: with a dilemma and they'll bring me a dream and
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: they'll be like, what is it saying I'm supposed to do,
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: in effect? But off, I mean, occasionally dreams are pretty prescriptive,
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: but it's rare, actually. And more it's like, here's some
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: information and then you, ego, have to actually wrestle with
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: that information. And what are you going to do with it?
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: You know, so I think that it does, you know,
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: it does leave space for this idea that there's always
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: agency with the ego, you know, and we have to
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: decide what to do. And there may be consequences, well,
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: there will be consequences for choosing one route or over another.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: But I guess we're getting into this area of like,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: what is free will, really?
• 31:33
  Speaker 4: But that's part of it. And we're kind of saying it,
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: as Deb was saying, it may be that, and I
• 31:39
  Speaker 4: think there's some truth to this, that angels don't have
• 31:42
  Speaker 4: free will, that they are extensions of the divine mind,
• 31:46
  Speaker 4: and they are anthropomorphic thoughts, is another way that Jung
• 31:53
  Speaker 4: describes it in one of his seminars. Angels are like birds, symbolism.
• 31:58
  Speaker 4: They're thoughts that fly into us, they deposit their content,
• 32:03
  Speaker 4: they fly away. We can't control them, but we still
• 32:09
  Speaker 4: are going to decide what we do. about what we've learned.
• 32:12
  Speaker 4: The angel comes and tells Mary, you are pregnant and
• 32:16
  Speaker 4: you're going to bear the child of God. We could
• 32:19
  Speaker 4: have some midrash and imagine, what would you do? Would
• 32:24
  Speaker 4: you believe it? Would you not believe it? Would you
• 32:25
  Speaker 4: be terrified? Would you be exalted? What the heck would
• 32:29
  Speaker 4: one do with that information?
• 32:32
  Speaker 3: What I'm thinking about, though, is that, you know, and
• 32:35
  Speaker 3: I like the idea of this range going from these really, uh,
• 32:41
  Speaker 3: truly awesome experiences to little angels beside every blade of
• 32:48
  Speaker 3: grass saying grow. I think that's charming. But if you
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: have one of these awesome experiences, I think you don't
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: really doubt it most of the time.
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: It's a conversion experience.
• 33:04
  Speaker 3: Exactly. It really is a transcendent function. That you've been told.
• 33:15
  Speaker 3: You know, Mary, of course, doesn't doubt it. And the
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: man sitting on the edge of the pier didn't doubt it.
• 33:25
  Speaker 3: That there is a force in that that doesn't say, hmm,
• 33:32
  Speaker 3: I think I'll think about this overnight and weigh the
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: pros and cons. It just comes in with a knowing
• 33:41
  Speaker 3: that your whole being resonates to.
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: So I'm thinking, listening to you, Deb, and I'm thinking
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: about this experience. I mean, and I've had a number
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: of these experiences, but I'm thinking about one in particular
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: where I just had a knowing. And I've always thought
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: about that as like an intuition, but actually maybe it's
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: right to think about it as, you know, like an angel.
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: I was, the story is that I was living and
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: working in the former Yugoslavia. And I was scheduled to
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: go up country to one of our offices in central
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: Bosnia that day. And I had gone out for like
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: a bike ride or a jog or a walk. I
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: can't remember, but I was, I was in a park
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: and I was just doing my thing. And all of
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: a sudden it was like, whomp, like something huge descended.
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: And I knew, I knew there was danger. And I stopped. And,
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: you know, because it's different, like that different thing between
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: like intuition and fear or worry or anxiety. Like they
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: feel really different. Like there was, it's not that I
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: was afraid. It was that I knew something.
• 34:50
  Speaker 4: It was a fact.
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: It was a fact. And I like stopped and I'm like, okay,
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: what do I do with this?
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: Exactly.
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: And I was like, oh, I, okay, message received, but
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: I don't know what to do with it. So then
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: I kept going. And it came again. And I was like, okay,
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: I got it. And I mean, I didn't know what
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: to do with it.
• 35:10
  Speaker 4: Oh, but let's go back to that moment that you
• 35:13
  Speaker 4: got the message. You knew it was numinous, but you
• 35:15
  Speaker 4: also decided to keep going forward. It took a second
• 35:19
  Speaker 4: message before you decided that you would reorient your track,
• 35:24
  Speaker 4: even though it was so powerful.
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: I didn't reorient my track. I finished my walk. Went upcountry,
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: and that night, the house we were staying in was
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: broken into by men with automatic weapons.
• 35:39
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it was really, really terrifying. It was really, really terrifying.
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: I mean, it ended okay, but it was terrifying.
