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Bringing together the opposites

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The “A La Gucci” Great Hermaphrodite and Why We Hit Mid-Life Crisis

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What is in there for me: What is behind the mid-life crisis? Why suicides and divorces surge in the second half of life? What keeps us from being happy? Ultimately, are we all hermaphrodites? Too many questions for a short post, but believe me, you’ll at least get a hint.

The full post starts here.

A year ago Alessandro Michele dressed The “A la Gucci Great Hermaphrodite” with a red Gucci T-shirt for GucciCuise18. As usual, the reactions were everything from revulsion to admiration. I am not about that. What I want to talk about is how Gucci, unknowingly or maybe knowingly tapped on a symbol that holds so much for our mental well-being – The Great Hermaphrodite.

The Great Hermaphrodite. We are psychologically wired to recognize and integrate the “opposite gender” within. Only then we tend to find meaning in our lives. This process is symbolized as the Great Hermaphrodite in alchemy. Photo: The Internet
The Great Hermaphrodite. We are psychologically wired to recognize and integrate the “opposite gender” within. Only then we tend to find meaning in our lives. This process is symbolized as the Great Hermaphrodite in alchemy. Photo: The Internet

Read about Why sexuality and spirituality in fact are two sides of the coin in the depth of our mind
Read about Yayoi Kusama’s overly sexual art and how her uncontrollable energies took her on this journey

Ops, We all are hermaphrodites…but without Gucci

It is a rather complex symbol. I’ll start from where we all know. Everybody knows that due to our biological structure, men carry small amount of female hormones, and women small amount of male hormones.

Now, let’s look at the psychological side of it. As usual, the resonance goes very far in the depth of our mind – it means in every man there is a small, hidden woman and in each woman some hidden man. That small woman inside man is called Anima (man’s soul). It is one of the unconscious forces of very strong power because it is deeply hidden.  Animus is on the contrary the man inside woman.

“The other side” within

Attention, now we are not talking strictly about genders now. Below the threshold of the consciousness, there is no duality. Now we are talking about the qualities that are ascribed to the feminine nature (receptivity, passivity, sentimentality etc) and the masculine nature (reasoning, action, penetration etc). The Anima is responsible for all of the female tendencies in man’s psyche and is an aspect of personality that normally is concealed from everybody, even the owner himself.

The Cycle of Life – sexuality and “the other”

Accept or not, during the first half of life sexuality is central to our being. Strictly talking about men, at this period, they keep polishing their “manly characters”, ego, thirst for power etc. But as we step into the second half of our lives and slowly leave sexuality behind, our nature changes. A spontaneous desire is born inside for spiritual growth and maturity. The female aspects within are what guide the man to learn to control his animalistic instincts and lead him to maturity. The same tendencies happen with women too, but everything reversed.

Divorce, suicide and more – even Gucci can’t help

At this period, when internal tendencies change towards spirituality and maturity, we still like to cling on to our previous life style and desires. That’s when a separation in our psyche starts to take place. Dressed in Gucci, or no Gucci, we constantly feel something is missing. That’s when, instead of opening up to the hidden tendencies, we start to blame our partners. The wider this psychological divergence, the more serious are the consequences (anything from depression to divorce to suicide).

In short, we are psychologically wired to recognize and integrate the “opposite gender” within. Only then we tend to find meaning in our lives. This process of integration of the psychic polar opposites is what symbolized as the Great Hermaphrodite in alchemy. In many other cultures it is also known as the Sacred Union or Sacred Marriage.

Read about Why sexuality and spirituality in fact are two sides of the coin in the depth of our mind
Read about Yayoi Kusama’s overly sexual art and how her uncontrollable energies took her on this journey

Gucci’s Garden of Earthly Delights …. Where to Look for It?

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What’s in there for me: Something big – a solid answer for this much debated topic of humanity. It would be naive to take The myth of Creation as a historical record. In fact, the first stories of the Garden of Eden date to a much later date than the earthed bones of early hominids, Homo Habilis. I mean, we talk about some 2 million years of difference. So, at the time the Eden’s Story was born, our ancestors already had some sort of clothing. It was not Gucci obviously but they had already covered their private parts. In short, this story is not a historical record. It is not biography of Adam and Eve either. It is a symbolic illustration of how our psyche has experienced the process of evolution, namely, the birth and separation of the consciousness. It is the way how our unconscious translated the process of growing consciously different from the rest. And it is also the story of hope. Hope for what? Read the full post to find out.

