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Not sure yet. This is totally new territory for me. This mouse only exists for aesthetic reasons. It's a living work of art. You don't "use it", you just delight in being it. The mouse it is own goal and reward. It's like experiencing an endless alien orgasm.

EVERYTHING is a subjective experience. Consciousness is Absolute Subjectivity. That's what Awakening reveals. God is Infinite Imagination. When you truly grok this, you can turn yourself into a playful alien mouse. Ta-DAAAA!

Think of it this way, I became so conscious that Leo's human body was radically recontextualized into this alien mouse. Leo's body did not physically change. The mouse body was superimposed within my consciousness. It's truly alien. It's a possibility only beyond 3D space-time. You cannot find such a mouse within our material reality. It requires totally different physical laws to exist. First I had a complete God-Realozation. Then I asked myself, What is beyond God? And so I discovered this new alien dimension of Infinity. I was Omniscient. Of course it's all my own Mind Show me someone who has ever described what I described above. There's nothing even close to this. I'm sure you could discover all sorts of other cool alien stuff within consciousness, but this mouse I am the first to discover.

@Leo Gura "This alien has set its life purpose to be the metaphysical embodiment of divine Playfulness, Quirkiness, and Weirdness. Imagine if playfulness, quirkiness, and weird could somehow be made absolutes. Well, this fucking mouse figured out how." I experienced something like this, dancing as the embodying of divine playfulness and joy on my second bufo experience. Completely out of control, fully flowing with divine intelligence. Best and most fulfilled experience of my entire life ?❤️ levels of joy that I still cry when I remember.

Yes. But it's more fucked up than that. Not only have I experienced the highest possible Truth, which is INFINITY, I have experienced new kinds of truth that hardly anyone on this planet even knows are possible because they are so alien.

Last night I awoke so radically that I went completely beyond nonduality and all human spiritual teachings. Beyond the classical God. I became an alien hyper intelligence for several hours. To clarify, I did not meet an alien, I became an alien consciousness and I engaged in alien spirituality it a manner that no human mind can ever imagine or fathom. This alien intelligence is an alien form of God-Consciousness. I am the first human who has ever discovered it. Although this is virtually impossible, now I shall try to paint you a poetic picture of what this alien intelligence was like, how it felt, and how it did spirituality. This is going to sound insane, so hold on to your hat. Here we go: My consciousness became so interconnected that I realized that I am a small alien kangroo-mouse, along the lines of the character Scrat from the kid's movie Ice Age. But I was way cooler. This was no ordinary kind of animal that humans have ever experienced. This alien kangaroo mouse does not live on any planet, it floats around in an infinite vacuum of metaphysical mind-space. This mouse is hyper animated. It is stuck in an endless loop of playfulness. It is constantly jumping around, twirling, doing backflips, spinning, dancing, twisting itself into prestles and impossible strange loops at a very rapid rate of something like 100 frames per second. It's playing this game with itself purely out of self-love and delight. It's able to sustain this game indefinitely. It never gets tired or needs a moment to stop to catch its breath. It has infinite child-like energy. But it gets weirder! This alien mouse isn't just doing this dance at the physical level with its body, it's simutaneously doing it at the emotional, mental, and spiritual level. This is a hyper-dimensional mouse whose intelligence is greater than that of all the combined human IQs on planet Earth. This mouse can speak to itself in a nonlinear, multi-parallel alien language that does not sound like anything a human would understand as language. But the mouse perfectly understands itself. Its inner monologue is extremely rapid and astoundingly intelligent and beautiful. Imagine the human inner monologue sped up by about 5x. It's thinking simultaneously on multiple planes, in parallel. Each plane of its monologue perfectly mirrors the playful, twisted, animates style of its dancing and movements on the physical plane. The immense delight that it takes in moving its body is matched by an immense delight in its own linguistic and mental gymnastics. It's lost in a dance of mental gymastics simply because it is in complete love with its own quirkiness. The goal of this alien intelligence is to experience it's own werkiness to infinity, all alone, forever by itself. This mouse's only purpose for existence is to twist itself into pretzels both physically and mentally. That IS how this consciousness does spirituality. That is its "meditation" so to speak. This mouse is so intelligent that it's found a way to twist meditation inside-out. Rather than trying to stop its mind, it speeds it up and makes the mind dance in exotic ways. This mouse is intelligent enough to perform complex mathematical calculations at dizzying speed, faster than a calculator. The mouse is fully conscious of itself as God, but precisely because it is God, it has selected to limit itself to this very peculiar mode of existence. This alien has set its life purpose to be the metaphysical embodiment of divine Playfulness, Quirkiness, and Weirdness. Imagine if playfulness, quirkiness, and weird could somehow be made absolutes. Well, this fucking mouse figured out how. This alien mouse is extremely beautiful in every possible way. The shape of its body. The way it moves its body and its mind are absolutely intoxicating. It's completely lost in an endless flow state. Its energy fills you with child-like wonder and joy. It's adorable in ways that no physical earthly animal can ever be. But perhaps its most beautiful part is its twisted and quirky alien language -- its internal monologue. Every word in its language rhymes with every other word in the most delightful dance. Its language is made of endless strange loops and listening to it is more addictive than taking any human drug. And perhaps the most mind-fucked part about all this is that the mouse's body was identical to Leo's human body. This sounds logically impossible and yet, there it was. When I awoke to all this, I wasn't just watching it from a distance, I BECAME this alien consciousness. It took me so by surprise that I was fell to the floor writhing in boundless joy, flabergasted in metaphysical extasy. This was hands down the happiest day of my life. This was my Heaven. This experience was so radically profound that it has become the single most important experience of my life. I don't care about human spirituality any more, all I care about basking as this alien consciousness forever. That's it for now. I am still struggling to figure out how to articulate all this. This is my first attempt. In the future I will make a better, deeper write-up of all this, and hopefully I am able to one day demonstrate this alien language to you on video. My human mouth is not able to speak it yet. The words sound so strange and they flow so fast that I will have to train myself to speak it. I'm not yet sure if this will be possible for a human to do, but I will really try. This will be my most important contribution to mankind. Anyhow, if you have any questions, ask away. Edit #1: To clarify, there exist some people on this planet who claim to have had experiences of being an alien. Some of them have contacted me, upset that I claimed to be the only one. So out of due diligence and respect for them I want to clarify that I don't claim to be the only human to have experienced what it's like to be an alien. Edit #2: You should not take my description of alien consciousness too literally because words fail us here. This is a poetic description which takes some liberties in order to communicate an overall feel for the experience. I'm less interested in the technical details than I am in painting a general picture in your mind. So if you parse my words literally like some legal scholar, expect to be disappointed. Communicating such an experience is extremely challenging and I reserve the right to make mistakes in attempting it.

