By far the most fruitful attempts, however, to find suitable symbolic expressions for the self were made by the Gnostics. Most of them—Valentinus and Basilides, for instance—were in reality theologians who, unlike the more orthodox ones, allowed themselves to be influenced in large measure by inner experience. They are therefore, like the alchemists, a veritable mine of information concerning all those natural symbols arising out of the repercussions of the Christian message. At the same time, their ideas compensate the asymmetry of God postulated by the doctrine of the privatio boni, exactly like those well-known modern tendencies of the unconscious to produce symbols of totality for bridging the gap between the conscious and the unconscious, which has widened dangerously to the point of universal disorientation.4
Unfortunately, I don’t think Jung will reclaim his well-deserved central status within the field of psychology. Psychology is a phenomenon, just like history writing, that is at times too affected by its own environment and contemporary influence. But I do believe that Jung’s thoughts and ideas will take on new forms and carry on within art, literature, and other expressions of culture. Because we don’t really need more existential manuals or more neurochemistry, but rather intuitive incentives, in which we see the totality and our own story clearer, to be able to make our own decisions. Causal, empirical science just isn’t good enough for that, so we need fairy tales, poems, and dreams, as well as old and new myths, to be able to act intelligently on both individual and species levels.
11
The Imaginative Libido
Originally published in the Polish magazine Trans/Wizje (No. 4, 2013).
IT’S EASY TO SEE how dolls and playing with miniatures are attractive to children, whose imaginations are not yet repressed by the demands of adult behavior. However, the externalizations or projections onto talismanic objects are of great value also for the psychic hygiene and well-being of adults. It seems that the times are changing in favor of an integration of a wider definition of play and, as an extension of this, of artificial human companions.
The child who plays with miniatures is regarded as “normal.” Indeed, the child seeks an externalization of fantasies in tangibly bestowing objects/proxies with magical life in a phase where confusion reigns and there’s simply quite a lot to learn about how to behave and when, and so on. Traditionally, girls are equipped with dolls and household items, and boys with tools of various kinds (cars, weapons, machines, fellow soldiers, etc). Whether this is all tradition and a manifestation of imposed gender patterns from anxious parents or something completely natural, we will leave for another discussion.
Mimicking adults close by can of course be both good and bad, depending on what these adults do. At best, parents can serve as good examples of balanced and creative decision makers. At worst, their own destructive behaviors can be contagiously transmitted into the psyche and behavior of the child in question. Using dolls in these formative years is a way to relate to and structure the chaotic aspects of childhood, both as amplification of positive emotions and experiences and as exorcism of bad ones.
Suffice to say here that dollhouses, garages, pastel-colored stables for cute unicorns, replica weapons, dress-up cutouts, grand landscapes with miniature trains and roads or even battlefields are integrated parts of growing up for most Western kids.
Dolls and toys in general have always existed and always will. Under dire straits, a stick and a pinecone can do the trick and get you to the “zone.” In more well-to-do circumstances, advanced and expensive mechanical miniatures will help saturate the imagination. The value seems to not have to do with cost per se but rather with invested emotional and imaginative energy. Your own favorite teddy bear may not have been the most lavish, costly, or elegant but what does it matter? It was yours and you felt an intense emotional resonance with it. This dynamic relationship can be so strong that the mere thought of that teddy bear can evoke a feeling of warmth and nostalgia later on in life.
There are several wonderful museums for toys in the world. One of the best when it comes to dolls, teddy bears, and dollhouses exists in the old town in Basel, Switzerland. On well-visited floors are thousands of items, all beautifully preserved. It is almost like entering a shrine somehow, the way the dolls and other items are meticulously showcased and looking out at you from behind glass boundaries.
Not only is there an impressive display of technical craftsmanship (now probably lost forever) but also of the very essence of dolls and proxies; yes, they are dead but they can easily come to life (of sorts). This becomes especially evident when looking at the multitude of mechanical dolls and constructions that move, either wound up or electrically. Although their movements are likely to be jerky and stiff, the mere action itself does indeed tilt one’s imagination. It is quite often an uneasy experience and one that provokes a light sense of fear. Probably that’s because it mimics our own behavior or environment but in a disturbingly flawed way.
On display at the Basel museum are many dollhouses that provide an insight into the behavioral programming of nineteenth-century Switzerland (and, surely, other equally civilized regions of the world). Everything is orderly, all the boys and girls are well dressed and well behaved (at least on the surface and during opening hours) and there is an ample display of exquisite miniature items belonging in the spheres of home, school, and work. That this was not strictly a matter of toys for fun quickly becomes evident.
Technology and craftsmanship dictated the shape of these important learning platforms of the era in question. In Switzerland of the late nineteenth century, where 10 percent of the gross national product came from exports of mechanical music machines, it’s no wonder that expertly constructed and fine mechanical worlds of wonder were presented to Swiss children.
