Author: lailatotti

In interpersonal relationships that generate tension in our lives, a question that penetrates to the heart of much of our suffering is “can i accept that this person may never change”?

In my experience, the desire that someone will change can be a desire we subconsciously hold for years, and decades, continuously setting us up for hurt and disappointment. No matter how valid the desire for them to change is… we must accept that they won’t.

Now, as for what is within our scope of influence, we can communicate and we can change our actions. These are the best chances we have in effecting change in another person, but more importantly, changing our relationship to that person that alleviates some of our undue suffering (whether it be a change in frequency of contact, proximity or even change in expectations).

A habit that I notice myself partaking in often, that generates a lot of undue suffering in relationships, is that I think that I can accept that another person won’t change, and yet I unconsciously hold onto a growing resentment in my body towards that person, that only incrementally builds as they do more of the things that bother me. My mind thinks its modifying its expectations but something deep inside of my body still resists… still insisting that the other person should change and that it shouldn’t give up trying.

And I’ve noticed that this actually serves a particular function unconsciously, which is this; As a non-confrontational person, I find it more comfortable to try to “accept” another person than to communicate to them that something they are doing bothers me.

(This can be a tendency for many people who consider themselves “spiritual”, as they can recognize that the ego is the one being activated and so interfacing with someone who “activates” us is a chance to practice relinquishing a part of our egos.)

But while this is the narrative I hold consciously, I feel my body very very subtly holding onto the desire that I can change them… or more specifically, I resist fully surrendering the desire to let go of the desire to change them, because it feels my acceptance would be a form of enabling – or even validating – that behavior.

A part of me thinks it can let go, while a part of me really does not want to validate that what they’re doing is ok, so it holds onto the desire to do or say something. But this desire comes in tension with my desire not to confront and create a temporarily awkward, or even rupturing, experience in the relationship.

I think the function of anger is that it generates energy for us to act in response to what is angering us. I think the same goes for the experience of being annoyed. When we feel this inner activating tension that arises in relation to a challenging interpersonal dynamic, whether its simply feeling subtly annoyed to feeling full on angry, that is our unconscious moving towards an action (be it verbal or behavioral) that feels like it could help rectify the situation.

If we’re non-confrontational, we may hold all that energy inside of ourselves. But by doing so, we only put off the eventual fruition of the unconscious desire for action into the inevitable future – since we can only hold that building tension for so long. When our annoyance or anger, both forms of internal resistance, reaches a certain threshold, our usual mechanisms for communication may feel overwhelmed to the extent that we snap reactively. In a way, the ego that does not find an outlet for it’s desires through direct, clear communication wants this experience of desperation, because it feels forced into acting on its desire instead of ever having to make the difficult choice of when and how to communicate intentionally (This is actually the underlying logic of all procrastination, whether it be running late to an event or putting off an assignment until the deadline forces one to act. (People who find decision-making or initiating-action difficult, overwhelming or uncomfortable have a particular tendency towards this dynamic of unconsciously waiting for situations that seem to force them to act)).

Interpersonally, though, this place of forced desperation, where the ego’s conflicting desires finally break its capacity to hold back, is the hardest place to respond clearly or skillfully from. Maybe a part of us, hidden deep down, wants to react in an unskillful, hurtful way to really increase the chance that the recipient will really internalize our hurt… and therefore change. But what this ultimately does is just have us carry this hurt within us so much more than is necessary in the process.

If confrontation is difficult, there are ways of micro-dosing feedback, although it may not be as effective as having a full conversation. Being honest about whether your boundaries with time, energy and proximity can be modified in relation to this person is also a means of protecting the relationship if it’s one that you still want to maintain yet aren’t ready or wanting to directly address the difficulties you are experiencing with them. Sometimes this extra space and breathing room allows us to feel authentically safe enough to practice relinquishing our desire to change them, whereas if we do not have boundaries with them at all, the unconscious is going to generate that inner energy to act/speak (out of a valid desire for self-protection), that when suppressed, results in our suffering.

My intention with this piece is to bring awareness to this often unconscious dynamic. Sometimes, just an awareness of what we are unconsciously doing in real time creates a little more space for us to consider responding differently.

Hello

“I am Laila-ing”

immediately a relief

a loosening of a box that was too tight

an attempt at containing a solid thing

where simple movement was at play

and an immediate sense that

If I am Laila-ing

and you are you-ing

who is the the do-er of these do-ings?

