| Introduction
Reflective practices did not become a part
of my education until long after I earned a doctorate and began a career
teaching music at various universities. It was while on my personal journey
under the guidance of practitioners of C. G. Jung’s analytical psychology
that I learned how working and playing with expressive media at a deep
level of the creative process releases symbolic images that can become
guides to individuation. Feeding that discovery little by little into my
own teaching led eventually to the idea of designing a course on the creative
process based on Jungian principles. In 1982 I was given the opportunity
to propose an interdisciplinary course in fine arts for the school of part-time
studies at my university. I put forward a proposal titled “Foundations
of Creative Imagination” with some trepidation, as C. G. Jung was not exactly
at the top of the charts on our recently-founded and otherwise progressive
campus. He was non grata in the psychology department, and only
a handful of colleagues in fine arts and humanities were known fellow travelers.
As this would be the first course at my university on Jung’s theory and
practice, I was surprised but delighted that it survived the scrutiny of
my colleagues and was accepted into the calendar. The course was offered
for the first time in 1984 and received so warmly that it was offered every
year or two thereafter through the next decade, at which point I retired
from active teaching. In this paper I shall give an overview of the curriculum
and discuss some unforeseen consequences.
The Course
The students who enrolled were for the most
part fine arts majors completing degrees in dance, film, music, theater,
and visual arts. The class of between 15 and 20 students met for four hours
one evening a week. The room was large enough for a circle of chairs for
presentations, with the rest of the space clear of furniture for experiential
exercises. We also held sessions in an art gallery, a dance studio, and
out of doors in a wooded area. The meetings usually began with discussions
of assigned readings and presentations on the topic of the day. After the
break came the exercises and time for processing the results. At the end
of each session we set aside a few minutes for journaling. When given as
a two-semester, 26-week course, the team of instructors included specialists
in art therapy, dance therapy, voice and story-telling, and Jungian psychology,
while I looked after the musical side of things and administered the course.
When given as a one-semester 13-week course to candidates for the B.Ed.
and M.Ed. degrees, I gave the course alone.
The curriculum can be summarized in some dozen
concepts: (1) Creativeness is a drive that guides individuals to the actualization
of their innate potential. (2) The creative imagination mediates the primary
process of the unconscious and the secondary process of conscious ego awareness.
(3) The threshold or liminal zone between the primary and secondary processes
is variously named the “transcendent function” (Jung), the “aesthetic experience”
(Dewey), the “presentational state of awareness” (Langer), the ‘tertiary
process” (Arieti). (4) Activating the imagination in various expressive
media releases emergent symbolic images that have an adaptive, homeodynamic,
life-fulfilling tendency (Stevens). (5) Such emergent images are complex,
multimodal formations that combine sense data and intuitions, feelings
and thoughts, memories and incipient portents. (6) Discovering correspondences
between personal images and primordial (archetypal) images from cultures
past and present fosters the symbolic attitude. (7) Learning the vocabulary,
grammar, and effects of symbolic images develops competence in the language
of the imagination. (8) Activating the imagination engages the creative
process (preparation, incubation, illumination, and verification); the
cycle of the creative process includes a de-integrative phase and a re-integrative
phase. (9) The creative process is cognate in structure with the ritual
process; self-created rites of passage deepen and intensify the creative
process and evoke in the group a sense of “existential or spontaneous communitas”
(Turner). (10) Sharing the results of the creative process in the group
fosters confidence in the individual’s creativeness, the ability to communicate
in the language of the imagination, and trust in the group as a safe container
for the individuation process. (11) Personality type indicates the pattern
of preferences that identifies the individual’s approach to learning and
creativeness. (12) Personality type indicates how people relate to each
other and fosters mutuality and collaboration in the group.
The struggle to find a balance between
the claims of the reason and the imagination is as old as education itself
(Frye, 1963; Egan, 1993; Kearney, 1988; Miller, 1996; Kessler, 2000), but
in an era of cognitive science the emphasis on instrumental rationality
and critical thinking leaves little room for inner-directed, symbolic thinking.
