Imaging the Experiential State, Complex Nucleus, and Ego-Self Axis

Note from Chuck: I first published this page in 2012. Note for me, my pages – see guide to pages at the top of right hand column – are the fixed building blocks of the symbol system. Posts, archived below the pages, are explorations on a theme.

Taking a look this morning, I decided to bring this page forward for a refresh. My conceptual framework does feel a bit like five ball juggling. I am shooting for identifying the various components, which, taken individually can be grasped quite directly. The challenge is to get them all in the air at once. The heart of this exploration for me continues to be the bridge between the life we live, starting out as infants, coming from our mother’s womb, and the archetypal world, our shared/collective, old brain, hard wired resource bank. Recall, for me the archetype(s) at play in our lives reflect those actual, precious few moments when, emotionally overwhelmed by what was going on in the room what ever our age that was more than we could take, required the employment of dissociative defenses. In this moment, the archetypal layer activates and spontaneously provides an/the associated image and affect based template(s) from the old brain’s collective memory. I have no real idea about what the scientists say about genetic memory; but, if there is such a thing, I believe it is in the imprinting/recording and passing along of the image and affect scenes encoding core survival strategies.

in the capturing of the components of the nucleus of the complex; which is to say, the scene of the wounding, in the act of being wounded, and all its associated affects. It is the place where the degree of intensity of the experience/episode is sufficient to precipitate a dissociative episode. This level of challenge evokes its associated archetypal scene image and affect template match. It seems to me this is the key. This link: Complexes as Bridge to the Symbolic World pulls up an extensive description of this plate’s illustration. Please feel encouraged to search for the core components. Enjoy…and let me know if this seems helpful.

From the experiential state to the complex: developmental failings or traumas severe enough to trigger primary survival defenses, that is, disconnection through splitting, evoke archetypal, hardwired resources in the form of complexes. These are as if image and affect templates activated via a match with the emotional resonance of the here and now scene.

Here I am suggesting we start with picturing the developmental wounding, symbolized by the Experiential State in the mother/father other approaching from the right, as the activating object, caught in the act. Imagine how this episode, one of here and now, this world, actual wounding, contributes to the composite Experiential State.

In addition, the complex nucleus, with its image and energy, reflects the fact of the scene’s corresponding evoked archetypal node. This activation contributes it’s ancient pattern recognition and resources in providing spontaneous help to insure survival in the face of a seemingly impossible experience. This plate illustrates the shared elements and places the ego-Self axis in the center, in recognizing the continuum with regards to the degree of conscious access versus effective repression at any given time.

Explore posts in the same categories: Complexes and More, Connecting the Dots Series, Learning to Think and Work Symbolically

Tags: archetype, bridge

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