Read the blog post “That wasn’t technically fire – what was it?” to learn more about the nature of the conscious and the symbols that illustrate the pain of being consciously different.

The full post starts here.

With arrival of Alessandro Michele, Gucci has become a Garden of mystery. Some interpretations are unnerving to me, I accept. Regardless, I love scrolling their Instagram feed full of mystical and historical references.

This is my first try of Gucci and I’ve chosen a widely known myth of Garden of Eden with “fashionable” touch of Ignasi Monreal.

Rework of Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights by Ignasi Monreal for Gucci. As usual, he beautifully mixes mythical with mundane.
Rework of Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights by Ignasi Monreal for Gucci. As usual, he beautifully mixes mythical with mundane. Photo: Internet

Our First Parents? Dressed in Gucci Style or Nude?

The original version of this retouched artwork is visually somehow different from “conventionally accepted” image of Garden of Eden as it carries quite some touch of author’s own visions. But the storyline is similar. We are talking about origins of universe and emergence of our first parents.

It is amusing to learn the fact that the first stories of Garden of Eden date to a much later date than the earthed bones of early hominids, Homo Habilis. I mean we talk about some 2 million years of difference. In other words, talking chronographically, when Adam was kicked out of that Walled Garden of Eternity and landed on mortal Earth, this place had already been populated with his fellow species long, long time ago. I am sure, he didn’t feel lonely. By the way, I guess they already had some sort of clothing.

Part of the original art "Garden of Earthly Delights" by Bosch. Photo: Internet
Part of the original art “Garden of Earthly Delights” by Bosch. Photo: Internet

Life in Garden of Delights – Not as Stylish as Gucci’s

Let’s see before being kicked out how was his life. Adam was in Garden of Delights enjoying his lazy and solitary yet immortal life. At the center of this Garden there were two trees – the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Immortality. There were four rivers in the garden, flowing from inexhaustible sources in four directions to keep the world refreshed. He was bored, so God created his counterpart, Eve out of his rib.

The treacherous serpent curled around the Tree of Knowledge whispered about the marvelous forbidden fruit of the Tree to the woman. Obviously she gave in, because, she herself is a symbol of temptation (in the eyes of Adam). She even convinced Adam. They tried the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge and suddenly became aware of their differences and got ashamed. They got expelled from the Garden for eating that fruit. To make things worse, the God put two wrathful protectors in front of the gates so that they couldn’t sneak in.

I am writing another post about this lower relatedness aspect of woman as homage to the Gucci’s Great Hermaphrodite art work. Also a separate post about Snake. Stay tuned.

Absurdity All the Way

Although ridiculously absurd, this story runs along the texts of all of Abrahamic religions. Even uncontaminated cultures have their own versions with similar symbolism – precisely, the Tree and the Snake. How one can believe in this bizarre story and actually consider it as actual records of beginning of the universe while our facts are telling us a totally different story? Now one needs to ask this question – did really this place exist?

Answer from psychoanalysis is yes and no. No, because, there is no Paradise (walled enclosure) on an already well-explored Earth. Yes, because, it is our inner reality and this explains why such a weird absurdity has managed to gain so much fame. It is not a historical record of the origin of the universe. Yet it is how our psyche has experienced the process of evolution, namely, birth and separation of the consciousness. This story is manifestation of man’s longing for pre-conscious sense of totality in symbolic language of unconscious. But it is not only about longing, it also talks about hope.

Second Look at Symbols

Let’s get into translation. It turns out that it was the Knowledge, the Awareness that put us behind the protected doors. It was time for us to get out of that Garden. So that treacherous Snake – the symbol of “Eternal Wisdom” set up the “plan”.

At some point in evolution, we developed a capacity to judge everything in terms of good and bad which we perceive as fear and desire. In mythological language, our first parents “ate the fruit of knowledge” and became self-aware – the characteristic feature of consciousness. So it was the nature of our reasoning that closed those doors to our face.

Self-awareness was not the only revelation. Then it downed upon them that there is a thing called death while they are lustful creatures with desire to live. So fairy tales abound with stories about search of elixir of life and man’s desire to transcend mortality. Because, although we can’t taste that bliss any more, we haven’t lost the knowledge that there is a dimension of our nature that transcends mortality.

