The Writer’s Edge – Finding Your Muse
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Matrix of the Writer’s Edge – Finding Your Muse
Dr. Mathias Alfred Jaren
C. July 2013
All proceeds given to All Souls College, -The Codrington Library
Oxford
"Madness is rare in individuals - but in groups, parties, nations and ages it is the rule." (Nietzsche, p.90) If true, how could one discover a method to enable them to use their own imagination? The imagination, how profound! Every human carries about a wondrous tool, at times miserably confined. Confounded! What havoc this thing, the imagination, has created! I wish to invite you into a short discussion to reexamine the past, to reassess the present. Where to begin? - A thing, a process, a spirit?
"Ideas and feelings which had long ceased to interest
me suddenly began to assume significance and interest.
A deep meaning and many subtle allegories appeared in
what only yesterday seemed to be naive popular fantasy
- or crude superstition.". (0uspensky, p.4)
There is a place of the here and now, a place where at no expense the world can exist. An "intellectual studio" which is also perceivable as a mechanism, a process. As we shall discover, this place frightens many, and horrified even more. It is a dimension of things variously described as the spirit, the soul, perhaps best understood as the reflection of spirit. Individuals looking here have found the devil. People in contemplation have been burned at the stake. Imaginative women fared poorly in early America. The imagination has often been viewed as a dangerous thing, to be externally controlled:
" We have seen a Bigotted Zeal, stirring up blind most bloody rage against as vertous and religious as any, and this by testimony of vile varlets as were not known before, by their manifest lives whoredoms, incest and the like..Boston Aug ll th 1697 (Burr, p.306)
Thinking can be dangerous. By cultural maxim we are expected to think, and to imagine, with great caution.
"Socrates is unjust both because he corrupts youth and because he does not recognize the gods the state recognizes, but rather new divinities." (Brickhouse, p.30)
Socrates was tried before many fellow citizens of Athens in 399 B.C. Scholars report the number of jurors faced by Socrates as 501.
" Socrates does wrong and is too curious, inquiring into the things
under the earth and in the heavens, and making the weaker arguments
into the stronger, and teaching others to do the same." (ibid, p. 63)
If here among us is a process of the soul, if we can find the future in our presence, dare we be cautious and miss the future? Do descendents of Socrates' prosecutors await us? Is the devil itself near,- or within? Are we remiss, conservative and understated when discussing hypothetical outcomes and exploring our own imaginations?
The trial of Socrates raises an interesting question important to resolve. Let us assume an imaginary or conceptual experience is an archetype. The individual is in effect the owner who builds a personally useable simulation base, one which can be drawn upon to craft into words of artful expression new perspectives. One presumes Socrates owned his thoughts, yet the State tried and found him guilty of using these thoughts as frameworks for corruption. In effect the state ( a collective of people having a form of artificial authority) believed the mental process was not owned by an individual. Is the result then that an individual by imposed values and cultures never begins to imagine? Arguably imagination then is prohibited? If so, when?
Archetype ownership, the shadows and expressions of one's soul, demands resolute contemplation. The mind's eye reveals much inner thought not all of us wish to share. Wisely so, for,
"thou shalt not suffer a witch to live!" (Exodus 22.18.)
Live with no fears. Resolve to your muse, your inner spirit of contemplation - and resolve! Without compromise demand time to build upon and inquire of the spirit and shadow within the mind's calm inner eye. Such behavior is not new!
"The supreme spirit moves at pleasure, but in itself is immovable, it is different from us, yet it is very near us; it pervades the whole system of worlds, yet it is definitely beyond it." - Fifth Isa Upanishad, 800 B.C. (Dasgupta)
There is much spirit to see, each one a spirit unto the self yet also as a part of others. Yet the spirit, your muse, does not speak in words. Optimism and trust are significant elements of spirit management. What could be the elements to be discussed as forms of exploration into consensual spirit management? Religious groups engage in the process uniformly. Yet does your muse self discover, or must it be compelled?
There are no connotations here to existing dimensions of spirituality as such dimensions are variously construed. The call is to absolute individuality. Here lies the enormous paradox. Spirituality and self reflection for centuries has been central to the evolution of mankind. It has long been the wish of others that you do not own your own soul.
