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Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

Kenneth [no longer around] said Sep 2, 2006, 4:25 PM:

Hello,

My lover of ten years and I groove together on many different levels; grounding on the instinctual level. Instinctual gender roles work well for us in all the rooms of the house and in outside society as well.

Are these roles transpersonal? For us they seem to lie in a ‘back to the sagas’ reality that feels satisfying on a deep earthy level and we both enjoy relating to each other in that way. They could be called transpersonal for they root in non-personal experiential archtypes.

This sort of gut-deep acting out is quite different from being a between-the-worlds cosmic lover. When working on that level one seems to be dead to the instinctual realms. Brings to mind the idea of chakra related realities, as in “Which chakra level to you habitually operate on?”.

I believe both are way’s of experiencing transpersonal reality.

All this begs the question: what is the transpersonal? Could you provide one for us, Whitewave?

Kenneth

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Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

Whitewave said Sep 3, 2006, 12:09 AM:

I see. So it seems as if they have been chosen consciously, is that right? Deliberately and intentionally from a high place of deep freedom. That would be very cool!

That sounds like it would work.

Yeah, I wouldn't want to be with someone who was too spaced out either. That makes sense.

I just have my doubts about it if it is not chosen from that higher place. If it is just following animal instinct, then I think it is pre-personal. Like aranged marriages where it will work regardless of who you're marrying because it's all about the roles.

Trans-personal would be more of a lets-do-this-because-it's-fun thing. So that when it's not fun anymore, or it needs to be put on hold for whatever reason (one spouse becomes ill or dies) it can be abandoned without wreaking havoc on one's identity. That may be what is essentially going wrong in India when a man dies and his wife dies with him on his funeral pyre.

But, keep talkin'. This is good. Fascinating!

~Ww

Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

Kenneth [no longer around] said Sep 4, 2006, 2:47 PM:

Agreed. If it’s done consciously as one rather than fallen into on a pre-conscious level.

One of the things I told my wife in the beginning stage of our relationship was that I would be quite happy living together as celibates or on an intimacy-for-esoteric-purposes-only basis. Our choice for me to primarily act out a King role, rather than the Magician was a conscious one made after the initial barriers to our relationship had been dissolved.

Kenneth

Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

Whitewave said Sep 4, 2006, 3:13 PM:

Gorgeous!

And no doubt, fun!

Thank you so much for your contributions.

I have much to tell, but as a unit, we're not fully conscious yet. When I sense the coast is clear to decide to talk, I'll spill.

Blessings.

~Ww

Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

Kenneth [no longer around] said Sep 10, 2006, 7:54 AM:

BTW these instincts fall very much in line with the idea of courtly love. I guess there is an idea that courtly love is a style of relating that is artificial and pasted on over top of whatever else is there… hmmm

My first marriage began when I was 22, she was only 2 weeks before turning 20. Neither of us had a clue. Our first child was born about 1 1/2 years later. I remember searching for books that would give me a clue about being a good husband and father… had no experience of seeing a good relationship to model my behavior on… We had our own business and worked together daily… much like we did at the end of our marriage, actually…

By the early 90’s books were hitting the shelves that were actually useful (to me at least) and after (and towards the end of) that marriage I took responsibility, studied up, made and kept resolutions… though I know it’s not for everyone the book, “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus” was the single book that most helped me to get clued in.

So, are is my current style ‘pasted on’ ? I think the old style was pretty well scoured away and what I feel as the instinctual style (because I allow it to surface from a grounded place deep within) has grown up in it’s place with some mindful tending on my part. The old dysfunction style had to be scrubbed away first, though.

Kenneth

Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

savanni [no longer around] said Feb 21, 2007, 11:12 AM:

You you explain the terms “King” and “Magician”? I have no context in which to understand these terms.

Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

Whitewave said Jan 21, 2007, 10:46 PM:

I have just been having the hardest time figuring out how to write about this! It seems I can think about it and find something to say when I'm busy doing other things - housework, driving, fucking… - but when I'm sitting at my desk and my hands are on the keyboard, it disappears. It must be in a part of my brain that I just don't usually use at this time. That's all I can figure.