The Cost of Being Consciously Different

This differentiation of ourselves, development of consciousness has cost us to lose that “eternal, timeless completeness” – the period now babies experience from the moment of conception until early development of consciousness (does that explain why they are good at being happy?). Then for the rest of life try to experience it again.

Read the blog post “That wasn’t technically fire – what was it?” to learn more about the nature of the conscious and the symbols that illustrate the pain of being consciously different.

Religions are our cry for such transcendence – our hope to transcend this carnal world of duality to experience that “timeless delightful state”. Because it is when the “self-aware” consciousness will let go its petty “me and mine” game and will experience transcendence through self-sacrifice and submission to higher order. Enduring spirituality is where he hopes to experience these delights that are beyond duality of opposites – worries and desires, temptations and fears, light and dark.

Paradise… Where is it?

But not all is lost. That walled eternal land still resides inside each of us, in the depth of our dark psyche, protected by cultural ogres, fire breathing dragons, many-headed scary creatures, which we come across in myth and fairy tales. They are personifications of our worldly attachments and survival instincts. Remember, the God put two frightful monsters in front of the doors?  We are talking of the same thing now. The way to return there is to defeat all these roaming instinctual forces and give back that “fruit”, which made us aware of ourselves and our surrounding. In other words, sacrifice our consciousness. Precisely, the way to immortality goes through Death, let it be physical death or symbolic death to our worldly attachments.

Only thru total renunciation of ego-oriented attachments the return is possible to that state of eternal bliss free of worries and temptations. But this time the experience is not that of a baby. It is that of a mature person in the form of immortality of spirit. Nothing carnal.

Related posts:

That wasn’t technically fire – what was it?
The Secret Story of Symbols”
The Unconscious – The Great Mother, The Conscious – Overconfident Kid

Gucci sends fashion back to roots…

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Gucci has made quite stir in elusive world of fashion with the latest show of RTW Fall/Winter 2018. No surprise, with Gucci’s Alessandro it is always a stir. Pale looking models were carrying around replicates of their heads, almost real-looking snakes and dragons in an operation room with operation chair in center. Some had third eye on their hands with myriad of ethnic twists to the looks. Some people found it unnerving, some awesome, some were confused, some didn’t understand at all. All for a reason. This scene resembled an initiation ritual with ghostly participants.

Models carrying deeply mythological motifes - dragons, third eyes, replica of their own heads. Gucci show - RTW, FW2018
Models carrying deeply mythological motifs – dragons, third eyes, replica of their own heads among others.

Gucci show – RTW, FW2018

Alessandro played a different card – to move to the next phase, he went back to basics, he shed light on a long-forgotten knowledge. The knowledge that fashion was not born out of the need to please eyes and tap only on sensuality. Fashion was not born to work as money-generating machine. Fashion, in the first place, is byproduct of “mystical participation”. The rituals where novice members of early societies were initiated into their roles in a neatly defined societal structure. Their “looks” symbolically communicated their role in that structure.

In this sense, primeval fashion used to be looks of medicine men, shamans with feathered headwears or of hunters with daunting chains around their necks made of horns of hunted animals etc. The root of fashion lies in taking on a social mask that represents the specific spot of each individual in a given society. Outer look used to be means, not the ends by itself. Now, with Gucci’s “cyborg-like” creations fashion takes on the same function again, it questions where we are and where we fit now. Actually, I do not think someone would call this collection sensual (which by the way has almost always been a strong card for Gucci). He had a different message and my take is as follows:

My take on the set:

To me it represented, in a more dramatized manner, the “liquid times” we are going through. In times when societies got protected by borders and distances, each survived and flourished upon certain set of moral foundations that defined general frame for every aspect of life. Yesterday traditional dresses characterized cherished values of societies and enjoyed emotional bond with those who put them on. Now, however with all the digital noise, fading borders and fusion of tastes we live in state of cacophony. Today, everything is everywhere, anything can go with anything – no bond, no emotions, no curated matching and it may feel like post-human. The experimental combinations may come out beautiful, creepy or transitory – the message that I think the collection delivered clearly. The process in making.

