Change in the human being implies a slow and intense process in each of its stops. It is important to be able to perceive the aroma of time in our own evolution.
These last few months I have been testing my patience in waiting and feeling the aroma of time that therapeutic processes entail. Sometimes it is difficult to realize that growth toward greater wisdom and self-awareness in others is a slow-cooking process. We notice this very clearly in ourselves, but it is difficult to see it in the eyes of others and we insist that the other change now, change in a few sessions or change so that I can see it.
There are many currents that today try to make us believe that personal evolution is rapid, that the results can be immediate. Maximum effectiveness and efficiency that equates people and human behavior with products that work quickly and well, and if they don’t, don’t worry, they are changed for others in the blink of an eye.
It is clear, regardless of who it may be, that the human psyche does not understand deadlines, specificities, superficialities and immediate optimal results. But she is much wiser than all that, she waits for the end to be much deeper and more essential and believe me, even despite the pain, fatigue and despair, the wait is rewarded.
Regarding these processes of change and their own tempo, I would like to reflect on a very beautiful way of thinking about that journey of descent into the underground world that any path of true personal transformation implies. The circular sequence would be like this: Black-Red-White-Black-Red-White-Black-Red-White….
The Nigredo It is the deep darkness, the phase where we say yes to a completely disadvantageous and deceptive deal, the pact with the devil. Everything begins to dissociate and life as we understood it until then stops making sense. Chaos, confusion and a marked feeling of loss and helplessness appear. However, this black thickness, although we cannot see it now, is the initiation to our later enlightenment and true knowledge. It is the beginning of the descent into the depths of hell, as dramatic as it is necessary to later ascend to the heavens.
The Rubedo It is the red sacrifice and dismemberment of our identity as we knew it. We lose something and enter into crisis believing that this will be our end, our destruction. At this moment we are on the edge of the precipice and there will be no other option but to jump into the void. We have lost our psychic hands, on which we had placed our sense of worth and we resisted falling again and again, we tried to negotiate, settle, go back to doing the same thing as always… days, months and even years pass. and we continue on the edge of the abyss. Boredom and despair fill us.
Cry and resist, tears save you from the fire. At the end of this tunnel, which seems to have no exit, the rest of the psychic body awaits us with another version of ourselves that we did not even imagine, fuller, more authentic, more at peace. Keep moving forward with anguish, sadness and frustration, but don’t stop.
The AlbedoFinally, it is the whiteness of the resurrection, the new life. To get here, to the light, we need a spirit to guide us on our descent, something or someone to accompany us even if it is in a very abstract way. A breath that reminds us in each section that we will reach a better destination. Here we return to our original nature and rediscover Love. To achieve albedo it is possible that we become wanderers for a time, without a home, without a world to belong to, you stop caring about things that previously occupied your attention. The gaze turns inward and the deep Self appears, the Self of the Soul.
These phases will occur cyclically throughout our lives for all change and transformation and we will go through this spiral no longer being the same as before. It is inevitable to go through these colors before each new test, the good news is that on the next tour the black and red will become shorter and less intense because the white will cover them with its intense light.