In any case, I hesitated to write about this in Kenneth's beautiful “Instinctual Relationships” thread because his version is… well, beautiful. But there is currently a huge wave of instinctual or impulsive relating that is going on right now that is completely devoid of beauty - or rather, it contains only the thinnest veneer of beauty. Or perhaps, the veneer of beauty is all it is and therefore contains nothing. Baudrillard lives! This is what I've observed:

Both men and women descending to a very low level of sexuality that is sub-human. Purely animal. In fact, those who can articulate the phenomenon inevitably end up using the term “animal” to describe it. Marilyn Manson. Britney Spears. Jenna Jamison. On and on. The only thing that justifies or explains coupling is animal attraction. “Animal attraction”, meaning a sort of collection of beauty standards which evoke only the most primative impulses and drives and refuse to be tainted or poisoned in any way by any civilized human values or standards of relating of any kind. If the reasons for coupling are derived from human values in any way, it is sexually incorrect. It must be purely instinctual. And the instinct is usually, that of predator and prey.

I'm not speaking as a moralist. I'm observing as objectively as I can and using as value-neutral terms to describe this as I can while still trying to convey the sense of urgency that is going on. This is clearly a cultural backlash to something. I think I see it pretty clearly now, but its still a bit fuzzy. Yesterday I was doing some reading and came across some blogs and what-nots that contain this zeitgeist quite nicely. Here are a few examples:

-O-

“Sometimes I miss her, the ole Mimi-doll. I miss being raped by a focusless gaze, the anonymity of being the centripetal force in a roomful of dicks, of being the other woman, the faceless other woman we females all fear, that bitch who makes our boyfriend / husband / lover drool and cower and snicker and groan, balls heavy and leaden and loaded with lust for the something more, the something more men always want because monogamy is just not in their sex. I want to be the high carbohydrate, benzene loaded, phenylanine fizzy smack, laced with aspartame and bursting with sugary, acidic cancer agents. I want to be the snack which fails to satisfy, the food for the hungry ghosts with empty holes where a stomach should be. I want to be Mimi again, for all the good it does me, did me. Sometimes, I miss her.

I miss her most, I think, when I slide back into her again. I feel it when I overhear another girl talk, a civilian – you know, not a stripper. “So in front of the whole lecture theatre the Professor made her take her lab jacket off because it wasn’t pressed, and all she had on underneath was a bra. All the girls in the class were crying.” There are days when you weep because your precious pride and your indignation and your idea of self has been destroyed by the simple act of exposure, and I will be staring at you with a sneer resting upon my lovely face, the fires of purgatory in my lovely eyes, fanned fires, swallowing up great gulps of oxygen. Haven’t we all seen the movie featuring the quivering female servant forced to undress in front of the stone-eyed master of the house, how her eyes slide with a choked sob to a distant corner of the room as his hand reaches, greedy, into his pants?…”

http://miminewyork.blogspot.com/2006/09/me-me.html

”The ravages against black womanhood are legion, but with big butts on endless display in videos and “bitch” and “ho” all but commonplace in hip-hop lyrics, one particularly sad and disturbing case comes to mind. Sarah Baartman (1789-1816) survived the slaughter of her people, only to be exploited for centuries hence. She was born in what we now call South Africa as a Khoikhoi, and enslaved in Cape Town by wealthy Britons. Her exceedingly large rear end, especially prominent on a short 4-foot-7 frame, gave associates of her enslavers the idea that there was money to be made. So Baartman went off to London, where she was christened “Hottentot Venus” and put on public display. She was marketed as the freak show to end all freak shows. She was made to bandy about in a cage, her derriere in full and barely clothed view, and would be told to perform a song or dance for the leering, jeering patrons. The spectacle became a smash hit, inspiring bawdy parlor songs. Baartman actually enjoyed a brief measure of dignity in her downtime from “performing”, but such luxuries were a thing of the past by the time the enterprise made its way to Paris. Have we really progressed much since the days of Sara Baartman? … ”

http://blissfullyclueless.blogspot.com/2006/03/video-vixens-victims-of-exploitation.html

-O-

And on and on. These are also rooted in the “non-personal experiential archetypes”. “Gut-deep acting out” indeed. There is a direct link between sex and violence which the Modern World has been trying to break for a very long time. For many, it seemed as though we were making progress. Then this.

I wanna figure out what is going on here. Especially since I'm innerested in Shadow Work so that means that this is not going to go away. It may go underground again for a while, but it won't really go away until we figure out what we need out of this. Is there anything here that is worth keeping? Any babies in this bathwater?

I am especially captivated by mimi's fantastic prose as she secures the future of unevolved male biases by knowingly betraying her gender from within. Paid by a higher bidder, she throws the game and brings all her teammates down with her. Who is this higher bidder? What are they paying her? What do they really want? Is there another way to get that without doing this? Or is this really necessary?

Is this the result of the legend of Lilith or is Lilith the result of this?