What is profoundly striking are the similarities these thoughts bear upon much of mankind's spiritual history. More explicitly, knowing one moves along time continuums as a dimension of the creative process, a similar yet perplexingly sublime paradigm of spirituality lurks urgently beneath this time continuum. The muse as a form of spirit is not time bound. Wisdom resides within this paradox. There is much evidence in religious history and various human cultures to shape one’s views of spirit treatment. It is not difficult to exchange language descriptions and terms which reference spirituality between periods in history. Many significant elements of seemingly similar events, when examined create strong indications that human minds all reach very similar spiritual perspectives, regardless of cultural, racial or historical attributes .
However, for the moment let us assume spirituality is described in a secular manner as the external spoken or written assertions of inner reflections.
Art can be perceived as an external assertion of inner reality. Pause and observe that language cannot effectively describe the thought in the above image. It is the point of this exploration. The muse can exist in paradox and discover.
(Magritte, Clarivoyance)
“It is in vain that we say what we see; what we see never resides
in what we say. And it is in vain that we attempt to show,
by the use of images, metaphors or similes what we are saying;
the space where they achieve their splendor is not that deployed
by our eyes but that defined by the sequential elements of syntax. "
(Foucault, p.48)
Our discussion asks no less. Perhaps individuals do not set down on paper their views as expressions in their own words. Rather, a shared set of views is constructed between acknowledged artisans consensually focused upon problem and issue exploration. – The muse is not alone. Accelerated generation of knowledge, however, has long been feared.
Everyone who meddles with these four things that follow,
it were better for him if he had not come into the world: they are;
What is Above, and What is Below
What is Before, and What is After
- from the Secret Doctrine of the Essene, as stated in the Mishnah (2nd C. A.D.). (Schonfield, p.144)
If we come to any conclusions, it is that our central issue is clear: The external expression of internal reflections is not
individually constrained.
If words are not things, or maps are not the actual territory,
then, obviously, the only possible link between the objective
world and the linguistic world is found in structure, and structure
alone. 1
The human intellectual experience is non linear, not time constrained, often non verbal and simultaneous.
One such suggestion of this unconstrained mental expression can be observed in an ancient sketch of "Sky Man" used as an illustration in the Kabbalah. Note that above the head of "Sky Man" translated from the Hebrew is "The endless". What comes together here is the implication that your muse or its variations has no identifiable upper limit, no individually discernable boundaries. What we can derive from this is a vision that there exists a culture of contempt for the muse.
Where one’s muse is the product of culture that muse is clearly a beast of burden, an ass by no other name. The culture of the muse compels us to believe that an individual mind must be bonded to the state. An obvious problem arises when the culture of the muse expands sufficiently such that it then drives the state which created it. At birth the culture of the muse is an entirely individual archetype. Over time consensus of culture shifted into the muse individual archetype reinforces the muse culture and diminishes the intellectual range of the individual. We thus easily conclude that mental efficiency is not the prime directive of any state or culture. The proficiencies of our own muse, our spiritual creativity, hang hard on collective inhibitions similar to those locked into the Secret Doctrine of the Essenes. Equally appropriate, we can conclude that Socrates at trial was a collective expression of intense contempt for him by his community. He was thinking. A synergy of these two perspectives is that culture has provided allocation mechanisms for the distribution of power. Power relies upon manipulated intellect, and cultural systems of constraint must be assessed with great diligence. When then does someone else own your muse? Repress it, demand it rest in quiet solitude? Is the imagination locked inside an abstract non verbal prison pasted upon the soul by expectations of culture?
We need not search far for added resolute affirmations that external expressions can raise our neighbor's ire.
“ If there arise amoung you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams,
and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, and the sign or wonder come to pass,
thou shalt not harken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer
of dreams; ye shall walk after the Lord your God, and fear him, and keep his
commandments, and obey his voice.." (Deuterotomy xiii 1-5)
The mind of Jesus Christ could not be tolerated by his own people. The charges against Jesus at bar are stunning.
Take note here the word "blaspheme" is used in the sense " to despise Judaism." - Your muse can be a dangerous thing.
“ Pilate assembled the priests and elders, announcing to them that Herod
had found no fault with the prisoner in their midst, reminded them that
he himself had aquitted him. This compromise was scornfully rejected
by the Jews who demanded the crucifixion of Jesus." (Chandler, p.xviii)
Do we thus find ourselves in some way faced with a redundant dilemma when our muse engages in the freedom of curiosity and reflections upon non vebnal abstractions? Surely not nailed to a cross, yet fearful to suggest an idea or viewpoint? Toffler catches a glimpse of an elusive spirit:
"Outraged by the hippies pagan rejection of traditional Christianity,
Christian fundamentalists began a powerful counterattack on secularism.
