Outside in the woods of the world, my love,
an owl carries a vole as a pledge to its mate,
the petals of the wild apple tree speckle
the sand and the kingfisher strikes like passion
in feathers to rise with a moon glint of fish.
The only world is neither unjust nor just
but round as an apple and we are made of it
to wonder, to savour and struggle and hurt,
to think, to try to build justice as the beaver
builds her dam, to weather the seasons,
the random bolts of nuisance and disaster,
to love what we can and endure in light and darkness.
(extract from The Seduction of Anticipated Pain by Marge Piercy)
Guided by ancient cultures, Jungian theory and contemporary neuropsychology, Soul Centred Psychotherapy holds to an orientation wherein not all suffering leads to joy, not all fear is transformed into courage, and not all confusion clears into understanding. Sometimes circumstances are as they are, and our task, is to “love what we can and endure in light and darkness”.
This orientation stands in stark contrast to a prevailing cultural attitude which exhorts us to be positive, to look on the bright side, to heal all the wounds, and, most of all, to keep moving forward. This attitude is so omnipresent, that it exists almost unquestioned. However, this way of thinking locks us into a linear time frame, striving for perennial summer, a perfectionistic naïvety unsurprising in a culture obsessed with eternal youth.
This focus on positivity is a relatively new cultural attitude, with it’s most identifiable roots in the bestselling 1952 Norman Peale book The Power of Positive Thinking. In her excellent analysis of both the limitations and destructive effects of positive thinking, Bright-Sided – How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America (2009), Barbara Ehrenreich points out the ways in which positive thinking is counter productive and even harmful to overall health and well being.
Traditional cultures have long since recognised the place for the darker aspects of humanity in our psychological and soulful lives. In the Ancient Egyptian culture, temples were built for Seth, who was consumed by envy for and eventually killed his brother god, Osiris, in anguished jealous rage. Certain members of this ancient society devoted themselves to the worship of Seth, and there was a legitimate place love and kindness, and is known as the Mother of the Whole Universe. Kali also embodies feminine energy, creativity and fertility and is an incarnation of Parvati, wife of the Hindu god Shiva. She is often represented with four arms, with the two left hands holding, respectively, a severed head and a sword, while the two right hands are poised in the mudras for ‘fear not’ and the bestowal of blessing. She is simultaneously representing both creation and destruction.