Humans are fundamentally social beings. Having adequate attunement of our perceptions to the perceptions of those around us is an essential cornerstone to our sense of existential stability .

The subversion of these norms that orient us to the world, each other and ourselves is what makes the manipulation tactics demonstrated in “Gaslight” so viscerally disturbing.

The story follows the slow unfolding of a husband’s psychological exploitation of a wife’s increasingly vulnerable state. At the beginning of the film, we come to know that Ingrid Bergman’s character was orphaned early in life, and survived the traumatic murder of her primary caregiver at an early age. Already primed for relational vulnerability from these tragic circumstances, she is whisked away by a man who seeks her hand in marriage merely 2 weeks after first meeting each other. Charles Boyer’s character sets the scene for his nefarious plot with textbook progressions of psychological manipulation; isolating the victim from any other points of contact, planting the seeds for her to doubt her own perception in seemingly insignificant ways and increasing the victim’s sense that she would not be able to function without him – interspersed with strategic shows of immense affection, fawning and gift-giving to tighten the fabricated “bond”.

From an archetypal lens, characters and dynamics of a story can be understood as symbolic depictions of the various faculties of a single mind. Primary masculine characters are often representations of the discursive thinking-mind and primary female characters frequently symbolize our connection to our soul. The discursive-mind -which can simply be understood as our inner monologue- has the capacity to supplement our experience of the world, but unfortunately, for many of us we are most familiar with its manifestation as our “inner critic”. Boyer’s character is that discursive mind that is hyper-critical and encourages us to give away our agency to outer figures who “know better” by constantly denegrating the inner authority of the soul. Through this archetypal lens, we can recognize all of the previously listed manipulative behaviors of Boyer’s character as the psychological effects of having an extreme “inner critic”; feeling isolated from others, doubting our own perception, and the increased sense that the “inner critic’s” harsh ways actually keep us safe.

As “light” is often understood to be a symbol for consciousness and lucidity, the dimming of the gas-lights serve as a rich symbol for the progressively confused and powerless state Bergman’s character descends into as a result of Boyer’s manipulation, representing the soul’s dimming in a dynamic where the inner-critic dominates.

The alternative to this dynamic is a discursive mind which supports & empowers rather than constantly criticizes & invalidates the soul. This role is fulfilled by Joseph Cotton’s character who, in a very tender scene, becomes the first point of contact with reality that mirrors Bergman’s perceptions back to herself, thus empowering Bergman’s inner authority by rationalizing her perceptions in accordance with reality.

While archetypally we can understand this as a restorative turning point in a psychological process, what Cotton does here can mirror the work of a skilled therapist, or any other relationship where authentic interpersonal contact has a reparative effect on our sense of inner agency.

As much as we may desire a feminist alternative ending where Bergman does not immediately run into the arms of another man, when interpreted archetypally, we can understand that – especially after the dissolution of her previous worldview (as symbolized by Boyer)- a novel worldview that supports her rehabilitation (represented by Cotton) is a necessary structure for her to recuperate within in order to establish a generative novel orientation to herself and the world.

It is a paradox of being human that psychological maturity comes from both differentiating from the dependence on others to “rescue” us and allowing authentic human connection to aid in repairing what may have been previously ruptured in relationship.

Craft as intimacy with the creative unfolding.

I used to have a resistance to the concept of gradual, cumulative progress. Hence routine felt like heavy obligations. Especially when it comes to my creative work, there was this sense that routine forces itself upon the intuitive flow of creativity. Complete lack of structure would be what allows creativity to emerge into whatever forms and structures best suit her.

Now that I have this unbound time to create within, I’ve found myself feeling very drawn to the daily routines of writers. Most have a very regular rhythm, that they’ve found works for them and the unfolding of their projects.

Rhythm is perhaps a good word for it rather than routine. My associations to “routine” are rigid, suffocating, deflating of life force. Rhythm connotes flow, and an intimacy with the experience of flow, reality, life – a complimentary form rather than an enforced one.

The structures that used to suffocate life force are now being called to evolve into symbiotic relationship to life force.

Archetypal clues into the dynamic of feminine and masculine energies, in this age of re-emergence of the feminine.

