Title: Autodidact & Archeologist of Psyche-Soul

Gender: Male

Location: San Buenaventura, Kalyfoarneeyay

Today at lunchtime, as I was sitting in my car parked next to the huge Kaiser hospital in Northwest Los Angeles county, I heard a small child cry somewhere in the vicinity of the hospital campus adjacent to my workplace parking lot. Amazingly (for me) it set off a strong feeling of sadness, compassion, pity and a little hopelessness… My wife and I have a toddler and I couldn't help imagining what the child could be suffering from…pain, bad news of a parent's health or life, or any number of tragedies.

Now this is unusual for me because I'm a clueless fool … although, in truth it did happen once before at a different hospital a year or two ago … I have a hard time realizing how unconscious I am to suffering … others much more weak and humble than I - poor souls that really could use compassion and support.

So, I wrote myself a question and posted it in my rear-view mirror:
“Am I capable of helping little children? Do I have heart enough?”

I mean, do I have courage, commitment, conviction? I fear not but hope this isn't the case…

(here's the old by-line)

Husband, father and founder of a new local club:
the 'Ventura Friends of Jung, Soul Psychology Club'.

Up till the last 2-7 years I've really been asleep, contemptious & closed-minded. My ego consciousness was the only lens through which I could define, see, or attempt to control the world and 'Reality' with… 
I didn't “get” art, myth, poetry, symbolism & metaphor..I still don't, but am now in love with it! The world of metaphor now connects me with a wider world of potentials & possibilities!
 
I'm finally waking up…and opening up!

What changed?
Well, to borrow a couple terms brought back into use by the late-great C.G. Jung: I experienced both an Auseinandersetzung and my own Enantiodromia .

Decades ago I had spun out pretty bad in fundamentalism from involvement in a charismatic/evangelical cult during my Army days in Georgia. Following this and all through the 90's saw me running & hiding though self medication and self-administered ecstasy (i.e. my own “spiritual experience”). I also had a 20 year nicotine addiction and am happy to say I'm no longer a slave to most substances…caffine excluded!

Another major milestone was when my father passed away Christmas eve, 2001. Following the start of the war and all the neurotic hype we disconnected the cable to the TV and stopped the mind-numbing, brain washing insanity.

After turning 41(officially mid-life) and facing imminent first time fatherhood I knew something BIG was happening! I had classical existential angst, financial debt & dread and general depression… I needed some kind of therapy in depth to deal with these existential issues. To be sure, I had sought therapy many times in the last 2+ decades but it never really got through (I wasn't ready & primed I guess).
At one point about 7 years ago, I read Robert Johnson's “Owning Your Own Shadow” and a tiny mustard seed was planted. Things started to change.

Vocatus Atque Non Vocatus, Deus Aderit

So, I've started a local club where we gather to explore Jung's thoughts, concepts & writings (also to share a lot of audio/visual materials recorded on film, video & CD/tape). It's only 2 months old but we have a half dozen folks meeting in a quaint used bookstore twice a month.

I'm a big fan of Thomas Moore's recorded lectures & writings on the soul.
Also seriously studying James Hollis' lectures, books and work on asking important questions of ourselves, not necessarily seeking hard & fast answers - second half of life issues, and of the vocatus our soul (or Self) is calling us to live apart from our social roles (i.e. individuation).
I'm enamored with the late poet John Keats' term, 'Negative Capability': “…I mean Negative Capability, that is when man is capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts without any irritable reaching after fact & reason…”
Another thing I've noticed is the struggle between either/or logic…a tension of the opposites. Negative capability opens me to a principle which includes neither/nor as well as both/and thinking. A transcendent function or third thing has always been a potential waiting to be grown, cultivated and realized coming out of the tension of opposites. I'm also looking into agnostic Buddhism with interest…

On the outside of things, I'm an old school trad climber since late 70's. I love reading Physics, Sci-Fi and Jungian psych books.. and am a HUGE consumer of books on tape/CD for my 500 mile a week commute.

Some of the following is from my Amazon.com site.
As long as I can remember I've always been grateful being a native southern Californian…my beloved “Golden State”…and living within walking distance to the Gold Coast let's enjoy surfing once in a blue moon. For a long time, I lived on an equestrian ranch out in rural suburbia & have enjoyed the solace & serenity of good clean country life as an antidote to my rough & tumble past. For those who know of him, I'm a friend of Bill for the last 7+ years and it's been a great relationship for my personal growth.

Spiritus contra Spiritum
- C.G. Jung

I have a lifelong passion for attaining knowledge & understanding of fundamental (high energy) theoretical physics & have a substantial library of “pop physics” literature to support my fervant autodidact addiction. Most of it's very technical so I won't make your nose bleed with details .

However, I also like to snow ski, fish, hike & camp and am a certifiable outdoor gear nut, freak - whatever. I like to “plink” targets, bottles, etc with my Ruger Mini-14 and dream of owning a Springfield Armory M1-A1 one day. I've dabbled in Wing Chun Gung-Fu for the better part of a decade and the biggest thing I learned from that wasn't how to fight, but simply how to learn, and how to be humble, and most importantly - how to avoid physical confrontations… I'm also a 30 year rock-climbing/mountaineering vet…never made it past 5.10 lead & 5.11follow. Did a couple Yosemite big walls, climbed at Joshua Tree & Tahquitz alot in my youth, locally, etc. (yeah, I too have a healthy fear of heights). I like playing first-person shooter video games (to honor & entertain my Shadow).

So, as you would imagine, I grew up exuberant in body but with a nervy, craving mind. It was wanting something more, something tangible. It sought for reality intensely, always as if it were not there… But you see at once what I do, I climb. -John Menlove Edwards

I'm a veteran military Reservist from the 1980's: Ft. Knox, KY; Army Signal Corps, Ft. Gordon, GA; a couple of TDY tours in S. Korea - 'Operation Team Spirit' maneuvers.

For the last 20+ years, I've been busy at work in high-tech maintenance in the Defense Aerospace sector working on everything from test & measurement instrumentation to high power lasers & robotics. My employer has changed hands 3 times (Teledyne, Litton, & now Northrop Grumman). I've subsequently survived a lot of stressful lay-offs. 

Following are favorite quotes that help keep me teachable and have changed my attitude, perspective & philosophy:

We dance around in a ring and suppose.
But the secret sits in the middle and knows.
-Robert Frost

Penetrating so many secrets, we cease to believe in the unknowable. But there it sits nevertheless, calmly licking its chops.
-H.L. Mencken

The unexamined life is not worth living…
-Socrates

To see a world in a grain of sand, And heaven in a wild flower: Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, And eternity in an hour.
-William Blake

There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance. That principle is contempt prior to investigation.
-Herbert Spencer

The most important thing we can know about a man is what he takes for granted and the most elemental and important facts about a society are those that are seldom debated and generally regarded as settled.
-Louis Wirth

As soon as man does not take his existence for granted, but beholds is as something unfathomably mysterious, thought begins.
-Albert Schweitzer

You can't think your way into right action, but you CAN act your way into right thinking…
-Anon

Member Since: Friday, March 30 2007

Last Visit: 274 days ago.

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