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Working with the Anima

  
 
23chao5
03:23 / 09.04.03
In summary: I want suggestions (reading/rituals, etc.) for coming toward integration with my anima, and thus starting to drop the large amount of projection I see myself doing when it comes to women and the relationships I seek.

In detail:

So, as a preface to this:
I've had a lot of dreams and a lot of tarot readings this year involving the moon and involving cups. I recently got involved (in a loose sense of the word) with a girl whose name directly refers to the moon, and as I definitely suddenly went through quite a bit of unexpected stuff--all kinds of complexes, attachments, loneliness, and fears started rising--all very quickly and out of nowhere (from my perspective).

I've come to deal with it more and though she is not in a position to be in a relationship with me, I've realized I am most likely not in a good position for it either--judging by the amount of psychic garbage I've noticed has come up just from contact with her... fantasies of sudden mystical connection with her, projection of my own fears onto her, fear-dreams relating to her. I'm sure to some degree this occurs to a lot of people when they begin to fall for someone, but I myself don't necessarily want this to be a permanent part of my psyche--I aim to feel more complete and comfortable in myself so that I don't project onto others, so that my relationships can be open and honest and not too demanding of myself or the other person--at least not so suddenly and quickly as my mind seems to desire.

In any case, I've read my share of Carl Jung, but coming from a chaos magick perspective, I want to establish some sort of ritual approach to coming more to terms with my own anima. I feel much of my desire for relationships and many of my fears are specifically due to me being very internally disconnected from my own anima, and that the amount of projection I see myself doing in relationship to girls just evidences the need for me to work on this.

What's more, when in situations like this I tend to just become very passive--I become very confused on what I want (because I want _a girl_ which becomes specifically _this girl_ but not really _her_ because who I want is a dream and who she _is_ is someone who cannot be with me... make sense?) etc. In any case, this confusion tends to lead me more to just meditation and not so much active magick, and I feel this time around I need to do some more active working to start to learn how to remain active in periods of time like this, and thus not descend too far into depression and anxiety--creating more internal knots.

So, any comments, personal experiences, words of advice, cool rituals, gods to explore?
 
 
Seth
08:12 / 09.04.03
I've worked in call centres for the last few years, and found myself projecting myself onto a good many of my co-workers. It's especially difficult for me, as my anima seems to manifest as a Chinese or Japanese girl in dreams. It's uncomfortable, wondering whether these things constitute an unconscious prejudice, having to deal with a rush of bizarre feelings about myself whenever I meet someone of the opposite sex and a certain ethnic group.

Hmmm. Risky posting this stuff on Barbelith. I know that there are things lurking in the corner of my mind that aren't exactly PC. Sue me: it's difficult enough trying to understand these forces within myself in order to regulate their manifestation, let alone try to teach them about objectification and discrimination. Isn't it fascinating that there's a huge drive within me that tends to discriminate and project onto certain girls, and that I have to consciously run to catch up with it before it gets out of hand? Of course, putting it like that it seems as though I'm passing the buck onto a vast occulted primal drive within my psyche, resisting taking any responsibility myself. That's a fair comment, I guess.

There's an exercise here, but I found the notion of anima as my polar opposite to be uncomfortably simplistic. The relationship is far richer and more complex, and has many more profound things to say about my psyche than just that Star Trek Mirror, Mirror approach. I found it extremely useful to make a list of the perceived characteristics of girls who trigger these experiences: even if I can't fully control these feelings, I may as well learn to recognise them when they appear. Being conscious of them is half the battle, and I'm not even sure that attempting to control them is a good idea.
 
 
FinderWolf
01:40 / 11.04.03
Can someone give me a definition of "anima", exactly? I sort of feel like I know what it is but not really. Thanks!
 
 
Quantum
09:26 / 11.04.03
A Jungian idea, it is the feminine aspect of yourself. (The equivalent for women is the Animus) Often she will appear in dreams, and represents you as a female.
 
 
cusm
16:51 / 11.04.03
One reference that might help is Antero Ali's The Akashic Record Player. A somewhat dated romp, but an amusing read with a good bit of it involving one of the main characters getting in touch with his Anima through a series of ritual and meditative exercises. And its got Chris Hiatt in there as a character, who's a real jerk, which is fun
 
  
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