Ep. 52 - Individuation with Steven Kampmann

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To dream bar, check out the Apple Kama male flavor, my favorite, tell 'em Noah sent you. All right guys, thanks for listening and here is the episode.

You know that what you're trying to be so afraid of, if you move into it, you can take that energy of the fear that's kind of dominating you and turn it into creative energy.

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This is synchronicity. (upbeat music) ♪ Happy birthday to ya ♪ ♪ Happy birthday ♪ ♪ Happy birthday to ya ♪ ♪ Happy birthday to ya ♪ ♪ Happy birthday ♪ ♪ I just never understood ♪ ♪ How man would that be good ♪ (upbeat music)

Welcome to episode 52 of Synchronicity and Happy Birthday, in case you didn't know what the intro was, I blatantly stole the beginning part of Stevie Wonder's Happy Birthday, which incidentally was written to get as a drive, as part of a drive to get Martin Luther King, a national holiday in the United States, which they did, we now have that holiday. So, good job Stevie Wonder. But, yeah, this marks one year of synchronicity. It's been a crazy year. A lot has happened in my life, in your lives, I'm sure, over the past year. It's been super fun doing this podcast, and my original idea for this episode, I was gonna do some bloopers, 'cause, you know, as you know this podcast is the professionally polished, you know, totally on point podcast, you don't notice that, that you hear, but you may not know this, but sometimes before it takes, I mess up.

And so, I have a bunch of bloopers that one day, I will put out in an episode. But, instead of doing that, I just wanted to say how grateful and appreciative I am for everyone who's listened in any capacity, subscribing, rating, all that good stuff. This is another record month for synchronicity, where it's possible I doubled last month's downloads. Well, that's pretty cool, 'cause, yeah. So, thank you, truthfully, to everyone who is listening now, listening, I will be quiet about this, but I do think it is pretty cool, that we did a whole year, every week, every single week, I had it yet, one of these for the year.

So, I'm especially happy to, for the 52nd, for the anniversary of this, to bring in Stephen Campman, again, for a second time. And Stephen, one of my most popular guests, I had more emails and more comments about Stephen than I think any other guest, and I've had a lot of really cool people on, so that's saying something. And, it's not surprising to me, because Stephen is just totally, he's in tune with the world, he's in the flow, he's with the Dow. Of refresher, I met Stephen through his son, Mikey Campman, who was out in California, doing really awesome stuff with two wet crew, his own comedy stuff, just like a really interesting, smart, creative, funny, really funny guy.

And yeah, so he's like, hey, you might wanna talk to my dad, I think he's into some of this stuff that you're into, and I'm really so happy and eternally grateful that he introduced me to Stephen, 'cause we really hit it off, and I always find the conversations personally enriching for my life, and Stephen often talks about the concept of a mentor, and I absolutely feel that he is certainly a mentor in my life, his clarity and ability to talk about concepts that I've read about and discuss with some other people, but his ability as a former teacher who taught classes on dreams is invaluable in my life.

So, usually also, I'll say I usually listen to the episodes again before I do the little intro, so I have somewhat of an idea of what was spoken about. This one I didn't do that for. I'm gonna listen to it again anew, just like you guys are, so I'm excited to do that, but I will say that this episode is primarily about individuation, and so if you're not familiar with what individuation is, it's a concept in Jungian, psychology, whatever you wanna call it, analysis, where, here's the textbook example, right? I'm reading from this, individuation is a process of transformation whereby the personal and collective unconscious are brought into consciousness, e.g., by means of dreams, active imagination, or free association, to be assimilated into the whole personality.

It is a completely natural process necessary for the integration of the psyche. So, you know, like most things, Jungian, that's a pretty heady description of what something is. Essentially, what it's saying is the concept of the unconscious is there's stuff that is below our threshold of understanding or awareness. We know this for a fact. Sometimes we forget things. Sometimes we remember stuff. We don't consciously process everything we've ever been told, heard, seen. It would be overwhelming, so there's stuff that is below the threshold of our awareness. In Jungian, Jung had a theory, and I believe in this theory, that there was also something called the collective unconscious, and this is kind of like a reservoir where all our collective myths, symbols, archetypes, which are kind of representations of a certain character or energy, maybe as a better word for it, reside.

And these are in our unconscious, stuff we can't consciously be aware of. And in many ways, this stuff dictates and kind of shapes our lives, and we're not totally aware of it. This is also a concept of mindfulness. This is one thing you'll learn while it's not explicitly said. This teaches you all of these things are there, and they can come to the fruition in the top of your mind when there's nothing else going on, like discursive thought. So all this stuff is connected in a very cool way, I think. But this process, this conversation, was primarily about individuation. And I like Steven's definition, which he is.

This is bringing in balance, two things, the inner and the outer, and having that be balanced, and also balancing the light aspects of yourself as well as the shadow aspects of yourself. I've also been reading, so a while ago, a few years ago, I bought on Amazon Cloud Kindle a book. It's the collective works of Swami Vivekananda, who's one of my favorite teachers, one of my favorite orders. This thing, it's like 17,000 pages, is gonna take me like a decade to get through it. But if you don't know Swami Vivekananda, he is of the Ramakrishna lineage, Ramakrishna, one of my favorite mystics, saints, just so fucking cool, that guy.

He worshiped Kali, the female destructor, God often portrayed in very like hideous ways, with like dripping bloods and skulls, but a feminine energy that is nevertheless critically important, that's who Ramakrishna worshiped, and he has a whole lineage of people. Vivekananda was one of his biggest disciples, went on to teach in the early 20th century, like 1900 and even the late 19th century, teach in the West, especially in Boston, and gave these huge discussions about what Hinduism was, what Vedanta was. And the reason I bring this up is, in Advaita Vedanta, which is basically a non-dual, a non-dual conception of the universe and the world, which is a concept, totally in a whole concept, in and of itself, that we're not gonna totally get into.

But in this non-dual Advaita Vedanta, a lot of these concepts line up very much, with Buddhism, which is always something I'm fascinated. How do these, they're regionally located in similar places, India, and the surrounding areas, so that makes sense how they would kind of be related to each other, but this concept of non-dual awareness, or non-duality, is a very interesting subject, which individuation also tackles this balancing of these two. Obviously, we live in a dual world, there's duality everywhere, multiplicity of things going on, that's undeniable, but there's also a theory that this is a non, ultimately a non-dual, it is a one being expressed through many, so the many in the one and the one in the many.

I know it's a little bit heady, but anyway, I think all of this stuff lines up, I'm gonna let Stephen evoke this in a more natural way than me doing it in the intro, I will say this, got a few other things going on, Fitbit people, right? Denise, I know you're listening, Denise hit me up, 'cause you heard me talking about Fitbit, and how I was psychotically running around my house and jogging in the mornings and doing all this stuff. She sent me a message, I had to me, I'm Fitbit, she goes, "Oh, I'm gonna crush you." Just matter of fact, like I'm gonna crush you, I check my leaderboard, Denise, you caught me on a vacation, I put on not a vacation, a travel, I was traveling up and down the East Coast, couldn't get my steps on Amtrak, not gonna be one of those peoples jumping down in the Amtrak train, but I will tell ya, I think you're realizing this week that I am truly an insane person, 'cause that leaderboard, I do believe there has been a switch.

So, anyone who wants to get in a hyper competition, competitive thing with me, add me on Fitbit, find me, I will add you and I will be happy to psychotically jog around my house to get my steps up. So, yeah, thank you, oh, book winner, book winner. You, there was a book winner last week, you have been emailed, you have a copy of Make Me One With Everything by Loma Suryodas, and we're gonna do another bonus thing. I know I said I was gonna do the books only once a month, but I'm changing my mind, gonna do one this week too. This conversation with Stephen also focuses on a book called Demian, Damien, by Hermann Hesse, Hermann Hesse.

And it's a great book and I think it's like $5, so I'm gonna send it out to someone. We're gonna do a random drawing. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you can join the synchronicity community where I send out cool talks, sometimes by Alan Watts, I give out books if you're on the list. You can join there, go to synchpodcast.com, S-Y-N-C, podcast.com, join the community, put your email in, I'll send you a little email every week about some stuff that's going on, nothing annoying, I promise, I hope it won't be. And yeah, you're entered in the book contest, so that's that. Anything else? Thank you to everyone who's rated in reviewing synchronicity, it means so much to me, it really, it really, really, really does.

