The sychronicity I'm experiencing with this post is uncanny. I've just undergone a 5-year journey of interior focus, which has just shifted. The outward rush of libido has been intense. Just yesterday, I started writing a piece about Aergia and Horme, and the need for a healthy relationship to activity and inactivity. "Laziness" as a necessary condition for restoration and dreams. I'm also halfway through The Dream and the Underworld, and had underlined the passage you quoted. "Tracking Persephone" adds a whole new dimension to what I was working. I'm excited to incorporate your ideas into the post (with citation and links, of course.)
I love your work, Alyssa. I'm sorry to miss you at The Alembic.
Hey Boston! Glad to hear the article is arriving at an opportune moment. You may enjoy the class linked too for further reflections on moving out of the descent/interior focus.
How are you liking Dream and the Underworld? I find it such an important text for bringing balance and new perspective to dreamwork.
Hopefully there will be more classes at The Alembic (and other venues!).
The other morning I dreamed I was playing this song on the piano. Pandora’s aquarium by Tori Amos. Played it sort of faking it over the keys on a baby grand? And it sounded like I was playing it alright, the song echoed on my head as I woke up and I knew I had to listen.
Tori blends diving into pandora’s aquarium/box (a contained version underworld of emotion shadow healing one must do) with identifying with Persephone as not being seen as an abductee, that she was willing to go there. Healing in the darkness, under the rocks with hades. But also that what happened to her was needing to go there,to the depths.
Her thoughts on the song: “You know when you've cried and cried, and you really can't cry anymore, so you're very quiet? I started hearing the water, and "Pandora" - the last song on the record - came to me. She was sort of warning me that there are so many feelings under the rocks that I needed to turn into. She told me, 'You need to dive into this one, Tori, because your healing is in there. Once you go, it's a whole new journey, but you've got to metaphorically leave this little dock and come with me to find out what's really in this ocean of feelings.' So i did. And that's where I met these songs."
This song reminds me a lot of Kate Bush, it's really cool! I'm not familiar with Tori Amos, thanks for sharing :)
Pandora and Persephone have thematic overlap. Seemingly innocent in one moment, and then interacting with these dark, underworld, overwhelm aspects the next. Both of their stories carry such wisdom for navigating our depths, journeying into the ocean of feelings, as Tori puts it!
Do you think the dream is speaking to something similar? Perhaps a descent for healing?
I have been feeling shadow work/transformation fatigue. And yet, I have started EMDR last week. I also tire of not being able to process some of it. It’s an interesting process that focused on desensitizing and specific eye movements following my therapists hands back and forth.
After that, deep anxiety and distress came up, like I was shedding it. And then, dreams started up. This some has always made me very emotional. It brings up deep things I cannot put words too.
I highly recommend her - a strong female musical genius who is also. Channels her muses and her music. Spotify has everything. Her early albums are a good start.
Oh, that's interesting context. I wonder if the dream is showing that you can engage the deep work (playing the piano) but have some distance from it (fake playing it). Since you were still playing the song well, it might imply that you can engage the process more lightly and still have it be effective.
I did some EMDR years ago. I felt like I didn't do it correctly because I would naturally fall into these really fantastical active imaginations (my therapist would tap my knees as I had my eyes closed). It was useful though!
It’s so hard to do it with my eyes open! it did work to bring down the reactive triggers I have. For the big ones, which will be in the future, we’ll see how it goes.
I’m sure the therapy and my own anxious mind were urging me to keep going. I am motivated but feel tired of it all too. I remember feeling like the playing was almost mystical because it was playing the some well enough. I was genuinely surprised at this. It seemed easier than I imagined it would.
The piano thing is from my childhood. I was obsessed with learning. But all the begging in the world did not get me lessons. I had to teach myself from level 1 books but after that I would need a teacher.
Hmmmm. Piano and Tori are always linked, and Tori & my own healing is linked. When I am processing things, she is on my playlist.
Piano as a child was a musical ability thing. Obsession with music. It morphed into high school and college voice/choir. It is the purest form of expression for me.
