On the numinosum : on healing trauma and bringing down the walls that keep our souls in isolation : insights from Donald Kalsched

The following is part direct extract and part translated extract, interspersed with my own comments taken from

Chapter 7. Rapunzel and the Self Care System in The Inner World of Trauma : Archetypal Dimensions of the Personal Spirit by Donald Kalsched

Jung adopted the word ‘numinous’ from Rudolf Otto’s important study of the nature of religious experience across cultures. Otto has shown that the numinous is a category of experience like love or aggresion, but a category experience pehaps uniquely expressive of what it means to be human. It was a small step for Jung to theoretically locate this awe inspiring mysterious power in the deepest layer of the psyche – its collective or religious dimension. So, according to the argument we are making here, when trauma strikes and the enchantress comes to rescue the human spirit, the archetypal world that opens up through the abyss of outer catastrophe is a world already waiting to be discovered. It is not ‘created’ by the ego in order to provide necessary illusion (as Freud thought). It is placed in the service of ‘illusion’ in order to defend the personal sprit, but these archetypal defences are a kind of miracle in their own right and provide for the organism’s survival.

The problem comes, as we have seen, in the Rapunzel-self’s desperate longing for a real life from with a towered world which begins to turn more and more persecutory. The caretaking of the numinous energies begins to give way to the diabolical, destructive side. These are the light and dark sides of the numinous and represent amplified versions of the ‘love’ and ‘aggression’ which the traumatised person has not been able to humanise in normal personal development with transitional figures.

… the separating ‘wall’ is back now as un unbridgeable gap separates them (the prince and Rapunzel) – each lost to the other. But then the Prince hears Rapunzel’s voice….he wanders blindly towards (it) until Rapunzel recognises him, falls on his neck, and cries the tears which heal his broken vision. In this image we have a beautiful description of how grief heals the lost connection to the numinous world.

In the therapy situation there are also many tears at this time. Patient and therapist go through many times when the connection seems to be broken. And yet, if the tension can be held during this period a true (joining or meeting) is possible. One of the healing factors in this working through period is the fact that this time, the ‘trauma’ comes after essential self object illusions (unravel). (this occurs because unlike in childhood the therapist can hear the protest of the traumatised child who at times feels ignored or locked out and validate it) In this way a small part of (the poison of the original wounding experience is released and healed).

Kalsched points out that for true healing to occur in therapy the therapist must also be strong enough to acknowledge when he makes mistakes or lets down the inner child of his client. It is common for clients to feel angry with the failures of therapist but equally important for them as adults to recognise the humanity of the therapist while allowing their inner child to feel and express that anger and locate its original source. They must recognise that the therapist is not the original parent who did the damage but only a stand in, their ‘failures’ provide an opportunity for the patient to feel the original pain of misattunement or shaming or emotional abandonment of the parent towards the child.

“In this process the therapist’s humanity distinguishes him from cruel perfectionism of the patients inner caretaker. The ensuing struggle, shared with the patient, represents the larger human reality which in one way is the larger human community which the patient has never fully entered. This is the essential grief work done during this period.

When our Rapunzel patients get better, even as their outer lives become more animated, they go through a mournful period of dreaded loss of their inner worlds – or so it seems to them – a kind of agonising sacrifice of what feels like their childhoods. They do not want to give up “Gods’ world” for the hollow superficialities of ‘this world’ with its banalities and falsehoods. Yet life in the outer world is beginning to be more real and authentic. ”

Kalsched says that as traumatic injuries are felt, grieved and integrated within we then become able to live in both worlds, neither sacrificing one world for the other, that is we do not have to endlessly live in an isolated world of pure fantasy besieged by terribly critical voices that break linkages or connections with others as defence against our fear of engaging in real and sometimes ‘flawed’ human relationships.

According to Kalsched successful working through of trauma and broken linkages to the ‘real’ world means : We begin “living in a world where the wall between imagination and reality comes down and becomes a flexible boundary. This is more than Freud’s every day misery. It is living a life that one can dream about and in which the struggle to realise that dream can be shared with those who are doing the same thing.

Healing of trauma brings us therefore back into relationship with an at times painful reality while accepting that it also has gifts. Bearing with the pain of taumatic injury can also mean we develop a very strong and healing relationship with the inner world of dream, myth and imagination, here within finding healing sources of numinous light and support which better help us to live deeply and skilfully within ‘reality’.