^I can definitely relate to this specific part. Its such a weird profound feeling. An otherworldly intelligence so grand it seems alien, Ai-Like, and yes divine. Same words I have.

I "confirmed in my direct experience" that the arcangel Gabriel appeared from the sky and told me my mission in life is to start a suicide cult... Connor Murphy "confirmed in his direct experience" that he is in fact a space alien. The judges at the Salem witch trials "confirmed in their direct experience" that everyone they sentenced to be burnt at the stake was a witch. 'Cause they got a funny feeling in their gut bro. My throat chakra is tense right now. I believe this means you are practicing witchcraft. Confirmed by direct experience bro. Off to the dunking pools with you! Thou ist a witch!

IDENTIFYING HER ANIMUS COMPLEX What is a man to you? What do you expect from a man in relationship with you? Tell me ten things that make you feel loved, honored, and respected as a woman? What do you think about male-female equality? What differences do you see between men and women? Are there different roles for men and women in a relationship and our society and what are they? What role did your father play in your life and what is your relationship with him today? Who were the most significant males in your life, during what period, what role did they play, and howdid they influence you? What role did your mother play in your life and what is your relationship with her today? What roles did you and your partners play in previous relationships? What makes men attractive to you? What kinds of men are unattractive to you? She may be in stage 1 (men as alien outsider) if she has an ambivalent relationship with her father and other significant men in her early life. Additional indicators are reports of tumultuous love/hate relationships with former partners, longer periods in her life without a male partner, sexual relationships with women, and if she goes back and forth between a desperate clingy desire for your love and then fearful rejections when you get close. Pointers to a stage 2 animus (men as father, God, or king) are a critical or disapproving father figure whom she never felt to be good enough for. She may speak favorably of kind men who adore, support, and treat her well, and negatively of those who criticize, challenge, or dismiss her. Women in this stage may struggle with aging, can be emotionally needy, constantly ask for approval and reassurance about their lovability, and are afraid to do things wrong. Indicators of a stage 3 animus complex (men as her hero) are answers that favor loyal, supportive, generous, and loving men with an unwavering commitment to honor and support their wife and children. She likely had a stable childhood and a good relationship with her father and mother, or at least healed most of her earlier emotional wounds. In her eyes, men should know right from wrong, be hard-working, good fathers, family-oriented, heroic, protective (if need be, aggressive towards others), and benevolent towards her. Women in stage 4 (men as independent being) are particularly easy to identify, as they talk about the financial and emotional independence that they have attained through their own work or through successful divorces after one or more long-term marriages. They express a desire to explore who they are, independent of a committed partnership with a man, and want to live alone, often with a dog or cat that they are proud to love more than they would any man. If women in this stage consider to be in a partnership they often exclaim...“where are all the good men?”...and of course no man within their reach is ever good enough. Successful, up-beat, entertaining, self-assured, and happy men who display empathy, understanding, and support for them while pursuing their own purpose and interests without needing a female partner for sex, approval, support, or “to mother” them are valued by women in this stage, who sometimes maintain uncommitted sexual relationships with younger lovers. Most eco-, radical, and social feminists—who resent men and what they stand for—are found in this stage (or stage 1) as well. She has arrived in stage 5 of her animus development (men as equal partner) when she realizes the benefits of being in a committed love relationship with an integrally informed man whom she values as an opposite and equal. A woman in this stage sees the benefits of a healthy, live together committed marriage as the foundation for her ongoing personal growth, spiritual development, physical sexual well being, and socially, economically, and ecologically responsible livelihood. Her focus is on the inner qualities of a responsible man who lives his authentic life purpose and can love unconditionally in a committed partnership, instead of his worldly possessions and social status only. A single woman in this stage is a rare find, as she is clear in what she seeks in a life-partner, and actively pursues men who are her equal. She has no problem finding a suitable partner within a few weeks of her opening to relationship if she is attractive and sex-positive,451 as men are naturally conditioned by evolution to be chosen by a healthy woman who honors and values them.

