Le Retour A Soi/Going Back to Self and Nobility
I am here writing in the lush university grounds, a beautiful pine tree outside my window and squirrels jumping from one branch to another.
I am grateful to have many of you members of Your Alchemists living all around the world and sharing with me how you and your communities are feeling and adapting to the current “global shift”. Shift, is my personal word choice for what many of us and our planet might be going through right now.
Finding Our Way
“Au départ l’Homme est « coupé de lui-même », totalement confondu avec son inconscient. Un processus de différenciation est à mettre en oeuvre.”
“In the beginning the Human Being is “cut from themselves”, totally fused and confused with their unconscious self. A process of differentiation is needed to be put in place.” Annick de Souzenelle
In its simple most basic definition shift starts with “movement” but as the great Annick de Souzenelle defines it more appropriately for our current context, I will refer to shift as “retournement” in French, meaning “the return” or “U Turn”.
Although many of us might feel that our movements are currently restricted (by our government or other) what this context might provide is an invitation to journey “back to self”. For those of you who do not know Annick, she is an incredibly beautiful, loving and inclusive spiritual writer, ex mathematician, clinician and psychotherapist now aged 97, is also author of some incredibly profound mystical books where quantum physics and spirituality meet. Annick studied Hebrew in depth and reinterpreted many sacred texts, including the old and new testaments.
What Annick invites us to do is to use this incredible context we are being thrown in to learn to go back to self, to surrender, which various psychotherapists and mystics calls “l’abandon” in French (i.e “surrender”). It is a very contained “surrendering” where we learn to be grounded (in our body) as well as “still” within ourselves, slowly strengthening our body container to be able to feel more and more.
Annick refers to this as “verticalisation” or the process of learning to stand upright as opposed to leading chaotic and emotionally stunted and immature lives. There is no judgement intended by the word “immature”. Each human being goes through a process of maturation. In Hindu yoga philosophy, we talk about aligning our energetic centres, the first 7 chakras. Often, without guidance, support, and initiations this process of maturation is stunted or non-existent. We do not learn to inter-act with others but to rely on them (“horizontalisation“). By learning to return to ourselves we go towards maturation. We stand on our own two feet, we can be there for ourselves and for others. This is a necessary stage of growth.
Unfortunately, I was not able to find interviews of her in English, but there are many interviews of her in French on Youtube. I also recommend her English book on the body, her reinterpretation of Adam and Eve, and of course her ‘opus’ works which revolve around what it means to go back to self.
Finding Our Nobility
“Pénétrer la pulpe, au-delà de la coque, atteindre au cœur des choses, en ouvrir le noyau pour en libérer l’énergie, cela ne peut se faire par seule voie extérieure si ce n’est en reconduisant le geste dont fait part le mythe de l’exil (appelé “chute” dans le langage religieux), alors que la voie intérieure dont seul dans la création l’Homme est capable, le conduit au cœur de lui-même et le fait alors entrer en résonance avec le cœur de l’univers. C’est ce chemin-là que nous avons perdu. “ Annick de Souzenelle
“ To enter into the core, beyond the outer shell, to go to the heart of things whilst opening the core to free this energy, this can only be attained by going within. This is known in myths as “the exile” or “the fall” in religious language. However the inner way’s sole aim is to show humans that we are capable to go within the heart of ourselves and by doing this find resonance with the universe. This is the journey we have lost.”
Annick de Souzenelle
I wrote about “the return” and exceptionally re-open my article on this subject based on Jospeh Campbell’s the Hero and Heroine’s journey below:
Another reason Annick’s work particularly resonates with me right now in my doctoral training is that we are increasingly moving from an old school medical model of diagnoses and pathologies to a more strengths based model of individuals being multi-dimensional, of having within ourselves “the keys to the kingdom” which are our gifts, talents, dreams and hopes. These are our nobility. How we connect to our nobility is a personal journey achieved through stillness, which we are now being forced to do, and which is challenging to our western culture.
“Matter in alchemy is material and spiritual, and spirit spiritual and material. It was from the spirit of alchemy that Goethe wrought the figure of the “superman” Faust, and this superman led Nietzsche’s Zarathustra to declare that God was dead and to proclaim the will to give birth to the superman, to “create a god for yourself out of your seven devils.” Carl Jung
The process of this journey is also what shamans and sages have called “The Initiation”. Psychologists like Carl Rogers refer to “self-actualisation” and Carl Jung to “ Psychological Alchemy” which I will write about in another article. It is achieved by connecting to ourselves in silence, by letting go and by allowing ourselves to surrender. What starts to happen, as in alchemy, is that we connect with what is difficult inside of ourselves (our shadow) and but also connect with out “light”, our inner gifts, our inner child, our soul. We can transform from within which will affect our external world.
For those of you who might currently find these times challenging, please connect with me here where I can take you through simple practices to “surrender” physically in our body. We refer to this letting go as “l’abandon alchimique” in French what Carl Jung also referred to as “alchemical surrender”.
References
De Souzenelle, A. (2020) Initiation. Relie.
De Souzenelle, A. (2020) Le grand retournement
De Souzenelle, A. (2013) “Va vers toi”: La vocation divine de l’Homme (A.M. GD FORMAT)
Jung, C. (1968) Psychology and Alchemy: The Collected Works. 2nd Ed. Routledge. London and New York.
Rogers, C. ( 1967) On Becoming A Person: a therapist’s view of psychotherapy. Constable.