Inherent in the spiritual path is this work of letting go of old ways of living that don’t work anymore.  Maybe we got energy from rescuing others or taking advantage of someone.  Maybe we had an outsized ego that had to be reduced to size.  Or maybe, and here’s the one that grabs me, we had some infantile fantasies that we had to lose.

Joseph Campbell talks a lot about infantile fantasies being a major stumbling block to the hero who seeks to become one with God.  His book, HERO WITH A THOUSAND FACES is an examination of world mythology with regards to spiritual heros.  Campbell writes that we are the only species who stay bonded to the Mother for so long, and that we have a lot of fantasies about Mother-good, Father-intruder, that play out in strange ways as we get older.

“As the original intruder into the paradise of the infant with its mother, the father is the archetypal enemy; hence, throughout life all enemies are symbolical (to the unconscious) of the father.  “Whatever is killed becomes the father.”  Hence the veneration in headhunting communities (in New Guinea, for example) of the heads brought home from vendetta raids.  Hence, too, the irresistible compulsion to make war:  the impulse to destroy the father is continually transforming itself into public violence.”

“Anxieties for the integrity of its body, fantasies of restitution, a silent, deep requirement for indestructibility and protection against the “bad” forces from within and without, begin to direct the shaping psyche; and these remain as determining factors in the later neurotic, and even normal, life activities, spiritual efforts, religious beliefs, and ritual practices of the adult.”

OK, so let’s assume that Joe has a point here . . . that the infantile fantasies that we created as a result of our surroundings shape our psyches in such a way as to be a significant part of our personalities and life views.  Which of us could actually go back to our infant feelings and know what they were?  And if we could go back and feel the fantasies being created, could we actually change them to create a healthy personality?  Or is that the purpose of life . . . to shed us of all of our naïve wishes and bring us in line with what is?

I remember sitting in therapy after divorcing my first wife at the tender age of 28 and listening to the therapist ask me about my childhood and specifically about my feelings during that time.  I could no more answer that question than answer what trajectory a rocket would have to shoot in order to orbit the moon and return to earth.  It would take years of discipline to find a feeling then begin to trace my feelings back in time.

After 22 years of that work, I can finally connect with even the very earliest feelings.  The unique quality of a baby feeling is that it doesn’t even have words to describe it.  In my experience it is gut level and can best be felt as a deep pervasive driving force that surfaces when we need to deliver:  starting out a new project, meeting someone for the first time, taking the final shot with 1.6 seconds to go.  All of these scenarios bring out a feeling and belief that is very similar to the belief that got imprinted early on.

For me the infant feelings are a mixture of, “I really need to please these people,” and “I’ve got to do something huge to fix this mess.”  I could go into specifics of why and what my parents did to evoke this response, but for now I’d rather just stick with the fantasy that was created.  Specifically, “I’ve got to do something huge to fix this mess.”  It’s followed me for life.  It’s manifested in my attempts to risk everything to create some art form that would save the world.  It definitely affected my initial understanding of God and then moved into my career.  But with each huge thing that I accomplished, I began to realize that there was no mess I could fix and no huge thing that would really change anything.  In fact the opposite resulted.  I self destructed, lol.

So now I’m experimenting with changing all this . . . letting go of the need to do something huge to assure my survival, accepting the moment as enough, sitting with my inner baby to reassure him that it’s OK.  I can only report a 50% success rating on this venture.  I’m not even sure if something this innate can be changed.  I’m going with the idea that God changes some of that through things and people I come in contact with.  In fact that’s the way it’s supposed to work . . . I think.

But back to Campbell . . . in next weeks post, I’ll share some more thoughts Joseph had on what at-one-ment looks like and how the spiritual quest is manifested in the hero.  Feel free to chime in in the “comments” section as to what your earliest pervasive feelings were or whether infantile fantasies play out for you today?  I’d be curious to hear.

As of late, I’m on a journey that I don’t understand.  It appears as if I am healing early, early wounds – when my power was taken from me through fear and intimidation.  In those early days my sensitivity picked up on the unconscious world around me, and was terrified that the ship was sinking.  Safety meant disconnecting, and doing whatever it took to please the giants.  I took on the mantra, “I can not fail . . . or I will not survive.”

Fast forward to adulthood and I’m on a team of 16 players from the Brookside men’s golf club playing against another team.  I’m feeling disconnected and not knowing why.  The feeling as I putt is, “I cannot fail, or I will not survive.”  The old scenario has reappeared in different clothing.  The result was of course failure for 9 holes.  No one can putt or succeed under the conditions that they have no room for failure.  Once my singles match was lost I was free to work with my partner in the team match.  Suddenly I was reconnected and sinking all the big putts . . . fear was gone and I was putting to make the putt rather than not to fail.

We had a week before our next matches and I had some time to reflect on the early childhood fear that had been projected onto the present.  I did some grieving, sat with it, got real clear on the fact that nothing I do on the green today can change anything that happened back on Cambridge Ave. in Phoenix, Arizona where I grew up.

The next week I went out and to my surprise there was no censor inside my head or body telling me to be tentative.  There were no conditions, no result that could be achieved other than just putting the ball into the hole and enjoying that moment for what it was.  And of course the putts were falling, I felt completely fearless.