And I think it also helps. Makes the show look popular, doesn't? And the show is popular. I would like to point that out, like this is a year in. I hold myself to a very high standard, and I'd like to say that if only like a few hundred people or a few thousand people were listening, that would be enough to keep me doing it. And maybe it would be, but the fact that there are so many more people listening really makes it an easy decision to continue with this. And like I said in previous episodes, we're working on stuff with MindPod Network to really create systems that are gonna allow people who do podcasts like this, like this one, other ones like Kelly's Dial of Comedy, Zach Leary, it's all happening, Michael Donovan's Walking Home, you name it, there's so many podcasts on MindPod Network, other places too, that aren't even associated with.

Going on a conversation, gonna have one with Michael from Third Eye Drops, which I just started listening to, he's awesome, you know, Corey, talk Corey Allen. My point is this, we're really working on stuff to make this viable for people who wanna have these conversations and talk about these things and try to provide some type of value into people's lives. That's gonna be meaningful and impactful. So rest assured, that stuff is coming, that is my primary focus at this point. I'm gonna stop rambling, how about that? How about we get to Steven? That is the meat of this episode and I am merely the bread on either side.

So without further ado, here is Steven Cameron. (upbeat music) Thank you, by the way, for coming on. Also, I wanna let you know, a lot of people have provided feedback and writing, have been writing in to say, you know, I'm really looking forward to Steven Cameron coming back on. It was one of my favorite episodes. So, I'm very excited for many reasons to have you back on and it's just nice to be able to catch up 'cause we were just looking for a little bit.

Absolutely.

How you doing?

I'm doing great, we just got back from the timing of this is really good because way back in 2005, Judith and I did a trip to Switzerland to visit the homes and the gray sites and the museums of Carl Jung and Herman Hesse. And last week, we returned to a small town in Switzerland called Montanola. Bear Hess has his museum and where he wrote some of his best work, including the Siddhartha. And so, we were back in his old Haunton. I tracked down the last home he lived in. And so, and I'm reading right now his autobiography.

How cool.

Which I'd always said to myself, I'm not gonna leave, read until I'm actually on my deathbed. I actually, it's so stupid. So now, I'm reading everything but the last chapter. (laughing) I haven't read the whole book. I mean, that's how insane it gets.

I totally can relate to that. I've definitely had experiences where I do a similar type of thing. (laughing)

So nutty, but in going back into that museum and being there and then reading about him, I realized as a young man way back when how important what a mentor he was when I was so personally lost in my own life and to read his autobiography and to read how he suffered and went through his own difficulties. Just remind me what a comfort and a friend he's been throughout the years. And I'm just really glad I renewed that feeling with him. 'Cause you know how it is, you read one or you get a friend and then you forget about them.

That's right.

But he's like a companion for me. He's just someone that I can always turn back to and know that he'll be speaking to me.

I know exactly what we were talking about. I have a similar relationship with Stevie Wonder and his music. It got me through and hit me at a time in my life that was like very tumultuous, emotionally, psychologically, spiritually. And I don't listen to Stevie Wonder every single day. Like I was back then, but then once in a while I'll discover a particular album or a song. And it's like, oh yeah, and it gives you that instant connection that kind of like was your gateway into a certain experience or feeling. So I know exactly what we were talking about with Hess.

Yeah, it's really significant that way. And so today, you know, in kind of preparing but we were gonna talk, I realized kind of condensed down everything about Jung and Hessa that I think is significant in one word and that's really individuation. I think that's the key ingredient, not only for them, but for people like you and myself on our own journey. And I wrote down that, so I'm gonna read this off that individuation, 'cause I think it's really important to understand this is not about individuality. This is called individuation and it's the lifelong process of becoming a complete human being you were born to be.

Right.

Now here's the key, the process of fulfilling potential by integrating opposites into a harmonious whole and thereby fulfilling one's unique being. It's when we suddenly aren't that divided itself. And if you can reach that, it's a lifelong process. It's not a process that happens at 20 or 30. It's a process by which you finally are in a comfort zone with black and white, with the dark and the light.

The good and evil, yeah.

But in the evil that somehow, that it's no longer you have to be blind or you are the other, that somehow you've blended that that is integrated and you've made choices. And the reason that I think Damien is such an important book is because it's a book of individuation, it's a book about individuation. And he wrote it after he had undergone 62 sessions of therapy with Joseph Leing, young in therapy. And suddenly, he said, after doing all this therapy, he said, all I wanna do is write a book with a plot line that leads nowhere but to the self.

Right.

I love that.

It's really great.

Yeah, it's really great. So I taught this book for 10 years. I always say to anyone, in this case today's listing, by Damien, it's a worthy book. And from Damien, every important conversation you can have about your inner end out or life can happen. It's filled with dreams.

Yeah.

It's filled with all the kind of young in terminology from animus and anima to shadow figures to the self, all the kind of key young in terms are played out in this novel.

So let's talk about specifically the anima and the animus because I don't know how familiar every single listener is with those concepts as they pertain to Jungian analysis and psychology and how it fits in. But I do want to say before we get to that, you had me read this book before we spoke the first time and or maybe it was after we spoke the first time but it was one of those times and I read it and I was astounded at how quickly I was reading it but also how it was reading it really was in a lot of ways like reading a dream or experiencing a dream, which to me was, I love whether it's like I mentioned music or literature or art, anything that can kind of put you into that state that dreamlike boundary-dissolving state I'm into and this book in particular, and it's not as fresh in my mind as it was the first time although I did review it a little bit for this before this conversation, it was really, everything you're saying about it is true.

It's short too, so it's not like a huge commitment. It's like 109, 10 pages. So yeah, but let's talk a little bit about the anima and the animus and what those actually mean, yeah.

Yeah, so the actual word of anima means, you know, the actual, it means soul from the Greek and effectively what the anima is in the male, it's the anima and the male is the female and the animus is what is in the female. The anima is that kind of the feminine part of us because here we're back to divide itself. We are male by 51% and then we have another 49, you know, the actual chromosomes are very close. So what happens is if you only have a kind of a male component working for you, that you're not in touch with the female part of you, which is called the anima, which is represented in dreams by female figures and the female figures, by the way, can grow themselves.

They actually have a life unto themselves. As you evolve, the actual anima goes from kind of a very physical kind of a Eve figure to kind of a romantic figure to like a mother figure and finally to kind of the highest expression of a self. So as you grow in your maturity, the anima within you will alter itself. But the bottom line is that by becoming, not becoming aware of it, and I'll give you a good example, when I was teaching at Blair Academy, that there was a young man there, there was a wrestler, and but he wanted to also be in the arts. He wanted to do plays and things like that, but he felt tremendous pressure from the male dominant wrestling group, not to go over to the art side of him, but he said the hell with it, he followed his own path saying, I can be both, I can be a wrestler, and I also can be in touch with the artistic intuitive self, but that took courage for him because at that school, as it is in many places, you're kind of having to be one or the other, if you have too much anima, then you're kind of a feminine, and if you have no anima, then you're kind of locked into just kind of male stereotype.

So why is it important? Because in the individuation process, in integrating yourself, you wanna have access to all parts of yourself, you wanna have access to the full orchestra that is your being, and part of that orchestra is your intuition, your ability to kind of see a feminine view of life, sensitivity, that kind of thing.

Feeling, feeling.

Being much more in touch with feelings, you're not repressed, you're not blocked off, and on the other side, for the females, it's allowing the male component to exist, so they don't have to play out the classic stereotype female role, that they can be aggressive, they can be the smart person in the block, and even the election of which we're going through, that's a very few things right now, because Trump's a great example of a guy deeply not in touch with his anima. (laughing)

You think, I mean, Jesus, right, right, and yet, and I really believe there's bias, whatever Hillary Clinton has done or not done, she's kind of being punished because she has a strong anima.

Well, it's so interesting because, and I also like to look at the election through a lot of different lenses, and whether we can consciously realize that or not, Hillary is representing a huge subset, she's representing for a lot of people, all women, right? This is potentially gonna be the first female president. Her personality, like you said, I mean, she has even spoken about this, and regardless of your politics, I'm not saying this is like an avid defense or supporting plea for Hillary, but she has put up and had to learn how to put up a very stern and unemotional kind of clinical approach to public view, because she has been savagely driving, I mean, I was thinking this, I mean, just to get into this a little bit, the last debate, the second debate, Trump went there and started bringing up all of Bill Clinton's infidelity, and he brought the people in the audience, and I mean, if anyone who's ever had any side of the coin of infidelity, you can, you know how painful and how sore and raw those things can be, let alone if you're a public figure, and he just gleefully went there with like, I was just, I was, you know, she and you saw her reaction, which is relatively unemotional, where inside you know she must be very upset, but like you're saying, she's portraying like a very, she's more balanced with her animus side, if anything, more on that side.