• 35:50
  Speaker 4: It was terrifying. Yeah. Yeah.
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: And it was, you know, it was it was like
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: my I think I think that legitimately my my life
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: or my at least my physical safety was definitely in danger. So, yeah.
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: So it was like my guardian angel came down and said, like,
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: watch out. But the thing is, and it's not that
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: I it's not that I didn't want to listen to it,
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: but I didn't. Oh, you know what, Joseph? Maybe I
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: did go home at that point. I think I might
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: have said, OK, I'm not going to finish my jog.
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: I think I did. But it's like, it didn't say, well,
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: tonight you're going to be staying in this house and
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: there's got, you know, it wasn't like that. So I couldn't,
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: I couldn't really use it except that when the thing
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: was happening, I was like, somehow, maybe somewhere in my psyche,
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: I'd been prepped.
• 36:36
  Speaker 4: Yes. Yes. Understood.
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 36:39
  Speaker 3: It's such an interesting question as extending the idea of
• 36:46
  Speaker 3: angels into.
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. Maybe, is that how angels operate?
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: Is that also a function? Right. It's one of the
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: things that they do. And then I'm thinking about Jung's
• 37:03
  Speaker 3: vision when he was traveling on a train and saw
• 37:08
  Speaker 3: the monstrous flood covering all the northern and low-lying lands
• 37:13
  Speaker 3: between the North Sea and the Alps. And I realized
• 37:18
  Speaker 3: a frightful catastrophe was in process. Mighty yellow waves, floating
• 37:23
  Speaker 3: rubble of civilization, drowned bodies of thousands, the sea turned
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: to blood. And an inner voice spoke and said, look
• 37:32
  Speaker 3: at it well. It is wholly real and it will
• 37:36
  Speaker 3: be so. You cannot doubt it. And it was a
• 37:39
  Speaker 3: premonition of World War, the onset of World War I. Yeah.
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: You had it twice.
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: So here we got, I think this is really so interesting,
• 37:51
  Speaker 3: what this image is taking us to. First, that whole
• 37:55
  Speaker 3: range from the awesome to dreams to a little blade
• 38:01
  Speaker 3: of grass having its own angel. And now to, wait
• 38:05
  Speaker 3: a minute, what other powerful kinds of incursions, because an
• 38:12
  Speaker 3: angel is an incursion. Yes.
• 38:14
  Speaker 4: Yes, it is.
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: And that's what I experienced.
• 38:18
  Speaker 3: Could we broaden the category to include those kinds of things?
• 38:22
  Speaker 3: Your premonition and Jung's premonition.
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: And Jung's premonition. Yeah, that's an interesting, that's an interesting,
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: I like that, I like that category heading of an incursion,
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: you know.
• 38:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah, or the guy sitting at the end of the pier,
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: you know, that was an incursion. It's like, whoa, where
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: did that come from? Yeah.
• 38:39
  Speaker 3: Right. You don't expect it. There's nothing leading up to it.
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: And all of a sudden, you're jolted into a knowing
• 38:51
  Speaker 3: that is powerful, that you cannot doubt. You know, and
• 38:55
  Speaker 3: it did get your attention, both of those things. But
• 38:59
  Speaker 3: it didn't say, you know, turn around and go home.
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: Don't take that trip tonight or, you know, when this
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: thing happens, do this.
• 39:10
  Speaker 4: And that is, I think, where we see is that
• 39:13
  Speaker 4: it gives us Like natural law, it gives the thing
• 39:17
  Speaker 4: that must be known based on whoever's sending the message,
• 39:21
  Speaker 4: the divine, and free will is not violated. Now, one
• 39:25
  Speaker 4: may feel that as you're saying, feel that I must
• 39:28
  Speaker 4: obey because I must. believe this is numinous and must
• 39:32
  Speaker 4: be followed. But there still has to be some decision
• 39:36
  Speaker 4: on the part of the ego. If not, then we're
• 39:39
  Speaker 4: in the realm of archetypal possession and then that's a
• 39:42
  Speaker 4: very uncertain process.
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: You're right. But on the other hand, I would be like, Okay, got.
• 39:53
  Speaker 4: It.
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: I feel a little bit like the two of you
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: are arguing about how many angels can fit on the
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: head of a pen. Oh, my gosh.
• 40:00
  Speaker 4: See what I did there? Which is important information if
• 40:02
  Speaker 4: you live in a universe where there are angels. But
• 40:06
  Speaker 4: to honor what you're saying, Deb, is that there is
• 40:08
  Speaker 4: a place, I believe in the Old Testament, where errant
• 40:12
  Speaker 4: angels fall in love with human women and they have
• 40:16
  Speaker 4: sex with them. What?