In these artists’ routines, there is a consistency on the part of the artist. I’m beginning to learn that flow feels safe – feels supported – by consistency. She emerges and unfurls in the luxury of a container (of consistent action, time or energy) that she can trust… that she can depend on.

There’s something about flow that is associated with depth… and these containers of time that we intentionally devote to what we wish to cultivate collect consciousness so that a depth of experience develops that allows for one to drop out and through the vapid mirages of the conceptual mind.

It’s good to remember that the reason why the hardest part is starting – or entering a state – is because a deep conscious way of being may be at odds with the mode of being we practice the most in modern default life, which is the vapid shimmering surface of the conceptual. Thus the initial resistance we feel at the threshold between two modes of being, especially entering into a more intentional mode of consciousness, is the intertial momentum of what we practice as default, and the still-figuring-out how-to-relate-to, the blind discerning of the contours-of, the terrain of the new state.

But regularity in showing up to these intentional states, which manifest as the routine perhaps, allow for us to not feel as orientation-less, confused or overwhelmed every time we attempt to cross that threshold.

It’s good to be aware of the experiential land that one’s in, and the mode of consciousness that is the native language of that place, instead of traveling the world confused why your default language doesn’t foster the intimacy with the environment that you seek, nor acclimate you to the terrain of where you actually are.

The consistent showing up for our relationship with our creative projects is an act of reverence. Through our conscious attention, we demonstrate that we value its Presence. It is a relationship. With frequency comes familiarity, comes intimacy, comes learning the rhythms of how to delicately weaving the threads that it offers us to follow. Creation is an intimate act… not one to race through like a sprint – (unless thats what the moment calls for in time (which sometimes, at take off, can be skillful)).

As someone with ADHD, my default is to think I need to build up the momentum to shoot through the initial barriers to entry of flow, like an airplane taking off. The stimulation of being excited must be maintained. But I want to offer another relation to flow, one that is perhaps more sustainable, nurturing and closer to the earth, which is that if you slow down, its not the fastness or the frenzied excitement of reality that makes it engaging, its the thickness of the Presence that actually connects. Its a different relationship.

Just an offering to remember another way of being through…

(Part 3: Personal and Collective embodiment)

Now with a more robust understanding of the savior archetype, we can explore this archetype’s practical resonance, both personally and collectively. What does the Savior archetype look like in our human lives and do we actually have the capacity to be world-saving superheroes?

Brief Note on Archetypal Inflation

Firstly, when discussing how we can embody archetypes, it is extremely important that we do not get caught in what’s known as archetypal inflation. In Jungian psychology, inflation is what happens when we conflate the power of an archetype with the power of an individual, a form of psychological hubris that is not sustainable, effective or healthy for the psyche. Archetypes are transpersonal, egos are personal. Identifying as an archetype is attempting to fit the transpersonal into the confines of the personal, like attempting to fit an ocean into a cup. We can dip the cup into the ocean, but attempting to fix our cup’s hold on too much of the ocean compromises the structure of the cup. A healthy, flexible, integrated ego is one that knows that it is not -nor can contain -the whole ocean. (However it also knows that it’s domain is indeed part of the ocean, and that it’s sphere of influence can ripple out far beyond its physical vessel).

The “savior” is an archetype with a particular propensity towards inflation. If we are not careful with our egos this often results in a savior complex. A savior complex says: “i am the chosen one and no one else is. the fate of the world depends on me alone”. It can turn even well heroes into villains. The savior complex and it’s antidotes will be explored more in depth in the next part: Lex Luthor.

The One =The Whole

With an awareness of the ego’s desire to be “The one” in the back of our minds, lets explore what a healthy – and more realistic – interpretation of “the One-ness” of the savior could be:

To re-iterate from the previous sections, what a fictional representation like Superman allows us to do is see the power of the archetype imagined in one character.

The fantasy is that the singular nature of Superman is a singular individual.

The reality – I propose – is that Superman as a symbol for the savior of humanity is a singular unified collective.

And that this singular collective comes about when each of us as individuals find our unique way of connecting to and participating with the collective.

Personal Influence

On the personal level, we should also not fall into the trap of underestimating just how impactful our capacity for influence is. It’s a product of habitual perception, language and culture that when we think of the world, we think of one thing we all live in. But let’s really look at each living being. Each of us is a world. When I die, the entire world I’ve experienced dies with me. To a person suffering and isolated, their entire world can be experienced as cold and harsh.