So yeah, I think that is a great way to look at this stuff.

I think it's, and it shows also how difficult it is to integrate these different sides of ourselves.

Right.

You live in a culture that will punish you for that, and certainly women have, and certainly in her case, she is, I totally believe that, I mean, we're a country that X number of years in, 200 some odd years in, we've never had a female, you know, in Europe, no big deal.

Right.

I mean, we've, you know, that's been like, okay, you know, that's part of life, but here it hasn't, which tells you more about just, I believe, the society itself, because remember, this is also a society that has no time for dreams.

That's right.

No time to kind of reflect on your inner growth.

Well, and society and culture also can have anima and animus elements too, right? There's an individuation process collectively as well.

Yes, and we're seeing that struggle have, well, I mean, in Hesse, and Hesse always felt in the end of Danian, he viewed the First World War as an expression of individuation in the sense that the world itself had to reinvent itself. It had grown tired of its own kind of animus mechanisms and needed to be destroyed in order for the possibility of integration to happen, where us and anima live together, are celebrated in one another, going back to my student who took a lot of heat because he went over and did the play because that was looked upon as being a feminine dream. We're not doing, and this is a perfect sample of individuation, he just said, no, no, no, boys and girls.

I'm living my life and I'm gonna honor all the voices in the orchestra that live with me. And what's happening in our society and we're certainly seeing these politics, it's dangerous when we get out of touch of the other component inside ourselves because then you get cut off, and when you get cut off, that's when bad things can happen to people individually and that can happen to us in a worldwide way. And then we can also say, go back, I mean, if you wanna do the political thing and go into the different cultures and go into some of the experience that women have felt in some of the religions, let's say the Muslim religion.

It's been shown that any time you cut out the female component in any religion, you are effectively, will not prosper as a society.

Well, that's a, and I agree with that. And the thing is, is that the dominant religions, the Abrahamic religions, specifically suppressed all of the cults and religions that had the females. And I was, I'm reading an excellent book, I've been reading it for like two years by Joseph Campbell, his posthumously published goddesses book. And it is fascinating to see with like clinical suppression, how the female aspect was just completely either transformed into something subservient or just completely eliminated or denigrated. And I agree with you, and I mean, I think a rebalancing is in order, if not underway, but it also takes conscious awareness of that process too, which is why I think you're hitting on some like, really important stuff with this individuation and balancing, so yeah.

Yeah, so you know, those religions all were invented when the people thought that the world was flat. And if you think of a pregnant person watching a female, a woman who's in like the seventh, eighth month of pregnancy, everything about that pregnancy when you look at it is round.

Yeah.

And when you start looking at the earth as, in terms of roundness and not in terms of linear, it becomes a more feminine understanding of the universe. But the religions were territorial by definition, because thought that, you know, you would just drop off the face of the earth. It was flat, left with the remnants of these incredibly male dominated. And I just find it so interesting that in the psyche, the male psyche, there's gotta be an element that both worships the female and it's absolutely terrified of the power of the female because, you know, that they can do, not only can they do the same brain power, and as a teacher, my best students always, when, you know, when I was teaching 17, 18-year-old kids, my brightest students by far were females.

Hey.

The males can't play that game, they can play the stronger of stronger than you gain. Once you can say, well, they can kind of compete on this level and they can go and have life grow within them.

Right.

Thing, somewhere in the male psyche, I think there's a lot of fear of that it's too much power because I don't understand the repression.

Well, I mean, I think it could also be just, if we look at just the symbols of some of the Eastern religions and philosophies, we can see female deities and goddesses represented in their wrathful aspect and their, you know, divine, heavenly, compassionate aspect. And that is the essence of femininity. And it's typically ascribed, you know, destruction, you know, renewal, what precedes renewal is destruction. And those are both typically feminine qualities. I, you know, not on a personal level, but on a symbolic and kind of like archetypal level. So I think that's probably floating around in the collective unconscious, which people, yeah.

Well, the Hindu, you know, I won't call it religion, but it has a lot of the, what you just described, the powers of the destructive and the positive in their goddesses and so it's pretty, it's pretty, you know, it's pretty rich, I'm actually a lot of that. But in this book, what becomes significant is that in time, the lead character effectively becomes much more intuitive.

Right.

And in touch with that part of themself. And the, when you start doing that, what happens is when you start getting in touch with your anima and you start recognizing the anima in your dream, which often, by the way, services a purpose of connecting you up with other parts of yourself. In other words, the female figure will show up in your dream, whatever, whoever that may be, and they'll leave you somewhere, maybe do a forest or maybe somewhere else, and there you'll meet someone new. And what the female anima figure is doing is effectively trying to nurture and build the connections to the orchestra within you, getting you in connection to the parts of yourself that you're unaware of.

Right, right.

And that figure, that figure in your dream plays that part, which is a vital part because the anima is trying to integrate.

Right.

And, you know, I used to in class, it was very interesting to go around, it's very interesting thing to do, and I'd go around to women and I would say, how strong is your anima's? And it was amazing, it's just class, and this is 17, 18 year olds, but very few ever gave over an eight, most of them were four, five, six, and these were classes, you know, that were boys and girls, and the girls were caught up in that social thing, you know, that if they're too aggressive in class, then they won't look like they're feminine. And the boys, on the other hand, you know, were nervous about showing the female component.

Oh, that's not interesting.

Yeah.

I mean, they look like weak, or they're a feminine, or whatever, the culture has decided that means.

Right, yeah.

So if you watch this character in Damien, he gets to a point where Sinclair, which by the way, if you break that name down, is Sinclair and in French, that's light and dark.

Right.

And that's exactly what Hess is doing, getting back to individuation, remember, it's integrating the opposites.

Well, I think this is, the one thing I did do before this conversation today is I put, you know, I was just skimming the book. I'm a priority Reddit. I kind of knew what was going on, but I was skimming the chapter title specifically, and it starts chapter one with two worlds. And then the chapter title is just progressively get, you kind of more ethereal and symbolic and all the way to the end, you know, I think his Lady Eve is the last chapter. Or no, the beginning of the end is the last chapter. The end begins, that's right.

Yeah, yeah, so I did pay attention to that, but yeah, I continue with where he starts with the book and the shit.

Well, you know, he basically, I mean, the great thing about the Jungian, the Jungians, in order to become individuated, they'll look at the Garden of Eden, actually as a place you don't wanna be in.

Mm-hmm.

The Garden of Eden is kind of this protective environment, and yes, you're in harmony, but in reality, in the individuated world, to become that unique person that all this should strive to be, which is figuring out who and what you are, what you're good at, how do you interact in the world, you have to kind of leave the Garden of Eden. You need to eat the apple, that's not considered negative. So in the beginning of the two realms, he's living the child life. You know, he's the perfect, the parents are there, they're protecting, he's been the good boy, not doing anything rash, he's in the good realm.

Right.

And then what happens is he meets a shadow. A shadow in Jungian terms is some part of yourself that you don't like, and you therefore repress it, and are you projected out onto someone else?

Or some aspect that is morally offensive to you on some level, so that you look at someone who's maybe like a gambler or a thief in this instance, and you say, "Oh, well, I would never do that."

That's it, that's the whole thing behind all this is that we're all vulnerable to our own weaknesses, and in acknowledging those weaknesses is your only kind of path to redemption in a way, so that when the good realm, he's in the good realm, and then he meets Franz Kromer, and who's a shadow figure, it's kind of this nasty part of himself, and he kind of hooks up with this guy, and then he tells a story about stealing apples, which of course is the perfect symbol for the Garden of Eden. And then he suddenly, Kromer starts blackmailing him, and now he finds himself lying to his parents, he finds himself stealing money from his parents, and then Kromer is trying to get him to kind of bring his sister along, so he obviously can do something nefarious with her, and suddenly, all that good realm is gone.

Right, shattered.

The good boy, the good boy is Sinclair, no longer is the good boy, and in the onion world, this is the only potential you have of growth, is the fact that you stop pretending that you're the perfect whatever, and you start acknowledging the other parts of yourself.

