New Realities recorded on December 28, 2010
Summary
In this episode of New Realities, host Alan Steinfeld interviews Arnold Mindell, an author and the originator of process-oriented psychology. They discuss Mindell’s transition from physics to Jungian psychology, his development of the ‘dream body’ and ‘process mind’ concepts, and his approach to conflict resolution and working with individuals in extreme states, including comas. Mindell emphasizes the importance of following subjective experiences, recognizing subtle signals, and understanding the deeper essence of conflicts to facilitate healing and unity.
Transcript
Alan Steinfeld
Welcome to New Realities. My name is Alan Steinfeld. This program is a series of ongoing investigations into the nature of reality and also a planetary transformation that’s happening around the world. Part of that is how can we start to think different about reality and what we know of ourselves. Tonight’s guest is someone who’s investigated that field about different ways of knowing, different ways of experiencing our life in the world. His name is Arnold Mindell. He’s the author of 19 books, published in 20 languages, particularly on the dream body and process work. He has a Jungian background, and I’m happy you’re here, Arny. Thank you.
Arnold Mindell
Thank you for inviting me, Alan, and thank you for exploring new realities. We need more of them.
Alan Steinfeld
Exactly. Your work is so vast that we should start right there. How do you define reality based on what you call the dream body and process work? And go a little bit into the background behind those if you don’t mind.
Arnold Mindell
How do I define reality? Let me say something about my background so you’ll understand me better. I studied at MIT. I was originally a scientist. I was practicing physics, applied physics, engineering, and things like that. And then I realized that physics wasn’t sufficiently scientific in the sense that it takes observations, looks at them, and says, I can see this or that, or there’s a probability of this or that happening. But they don’t sufficiently study the observer, me and you. That’s the first-person experience. So you may look at me or I look at you. I see a person, I measure up, you have a certain weight, all those kinds of things. But then there’s all sorts of other feelings and things and dreams that you’re having that are not treated sufficiently scientifically. So I started to study Jungian psychology.
Alan Steinfeld
I just wanted to ask you about that because science, and that’s been the big divide in science, is science is only really Western science, what you can measure and observe. It doesn’t really take into account any feeling, any internal, any subjective experience.
Arnold Mindell
That’s right. It doesn’t know what to do with non-repeatable experience. It admits that that’s possible, but for example, if you go to your doctor or I go to my medical doctor, a normal medical doctor, and say, I have a stomachache. He’ll take some chemical measurements, he’ll take some different physical measurements. But asking about how I experience my stomachache, that’s a first-person experience. Science doesn’t treat first-person experiences sufficiently scientifically. They don’t analyze them, they don’t look at them, they don’t follow those experiences.
Alan Steinfeld
And so you in your experience knew that there was another level of reality that was based on the subjective.
Arnold Mindell
Exactly. So I went into Jungian psychology and I love Jungian psychology. I love Jung. And his treating of the dreams and dreaming so seriously, and taking that seriously. And then one day, in my early 30s, I had some pain in my feet, and my God, it was the gout at the age of 30. So my doctors thought at the time. And I realized, my God, they’re treating me allopathically. What happened to the meaningfulness of Jungian psychology? There was no dreaming body, there was just a body. And I was being treated as a body as if it wasn’t mine.
Alan Steinfeld
That’s such a major point in Western medicine that we’re still trying to deal with. They treat the body as if it’s uninhabitable and life itself is an accident and there’s no connection to any source of creation.
Arnold Mindell
I do know. Yes. So when the doctor said I have the gout, I said, no, I have a pain in my foot that feels like hell. And he said, I don’t know what to do with that. So they’re doing their best. Part of reality is the physical reality. I call it consensus reality, Alan. Consensus means the consent that reality is my physical body, is a physical thing that can be treated physically. And I do love that. I believe in that, being a physicist especially, I take that seriously. However, it didn’t make me feel better, and I needed to go more deeply into what is reality and incorporate not just consensus reality, but also the whole world of dreams, dreaming, and so-called non-consensus or subjective reality, first-person experience.
Alan Steinfeld
So the first-person experience was sort of your jumping-off point into a kind of original thinking, into a creative exploration about the nature of who we are.