Something is telling me - no, whispering to me… that this is somehow necessary. [Anyone else hearing that TOOL song in their heads?… “This is necessary. This is necessary. Life feeds on life feeds on life feeds on life feeds on.. This is necessary…” ~Disgustipated.

I'm prolly not going to make too many friends among the New Age crowd with this line of thought, but I'm not too concerned about that. What I'm mainly concerned with is helping humanity to become what it was meant to be - the Manifest expression of God. So, while I realize that in one way everything is “always already” perfect, in another way, this is really not okay and something must be done. But repression isn't it.

So, what do we do? Is is fair to adopt a mythology that makes sense of it all? A metaphysics? Ken Wilber is making the case for dropping all the metaphysics because it is like a ball and chain at the moment, keeping us from ascending above the level of Mutual Assured Destruction. That's fair. And I guess he encourages us to integrate this impulse as individuals and find a way to fit it into our daily life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. Dropping the Old, Old Story, isolating the impulse and fitting it into the new Story that is being created as we speak.

Is this the task before us?

From what I see, the people who are promoting this aesthetic or life-style choice are ready and willing to own this impulse… and not much else. It seems they're not gonna drop it or get out of our faces until we all follow suit. Can we do this? How should we proceed?

~Ww

Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

Pantergnosis said Feb 21, 2007, 12:30 PM:

KW has made a good point of descerning the pre and postpersonal. Instincts sounds very pre. Still there are other transpersonal theorists that have preferred to include many non-personal archetypal experiences in the term transpersonal. Both CG Jung and Stanislav grof are often doing that. In theory I guess KW is right, still f.ex Grof may have a point that we in a personal journey often will have all these levels mixed. In a holotropic breathwork session there will often be a strong and strange mixture of both pre- and transpersonal experiences, that may make up a wholeness together if one surrenders to it. And then a regressive reliving of ones birth may be a psycological rebirth that open up for deep transpersonal truths.

I guess the same to some degree may be true in a relationship. Many of these levels will play themselves out a bit parallell. Working with shadow, trust, and love. Surrendering to the good, but also exploring the scary parts. Both of admitting lust and of fears of being used or devoured by the other or lots of other stuff. By accepting these “bad” or “unmature” aspects of ourselves they may also heal, which then is a part of our souls journey.

Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

savanni [no longer around] said Feb 21, 2007, 12:38 PM:

I read the description of the “Mimi-doll”, and while I could not make logical sense of it (the prose confuses me), I have the general emotion and feeling down pretty well. I do not have the words to describe the level of contempt I feel for such creatures. I also cannot describe how much I might enjoy letting such a creature think e is winning for a while, and then suddenly conciously ending the game.

There may have been a time when somebody could have used sex manipulate me into some very stupid decisions. I know that I can still be badly hurt from sexual manipulation, though, but I do not think that anyone could use that to actually convince me to do something really stupid.

Or maybe, if somebody set out to be manipulative, I would notice and end the game immediately, even before I stood to get particularly hurt.

Sex = violence… I am not sure what to make of this. While there are some people who abhor sex and call it one of the most violent things that can ever be done, I do not see that feeling in the culture around me. This could be a case in which my selective filtering has created a distorted view of the world around me. For instance, I know that sexually violent music exists, but I usually avoid even the genres that promote it, so I do not even know how common it is.

What I do see, even in poly circles, is some people trying to downplay sex, make it a minor element of any relationship. I can sometimes see how this is a sincere statement (I know at least one, and possibly two true asexuals), but often I know that it is an untrue or only partially true statement that is being made in order to try to make their extra relationships seem more “pure”. There is still the idea that a sexual relationship is somehow an exceedingly shallow relationship.

What I try to do, and again it is perhaps self-selecting, is to surround myself with the most intelligent people I can meet with intellectually, and try to form emotional and sexual bonds with them. I do not think I would ever be okay with a pre-personal relationship (I would call it a purely physical sexual relationship), but I am quite okay and very much want to take my existing emotional attachments and make them sexual, also.

The key element for me is probably to build up communities that avoid pre-personal relationships, but not at the cost of denigrating sexual relationships.

Besides… why bother with a pre-personal relationship? Masturbation is more fun, runs no risk of disease, and runs no risk of anyone getting attached.

Re: Transpersonal and/or/vrs Instinctual Relationships

jackii said Mar 27, 2007, 9:04 AM:

the perfect world is perfect, precisely because there are people who see that it is not perfect and choose to improve it as led by all that they connect to.

thank you for standing up and speaking your truth when you decide it is the right time, even if you step on my toes, or kill me (and my friends). but don't be surprised when the karma hits the fan.