I have a map to the home of the soul.
Beyond the mind is a golden find, –
The paradox is a guide to the goal, –
Though doubt is sacred, each man is the Whole.
~Richard Rose
Twenty years ago, I used to browse the shelves of used book stores hoping to come upon a book of wisdom. As I recall, that is how I discovered Bernadette Roberts’ The Experience of No-Self. Last week, I found myself in an obscure corner of the internet, after following one thought and another, till I sat facing a discussion of paradox that impressed me. The author was discussing Albert Rothenberg: a researcher on creativity who was likewise impressed by Niels Bohr.
He was intrigued by Bohr’s ability to imagine two opposite or contradictory ideas, concepts or images existing simultaneously. Bohr demonstrated that if you hold opposites together, then you suspend your thought and your mind moves to a new level. The suspension of thought allows an intelligence beyond thought to act and create a new form. The swirling of opposites creates the conditions for a new point of view to bubble free from your mind.
Rothenberg identified this process as “Janusian thinking,” a process named after Janus, a Roman God who has two faces, each looking in the opposite direction. Janusian thinking is the ability to imagine two opposites or contradictory ideas, concepts, or images existing simultaneously. Imagine, if you will, your mother existing as a young baby and old woman simultaneously, or your pet existing and not existing at the same time.
I experienced the feeling of grappling with paradox on many occasions. The most striking of these involves flying. I used to find flying quite confrontational, as I feared crashing during takeoff. As the plane barreled down the runway, picking up speed, the thought of my death loomed large. I would, in short order, take stock of what I knew for certain. Who was I? Did I know if any part of me would survive death? As the plane rattled and shook, leaving the ground, it hurtled me towards the undeniable conclusion I knew nothing for certain. “What did it mean to die?” I asked. “What would it feel like?” I could imagine blackness, I could imagine the world vanishing, yet… the thing, my most precious self, doing the imagining could not imagine itself no longer existing. The imaginer would vanish along with all of its experience. How could I imagine being without that which did the imagining? This paradox, occurring at a height of tension and demanding an answer, would seemingly melt the either/or framework of my mind. In giving up the struggle, a feeling dawned that I was, inexplicably, already dead. I was alive, but dead. Death, nothingness, was within me; I was simultaneously existent and non-existent. I felt it, but my mind only faltered and sputtered in the faint gust of that feeling. It did not blow out as Nirvana demands.
I find the words to attempt to explain this now, but at the time, there were no words. There was only a feeling of giving up, of being helpless in the face of uncertainty, of having no solution. In facing, living, and considering the paradox, I allowed the glimmer of some other way of thinking – a new point of view.
Consider this image:
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height=“1.34375in”}
Spend a minute or so looking at the image above. You may notice your mind flipping back and forth as it identifies the word “false” and the word “true.” It may rapidly flip back and forth, but does it ever see both words simultaneously? Do you understand how you can see both simultaneously? What does it take? Keep looking till you think you have experienced what it is to see both simultaneously.
For some, after a period of experimenting with this, there is a noticeable withdrawal of the mind from its nearly constant reaching out and engaging in identifying/categorizing behavior. Instead, they feel the image come to them, just as it is: neither “true” nor “false.” As one person explained, “As long as I see them as ’true’ and ‘false,’ I cannot see them simultaneously.” The only way to transcend is to not identify. Try it. It is important to notice the feelings and inner motions of your mind as you do this.
Rothenberg felt that doing exercises in “Janusian Thinking” might improve creativity. I don’t know. Nor do I know if such exercises would improve one’s spiritual discernment. What I do know is what Rose said: “The paradox is a guide to the goal.” We are presented with paradoxes; our very existence is a paradox. During plane flights I might have read a magazine, or listened to music, or imagined myself eating ice cream. I might have employed a dozen easy distractions to avoid facing the uncomfortable paradox presenting itself in my experience. Allowing the discomfort to be present, sitting with it, was all that was required. Yet, I should not diminish the effort: that “all” required everything I had to offer.
Facing our paradoxes is no easy task, yet it calls to us. Acknowledge the paradoxes that call to you, and allow them to do their work. They are guides, whose chief demand is your attention.