The challenge at the outset of the course is to devise ways of putting
on hold the critical attitude that prevails in university classrooms so
as to free the creative imagination to play. After kindergarten, play has
become an increasingly alien concept, even on playing fields, so it takes
some time before students re-learn how to take play seriously. They know
how to ‘unpack’ images intellectually, but the course shows them how to
‘backpack’ images until meanings emerge spontaneously, usually with an
aha! shock of recognition. Edward Whitmont, author of The Symbolic Quest,
the basis text for the course, writes: “The symbolic approach can mediate
an experience of something indefinable, intuitive or imaginative, or a
feeling-sense of something that can be known or conveyed in no other way,
since abstract terms do not suffice everywhere” (Whitmont, 1969, 16). The
first lesson is to leave open the meaning of emergent images until their
effects have been experienced. The following overview of the course cites
examples from personal stories written by eleven members of the fifth cohort
of the course (Clarkson et alia, in preparation).
The course is an immersion program in
the creative imagination, and at the first evening the students make collages.
They gather around a table covered with stacks of many-colored tissue papers
while the instructor says, “Touch the colors and sense their different
energies. What feelings do they bring? Everyone responds to colors differently.”
They take a few sheets, tear them into pieces, and paste the pieces onto
cardboards with paintbrushes and white glue. “Be playful and spontaneous!
Let accidents happen! Avoid known forms! There’s no right or wrong way
of doing this. Have fun!" Some want more detailed instructions and have
difficulty being playful and spontaneous. Others are apprehensive about
‘doing art’ and having their work critiqued. Anxiety subsides when the
collages are put up on the wall and we begin to view them as harbingers
of new meanings rather than as objects for critical judgment. The colors,
shapes, and designs begin to take on symbolic forms. One collage has a
large blue area that the student recognizes to be a Black Panther, her
tutelary figure for the rest of the course. Another collage has a patch
of red that leads to Little Red Riding Hood and eventually to the guiding
figure of Aphrodite. Many initial collages point uncannily to what is about
to unfold during the next eight months.
One student reported that she had difficulty
seeing what others saw in the collages during that first meeting, but realized
that a new dimension of sight, a form of “vision/seeing” was being born,
“a marriage between the obvious and not-so-obvious.” Working this way,
she says, “developed an atmosphere of sacred trust in processing of each
other’s work,” and she noticed herself warming up and softening to the
process and to the people around her. Activating the imagination puts the
intellect in touch with deeper levels of the psyche and arouses positive
feelings of well-being. On leaving the class that night she felt “alive
and vibrant.”
After viewing the collages we introduce
the I Ching or Book of Changes. Each student formulates a
question, throws three coins six times, and scores the throws to obtain
one of 64 hexagrams. They read the texts and reflect on how the hexagrams
respond to their questions. The instructor then asks whether they can find
any correspondences between the collage and the hexagram, and several find
significant linkages. Without making the point explicit, the first meeting
challenges the logical concept of causality, for there is no possible rational
connection between a spontaneous collage and consulting the I Ching.
This jolt to the cognitive standpoint is founded on Jung’s reception
of Wilhelm’s edition of the I Ching (Jung, 1979). He welcomed the
work as a much-needed corrective to Western habits of thought, for it introduced
what he called “synchronicity,” the quantum principle of a-causal order
that links non-local events (Jung, 1982, 179-181). It is not too long before
students begin to notice the effects of synchronicity and incorporate them
in their on-going creative process. For Rudolf Ritsema, “using a divinatory
system is an exploration of the unconscious side of a situation. The symbols
evoked adjust the balance between you and the unknown forces behind it”
(Ritsema, 1995, 16). During the remainder of the course the students consult
a modern edition of the I Ching as they choose, and many find that
the Sage becomes a helpful guide (Anthony, 1988).
The second meeting is in a campus art
gallery and introduces the basic exercise for activating the imagination.
The exercise is as non-directive as possible and thus differs from techniques
of so-called “guided imagery” that engage participants with selected images
in order to achieve specified outcomes. It follows the four phases of the
creative process first enunciated by Graham Wallas: preparation, incubation,
illumination, verification (1926, 87). During the ‘preparation’ phase the
students walk around the gallery and select an artwork that attracts them.
While they sit facing the works the instructor leads them in a brief relaxation.
The ‘incubation’ phase activates the imagination to form a strong imaginal
bond with the artwork. They scan the artwork all over slowly, then close
their eyes in order to ‘see’ the artwork with the eyes of the imagination.