Oh! I understand that. Sort of like lock and key, you just allow what you need to come to you in order to heal and it seems to take affect? Thing happening to you, working through you - do you mean divine or just any circumstance? Does it seem like you were just given a natural talent to be able to work through things/think through them? That's really sad that you have not been able to go after things you desire/don't have them and that you have to do things out of necessity. Both of our cultures/lives are very different in that sense. I've been given both pain and luxury at differing times. Sometimes when we would talk and I would hear of your stories, about constantly being under pressure in some way I wondered how you didn't buckle from it. I would have within a year's time. I understand from my side of the fence on how it feels to feel like an alien, or like your hardware is different. You've come a long way for where you've come from and I imagine it is probably hard to relate to people because you have a natural talent for growing intuitively, and your environment is more stagnant for the kind of person that you inherently are. I agree, I don't agree with the vision humanity has at all, but I also don't really have a better vision in place - do you? I've been thinking a lot about this - if everything was reset by some cosmic force, how would we all redo things? I have this feeling that people continue to go on after death and that they develop groups in order to grow, and I wonder what I will discuss with my group - or if they will all sort of assimilate into me - like how they say all is One. It's hard to know. What I do know is that humanity is whack, dude. People are so messed up - I wish there was a better structure for all people, from start to finish so that everyone was happy and could do the things that they love and are good at without all the bullshit getting in the way. There's so much missed potential when we fight all the time, war with one another, when you have these rich assholes at the very top dictating what everyone else should do. I don't feel connected to the human dream at all. I feel connected to something else entirely. As in, the whole world just seems to be made of it. Hard to explain, but... everything just feels like a manifestation of forces just outside of human awareness, that no one else sees. I feel that people are very blind to themselves in a lot of ways and I don't relate/even know how to function in this world at all. Like... I don't belong here. Someone gave me the wrong map dude. LOL! I relate also to the feelings of - if it weren't for some desire to survive - I would have ended it. I'm sorry to hear that you ever felt that way, though. That sucks. Do you still feel that way or have you resolved it somewhat? Shit dude, I am so sorry. It really pains me to know what happened to your country. It's really not fucking fair knowing that people struggle while others get safe/comfy lives. We all deserve the same things in life. No one should feel any sort of lack. I hate it and wish and hope that this will change for you. I can give some really broad answers on that, but for the nitty gritty, you'll have to have an awakening into what that is. The broad answers - God literally can't function without you as a part of the system. "I can't feel anything without you" God tells its creations. If you were not here, it would be incomplete and God can't be incomplete. There's a mechanism, an evolutionary feedback loop of positive and negative that looks completely different from up on high, and from that vantage point, there is a plan and purpose for it all. It sort of branches out with a lot of different tendrils and tastes for areas where people are ripe for discovering themselves and it does aid in that process. If you keep inquiring, keep looking within and don't stop learning, eventually your own puzzle will start to unravel. I'll bet it already has been.