So you know what this reminds me of too, is in Buddhist cosmology, and also in Vedanta, so Hinduism as well, there's these six realms, these cyclical realms, and the top one are the devas, the God realm, and this is a realm that's defined by extreme pleasure, harmony, everything is great, everything is wonderful, but it's actually not the most appealing or fortuitous place to be born or live, because you don't have that ability to change, and inevitably, why it's also not a great place to live is everything is impermanent, everything that lives must die, so there is at some point actually a death of that realm, which is can be a very painful experience for a being that is only lived in harmony, so I bring this up because this puts the focal point on a human birth, in this case, in particular, in the stories, Sinclair's, the ability to change and kind of, individuate, basically grow through an experience, so I bring that up because it's very poignant, I think it's something that is found in many, many different religions, philosophies, schools of thought, so yeah.

I think that's, it's good, and in the preface he writes, I want it only to live in accord with the promptings of my true self, what is that so difficult?

And the reason it's difficult is because we live in a world which is bringing cultural pressure on us all the time, explain us, someone's telling you that you should go into banking or you should go into that, you have no risk, but you kind of don't want to let down people, and so you just kind of fall into it, and you don't realize how miserable you are until like 10 years later, when your whole life turns upside down because it didn't work, that the world we live in, it's very hard to just follow your kind of inner world, and the heroes we have are always people, from whether it's literature or history or anything, they're all about individuated people, that's why we read them.

It's the hero's journey, right? I mean, that is another description or way of looking at the process of individuation, if applied to an individual.

Yeah, and the hero's journey is circular, right? You leave home, you have experiences, you take those experiences, and leave them into, you're now your complex personality, and then come home. I've always been in acting and writing and stuff. I literally left Philadelphia 30 years ago or more, and went off to Chicago from the second city, and then from there went to Toronto, and then eventually to LA, and then years later came back to basically my home turf, meaning, I'm in New Jersey, but I'm right next to Philadelphia.

Right.

And I always looked at that as the circle, that all those places I stopped in Chicago, Toronto, and LA were all part of the individuated, and Vermont, I forgot Vermont, Vermont was the first, and by the way, Vermont was really critical, 'cause that's where my animal took over in my life and allowed me to start, gave me permission to try things that I wouldn't have probably done if I'd stayed in a city or got caught up in the kind of business deal or becoming a lawyer. It allowed me to kind of start pursuing the things that were within me.

Right.

And then once I had that, then I was capable of taking that and go to the next journey, which is Chicago, to the next journey, Toronto, and all the time, what you just said is really true. All those moves were based on growing.

Right.

They were all based on expanding.

Right.

And because I don't know about you, but I have nothing good has ever happened to me when I try to stay contracted. (laughing)

Nope.

That's one that my ass gets kicked.

Yeah, it's gonna say not only nothing good, but dad.

Yeah, I mean, it actually gets, like I said, because the game has changed or died. I mean, so when people try to hold on, hold on, and I don't wanna change, and I'm not gonna change, it's not getting better.

Right.

And so--

Well, it's fighting the nature. Like, there's very few things I know for sure about the world and the universe at large. One of them is that it is definitely, everything we experience is a state of impermanence. I don't know, no one has gotten through this thing we call life alive yet that we know about. So, you know, if you're trying to stay in a bubble and live in an idyllic place because it's comfortable or whatever it is, even if it's uncomfortable, you're fighting the natural, you know, what Dallas would call the Dow. You're fighting it. You're not in the flow of it, so, yeah.

That's it. You know, my brother used to say how, my brother Bobby used to say how ludicrous trying to hold on to anything. You're on a planet floating in space going 65,000 miles around a star. And you have no idea how you got here and you're trying to be conservative and safe.

Great, yeah, I totally get it.

I used to say that to me. It's another great thing he used to say to me, and this is when I was really like 2021, he had a profound impact. He used to say, "Follow your fear." And I would go, "Oh, my fear, why?" And he'd say, "Because that's where all your energy is." You know, that you're, what you're trying to be so afraid of. If you move into it, you can take that energy of the fear that's kind of dominating you and turn it into creative energy.

Right.

And it's, you know, there's just a lot of truth in that. And by the way, the other thing I used to teach that in my class, and I miss having that. Damien is, Damien, and not only Damien, but all the people that he meets in the story.

One way, when you're going back to what you said about, you know, it feels dreamlike. And I also, by the way, used to sell my students on the shortness of the book. Because most young people aren't reading. And I would say to them, here's the good news. It's 148 pages, and their blank pages count. Like if a chapter ends, then the next page is blank. You know, that was 148, the blank is 149. So it's not even as long as that. But the really critical thing that all this need, at some different points, and they've definitely been in my life, critical mentors who come along, who are like an anima, lead us to the next kind of place we need to get to, to keep growing.

And some of the saddest lives you can see were lives of phone by the wayside, or when those mentors didn't show up, or you ignored the mentor when they were there. You didn't see that they were there to guide you toward, you know, the light. And, you know, and every day, when I meditate, I think of, and give thanks to those mentors.

Yeah, no, it's super important. And I mean, I will also add to that, like, you know, and anything or anyone can be a mentor. And I think this is critically important because sometimes, you know, someone could be listening and hearing this and be like, well, great. Yeah, but I don't have anyone in my life who has come in and fulfilled this role. But in the same way that you use HES, and the same way I maybe use, you know, artists, or, you know, thinkers, young, of course, is one of them, you can look at their collective kind of body of whatever you want to describe it. Not just their works, but what they stood for.

And that could be something that helps you along the way until maybe there is a physical embodiment of a mentor that can come in and kind of guide you, whether you want to call it a guru or something else. So I point that out because I know a famous saying is, you know, when the guru, when you're ready, the guru will find you. And that's something that really used to piss me off when I didn't have any clear sign that that was going on. Looking back, it wasn't that there weren't people around me or even specific situations that could teach me that, is I wasn't paying attention and my eyes open. I have my head on my ass so I didn't see it.

But I do understand the predicament of feeling like, well, there's not anything around me. No one has come into my life to fill that role. There's little things you can use that are kind of omnipresent, that can serve as little gateways or even lead you to that mentor or mentors. So I think that's important to you.

I think that's very important to say because two of my mentors and people I never met.

Right, there you go.

They were people that when I was as lost as lost could be in Vermont, Hess and Young were literally saviors. And then I met oddly enough, on the yellow pages, thank you very much, a dream therapist in Montpelier named Elizabeth Forsberg. And I kind of went to her randomly and she listened to my tale and I just was kind of saying, I don't know what I'm meant to be doing. I don't know where I am and she looked at me. And with the simple words of saying, there's nothing wrong with you. You've just been with the wrong people. And in that moment, she validated everything in my life, everything changed after that moment.

And that led me to suddenly have confidence that the road I was traveling on was okay. It's okay that I wasn't in business school like all my friends or at Harvard or getting ahead and feeling behind that I'm gonna be taking a separate road. And I always was gonna be taking that road because when my dad died when I was 16 in a car accident, that was the beginning of individuation. Let me tell you, because our family was never gonna be the same. And so on the one hand, it was a horrible event. On the other hand, it was that event that gave me the permission to follow a different route than I might've never done it if everything had stayed the same.

Right.

It's just like even in the worst moments, there may be something teaching or leading us to something else.

I say, I mean, truthfully, I think especially in the worst moments, quote unquote. I mean, that's when those can serve as catalysts or kind of like turbo boost into learning because you're blasted out of this kind of everyday situation whether it's good or bad, but you're thrust into these like other worldly, like what the hell is going on. And that's where I think truthfully, we have a tremendous amount of access to opportunities for growth. I mean, I've seen it time and time again. When I look back, when I was going through very painful experiences, you know, whether they're relationships or whatever it is, those are the junctures and the kind of posts I can look back on were like, oh, my life kind of changed from that point on.

I remember like getting, you know, 'cause when you're, there's this great saying, I've said it on here before, I heard Jack form field quote at once and it's great there. I think it was a rabbi who said it, but he's like, the reason we refer to the heart breaking is because when it breaks, you know, the cracks allow the wisdom and the love in. So that's why we say when the heart breaks open, that's the term we use. And I think that is something that in my experience, like I think it's especially true when the bad shit happens, when the experiences that are traumatic and really not pleasant, those can be tremendous opportunities for growth, for sure.

I think that that's absolute. I just was thinking going back to using the book and the (indistinct) the garden, you know, before my father died, I was in the garden of Eden.