Arnold Mindell
That’s right. Following the person the way she is. From Jung I learned to follow dreams. Then I wanted to learn to follow the dreaming as it’s happening in our body moment to moment. For example, I’m talking to you now, but I’m standing up here on the West Coast overlooking the sea and what you can’t see is I’m very excited because I’m inspired by the conversation. So now I’m saying it. But that would be a dreaming. These things you don’t hear them automatically in my vocabulary.
Alan Steinfeld
Let me see if I understand that. So the dreaming would be the experience of the emotion, of the internal perception.
Arnold Mindell
Dreaming is internal and, believe it or not, Alan, dreaming is visible. If we develop our eyes, you can see it in my signals. I’m dancing around a little bit here. And I’m moving around, and you can see it in people’s signals.
Alan Steinfeld
Yes, please give me another example.
Arnold Mindell
Think for example of one of my early clients when I was working in Switzerland. It was a pastor, a reverend, a very sweet man who came in and said he was having stabbing heart pains. He smiled at me while he said that, but I noticed that he was putting his nails into his skin as he was talking. I said, how do you experience your nails? He said, they’re sharp. I said, isn’t that interesting? That sharpness is not just in your heart pain and angina. It’s also in your nails, what you’re doing right now. I can see it. I said, have you recently had any dreams of anything? And he said, yes, I dreamed that after I found out I have a very bad heart, I dreamed about a big knife. So I said, I can see the knife in the way you use your nails right now. And I can hear you trying to be definitive. And I said, maybe you need to be a little sharper and more definitive in the way you do things. And he started roaring with laughter. He said, oh my God, my congregation has been telling me that for a long time. That I’m too nice, I’m not sharp and definitive enough.
Alan Steinfeld
So his own internal dream and his own body itself was telling him something about his own psychology.
Arnold Mindell
That’s right. His double signals, that means not the signals he associates with, but his nails into his skin and his experience of the heart, namely sharpness, were just like his dream of a knife. So I called this experience of the body the dream body, that our dream body is there. And to make him feel better, I said, you should begin to use that knife, not just on yourself, but use it outside, be more definitive. And lo and behold, his heart pains got better. So I tell you that’s a very simple story about how integrating dreaming, which you can’t see, so-called subjective experience, but really it’s not subjective. You can see it in people’s signals.
Alan Steinfeld
Another aspect of it not being subjective, and I think I read it somewhere in one of your books, is that the external environment, like a sound in the street, Jung had that happen to him as well, is a kind of interaction with our deep psyche. Can you tell me one of those stories where a group was going on and there was something happening external in the world that reflected the process of the people in the group?
Arnold Mindell
That’s very interesting. Amy and I work on conflict resolution also in different parts of the world. So let me just be more methodical. This dream body idea went further and you could see the dreaming happening in relationships and in large groups. You can see it happening in people near death. It’s a useful thing in working with people in extreme or psychotic conditions.
Alan Steinfeld
Can you just say how you would work with it in an extreme and psychotic condition? I’m interested in that as well.
Arnold Mindell
I follow the person. I don’t just assume that a so-called psychotic person is crazy. The medical diagnosis, I totally understand and I understand the importance of giving medicine and making people feel better and calmer if it works, all the better. On the other hand, I learned to work with people when there were no pills yet in Switzerland. The medicines were still very undeveloped. So for example, one of the people I met for the first time, her psychiatrist invited me into the mental hospital where she was, and this particular person, he said she’s completely crazy, just look at her, what shall we do? And I looked at her, she was under her bed. And I thought, well, that’s really interesting. She’s under the bed, she won’t come out. Now that’s a real opportunity for an adult therapist. I’ve never had a chance really to work with anybody who’s under a bed. She’s really creative. So in any case, to make the story short, I also got under a chair and I just was there with her following her process. After a minute or two, she said, blub. And I said, blub. To make the story short, we were blubbing together and she said she was a fish. Then some weeks later to make that story short, she was out of the mental hospital and in my practice and she explained to me that she didn’t like being a human being, Alan, because being a human being for her meant that she had to be part of her family system just after the Second World War. Her father had done some very ugly things in the country that she was from to other people, and when she learned about it, she went so-called crazy.