My doubts:

Although the concept he’s put forward is interesting, one thing is clear that he’s stepped away from what made fashion a “sweet spot” of humanity.  Namely, the tendency to please eyes and tap on sensuality. There is a reason why with time fashion became limited to only sensuality and beauty.  Deductively, outer looks turned into its only reference with no inward ties. To put it in an unpolished manner, “low” chakras are where money circulates. We have capacity to reach angels. Yet often times we find ourselves in the grip of our basic instincts of sexual desire and power quest. So, I wonder, how this new strategy will impact on Gucci sales.

My touch on the set-up:

I wish I were his genius, but we all have our opinions, right? I’d replace the operation chair in the middle with something that is pure representation of unconscious. For example, an unexplored forest, dark waters or infinite deserts. Why? Alessandro’s explanation of his vision is clear. He is the Hero busy with creating his world populated by personalities honed by his sentiments on our time in his laboratory. Another version would be to make these ghostly creatures (models) come out of a set that represents depth of unconscious. He aimed to break thru the “canonized rules”, yet every urge of destruction rises not from conscious, but from unconscious. The unknown new gets ripen there which will break into conscious only through destruction.

Symbols of Transformation

Furthermore, snake and dragon are unmistakable symbols of transformation. But they are not always that peaceful and friendly as they were in the hands of the models. Study of mythology tells us that they are personifications of our fears, desires and compulsive impulses. Each of these forces always try to get upper hand in our consciousness. The task of conscious is to tame and subdue them just like how Hercules fought. Otherwise they will grow into many-headed, flame-breathing wrathful dragons and swallow the conscious. But to defeat them the Hero needs to “re-vive” the moral values of the society he belongs. Because that is where he’d find the tips and mystical powers to subdue that dragon and experience transcendence.

Now that those moral foundations are vanishing, we are back in square figuring out where to turn to re-establish that connection with the inner space and outer space. In a sense, this set with a new twist to the centerpiece would symbolize our pledge to re-establish new set of morals, which would enable us to carry those snakes and dragons in as peaceful and friendly manner as they seemed in the show. As a result, It would also portray the process of the birth of new transcendent identity.

In general, these moments of chaos are times when new identity is born – usually more embracing, more universal.  I am curios to follow his next creations to see how he visualizes it.

This article was originally published at fashionnewsmagazine.com in Italian and in English.

I’ve made slight changes to this version to make it easier to read as a blog post.

Abnormal sexual desire, art and Louis Vuitton…

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 Her polka dots are not mere dots:
For her troubled mind dots are female genitals, tentacle-like structures phallus.

About six years ago some concept stores of Louis Vuitton got decorated with sublime and fascinating art works by one of the most renowned Japanese artists Yayoi Kusama. They were so beautiful and enticing that I’d be surprised if high fashion nerds forgot them.

Yayoi Kusama pumpkins with polka dots. Pumpkin by its form is similar to "vessel", the receiver - the female quality. Polka dots symbolize female genital. Photo: the Internet
Yayoi Kusama pumpkins with polka dots. Pumpkin by its shape resembles alchemic “vessel”, the recipient – the female quality, the womb. Polka dots symbolize female genital. Even more subtle here, dots on the pumpkins are arranged in snake-like shape. Besides being a classical symbols of the unconscious, the snake is also an unmistakable symbol of the androgynous nature of the human psyche.  Photo: the Internet
 

A year forward and I am busy with my studies on psychoanalysis, especially Freud’s theory on repression of sexuality in Buenos Aires. The place where I lived was very close to the largest modern gallery in the city called Malba. One day while passing by I see the trees in front of Malba dressed in red with white polka dots – that remarkable signature design I remember from a year ago. Malba was hosting an exhibition of Yayoi Kusama. The trees looked intriguing and beautiful. I resolved to go and see what it is about.

Shoes with phallus. the complimentary detail to red polka dots of Japanese artist who also designed for Louis Vuitton.
Yayoi Kusama shoes with phallus as demonstrated in Malba, Buenos Aires, 2013.  Photo: The Internet

In Museum: polka dots, but also phallus

Next day, I enter Malba and the first impression I have was – God, this is what classical Freudian wish fulfillment of excessive sexual desire and irrepressible conflicting impulses looks like. Interestingly, her polka dots became famous and made it all the way to the world of high fashion and beyond just the way they were. However, another important detail accompanying those dots was so beautifully disguised into unsuspecting snake-like shapes, or tentacles as critics called them, in Louis Vuitton installations and went almost unnoticed – her obsession with phallus. Maybe, for a reason, otherwise that would have been too perverse, who knows. Maybe not. 