Each life is an entire world.

If we are able to make an impact on another person’s life, we have played a part in the salvation of a world. And world’s do not exist in isolation, but are interrelated with the worlds of all who are in relation with that being, however briefly. Each of our worlds are entire worlds that overlap with the worlds of those we interact with, whose own worlds in turn overlap with those they interact with, and so on until we get a whole network of interdependent worlds.

So while it may not be immediately evident that our actions play an impactful role on The World, an act towards goodness for someone else’s wellbeing has an immeasurable ripple effect on the interdependent web of Worlds. Now imagine the effect of the force of a life lived as a hero’s journey in service to the collective wellbeing.

It is true it may be compassion that still grieves that we can’t literally be Superman and stop all wars and harm with the power of our super-strength, but it is the ego that says anything short of that is futile. And the more people embody this responsibility, is this not the mechanism of change through which the collective world at large actually does change?

Which brings us to the collective level of the savior archetype.

Unified Collective as Savior

An imagine that is made up of smaller images of itself is called a Fractal Image, and it is the perfect metaphor for demonstrating the relation of each of us to the collective.

When we turn on the savior within each of us, we do our part in ushering the savior of the collective… which IS US as a unified collective.

Each of us, living in accordance with how Life seeks to unfold from our souls, is an image that – like a piece of the puzzle – is the realization of the collective image that is the collective savior of humanity. We each become the hero, and The Hero becomes. This idea… that the savior of humanity is the sum total of each of us activating collective consciousness individually is found in many eschatological traditions around the world… perhaps most popularly with the most well known Savior archetype. Here is just a handful of remarks* that illustrate this point:

“From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.” – Ephesians 4:16

“Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace.” – Colossians 3:15

“For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.” Corinthians 12:12

“So we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.” Romans 12:5

Saadi Shirazi, a 13th century Iranian poet, similarly wrote that:

“Since Human Beings are members of one body

Created of One essence

if one member feels pain

other members uneasy will remain”

An Ideal to Strive Towards

Characteristically of the fractal nature of archetypes, not only does this self-similar pattern of the savior find resonance in both personal and collective functions, but it also serves various functions throughout time. Having an ideal to look forward towards can be a powerfully motivating factor, especially when we feel like our values are at odds with the society around us. It gives us an orientation, that although perfect and thus unattainable, inspires us beyond our self-limiting ideas about our selves. If we can keep the voice of the ego that nags that anything less than perfection is futile, this orientation can help us, step by step, day by day, set into motion major forces for personal and collective salvation. So in addition to motivation, we arrive at what Savior symbols are perhaps most known for evoking, which is hope. But hopefully this far through our explorations, this hope is no longer seen as passive, but intimately linked with sustained action.

“Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” – Philippians 1:6

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” – Galatians 6:9

Final word

Perhaps the biggest take away from this archetypal exploration through various dimensions is the reality that we are not alone in our striving to create a better world. It is categorically at odds with the metaphysics of change for us to think so. Hopefully, after the initial resistance of the ego to unburden itself from the responsibility of the entire world softens a bit, this becomes a source of refuge, inspiration and motivation and deepens our appreciation of one another – in turn deepening are commitment to doing our part in making the world a better place for eachother.

“But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another.” – 1 John 1:7

“From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.” – Ephesians 4:16

“Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace.” – Colossians 3:15

Stay tuned for part 4: Lex Luthor

*note: Christianity is the tradition that the parallels of the Superman figure seemed most obvious to me and my knowledge. I don’t doubt that parallels from other traditions would be fruitful and resonant. If organized religion, or Christianity in particular, does not resonate with you, I hope these passages still stoke interest how various symbols throughout time seem to evoke certain perennial spiritual truths.

So much of my* philosophy is based on the idea that the root of so much of our suffering -personally and collectively, psychologically and politically – is how much of our identity we imbue into our egos. The issue is not with the existence of the ego itself, which is the fruit of the evolution of consciousness, but it is the ego pulled out of its natural context – severed from its roots in our true nature that is beyond ego.

While discussions of the “ego” and “our true nature” can feel esoteric and abstract, I find practical resonance with these ideas in our direct somatic experience.

How does my experiential field differ when I am identified in my ego vs. when my ego is in right relation?