- " (Or visionaries!) (Toffler, p 374)
For further clarification we need to return for a moment to another of our visionary friends. Is an angel one’s own muse?
"The voice told her she must come to France, she easily heard a worthy voice..she knew it was the voice of an angel. On her departure from Vaucouleurs she wore the habit of a man, and carried a sword. You are guilty of thinking evil in our catholic faith, devious sacrilegious, idolatrous, accursed and working evil, scandalous, seditious, perturbing and obstructing the peace, inciting war, cruelly thirsting for human blood, encouraging it to be shed, shamelessly abandoning the modesty befitting her sex, and indecently put on the ill-fitting dress and state of men-at-arms." (Barrett, p.147)
Jeanne d'Arc was burned at the stake May 30th 1431, in Rouen, France.
Individual life is a composite of personal abstractions which can be articulated as stories. These stories at origin are neither words nor images. They are your soul, in form energy.
Magritte, "La Maison de Verre" 1939
Much of what must be faced in the future is explored through hypothetical reflection. Such behavior is innately rational, it is safe.
The writer’s muse is organic energy which must be cared for with great attention. How might one imagine this soul and force of energy to appear? It again exists as truth in paradox, an almost intentional impossibility, …to wit
The supreme spirit moves at pleasure, but in itself is immovable,
it is different from us, yet it is very near us;
Leonardo Da Vinci Proportional Studies
This is greatly reassuring. It is safe to create a visualization of something which doesn't exist because you can erase it.'
Visualization at the individual level is always secure by erasure. Absent some morbid mental derangement, one simply quits. An alternative explanation is that the need for the imagery subsides. Can we share and visualize? Perhaps commitment to the inherent risk taking of shared visualizations is secured by exit. However, our understanding of exit is often insufficient to facilitate important group achievements. It is a noteworthy irony to consider that many institutions, even contemporary legal procedures have few provisions for untainted exit. There are cultural manifestations of exit. One cannot be what they inherently are in a society without self imposing varying degrees of exit from their cultural origins. (See Jean Paul Sartre, "No Exit".) Discernable in this reasoning is the nexus of a major issue for creative visualizations among groups. There necessarily exists a procedural interpersonal framework of anticipated qualifications to an issue matrix. Here by issue matrix one visualizes a consensus of values, or breakdown in the group visualization synergy. There likely exists a negative dynamic between personal needs for exit or continuation into a group structured visualization. In effect the visualization becomes participant disqualified as preconceived notions and values surface to interfere with the consensus required to forward the group's purpose. An alternative line of inquiry may help explore and clarify this issue.
"To be qualified as a Shaman, the pupil is instructed in singing,
beating drums, calling the spirit, charming methods, and overcoming
disease. The most important is the calling of the Spirit and speaking to the
spirit."
Shamanism is very old. Here the novice is taught above all else to speak with the spirit. In this instance the spirit is Korean and rests inside a stick held by a 39 year old woman. The spirit is from a mountain, residing in the held stick, and can be summoned by proper application. Mysteriously, the shaman can tell all things of the individual being examined. If true the meaning of inference is not understood.
Thus in examining a "patient" for disease, the shaman also learns through the spirit what the life history is of the "patient". Also, if the patient will die (in the future). Is this the 8th century B.C. Hindu spirit from the ISA Upanishad? Our shaman here is speaking from Korea April 8th 1961. (Kim, p. 198) Has time itself somehow become reflexive? Does time melt, as Dali would suggest in his melting clocks? (D
ali – The Persistence of Memory, 1931)
What can be done?
"In the Constructive Realistic Fantasy the patient is encouraged to
Construct and experience selected fantasies which are designed to be
realistic. The technique of asking the individual to concretize concepts
and develop an image of what they really mean can often help wishes to
be realized."
(Levitsky, p. 53)
An important contribution from Levitsky is the following characterization of his process:
“It may be frightening to contemplate actually practicing new
behavior, but it is far less frightening to practice it in one's own
head." (ibid, p. 55)
Here we see a clinical affirmation for safe contemplations, yet also we have recognized great problems for humanity in moments of visualization. We are left by Levitsky encouraged:
"The capacity for fantasy of all kinds both realistic and unrealistic
Is one of the great assets of the human brain. It opens up for us the
dizzying range of human capabilities and possibilities."
Surely each of us by now realizes that such constructive mental activity has led to horrendous responses by the Athenians, Jews, and Catholics. We cannot deny the trials of Socrates, Christ, and Jean d'Arc. Each of them were individuals acting on their visions.