Today is the last full day of my being in my seventy seventh (77th) year of birth, tomorrow I will start on my seventy eighth year, leaving the middle seventies behind. However, I feel that seventy seven is a year of significance either way, so I am in a mood of appreciation and expectation.

My writings did not get completed yesterday, but I will make an attempt today. Last night I entered on the computer the first page from my yellow notebook (p.40) that relates to my just completed talk ‘My Belief Shared’.

That very first page as preparation for the mentioned talk was titled ‘Hymn to Existence Divine’. I found it quite amazing while transcribing it, how it presaged the ideas that I ended up expressing in my talk. This makes it clear to me that all the remaining pages - about ten - also will have to be entered on the computer and revisted.

I did a little bit of shopping yesterday, combined with a walk. However, I am nursing a cold, so I am taking extra vitamins, lemon in the tea and staying warm and restful. The latter works fine!

I also received birthday cards, one from my sister Els and one from Herman. Els’ card is the image of Isaac Israels’ painting of a late 18-hundred Amsterdam scene, while Herman’s is enhanced by his fancy writing and a dinner invite.

I looked at the writings of last Friday and yesterday’s entries and concluded that they are complete the way they are. I just have to add the descriptions and do the grammar checks.

However, there is a topic that fits with Friday’s ideology and yesterday’s belief formulation and that is ‘projection’ and the ‘wandering of the libido’. The latter is in the German title of Jung’s ‘Symbols of transformation’ (C.W volume 5). Libido for Jung is the general psychic energy, much like ‘the Force’ of the movie ‘Star Wars’.

This wandering comes about, says Jung, when the symbols of the handed down traditions start to loose their attractiveness. This can be observed in today’s interests for various old sects, cults, mysteries and teachings. The relating literature can be found in the ‘New Age’ books section in the books stores as well as on the internet.

Those authors combine old concepts of the Gnostic or the Celtic priests to lend historic validity to modern ideas about mother goddesses, powers in and of nature and apparent lost lore. This way new ideas are given the glow of an old rediscovered truth.

This new fascination comes from the old raditional symbol - say Mary the mother of god - and is now projected on this new symbol that is much less defined and has much flexibility. It even will even allow for the idea that men have to develop their femininity and feelings, which is indeed not superfluous.

This retreat to older symbols, that so have become reactivated and are now the carriers of modern surfacing - emerging - content that needs to become conscious. So, I am not discounting the need to make new content conscious, but I am pointing out that we are deploying old spent symbols that have been rejected for their inadequacy.

In other words this newly found fascination will start to wander, as none of the old symbolisms will prove up to the task of expressing the new realisations emerging today.

The danger rests in the old symbols with the new energy gaining the upper hand in society, as this did in the case of the Nazi ideology, which acquired religious power. It was an ideology of desperation, but a very destructive one.

That desperation came from the unwillingness combined with inability of the power that be at the time, to address the societal problems of their time and seek a new and creative expression. Creativity thwarted, turns destructive to make room for the new, willy-nilly, which did happen in Europe as we can see today.

Reruns of old philosophies, beliefs and value systems will not address this situation, but make us fall back into the old antagonisms and traditional viewpoints.

On our planet today we have many problems of cultural and economic inequality, cultural misunderstandings and conflicting identities. Reruns of old philosophies, beliefs and value systems will not address this situation, but make us fall back into the old antagonisms and traditional viewpoints.

Today’s ideology of desperation can be read in the statements of the terrorists and is evidenced by their actions, which will not be curbed by a ‘war on terrorism’ alone.

What we need today is an acknowledgement of our situation, that is combined with a mutual validation of our respective positions and the realisation that we are all rowing in the same boat. Recognition of this situation should make us work together towards a solution that is for the common and not the particular good of humanity as a whole.
<10:10am~