SMA, Pittsfield, United States
Once you’ve unleashed a previously captive octopus upon your life, how do you honor the
disruption?
…
My therapist offered a journey to meet my “higher self” who would possibly have answers for
me.
In the vision a dark door appears and I step through it into a long corridor of stone arches.
The walkway is now outside and as I walk it, it becomes a pier over the sea. Gulls are flying
by, but otherwise it is just me. The pier leads to a stone staircase that has been formed by
sea-pebbles that have gathered there. Here I hesitate. My higher self is under the water?? It
is dark. I hear myself say out loud that I am hesitating. My therapist reminds me that I can
slip into any kind of protective gear I may need, a white disco scuba suit, she offers. But as
she says it I grow gills. I grow a purple tail. And I dive under.
There is a shipwreck. Beneath it is a rusty, dangling lobster trap. I suddenly have a rusty
key. I swim up to it and crunched into the corner is a small purple octopus holding amethyst
and pearls. My therapist says I have locked her here. I apologize, I make amends, say I am
ready to free her, and unlock the cage.
She – she comes out with a powerful female energy- she swims out into the free water and
expands to almost become the whole “sky” above me. She draws a figure 8 in the air. She
touches my head and soon gently pulls me to her, holding me like a babydoll in two of her
arms.
She then tells me that I am an artist and a healer. I ask… But how do I offer healing? In what
form? She shows me it is a circle: art to healing and back again. Then she tells me that I can
feed her my doubt. And she can transmute it into “momentum.” This is something she offers
to do anytime I think to offer. Anytime I feel the roaring, searing, painful doubt I have been
feeling.
Since this journey to meet her, I have felt the effects of unlocking her cage and feeding her
and loving her. But the very scary part is, it feels like many comforts and relationships in my
life must change. It feels even like I may need to leave the comfort of a loving but stifling
relationship I have been in for 6 years. Leave my job. Leave the town I live in. Travel far.
So my question perhaps is this: can you help me be brave? Can you help me feel peace in
the chaos of releasing a kraken into my psyche so to speak? Can you help me understand
how to navigate times of great unsettling change in the quest to go deeper within my own
self? And in the face of a wild and unsteady world that is hurtling toward an unknown with us
all?
SMA
KSP:
Your letter is intriguing. The imagery you describe is striking. There appears to be a conflict
here between your internal struggle to unlock your “higher self” and your external struggle
with the chaotic outside world. Is this the same struggle you describe? Perhaps you can
think about this duality as interconnected and relational. The way you act and are acted
upon in the world affects your interiority, and so too your internal conflicts affect your
behaviour and presence. We might call this subjectivity. This idea of doubt transmuting into
momentum via a mediatory figure seems fruitful, but relies on a certain embrace of
ambivalence. This may not feel peaceful necessarily, but it is something you can harness in
your psyche and in the world outside.
On a practical level, it appears art and healing (through therapy or otherwise) are important
fields for you. Are there ways you can commit to these in a larger capacity than at present?
Think about going beyond just yourself and try to engage with wider social groups and
communities. In terms of making great leaps, have you spoken to your lover about your
desires for change and movement? Or to other people in your life? Developing and opening
up conversations can provide huge releases of energy and emotion that you could likely not
foresee. It seems you want movement, release, some sort of break. Travelling can offer a
great release, but you also bring all your emotional baggage with you.
I give you here “Non-Cognitive Aspects of the City” by Joseph Jarman. Its combination of
experimental jazz and dada spoken poetry points to the embrace of difficulty and dissonance
in the internal and external world. This should help you think about doubt, momentum,
release and movement in a changing, complicated world. If you can hold onto ambivalence
and accept no guarantees, you can find peace in there somewhere.
