Dear Gentleman,
What a powerful question you present for us to contemplate, Russ: What does the “Spirit of the Depths” see now?
And what a powerful image you present, Paco, in answer to that question: the “seismic mega-thrust” of Indonesia’s “monstrous, sub-seafloor” 2004 massive earthquake & tsunami. Your description of it boggles the mind.
It allows us to feel the “magnitude of what we humans are most likely to undergo” if we allow ourselves to compare it to what the “Spirit of the Depths portends for us. We are all being sucked into the tornado of your dream, Paco.
You write: “Whoever is able to grasp the relevance of such magnitudes … should. Should what?”
And you answer: “Create whatever they can — while they can — even if their contributions … are only grains of sand on those scales of destiny.”
But what exactly do our “grains of sand” make better? Our own inner development? Does it help those few who are conscious of what’s happening to better themselves? What difference do our contributions to such an enormous, vast seismic shift possibly matter at this point in time?
Russ, you felt the potency of Paco’s use of Indonesia’s 2004 tsunami as a “cautionary metaphor for our time & psyche” — and even had a dream voice announce: “It is not a metaphor.” Then what?
You say it must be a corrective of some sort. The “Other” speaking wants us to see what’s happening as reality, as something that is literally true. In the Indonesian tsunami the animals, birds, insects and spiders all detected the vibrational waves in their bodies and ran to the high ground. Snakes and salamanders put their ears to the ground to detect the same waves — even though the earthquake in the sea occurred up to 6,000 miles away!! Most of the animals escaped the devastation. What’s more, the Islanders from the Nias people also headed for the mountains, crying out, “Smong! Smong!” There was an Indonesian song, passed down by parents and grandparents, and sung by Indigenous children for centuries: “When animals go crazy, run away from the sea. Run to the mountains to save yourself, and yell out ’Smong! Smong!’ as you go to warn the others.”
The tribal people of Rajasthan, India, anticipate floods by noticing changes in the color of the clouds, movement of the sea, and activities of animals and plants.
Anthropologist James C.Scott describes this intense, observed learning with the Greek term metis, meaning “a wide array of practical skills & acquired intelligence responding to a constantly changing natural & human environment”. But, says Scott, metis is passed down primarily thru experience and storytelling which is being lost in developing countries like Indonesia as modernization takes its inevitable toll on tradition. To incorporate this nature wisdom into the formalized technical knowledge valued by institutions teche is a daunting task today. Scott thinks one way forward is through systematic efforts by scientists to incorporate indigenous knowledge into more formal warning systems — bridging the gap between metis & techne. Of course, that’s not likely to happen.
Part of the breakdown going on in the world right now is due to our culture’s disconnection — and we are part of that culture — to our own animal nature and intuitive feelings. That certainly does drain this reality of something vital. Our high-tech warning systems fail us. They failed during the 2004 tsunami. And we have lost direct communication with Nature’s warning system.
What kind of response can we make to being caught up in this plague of denial? Paco’s example of the Indonesian tsunami is very clear: It’s flight (not fight) or fright. Flight was the natural response of the animals and indigenous people, most of whom lived to see another day. And being frozen in fright was the response of those trapped in our Capitalistic Western culture leaving 230,000 dead.
Richard Tarnas said at the end of his book COSMOS & PSYCHE that he felt the question up for humanity today is (this is a loose translation since I don’t have the book with me): Is the Universe silent and inert, or is it alive and trying to communicate with us? And, if so, how? Tarnas sees the Universe speaking to us in three ways: dreams, synchronicities, and nature.
Russ, you say that you and Paco feel the need and even the necessity of “speaking out” no matter how few ears may be hearing what you have to say. It does help me to keep this kind of conversation going and share dreams with people — for my own sanity, I guess. I have a drive to delve as deep as I can into the human psyche, of which I am a living part, no matter what. And I can’t help hoping this all has a larger meaning, one that the Spirit of the Depths will help me to SEE — or at least glimpse.
Russ, you say that Paco’s dreams reveal a very specific form of reality, i.e.
1) An ordinary disaster has shifted into a vast disaster
2) Though our situation is “inescapable” we still must act, the best way we can, in this difficult task … which may yet lead somewhere
3) The archetypal “who” behind this vast disaster is/will be revealed
4) There will be more turbulence
Then, you say, “There IS something we can do in the face of ‘the end’.” But what that is will come only from the Spirit of the Depths.
So, in regard to that last statement, I want to tell you a dream of mine that revealed to me what I could do in the face of the “end”. You may have already heard it, nevertheless, it feels pertinent to repeat it for this discussion,
Dream:
I’m in the Art Museum in Chicago, only it’s now a combination of the Art & History museums, and I lose my reading glasses. I’m distraught. In the middle of the first floor is a room that is all white with big windows. The people inside wear white coats and look like scientists doing chemistry experiments. I’ve looked everywhere I can think of to retrieve my glasses. Then the white room empties. I sneak in and open a few drawers. In one of them I find my glasses. Delighted to have possession of them again I go to the front doors to leave the building.