They imagine going into the artwork and exploring it, then focusing on
a color, then on a shape. The exercise concludes with a period of silence,
a ‘solo’ time during which the imagination is free to play. This is the
‘illumination’ phase, when authentic images flow spontaneously into conscious
awareness. The ‘verification’ phase consists of recording the experience
in words and images (oil pastels and paper are provided) and then sharing
them with a partner.
When conscious awareness is relaxed and the
imagination is activated, the transcendent function is engaged. Things
that appear distinct in the ordinary, space-time world begin to blur in
the liminal zone of imaginal cognition. Sense modalities--vision, hearing,
somatosensory perceptions, etc.--flow together in surprising combinations.
The membrane between mind, body, and spirit becomes permeable, which accounts
for experiences described as body-knowing, cellular responses, and subtle
body phenomena. Images seem to take on a life of their own and are often
accompanied by powerful affects. These affect-images are experienced as
new and surprising and yet authentic and meaningful. Because they involve
the whole being, participants report a sense of fulfillment, abundance,
and even awe. Some describe the experience as profound, erotic, blissful,
and even spiritual. From sharing their responses students recognize the
extraordinary variety of reactions that can result from the creative process
and appreciate that the imagination is a powerful and untapped source of
personal knowledge.
There is often an inner struggle between wanting
to participate in these seemingly strange exercises and the inhibition
against giving up control to the creative imagination. One student wrote
that she wanted to feel more free but often felt that it wasn’t “proper
to behave so.” When an exercise did work for her, she felt supercharged
with energy. An indication that the inner and outer worlds are coming into
productive partnership is heightened motivation for the course. During
the early weeks many show great interest without really knowing why. They
look forward to the exercises even though they can’t figure out the rationale
that connects them. Puzzlement gives way to intense involvement when emergent
images and feelings begin to reveal distinctive, recurrent, and meaningful
patterns. As they become accustomed to the rhythm of the creative process,
they look forward to the exercises as means of discovering new and fascinating
images.
Presentations are given and discussions
held on principal concepts while the students are undergoing the series
of exercises in activating the imagination. Psychological type is a major
topic throughout the course, and the participants are given the Myers Briggs
Type Indicator (MBTI) at the outset. Discussing the in-class exercises
provides many examples of how different types respond to the same experiences.
The structure of the psyche is presented according to Jung: conscious and
unconscious, ego and shadow, complexes and the Self. We study the archetypes
of the Warrior (Hero/Heroine), Mother and Father, Sibling, Child, and Beloved
in their positive and negative aspects in myths and fairy tales. The students
begin to observe daily events for clues to the individuation process and
keep a course journal to record in-class exercises and (if they choose)
their dreams. The ego attitude becomes more flexible and permeable as they
encounter emergent images and affects. Sooner or later they realize that
a previously hidden world has opened up and there is a dramatic shift in
the cognitive standpoint. As one student put it, “outer events quite beyond
our conscious control seem to correspond to and give form to unconscious
trends that are striving towards expression.” Another wrote that learning
how to track images and engage them through dialogue and active imagination
showed that they speak through a “body-knowing.” A third student said that
at first he did not identify with any images, then he identified with all
images, and finally he found a middle way of “walking in the field of images.”
And a fourth wrote that she now realizes the power of imagery to carry
messages not available in other forms, and that it was a major breakthrough
to learn how to let herself be spontaneous, express emotions directly,
and validate them without first attaching a thought (usually tinged with
fear or judgment).
Primordial Images
The first semester concludes with an
essay on an image that came up during the exercises. Usually the image
emerges so forcefully that there is no question what it should be. But
some students have difficulty in choosing. The image of a bunny kept appearing
to one student, but she thought that a bunny was too cute and cuddly to
be suitable for a major project. Then she dreamed that a bunny came to
her and said that now that she has dreamed of a bunny she can use it for
her image. The bunny became her guiding figure for the remainder of the
course. They amplify the meanings of the images by researching their occurrence
in various cultures and art forms while continuing to find personal associations
during the in-class exercises. Discovering meaningful correspondences between
personal associations and the cultural meanings of an image fosters the
symbolic attitude and an understanding of the relationship between the
personal and the objective psyche (Jung’s collective unconscious).
