W O R D W O R K

Wordwork is a method of revealing the deep psyche hidden in words and images. From time to time, I’ll post an example to illustrate how to make use of this method. For more details, consult my paper, “Words as Eggs,” in my book, Words as Eggs: Psyche in Language and Clinic.

consider

The first step is to find the word in the dictionary. For wordwork, I suggest The American Heritage Dictionary. Here is what you will find:

con?sid?er (k?n-sid’?r) v. -ered, -er?ing, -ers—tr. 1. To think carefully about. 2. To think or deem to be, regard as. See Usage Note at as¹. 3. To form an opinion about; judge: considers waste to be criminal. 4. To take into account; bear in mind. 5. To show consideration for; considered the feelings of others. 6. To esteem; regard. 7. To look at thoughtfully. — intr. To think carefully; reflect. [ME consideren < OFr. < Lat. considerare : com-, com + s?dus, s?der-, star.]

The initial entry will show the word in bold and separated into syllables. Here you can see that “consider” is a three-syllable word. Next comes the phonetic spelling showing how the word is pronounced. Then the part of speech is indicated; in this case, consider is a verb. There follow different grammatical forms of consider. The entry then tells us this is a transitive verb, meaning that it requires an object to be acted on, to make sense. Then there will be a number of entries showing what the word means. Most dictionaries will list these meanings historically (with current-meaning first) or in terms of commonality (the most common-meaning first). If the verb can also be used intransitively (as a stand-alone word not requiring an object to make sense), this will be indicated.

So far, while some of this may be useful in various ways, none of it has any impact emotionally, psychologically, or imaginatively. All necessary, of course, and not to be ignored, but essentially utilitarian and rather boring.

But now something interesting begins to happen as the dictionary shows us the origin and history of the word. We rarely think about the origin of a word, but every word in every language was born at some point in time and somewhere in the world. And every word that has been born has a history, a story to tell. This birth and story of a word is referred to generally as a word’s etymology. You will recognize the “-logy” of this word, which means “speech.” The component “etym-, refers to “truth.” So, etymology literally means “truth speaking.” Notice that the dictionary “brackets” the etymology. It’s the last entry. Some dictionaries omit this altogether. But this is where the gold is.

Current meaning and definition are too often only the shell of a word. We use words but do not know their soul—or even care; we are all word abusers. Anything that will help free us from the prison of current meaning, the literalness and speed of the present, will help us to free Psyche from her prison shell. Words take on life, induce images, excite the imagination, begin to weave textures with one another, and tell whole stories, if we but scratch the surface of the word.

The sider part of this word is the root-word for star—the same etymon we see in such words as sidereal, meaning “in reference to star time,” and siderite, the iron from meteorites—that is, “what falls to earth from the stars.” In earlier times, a sidus was one who observed the stars. That required care and time—one could not hurry the heavens. And in watching the stars in this slow and attentive way, the psyche was stirred, began to move, and projected itself into the starry lights. In such careful looking, the psyche began to see itself, and man perceived the relationship between himself and the stars. In such con-sideration, being with the stars, the psyche gave birth to astrology.

In these days of instant, this sense of “consider” has been lost.

So, paying attention to the word’s birth and its developmental history is one effective waay of slowing down. And by slowing down, we become psychically prepared to experience the “shock” of what is revealed, that what is hidden in the birth and history of “consider” is the image of “star.” Now this revelation can set the imagination in motion.

Even more. Sometimes, the dictionary will follow the origin-story further back, to the primitive Indo-European roots. In this case, the I-E root for “consider” is sweide¹. This root means “to shine,” and “to consult the stars.” A further development is the word “desiderate,” which originally meant “to hope from the stars,” but in modern time has given rise to our word for “desire.” Neither of these images (star, desire) is available to us unless we do this sort of word work.

In future posts, I’ll illustrate more fully how wordwork can lead one into unexpected places in working on a dream. In the meantime, keep in mind what Emerson said: “Every word was once a poem.”