I didn't really work through it in the strict meaning of the word. It's probably more accurate to say that it's working through me and I'm allowing it. Almost all of my life, it's always been things/events working through me/happening to me. I can hardly remember a time where I really desired something and went after it for the sake of it. Unlike most people, everything I do is out of necessity, not luxury. I don't seem to have the conventional built-in desire to live the human life or to be a person. I am weird and an alien in that sense, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. Though, it has its drawbacks when dealing with humans, cuz we are often on different frequencies, and that can make me struggle to relate to them. I've gotten a lot better over the years, but I still don't find the human life as interesting as advertised. That's not to say I don't like socializing or being with other humans, it's just that I don't agree with the vision that humanity has as a collective, as I view all the games they play as fruitless, distracting, and even harmful. So it's not that I was/am emotionally disconnected from myself as much as I was/am disconnected from the human dream. I don't know if it's different for you, but that's as best as I could describe it from my most authentic self's pov. I really don't relate to most of the human nonsense, most of the times I just force myself to. If it wasn't for my sexual drive and the need to survive, I would probably have killed myself long ago. It hurts just thinking about it. Me too. I just want to know what God ultimately wants with me.

I’m actually working on the summary for Leo’s Ketamine episode. I’m travelling right now and don’t have reliable access to wifi, so it won’t be up for at least 3 weeks. Here are some tidbits. -Plugging is perfect for K. A good starter dose is 15-30mg. For Leo, a medium dose is 30mg, but he’s very sensitive to substances. -Ketamine has a very heavy body load, especially with medium doses and larger. I have no idea how people dance on it. I highly recommend just lying down and listening to music for at least 90 mins after you’ve plugged and while you’re tripping. I like to have a bottle of water and my laptop at hand to switch the music if I feel like it. Here’s a ketamine playlist you may enjoy. I especially like the meditation at the beginning. Music makes a big difference on your trip. https://soundcloud.com/sarahmyers/sarah-myers-music-for-ketamine-psychedelic-therapy-001 -After plugging, it takes 10 mins to come on and the high is 30-60 mins. -Things can look weird, alien and blurry, but K also shuts down your conceptual mind. I personally feel no fear on it, even at high doses, whereas I’ve have plenty of spooky experiences on 5-MeO and shrooms. Other people’s experiences will vary. -This video’s pretty accurate: -Because your body is fairly numb, you can feel like a 20 ft cloud of awareness, or even as thin as a pancake (for me, anyway). Music takes on a beautiful faraway quality. -K gives you a potent No-Mind experience. It’s probably similar to what multi-decade meditators experience during a peak. It’s not as good for getting insights into non-duality, Love or God as proper psychedelics. It could be great for healing at a psychological or emotional level however.

@Flyboy Leo tripped hard man.. Did you know 5 meo produces Neurogenesis? His left brain must have been grown with 5 meo dmt and the same for his right brain with 5 meo malt. Would be interesting to see a MRT scan of his alien brain for sure would be a good proof at least

Lol Dude, you could not comprehend the level of right-brained intuitive thinking that I do. No human intellectual or academic understands how to think like I do. I've discovered modes of thinking that most humans have yet to discover. Which is why humans books are of little interest to me now. I can think like an alien.

Universe picture: Add friendly looking ghostly alien creature: „Let’s explore infinity!“ Followed by countless examples that show that the universe is infinite, starting with earth. Fire picture: Add some friendly looking forest spirit: „Have you ever wondered what Love really is? To explain what Love is we can take fire as an analogy, as it shows the aspects of love that we often overlook because we have a hard time accepting them.“ Strange Loop Ant Picture: Take ants away. The VR user walks on the Strange Loop himself while he gets an explanation of what Strange Loops are. Some ideas for starting so far. Need these awakenings though to be able to explain it well.

Solipsism is the realization that there are no "others " it actually increases my social anxiety. Because these imaginary others are like alien simulation stuff doing a conspiracy against me .