Jung’s concept of the primordial image or
archetype is compared by Anthony Stevens to the fundamental dynamisms that
are postulated in many fields of enquiry--the innate releasing mechanisms
of ethology, the behavioral systems of evolutionary psychology, the algorithms
of cognitive science, the deep structures of linguistics, and the genetically
transmitted response strategies of sociobiology.
| Whether one calls these psychological adaptations archetypes or algorithms,
both cognitive science and analytical psychology conceive of them as built-in
assumptions that certain typical figures (e.g., mother, child, stranger,
mate) and certain physical features (water, shelter, edible substances)
will be encountered in the social and ecological environment (Stevens,
1995, 126-132). |
Archetypes appear to have autonomous energies
which they seek to achieve in the psyche (in the form of images, symbols,
and myths), in the personality (in the form of complexes), and in outer
reality (in the form of behavior). Their survival value lies in their ability
to further fitness, adaptation, and growth, which Jung subsumed under the
concept of the individuation process (ibid., 94-97). Participants confirm
that their images have adaptive value, for they accept them as authentic
expressions of the personality. Dialoguing with such images establishes
communication between the ego and the Self. In the process the ego becomes
more responsive to whatever is Other.
The concept of the archetype is introduced
after the students have been immersed in images for several weeks. They
have encountered the archetypes of color in the first meeting when they
made collages, and thereafter colors take on particular powers. One student
cut her finger on a piece of glass and a poem flowed out on redness as
the life force. For another, whose image was the Black Madonna, black became
“darkness of unknowable depth.” Green connected a third student to the
earth, the life of the instincts, and the viriditas of Hildegard
of Bingen. The next meetings introduce the Stone, and the Tree in the Forest
as archetypal images. Students bring a stone to class and tell its story
as though the stone itself is speaking. The stone stories weave together
primordial with personal meanings. One stone is pregnant with potential,
as if inside it the whole universe is waiting to be discovered. Another
is incomplete, bearing scars of separation and in search of wholeness.
A third came from the ancestral home of Scotland, and though it is small
and insignificant, it is useful to others. Several weeks later the students
re-read their stone stories as though they are autobiographies and discover
that the stones have told them their own stories but from another, more
inclusive perspective.
The next evening we gather in a woodlot on
the campus. The students wander about looking for a tree that attracts
them. Sitting beside the tree in a meditative state, they engage in an
imaginal dialogue with the tree. After an hour they return to the classroom
and record the experience in a collage or drawing and a journal entry.
One student sees the mask of a bear in her tree, and the Bear becomes her
guiding figure through the course. Another merges blissfully with a tree
that tells of the inner strength that comes from connectedness with all
of life and of the wisdom that is available to those who seek and ask.
A fallen tree with new shoots growing from it provides an experience of
death and rebirth.
In subsequent meetings, exercises in
body movement and music activate the creative imagination in various media
and further the dialogue between the ego and the Self. After the course
is well under way the creative process begins to operate spontaneously.
One student finds herself taking photographs without knowing why, only
to discover later that they have become core images for her process. Another
notices blue jays during the week and chooses the image for an active imagination
exercise. It transforms into an eagle, which becomes her guiding figure
for the year’s process. To enrich the fund of available images, the class
divides into groups and gives presentations on the symbol systems of Astrology,
Alchemy, the Tarot, Kundalini Yoga, and the Native Medicine Wheel. When
the symbolic attitude is well established, they notice images appearing
synchronistically from many sources. They discover that learning the language
of the imagination requires as much knowledge and practice as any language.
Personality Type and Creativeness
Many traits have been associated with creativity:
divergent thinking, introversion, self-esteem, tolerance for ambiguity,
willingness to take risks, behavioral flexibility, emotional variability,
ability to absorb imagery, and even the tendency to neurosis and psychosis
(James & Asmus, 2001). To isolate traits as predictors assumes a normative
concept of creativity. The premise is that the traits possessed by eminent
creators can then be taught to make ordinary people more creative. People
learn about the creativity of Darwin and Mozart, Picasso and Einstein,
while their authentic, personal creativeness is not affirmed and valued.