On my way, one of the people working there comes up to me and says, “Sekhmet wants to see you.” I’m flabbergasted. This person tells me the goddess is waiting by the bridge over Lake Michigan and points to the exit I need to take. I immediately go to the exit. There are two flights of steep stairs, and I’m hurrying so fast I stumble and fall down the last one. My reading glasses smash. I let out a wail of grief at their loss.
It’s dusk when I leave the building now. I go to a railing on the bridge over the Lake and peer into the dark water. Sekhmet rises up out of the lake sitting in her chair with an ankh in her left hand. The chair stops mid air so that our eyes meet. She holds out the ankh and I grasp it. Powerful vibrations shake my body, then she withdraws the ankh and begins to sink back into the water. But before she disappears she cries, “Flee the city!” She descends, then calls out in a final shout, “NOW!”
The scene changes and I’m on a street in a place like Iowa City. The street is empty of traffic but there’s a pile of discarded strips of white linen with a bucket next to them. A figure in a brown robe and cowl — I can’t see the face — stands beside me and gives me instructions on how to build a pod. The bucket has a brush and is filled with glue. I begin to glue the strips to form a large white, almond-shaped “pod”. It stands alone on the deserted street.
“Find a mate and put him in the pod,” says the figure.
A man is walking along the sidewalk. I go up and ask him if he’ll be my “mate” and get into the pod. He agrees to do this and takes his place at the front of the pod. He sits in front on the left side and I will sit on the right side of the pod across from him. Then I’m told to get a “father” and “mother”. This man and woman sit opposite each other in the bulging middle of the pod. Finally, I’m told to get a child who sits in the tail of the pod.
With that a storm comes up. The turbulence increases until the pod is lifted into the air and tossed around. It’s not water that makes up this storm. Clouds of pure CHAOS toss my pod furiously to and fro. The “father” cries out, “We’re all going to die!” I look around at the pod’s interior and say in a clear, calm voice, “No, we’re not . There’s not a single tear in this pod. We’re going to be fine.” And I know that it’s true.
End of dream.
So I guess my task at the “end” of this world we are still embedded in is to build a pod and find those who are needed to seed a new world once all the chaos/turbulence subsides. And my reading (left brain) glasses won’t be necessary in this new world.
Sekhmet = sekhem = life force This is the same root as in Shakti, though ancient Egypt was flourishing 1,000 years before the first civilization in India.
Some further thoughts —
It seems important to maintain our connection to our body, to our instinctual nature, yet nature is brutal. Predators rip the flesh off their prey. Prey chews up living plants who definitely feel fear … and perhaps pain. Even prey, like stately giraffes, can heave a lion off their back like an irritating fly, or smash a lion’s face. This has been recorded.
The IRON LABYRINTH is a world of rational, disciplined men who have the ability to repress or contain their emotions and even fears to do important tasks (when they go out on missions). Whereas, the CAVE is a place of the dark, chaotic feminine filled with volatile, fiery swings of emotion. Which reminds me of where we are today. Has our creation of such an extreme rational, left-brained, capitalistic, literal, patriarchal, scientific, masculine world with its insight into the mysteries of physics, the Cosmos, algorithms, the human body, etc. triggered an enantiodromia that is flinging us at tremendous speed to its polar opposite — the Maga forces around the entire world with their fury of emotions and fierce indifference to logic?
After the gods withdrew from the Earth (see Julian Jaynes on that one) spreading destruction and chaos across the face of the earth, then came the Axial Age bringing Buddhism, a thirst for justice and equality, compassion for all sentient beings. Susuzki says, the essence of Zen Buddhism is: ALL THINGS CHANGE!” And the mantra of my 2nd book, The Cave of the Dark Moon is, “All things are in flux!”
The pod in my Sekhmet dream allows us to ride out the next round of CHAOS & FLUX and to birth new life on the other side of whatever huge metamorphic change is coming.
In THE IRON LABYRINTH, Uncle says to Colum after manifesting the Tree of Life in the Garden of Eden: “You could never have seen the tree so powerfully if not for your swim with the pyrite.” Colum had to swim in the molten core of the Earth — the molten core of his own being — in order to see the Tree.
In the Sekhmet dream I find myself on the quiet street of a small town and discover strips of white linen and a bucket of glue (a gift from the lion goddess?) after being told by the Goddess — she who dispenses the life force of the Universe — to flee the City. Does Chicago represent all cities? Does it stand for our current civilization and culture?)
The pod is built under HER auspices, and Sekhmet is the goddess of those who are no longer dependent on Mother or Father — on humans who can stand by themselves … in their own inner authority.
Think of Leo, the most individual of all 12 signs with a single wave for its sign. Directly opposed to Leo, and in tandem with it, is Aquarius (the most collective of all 12 signs) with two rows of waves. One way to think of our moving into Aquarius is — we aren’t looking at the Flower Children (with their tender feelings) of the 1960s who yearned for communes where Mother would take care of them — versus Aquarians, Leos who come together for a purpose, achieve that purpose, and then disperse without regret, because they are far more individuated people who can stand on their own just fine.
Merrilee