@Leo Gura What about meditation experiences that are more psychcedelic in nature? I have issues maintaining health, yet when I am fully healthy and can workout I can have crazy energetic experiences that are similar to the one NN-DMT experience I have the NN-DMT experience feels more alien, yet it often feels like heavy ego / dark knight stuff that needs to be proccessed for example dark room retreats. Similar with LSD I get tiny tastes of love, emptiness, nothingness and a lot of internal relative insight and I feel I become more whole/open and clean overall in terms of how I conduct my life after some integration approx. What can I make out meditative experiences that surpass psychdelic experiences? Would you for example in the same situation continue to pursue meditation seriously? When it has such a dramatic affect that it can be more intense than any psychdelic you can take. It's like my brain is made for meditation and psychdelics are the deepst layer you can enter, that is why I have so much respect, I did not meet many people who have the same kind of experiences, they are similar, yet never as intense. I have a big/huge ego, so I know I consistently implore what is consciouness and choose deliberately teachers/gurus who go and see beyond the edge of a plate. The main issue I have is physical health mostly, not even that much mental. Why for example the comment you made about merging, I can get tastes of merging while meditating like I become the orange/juice/rock/bird/object in 3D space, yet with psychcedelics transforming into something else becomes way way more real, I once posted a report saying I basically merged with a part of nature I became literally the bird outside chirping. While meditating on LSD for hours. You wrote to me I am paraprhrasing: "Nice work tasting the tail of the ox " in a bit more cheeky manner, is that what is meant with consciouness? The pure fabric so to speak that gives rise to everything? Ground zero? Or am I completely of here, as I tasted so many different flavours it's not easy to make distinctions and continue the work when there are so many silos, instead of wholes. I am just sometimes to afraid to go off into the deep end and never comeback lol.

@Tyler Robinson they do know. They talk to alien bro. But its genetic through a lineage of concentrated people.

Entry84/17 STAGES OF ANIMUS DEVELOPMENT IN WOMEN 1. Men as alien outsiders - She fears, hates, and loves him. Because of abuse or abandonment from men that she identified with during childhood, such as a father, father figure, older brother, uncle, or family friend, a woman in this stage completely denies and suppresses her animus as alien inside and outside of herself. She trusts her mother and other females, while she distrusts, hates, or fears men. This is often countered by a strange curiosity about men, which she cannot differentiate. This ambivalence can make her extremely seductive, needy, and clingy, and cause severe symptoms of the “seduce and withhold”230 syndrome. As soon as a man gets close to her she withdraws, only to come back to ask for more after he becomes distant. She can break the heart of a weak man who tries to prove that he is different, attempts to rescue her from her fears, and so becomes codependent231 as she lures him into her pathological cat and mouse game. Within the limits of her domain in household, family, and female-oriented work environment (e.g., school teacher, nurse, artist, gardener, therapist, healer, working with animals, etc.), such a woman may seem grounded and self-confident. Outside those limits, she leaves the work and responsibility to men and more mature women.232 2. Men as father, God, or king - She wants his approval. The self-esteem of a woman in this stage is directly connected to the response and approval that she receives from men. She is often driven by a need to be seen as the most attractive female, and constantly monitors her value by her internalized masculine judgment and through externalized male reflection. This may lead to a split in her personality when she imitates male behavior to be liked by them, and at other times presents herself as a sexually seductive femme fatale (such as in the movie Basic Instinct) to be desired. She either hides behind a feminine mask of beautiful appearance, graceful charming manner, and entertaining wit, or develops a tom boyish attitude through teasing, competing, and challenging, or some other facade that suggests success. Women in this stage gravitate towards men that they perceive to be more attractive, intelligent, and exciting than they could ever be themselves. They often try to live up to men by dietary restrictions, vigorous physical exercising, adapting to their intellectual interests, developing new talents, and being sexually available to become the perfect mate. If a woman remains in this stage, she is at great risk of entering a profound depression when her beauty and sexual attractiveness wane, and the number of heads that she is turning, and men who admire her diminishes. She may then isolate herself from all intimate relationships, because her perfectionism overrides her ability to be compassionate and to forgive her own and others’ mistakes. This may lead her to withdraw into a cold and bitter self-denial in which her anxieties create all kinds of psychosomatic illnesses, such as panic attacks, vomiting, heart problems, fatigue, and body aches. A strong, conscious, and patient man (or a good psychotherapist) can support a woman in this stage to find her own worth, passions, and identity, independent of male approval, which then allows her to enter into stage three.

I mean it was an international school, there were not even that many arabs there. People from Ghana, Nigeria, Sri Lanka, South America, Philippines, Thailand etc. Good representation of most major ethnicities. There was no "weird feeling" among the kids since everyone was part of the same "tribe". Sure, you see the difference in appearance, but if it's not associated with any more sense of "other" than a person that looks more similiar, it won't cause any racist response. That person is just one of "us". A baby and a 90 year old grandpa look drastically different to each other, you might even say "alien". Yet they can very easily feel part of the same tribe.