The theory of personality type corrects the
normative attitude with the idea that each person has particular gifts
according to their type, and that no one type is in and of itself more
creative than any other. The degree of talent and aptitude in a domain
is independent of the individual’s preferred type of creativeness. Building
on the typological scheme of William James, Jung developed a theory of
personality that is now widely applied by means of the MBTI (Jung, 1971;
Myers, 1980, 1993). It holds that type is a given of the personality and
remains relatively stable through time. When eleven members of the fifth
cohort of the course did the MBTI again six years later, their scores were
virtually unchanged.
As students become familiar with the range
of types in the class and the unique qualities and gifts of each type,
they begin to value their own type and understand how it differs from and
relates to others. They understand that some types prefer to work independently
(introverts) and others in groups (extraverts); how some take in information
through the so-called five senses (sensing types) and others through the
‘sixth’ sense (intuitive types); how some evaluate information logically
and impersonally (thinking types) and others empathically (feeling types).
Jung combined the three polarities of attitude (introversion-extraversion),
perceiving (sensation-intuition), and judging (thinking-feeling) to produce
a system of eight types. (For more resources on the MBTI, go to http://capt.org.)
They learn that each individual possesses all the functions, but that the
proportions vary according to their type. When thinking, for example, is
the dominant function, sensing and intuition are the auxiliary functions,
and feeling is the inferior function. They discover that though getting
in touch with the inferior function is the greatest challenge of all, it
is the route to their most powerful creativeness. The range, richness,
intensity, and originality of the students’ final presentations gives evidence
of how fully they have engaged all functions of the personality.
The Cycle of the Creative Process
We introduce a model of the creative process
at the beginning of the second half of the course (see Figure 1). The students
have been through one cycle in the first half and are ready to take the
process deeper. The basis for the model is the T’ai chi symbol, already
familiar from the I Ching as an image of the interflow of opposed
energy forms in nature and human experience. A host of contrastive qualities
are associated with the complementary principles of Yin-chi (dark energy)
and Yang-chi (light energy) (Ritsema, 1995, 68-69). The familiar form of
the T’ai chi symbol lies at the northeast and southwest positions of Figure
1, if we think of the diagram as a compass with north at the top and south
at the bottom. The dot of light in the dark area and the dot of dark in
the light area symbolize inception, the beginning of a new phase of development.
The difference between the northeast and southwest positions lies in the
direction of rotation. The northeast figure appears to rotate clockwise,
while the southwest figure rotates in the opposite direction. Thus the
cycle of the T’ai chi is analogous to processes that have two phases, such
as simple harmonic motion, the heartbeat, and breathing.
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Figure 1: The Cycle of the T'ai Chi as a Model for the Creative
Process
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Proceeding clockwise from the northeast
position, the dots increases in size while the complementary areas of dark
and light energy correspondingly decrease. At the east position the dark
and light areas are in balance, and at the southeast the clockwise phase
reaches its fullest extent. Between the southeast and south positions the
Yin and Yang energies completely fill their respective areas, causing the
process to reverse from clockwise to counter-clockwise motion. The south
position now symbolizes the moment when the energies are utterly opposed.
The out-breath has ceased and the in-breath has not yet begun; the pendulum
is poised at the limit of its arc. The emergence of a point of dark in
the light energy and a point of light in the dark energy initiates the
next phase of the cycle. The west position finds the two energies again
in balance, and the return phase reaches its apogee in the northeast. A
reversal again produces maximum opposition in the north position and the
return to the clockwise phase. We suggest that the clockwise phase represents
the de-integrative aspect of the creative process, which breaks down the
status quo, and the counter-clockwise phase the re-integrative aspect out
of which emerges the new condition.
The model conceptualizes the dynamics of the
creative process. During the de-integration phase psychic energy flows
to the unconscious, leaving the individual feeling stuck and even depressed.
In a culture that privileges the goal-directed conscious attitude, it is
a challenge to be stuck in the depressed position and wait patiently, trusting
that the illumination will break through to begin the re-integration phase.
One student wrote that after the discussion of the cycle of the creative
process she no longer fought the depression that had resulted in a bout
of illness. The breakthrough came when she suddenly understood the meaning
of two photographs that she had taken the previous term. A painter went
through a period of darkness that she realized was the time of incubation.