To me, identification with the ego is a tension, a bracing around a localized point in my body, usually within my head. Other times, when I’m triggered interpersonally, this bracing point may be felt in my diaphragm. Most often, the defining characteristic of this ego-centric experience is a tightening, bunching, bracing against.

Not only is this state of being -of bracing against -common in our world today, I’d say it is the foundation of our modern culture. In order to keep up and manage in the fast-paced, loud, artificially bright, hard, isolating and endlessly exploitative matrix of modernity, the ego has become the default position of minimal vulnerability and maximum productivity.

And our culture is such that most people do not even know an alternative orientation of consciousness exists.

But even for those of us who know and have experienced consciousness outside of the ego-centric state, we know that being alive in the world today means that these alternatives need to be cultivated regularly to counteract the inertia of the cultural matrix.

Hence the emphasis in all spiritual traditions of daily practice, ritual and emphasis on Remembrance (of our true state). These actions saturate our beings, perceptions and thinking in a different worldview – in a sense bathing and protecting us from taking the current status quo as the norm.

I’d like to offer some of the ways of reorienting from ego-centric state to a more wholistic, field-like state of Presence that I return to (when I inevitably find myself caught up in my head too much). To those who have a regular religious or spiritual practice, these may be very familiar for the reasons touched on above.

3 points to remember about releasing from the ego’s hold… 1. Do not expect any of these or other steps to result in complete release. The inertia of identifying with ego has quiet a kinetic momentum. Cultivating a few degrees of softness of the ego’s bracing is putting the seeds of reorientation into motion. Be patient with planting seeds, but know that the more regularly you plant the seeds, the sooner they come to fruition. 2. The ego being quiet and non-frantic is not a precondition of accessing a state beyond the ego. In fact, the content of the ego has nothing to do with what state of being you can access, in the same way that clouds in the sky have no effect on the existence of sky. Expect that the ego will persist in its monologuing and bracing throughout these or any techniques and do not let that dishearten your practice. 3. Resisting the ego is an activity of the ego, and therefore perpetuates the ego. Resisting the ego keeps the ego as the main character of your experience. Allow the ego to exist as it is, just decenter it as the object of your attention.

1. Contextualizing Heuristics

This is the most important and fundamental step for me, which is: remembering that there is a state of being beyond the ego-centric one, and its never farther than one perceptual shift away. Its crazy how easy it is to forget this, even if you identify as a very “spiritual” person.

The purpose of this step is to point out that sometimes, remembering that an alternative exists is itself a potent way to access that alternative. This is especially true in the context of working with the over-inflated ego, which maintains its authority by convincing us that there are no alternatives. Remembering that a lot of what the ego deems as existential death, is actually its own death and our own liberation from it, helps depotentiate its power.

There’s infinite ways to language what the nature of this “other” (more natural, and holistic) state of consciousness is like. Here’s an attempt from my language:

ego is a tiny sliver of the field of consciousness which is ever-present in any experience as long (at least) as you are alive. The field of consciousness is the fabric of any experience you are having, with all the seemingly definite “parts” of experience (like the ego, self, identity, resistance, bracing) being manifestations of this fabric. Its like bunched up different parts of a bed sheet into more concentrated clumps – ultimately its all sheet. The unbound experiential field just is -whether you are conscious of it or not. Just this remembrance alone can help loosen some of the existential tightness of performing the ego for too long.

Another, more poetic description of the difference of ego-consciousness vs. field consciousness: Here

Disclaimer: I think the efficacy of this step is directly related to how much somatic memory you have of states beyond the ego, which can only be cultivated through experience. We all have somatic memory of the expansive field of Presence because we all have been children. Can you remember a glimmer of what it was like for experience to be totally OPEN? Before all the categories of self-consciousness divvy upped our experience, there was a bright, vibrant wholeness to our experience of the world. Its ok if you can’t fully consciously remember that state.

2. Somatic cues

a. While you’re reading this, curl one hand up into a tight fist. Feel this concentrated ball of sensation. bring your attention to the tension, the sustained effort to maintain the action. Now, and here’s the key, pay very close attention to the experience of releasing the fist. Mindfully experience release. Allow the concentrated sensations to disperse.