Today, entertainment has taken over the same function. However, there is a big difference. Today, kids are educated in passive modes by a never-ending flow of entertainment. Where active fantasy and playacting used to be key ingredients in the mental, moral, and emotional development of children, today there is a saddening prevalence of introverted staring into illuminated screens of varying sizes.
This is also why prefab household robots, for instance, can’t fulfil the same needs as artificial human companions. Their robotic presets and cold, distinctly nonhuman behavior leaves very little for the imagination to work with.
The fear of dolls in general is called pediophobia, and constitutes part of a greater cluster of fears called automatonophobia. The considerably more enthusiastic attitudes toward the same phenomenon are called pediophilia and automatonophilia.
The eerie and sometimes even terrifying encounter with glassy-eyed porcelain dolls or even mute teddy bears, especially when one sees many of them at the same time, clearly distinguishes the thin line between death and magical life. By mere will, an inanimate object can go from being a scary zombie or voodoo horror-film-nightmare item to something that is “cute,” “cuddly,” and—not forgetting this—“mine.” And then also integrated in harmonious playing, alone or together with friends. It’s what the human imagination invests in the object that makes it come alive.
Historically, the projection of life onto or into inanimate objects belongs in magic and protoreligious spheres. Children have always played in this sense, but adults have also to a varying degree been allowed to do this. Rituals and ceremonies in all cultures have been creations by proxy, either for keeping a community together by sharing a belief system, or for making substantial and sympathetic changes in a willed direction. The use of totems, dolls, proxies, and so forth, has always been integrated in this process.
Imagination in itself shouldn’t be forgotten either. This is a quality or essence that is so fundamentally human that when it is discouraged (“Stop daydreaming and get back to work!”) it creates severe emotional imbalances in the individual. For children, using toys and acting/playing is considered natural. For adults, however, rigidity and obedience are encouraged. Interestingly, this is a process or
projection that usually sets in as the individual becomes sexually mature. There seems to be a link in there somehow, one that demands that the two protohuman phenomena of sex and imagination should not be allowed in the same psychic sphere. Now, why is that?
There have been many pioneering psychologists and intellectuals who’ve focused on these phenomena, Jung being but one. His integration (not least in his own life and creativity) of the imagination and his trusting of his own intuition remain groundbreaking when looking back at the twentieth century. Several of his disciples have carried on researching this, including Marie-Louise von Franz:
In a way, one must be potentially “whole” already in order to enter the drama; if one is not, one will learn to become so by painful experience. Active imagination is thus the most powerful tool in Jungian psychology for achieving wholeness—far more efficient than dream interpretation alone. . . . In contrast to the numerous existing techniques of passive imagination, active imagination is done alone, to which most people must overcome considerable resistance. It is a form of play, but a bloody serious one. . . . We also know that many alchemists used an imaginatio vera et non phantastica in their work, which was a form of active imagination. This gives us the satisfaction of knowing that we are dealing here not with a weird innovation, but with a human experience, which has been lived through before. It is actually a new form of one of the oldest forms of religio, in the sense of “giving careful consideration to the numinous powers.”1
The American Satanist and philosopher Anton LaVey wrote and talked a lot about something he foresaw as a great business and phenomenon of the future: artificial human companions. What he meant by this was the integration in daily life of life-size dolls, with which you talk, hang out, or even have sex. LaVey himself had an entire room designed as a 1950s bar, complete with furniture, musical instruments, a bartender and life-size guests that he had built himself over the years. The possibility of venting anger or indulging in prurient fantasies (and behavior) in this strictly private sphere LaVey saw as something that could become not only psychologically healing but also a revolutionary big business.
Time has definitely caught up with this thinking. Where previously store mannequins were modified by a few pediophilic Galatea aficionados, now an entire industry has bloomed that makes life-size dolls, complete with natural-feeling skin, various hair- and eye-color options, racial features, and physical endowments. As with so many aspects of the development of human technology, sexual needs have been instrumental in this. Companies like the American outfit Real Doll manufacture dolls for sexual use, but they can of course equally well be used for polite conversation or whatever else floats your boat.
If you think it’s strange that people of both sexes would indulge erotically with dolls or toys rather than with real people, think again. The predominantly female use of dildos has been with us since time immemorial and is perhaps the most common example of adult talismanic use in our contemporary culture. The use of a proxy penis not only gives sexual and sensual pleasure but also activates the adult imagination immediately. Also, try to remember what you yourself (God forbid!) or your friends did when you got a new doll in your hands. Wasn’t Barbie more or less immediately defrocked and examined between her legs? Ditto with Ken? The curiosity and relationship has been there all along.
There is nowadays a gigantic global industry that has surpassed its cousin, pornography, and that is sex toys. That’s right: “toys.” And dolls constitute a large portion of this industry of adult toy making. Does this mean that adults have suddenly become more infantile? No, it very likely just means that the market now acknowledges a deep-rooted human need to act out fantasies in isolated spaces that allow for not only a sexual but also an overall psychic release.