She let go of all thoughts, even the wish to understand, and let her paintbrushes
take over. The breakthrough came with a series of paintings that produced
a sense of movement, as though an embryo was being born. A third student
fell ill and became depressed, but she decided to go with the feeling of
darkness instead of fighting it. The breakthrough for her came during a
visit to an art gallery where the painting of a young boy brought her the
renewing energy of the Child. The model of the creative process convinced
a fourth student, who had suffered from depression, that depression is
as important and natural a part of his life cycle as are the highs.
We discuss the difference between the goal-directed,
purposeful energy of the re-integration phase and the feelings of doubt,
frustration, and even depression of the de-integration phase. They recognize
that the de-integration phase is a natural part of the creative process
and that one must wait until the new image breaks through to initiate the
final phase of the project. The moment of the breakthrough happens differently
for each student, but when it occurs they experience a rush of energy.
Everything seems to come together as they prepare for the final presentations.
They find that they can give up trying to work out problems intellectually
and put their trust in the confluence of conscious and unconscious forces
in the liminal zone of the creative imagination.
Enter the Masks
The second half of the course is built around
a mask project. Working in pairs the students make masks on each other’s
faces with plaster-of-Paris bandages. While decorating the mask, they leave
open the question of its identity. They dialogue with the mask, and write
poems and songs for the mask. One evening they bring costumes, dress up
as the masks, and silently introduce them to each other. The coming-out
party for the masks ends in a lively dance.
After the mask process is under way, we introduce
a schema that links eight of the archetypes to the eight personality types.
(John Beebe distributed this model when giving lectures and workshop, but
did not publish it. He gave permission for me to adapt it here as in Figure
2.) Four positions are supportive of the ego standpoint (ego-syntonic),
while four are opposed (ego-dystonic). The positive aspect of the dominant
function is the Warrior (Hero/Heroine), while the shadow aspect is the
Opposing Personality. The positive aspect of the auxiliary function is
the supportive parent (Mother/Father), while the shadow aspect is the negative
parent (Witch/Senex). The positive aspect of the tertiary function is the
Child (Puer/Puella), of which the shadow aspect is the Trickster. The inferior
function is associated with the Anima or Animus, the positive aspect of
which is the Beloved and the shadow aspect, the Demonic Personality. Having
worked with personality types and archetypes through the program, the students
assign figures of their own choosing to the various positions of Beebe’s
model. Some make additional masks to represent those figures. The realization
that the full range of functions and archetypes resides within each individual
furthers a dynamic and developmental perspective of the psyche.
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Figure 2: Archetypal Complexes Carrying the Eight Functions
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The mask process concludes with building an environment
or altar for the mask that can be transported to the classroom and to compose
rituals to take place in that environment. Because they have to work quickly,
they give up trying to figure out solutions intellectually. Several comment
that while doing these last assignments they noticed that they were giving
over control to the tertiary process and trusting that their creativeness
would flow. One student who felt stuck for a long time said that she proceeded
without letting her thinking function interfere and found that the box
built itself.
After making the environment for the mask,
the students are given an imaginal journey into the environment in order
to develop their rituals. One student was inspired to make several paintings
that she mounted as the background to her final performance. Another student
resisted the last assignments and, while working on the box, figured out
what was causing the resistance. A dream then gave her permission to build
the box according to her own thoughts and feelings. A fourth participant
came out of the incubation phase to find herself in a powerful flow of
energy that carried her through preparations for a dance performance. A
fifth student found that on letting the tertiary process take over, building
the box was easy and fun and made her feel very much alive.
The breakthrough releases an exhilarating
rush of creativity that involves all their resources, conscious and unconscious.
After a long period of self-doubt one reported that after the breakthrough
the new image took on a life of its own. Another said that while working
on his final presentation he let the process develop, fully understanding
its implications and without fear of feeling intimidated. Trusting the
creative process and with energy that has been stored up during the incubation
stage, the students prepare to give their final presentations with little
or no help from the instructors, as the masks have become their authentic
mentors and guides. The mask process provides a rich reservoir of material
for the final presentation, a twenty-minute performance or show of work
in which the masks play crucial roles. The final essay documents how the
creative process unfolded through the year.