Right, right.

Excuse me, when he, and when he died, I was thrown out of the garden.

Exactly, right.

And at first, that's one of the worst experiences because the alienation and the sense of aloneness and the sense of hopelessness and the sense of that this kind of view of your life going along and where every moment will be kind of gifted and joyous was over.

Right.

And that in the long run, as I was saying before, that's the mystery of everything because that's what gives you the full permission to, I knew at that moment that there was no way that I could ever put the genie back in the box.

Right, right.

And now you're given a kind of weird permission to kind of move in a direction, any direction you need to move in, that's gonna feel, you know, feel not comfortable but feel right. So you kind of have to start listening to your inner life.

That's right.

Now in the book, one of the things how this works, we're just talking about the power of mentors that we never met, like Hess and Young and songwriters, Stevie Wonder.

Yes.

In the book, our hero Sinclair becomes a drunkard. You know, he falls into a negative shadow. That's what the problem is. You know, I used to see this with students. They would fall into bad influence, bad shadows, bad. Parts of, you know, the parts of themselves that are dark would get attracted to people in the outside world that were dark and then they're getting in trouble. Well, in the book, he falls into a drinking companion and this guy alphons back and he's drunkard. He doesn't go to class, he doesn't do anything. And then he suddenly has a vision. He sees this woman and he never talks to her and he calls her Beatrice from the Dante's Inferno and based just on his inner life projecting, in other words, his inner anima projecting under her kind of goodness and following the right path.

He completely changed his being. He stopped drinking. He started getting up in the morning and taking cold baths and showers. He began to draw, he began going to classes. He never met her, she never impact him. And I would even go further if he had, that spell may have been broken. What he was really listening to was the inner anima within him trying to get him to go and move in a positive direction. And once he started listening to her, then the whole game changed because I used to say that in class. A lot of you guys are thinking you're turned on by some girl in class you see and you're all worked up about it and then it doesn't work, something doesn't work out.

Well, you gotta understand that 90% of you are only responding to what your concept of your inner anima is.

Right, you're not turning on to someone you know.

How many 18 year old boys got that?

And by the way, the girls are as bad.

Of course, of course. How many 18 year olds got that? How many did that say?

No, of course, and they would look and I said, you guys see, and here's the thing. If you've been race, you had a horrible mother or you had a terrible father in your own. Guess what, your anima is pretty negative and if you don't pay attention, you'll be seeking out those kinds of women and then you can't figure out why is this always in disaster?

Right.

Because the imprint on your anima is a negative one. And you have to become aware of that negative imprint and choose a positive one like he does, and Claire does with Beatrice, and then you can kind of move toward the light.

Well, yeah, and you're talking about a crucial thing here which is the awareness that that is going on or there's even a mechanism at play that could be kind of promoting certain behaviors or attractions or repulsions even. So I think that is really, really important to touch on 'cause it is, that is the first step, right? Having an awareness that this stuff is even going on, like without that, what are you doing? Unless you're just the most blessed and graceful being, you're not gonna naturally kind of tune into this, I don't think, especially like you said, the cudgel of culture, you know what I mean?

Like there is a whole other thing going on around us that maybe dictates and shapes our perspectives and views. So, yeah.

Yeah, and it definitely, and we live in a, that's my big fiction and moaning about the culture we live in, there's no time. There's no time to explore the inner self. It's such a joke. You're on the planet, ladies and gentlemen, to get consciousness while you're here, to be aware of as much as possible within you and without, is the game of foot. If you're locked into one point of view and that's it. What a, you've put a limit.

You've cut yourself off.

You've cut yourself off, but we live in a culture that is in the cutting off business. We live in a culture that is trying to get you to respond always to the outside, always do everything. And I want to give an example because in this book, as you remember, he becomes a painter.

Yes.

And then he, and he then has a dream and we haven't talked about this, but one of the brilliance of this book is think about it. I'll ask you a question. How do you write a novel about a process that is invisible?

Exactly, I mean, like that is.

Right, I mean, why he is a great thinker, and why I consider, I mean, he comes out of the interview, he comes out of therapy and he says he wants to write a book on individuation, and he goes, but how do I do that when that's all kind of an internal process?

Right.

What he does, and it's one of the really cool things to follow in the book, is he creates the symbol of the bird.

Right, and as you follow the symbol, as the bird evolves in the storyline, then you were realizing on the parallel track, his inner life is evolving.

Right.

So let me show you where that shows up.

Yeah.

And the second, I think the second chapter is called "Came".

Right.

That's where he meets Damien.

Right.

So Damien walks him home from school, and after "Came" outrageous things, like, "Came's a good guy." Like, "Came got screwed over." And Sinclair is in there and goes, "What's he talking about? Murdered his brother."

Like a unanimously bad bird character in the Bible.

You know, and he says, oh, he had the mark of distinction. You know, like he was special. And it really is confusing to him. And of course, what he's talking about special is that these characters, because God didn't really, really punish Cane. You know, like that's his argument. Like, he's really saying that Cane had the kind of nerve to follow, you know, he did what he, he followed his, whether you like it or not, he followed his inner self.

Right.

And so he had the mark of distinction. And they're walking, and he certainly looks up, and he looks at his house at Sinclair's house. He says, "Oh, look at that. Look at that up on the, on the outside of the house." And in it is a kind of a motif of a bird sitting there. And Sinclair goes, "Wow, I never noticed that." And then Sinclair says, "Well, this was, used to be a monastery or home." And of course, at that moment, what Hess is doing is saying that all this individuation journey is ultimately a spiritual journey. So the fact he was in a, in a former monastery is a perfect place for him to be, because what he's gonna undergo is a spiritual transformation.

That's right. So why is this important? He gets to a dream later in the story, where in the dream, he swallows a bird.

Right.

And the bird is inside him, and he's freaking out. And he wakes up. And of course, this is the, Hess taking the bird that was in the first image of the first was outside the house.

Exterior, yeah.

It was exterior. And then in this part, this is when it now begins the process of internalizing individuation and following your feelings, and following your intuition, and following being on the journey. So he swallows it. And what does he do? He wakes up, he notices that the paint's been messed up, and he wraps the painting and sends it to Damien.

Right.

Then I'm sure why he's doing anything.

Right, right.

Well, guess what he's doing? He's following his inner self. He's not following, I mean, you could say, "Well, that's crazy. You're sending it to you. I don't know where he is. How's it gonna get to him? Why would he be interested? You haven't talked to him in a long time." Something said doing it. - He's just doing it, right.

Because he's now got the bird inside him, and he gets back the comment, and watch how this works now, because this is where synchronicity comes into play. Synchronicity being the two events that don't look like they're causal are somehow connected.

Right.

So where does it show up? Now he's in class and he gets a letter, a note from Damien that does the bird fights its way out of the egg, the egg is the world who would be born and must first destroy a world. Well, that's the definition of individuation.

That's right.

Right? So what does he do? He's kind of saying they're dazed, and suddenly he hears the teacher mention the name of Braxis.

Right.

Who's the God of good and evil, the dark and light?

Right.

And he goes, because in that quote from Damien, it goes, you know, the bird fights his way out of the egg age, the world who'd be born again must first fly to God, that God's name is a Braxis.

Right.

Then he hears the teacher hears the name of Braxis.

Right. And I told you what happened when you mentioned, when I was reading the book, and I told you after I read it that I wrote a song, I don't know, a six or seven, maybe eight years ago, and I titled it a Braxis, and I had totally forgotten about it. And then I found it like that week while I was reading the book. It's like, that's really weird.

That's right, right. - Say that.

But I always take those moments as the moments when they're kind of, they're kind of signs that you're doing so.

Validation, that's how I take it, truthfully.

A total validation, right.

I don't even think about it. I don't know if I told you, but this is quite crazy, but this is all in like the kind of stuff he did, because remember the next thing he does is he's walking the streets, lost his loss could be, and he hears music.

That's right.

That draws him, and he sits on the curb and listens to this organist. You don't know who the hell he is. And I always would say to my students to say, how many of you if we were walking in New York City and we were going to go to the Natural Museum or go one of the great museum, and we're walking, and you suddenly heard music and you'd go, sorry, Mr. Cameron, I got to go follow that music, right? So this is what he does. He listens to music, then he follows the guy that put this Pistorius, who by the way, is named Pistorius, but in real life was really his therapist, Joseph Lang. So he follows Pistorius to a bar, has the nerve to go up to Pistorius and sits down and says, totally from intuition, have you ever heard of a god name of Braxis?

