“My practice tells me I can no longer distinguish clearly between neurosis of self and neurosis of world, psychopathology of self and psychopathology of world. Moreover, it tells me that to place neurosis and psychopathology solely in personal reality is a delusional repression of what is actually, realistically, being experienced”
― James Hillman, The Thought of the Heart and the Soul of the World
Does the heart have thoughts, does the mind have feelings? These are the poetic questions I have been feeling into for some time, because for me the answer is yes.
A strange, distant misty yes – just like everything we don’t quite have a language for. But a yes just the same.
I have settled – for now – on the term imaginal feeling to describe the sense of feeling through the mind, that then links up in coherence with the heart. I think of this as a kind of alchemical ceremony – a chain of reactions - as we access our senses with true dynamism and a lack of contamination or stifling. At which time they are able to move towards the greatest representation of who and what they are in order to inform us.
Although the mode of receiving or feeling may be different for each person, the energy of the thing remains the same, it simply taps into a different set of sensory experiences in us to communicate or match to the energy we hold as a mirror to it. This alerts us to what this energy means specifically to us. For example - the meaning of a blueberry is both universal to all who know a blueberry and has the potential - when we tap into our exquisite aliveness - to be infinitely multitudinous in meaning to all people - and yet the blueberry’s frequency, its matter and volume, chemical makeup remain the same. But the way we register it carries its medicine, a prescription of identity just for us.
But let’s go back a moment:
What is imaginal feeling?
I feel that a certain amount of poetic license is taken by the imaginal in the way it projects, not because it’s a lie, but as in the blueberry example, its translating through our own particular filters - sometimes dependant on: us/ environment and who knows what else; it appears differently to each of us. I think this is particularly clear in the realm of dreams and extra-ordinary experience. One event can be received as very different by different people and there can also be striking similarities in experience of separate people. When we lean into the poetic, we lean also into sensitivity - into imaginal feeling, giving us the tools to access things in a non-linear way, and make connections that don’t ‘make sense’.
I have always felt like I had an extra sensory perception of ... stuff. I’m not talking about clairsentience or any of that stuff *today* but I mean I have always felt in receipt of a conversation between spaces, colours, textures, smells the stuff that makes up the world.
It sometimes feels like emotional feelings but not quite, like sensory information travelling through and into my mind – and then perceived by my imaginal centres. This sometimes means I get weird reactions to things; certain bands make me see particular colours and shapes and also feel nauseous literally (steely dan, sorry). I see kind of sliding scales like musical notes to explain taste, when I paint - I choose colours based on what the feeling on the edge of my teeth are about them (I call this bite-ability) and I often receive sensations on the very tip of my tongue when people tell me emotional stories. Sometimes in response to this I receive an emotional feeling or physical sensation, sometimes a further mind narrative or story about what I think it all means.
I have always just folded this into being first and foremost an artist, and thought that maybe everyone felt like that, then I wondered if anyone at all felt like this and now, I come to the conclusion that probably a lot of people do. So here I am to talk about this, is it synaesthesia? – yes somewhat -
noun: synaesthesia
the production of a sense impression relating to one sense or part of the body by stimulation of another sense or part of the body.
But it feels more like imaginal feeling to me – like my imaginal self is exploring life, touching and sensing and tasting just as I do. It feels creative, anything that stitches together genres with the ease of innocence feels creative to me – and if it’s creative I am into it.
It makes me think of animism
Noun: animism
1. the attribution of a living soul to plants, inanimate objects, and natural phenomena.
2. the belief in a supernatural power that organizes and animates the material universe.
Is this a form of internal animism… why should the senses be compartmentalised by this flawed idea of ‘normal’? Why not allow the mouth to hear or the ear to taste, perhaps instead of listening harder through our ears, it’s about full body listening - for example.
If you know my work you know I love to talk about ‘agility of mind’ a state to practice in which we can fly from one idea to something seemingly opposite and still find common truth, still find areas for collaboration between, say – arm and orange. Things that at first seem categorically disparate often give us the most hidden and sage information when we slot them together. This is a magical and alchemical skill that has been used since as long as there have been magicians, it’s also an understanding that moves through most mystical traditions from Sufism to the tarot.
When we move outside the known we can begin to find a language that is authentic and marries up with the uniqueness of experience, at least a little better. We can also truly affect transmutation, not just swirl things about a bit.
This is modelled archetypally in the hero’s journey in which the young person must leave the village – even though this feels terrifying, it’s the only way to return as a storied and experienced self.
We see it also modelled in maths’ chaos theory in which it is posited that most mathematical and scientific models are based upon a non-infinite field – and so therefore we bump up against an edge in which we can’t predict or have a foundation for greater understandings – because we are just moving around the same plate of spaghetti, without ever leaving the plate.
We see a similar awareness in theories of consciousness, relationship dynamics and even the merit of having a dedicated place to work creatively – we can’t expand if we don’t acknowledge the containers we are working in and from, and use this awareness to shift them when they become outdated – or we just want something new. Being able to cross genres in the mind and therefore carry wisdom from one hard earned understanding to a working issue is - treasure.
It is my hope that as we expand our understanding of the playing field we reside in as inner and outer beings we can also become more accepting, more dynamic and less rigid. Which I feel, like true creativity – is the energy of healing.
I would love to hear your thoughts on this, have you encountered imaginal feeling in your life experience?
If this floats your boat you might enjoy my course on the tarot which includes a multitudinous approach to understanding the archetypes - you can find it here.
You can also hear me talk a little on this with Vanessa Lamorte on her podcast - Memento Futurum Poetcast
I read this in my email in Dec. and loved it so much! It resonates and delights me in whole body joy. Thank you so much, Arizona! Thank you for sharing your magic as well as how it flows in your life/body/energy. This is a Treasure!
I get a yes to experiencing imaginal feeling, but I have no words for it. Going to sit with this. 💜💙🩵💚💛🧡♥️🩷 thank You!