The Ritual Process and Community
The archetypal reality of the ritual process
is evident from the fact that it appears spontaneously in dreams and fantasy
journey exercises. During an active imagination exercise the Bear takes
one student to a cave with the bones of his ancestors. She sheds her skin
like a skeleton-spirit and is led deep into the cave where, with the aid
of fire and prayers, the Bear calls up spirits which slash her back with
their claws. The Bear heals her wounds in the flames, then leads her out
of the cave, where she is re-clothed in her skin. The ritual motifs of
fire, wounding, healing, and renewal occur in other stories. Another student
tells of a visualization exercise during which she descends deep into the
earth and meets an old woman who gives her a spindle with which to spin
the strands of her life. She then climbs a spiral staircase back into the
light. During a fantasy journey with the image of the Path in the Forest,
a third student imagines that a Fox is exploring a cave with a pool in
it. The Fox takes off her skin and dives into the water. After the swim
she finds that her skin has changed into a long red dress. When she puts
it on, she is transformed into a beautiful woman. During a fantasy journey
with the mask a fourth student is led to a cave with a fire in the middle.
A ritual takes place in which she integrates the many aspects of the mask.
When she steps out into the light, she feels restored and at one with herself.
The theme of ceremony and ritual is touched
on from time to time. We discuss the history and symbolism of Thanksgiving
(Harvest Festival), Halloween (Saowain, The Day of the Dead), the Winter
Solstice (Christmas, New Year), and other festivals. Near the end of the
course we study the structure of the ritual process and investigate the
practice of rituals that are self-created to accompany important life-events--birth,
childhood to adulthood, marriage, separation or divorce, recovery from
illness, mid-life to old age, and death (Turner, 1987; Hine, 1987). The
assignment is to design rituals for the masks that combine aspects of both
the sacred and the profane. Some have difficulty with the topic of ritual,
as they think of rituals as phony and unrelated to the lives people actually
lead. After the course one such student realized that ritual was one of
the components of the course that she valued most highly. She commented
that each class meeting embodied a sense of ritual, and that the ceremony
of completion that brought the last evening to a close was especially meaningful.
Turner notes that the liminal phase of the
ritual process generates a sense of homogeneity and comradeship in the
participants that dissolves social divisions of rank and class such that
all feel entitled to membership in the group. He found that rituals generate
a community of equal individuals that has about it a quality of sacredness,
which he called ‘existential or spontaneous communitas’ (Turner, 1969,
94-96, 132). Attention to ritual brings the creative process of the individual
student into a social context and constellates a strong, even sacred sense
of community in the group.
The last three meetings of the course are
given over to the final presentations. It is a time of intense anticipation,
adventure, risk-taking, and crucial discoveries. What until then has been
largely a personal journey becomes a shared enterprise. Each presentation
takes on the aspect of a rite of passage that affirms the bond between
the individual and the witnessing community. Several students involve classmates
in their presentation, and sometimes the whole class is asked to take part.
The students become each other’s teachers. Both as witness and presenter,
they discover some new knowledge that marks the conclusion of this stage
and the beginning of the next stage in their journey. At the end of the
course several feel the need for further study and write in the course
evaluations that they wish they could do the course over again or could
pursue the subject at a more advanced level. Unfortunately, there were
no means to do so, which is perhaps one reason why the cohort of 1994-95
decided to stay together and form an ongoing group.
Consequences
By way summarizing the effects of the course I shall quote from statements
made by members of the fifth cohort soon after it was over:
On creativeness: “Since every human being
has the capacity and ability to develop creatively, this course provided
valuable insight in order for everyone to recognize their potential, individuality,
and creativity. I personally gained understanding and the encouragement
to create what I feel or think.”
On emergent images and community: “Being on
the edge of discovery at every moment, waiting for something new to emerge,
to surprise, to bring to wholeness and to bring us into communion with
one another, this course put me in touch with the sacredness of the creative
process and of the space created.”
On connecting with the Self: “The creative
process is a spiritual path to becoming who we truly are. This class provided
a safe environment for me to connect with the deep self, the creator who
is fully and originally myself.”
On the opposites: The explanation of the Yin-Yang
symbol shifting to the opposite when one of the two sides reaches its maximum
was helpful to me to understand the cycles of light and darkness, consolation
and desolation, life and death (cycles of life) as well as in the creative
process. I love the process of creativity, allowing mistakes to occur,
to be open to possibilities.”