Middle East is a special case, The Arab "race" is not really a race, it is a mixture of differnet races with no distinct skin tone or facial features. so you would expect less racism in the Arab world, and yet in my country ( I live in the Middle East) people still in a hidden and sneaky way look down into black people, and they usually have lower economical status. Also you can build the US community out of any common feature, like religion, nationalism. But race is also a very common theme and for a good reason. If we weren't racists we wouldn't have survived Racism in its lowest degrees is that weird feeling that you have When you see someone with different facial features or darker skin tone, like you are looking at an alien or something

@universe Ah I see. Is it similar to when some artist that almost nobody knows, dies and leaves behind some work legacy that almost nobody understands how it's made, but can appreciate the finished work? Maybe 1,000 of years from now, majority of mankind has left the planet, or has died off, and some alien finds a picture, and foraging through finds a book, and a computer with some functioning internet, about Actualized.org?

@Leo Gura @Guru Peter Jordanson they are better than the rest. But still not on the point. If you found new good one please share After all I must admit there is something very secret going on with Ufos. They are linked to altered states of consciousness. On mushrooms people describe alien abduction and spaceship visits.

@D2sage My best guess is mainly two ways: worship, and mass hysteria. Not to mention any alien technology that could manipulate minds in mass. Likely, another interesting world effect, is other countries that were indifferent or hostile to other countries, would agree to a coalition to work together a bit more, and have a potential common enemy.