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: What?
• 40:18
  Speaker 4: And the women give birth to a race of monsters,
• 40:22
  Speaker 4: monstrous giants. The Old Testament is very strange. Wow. And
• 40:30
  Speaker 4: that's an example of inflation. When the numinous comes into
• 40:37
  Speaker 4: us and we allow it to take us over and
• 40:42
  Speaker 4: we will give form to things that are a problem.
• 40:48
  Speaker 4: versus retaining the ego's ability to ponder and metabolize what
• 40:55
  Speaker 4: has been offered.
• 40:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah, there is a reference to that in Genesis.
• 41:02
  Speaker 4: Which is a metaphor. You know, these are symbols. You know,
• 41:05
  Speaker 4: if we literalize them, then we're... Right. We live in
• 41:09
  Speaker 4: an interesting universe, undoubtedly, but it can mean other things.
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: Yes. So if it's okay, I would like to, since
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: we're on Genesis, I would like to go to that
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: story in Genesis where Jacob wrestles. Now, the scripture actually says,
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: the text actually says he's wrestling with an unknown man.
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: And I believe it says he wrestles with God, but
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: it's usually kind of translated as he wrestles with an angel.
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: And Deb, I don't know if you want to set
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: the story up a little bit. You're so much better
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: with the biblical stories than I am.
• 41:47
  Speaker 3: Jacob had a brother, Esau, who was his older brother
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: and who was supposed to inherit the estate. But through
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: some trickery and disguise, Jacob got the goods and off
• 42:02
  Speaker 3: he went. And now he's coming back. He's going to
• 42:06
  Speaker 3: try to reconcile or at least appease Esau. He's got
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: a guilty conscience. And he comes with all kinds of gifts.
• 42:17
  Speaker 3: I mean, you know, 20 male goats, 200 ewes, some
• 42:21
  Speaker 3: number of camels, the list goes on and on. So
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: here comes Jacob to revisit his brother, saying, hey, look,
• 42:29
  Speaker 3: I'm really sorry about that. And here's some really good
• 42:32
  Speaker 3: stuff for you. So he expects Esau, he gets word
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: that Esau is coming with 400 men, And Jacob naturally thinks, uh-oh,
• 42:44
  Speaker 3: he's out to get me. And he makes his own
• 42:48
  Speaker 3: plan and so on. But then that night, this goes
• 42:52
  Speaker 3: to your theory here and contention, Joseph, he has a dream,
• 42:57
  Speaker 3: a kind of a dream. That night he got up,
• 43:01
  Speaker 3: took his two wives, two maids, his 11 children, crossed
• 43:06
  Speaker 3: the ford of the river, sends them across. he was
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: left alone and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.
• 43:17
  Speaker 3: When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob,
• 43:20
  Speaker 3: he struck him on the hip socket and Jacob's hip
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: was put out of joint as he wrestled with him.
• 43:27
  Speaker 3: Then he said, let me go for day is breaking.
• 43:29
  Speaker 3: But Jacob said, I will not let you go unless
• 43:32
  Speaker 3: you bless me. So he said to him, what is
• 43:36
  Speaker 3: your name? And he said, Jacob. And the man said,
• 43:39
  Speaker 3: You shall no longer be called Jacob. Your name is Israel,
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: for you have striven with God and with humans and
• 43:48
  Speaker 3: have prevailed. And Jacob said, Please tell me your name.
• 43:52
  Speaker 3: And he said, Why do you ask my name? And
• 43:55
  Speaker 3: there he blessed him. And then Jacob names the place.
• 43:59
  Speaker 3: And he says, I have seen God face to face,
• 44:01
  Speaker 3: yet my life is preserved. And he continues to limp
• 44:05
  Speaker 3: because of his hip. And to this day, the Israelites
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: do not eat the thigh muscle that is on the
• 44:11
  Speaker 3: hip socket because that's where Jacob was struck.
• 44:16
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 44:16
  Speaker 3: So it wasn't a dream. It was a visitation or
• 44:20
  Speaker 3: whatever else we might want to call it. And he
• 44:24
  Speaker 3: is called an angel. But angels traditionally, although they can
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: take other forms and appear in other ways like lilies
• 44:32
  Speaker 3: and trumpets and scepters and flaming swords, Traditionally, they take
• 44:40
  Speaker 3: human form.
• 44:42
  Speaker 4: Let's lead into that a little bit, because Jung addresses
• 44:46
  Speaker 4: this in his essays on flying saucers.
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 44:50
  Speaker 3: Oh, my gosh.