As soon as you so desire, the pediophobic aspects of dolls in general are magically removed, and these become alive and someone you can talk to or integrate in your own and possibly your friends’ interactions. That is, when you yourself make that happen by opening up your mind to a reality slightly less causal than the normal, waking adult state of mind. The doll then becomes very much alive. If it’s only in your own mind or not is irrelevant. In the subjective sphere, subjectivity rules supreme. The pediophobic quickly turns into the pediophilic at the very first realization that you are now alone with your new artificial friend.
One usually says that size doesn’t matter, but of course it does. Small dolls are for small humans, meaning children. But what happens when the dolls grow in size along with their owners? Well, they need to do what adults do, of course. Or what adults would like to do with other adults but for various reasons don’t. The primitive inflatable dolls with washable plastic orifices or attached dildos have been an interesting part of human culture from the 1970s and onward. From a psychoanalytical perspective, it’s very revealing. You fill a doll with your own breath (of life)—or perhaps use a pump—then fuck it or are fucked by it, clean up the mess, and eventually deflate it again. How is that for an analogy of the Western narcissistic libido and its shame-based repression?
With a new generation of life-size and life-like dolls designed for various purposes (basically with or without orifices), we are going to see a change in privately controlled psychic hygiene for adults. When Anton LaVey prophesied and in a pioneering way built his own best friends, he consciously and willingly paved the way for a potential quantum leap in human behavior:
I have great respect for those who pioneer their own artificial human companions, crude as they might initially be. They will have come a small step closer to playing God and creating man or woman according to their desired image. With a creative outlet as cloaked in age-old taboo as this, innovation may now run rampant—more so than any art form man has yet known.2
What the kids do with their dolls is their business. What the adults do with theirs, ditto. Those who can’t, won’t, or simply refuse to realize the potential of pediophilic power will eventually have to find themselves becoming unwilling puppets rather than (self-inflated) puppet masters. Interhuman communication is becoming more banal and strenuous with each day that passes, which is in part a result of intellectual depletion by technology. Why not rather live to the fullest and explore all the intimate facets of life together with a companion (or several) that is not terrifying and dead (nor banal and strenuous) but rather filled with exactly the kind of life and style you prefer and are stimulated by?
12
Formulating the Desired
Some Similarities between Ritual Magic and the Psychoanalytic Process
Originally a lecture delivered at the Psychoanalysis, Art, and the Occult symposium, London, England, 2016.
It seems to me that one is displaying no great trust in science if one cannot rely on it to accept and deal with any occult hypothesis that may turn out to be correct.
SIGMUND FREUD, “DREAMS AND THE OCCULT”1
IN A SPECIFICALLY WESTERN MIND FRAME, we can see many similarities between ritual magic and the psychoanalytic process. A lot of it has to do with formulation, lack of formulation, or, possibly, misapplied or misdirected formulation. We are creators of our own worlds, and they in turn create their own, on their own. Usually, for balanced individuals, the interaction between the formulating strata of the psyche and the formulated expressions is well adjusted. There are also many gray areas in which there is a discrepancy between the two. One such area is lying—or should we say “white lying”?—which could be seen as a minor offense of desired manipulation. Another more pathological area would be a phenomenon like Tourette’s syndrome, in which there is a distinct lack of control of expression of key strata terms.
No matter which perspective we choose to regard this interaction from, there are analogies within the fascinating spheres of occultism and magic. I’d like to narrow that down to a specifically Western mind frame, meaning: fairly rational, decidedly intellectual, and to a great extent ego based. Different systems could be looked at here: Western ceremonial, chaos, witchcraft, an
d so forth. I’d also like to narrow it down to the individual perspective. What does the individual magician do or express? With this in mind, the equivalent of a white lie could, for instance, be a misdirected expression of will, meaning one that’s not rooted in thought-through, individuated reasoning but something perhaps more immediate, ephemeral, or reactive. And the Tourette’s angle could be the equivalent of magic as a lifestyle attribute rather than an essential, transforming tool that’s perfectly valuable even though it’s not visible and frequent on social media platforms.
Human language is both a blessing and a curse. Nowhere is this so apparent as when one is talking about oneself or expressing what one wants in ritual. Well, it’s apparent in politics too, and in device-instruction manuals. The formulation seems to take place right after the need to express has encountered the comfort-zone filter, and substantial things are usually lost in this translation. It becomes a compromise that makes perfect sense to the ego, a signal filtered out with safe noise.
The destinations in terms of psychoanalysis and magical practice are basically one and the same: in order to change negative behavioral loops and hindrances, we gradually work on small steps and changes, very much through formulation, and hopefully learn more about ourselves while doing that. But in both cases, the road to insight is paved with eloquent defense mechanisms and delusions of grandeur. In both, the underlying problematic emotional or psychic cluster is protected by expressions of what seems to be will. That is, a desired direction. But usually it is not ingrained existential will based on a 100 percent genuine honesty (if there is such a thing) but rather momentary bursts of what appears to be genuine will.
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