Alan Steinfeld
But craziness is basically a subjective experience which isn’t being followed enough. That’s my point. So you followed her into her mythologies, into her own mind in a way.
Arnold Mindell
Yeah. I assumed that process knows the way. I follow process, why I call the work that we do process-oriented psychology. I look at somebody’s process, whether it’s his nails into his skin or a pain that he has or whatever. I follow the dreaming process without first diagnosing the person or interpreting them as sane or insane.
Alan Steinfeld
Oh, so that’s right. I got that from your books. It’s like you’re just following along as the universe is giving you signals. And you’re saying, what’s this about? You have this open inquisitive mind that says, okay, what’s the world trying to show me?
Arnold Mindell
Yes, I like it. In some ways process work is like Taoism. I say there’s a Tao that means there’s a situation. Now it’s a kind of spiritual thing for me. I behave mostly like a practical therapist, but it’s a spiritual thing. The universe is showing me something. I want to open up and see if I can follow it in reality. Take a pill if you don’t feel good. If it doesn’t work, go deeper, follow your dreaming and go even deeper even if that’s not enough.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, that’s been your amazing work with people in comas. I mean, you’ve been able, I’ve heard, bring people out of comas by following the process of their breathing and things. Isn’t that true?
Arnold Mindell
That’s absolutely right.
Alan Steinfeld
Tell me about something and then we’ll get back to the collective thing. But this is all really fascinating. I’m getting what you’re about. And it’s a great way to just live moment to moment as well, isn’t it?
Arnold Mindell
It is, it’s more fun. It’s more creative to live this way. You never know. You set your life up and make all sorts of dates and then you see what happens. Well, yes, in coma, I discuss that in my book on coma. And Amy, my wife, has also written on coma. There I discuss, for example, the case of somebody who was dying, and he was already comatose. And the doctor said, well, he’s done, you might as well just say goodbye and that’s it. But his wife wanted Amy and me to work with him. So we sat by his bedside and I said, now just follow your breathing. He’s not talking obviously, he’s lying there. So I’m just following the process. Breathing with him, breathing in, breathing out, watching the tiny little flickerings of his eyes. Assuming he might be experiencing something. So I say, notice that. Oh, we noticed your eyes flickering, we noticed this, we notice that. And to make the story short…
Alan Steinfeld
You said that out loud when you…
Arnold Mindell
Out loud. While he’s breathing we’re talking to him. Assuming there is somebody there even though nobody thinks he’s there. And we assume he’s dreaming. And after a while, after a couple of hours, he sat up in bed. And he started talking to us. And I won’t go through the whole dialogue, he came back for 24 hours to resolve and complete a whole bunch of things that he wanted to complete to tell his love to everybody and what have you. You can read about that in one of my books. And then he was ready. And then he said, well, Arnie, thanks a lot. I’m going to go on studying with you afterwards. But for now, that’s it, and then he died.
Alan Steinfeld
Wow. And that must have been an awakening for you in some ways to know the power of this work, or were you expecting it, like, oh, no big deal, or were you really saying, oh my God, look what we can communicate with?
Arnold Mindell
Alan, that’s a really good question. I have constantly been surprised by the power of nature. The power that we follow nature and people who are dying have remarkable abilities, or comatose, around the world now, today. This work that I started years ago is in hospitals all over the place now, and communicate with people in comas and many can come out and talk about their experiences and live on. But I have constantly been absolutely amazed. My God, life is much more than I ever realized it could be.
Alan Steinfeld
And you’re still, I mean, I get that excitement just in your voice and just by hearing your enthusiasm for your work. It’s an ongoing discovery, each moment, isn’t it?
Arnold Mindell
Yes. You never know what’s going to happen.
Alan Steinfeld
If you can communicate that to the world, then that is a gift that each one of us has that potentially evolving dream body to discover.
Arnold Mindell
Each of us has a remarkable intelligence that we’re not quite in touch with. It’s the intelligence that Jung saw behind the dreams. People have called it God and the mind of God and all that kind of thing. That intelligence is right there. For example, you even see it in group work.
