by Daniel Plambeck

Discussion and Interpretation I have attempted to show the minute process of cerebral flow involved in a particular creative process during which I recorded both the tilt of the head and the changing topography of the skin. Through dialogue with the subject I observed the mental states and thought processes of the subject. Finally, I have applied my theory of the recorded events in terms of the Jungian processes called shadow and persona. But why might we care to label images of isolated, asymmetrical sides of the face as attributes called shadow and persona? Recall that our eyes process data from the right and left visual fields independently. Most of what we see can be integrated by our conscious mind if we pay attention. We have evolved to recognize intention on other people's faces almost instantaneously and to judge whether to approach or avoid them. While a large part of the field data that enters our senses generally is not interpreted (consciously), face data is critical, and our two hemispheres contribute by intensively processing data independently in their specialized ways. Information about other faces is retained in our subconscious, and is processed exclusively by the hemisphere that perceived it. The laterally mirrored images are not consciously seen, yet their information is undeniably present when we regard another person. I'm suggesting that this multitasking process contributes to the experience we call intuition. For whatever reason, self-viewing of these lateralized images have an especially powerful effect upon people. A younger man I knew agreed to have his image altered in this way. When later I showed him his face images, he stared at them intently for half a minute, looked up and said something like "huh?!". I was interested in observing him and didn't comment. He returned to our business at hand until it was not quite finished, when he abruptly declared he had to leave. He paused with his hand on the door, then re-entered the room. He took my arm and looked in my face. He confessed that he had always wanted to have a son but had never been able. Then he turned and was gone. This was a new level of intimacy between us that I attribute to the effect of his own strangely familiar images on his subconscious mind. Perhaps he saw his shadow. Perhaps for that half minute of staring my friend was in a trance. When two normally dissonant phenomena start to resonate, consciousness ceases being linear and becomes circular, resulting in the right brain dominating the left. Seeing oneself as both familiar and unfamiliar simultaneously is the shock that sets up this resonating condition. When the shock to the persona is strong, this cycling of alternating imagery becomes a self-energizing condition called trance. Trances are highly integrative and therefore often healing to the soul. Against our wills we descend into our subconscious. I don't know what my associate saw in his pictures, but he took a psychic journey during those thirty seconds that put him in touch with deep inner resources that led him to open his soul to me. The ancient Greeks held that the soul's residence was rightly the underworld They insisted the soul is distinct from the spirit (the illuminated god Apollo) and cannot thrive without the mediation of the body's senses. For this reason the soul is a favorite subject of artists who also cultivate the dreamy states of the right brain. Cognitive research confirms that sensory input is mostly processed in the right brain and all indicators suggest that we look for the soul in the same territory. Our shadows probably reside in the underworld of the soul, and not in the disembodied world of the (left brain) spirit. Carl Jung wrote that modern people are restless in their search for soul, but it remained for his disciple James Hillman to take Jung's thinking to its radical conclusions. Because he didn't see why Jung's archetypes needed to be symbols for something else, he redefined "archetypal" as a quality (a process that alters states of being rather than ideation such as Platonic "forms".) Any experience could now become archetypal through the assignment of meaning to it. Since experience of the world enters the mind through the senses Hillman defined all sensory data as images. He insisted that images did not stand for anything else, but were phenomena, and that the imagination is the faculty that assigns value to phenomena. In the photos above our friend burst out laughing as she assigned value to her imaginings. Hillman refers to this imagining process as the poetic basis of mind. The enemy of the imagination is the ego, almost by definition, because it is rational and insists on rules. The word "poet" comes from ancient Greek and literally means, "to make", and Hillman argues that what modern people need to make is soul, which we don't have enough of. Art delivers the opportunity to imagine more of it in our lives We live in a society that is profoundly addictive. Confronting any temptation to stake a claim to right or left brained-ness is to resist the addictive state. The right or left brain dominates the psyche at individual moments that are appropriate to styles of thinking, sensing and feeling. By refusing to politicize brained-ness we can keep our minds open to optimal cerebral flow. Lateral prejudice is counterproductive. The left brain in its quest for rules and structure can block out the inspiration needed for successful creative work, and the right brain can become so absorbed in dreamy contemplation that it forgets to commence work. Intuition too is dependent upon sophisticated left-right brain inter-operations but works a little like the trance. Consider two intersecting circles. Intuition is blocked when the left brain wants to analyze to the point the circles no longer touch. On the other extreme, when the right brain wants the circles to mystically merge so that neither has its original identity, there is no definitive ground for intuition to stand upon. Intuition requires a boundary that shares one part and excludes another part of the territory. MillenniumArts.Net is a web site that presents the development of soul as one aspect of passing the landmark year 2000. The placement of soul as the mediating factor between body and spirit is especially useful in counteracting the dualistic trap that pervades Western thinking and generates some anxiety in all of us at this mythical time of final apocalyptic battle and judgement. More generally the nurturance of soul offers a way through certain spiritual blockages many searchers experience. At our site and under Socrate's dictum, "know thyself", you can apply to us to create imagery of your own face such as appear in this article. We are currently researching the complementary relationships of "soul-mates" and we solicit identical twins to apply for our service at no charge.

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Other articles on the Left/Right brain phenomenon can be found at:

LEFT BRAIN:RIGHT BRAIN by Dan Eden
Rhythm Therapy -A new healing potential.