Transcendent Functions, Peak Experiences, and a Different Way of Knowing

Here are links to two lectures I’ve given recently. One, on “Jung’s Search for Meaning,” was given for the Weekend University here in London last summer. The other, “A Different Way of Knowing,” is the first part of the three part seminar on Lost Knowledge of the Imagination I’ve been giving through Nura Learning. I imagine a lecture should speak for itself, but here’s the general idea: In the first I try to bring together Jung’s notion of the “transcendent function” - the “lift” the psyche gets when the conscious and unconscious minds reach an agreement - with Maslow’s “peak experiences” and Colin Wilson’s Faculty X. In the second, I take the class through the first chapter in Lost Knowledge, trying to bring out exactly what a “different way of knowing” might be like. You should be able to take it from there.

2 thoughts on “Transcendent Functions, Peak Experiences, and a Different Way of Knowing

  1. Hi Gary. I appreciate who you are and the trajectory you are following. Thank you for all the great insights you have shared. I have some puzzle pieces that you need. Conscious and unconscious are outdated terms, as are right/brain and left/brain. There is a fundamental reason why consciousness is dual and there is a quantum/biological explanation for our mutually-exclusive, co-dependent, oscillating duality-this is an expansion of dual-process theory. This new system theory fits with the symbolism of Alchemy and with Gurdjieff’s and Steiners movement routines (etc).

    1. Thanks for the tip, but to be honest, I never worried that much about being up to date. Conscious/unconscious, right/left work for me, and they still do for a lot of other people, so I will stick with them. Cheers!

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