Mm-hmm.

Because he connected the sound of that music.

With the, yes.

With the kind of inner, individuated path, and something intuitive said, because he's now in touch with the anima and everything in him, that this guy knew something, and then that became his new mentor. And they even showed that in another sign of the bird, because when they're together up in Pistorius' apartment, the fire, he makes a fire, and in the fire, you can see the bird image.

That's right.

So it's validation. So here comes the symbol leading us to the new journey. How did he find it? Did he get it, because he checked in with a, you know, he went to a college counselor's next move. Did he check in with parents? No, he listened to something that drew him to the music, to draw him to the man, and now you are following the inner world. And I wanna, 'cause I think it's worthy, I probably told the story, but it's in the other one, but I think it's worthy because when I had that experience with a therapist, Elizabeth Forsberg, who then did dream therapy for a year, I started to, I was kind of like him, I was kind of just lost, but I kind of was listening more to my inner self.

And I would drive from Burlington, Vermont to Montpelier once a week for this dream therapy, and I passed this great mountain camel's hump. And somewhere in my stupid brain, I got it in my head that if I could climb that mountain by myself in the middle of the winter, everything would be okay. And I kept thinking about it, and then you know how you do that, "Oh, I can't really do that, I'm not gonna do it." Crazy, I'll die up on the mountain, I'm not gonna do it. And then finally, I said one day, "I'm gonna do it." Yeah, this is important to say, because when I do dream work with people, I never, it's fine to have your dream, and you can intellectualize your dream.

Right.

The first thing that's really interesting is when you start putting your dream into action.

That's right.

So like, if you dream of a friend that you haven't seen for a long time and something bad happened to him, pick up the damn phone or email or text him or do whatever, and just don't say you dreamt about him.

Right.

How are you? I haven't spoken to you in a long time. How are things going? Maybe it's a call-out.

Right.

And you know what that means by picking up the phone or texting, it means you're now living the truth of the dream. You're not denying the validity in your inner life. You're thinking, this could be, and if it's not good, but at least I checked it out.

Well, this, yes, totally, totally.

All right, so should I continue this?

Yes, yes, continue, continue.

So I gathered some little symbols from my son and who was to be my ex-wife and myself 'cause I was going through a personal bedtime and I put them in a knapsack and put something together and on a January morning, I got up and drove to the mountain and started to go up and I noticed a little cabin to my right and I thought, you know, I'm gonna check in with these people. So I walked on the door and the man had emphysema and the wife were there and they're very kind. I said, look, I'm going up the mountain, but I'm not down by three. I'm up on the mountain, you know? I'm gonna make a square and they were like, okay, fine.

They gave me a trail book and he gave me some snow shoes that, you know, so, you know, what do you think of? Snow, you know, yeah, snow shoes. And I said, off I go. Well, the last 300, 100 yards of the mountain, it's all bare, there's no trees and it was a 50 mile an hour wind and I was crawling. And by the time I got to the top, I stood and I just screamed to the gods, like, you know, I made it. And I swear to God to tell you, is idiotic as this tale was at the time, it was totally validating and I came down the mountain, I just flew down the mountain, stopped at their cabin and said to him, I'm fine, had tea with them and then every, once every season, this mountain became sacred, I would always climb it and I would always stop and see them.

All right, now, this is what I'm talking about. I'm in Vermont, I have no profession, I have no idea that I have no interest in doing acting, I'm not doing any of that stuff, I'm not doing any of it. Flash forward in my life to 10 years later and I'm on a set in Los Angeles and I'm an actor on a TV show called Newhart. And the show is set in Vermont and I'm about to do a scene with Bob Newhart and where he's talking to someone then he comes over to the table and he and I say a few words and the prop master brought me the Burlington Free Press to have, you know, like--

Right, props.

And one that's real, you know, that kind of thing. And then the director's screams action. So this is now on camera live. Bob starts talking to the other actor and I start reading the, pretend to read the paper and I turn to the back and there's the obituary of the man that I stopped and got the snow shoes from and who I always stopped every time I did the mountain. I read about him dying while shooting the scene in LA on a show set in Vermont.

Right.

And I totally believe that because that crazy idea of climbing that mountain led to everything.

Right.

And in the story in Damien, that's who he becomes. He becomes a person following the inner voice, not the outer voice. And you know this because that's why we're talking. That's why we're connected.

That's right.

When you start following the inner voice and trust it and don't kind of deny it and put it away, miraculous, synchronicistic things begin to unfold in your life.

That's right. That's, I mean, that's the essence of, you know, and I told you about the book and I don't expect anyone to finish it any time soon, but psyche and matter, that's why that book meant so much to me is because this has been a premise, something I've noticed throughout my life and has been validated in a variety of synchronicities and just reading and talking to people, but that changing the inner promotes change in the outer. And take that to mean whatever you wanted to mean, but that is something that at this point, it is something that I know to be true, you know? It's not something I would even say I think to be true.

It's like I know that to be the case. And you could make that as esoteric or as plain as it needs to be, but I also am of the belief that you climbing the mountain symbolically, you know, effected the outside reality of your world and the world at large. So I'm totally with you on that. I love that story, by the way.

Well, you know, because really, the climbing the mountain had no, it had no meaning to anyone but me.

Right.

It had no, it had no, it was an inner prompting.

Right.

It was an inner prompting. And by the way, I am reading Psyche and Matter. And, you know, that's no, that is not a small-minded thing. (laughing) If I can do a page and a half,

Right.

A, that is like, and it all is completely interesting, totally amazing stuff. And I totally am into it, but it's not like, you can read Damien in, you know, really two days.

Yeah, day or two days, easy. You know, Psyche and Matter took me, I think, three years to read.

I think I'm on that track.

Yeah. (laughing)

It's definitely.

But who cares? But you see, but there's an example, because I know you're on the path and you know I'm on the path, both of us immediately ordered books that the other person was reading.

Right.

Because we know that we trusted, if they're on it and they're responding, then it's probably gonna be something that somewhere in there will be something that's relevant to my life.

It's true.

And I'll say this, like, that is the reason that I got a book and that's a reason. I'm generally very accepting and open-minded of other people's suggestions and ideas. There is something that kind of tunes me into, oh, well, this person really has something valuable to communicate, but I will say this, even if you're not naturally like that or you're not at the point where you're just like, even hearing the inner voice or let alone listening to it, you can kind of mechanically go through these motions as well and you can be a mace. It's kind of like the fake it 'til you make it thing. That still works.

It's not like you have to always do these things with 100% authenticity, it's just tweaking. This is, I'm not a huge chaos magic fan, but I just 'cause I don't know a lot about it, but I know in chaos magic and kind of like magic in general with a K there, you know, you do these kind of rituals that are supposed to promote change in external reality. And whether you believe it or not, I mean, I had a friend who did this and I don't think he was doing it with the utmost sincerity like he really believed it was gonna happen, but then all this crazy shit started happening in his life and he's like, I'm kind of freaked out.

I'm like, yeah, this stuff can still work whether you believe it or not. It's kind of independent. Although I will say there is something to be said for when you really are tuned in to that inner voice, whatever you wanna call it, the self, your conscience, you know, their Buddha nature, whatever it is, you can really make some powerful connections and relationships, which I find to be the glue that kind of like reinforces and hold all these things together because let's be honest, these conversations, I have them relatively frequently in my life and because of this podcast, but I'm a regular person too.

I have oscillations of not being talking about these things where I have to do regularly quote unquote mundane things and forget about them. So I think this is where the concept of community and this is something that clearly comes out in Demian. His community and relationship, St. Clair's with Demian is kind of, and the mentors throughout the book is what slowly allows him to kind of go through this process throughout the book. So I wanted to touch on that too.

Well, I think it's, you know, I'm back. You know, I mean, it's just so many things you just touched upon and I realized that what I'd said before about the therapist said, there's nothing wrong with you. You've just been with the wrong people.

Right.

What she was really saying was you need to be around other people that have the bulk of distinction and are trying to be individuated.

That's right.

That's all that it is. And when we speak like we are now, or hopefully to your audience members and stuff, there, you know, many of them are out there on that path themselves.

Right.

And, you know, these are the people that interest me the most, you know, that they're, because, and they were the most interesting students for me, the ones that didn't fit into the prescribed formula for happiness.

Right.