Alan Steinfeld
Group work, yes, because…
Arnold Mindell
For example, Amy and I work with a group that was having a big problem because the vice president of the organization had stolen a lot of money. So they kicked the vice president out. But everybody was talking about the vice president anyhow. In fact, they were talking about the vice president so much that people weren’t going to work. They were just talking about the vice president. So they invited us in to help. So now there’s a group situation and the vice president isn’t there, but the vice president is there in another sense. Things that people talk about in groups and in relationships that cannot be directly represented, like the vice president, he’s gone, are still there in a ghost role. They’re like ghosts inside of us, and we call them ghost roles. And we get the group then to play that ghost role out. Play out the vice president. We said to everybody, and we got together with this large group, and everyone said, I want to steal this. I want to steal that. I’m going to steal this and this and that. And I said, now really feel that. What are you saying? They said, I want to steal something. And then suddenly a woman said, I too want to steal something, and the reason is because no one appreciates me. No one says good morning when they come in the office. I just sit here at the desk and nobody says hello. I want a flower. I want to steal something. I would like more love here. And suddenly everybody started saying the same thing. Yeah, we want to be appreciated too. In other words, the vice president who had stolen was a symbol of everybody’s need in the organization to get more appreciation. Since they weren’t getting it, they felt like unconsciously robbing everyone.
Alan Steinfeld
So wait, wait. Does this mean they actually realized that in the moment?
Arnold Mindell
Yes, the group realized it right then and there. And then they stopped talking about the vice president, and began appreciating one another for who they are. And that was the end of the stealing, and that was the beginning of them making a lot more money. They were happier.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, it’s interesting because a lot of my friends are divorced, and even in the separation, the argument is what binds the relationship together still. So, I mean, how does one get through that in your work and finally get disconnected from the thing that wants to occupy the psyche, you know?
Arnold Mindell
By going into it more deeply. Like for example, between conflicting parties like in Ireland some years ago, when the Irish were in terrible straits. We were working in Dublin, and then people were saying, you’re the bad guy. No, you are the evil people. You’ve done this. And the other said, then you’ve done that. No, you killed my people. The other said, you killed my people. So then Amy and I basically said, so death is in the air. How is death really present right now between us? So I’m going deeper than the killer. I’m talking about the essence of the ghost role. How, not just who’s the killer, but is death in the air? And my God, that was so amazing. There was complete silence. Because everyone on both sides started thinking, yeah, death is in the air. We are all afraid of dying. Just naming it, that death is in the air, what I call a ghost role, a large energy in the group that no one person can identify with, but they can project onto another. Once you bring out the essence of what’s in the air, suddenly there’s a change. For instance, I saw that suddenly. What is that big red spot I see on the side of your neck? I said to one of the main political participants. And he said, the doctor told me not to come today because he said I could die, I have lethally high blood pressure. Then somebody from the other side said, I was told not to come because I just had a heart attack. Death is in the air, and they looked at each other. Alan, these two men from opposing parties who were afraid and who hated each other, then said, you’re gonna die? And the other one said, you’re gonna die? And in front of these hundreds of people gathered together there in downtown Dublin, suddenly these two guys embraced each other, realizing they were both on the verge of death. And the whole group came together. There was an understanding that was just before voting on the peace accord there in Ireland. So the way to do things is to say, what is the bad thing happening between us and what’s the essence of it? It’s a little different all the time.
Alan Steinfeld
But what does this all say about human beings and our kind of internal landscape and how we are in a way supposed to be in the world? What is the right way of being from your experience and how can we bring the most joy to our experience?
Arnold Mindell
Well, your question if I understand is how should we be living to live most joyously, is that what you were saying?
Alan Steinfeld
Yeah, I mean, based on all the people you’ve worked with and this understanding of the process, how can we use all these experiences to have the most fun, to be in the most correct relationship with this force that’s working with us?
Arnold Mindell
My suggestion to those who are able, some people say I don’t want to know more about myself, I just want to live my life and that’s it. And I say, fine, if you’re happy that way, do that. But for others and probably the majority of the human race, the happiest way to live is to believe in yourself. Believe in all of your experiences. Don’t marginalize tiny little things. Take them as potentially significant. Get to the essence of them. What could they mean for you? Try playing with them. And the same in relationships and in organizations. Take yourself seriously, all that you experience. That’s my suggestion.
