Invisible Counselors

"In a dark time the eye begins to see."  

This is the opening line of the poem by Theodore Roethke.  But how does it happen in life?

In a dark time, when battling paralyzing fear (the fear of poverty, of criticism, of loss of love), I wrote down those words of the poet.  I had no idea how I would find my way out of the underground passage I found myself in, especially as there were no mentors or guides.

The idea that I could turn misfortune (which I began to write about in the form of a book that I would call The Red Coat) into a blessing was the thought that changed my life.

In his inspirational classic, Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill says that people end up where they are because of their dominating thoughts and desires.  Everything created in the world begins in the form of a thought inside your head.

"All thought has a tendency to clothe itself in its physical equivalent."

If you are a worrier, you get things to worry about.  If you fear criticism, you find yourself inundated by it. 

To address his own shortcomings, Hill conducted a thought experiment.  He called an imaginary council of historical figures whom he admired and who he thought would have a positive influence on him, such that he might in time and through interaction with them rebuild his own character.  Hill appointed himself the head of that assembly and addressed the figures one by one, requesting their assistance in his endeavors.  Soon, these "Invisible Counselors" began to communicate to him through the "receiving set" of his subconscious mind, granting him throughout his day the extraordinary ideas, plans and hunches that flashed before his mind. 

Here is my cabinet (with seating chart) and call to order.  Who's in yours?

INVISIBLE COUNSELORS

NAPOLEON HILL (sitting at my right hand which is the strong hand of my will), I ask that you pass on to me the habit of directing my thoughts toward success, being ever mindful that thoughts are things, and powerful things when mixed with definiteness of purpose, persistence and a burning desire for their translation into wealth.  

SHIKO MUNAKATA (self-taught Artist born to a blacksmith), I ask that you teach me to see what is already there and to work with marvelous speed in getting it down on paper.

From you, DIONYSUS (God of Theater and Wine), I wish to acquire the freedom of Nobody and the gift of the Poets through whom speak the daemons of your house.

From you, INGMAR BERGMAN (Master of the Magic Lantern), I wish to learn how to express through word and image those chasms, heavens, eternities that we bear within us.

You, ERESHKIGAL (Queen of the Great Below whose dark forces when unobserved are felt as depression), I wish to keep in my circle so that you do not destroy me.

From you, POLAR BEAR (sitting opposite me), I ask that you let me put on your coat and be who I am.

From you, INANNA (Queen of Heaven and Earth), I wish to acquire all of the virtues: the virtue of war, of incantation, of truth, of dagger and sword, of fear, of lovemaking, of the happy song, of the lamentation, of treachery, of straightforwardness, of kindness, of deceit, and so on, so that I am a whole and sovereign being.

From you, ARISTOPHANES (Comic Poet of the Ancient World), I wish to acquire the audacity and skill to erase the world that is and create another.

From you, ARTEMIS (Mistress of the Wilderness), I wish to acquire the ability to talk to the animals and to hear the wisdom of the natural world.

From you, C.G. JUNG, I wish to acquire the ability and courage to overcome those strange resistances that hold me back, to let go of suffering and open myself to the possibility of all that I am, giving battle to the nursery demons at the gate and entering the causal zone of my psyche where I clarify and name the Eternal Ones who hold the keys to my life.

From you, JOAN OF ARC (sitting to my left, the little left hand of me), I desire to acquire the Movement of Faith, the resolute action that is needed to put in motion the extraordinary ideas that come to me in sparks of divinity. 

Knight of Faith

Why is it in the spirit world anything is possible but in life we must pass the same old traces? 

Jack and I just finished watching Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal and I asked him why it was one of his favorite films.  He said because it deals with the deepest questions facing human beings -- and still is very funny. 

I'm reading the screenplay to Fanny and Alexander, and notice that in both films, Bergman juxtaposes the choices people make between cruelty and kindness.  In Fanny and Alexander it is the choice that is made in a marriage and in The Seventh Seal it is the choice that one makes during a time of extreme crisis, in this case the period of profound social, economic and religious upheaval brought on in 14th Century Europe by the Plague.  The Knight, played by Max Von Sydow, and his Squire return from the Crusades to find the world turned upside down.  Reacting in terror to the Black Death that has taken nearly half the population, the townsfolk have gone out of their minds, torturing each other and flagellating themselves. 

Why do some people choose cruelty -- and others kindness? 


Why is it in the spirit world anything is possible but in life we must pass the same old traces?  

Jack and I pondered these questions.  Yes, I thought, I am afraid to die but why must it define me? When the Knight witnesses these displays of cruelty, feels his own fear, he replies, "My body is afraid, but I am not."   

I repeated that line to Jack.  "That is what I shall say."  "Then you have faith?" he relied.  I was surprised.  "I have been fooled before," I said with a sly smile.  "What do you mean?" he asked.  I told him how many years ago when I was pregnant I had thought the birth of my child would transform me, but the experience was something very different.  I forewent pain killers in order to be completely present but I had no idea how excruciating it would be.  The labor which lasted for 36 hours was unabated pain until at last, in exhaustion, I submitted to cesarean.  

And still.  I was transformed.  

"Perhaps it was because of the pain," I said to Jack.  It was for that reason, I told him, I wasn't sure I wanted to be sedated in the last moments before death.  Jack related what he'd read in a biography of Montaigne.  He'd had a nearly fatal fall from a horse and witnesses reported he was in agonizing pain, yet Montaigne's own recollection of the experience was very different.  He said it was peaceful.


I told Jack that was probably because Montaigne was in shock as the consciousness began to leave the body.  And then, all of a sudden, as we were discussing this, my mind made a leap.  My consciousness lighted on the possibility that things were not as they appeared at all.  I was staring at the bookcase, I remember.  The lamp was on and Jack was sitting there on the couch beside me.  "Perhaps all of this," I said waving my hands to indicate the world around us as we were sitting there experiencing it "...perhaps all of this is an illusion."  What if it didn't matter?  Or, more precisely, what if we weren't bound by it?  Then what was true?  I tried to focus my mind.  What if we bore, as Bergman has his hero in Fanny and Alexander say,  "chasms, heavens, eternities" within us? 

Though I seem small and insignificant in the face of this,
I bear chasms, heavens, eternities within me.
I carry my lantern in the darkness;
I make the movements;
And though my body may be afraid,
I am not.

If I could see this, remember this, what great things would I accomplish?