 
Chairs covered with phallus, the complimentary detail to red polka dots of Japanese artist who also designed for Louis Vuitton.
Yayoi Kusama art – chairs covered with myriad of phallus exhibited in Malba, Buenos Aires, 2013.
Photo: The Internet

Tentacle-like art and polka dots: penetrator and recipient

Unlike her fashion installations, the view of tentacle-like elements covering every object was more prominent in the exhibition venue. These objects covered the things that we normally use to lay over, sit upon or wear such as sofas, couches, chairs, shirts even shoes. They basically covered everything one can imagine, even pasta, anything that we can touch. The photos with herself covered in dots laying over these thorny sofas decorated the walls.

By now, it is pretty much clear that polka dots all over her, analogous to the genital organs, represent vagina.  On the other hand, everything else that we can touch has grown innumerable phallus. It was a classical portrait of Freudian wish fulfillment of incompatible sexual desire. The vividness with which she depicted her troubled state of mind was chilling. These art works were explosive manifestation of deeply repressed conflicts. The curiosity took me to study her life. In some places she talks openly about her revulsion to sex. Maybe, it rooted in her troubled childhood experiences of the relationship between her parents too.

So her art, to me, was basically free ride of deeply conflicting urges. On one side, her revulsion of sex, on the other side, her strong desire for it. On top of all, she had to numb this internal storm against the backdrop of strict social frame. It feels like, it has been too much to stomach and at some point, she has let it go.

Obsession – Morbid dark impulses in psyche

It seems she had full divine experience in dots and phallus, she felt the creative power of universe in them. Here comes to mind Indian Gods Shiva and Shakti. However, her experience was reverse, regressive and destructive. Instead of leading them towards a fruitful and meaningful experience, she became overwhelmed by them. She lived it not in the form of celestial experience, but as morbid obsessive forces chasing her to insanity. She kind of talked about it openly through art and this is what she labels as “obsession” – let it be her phallus chair, mirror rooms or dotted pumpkins – automated instinctual impulses that tend to magnify, augment and overwhelm. 

Sexuality and Spirituality – why are the same thing in the depth of our mind? – Read this post to see why Kusama’s art made me think of God Shiva and Goddess Shakti

1. That wasn’t technically fire…what was it?…

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“The light was lit to illuminate the temple of soul”
“Prometheus stole fire from Gods and Zeus condemned him to a life of perpetual torture”.

The above examples do sound like total absurdity when we try to analyze them literally, don’t they? Talk about tricky and allegoric language of the unconscious!

This is the very first post and I am still not sure how to enter the topic. I’ve changed it million times already. Especially after second birth and months of breastfeeding, I think, some part of my brain has really shrunk. I think, before talking about unconscious, I should probably, talk about definitions ascribed to conscious. After all, that is the realm where we function in general. So, simplicity in mind, I’ll try my best.

Gucci bag featuring Unicorn. The Unicorn is symbol of spirit, which is associated with reasoning and intellect (Soul is feminine, receptive). Now, reasoning has a penetrating nature that's why in the Unconscious it is linked with masculinity. To rephrase it, in the depth of our psyche reasoning and masculinity are linked due to their penetrating nature. Photo: Gucci.com
Gucci bag featuring Unicorn. The Unicorn is symbol of spirit, which is associated with reasoning and intellect (Soul is feminine, receptive). Now, reasoning has a penetrating nature that’s why in the Unconscious it is linked with masculinity. To rephrase it, in the depth of our psyche reasoning and masculinity are linked due to their penetrating nature. Photo: Gucci.com

 

Evolution….Not a Joke

We humans, obviously, are the product of long, tedious journey of evolution. Nature has been polishing functionality of our body to meet our physical needs and capacity (which itself kept evolving along the way). That means the same evolution process has taken place in our psyche as well. It is a part that we do not see, however it is the very part that has been honed and shaped the most by the evolution process. Just like how a huge tree grows from a single seed, the consciousness has grown into its current state over countless years… Does it make sense? If it does, we’ve started on the right foot!