STAGES OF ANIMA DEVELOPMENT IN MEN 1. Women as mother - He needs a mommy to take care of him. In this first stage, a man’s anima is completely tied up with the mother. She is not necessarily his personal mother but the image of a woman that is a faithful provider of nourishment, security, and love. She represents all that is natural, instinctual, and biological.223 A man with an anima complex of this type cannot function well without a vital connection to a woman, and is easy prey of being controlled and exploited by her. He frequently suffers from impotence or has no sexual desire at all, and is therefore called a mama’s boy. This type of anima possession also manifests through fear of accidents or disease, or in a sort of dullness of personality. The Greek Sirens and the German Lorelei personify these dangerous aspects of the anima, which may even lead a man to his death over a lost love relationship through suicide. 2. Women as sex object - He wants her to make him feel good. In the second stage, the anima is a collective sexual image. She is a Marilyn Monroe, Madonna, or Playboy model. Men in stage two are often Don Juans who see all women as sex objects, and engage in repeated sexual adventures, sometimes developing into sexual addictions. These relationships are invariably short-lived, because he is not faithful, is always looking for his next conquest, and no woman can ever live up to his unrealistic image of the ideal female partner. 3. Women as wife - He wants her loyalty and support. In the third stage of his anima complex development, a man becomes ready to care for a wife and be devoted to his family. He is the loving protector and provider that women in the equivalent stage three of their animus development seek. Men with this anima accept their partner as she is, as long as she fulfills her role as supportive, undemanding, caring, and faithful wife, available sex partner, and loving mother to his children. His sexuality is usually integrated into their relationship and not an autonomous function that drives him. He can differentiate between love and lust, which allows him to create a lasting partnership (if she stays), because he can tell the difference between the objects of his sexual desire and the benefits of being a faithful partner/husband. 4. Women as guide to creativity and awakening - He struggles with her need for independence. In the fourth stage, a man’s anima functions as a guide to his inner life. As women in this stage become emotionally and financially independent from men, they often turn away and abandon their partners against their will. This challenges him to seek other sources of fulfillment, happiness, aliveness, passion, joy, purpose, peace, and love. Through his quest arises a desire to answer life’s deeper questions of “who am I,” “where do I come from,” “why am I here,” “what is the meaning of my life,” “what should I do,” “what is my purpose,” and “where do I go”? Contemplating these questions, reading books like the one that you are holding right now, meditating, or seeking a bond with others on a similar path in men’s groups, New Age churches, and personal growth workshops allow him to bring deeper levels of his unconscious anima into his awareness. This leads to a liberating process of awakening to his authentic nature, true purpose, genuine passions, and capacity to love unconditionally that are independent from a partnership with a woman.224 On the flipside, he may show behaviors that are usually described as a midlife crisis,225 become commitment phobic, avoid deeper intimacy with women altogether, or engage in serial monogamy or polyamory,226 since he does not want to sacrifice his newfound freedom or to be limited by one partnership. This partial awakening (the idea of living alone is not Integral, fully realized, or the ultimate realization of human development) is transcended when a man enters stage five of his anima development. 5. Women as equal partner - He meets her as an opposite and equal partner. Similar to a woman in this stage (see below), a man in stage five of his anima complex development has accepted the fact that conflicts and ambivalence are intrinsic to human relationships, and sees how their resolution contributes to his ongoing healing, personal growth, and spiritual realization. He feels confident, secure, and comfortable to authentically express his sexual essence (which tends to be masculine in heterosexual men), while he embraces his feminine (anima).227 This allows him to invite differing views, experiences, and feelings of his female partner without feeling threatened, offended, or puzzled by them. Her authentic stage-five feminine qualities naturally complement his masculinity and vice versa. Since he has found his own purposeful identity that does not depend on her inspiration, support, or approval, he appreciates his partner’s independent authority,228 and doesn’t feel responsibility, shame, or insecurity if she is unhappy—even though he shows empathy, care, and devotion—and enjoys when she is happy. He neither clings, nor pushes her away, but fully opens to embrace her at all levels of his being when they are together, and stays content and fulfilled when they are apart. This allows him to enter into a mature monogamous relationship of opposites and equals from which radically new life experiences, emotional healing processes, and deeper spiritual realizations that often become the foundation for altruistic acts of kindness and service towards others emerge. STAGES OF ANIMUS DEVELOPMENT IN WOMEN 1. Men as alien outsiders - She fears, hates, and loves him. Because of abuse or abandonment from men that she identified with during childhood, such as a father, father figure, older brother, uncle, or family friend, a woman in this stage completely denies and suppresses her animus as alien inside and outside of herself. She trusts her mother and other females, while she distrusts, hates, or fears men. This is often countered by a strange curiosity about men, which she cannot differentiate. This ambivalence can make her extremely seductive, needy, and clingy, and cause severe symptoms of the “seduce and withhold”230 syndrome. As soon as a man gets close to her she withdraws, only to come back to ask for more after he becomes distant. She can break the heart of a weak man who tries to prove that he is different, attempts to rescue her from her fears, and so becomes codependent231 as she lures him into her pathological cat and mouse game. Within the limits of her domain in household, family, and female-oriented work environment (e.g., school teacher, nurse, artist, gardener, therapist, healer, working with animals, etc.), such a woman may seem grounded and self-confident. Outside those limits, she leaves the work and responsibility to men and more mature women.232 2. Men as father, God, or king - She wants his approval. The self-esteem of a woman in this stage is directly connected to the response and approval that she receives from men. She is often driven by a need to be seen as the most attractive female, and constantly monitors her value by her internalized masculine judgment and through externalized male reflection. This may lead to a split in her personality when she imitates male behavior to be liked by them, and at other times presents herself as a sexually seductive femme fatale (such as in the movie Basic Instinct) to be desired. She either hides behind a feminine mask of beautiful appearance, graceful charming manner, and entertaining wit, or develops a tom boyish attitude through teasing, competing, and challenging, or some other facade that suggests success. Women in this stage gravitate towards men that they perceive to be more attractive, intelligent, and exciting than they could ever be themselves. They often try to live up to men by dietary restrictions, vigorous physical exercising, adapting to their intellectual interests, developing new talents, and being sexually available to become the perfect mate. If a woman remains in this stage, she is at great risk of entering a profound depression when her beauty and sexual attractiveness wane, and the number of heads that she is turning, and men who admire her diminishes. She may then isolate herself from all intimate relationships, because her perfectionism overrides her ability to be compassionate and to forgive her own and others’ mistakes. This may lead her to withdraw into a cold and bitter self-denial in which her anxieties