But we're trying to seek their own kind of voice and seek their own way. And those are the people that, you know, takes great, it takes great courage to kind of follow your own number. In the book, by the way, what's so interesting is that, and it goes full circle, he ends up looking for Eva, Damon's mother, and it actually ends up in a city and of course runs into Damon, which is no surprise in the city, 'cause he's hunting for his mother. So as soon as you real want, you know, that's a big point of the story. As soon as, you know, not what you want, like I want a new, I want a new car, or I want a new house, or I want a new whatever, when you have a true want that is deep and real and soulful, and you follow it, it's gonna, something's gonna happen.

Right.

And it's on that path, and then he ran Damon, the name is invited out to the house, and guess what? There was his painting, (laughs) the painting that he had sent years ago to Damon. Now, where was it? It was inside the house. Remember, let's go back to the symbol in the beginning, was a monastery, and the symbol was outside.

Right.

It was frozen. Now he walks in, and where is it? It's not just on the wall, it's on the mantle, in the living room, it's in a place of distinction, and all symbolizing that you've come home to your psychological home.

Right.

Yeah, we're all born into these different realities, these different homes with brothers and sisters, or not brothers and sisters, and those and fathers, we may adore and love, or we may not adore and love, and part of the individuation is to find your true psychological home.

Right.

And when he arrives in that house, he psychologically is done, he's home.

Right, right.

And I always thought that was, and there was one more symbol of the bird, and my students, my class used to always get this wrong. He, the first world war is coming. Has to rock this right after the war. And then let me just say one more thing about that.

Sure, sure.

Has, in order to invent himself, Has was a successful, he wrote a book on Peter Camuson back in 1905, and he started making money. He started being successful, and then he wondered when this analysis, and everything that he had felt going on in his life suddenly had a framework that he could understand all these internal turmoil. And he said, "I want to write about individuation. "I want to write about a path that leads to itself, "but I can't do it as Herman Hessel, "because they all want it."

Right.

It's like in the movie business, you know, I was writing comedy.

Right.

I wanted to see a non-comedy for me.

Right.

Right, because then that's not who we're hiring. We're hiring you because you do comedy.

Right.

And as you broke it. So he goes, "I want to write this book." So what did he do? He reinvented his name to a male Sinclair.

Right.

And reinvented himself. By the way, this book, post-Second World War, first World War, was the most popular book among youth, to Europe, and no one knew who wrote it for a period of time, because Has himself was undergoing individuation, and he was smart enough to know that he put his old name on it.

Right.

It's like musical performers who try to break free and do something different, get criticized, because, you know--

Without a doubt.

Yes.

Right, we know that game, and it's the same in movies, it's the same everywhere. So I just want to appreciate that Has understood that in order to reinvent himself, he'd have to use the pseudonym. So he did, and then, you know, he was found out, but then he didn't care, and then he went on to do his thing. There was a point that was going to make, but no, I can't remember. (laughing) But I do think that even no matter where you are in your life, whether you're a young person, like the students I taught, or you're older, or you're my age, you're still having to make these choices. You're still having to take risk.

You're still, there's no safe ground.

That's right.

That's right?

Right?

Well, there's a Chogem Trunkba quote that is, "The bad news is you're falling through the air "with no parachute, nothing to save you. "The good news is there's no ground." (laughing) So that is pretty much, I think, an accurate description of what we all go through at a various time, so.

Sorry, I just remembered what it was. At the end of the story, the First World War is coming, and he sees up in the sky this great gathering of clouds in the form of a powerful hawk. And my students always thought, well, I guess that's an air symbol of his inner life where a symbol, and they were right on this, that he was probably, it was a symbol that he was gonna be involved in the war, which he was, became a soldier, and got wounded. But the real other meaning of seeing that hawk in the sky, what Hesse was trying to say was not only, or each of us undergoing individuation, the world is undergoing.

Right.

Individuation, the world has to destroy itself in order for newness and freshness and new growth to happen. So that symbol of the sky was, it's not just about our little small lives, but we are, it's about the universe, the world we're living in, she has to shed that. And it does, remember at the end, and I love this ending, 'cause at the end, both he and Damien are injured, and Damien gives him that speech, and he says to him, you know, for now on, you won't be seeing me anymore. He said, I will have to go away, perhaps you'll need me again sometime against Chroma, or something, if you call me, then I won't come crudely on horseback, or by train.

You'll have to listen within yourself, and you will notice that I am within you. Do you understand? And then he wakes up the next day, and Damien is gone, and in the last paragraph, he goes, dressing the wound heard, everything that has happened to me since it's heard, but sometimes when I find the key, and climb deep into myself, where the images of fate lies a slumber in the dark mirror, I need only bend over that dark mirror to behold my image, now completely resembling him, my brother, my master. So that ultimately, Damien, the whole time, if you take this novel, you can read it for what it is, or you can realize that every single figure in this novel is an inner figure in his own life.

He's either an anima, a shadow, or in this case, and Damien, the ultimate self, that it's the self inside us that's overlooking us. And in the end of the story, he now has taken the outer and fully internalized it. So I used to say to my students, what was the next move? If you were to write the next chapter of this, what would it be? But because it's gonna be, whatever it's gonna be, it's gonna be completely, you know, most of them would say he's gonna turn into a writer, or you'll be an artist. And I went, that's probably right, you know. But either way, he now is fully individuated in the sense that all choices will only be following the inner path.

Right, that's the goal. I mean, that's the real goal. This is something I think the first notion or idea I ever had of individuation before I read about it was, and this is a different interpretation of it, but a similar thing was Maslow's self-actualization. And I always thought, I was like, you know what, that's such an interesting concept. I was like AP Psychology in high school. And I was like, this is describing something which I feel intuitively is the aim of everyone and collectively as well. And individuation is a maybe more detailed explanation and an explanation of what that process is.

And that's why I think it's really important. My only hope is that in order for the world to individuate, we don't have to elect Donald Trump. So, but I'm thinking that's probably not gonna be the case. So we're a little bit safe, at least for four more years.

It's really scary though, because he, and this isn't really political, I mean, it's psychological.

He himself is so profoundly caught, not in the self, but he's caught in the narcissistic ego self, and he's, everything we've been discussing today is about a man cut off from that part of him that would allow him to be truly compassionate, and truly caring and understanding that to be an empathetic figure, that you can't just live in the ego. And it scares me, and I've never really been frayed in politics before, because I think it's so cut off. It's so not integrated, he's not, that it scares me what that would imply or what that behavior would lead to in terms of the world and leading the world and the dangers that are already in the world.

And how did we arrive at this point that this is okay, this is okay?

Well, you know what, I unfortunately, I think I feel like I see the conditions that brought this about. Donald Trump, the best way I would describe him is that part of yourself, that when someone says something to you that you don't like, or you get upset, or you get angry, or you get mad, that is what he is embodying as a physical person. That is his reaction to every insult, to every jab, to every perceived slight, and what he's really tapping into which is very scary, and this is brought about by a lot of things, there has to be conditions to create this, he's tapping into people's fear and their rage and their anger, and just all of those things that the ego is so adept at using for survival, let's not totally bash the ego just into oblivion, we need it to survive in certain situations, but when it becomes overblown and begins to think that it is the ruler, creator, and master of everything around him, I mean, my favorite, I think the thing that highlights this the most is Donald Trump was asked a question about God, and I was like, do you believe in God?

And if you read his answer, it is borderline schizophrenic. I mean, he morphs from the question of being, does he believe into God, into saying how kind of he's God, into how all the best decisions he's made? It's like very, very weird. And I think those conditions are created by a lot of different things, but the easiest way to say it, I think, is that it's still easy to tap into people's fears. The world isn't a perfect place in terms of everything being in harmony and everyone prospering. We're clearly at the brink or within the transition period of people realizing that the systems that we've created globally, locally, and nationally are not maybe working the way we've been told they should work, and that creates a tremendous amount of unease, and there's always room in unease for someone like Donald Trump to go in.

I mean, we see this with authoritarian leaders since the beginning of recorded time. So, I mean, it's not good that in the United States, a country that prides itself on freedom and justice and all of these things that this happens, but it's not totally unsurprising. I mean, I think we saw Donald Trump emerge at the same time where nationally and politically, we're seeing the underbelly of racism being exposed for what's always been there. You know, a lot of people, especially white people, even myself included, either don't think about racism in this country because it doesn't affect us as personally unless we have friends who have to go through it, and now it's being exposed.