The question for me lately has been, How can I do this more in my life? The sensation of being free of those early childhood binds was like being let into Disneyland for the first time.  And I’m not sure if I can even take credit for the healing.  It was like something had been “lifted” from me.  Sure, my availability to making the connections helped, but I’ve been trying to shake this monkey for a long, long time.

Here are a couple thoughts from Joseph Campbell (from The Power of Myth) on ego transcending and its place in the spiritual quest.

“For to experience this sense of compassion, accord, or even identity with another, or with some ego-transcending principle that has become lodged in your mind as a good to be revered and served, is the beginning once and for all, of the properly religious way of life and experience; and this may then lead to a life-consuming quest for a full experience of that one Being of beings of which all temporal forms are the reflections.”

“When life comes into being, it is neither afraid nor desiring, it is just becoming.  Then it gets into being, and it begins to be afraid and desiring.  When you can get rid of fear and desire and just get back to where you’re becoming, you’ve hit the spot.”

It’s easy to forget in tough times or when we’re going through something annoying or painful that, “where you stumble is where your treasure lies.”  That’s the way Joseph Campbell sums up mythology’s answer to life’s dilemmas.  For Campbell, one of the great unsung spiritual heroes of the 20^th Century, mythology speaks to a spiritual journey that each of us is on.  It’s an inward journey and one that is made by everyone on the planet, be they Muslim or Buddhist, Christian or Jew.  For Campbell it is the real journey to be made, not living up to the tenants of a faith, a shallow rendition of the real deal.

Campbell even goes so far (or maybe not) to assert that the real magic of the Bible is to read it as mythology rather than literal historical fact.  By reading the Bible as myth we have stories that act as guideposts to the inward journey.

One of the myths Campbell likes to reference is the story of the Knights of the Round Table and their search for the Holy Grail (no, not the Monty Python version).  The knights are challenged to seek the grail and upon agreeing to the quest, each knight, “entered the forest where he chose where it was darkest and there was no way or path.”  Campbell makes a point of noting that we each have a dark forest, but we choose the entry point and how to make our way out.  This is the spiritual journey, making our way out of the dark forest.

“Wo!  Hold on there Mr. Campbell.  I didn’t choose these messes I’ve been in.  They just happened to me,”  I can hear many saying.

That’s where it gets weird, doesn’t it?  The idea that we choose our Waterloos is very deep, but think about it for a moment.  Imagine that God set up the universe so that we had the unconscious ability to put ourselves in situations, that when worked through would give us the strength we were lacking.  Each sticky situation is an opportunity to ask for help and make our way through the forest.  Of course the illusion is that the forest is too much for us.  And many events, broken relationships, failed careers, addictions, we’re sure are going to sink us.  Then self-pity can creep in and become a warm cabin in the woods.  But according to Campbell fear can be only temporary:

“Where it seems to be most challenging is where the greatest invitation lies to find deeper or greater power in ourselves.  Where power to respond succeeds, there comes a new amplification of life and consciousness.”

As I look at the history of my own personal myth, I was sure I was sunk many times and yet ironically the sinkings (sic) all had something I needed to lose to get further down the path:  an arrogance, a false ego pursuit, a superman dream, a control grab . . . so far Campbell has been right about finding a deeper power.

So pay attention yea knights and damsels, today may hold a clue to getting out of the forest.

There’s been a buzz in the mental health community for a while now over Cesar Millan.  Cesar has a show on the National Geographic Channel called THE DOG WHISPERER (Friday nights).  He opens every show with the mantra, “I rehabilitate dogs, I train people.”  He then proceeds to help dog owners with their dogs.  But unlike any dog trainer I’ve ever seen, he goes after the “weak” psychology of the owner as a means of correcting the dog’s behavior problem.  The owner needs to be calm assertive so the dog can be calm submissive.

There’s no question in my mind that Cesar is the Jesus of the dog world – the way he controls and exorcises the “demons” every week blows my mind.  But I’m also finding that his methodology goes way beyond the dog kingdom.  It’s a way to treat human behavior problems – especially addiction and obsessive compulsive disorders.

Dogs need a few things to be healthy (notice how similar these are to humans).  They need someone in charge – Cesar calls this a “pack leader.”  Then they need to start every day with three components, in order:  Exercise, Discipline and Affection.  Once accomplished, the dog’s ready to settle into a calm submissive state.  Recovering addicts aren’t much different (myself included).  Exercise brings about endorphins and levels out the body chemistry.  Discipline shakes the mind out of magical thinking and the laziness of the ego.  And then affection comes last when it’s more appropriate.

The trouble Cesar has with most dog owners he encounters is that they are weak or lazy or both.  They’re afraid to be assertive and they just want their affection (without exercise or discipline) to make everything better.  It reminds me a lot of my old days as a fundamentalist Christian and why it was so weak and powerless to stop addiction.  The notion that God’s love was going to make everything better was so devoid of the emotional exercise and discipline of going back and finding how my upbringing shaped my being.  It was Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell that gave me the workout I needed to get beyond my sheltered childhood.  The path of heeding my unconscious (Jung) and uncovering my own myth (Campbell) keeps paying dividends as long as I’m willing to do the work.

I’m still surprised though when I watch THE DOG WHISPERER.  Such a unique combination of skills and intuitions.  I think he’s just moved into my top 3 people I’d most like to have dinner with.