• 44:51
  Speaker 4: Where he says that the human psyche is attuning to
• 44:56
  Speaker 4: something that comes from the transpersonal, but at a certain point,
• 45:01
  Speaker 4: the images of angels change. no longer worked in the
• 45:04
  Speaker 4: collective psyche. And so people began to fantasize that they
• 45:08
  Speaker 4: would be aliens and they would come through technology in
• 45:12
  Speaker 4: one way or another, which, by the way, in a sense,
• 45:15
  Speaker 4: I think is being projected onto AI right now, is
• 45:19
  Speaker 4: that this technologic intelligence that comes from the sky that
• 45:24
  Speaker 4: may harm us, like Lucifer.
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: Or save us.
• 45:29
  Speaker 4: But mostly save us. They will come at the last
• 45:31
  Speaker 4: minute and scoop us up into the air as the
• 45:34
  Speaker 4: earth is going to be destroyed by our foolishness in
• 45:38
  Speaker 4: one way or another. And so the archetype, which is
• 45:42
  Speaker 4: always invisible, can lean into any human psyche and generate
• 45:50
  Speaker 4: images that act as the symbolic bridge to the thing
• 45:54
  Speaker 4: that cannot be seen or tolerated directly. Right. So yes,
• 46:00
  Speaker 4: in these ancient times, birds fly, so it makes sense
• 46:05
  Speaker 4: that angels would, given their coming from the sky, they
• 46:08
  Speaker 4: should have wings. Makes perfect sense. But we come from
• 46:12
  Speaker 4: a world where many things fly, and so the angels
• 46:16
  Speaker 4: might be imagined coming in any number of different ways
• 46:20
  Speaker 4: because our unconscious is populated with all kinds of new
• 46:23
  Speaker 4: and unique images. But you're right, Deb, that historically, and
• 46:27
  Speaker 4: we're drawing from ancient sources, birds are would carry some
• 46:31
  Speaker 4: of the image to make sense of something that descends
• 46:34
  Speaker 4: from on high.
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: But I want to lean into this idea about wrestling
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: with God or wrestling with an angel, because I think
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: it goes to the discussion that the two of you
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: were having a few minutes ago is that, you know, God,
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: the transcendent, the self says, you know, you need to
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: do this or, you know, Lisa, watch out or whatever.
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: And then it's like, how do we engage that? And
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: do we engage it with integrity and intensity? Do we
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: take it seriously? And I think that story is so
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: beautiful of Jacob wrestling with the angel, with God, whatever,
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: because he does. He doesn't, you know, he doesn't give up.
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: He just fights and he's not meant to win and
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: he's going to be, you know, lamed. But there's an
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: integrity to the way he engages it. And I think
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: that that's a lesson to all of us about how
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: we engage. And I want to read the Rilke poem
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: called The Man Watching.
• 47:34
  Speaker 3: Before you do that, can I just make the very
• 47:38
  Speaker 3: great Jungian point here?
• 47:40
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 47:40
  Speaker 3: This is a classic example of holding the tension of
• 47:44
  Speaker 3: the opposites.
• 47:45
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: That Jacob will not let go. I will not let
• 47:49
  Speaker 3: go unless you bless me. In other words, the transcendent function,
• 47:54
  Speaker 3: the third, something else has to happen. And I'm going
• 48:00
  Speaker 3: to hang in there and hang on to you. And
• 48:03
  Speaker 3: he doesn't escape unscathed. But neither one of those polarities,
• 48:09
  Speaker 3: there's no win-lose. It's a great example of holding the
• 48:13
  Speaker 3: tension of the opposites.
• 48:15
  Speaker 4: And one might say that the purpose, going back to
• 48:18
  Speaker 4: the story for a second, is that he cannot leave unchanged.
• 48:23
  Speaker 3: Yep.
• 48:23
  Speaker 4: That whatever is going to happen, he's not going to
• 48:26
  Speaker 4: arrive and depart exactly as he was, whether it's a
• 48:29
  Speaker 4: dislocated hip or a new name or a blessing or
• 48:33
  Speaker 4: change must happen for the sequence to complete itself. But
• 48:37
  Speaker 4: go ahead, Lisa, I want to hear your poem.
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: So this is The Man Watching by Rilke, translated by
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: Robert Bly. I can tell by the way the trees
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: beat after so many dull days on my worried window
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: panes that a storm is coming. And I hear the
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: far-off fields say things I can't bear without a friend,
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: I can't love without a sister. The storm, the shifter
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: of shapes, drives on across the woods and across time,
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: and the world looks as if it had no age.
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: The landscape, like a line in the psalm book, is
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: serious and weight and eternity. What we choose to fight
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: is so tiny. What fights with us is so great.