Can we move that feeling of release to the feeling of concentrated sensation you feel identified with in your body/head? Try it for a few moments. Do not expect full release, but even a few degrees of softness is effective and putting the seeds of reorientation into motion.

b. I find that any meditation that requires maintaining awareness of two sides of my body at once helps pull me out of the ego’s one-pointedness almost immediately. Example:

• imagine two dots, each just an inch or so above each shoulder. Keep your awareness on both these points at once. Let the tension of “holding up your head” melt.

can move these two dots to any height in the body, as long as they’re on opposite sides. holding them at my hips while i sit is very effective for embodiment as well.

3. Nature

Being in nature is our true nature. nature is our true nature. just communing with nature for 20 minutes is medicine and reconnection to family.

4. “Other”-orientation

Help someone else. Go for a walk with a friend. Volunteer. Literally get outside of yourself.

5. Moving Slowly

Whether its Tai Chi, yoga, or (my preference) just slow non-productive intuitive movement, this is sometimes the quickest way for me to access embodied Presence. Oftentimes, especially when its new, the ego hates this. it shouts. it actually sometimes feels like it may die if you continue going so slow any longer. remind yourself of the relief, of the important existential recontextualization that is just on the other side of allowing this part of you to die. And relish in the subtle, quiet, scrumptious, luxurious, velvety experience of engaging with experience outside the whirlwind immediacy and urgency of the ego.

To further explore the psychosomatics of change, explore How to Get out of a Rut .

I’ve never found the topic of “Free Will” to be a super interesting branch of philosophy on it’s own.

Much like “ethics”, “free will” felt to me to be one of those “downstream” topics in philosophy that would would only be resolved after addressing more fundamental branches of philosophy like metaphysics, epistemology and phenomenology.

In other words, how can we really be clear about free will if we’re not first clear about what a “self” is, what it’s relationship to reality can be, and how we know about reality beyond what it appears to be?

This is why, when discussing with people who are adamant that free will is an illusion, I just don’t really find their conclusion very interesting, regardless of whether ultimately it’s true or not.

A way into this topic that I find more relevant to our actual experience of the world is with an inquiry into a more fundamental principle – cause and effect.

In materialist frameworks, the truth of cause and effect is the evidence that free will does not exist, since no effect could arise without a cause, and – more essentially – no cause comes to be in total isolation from other causes. We can not create a cause out of thin air, nor in separation from previous influences – whether they be social, cultural, psychological, biological, etc.

This topic of cause and effect could be considered the heart of Buddhist philosophy and psychology. The first noble truth, that “life is suffering”, is the Buddha’s diagnosis of our default unconsciousness. When we are unconscious of our part to play in our experience of life, we experience life as victims at the mercy of both external (environmental, social) and internal (psychological) circumstance. When we are unconscious of our part to play in our experience, we unknowingly perpetuating the very habits of thinking and behavior that keep us in suffering.

The third noble truth, that “freedom from suffering exists”, is premised on one’s waking up to a more conscious perception of cause and effect within their own experience.

What this looks like, practically, in our experience is succinctly summarized by Viktor Frankl, the Austrian psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor known for his poignant analysis of human nature from within concentration camps.

Frankl wrote: “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

Similarly in Buddhist psychology, all of our mental states, and associated behaviors are the effects of previous mental habits. In so far as we take the contents of our experience as a given, we unconsciously play out this domino effect of past actions on current reactions. Where Buddhism differs from the materialist determinism implicit in our culture is that there is an alternative relationship to this “cycle” known as samsara that we can cultivate, through practice. This alternative relationship is a conscious relationship to this matrix of cause and effect instead of a purely reactive one.

In effect, we can will new causes to, over time, bring to fruition alternative effects than our habitual ones. Through practice, attention and effort we can engage with this realm of cause and effect consciously rather than unconsciously to liberate us from being condemned to the trajectories laid out for us by our past behaviors. (Not only are there alternative trajectories to be cultivated, but alternative ways to play with the very medium of causality itself. For more information on this, look into the difference between the causal logic of tantrayana and sutrayana.)