Alan Steinfeld
So, I mean, but some people also say meaning is not absolute, meaning is what we create. I mean, is there an absolute meaning that the body sometimes wants to tell us or is it just what we project onto meaning?
Arnold Mindell
That’s a really big question. Meaning is definitely not absolute, nor is it permanent. There’s more sustainable, more permanent experiences we have. There’s the Tao that can’t be said, that’s always changing. But there’s something about each human being which is the deepest part of us. I call that the process mind. The deepest part of us doesn’t change too much. And we usually project it, it can easily be projected or experienced as a piece of the earth. Who we are as a piece of the earth or a piece of the universe. We just look like human beings most of the time. But when we go to sleep at night and when we’re very attentive to our subtle things, we pick up all sorts of little tiny tips about what to do next. These things are coming from our deepest part, the process mind. But you need to be pretty aware to pick that stuff up.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, it also has to do with creativity. I’m here in Connecticut with two very creative people and we’ve been discussing this idea of letting the universe itself work through us as sort of agents of feeling.
Arnold Mindell
Definitely. Yes, I mean, an artist, for example, to live like an artist means that everything is art. So if I were to identify myself as being an artist, and I do sometimes, and my wife Amy surely does, then the idea is you put the piece of paper in front of you or you look at a piece of clay and you watch how it informs you, it dialogues with you so to speak about what to do next. Great art and very creative people do this all the time.
Alan Steinfeld
Picking up flirts, we call them. But then it’s like related to the process work because it’s like let’s see what wants to happen, and then we’re dialoguing with that creative force is what you’re saying, right?
Arnold Mindell
That’s right. For example, somebody comes to see me and says they’re very, very depressed. They can’t move, they don’t know what to do next. And they never have any dreams, and they have no experiences, and they don’t want to follow their body. So then I say, that all sounds perfect to me. So let’s just notice what happens next. Well, nothing’s happening next, the person says. Then I say, that’s good. I’ll wait. Suddenly he said, how come you don’t pull your shades down more? I said, why? He said, there’s the sun is out there. I said, the sun is catching your attention? He said, you bet. That’s bright, that sun. And I said, that’s interesting. That bright sun is so beautiful. He said, yeah, he said, actually, I’m always so dark and somber. Why am I not more like that sunshine? So there it is, that he picked up a piece of the environment that was flirting with him so to speak, the sun. So you can work with the moment, whatever is happening. That the moment has everything in it.
Alan Steinfeld
And you were also going to say before we got sidetracked about this causality that also happens in the moment with our minds and how things outside in the street, even though they will catch our attention for us. Do you know what I mean?
Arnold Mindell
I can only agree with you. That’s right.
Alan Steinfeld
But tell me an example of that because I want to explain that to other people, but I think you’ve seen this in process.
Arnold Mindell
You mean synchronicities that happen suddenly?
Alan Steinfeld
Yes, yes, exactly.
Arnold Mindell
Yeah, this is something that Jung and Pauli were very interested in. You’re walking down the street and certain kinds of colors or a certain kind of person catches your attention. And if you are able to follow your dreams, almost always the things that catch your attention you can find in your dreams. It’s like dreaming while awake. It’s lucid dreaming.
Alan Steinfeld
But there are specific instances where you are working with groups where you can talk about that. I think I read that in one of your books somewhere.
Arnold Mindell
Yes. Oh, I see, yes. In a group. Like for example, we were, I can’t name the countries that were involved in this case, but there were two groups from two different countries which are at war with one another. And the people were there and everybody’s being very nice, trying to be very nice to one another. And each group was saying, we try to do the best we can, and the other said, we’re trying to do the best we can. And suddenly there was a big thunder outside, like from the skies, a big brrrr coming in. And everyone was shocked. And then I said, would everyone be kind enough please to also be the thunder for a couple of seconds? And everyone picked up the thunder by saying brrrr. Then I said, now let’s continue our conversation with more brrrr in it. And wow, the issues came up in seconds. Well, I really hate you. And I really hate you. And what’s behind the hatred? You hurt us, you hurt us. And all sorts of feeling things could come up, and we could get down to business and get through it. And I understand, you see, groups at war don’t want to have to face each other and talk about it. It’s easier to shoot one another than it is to be thunderous and to work through the feeling stuff. So that’s an example of how the environment was a great help.