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: If only we would let ourselves be dominated as things
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: do by some immense storm, we would become strong too
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: and not need names. When we win, it's with small things,
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: and the triumph itself makes us small. What is extraordinary
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: and eternal does not want to be bent by us.
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: I mean the angel who appeared to the wrestlers of
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: the Old Testament. When the wrestler's sinews grew long like
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: metal strings, he felt them under his fingers like chords
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: of deep music. Whoever was beaten by this angel, who
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: often simply declined the fight, went away proud and strengthened
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: and great from that harsh hand. that needed him as
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: if to change his shape. Winning does not tempt that man.
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: This is how he grows, by being defeated decisively by
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: constantly greater beings.
• 50:26
  Speaker 4: How insightful, how lovely.
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: It's just, it's so great. So we should all want
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: to wrestle with that angel.
• 50:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah. That's really great. That's really, really great. I
• 50:41
  Speaker 3: don't think we can say it any better than Rilke.
• 50:44
  Speaker 4: Yeah. But Jung is saying the same thing when he
• 50:47
  Speaker 4: says that everything that thwarts the path of my ego,
• 50:51
  Speaker 4: I call God.
• 50:52
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 50:52
  Speaker 4: Which is a framing. Do we live in a universe
• 50:56
  Speaker 4: that is continuous, you know, with the transpersonal or Does
• 51:02
  Speaker 4: the transpersonal box into something else and everything else is
• 51:06
  Speaker 4: the domain of science and ego? And Jung would say,
• 51:10
  Speaker 4: we become symptomatic when we try to box the numinous
• 51:15
  Speaker 4: somewhere else that we may or may not believe in
• 51:18
  Speaker 4: or encounter. But if we can provide thought and image
• 51:23
  Speaker 4: for the numinous to be right up against us, wrestling us,
• 51:27
  Speaker 4: creating problems, growth, grace, healing, something, changes in our own
• 51:34
  Speaker 4: psychology and something is lifted, a burden is lifted from
• 51:39
  Speaker 4: us when we can tolerate the mythic. We can tolerate
• 51:45
  Speaker 4: these images.
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: Our better angels.
• 51:48
  Speaker 4: Our better angels. I want to quickly, I know, just
• 51:52
  Speaker 4: to share it, I want to retell a quick story
• 51:55
  Speaker 4: because it's so germane to this topic and forbear because
• 52:00
  Speaker 4: I know Many of the listeners have heard me say
• 52:02
  Speaker 4: this before. Many years ago, I was in my early 30s.
• 52:08
  Speaker 4: I had actually some shocking news, and I wasn't sure
• 52:13
  Speaker 4: how to orient around it. Within about three days, I
• 52:17
  Speaker 4: suddenly stood up. I noticed a tension in my low back,
• 52:20
  Speaker 4: and I tried to wrench it out by arching my back.
• 52:23
  Speaker 4: I felt like lightning had stricken me. I fell to
• 52:26
  Speaker 4: the floor in agonizing pain.
• 52:29
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 52:29
  Speaker 4: And I could not walk for about six weeks or so.
• 52:33
  Speaker 4: While I was trying to figure this out, I was young.
• 52:36
  Speaker 4: I didn't have insurance. I didn't even have medical care.
• 52:39
  Speaker 4: I was hoping this would self-resolve. Oof. So a friend
• 52:44
  Speaker 4: of mine who was an elderly and wise analyst said,
• 52:50
  Speaker 4: loaned me these hemi-sync gateway tapes, which are meditation tapes.
• 52:55
  Speaker 4: I had nothing else to do, but I spent hours
• 52:57
  Speaker 4: listening to them. Finally, after about six weeks, I had
• 53:03
  Speaker 4: this experience where I suddenly am conscious and I am
• 53:07
  Speaker 4: in a vast void with no end in any direction.
• 53:12
  Speaker 4: I cannot sense my physical body, which was the first
• 53:16
  Speaker 4: panicky thing. Um, I'm feeling lost in the void. Part
• 53:20
  Speaker 4: of me wants to run back to my body, but
• 53:22
  Speaker 4: it occurs to me that I should ask for help,
• 53:28
  Speaker 4: which I do. I just call out into the void
• 53:31
  Speaker 4: for help. A being, which I would describe as angelic,
• 53:35
  Speaker 4: this being comes to me and begins to rip things
• 53:40
  Speaker 4: off of my body that look like a carapace. And
• 53:44
  Speaker 4: I'm looking at it. I have no physical sensations of it.
• 53:46
  Speaker 4: It's dripping in gore. This happens, that happens. And then
• 53:50
  Speaker 4: at a certain point, I simply open my physical eyes.