Can we say that the arisal of one’s desire to overcome causality, or karma, or determinism itself arises from within that very realm of causality. Yes! But can we also say that the aim of that desire transcends the system? I think the answer is yes. And then could we say that one who has achieved this aim of transcending karma has effectively achieved free will? I believe so. But what does this “achievement” actually entail; where is this place beyond the realm of causality. That was a misleading question, in fact, because we must be aware of our implicit conceptual assumption to make the absence of something a thing. The transcendence of karma is not some untouchable “place”, but is more like a process that ceases. Indeed the etymology for the word for this liberation, Nirvana, translates to to extinguish. When this process ceases, one may re-enter the realm of causality, ie. form, identity and action, but instead of being reactive to it, they enage non-reactively, allowing them the freedom to play rather than be forced to enact. Is this freedom to play not free will?

The popular spiritual belief that “the body is a prison” is one I take deep issue with.

At best, it can be a useful starting point of our spiritual journey, at worst it can be an existentially suffocating framework with disturbing psychological, somatic and ecological consequences.

In our modern culture, I like to conceptualize “the spiritual path” as a 3 part journey. The first is rejecting the default culture, and our internalization of it’s messages about the nature of self and reality.

In order to extract ourselves from the matrix of modern culture -with it’s overemphasis on surfaces, appearances and materialist values- a corresponding awareness of the shadow side of these dimensions – death, decay, and emptiness- comes to light. That “the body is a prison” and that “this world of decay must be transcended in order to find spiritual truth” are ideas that motivate us within this stage of “waking up” from our cultural slumber, rather than intrinsic truths. After rejecting the avenues of reality that our culture enticed us into believing would satisfy our existential thirst, we turn away to begin our conscious seeking of a higher, more substantial truth.

The second stage could be considered the realization of that truth. I believe this “realization” process looks different for everybody, as we each approach it from our unique circumstantial angles.

Nevertheless, this realization always opens us up to a magnitude of living and vitality that extends beyond the default cognitive parameters that we began with. And as such, it alters the structure of our experience by shifting the charge with which we identify with the various aspects of our experience. We can say that this structural transformation of our being that unfolds subsequent to our encounter with truth is stage 3 of the “spiritual” process.

One of these major structural shifts that occurs is a somatic re-contextualizing of how much we identify as and within the confines of our physical body. This may sound like an allusion to esoteric dimensions, but it can manifest as simply as loosening an anxious perpetual bracing of the body, and a softening of your attachment to thoughts and feelings that arise “inside” your body. As you develop and refine you conceptual frameworks, its not only that the content of your concepts change, but that your relationship to concepts themselves change. An action is less enacted from the preconception that you as a [subject] are doing something to an [object], but notions of subject, object and action -while still intact- become more transparent, instead giving rise to a present embodied experience without distinct intrinsic demarcations.

From this state of consciousness, where conceptual demarcations between self, action and other become softer, we can see how “the body is a prison” loses it’s resonance. Through no change of the physical facts of the body but rather through a perceptual shift, the body itself, through the spiritual journey, becomes less of a solid, enclosed, isolated, limited, heavy, distinct object and softens into an extension of experience that extends through perceptions, sensations and interactions to touch and commune with the world and other beings. Through transformed perception, it becomes a mode upon the spectrum of experience rather than a limiting enclosure.

Ideas like “the body is a prison” are then understood to apply to a certain conceptual relationship to the body (albeit a popular one), but not intrinsic to it.

Part II: Superman (Click here for Part 1: Intro)

So what is the medicine of the savior archetype? How can this character move from a abstract source of generalized hope to a practically relevant and motivating force?

Let’s start by looking at the archetype of the Hero, the general type of archetype of which the Savior is a particular form. The Hero, as demonstrated in the classic “Hero’s Journey” stories, is often times characterized by the will to persevere. Whether it be Odysseus, Harry Potter, Luke Skywalker or Mulan, the hero meets inevitable challenge and follows through instead of running away in service of their goal.

The Savior is a type of Hero whose goals are in service of the collective good, rather than personal gain. Because of this self-less orientation, they are often held as embodiments of spiritual ideals and Divine values.

We can say there are three parts of this Savior archetype: the embodiment of transpersonal values, which extend into the will to persevere in noble action towards that aim, despite obstacles & the promise of hope for the future.

This Savior archetype is exemplified in the way that Superman’s unconditional compassion extends into the powerful actions he takes towards those aims. Superman as a savior has his will deeply rooted in service to the collective. This compassion is best displayed in the most recent Superman (2025), where he goes out of his way to save a single squirrel, let alone children and innocent bystanders from the line of fire. We even see his unconditional compassion on display in relation to the monster terrorizing the city, attempting to humanely transport the creature out of harms way rather than blowing it up the way his other superhero peers are quick to do without hesitation. His compassion is the fundamental premise from which he orients towards the world, from which his desire to act emerges.