Recommendation for Lily Iona MacKenzie’s Dreaming Myself Into Old Age: One Woman’s Search for Meaning

Old age is an opportunity to experience our own deepest mystery. Life’s distractions preclude tending to this mystery before the prospect of death begins to close all the curtains to the outside world. Mystery literally means “seeing with the eyes closed.” We do this when we sleep, and then we see dreams. Dreams, like our DNA, are unique to us. Truth be known, our dreams are an invitation to explore our uniqueness and become an extraordinary resource for us as we confront the reality and inevitability of death. We do know that every dream is a story—a mystery—but most people have little or no connection to this reality. This is why it is important for something or someone to point us in the direction of our own unique path—a direction that becomes crucial as death approaches. We don’t need instruction. We don’t need lectures. We don’t need admonitions or dogma. What we need are stories that strike us to the core, stories that can open us up to the most important pathway we will ever experience. What can help is to hear stories of someone who has struggled with the same things we struggle with in old age and as death begins to call our name. An exquisite example is Lilly Iona MacKensie’s book, Dreaming Myself into Old Age: One Woman’s Search for Meaning. What I find most compelling about this work is she speaks not with an impersonal, distant voice, but with full-throated revelations of her personal struggles, an inside view that invites connection, that opens one up to her stories, her dreams, her art, in such a way that it becomes a genuine companion to one’s own struggles with old age, dying and death. Read this book now. You will be glad you did.

Russell A. Lockhart, Ph.D.

Author of The Final Interlude: Advancing Age and Life’s End (with Lee Roloff), Psyche Speaks, Words As Eggs

Douglas Thomas: The Deep Psychology of BDSM and Kink: Jungian and Archetypal Perspectives on the Soul’s Transgressive Necessities. London: Rutledge, 2024.

I was asked some years ago if I could capture the essence of Jung’s psychology in a phrase. My mind went blank and time seemed to drag out. But then it came: everything belongs. There is nothing in human experience or in human behavior that is not the proper purview for reflection through the Jungian lens. Douglas Thomas’ book, The Deep Psychology of BDSM and Kink: Jungian and Archetypal Perspectives on the Soul’s Transgressive Necessities, is an exquisite example of this belongingness of what most might generally feel should be left to the nether regions of human behavior. Yet, what Doug makes abundantly clear is that the human soul seeks expression, relationship and incarnation in even the most hellish of forms, even those where human evil is at the very edge. In looking at what some may consider forbidden topics. Doug has done a deep service not only to depth psychology by bringing these topics out of the closet and into full light of day, but also to those members of the BDSM and kink communities, enabling them to find soulful meaning in their activities, so rejected by the general collective. Practitioners of depth psychology, as well as practitioners of erotic choices far outside what is considered “normal,” will benefit from a close reading of Doug’s magnificent offering. It is indeed a gift.

Russell Lockhart, author:
Words as Eggs: Psyche in Language and Clinic,
Psyche Speaks: A Jungian Approach to Self and World

The Church of Cracks

Beyond the clutch of reason
Lies the Church of Cracks
Parishioners seeking cracks
Or make them here and there
Desperately cracking everything
For the crack that will let the light in
Alas, only darkness seeps in
Until it becomes a the final flood

From Dreamwork Poems
August 2023

Friday, July 14, 2023

Google announced some new features in Bard, so I decided to ask it to write someething about my book, Psyche Speaks. Here is what AI has to say. What do you think of this?