• 53:53
  Speaker 4: I'm back in the bed. While this is getting ripped off,
• 53:58
  Speaker 4: I have the insight that shame has infected my body
• 54:05
  Speaker 4: at a level that it cannot function. I open my eyes.
• 54:10
  Speaker 4: My body feels a little different. And I stand up
• 54:13
  Speaker 4: and I'm no longer in pain.
• 54:14
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 54:15
  Speaker 4: So at the time, I didn't call it an angel,
• 54:18
  Speaker 4: but I don't know how else to conceptualize it in
• 54:21
  Speaker 4: that mythic world. But that was a very real experience.
• 54:26
  Speaker 4: But I had to ask for help. I could have
• 54:29
  Speaker 4: easily just opened my eyes and been there for another
• 54:31
  Speaker 4: God knows how long. Yeah, yeah. You had to ask.
• 54:34
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: When we ask for help, often our angels do appear.
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: And sometimes they appear in the form of dreams.
• 54:43
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: And so I wonder if now would be a good
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: time to look at a dream.
• 54:49
  Speaker 3: Our dreamer this week is a woman. She's 46 years old.
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: and she's an executive director of programs administration, and she
• 55:12
  Speaker 3: has entitled her dream Tower Archaeology. And here's the dream.
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: I am in a defensive tower, which is part of
• 55:22
  Speaker 3: a medieval or Roman era city wall. I'm in the
• 55:27
  Speaker 3: defensive turret with an old boyfriend. We're looking together at
• 55:32
  Speaker 3: a slit in the tower masonry, and identifying artifacts in
• 55:37
  Speaker 3: the space and pulling them out carefully and examining them.
• 55:42
  Speaker 3: We find things that look like bones and then a
• 55:44
  Speaker 3: scroll of paper that when I pull it out and
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: unfurl it is an anatomical drawing of the human skull
• 55:51
  Speaker 3: with levels in the drawing that when lifted or pulled
• 55:55
  Speaker 3: aside reveal deeper and deeper layers of the brain that
• 55:59
  Speaker 3: are illustrated in black and white ink in the style
• 56:03
  Speaker 3: of a medieval or early Renaissance medical text. We look
• 56:07
  Speaker 3: at it together and decide we will take it with
• 56:09
  Speaker 3: us when we leave the tower. Then I am arriving
• 56:12
  Speaker 3: at a new school and meeting classmates together and teachers.
• 56:19
  Speaker 3: I am hesitant but friendly and hope they will like
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: me and I will like them. I have brought documents
• 56:26
  Speaker 3: or work to share that I hope they will appreciate.
• 56:30
  Speaker 3: I go into one of the classrooms off the main
• 56:32
  Speaker 3: reception area and lobby. I join an MS Teams call.
• 56:39
  Speaker 3: I am leading the discussion and telling the participants to
• 56:43
  Speaker 3: put on their cameras for the meeting so we can
• 56:46
  Speaker 3: see each other. One participant has not put on their camera,
• 56:51
  Speaker 3: and I click on their screen, which unexpectedly turns the
• 56:55
  Speaker 3: participant's camera on And it is Eckhart Tolle sitting at
• 57:00
  Speaker 3: a desk. I'm surprised to see him on the call
• 57:04
  Speaker 3: and apologize for turning on his camera without his permission.
• 57:07
  Speaker 3: I didn't expect the software to give me the access
• 57:11
  Speaker 3: to turn the camera on in this way. For context,
• 57:15
  Speaker 3: she says, I had this dream on December 13th or
• 57:19
  Speaker 3: 14th of this year. I have three children and my
• 57:23
  Speaker 3: youngest just turned four. Slowly, gradually, week after week, I'm
• 57:29
  Speaker 3: able to spend more time reading Jungian psychology, listening to podcasts,
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: and keeping a dream journal. It's a real pleasure to
• 57:37
  Speaker 3: be able to turn to topics that were pertinent to
• 57:40
  Speaker 3: me over 20 years ago before I married and started
• 57:43
  Speaker 3: a family. The main feelings, she says, are curiosity and
• 57:48
  Speaker 3: awe around what I might find in the tower, anticipation
• 57:53
  Speaker 3: and nervousness about meeting new classmates and teachers, and awkwardness
• 57:59
  Speaker 3: around the MS Teams software allowing me to turn participants'
• 58:04
  Speaker 3: camera on unexpectedly. Associations, she says, I attended high school
• 58:11
  Speaker 3: in Italy and have first-hand experience of the Aurelian Wall
• 58:16
  Speaker 3: around the city of Roma, as well as other medieval
• 58:20
  Speaker 3: defensive structures around Italian towns and villages. I am fascinated
• 58:26
  Speaker 3: by these structures and enjoy visiting castles and forts. My
• 58:30
  Speaker 3: father was in the Canadian military and had a keen
• 58:34
  Speaker 3: sense of military history and imparted an appreciation of these
• 58:38
  Speaker 3: Roman and medieval structures to me. I changed schools often
• 58:43
  Speaker 3: throughout my adolescence, had many experiences meeting new classmates and teachers.