So, I think we're seeing kind of all the dark shadow aspects manifest clearly in front of our faces. Exactly, exactly. It's a cultural shadow, but that's right. The destruction of life, and this is true about shadows, I mean, Hitler was a shadow. And he projected his own hatred, his own racism, all that, his own crap that's within him that he didn't deal with. He put that on the Jews, and that's what is dangerous about cultural shadows. He is a shadow of who we are. And the fact is the other, if you listen, I watch the debates and the new stuff, all based on a man that is so out of touch with his own anima, with his being.

So, I watch him in terms of what he says, in terms of projections of his own, of himself. The other day, when he said to Hillary Clinton in the second debate, you have so much hatred. Yes. And I thought he has no understanding of his own inner, what he just revealed. It's just that he is just filled with this man, with everything in the world, and the Trump name, everywhere, and all the planes, and everything. As David Brooks pointed out in an article. Yes, I read that. And really, is a small man. Yes, a lone in a lot of ways. A lone, because, well, that's the fate of the ego. I mean, the whole story of individuation, by the way.

The whole story of Dame, the name of the book is Damien. It's not A. Meals Sinclair. Damien is the self. When we serve the ego and the narcissistic things within ourselves, which I completely, you have to own. Like, you're on this path, you can't just look at Donald. Hasn't been on that bus. Said some sort of male comment, whether they're doing, not necessarily that. But most people I know, when they say crap, like they say crap, and you have to own, it's not, you're not the pure choir boy. You have to own your own crap. The difference is, you don't act on that crap. Right. So you don't say that crap is entitled.

Well, Trump, because he has no interconnection to anything, is only listening to whatever he wants and whatever he likes. And the self is invisible. The self is what each of us, in theory, should be serving. So when you walk down the street, and you see a piece of something to pick up and throw away, you don't say, well, I didn't throw it, you can say, oh, that you realize that everything, if you start serving the higher voice, the Damien within you, and you start making that the master, that's in time, the possibility of the kind of behavior that Trump has will not be able to, impossible to happen.

But if we're going to be in an ego-centric, narcissistic culture, it's all about me, my phone, my life, my text, my everything, then you're in danger of the self completely going invisible. And right now, this is why this conversation, these kinds of conversations are actually important because I've never, in my life, long life, this is the most dangerous time I've seen where the self is being, almost being annihilated in, or trying to be annihilated by the ego. It's culturally, I agree. I think that that is a predominant theme that has kind of been going on for a while. Luckily, I will say that there's as much, not as much, but there are more than ever people aware of these themes and kind of this stuff that's going on and having these types of conversations.

So that's an encouraging sign for me. I also, I mean, to be clear, we'll see what happens after November 8th. The tea leaves are pointing to Donald Trump, you know, losing potentially in a landslide because I think for as much as the brash, you know, and Braggadashio of Donald Trump is appealing to some people. And let's be clear, you know, so I watched a very interesting thing today, like an hour or two ago about this West Virginia town that is a coal town. And coal is not something people are doing anymore. It's not, it's especially not good for the environment, but this is an economy that was dependent on it.

And no one cares about the, people aren't campaigning in this world town in West Virginia, but what Donald Trump is doing when he gets any place close to a coal town, he's saying, I'll bring jobs back. I'm the best at bringing jobs back. You're gonna have jobs down. So I think what's really important when you're talking about the ego part of this is having the ability to see that this is a person or a soul or a group of people who are having trouble and not completely just ruling them off as just these monstrous, horrible people, but identifying them that they're an ego out of control and trying to realize that, like you said, this is, you touched on something I think is so important and so many people, so many people miss this.

And when Donald Trump did this tax thing, this whole tax right off, I completely agree with the sentiment that someone who is campaigning to run president and pointing out how he's gonna bring jobs back and everything and he's gonna help the economy. When he doesn't pay taxes, you have a big hypocrisy situation going on. That being said, I know a lot of people who purposely and all spectrums of financial success or not success try to make sure that they don't pay a high level of taxes. So if you're one of those people who's trying to do that and you're also just completely so rageful and wrathful at Donald Trump, you're missing there.

There's a schism and there's a cognitive dissonance that's important to pay attention to instead of just ruling off because I think the most dangerous thing with Donald Trump that I've seen outside of his rhetoric and his horrible racism and xenophobia is what he is able to create and people who disagree with him or see what he's doing. He evokes the same type of rage and hatred and dismissiveness and it's this really, it's like a catch 22. So that's why when we talk about things like individuation, being able to take a step back from this and look at it through different lenses and try to be aware of what comes up in yourself as an individual, that ultimately becomes the medicine and the catalyst for actually changing all of this stuff in the world.

And I think that's an important thing to kind of touch on.

And it's interesting if you just approach it from what our conversation has been.

Yes.

His inner, because he's cut off from his own anima.

Right.

His own anima is projecting out onto the world, you know, this kind of, he wants to do an image that no one loves women more, right? And of course what it is, he's completely objectified women because in reality in his own inner world, he has no connection to that female principle 'cause if he did, it would be impossible for him to do the allegations that he's been accused of. He would even be fighting it, but if you're cut off from your anima and then you're gonna be in the business of objectifying the female people outside of you, not realizing you're just projecting your lack of a relationship of your inner life.

Right.

And that's what's going, what's actually going on is that and even as the guy that wrote the art of the deal, every time he talks about it, he talks about him in psychological terms.

That's right.

He doesn't talk about, you know, this and that. He talks about the fact that this character is really, he's like Kroger in the story. He's a bully and he's a bully because he's in total connected, he's not connected to the full orchestra within him. He's not, remember, individuation is to make you the complete self.

So when you have a 70 year old man that is cut off from 47 or 8% of himself, then he's gonna be, it's all gonna be dominated by the kind of male, the male.

That's like a caricature. And that's-

The wonderful line, David Brooks on it in his book, The Road to Character, which is a fabulous book. And he said to in a resume life, which is what Trump is, you achieve success by winning victories over others. In a eulogy life, you build character by winning victories over weaknesses in yourself.

That's awesome.

And that an awesome quote. And the truth is, Trump is a resume life. It's about, and I responded that 'cause I'm extremely competitive.

So am I.

But listen, that's part of the deal. When you watch him, it's not to just project and say, oh, he's evil, it's to recognize the crap that was within your own self.

That's like-

Like what happened to a male, he was the little golden boy at home putting on his little galashes and going down one day, he hooked up with a shadow figure chromer. And the next minute, he's stealing, cheating, flying, doing everything. That's us.

Yep, it is.

It doesn't take much. I mean, everyone has to get off their high horse and recognize the danger of not being connected to their life.

That's right. And I think that's the ultimate message. And I think we get these hyperbolic kind of characters because they're opportunities to learn about ourselves. Okay, Stephen, I'm wrapping it up here. I have three questions that I didn't get to ask you because I started these questions after the first episode. So there are three rapid fire questions. First one, what's your favorite color?

Green.

Cool. What's your favorite number?

Nine.

What's your favorite animal?

Hawk.

Awesome. All right, we are done.

How's it making sure?

Bad eagle.

Okay, I like that even better. Awesome.

Stephen.

Yeah.

Thank you so much for coming on again. We're obviously gonna do a part three. I would like to just continue this for as long as people are listening, which should hopefully be for a long time. Thank you so much for coming on again.

Thanks Noah. I always enjoy it because it's a true conversation with you.

Cool.

Thank you very much.

All right, we'll talk soon.

Talk to you soon.

All right, bye bye. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)

Pretty good episode. I thought Stephen, my favorite. I think if you've caught on at this point, I always kind of say pretty good episode, good episode to myself, I guess, after it's there. But I really, what I am referencing is the guest. Really good guest, right? I mean, this is why I've had him on twice. Love Stephen. I'm sure he'll be on again. We never have a shortage of things to talk about. So thank you everyone. Really, truthfully, it means so much that it's been a year and this thing is still going strong. Great review on iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever else, you can great and review these types of things.

And then also thank you to everyone who's donated. If you'd like to make a donation, sinkpodcast.com, there's the menu, it says donate, feel free. It helps, it really does. But without further ado, what have we got going on? Am I gonna say goodbye now? We have some other really cool guests coming up, but I'm not gonna talk about them right now. So officially, thank you. Goodbye, and I'll see you next week. I hope you have a new movie. Talk to you every time, but then I'll laugh, I'll laugh.

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