Superman embodies this throughline of empowered values to empowered will to empowered action. If we consider these aspects as progressive extensions of eachother, rather than separate qualities-values lead to mindsets which lead to actions– we can see that there is a direct line of power that starts from his values and that extends through to the completion of action, without diminishment. In physics, this is analogous to a current of electricity passing through a conductor with zero resistance, and thus zero change in force throughout. (Actually, most common conductors are made of metals which result in some degree of energy loss through the current due to resistance, but there are some more rare materials which result in no energy loss, which allow for energy to be transmitted over large distances without any energy loss. Guess what these types of materials are called? Superconductors.) In spiritual terms, this is the meaning of “being aligned”, and has correspondence throughout various religions and spiritual traditions like the Zoroastrian tenets “Right thought, right word, right deed”, and the Buddhist 8 fold path “Right View, Right Intention, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Concentration”.

(Alex Grey, Lightworker)

It is as if Superman has a unity of his being, like the Superconductor without resistance, that allows for the transpersonal magnitude for his internal sense of goodness to proportionally translate into the power with which he follows through in his action (towards that aim), without a loss of magnitude. 

Here we can introduce another popular symbol of the savior archetype to get a better sense of what this archetype represents; Jesus Christ. Like the Christ symbol, Superman is the embodiment of Divine ideals incarnate into Earthly form – part otherworldly and part human. But again, this bridge between the divine and the human is -archetypally- the bringing together of the deepest spiritual values (can we call it, simply, “Love”?) with the ability to carry them out into action into the realm of form. Symbolic images associated with saviors often allude to this premise… consider the intersecting vertical (spiritual) and horizontal (physical) planes of the Christ symbol.

(Alex Ross, Superman; Peace on Earth)

What does this look like in our human lives? Does living out our values to the fullest capacity save the world the way Superman does?

Click for Part 3: Superman: Personal and Collective Embodiment

In a recent political “discourse” online, I was confronted with an aspect of our world and the human psyche that stunned me.

What interests me in discussions with people “on the other side” of certain political, social and ethical debates is not finding the right facts to “convince” them of my perspective, nor is it to rage against their -to me, inhumane- viewpoints with charged emotions.

What I am interested in is finding the place in their thinking that is one step -one logical inversion- away from my worldview.

To do this, I start with first principles: What is your foundational understanding of the world and your relation to it?

This bypasses all the arguments and debates that could go on ad infinitum if we kept our discussion to specifics: specifics about what one particular politician on your “side” said, or about what country did to another at a specific isolated time. This isn’t to say that these specifics are not essential and important topics of discourse, but rather, if you have a certain worldview and I have another, the exact same fact, or anecdote or event could mean something completely different within my worldview than it does within yours… hence the feeling of “talking past each other” that so often happens in these kind of heated debates.

So I was adamant to excavate, in this online discussion, to the core of this person’s primary framework to understand the root of the divergence in thinking that led to our opposite political ideologies.

And long story short, we hit the root.

He explicitly stated that he believes that it is each person’s prerogative to care about their “own” people and not others.

Suddenly, all his other political views clicked into place. In fact, they made sense.

And it made sense why, when discussing with someone like me – who conversely starts from the premise that all living beings are worthy of our care, regardless of our relation to them- we would find no meeting point in any of the political topics we discussed.

I think what surprised me was not that he held this view at his core, but that he was so conscious of holding it.

Because from my perspective, within my worldview of universal care, this was it right here in the open… the conceptual glitch at the root of all “evil” in the world.

But by taking a step outside my system of meaning… I saw how that same belief, that our only responsibility is to care about our “own” and not “others”, is a pretty natural belief for a human animal to hold.

It almost gives me vertigo to switch between these two perspectives, because one’s whole world shifts depending on which belief is your starting point of understanding.

So here I felt we arrived at the irreducible impasse; I believe all humans are worthy of my care and he believed only his “own” were.

Where could i go from here in convincing someone to widen the scope of their ethical consideration when they just don’t value that as an intrinsically important thing to do?