• 58:50
  Speaker 3: In my current role, I lead a lot of MS
• 58:53
  Speaker 3: Teams calls and spend time in virtual meetings. I always
• 58:58
  Speaker 3: have my camera on during work calls, and I do
• 59:02
  Speaker 3: not like when others leave their cameras off. I know
• 59:06
  Speaker 3: who Eckhart Tolle is, but I've not read his books
• 59:09
  Speaker 3: in great detail. I tried reading his most popular books,
• 59:12
  Speaker 3: but found it uncompelling and dull. I'm confused about Eckhart
• 59:17
  Speaker 3: Tolle's name as it reminds me of Meister Eckhart, and
• 59:20
  Speaker 3: I used to get these two confused. I think Eckhart
• 59:24
  Speaker 3: Tolle has an odd look on his face in many
• 59:27
  Speaker 3: of his public photos, like he's in on a big joke.
• 59:31
  Speaker 3: I wonder whether there is an underlying strategy to his
• 59:34
  Speaker 3: books and overall approach, more below the surface than what
• 59:38
  Speaker 3: is presented in public. Okay, this is a lot for
• 59:44
  Speaker 3: us to delve into and try to understand.
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: The first thing that I noticed is that the dream
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: has really two very distinct parts to it. It has
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: this kind of scene in the medieval tower with the
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: old boyfriend and then this kind of more quotidian sort
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: of setting of being on this MS Teams call.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: And then it has a surprise at the end. I
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: think surprise in dreams is always really interesting. Like something
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: new has been revealed. Yes. Overall, you know, let me
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: just go back to see what she says about the
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: feelings in the dream. What does she say about that?
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: But overall, the dream seems to be, yeah, she says
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: it's surprise and awe and curiosity and some awkwardness. But overall,
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: it seems to me to have a sort of positive
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: trajectory there. I get the feeling that it was the
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: right thing to do to take that document out of
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: the tower. You know, if we look at that sort
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: of when-then thing, it's like when we decide to take
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: this with us when we leave the tower, then I'm
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: in this new classroom and I'm hesitant but friendly and
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: it seems like things are kind of going okay. At
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: least she's optimistic about it. And then there's this really
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: sort of surprising lysis, which is, whoa, there's Eckhart Tolle.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: And I, you know, I actually haven't read Eckhart Tolle,
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: and I sort of know who he is. But from
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: her associations, he feels a little bit like a trickster
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: figure in this dream, doesn't he?
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Just for clarification for me and perhaps listeners, what
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 3: are MS Teams?
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 4: Microsoft.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's Microsoft Teams. It would be a little bit
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: like being on a Zoom call.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 4: But it's very, very ubiquitous. It's like everybody's left Zoom
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 4: and is now using this other tool.
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 3: I'm probably the only one who didn't know what that was.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 4: You're living in that enchanted universe where angels provide the communications.
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 3: That must be it.
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: Or the medieval tower. But there is this really sharp, like,
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: we're in this magical place. I mean, that document sounds magical.
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 4: Right, ancient and modern laying right next to each other.
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 3: But Eckhart Tolle is one of a number of basically
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 3: spiritually oriented in sort of Eastern traditions or that kind
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 3: of attitude course of growth and development. And I'm just
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 3: thinking she begins in a defensive tower. Yep. And isn't
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 3: that what they are with the slits? You can shoot
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 3: your own bow and arrow out, but incoming arrows would
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 3: never make it through the slit.
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 4: Exactly.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 3: The towers are great images of defense.
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 4: What must not get in.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 3: Right. This dream moves from that to Eckhart Tolle sitting
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 3: at a desk and the dream ego saying, whoa, you know, sorry,
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 3: I didn't mean to do that. But nevertheless, a kind
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 3: of wonderful surprise.
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 4: He is undefended. Yeah. You can walk right in.
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 3: That's really good. Yep. That's exactly it. He's the essence
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 3: of openness and being vulnerable and deep and human and
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 3: present and undefended.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 4: And the tower as the defense suggests this is an
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 4: old defense and maybe even a multi-generational way of keeping
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 4: a lot of things out for whatever reason.