The sychronicity I'm experiencing with this post is uncanny. I've just undergone a 5-year journey of interior focus, which has just shifted. The outward rush of libido has been intense. Just yesterday, I started writing a piece about Aergia and Horme, and the need for a healthy relationship to activity and inactivity. "Laziness" as a necessary condition for restoration and dreams. I'm also halfway through The Dream and the Underworld, and had underlined the passage you quoted. "Tracking Persephone" adds a whole new dimension to what I was working. I'm excited to incorporate your ideas into the post (with citation and links, of course.)
I love your work, Alyssa. I'm sorry to miss you at The Alembic.
Hey Boston! Glad to hear the article is arriving at an opportune moment. You may enjoy the class linked too for further reflections on moving out of the descent/interior focus.
How are you liking Dream and the Underworld? I find it such an important text for bringing balance and new perspective to dreamwork.
Hopefully there will be more classes at The Alembic (and other venues!).
The other morning I dreamed I was playing this song on the piano. Pandora’s aquarium by Tori Amos. Played it sort of faking it over the keys on a baby grand? And it sounded like I was playing it alright, the song echoed on my head as I woke up and I knew I had to listen.
Tori blends diving into pandora’s aquarium/box (a contained version underworld of emotion shadow healing one must do) with identifying with Persephone as not being seen as an abductee, that she was willing to go there. Healing in the darkness, under the rocks with hades. But also that what happened to her was needing to go there,to the depths.
https://youtu.be/s9JSGABVd3k
Her thoughts on the song: “You know when you've cried and cried, and you really can't cry anymore, so you're very quiet? I started hearing the water, and "Pandora" - the last song on the record - came to me. She was sort of warning me that there are so many feelings under the rocks that I needed to turn into. She told me, 'You need to dive into this one, Tori, because your healing is in there. Once you go, it's a whole new journey, but you've got to metaphorically leave this little dock and come with me to find out what's really in this ocean of feelings.' So i did. And that's where I met these songs."
https://www.yessaid.com/lyrics/1998fromthechoirgirlhotel/12pandorasaquarium.html
This song reminds me a lot of Kate Bush, it's really cool! I'm not familiar with Tori Amos, thanks for sharing :)
Pandora and Persephone have thematic overlap. Seemingly innocent in one moment, and then interacting with these dark, underworld, overwhelm aspects the next. Both of their stories carry such wisdom for navigating our depths, journeying into the ocean of feelings, as Tori puts it!
Do you think the dream is speaking to something similar? Perhaps a descent for healing?
I have been feeling shadow work/transformation fatigue. And yet, I have started EMDR last week. I also tire of not being able to process some of it. It’s an interesting process that focused on desensitizing and specific eye movements following my therapists hands back and forth.
After that, deep anxiety and distress came up, like I was shedding it. And then, dreams started up. This some has always made me very emotional. It brings up deep things I cannot put words too.
I highly recommend her - a strong female musical genius who is also. Channels her muses and her music. Spotify has everything. Her early albums are a good start.
Oh, that's interesting context. I wonder if the dream is showing that you can engage the deep work (playing the piano) but have some distance from it (fake playing it). Since you were still playing the song well, it might imply that you can engage the process more lightly and still have it be effective.
I did some EMDR years ago. I felt like I didn't do it correctly because I would naturally fall into these really fantastical active imaginations (my therapist would tap my knees as I had my eyes closed). It was useful though!
It’s so hard to do it with my eyes open! it did work to bring down the reactive triggers I have. For the big ones, which will be in the future, we’ll see how it goes.
I’m sure the therapy and my own anxious mind were urging me to keep going. I am motivated but feel tired of it all too. I remember feeling like the playing was almost mystical because it was playing the some well enough. I was genuinely surprised at this. It seemed easier than I imagined it would.
The piano thing is from my childhood. I was obsessed with learning. But all the begging in the world did not get me lessons. I had to teach myself from level 1 books but after that I would need a teacher.
Does the piano dynamic from childhood echos the stuff you're working on now? I wonder if there is a direct link?
Hmmmm. Piano and Tori are always linked, and Tori & my own healing is linked. When I am processing things, she is on my playlist.
Piano as a child was a musical ability thing. Obsession with music. It morphed into high school and college voice/choir. It is the purest form of expression for me.