Write about the book Psyche Speaks

Sure, here is some information about the book Psyche Speaks:
Title: Psyche Speaks: A Jungian Approach to Self and World
Author: Russell Arthur Lockhart
Publication date: 1982
Publisher: Chiron Publications
Psyche Speaks is a book about the importance of nurturing the soul in our everyday lives. The author, Russell Arthur Lockhart, draws on his own experiences as well as Jungian psychology to explore the ways in which we can connect with our inner selves and develop a more meaningful existence.
The book is divided into three parts. The first part, "The Dream," tells the story of Lockhart's dream that inspired him to write the book. In the dream, he hears the words "where madness is psyche's only nurse." This phrase haunts him, and he begins to explore its meaning in the context of his own life and the world around him.
The second part of the book, "The Poem," is a collection of poems that Lockhart wrote in response to his dream. These poems explore the themes of madness, psyche, and the search for meaning.
The third part of the book, "The Market Street," is a series of essays that apply Jungian psychology to everyday life. Lockhart discusses topics such as the shadow, the anima, and the Self. He also offers practical advice on how to connect with our inner selves and live more meaningful lives.
Psyche Speaks is a thought-provoking and inspiring book that offers a new way of understanding the soul. Lockhart's writing is clear and engaging, and his insights are both challenging and rewarding. This book is a must-read for anyone who is interested in Jungian psychology or the search for meaning in life.
Here are some additional thoughts about the book:

BARD.GOOGLE.COM
bard.google.com
https://www.facebook.com/

Dreamword from the Dream World

It was not the voice of a Marine drill sergeant, or a wise old man like Gandalf, but softer, more mysterious, like some poet dropping his voice at the end of a deep poem to draw the audience in. The line was: “Modemus is the key to the future.”

AI tells me: “I’m sorry but I couldn’t find any information about “modemus”. Could you please provide more context or clarify your question?”  Further dialogue with AI got no further than “there is no such word.”

I love it that AI does not yet have access to dreams (but they are close). My dream is not at all bothered by the fact that there is no word “modemus” in the known languages. This tells me the dream knows more languages than we know, or perhaps the dream likes to make up words.

The word has a Spanish flavor to me, so I asked Paco his take on it. Paco writes:

It only makes sense to me as a conjugation of the verb moderar, which means “to moderate,” or modelar, “to model.” But in either case, modemus would be incorrect. I don’t know any verb moder, thus no modemus. You could say, moderamos (present indicative), or que moderemos (present subjunctive) “let us moderate.” But if it came from a dream, it might yield to more whimsy. My fantasy says, how about trying: “Let us moderate.”

So, this throws us back to another word: moderate. Let’s unpack this word and see what lies beneath its shell. It comes from the IE root -med, meaning “to take appropriate measures.” This developed into the senses of “to abate excessiveness,” “to regulate,” “mitigate,” “restrain,” “temper,” “set a measure,” “to keep (something) within measure.”

Clearly, we are in times of unrestrained intemperateness, excessiveness, and lacking in keeping things within measure. So, we lack moderation as things become more extreme. In Paco’s fantasy, “let us moderate” is the key to the future. Surely, this would be good medicine for curing our preset ills.

But can we, as divided as we are, willingly take such medicine? The medicine may be available, but will it be taken? So far, there are precious few signs that this can or will happen.

As I was working on the dream, I was struck by a strong intuition that the dreamword was a name: Modemus! This did not get me any closer to the meaning of the name, but the sense of personalization had a strong impact on me. My immediate association was to the figure that Jung referred to as “the coming guest.” My sense is that only something of this dimension would have the “power” to break through the miasma we are sinking into, something from realms that are beyond our conscious realities. So, I wrote out: The Coming Guest, Modemus, is the key to the future. This sense of personalization implies that the coming guest is coming closer, closer in time, closer in space, closer in some sense.

Here is the first draft for the cover of Bits & Pieces.

Russell A. Lockhart

BITS & PIECES

A Laconic Anthology

Writings, Poems, Images,
Memories and Dreams

Aiming for December 2023

The Old Man

Sitting a table away

I heard the old man say

To a young boy

Possibly his grandson:

“Back in my day

Come what may

We would always say

With eyes closed:

Buck up!

Buck up!”

“Did it work?” the lad asks

“Oh yes, indeed

Bet your bean stalks

On it, you could.”

“Bean stalks?”

“Don’t hear much these days

About bean stalks, but then,

Back then, everyone had ‘em.”

“Could you get me one, Grandpa?”

“No, son, I can’t, I can’t.

But you can. Just ask for one

In your dreams.”

a long slow simpering demise

no trumpets no fireworks

not even headlines

because the end

no matter how long it takes

will have become the new normal

the new business as usual

the last profit center of the few