Alan Steinfeld
But how are we ever going to put an end to war? I mean, people have to start to look at their feelings somehow. I mean, how do you see this changing in our worldwide culture that, you know, you’re so involved with?
Arnold Mindell
We are. I used to think people are just mixed up. They need to develop more or do this. I don’t think that anymore. I think most people are fine the way they are. I don’t want to change anything about the human race. I love people the way they are. However, we need more facilitators, Alan. We need more people who can model loving all sides. Model understanding all sides. Who don’t get polarized themselves. It’s not the general mass of people that’s all messed up. It’s we don’t have enough leaders and enough facilitators. You find them in ashrams or you find having mystical New Age experiences, but we need those people right there on the streets in the middle of conflict helping. That’s the next step, I hope.
Alan Steinfeld
So that’s been your work lately. So you went from Jungian, you went from physics to Jungian to this creative dreaming process work to conflict. Is that the sort of journey you’ve been on, and now…
Arnold Mindell
Yes, I’ve been on the journey of trying to understand, like you and like others and like many of us, who are we? Why are we here? What are we supposed to be doing? How can we be close to the universe and let it speak through us? The universe obviously has a huge diversity capacity. It’s got room for everybody. The planet Earth has room for everybody. How can we find more people, more facilitators who also have a big heart to have more room for everybody? That has been a constant driving force in my life since I was a child.
Alan Steinfeld
So, but also back to your personal search, you have gotten answers. You’ve understood in a sense who you are and where we’re going and what we’re supposed to be doing. I mean, the universe spoke to you because you’ve listened. It sounds like.
Arnold Mindell
Yes, I wouldn’t say that I’ve always listened. It spoke even when I wasn’t ready to listen. And it awakened me many times. I now, of course, I try to be as open-minded as possible and listen carefully to things. But the universe speaks even when we’re not listening. And those are important things. And each has her own path or his own path getting there.
Alan Steinfeld
But no, tell me a situation where you felt like the universe was speaking that you weren’t listening to.
Arnold Mindell
Well, for example, the universe was, there, that example when many years ago when I had a case of the gout. I had already had all sorts of dreams about needing to make changes in psychology and carrying out new things, but I really wasn’t able to do it. I was afraid to do it and what have you. And then, woof, the universe spoke to me through the pain in my foot and said, stop walking the way you are. Start a new way of walking. So big symptoms are wonderful tips often that can give us hints about things that we’re afraid to think or new ways of being that we’re shy about. The body is a terrific message bringer from the universe for me.
Alan Steinfeld
A reflection of our own pure consciousness in a way, isn’t it, the body?
Arnold Mindell
It is, it is.
Alan Steinfeld
So, but I’m also interested now in this work you’re doing back to physics, back to quantum physics and how that is pulling together all these other pieces that you’ve been investigating. How do you resolve it all?
Arnold Mindell
Well, yes, my most recent book, The Process Mind, is an attempt to resolve these things. As a physicist, I was looking, I always loved looking into the universe. What are the laws that govern this universe? Are there laws? And if so, how is it that we can understand them? Einstein called the laws of nature the mind of God. So, as you know or as you may know, physics in the last years, the last probably good 50, 60 years has been looking for the unified field theory. Something that pulls all of physics together. Because there are various forces in physics like gravity and the electromagnetic force, strong and weak nuclear forces and what have you. And there’s no TOE, theory of everything. They’re looking for that. But psychology too has had the same problem. There’s no theory, there hasn’t been a theory of everything. How do body problems connect to dreams? How do you use that in public work and what have you? So I’ve always been looking for a unifying field theory not just in physics and not just in psychology, but something that will connect physics, psychology, and spiritual traditions. Because spiritual traditions have always been trying to think up and imagine images of some unifying force, God or with all its various names. Some mind of God, that intelligence in the universe that moves us. So my research on the process mind is an attempt to pull these various fields together. The process mind really simply says in a way, that as you and maybe others know, something moves us that we can’t quite define yet. If you’re really sensitive and open and just stand, just the slightest, it’s like a little breeze or a little something moves us. If you follow your movements and what have you, you find out its meanings. So my attempt to pull all these fields together to find out what is this thing that moves us, I’ve been calling the process mind.