create all kinds of psychosomatic illnesses, such as panic attacks, vomiting, heart problems, fatigue, and body aches. A strong, conscious, and patient man (or a good psychotherapist) can support a woman in this stage to find her own worth, passions, and identity, independent of male approval, which then allows her to enter into stage three.233 3. Men as hero - She wants him to take care of her. Women in stage three seek a man as protector and provider with strength, courage, and ability, who can meet her needs, cherish her, and whom she wants to marry. He represents her ideal (and often unrealistic) image of the knight in shining armor who fulfills her expectations for good looks, intelligence, solid reputation, stable finances, generosity, loyalty, humor, kindness, care, integrity, and faithfulness. To be in a good bargaining position, this woman will focus on her appearance, health/fitness, and adapting to the world of men by seeking a higher education, pursuing a career, fighting for social justice, or saving a failing business. She will appear as self-affirming and expects something in return. She functions well in the competitive world of men, sees herself as equal, is willing to share responsibilities, and will contribute and perform as long as her partner is able to provide more in return, since women want to marry up. As long as he meets her expectations for financial security, social status, and devotion, she will support him to achieve his full potential while often denying such achievements to herself. This can lead to feelings of resentment and anger when she sees that she has been “denied” the right to experience her own competence, and when her partner/husband fails to live up to her ever-growing expectations. Some women in this stage will enter an inward journey once they become aware of the transitory nature of their physical attractiveness, ability to succeed with men, and limitations of finding acceptance in the male world. This may lead them to the restoration of their female authority 234 as they take responsibility for their own identity once they have moved into stage four of their animus complex development.235 4. Men as independent beings - She wants her independence. A woman in stage four makes an active choice in favor of her self-interest and self-fulfillment—independent of a partner or husband. This transition takes place with the realization that she has constructed her own experiences throughout her lifetime in relationship to men, and now wants to find her own identity. She will stop trying to be perfect in all things in order to please her partner (who was a heroic father figure in the previous stage), as she becomes emotionally free from his approval and support. Having discovered her own source of worthiness and foundation, she is working to restore her female authority. Financial independence through her own labor or through other sources of money that are often only available to women, such as “divorcing well,” alimony and child-support payments, generous lovers, support from parents, or Social Security benefits, are the prerequisite for this transition. You will notice if your partner enters into stage four of her animus development when she starts to challenge you, cares less about your needs, seeks her financial independence, and refuses to take responsibility for holding your relationship together. If you are in partnership with a woman in this stage, it is important to know that it is not your fault that her pain of staying will eventually be greater than her fear of leaving, and that there is nothing you can do but to take care of yourself emotionally 236 and sexually, protect the financial assets that are legitimately yours (if you have to, with the help of a CPA or lawyer), and, if you can, support her with love and compassion in her transition. Once separated and/or divorced, she will feel free from the evaluation and needs of men for the first time in her life. These newly single women are then much occupied with challenging work, their animals and children, social activities, educational advancements, maintaining their household, hobbies, world-travel, and their friendships.237 At the same time, they look down at women who show more feminine or balanced qualities and who desire to be (or are) in a committed partnership with a man. To women in stage four, partnered women still seem to be in the pitiful stage two or three of dependence on a male partner (which they have just escaped). However, married women may have actually advanced into stage five, which women in stage four cannot fathom yet. They discredit partnered women as unevolved and often compete with them in merciless ways. Women in stage four frequently break with the conventional role of caring mother, show tough love, and feel fulfilled outside a partnership with a man. Still, there remains an underlying fear of abandonment, especially in older women, when concerns about the disappearance of their skills and autonomy in the midst of a crisis arise. This often leads to feelings of ambivalence. On one side there is a secret longing for the stability and support that a partnership with a man could provide during times of stress, fatigue, loneliness, or desire for sex. On the other side there is the fear of becoming emotionally dependent, used, and dominated again. Frequent complaints about the lack of good men who are physically fit and attractive, highly intelligent, successful, accomplished, mature, kind, loving, generous, evolved, supportive, spiritual, and available when they need/want them, but who remain flexible, undemanding, and unattached otherwise, are a hallmark of women in stage four.238 Becoming men-hating diehard singles, settling for “friends with benefits” whom they string a long, or serial monogamy are often the only solutions that seem to solve their dilemma. It is not your fault if you get mixed messages, are rejected, or are ignored altogether by women in stage four that you try to date or get a commitment from, as these women are highly independent, endlessly demanding, impossible to please, and commitmentphobic.239 This is, of course, no problem for men who have entered stage four of their own anima development, which many single males and females falsely see as the highest stage of their personal and spiritual development (as in, I am so whole and complete, I don’t need a partner to complete me). If you have matured into stage five and meet a woman who is at the end of her animus stage four development, then you may be able to patiently support her to transition into stage five and find a wonderful partner in her. 5. Men as equal partners - She wants him as an equal and opposite partner. Just as a man, a woman in stage five of her animus development has accepted that conflict and ambivalence are intrinsic to human relationships, and realized the significance of a partnership to balance her further psychological growth and spiritual awakening.240 Having fully claimed her own authority after transcending her animus complex, she no longer sees men as alien, superior, inferior, or independent. The realization that the idea of living and going it alone was a distorted conception of human existence emerges in her, because we never live alone. She sees that in being human we have a variety of economic, physical, sexual, psychological, and spiritual needs that cannot be met by living alone. At last she has the insight that a balanced personality always develops in a self-other conception, and never through the discovery of an independent self.241 This woman then desires the material, intellectual, emotional, sexual, and spiritual synergy that is co-created with a man who meets her as an opposite and equal (which means opposite feminine and masculine polarities with equal levels of consciousness, rights, and responsibilities). Since she may have never experienced a stage five partnership, she needs guidance from a man (like you?) at the same stage of his anima development, who is able to meet her in an integrally informed way. These couples can then form interdependent242 partnerships in which they heal, learn, grow, and enjoy family and social activities together, while contributing to the well-being of others.243 --------------------------- So where are you guys in your development? Men answer from the ANIMA list and Woman from the ANIMUS list. Its possible to be a mix of many stages and a mix of anima and animus, if so describe your experience.