Prometheus is representation of acquisition of consciousness. Since the moment He stole fire, he became different. He was aware of his difference. He couldn't be like the rest of living things any more. So he was condemned to eternal punishment of being consciously different. On the other side, compulsive impulses rising from depth of psyche are always after him trying to swallow him back. Photo: Wikimedia
Prometheus is representation of acquisition of the consciousness. Since the moment He stole fire, he became different. He was aware of his difference. He couldn’t be like the rest of living things any more. So he was condemned to eternal punishment of being consciously different. On the other side, compulsive impulses rising from depth of psyche are always after him trying to swallow him back. Photo: Wikimedia

Here Came that Light – Conscious

Let’s dig a bit deeper. Way back in times of our ancestors some big change took place. Extremely slowly, yet surely – our grannies acquired a new skill – The Consciousness! In language of the unconscious he learned “a well-concealed secret of revengeful Gods”.  Thus “The Light illuminated the darkness of abyss”. In other words, reasoning shed light over the bottomless unconscious… Prometheus thus stole fire. Jung calls this painful and slow process “the Battle for Deliverance”. Just like how difficult it is to totally separate oneself from mother, separating itself from Great Mother (the unconscious) was the “mission impossible” for consciousness. It separated itself through a painful process. To make it worse, it had to fight hard against violent and compulsive impulses of the unconscious not to relapse. Or not fall into possession of one of them. In other words, He had to fight against “revengeful Gods” to keep this fire.

Now, let’s see why consciousness is symbolized this way and who are those revengeful gods? Once differentiated, The Conscoius – the New Hero became aware of himself just like a baby recognizes herself in the mirror for the first time. He was different and he became aware of this.

With it came a different mode of seeing and understanding things. His mode of thinking wasn’t vague and could control the train of thoughts. Also, his judgement was causal. For him everything had a cause and effect in a way that he understood. Thus, his mode of thinking was deductive, mathematical and calculated. He reasoned for the first time. Unlike predecessors, he rose above the free rein of instincts and felt, still very dimly, the capacity to control them. This new realm of psyche had its own small center, which we call Ego today. He was the intellect illuminating the dark mass of unconscious, the Great Mother.

Revengeful Underground Gods?…Seriously?

Here comes another question, who are those revengeful gods that condemned Prometheus to a life of eternal torture? They are our own instincts, urges, impulses, all the impetuous animalistic tendencies. They are our desires and fears that inhabit in the depth of our psyche. In the unconscious landscape they get personified just like in fairly tales and myths. They are living realities that are out of conscious control. They are capable of full manipulation of our mind. In a sense, they are creative powers of cosmos such as sexual desire, hunger drive, survival instincts etc.  But if experienced in destructive form, they turn into obsessive impulses chasing one to insanity. These are the cases they are experienced as wrathful Gods and underground frightful creatures. This battle has been one of the major themes of fairy tales, myths, monuments (Rome is full of it), paintings etc.

Here the Hero is the consciousness fighting against primordial Semi-Gods in shape of half snake-half human monsters, flame-breathing, many-headed dragons, wrathful and scary creatures, ogres, treacherous trolls, deceitful sirens etc. These dark forces persecute this new Hero each trying to assume total control. It would take this New Hero a very long time to learn how to tame and subdue dark aspects of these forces of psyche. Once subdued, Hero experiences the illuminating, spiritual and celestial aspects of those same Gods. Interestingly, during our lifetime, our consciousness repeats – in a fast pace – the evolution of conscious development.  That explains why toddlers up until five to six years can not tell difference between imagination and reality. At those ages the level of conscious development is still incipient and fragile.

Proportion of The Conscious – To be or not to be…

But this differentiation doesn’t mean that the “job” of Ego is over. Like any other acquired skill, there is always a danger to lose it. Relapsing back into the unconscious or “being swallowed by devouring monsters” is looming danger for each of us. However, too much separation of the consciousness is not good either as it will strip off that irrational, intuitional, “feeling” foundation upon which the Conscious has built its small kingdom and on which still nourishes and keeps its balance. The more separation, the greater the danger to be “possessed by daemon”. Meaning, the more danger to be associated with certain psychic forces that are already out of conscious control. So this Ego it is a bittersweet affair of mankind, which is too sweet to give up and too costly to keep in right proportion.