Alan Steinfeld
And do you, it’s, I mean, you could write about it and maybe you can, but it’s an experience I think. If people, I mean, explaining it is one level, but making people aware that there is this force, right?
Arnold Mindell
You got it. And I, and that’s why, yes, I agree totally. Words are pointing to something, but they’re pointing toward something that moves them. The experience is more important than our understanding of it. Because it will explain itself to each in her own way, in time.
Alan Steinfeld
So is, I mean, you are reflecting the greater movement in culture I think as well. I think many of us are coming to this place of embracing the mystery and not explaining it and how do you see that manifesting in the world? I mean, do you, I see a shift where I’m coming from. Do you see it in your work in the world with conflicts and people and you know, psychology and all that. Is there something coming or is it sort of a New Age fantasy?
Arnold Mindell
It depends upon the group of people that you’re working with and that you deal with. There is definitely in the psychologies an attempt to get deeper and to embrace this wisdom that is in the background and to follow it. There’s no doubt about that. Because it has a healing effect. That’s definitely there. Now in medicine, I think people are waking, I’m more optimistic about medicine than I was years ago. There’s many indications that people are looking for the spirit of the human being as well as their material body. But the large mass of people, when you are starving, and you are under terrific stress, or you’re terrified that you’re going to be killed, there I don’t ask people to necessarily have a spiritual experience, unless it is something that they can, unless it’s natural to them to have it. Some will have it even there, but the majority won’t. And that’s why I say what we need is more people who have the sense of this overarching consciousness who can step right into those hot spots like downtown in front of city hall or where have you, the places where it’s all happening and bring some of these other qualities there because that creates healing. So that’s the long answer to your question.
Alan Steinfeld
No, it’s excellent. Actually what you’re saying is that the way out of those lower states of survival is finding enough people who can model the higher consciousness. And that pulls the lower up out of itself to see the broader perspective. Does that make sense?
Arnold Mindell
That makes sense entirely, Alan. It’s called eldership. The term I like to use is eldership. An elder is somebody who not only represents her own position or his position, but can represent everybody else’s as well, who embraces the conflict and finds meaning in it. An elder is a model. A facilitator who models it. It’s exactly right.
Alan Steinfeld
You know what I’m hoping is that more leaders understand that we are an interconnected entity, like one body. A planetary body. Just as you deal with individual bodies. We’ve talked about group bodies. Is there a way to bring this to the collective, to the politicians, to the people in charge? Because the way you’re approaching it, by seeing the overarching pattern, diffuses the polarity right away.
Arnold Mindell
It’s what needs to be done. We have tried. But many leaders are so identified with their part in the fight that it’s hard for them. I believe it really has to start with the people. It’s a grassroots movement, just like you were saying.
Alan Steinfeld
Right. Like you talk about these conflict resolutions where somebody finally just breaks down and cries. Just a moment of true human feeling shifts the entire room. Can you just recall one more of those? Because it’s so moving to think about that shift.
Arnold Mindell
Yeah. Well, for example, some years ago before the revolution in South Africa, Amy and I were working in Cape Town, and we were working on the conflict between the different tribes and between the white community there. Wow, that was hot. At one point, one person from one tribe said to another person in another tribe, if this conflict doesn’t get settled, when we walk out the door, I’m going to kill you. And then some white woman came forward and said, oh, sweetie, you wouldn’t want to do that, would you? And that attitude irritated that particular person so much, he said it again, I’m going to kill! And then I got into it. I said, yes, you don’t realize if it would, to kill somebody, oh, that would, to kill somebody who’s oppressing you and holding you back in life, who is not even aware that they’re doing it, to murder them could be so relieving. Revenge is somehow, it doesn’t solve everything, but it makes you feel at least a little better. You’re getting back for a little something. And then the woman who had said she was going to be a killer, started to cry. She said, yeah, that’s right. It’s been so painful, really, I’m just hopeless. I don’t want to murder the other person. That’s an example of getting into a one-sided position that actually softened the person.
Alan Steinfeld
You helped people to understand their one-sidedness, they’re stuck there perhaps for a reason.