On unlocking creative potential: “This course
has shown me the key that can open up my unconscious and see the potential
of the creative mind. It has given me the confidence to confront and understand
my creative potential and therefore my true self.”
On the individuation process: “I have gained
a deep appreciation and respect for the workings of the psyche and how
it connects our inner and outer worlds. I have received an exciting gift
of insight, understanding, and compassion for the human spirit. . . . It
is the journey of life.”
On the journey: “This course has started me
on a journey I didn’t know I needed to take, but once begun, it is one
that I cannot deny or leave--even with all the ups and downs, light and
dark, joy and sorrow that have been encountered--until that journey is
complete.
For the students of the fifth cohort the course
did not end as usual with final presentations and term papers. The sense
of communitas had formed so strongly that at the last class they set a
date to meet again. Ten years later the group is still together, although
a few of the original class went separate ways and some new members have
joined. We gather four times a year at members’ homes and other locales
to share what has happened in our lives, show new work, engage in fresh
creative exercises, and plan group projects. Some members now live hundreds
of miles away but keep in touch via email because the group has taken up
a permanent place in our lives, an extended family that sees to the continued
renewal of our creative energies. In 2000 the group decided to give a public
show of artwork in a local community art center and took the name The Milkweed
Collective. In conjunction with the show Milkweed gave workshops on the
creative process to children and adults. In succeeding years the Collective
has given two further group shows and provided the day-long workshop Exploring
Creativity in Depth to several hundred children from area schools.
Teachers who took the course toward their B.Ed.
or M.Ed. degrees have adapted elements of the curriculum for middle school
and high school classrooms (Clarkson, 2003, 69-72). Another outcome of
the program was an exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Since 1993 some
75-100,000 visitors have sat in a booth in the Canadian Historical Collection,
put on a headset, and listened to three audio programs while viewing a
landscape, “The Beaver Dam,” by the Group of Seven artist J. E. H. MacDonald.
One of the programs is a 12-minute version of the exercise for animating
the imagination while viewing an artwork. Some 2,000 Share Your Reaction
cards have been left by visitors who recorded their experiences in words
and drawings. The cards show that activating the creative process transforms
the painting for children and seniors, first time visitors to a museum
and seasoned gallery-goers, students from poor neighborhoods and teachers.
Young people say that now they know how to go into a painting they will
do it on their own, and teachers say they will do the exercise with their
students (Clarkson & Worts, in press).
Conclusion
Eleven members of the fifth cohort collaborated
in writing a book on their experience of the course and its consequences.
One author begins her chapter with a poem titled “Home,” which she wrote
one morning near the end of the course. The poem ends, “I’ve never lived
here until NOW.” Another author closes her story with the exclamation,
“I AM WOMAN. I AM HOME.” A third chapter is about reclaiming an abandoned
house. The author of a fourth tells of realizing that she needed to move
from her old house and make a new home. A fifth student had to leave his
family to find himself. The individuation process reveals the necessity
of being at home to one’s Self.
In their respective stories several quote
the saying, “When the student is ready, the teacher will come.” They mean
not just the flesh-and-blood instructors of the course, but the teachers
that emerge from the creative process as personal guides. As one puts it,
the course was a vehicle for discovering “my animal teacher.” The language
of mythos is the language of the imagination (Kearney, 1988, 395-396).
Telling the mythos at the heart of one’s story is to discover the source
of meaning and identity and the authentic path for life’s journey. Northrop
Frye speaks of the language of myth as metaphorical language in which subject
and object are not clearly separated, but linked by a common power or energy.
The terms of such language are not abstractions but concrete, dynamic powers.
The language of mythos is “solidly anchored in physical images connected
with bodily processes or with specific objects” (Frye, 1982, 6-17). “I’ve
never lived here until NOW,” and “I AM HOME” are expressions that tell
of a more holistic reality.
This curriculum provides a model for educating
the imagination so that it can collaborate with the reason to produce a
cognitive attitude that bridges both the inner world of mythos and the
outer world of logos. The students in the program and those who applied
it in their own classrooms have demonstrated that it enhances the sense
of authentic identity and motivation for inner-directed learning. I am
most grateful to the students who took the course over the years and especially
to the members of the fifth cohort for providing illustrations for this
essay. I am sure they join me in wishing that it will provide encouragement
to readers to contribute to this enterprise each in their own way.
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