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and she's also with an old boyfriend and the
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 3: old things that look like bones and medieval early Renaissance.
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 3: So all these are references. I think it's right on
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 3: that it's in the past.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: You know, I would be curious about who that old
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: boyfriend was and what was the nature of that relationship.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: And of course, we don't have that in the associations,
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: but we can obviously say that that's some kind of
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: animus figure. My imagination, because of what she talked about,
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: kind of going back to things that she was interested
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: in before she got married, was that it could be
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: that that's kind of what that animus represents, that there
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: were these interests or energies that she had access to
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: a long time ago that she's reconnecting with now. And then,
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: of course, there's a different kind of animus figure that
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: shows up at the end of the second part of
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: the dream, which is Eckhart Tolle. And he's a little bit,
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: you know, again, it's a kind of a complex image
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: because it's not like she's saying, oh, I've read all
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: of his books and they're so meaningful to me. She's saying,
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: I don't know who he is, and he is this
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: kind of spiritual guy, but he also seems like he
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: might have a con going on. But definitely something surprising there.
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: And that she, like you said, Joseph, she just has
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: ready access to it.
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 4: And she's not sure how to relate to. I think
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 4: this often happens in dreams that something that is in
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 4: preparation for the ego, you get a glimpse, you brush
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 4: against it. But I think what we're seeing here is
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 4: that highly spiritualized or abstracted aspect of the animus, which
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 4: by the way is A carrier of the logos. I mean,
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 4: this is a guy that traffics in words. He publishes books.
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 4: I mean, he is of that trajectory that Barbara Hanna
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 4: writes about. And she's like, I don't know.
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 3: But it goes right back to that's the next iteration
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 3: of head work, so to speak, being in your head,
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 3: writing a book earlier in the dream. was finding the
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 3: drawing of the human skull, you know, that has deeper
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 3: and deeper layers of the brain illustrated in black and
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 3: white ink in medieval sort of style. So we could
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 3: call that the psyche.
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 4: And the skull is a tower, right? It's a protective
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 4: tower with little openings in it.
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 3: Right. It's our defensive skull. And then we have, it
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 3: goes to Eckhart Tolle. We're all sitting here smiling. Because
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 3: the dream feels like it has a wonderful forward trajectory
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 3: or telos.
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 4: It does.
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 3: And our dreamer says, you know, my kids are old
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 3: enough now that I can go back to reading Jung
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 3: and I can listen to podcasts. I can have a
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 3: little more of my own life now. And with three children,
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 3: there are years when you just don't have, psychic space
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 3: or the time on the clock to do much of that.
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 4: Yes, undoubtedly. So she's in the new school. So she
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 4: goes from defending and that with the little slits, she'll
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 4: let a little bit out, a word, maybe an email,
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 4: you know, can get out through the slit of the tower.
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 4: But with part two, as you were saying, Lisa, now
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 4: it's the time of learning. Again, coming back to being
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 4: the beginner, the student, which is also something that Eckhart Tolle,
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 4: who I'm not a good representative of, does talk about
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 4: the idea of the beginner's mind, the learner's mind, and
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 4: the value of that. So now there's much to learn,
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 4: including learning about the advanced animus that is just quietly abiding.
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 4: Just come on in if you want to. You know,
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 4: we'll talk if you want. It's up to you.
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah, right.
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: You have the power, actually. You have the power. The
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: software has given her the power to reveal this. That
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: feels significant.
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 4: And often in fairy tales and myths, it's up to
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 4: the hero or the heroine to recognize what's valuable. The
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 4: gods show up, knock at your doors, they're wearing rags, oh,
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 4: get out of here. But for those who have eyes
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 4: to see and ears to hear, There may be something
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 4: more there. She doesn't summarily dismiss him in the dream,
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 4: but it remains to be seen if she has eyes
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 4: to see and ears to hear in this next iteration.
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 4: And the dream, I think, is opening to open the
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 4: slits large enough so that she can really see the
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 4: potential in herself as well as the potential in the world.
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 4: Or is she going to lock it all up again?
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 4: Up to her.
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: And the dream susu saying, like, we were talking about
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: how angels are incursions. It's kind of like Eckhart Tolle
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: is an incursion. She thinks she's just in this sort
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: of like ordinary MS teams meeting. And then it's like, oh,
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: my gosh, there he is sitting at his desk.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 4: Right. So what I would offer to the dreamer is
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 4: proceed like an archaeologist, not like software with administrative privileges.
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: Right. Right. That's great. I really like that. Thanks for listening.
• 1:09:16
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• 1:09:19
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• 1:09:24
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