Arnold Mindell
Well, they were heard. I mean, it’s related to Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication in a way. Beautiful.
Alan Steinfeld
Just being heard helped her shift that feeling, that holding.
Arnold Mindell
There you go. Marshall, yes, Rosenberg is doing terrific stuff, absolutely.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, you’re doing amazing stuff. I love your vitality, your enthusiasm for life, for learning, for experience. You just go right at it and you welcome it. It’s really inspiring to hear you talk and to meet you and to see the person behind the words, to see you and your vitality, Arnie. Thank you.
Arnold Mindell
Thank you, thank you, Alan. Yes, I…
Alan Steinfeld
I just want to ask you one question before we wrap up, is like what, I mean, it just came to me, just what is the most outrageous thing you could think of or feel or have happened? What’s the most outrageous thing that comes to you that really blows your mind, you know, that opens you up?
Arnold Mindell
The most outrageous thing I can think of that opens me up and blows my mind is, again, something that happened with a large group of people in Oakland. We were working down during the times of trials down there, and it was amazing. There was a bunch of African Americans and a bunch of white Americans screaming at each other, and one single person, an African American, came forward during the Rodney King trials at that time. One single person came forward and he started to cry. Everyone was yelling at each other and he started to cry, and his crying touched groups on one side, then another. People felt his tears. There was the most outrageous, most magnificent thing in a large public situation where people wanted to kill each other. He came forwards with his tears and melted the whole group. There were hundreds of people. The San Francisco Chronicle gave us credit for that, but it wasn’t us. It was this single person who helped that whole scene come together.
Alan Steinfeld
Because we all have this ability to feel the same thing. We are such amazing beings of feeling and emotion and sensitivity. If we would only recognize that parts of ourselves we, the world could live in peace and harmony if we recognize how sensitive we are, right?
Arnold Mindell
You got it. I love your attitude.
Alan Steinfeld
Yes. I’m excited about this because I’m involved in the arts and I think the arts are ways that we do feel more. But tell me what you were going to say.
Arnold Mindell
I was going to say that the attitudes, we need to open up to one another. We shouldn’t make war with war. We have to be careful not to be in conflict with one another, thinking others are lower consciousness or not. Those people who are able to develop the ability to facilitate, we want to encourage them. Go deeper and bring your wisdoms out in art, bring it out in music, bring it in writing, bring it out on the streets, and please feel supported by us. We all need you to do that.
Alan Steinfeld
Thank you, Arnie. Very beautifully spoken, and…
Arnold Mindell
Your website is Arnold Mindell? Is that the website that people can find you?
Arnold Mindell
Best website is www.aamindell.net. A-A-M-I-N-D-E-L-L.net.
Alan Steinfeld
I’d love to bring you to New York and do an evening there or a weekend, that would be possible, right?
Arnold Mindell
Terrific, yeah.
Alan Steinfeld
Okay, well, we’ll be in touch and you can call me anytime, and maybe I’ll give you a little ring after the show here, but… Is the show done now?
Arnold Mindell
Almost, I’m just going to say goodbye. I mean this has been great. Alan, thank you so much for your outrageous ability to bring forwards and to elicit the deepest part of me and of all of us. I’ve seen you do this with other people as well. Thank you so much for using your abilities in this way.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, you know, I’m just eternally curious. I am just, you know, especially people like you and the people I’m with here, creative thinkers and people who are not willing to go with what’s been accepted, they’re people willing to look outside the box of what’s possible. That’s what’s so inspiring and I want to share with whoever’s listening. So thanks again.
Arnold Mindell
Thank you and a big hug to you. And to you Ron, and to the others there in your room as well.
Alan Steinfeld
Thank you, thank you Arnie, for your work. Wonderful, it was wonderful listening to this. Very exciting. And I sent it all over Facebook. I’ve been talking here with Arnold Mindell, and his wife is Amy, there too, and his latest book is called ‘Process Mind’, and he is the originator of an amazing body of knowledge on the dream body, and you can see his work is still happening around the world. So again, thank you for being a guest on New Realities. I’m Alan Steinfeld, and if you want to reach me, email me at newrealities@earthlink.net, and check my website newrealities.com. I’m going to end with this song called ‘Song of the Soul’.