There’s a great scene in The Right Stuff where an astronaut meets some aborigines in Australia.
He tells them about his buddy who is going into outer space, and to his surprise;
the aborigine seems to know exactly what he’s talking about;
Fly over? - Yeah.
Your bloke do that too?
You’re saying you do that yourself?
No, not me mate, not me.
See that old bloke there?
He know, he know the moon, he know the star.
It’s an interesting connection between old wisdom and modern technology, about which
Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette comment; We often mistakenly think that we are very
different from our ancient ancestors, with our great knowledge and our amazing technology.
But the origins of our knowledge and technology lie in the minds of men like the old aborigine.
He, and all those like him in tribal and ancient societies were accessing the magician energy.
The archetypal Magician is one of the four basic building blocks of our psychology
discussed in their book King, Warrior, Magician, Lover, and it is the last one in my series
exploring these instinctual energies in film and television.
Carol S. Pearson also wrote about the Magician in her book The Hero Within,
and gives us the following broad definition;
The archetype of the magician teaches us about creation,
about our capacity to bring into being what never was there before,
about claiming our roles as cocreators of the universe.
To access the Magician is to adventure into the world of ideas, to become a student of
all kinds of hidden and secret knowledge and take part in the constant process of creation.
This is often achieved through the process of initiation,
in which the Magician is not only a student, but also a master.
In Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey, these are the mentors who guide the protagonist
from the ordinary world into the special one where transformation takes place.
You've taken your first steps into a larger world.
A distinction can be made here between the Magician as a master of technology,
and the Magician as a knower.
The first relates to transformation in the material world,
the second to transformation in the personal psyche.
This distinction is important, because as Moore and Gillette argue;
Ours is, we believe, the age of the magician, because it is a technological age.
It is an age of the magician at least in his materialistic concern with understanding and
having power over nature.
But in terms of nonmaterialistic, psychological, or spiritual initiatory process,
the magician energy seems to be in short supply.
Where did this imbalance come from?
And what is this other half of the Magician that we appear to have lost?
In his book The Archetype of Initiation, Robert Moore explores these questions by examining
premodern tribal principles considered lost or inaccessible to modern society.
One of those lost principles is sacred space,
which is separated from the ordinary or profane space.
Moore refers to Mircea Eliade who, in his book The Sacred and The Profane;
explains how our modern society is based solely on the profane
and no longer acknowledges the sacred as an ontologically unique space;
Properly speaking, there is no longer any world,
there are only fragments of a shattered universe, an amorphous mass consisting of
an infinite number of more or less neutral places in which man moves, governed and driven
by the obligations of an existence incorporated into an industrial society.
The consequences of this are explored in films such as Embrace of the Serpent,
which recounts the stories of two explores, both unable to dream,
in search of a sacred healing plant in the Amazon.
and The Tree of Life, in which the main character finds himself lost in our modern world.
How did I lose you?
Wandered.
Profane space differs from sacred space in that it has no fixed point or center from which to gain orientation.
Profane space has no axis mundi, no cosmic tree or pillar leading to the heavens.
This is the experience of modernity: people unable to locate a center.
It should be noted that sacred space in this context doesn’t necessarily have today’s religious associations,
but rather signifies a more Star Wars-like Force
that can be accessed through tears in the fabric of ordinary profane space.
The consistent factor in premodern times was not the belief in God
but belief in some kind of regenerative power or libidinal energy
that could be tapped into for personal and social regeneration.
There’s a great Korean film called Spring,Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring
which I believe beautifully captures this kind of sacred space.
The story is centered around a small floating temple that contains some peculiar doorways;
in material terms, they seem of little use, but symbolically; they form a threshold from
the profane to the sacred; to the source for personal growth and healing.
Another film that exemplifies this type of sacred space is James Cameron's Avatar; Avatar
I'm trying to understand this deep connection the people have to the forest.
She talks about a network of energy,
Avatar not only features a clearly defined sacred space, but also shows quite literally
how it can be tapped into for its regenerative power.
In today’s society, this might all seem rather silly, but this is completely understandable
As Moore explains;
Modern persons find this notion difficult to perceive because they have been so exiled
from an authentically spiritual or religious understanding of human experience.
Modern secularized individuals typically think that no true center really exists,
and profane space becomes for them a formidable yet meaningless expanse that is fundamentally unreal.
And yet, we can still find traces of sacred space in today’s society, but they are mostly
found on the personal level; in the places that have a special meaning for an individual
and can even hold some regenerative power.
Think about Lady Bird’s hometown Sacramento for example,
or the well that Bruce Wayne fell into as a child.
