The Dance of Soul and Reason

Visionaries have traditionally raised alarms about the dangers of reason and the intellect. Often these alarms are fervent, sometimes strident, perhaps because they are intended as wake-up calls. Perhaps they reflect the soul’s anger over rejection. They express rage at the thinking mind’s capacity for various forms of destructive activity. The artist Goya, for example, said simply that “The sleep of reason produces monsters.” In a more restrained way, modern author Malidoma Some’, speaking from the wisdom of an indigenous tradition, has said: “Only through poetry can the mind be saved from its own restlessness, constantly wanting to take control of everything as if the lack of control is terminal to the mind. The mind is something that is in service of the heart.”

Similar sentiments are found in many of the world’s spiritual traditions. Yogi Ramacharaka writes that: “The mind has a wonderful range, but nevertheless, man finds himself traveling around and around in a circle, until he realizes that he is confronted continually by the unknown.” The Zen author Daisetz Suzuki reminds us that: “Man is a thinking reed, but his great works are done when he is not calculating and thinking.” Lao Tsu, author of the Tao de Ching, says simply that: “Those who know do not talk and talkers do not know.” Seng-ts’an says: “The more you talk about it, the more you think about it, the further from it you go; stop talking, stop thinking, and there is nothing you will not understand.” Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce tribe says, with masterful elegance: “It does not require many words to speak the truth.”

I hear and respect these admonitions, but fear that they could lead to an alternative imbalance, one in which the left-brain is disrespected rather than the right. This is why I resonate so much with the image of dancing energies, as expressed in the down-to-earth simplicity of Bill Holm’s poem Advice, quoted in the introduction of this essay:

Perhaps I’m biased, since I like to think and talk so much. Nevertheless, I believe that the problem is not the thinking mind per se, but the imbalance between mind and soul. The danger occurs when the analytical mind is always on stage, in the spotlight, performing solo. This seems the norm in post-modern society for the processes by which we engage issues such as homelessness and affordable housing. The energy of the soul is certainly present, but generally off stage, behind the scenes, sometimes erupting in surprising and refreshing ways, but generally unacknowledged and repressed, so that it too often appears as skewed, distorted, disruptive.

This is all critically relevant to any organization with a mission to engage social issues, particularly organizations that deal with such fundamental issues as house and home. If the processes by which we engage these issues are out of balance, then our outcomes will be less than optimal, not only in the primary sense of providing homes for families and children in need, but also in terms of contributing our share to the healing of the world. We don’t need to be ashamed of thinking and talking. We can celebrate logos, celebrate the value of reasoned, thoughtful approaches to defining and accomplishing our objectives. Yet, we could be more inclusive, more diverse in the truest, most fundamental sense. This, to me, is the underlying meaning of the Family Housing Fund’s “Home Sweet Home” exhibit. The artists, through their images, blessed and inspired our work, indeed joined in the work, as we did in theirs.

The question then becomes how to invite more dancing.

Since the thinking mind is usually in the dominant power position, the first step is to achieve greater consciousness of what’s missing. A common theme among champions of the soul is that over-reliance on the thinking mind produces a kind of socially reinforced group trance, often expressed in the metaphor of sleep. The challenge then is to Wake Up! and to stay awake, so that it is possible to move with grace, back and forth, from one energy to the other in an evolving dance. Again in the words of the poet Rumi:

Those who study the human psyche can help raise awareness as well. In that respect, I have found the ideas of archetypal psychologists Thomas Moore (Care of the Soul) and James Hillman helpful. Hillman was a founder of the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture. In his book, Blue Fire, Moore says this about Hillman:

Here, once again, there is need for caution lest one imbalance replace another. Like many of the admonitions of the sages, this quote represents a corrective one-sidedness. Yes, by all means, let’s enter the symptom with relentless imagination, but let’s keep coming up with our old-fashioned plans of attack, not necessarily to solve the entire problem, but to provide real relief to real families and their children. Let’s both re-imagine our work while we make the best use possible of the gifts of the organized, orderly, rational mind to create as many affordable homes as possible. Let’s continue doing our “work in 4/4 time” while beginning to dance with the “woman standing away from the lamp.”

When I reflected on James Hillman’s path of “unrelenting imagination,” I thought of poetry as a way to engage the symptoms of stress and dysfunction that result from an imbalance of mind and soul. I once heard poetry described as “healing word music,” and I imagine poems as homeopathic remedies, with particular poems providing a form of healing energy for particular symptoms, especially if read aloud. Thus, what follows is an attempt to explore the symptoms poetically, beginning with those that many poets consider primary—fear and denial. One poetic way of engaging fear and denial is through the paths of love and awareness.

Note to readers: This essay is an evolving work in progress. More sections to this essay will be added over time.

Above: Anne Brink (1st), The Housewarming, (detail), 2000, acrylic on muslin, 72 x 60 in.

Download printable version of Soul and Affordable Housing (.pdf format).