These are, as Eliade describes it, the holy places of our private universes
where we receive revelations of a reality beyond the one we experience in ordinary everyday life.
Again, these are but distant relics of what was once
a more complete and organized experience of sacred space of sacred space.
Nevertheless, it is interesting to observe how they still play a role in our lives.
In fact; many even actively pursue these hints of sacred space in the hope of finding direction
and structure in an ever more fragmented society.
Robert Moore observes how this pursuit often signifies a desire to submit,
to surrender oneself to the power of the sacred.
A good example of this can be found in Sunshine,
in which the Sun is not only a source of life in literal terms,
but also symbolically as several crewmembers develop a sacred connection to its overwhelming power.
Although submission tends to be perceived as a negative thing in modern society,
when it comes to sacred space and personal transformation it is considered to be a necessary element,
because, as Robert Moore puts it; If you cannot submit, you cannot die,
and if you cannot die, you cannot get reborn.
I'm gonna die.
Here we can turn to Victor Turner’s The Ritual Process and introduce another distinction;
that between liminal and liminoid space.
Both are special forms of space that temporally break us out of our everyday lives,
but whereas liminal space enables true transformation, liminoid space does not.
Robert Moore adds that this is because unlike in liminoid space,
the boundaries of liminal space are stewarded; Truly liminal space, truly transformative
space, truly sacred space in the sense that tribal peoples used it for personal transformations,
always has ritual leaders.
The presence of true magicians is required to contain the powers of sacred space.
Without their knowledge and guidance; people in search for transformative space will only
find liminoid experiences which at best are momentary revelations or vacations providing
some nourishment, but at their worst, they can be dangerous and harmful.
This happens when people don’t fully understand sacred space and are not equipped to handle its power;
or when they venture off alone without the proper guidance,
or when they stay in a liminal state for too long, not knowing how to get back;
this is often the result of pseudo-initiations, examples of which we can find in the military,
which succeeds at turning men into warriors, but often fails at bringing them home.
The absence of true magicians also made us vulnerable to those
who channel the archetype in a dysfunctional way.
These so-called Shadow Magicians don’t guide others, but direct them in ways they cannot see.
They are not driven by a desire to help others, but instead they use their knowledge to manipulate
and belittle others as to maintain their own status and superiority.
For the first time in my life, I began to know really violent thoughts.
As the great film Amadeus shows us;
this shadow often arises from being envious of life and of those who do act and share.
All I ever wanted was to sing to God. He gave me that longing, and then made me mute.
Their intentions can be more noble; take The Dark Knight for example,
where the Joker sees Batman’s morality as arrogant and wants to expose the flaws in his logic,
You see, their morals, their code, it's a bad joke. Dropped at the first sign of trouble.
but instead of doing so in a way that helps him,
the Joker has no intention of constructive transformation,
he only seeks to destroy, thereby accessing the infantile version of the Shadow Magician called the Trickster;
This is the energy form that seeks the fall of great men,
that delights in the destruction of a man of importance.
But the trickster does not want to replace the man who has fallen.
He does not want to take up the man’s responsibilities.
In fact, he doesn’t want any responsibilities.
He want to do just enough to wreck things for others.
So what then are the qualities of good magicians?
And what function can they serve in a society without sacred space and rituals of initiation?
Ultimately; the most important purpose of accessing the magician
and venturing into sacred space is the deconstruction of the ego.
The magician keeps our grandiosity in check, keeps our other archetypes in balance.
It is the archetype of thoughtfulness and reflection, of awareness and insight.
Great magicians see into the depths of human beings;
they have the capacity to deflate our arrogance and call us out when we act in denial or pretense.
I look at you, I don't see an intelligent, confident man. I see a cocky, scared shitless kid.
This is no trivial task;
for unlike the magician’s efforts in the earlier mentioned technological sense, which accumulate over time,
the magician as the steward of our psyche makes no lasting progress
and starts from zero with every new life.
It is no coincidence that the film Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and… Spring parallels the lifecycle of one man,
of one ego, with the passing of the seasons;
the moment spring comes again; the previous cycle has been erased from memory,
and the entire journey begins anew.
What is needed then is a deeper focus on the seasonal cycle of the collective psyche;
and wise magicians who guide new initiates through it;
so that they may do the same when the cycle begins again.
Pearson emphasizes that; Magicians do not try to force social change,
because they recognize that people need to take their journeys in order to be able to
live in a human and peaceful world.
Robert Moore too argues for the need of people of understanding who know how to control our grandiosity
and reconnect us to the fabric of the universe.
Only then can we act from a place of unity; a place of purpose, and grace.
Only then can we channel our energy for the benefit of mankind, and the grand process of creation