Familiars & psychic residue

Astral and paranormal experiences, dreams and visions.
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Nefastos
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Familiars & psychic residue

Post by Nefastos »

Dear brothers and sisters, and dear guests,

What do you think about so called familiar spirits? Does someone consider having or having seen or felt one? Or do you consider the idea to refer to something that is more psychological or symbolical?

We know the familiar spirits mainly from folklore & witch hunters' stories, and some, like the Finnish para or paara has been discussed in this forum before, although briefly. In Finland the familiar spirit of the house and its family, called tonttu (domovoi, the house-elf), was very important for a long time. (Most of our pagan customs have died away in the last hundred years or so.) Nowadays the familiar spirits, the minor spirits helping in one's everyday tasks on regular basis, seem to be more person- than family-attached, since there are few families that share the needed occult – or should we say superstitious – world view.

A month ago Obnoxion made a passing notion to an artist's companion entity Loplop, which made me to think about this subject. More precisely, it made me to think about the familiar spirits' relation to shared atavism and shared psychic residue, since I hadn't ever heard of Max Ernst, but I too have had a familiar entity with almost the same name for many years. But more of this later, I try to remember not to build a wall in the very beginning of the topic.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
obnoxion
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

Post by obnoxion »

Nefastos wrote: Mon Jun 03, 2019 10:42 am What do you think about so called familiar spirits? Does someone consider having or having seen or felt one? Or do you consider the idea to refer to something that is more psychological or symbolical?
This is a difficult topic, because it is so occult - it is incredibly private, and it is hidden in many senses of the term. We have increasingly ceased to have to the language to talk about these things, and, as you mentioned, the tide of the last century supports the oblivion of such fairy-faith (and behind that century works a millenium of demonization).

I do not make much difference betwee the concrete, the psychological or the symbolic, but consider things as not unlike strings of pearls the hang from the abyss of the spirit. In this sort of thinking, an inanimated and manufactured object can function as a familiar, if you review its string.

When I was six years old, I think I first had a familiar that I was conscious of. It was a blumb old brown mouse in a Dracula costume, and he was called Sir Imagination. He was about one meter tall, and he walked upright with a cane. He never spoke, but always smiled in a very warm way.

He lived in a huge castle with countless rooms, all of them made entirely of jewls and crystals. Now, I would have loved to imagine the rooms full of furnitures and treasures, but I couldn't. The rooms always stayed empty. And no matter how I tried, I never found a center to the castle. It was always just room aftet room aftet similar room.

On the hinde sight, this is why I think he was a familiar - because it it had a clear independence that a free phantasy does not. One couldn't imagine furniture in his castle because he didn't have any. Of course, Sir Imagination was a child's familiar. But unless one has some experience of the kind, I doubt we can have a shared understanding of the phenomenon.
One day of Brahma has 14 Indras; his life has 54 000 Indras. One day of Vishnu is the lifetime of Brahma. The lifetime of Vishnu is one day of Shiva.
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Nefastos
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

Post by Nefastos »

obnoxion wrote: Wed Jun 05, 2019 12:00 pmThis is a difficult topic, because it is so occult - it is incredibly private, and it is hidden in many senses of the term.

You are right. At first I thought of opening this discussion in our members only area; maybe I should have done that.

obnoxion wrote: Wed Jun 05, 2019 12:00 pmI do not make much difference between the concrete, the psychological or the symbolic, but consider things as not unlike strings of pearls the hang from the abyss of the spirit.

Your view is easy for me to undersign as well.

obnoxion wrote: Wed Jun 05, 2019 12:00 pmOn the hinde sight, this is why I think he was a familiar - because it it had a clear independence that a free phantasy does not.

That is good point, and same can be said to my own familiars (or "familiars", if we'd prefer a more distanced view in open discussion). They are few, but of a different kind, some more intrapsychical than others, and thus, rarely on the vein of the "house-elf". I take an example from the basis I already mentioned.

My own Loplop presented itself to me – as these things usually happen, also in the archaic shamanistic experiences of receiving the helping spirit – in a moment of great psychological stress. People usually seem to "phase out", lose their ability to track time and place, or in some other way lose their mind if cumulated stress effect becomes too intensive to handle. For me, this never seems to happen, regardless how intensive the psychic stress has become; neither do I hallucinate, which I consider a bit similar liminal experience. In one such event of endured stress, about ten years ago or so, this smiling lump of matter, Loplop of mine, presented itself to me: I simply draw its figure down & the name under it, like a child would have. He has remained with me since, giving some assistance in seeing the more relaxed way of treating the world and my experiences. Because such psychological beings need not do anything on physical level, I have never considered leaving him treats, like I sometimes do for the more physically (etherically) manifesting little spirits (e.g. "house-elf"). He is part of my own psyche and yet he is not. Nowadays he has little to do, since I have adopted a more relaxed world view and thus we have in a way merged once again.

Now, the interesting thing to ponder is, how do these psychological & psychic residues mix in the world, for they seem to do that. In what ways is our mind-stuff atavistic, transferable, and in other ways interpersonal? These are very deep questions, and it might be that several centuries must pass and the basis of our individualistically oriented culture change before it can get any answers.

Also, these are difficult concepts to handle outside the psychiatric field, unless we want to throw outselves straight into the other end of the pool, viz. the one of unquestioning spiritism. That I wouldn't recommend, since it might give quite a blow to one's intellectual capacities, and encourage some problematically defensive or even pathological mindsets.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
obnoxion
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

Post by obnoxion »

Nefastos wrote: Wed Jun 05, 2019 1:03 pm Now, the interesting thing to ponder is, how do these psychological & psychic residues mix in the world, for they seem to do that. In what ways is our mind-stuff atavistic, transferable, and in other ways interpersonal? These are very deep questions, and it might be that several centuries must pass and the basis of our individualistically oriented culture change before it can get any answers.

Also, these are difficult concepts to handle outside the psychiatric field, unless we want to throw outselves straight into the other end of the pool, viz. the one of unquestioning spiritism.
These are, I think, one of the most interesting practical questions there exist. And I think these are rather questions for psychology than psychiatry (should we choose between these two). Gladly, it seems that observing religious life and spirituality through the lence of psychiatry is considered vulgar by most people equipped to have a meaningful discussions on such topics. To lump these things under the topic of mental illnesses, is simply another way of saying that one doesn't want to talk about them.

I think that perhaps the best general field for research of these things is Art. Like Max Ernst has done. People are more able to think deeply such things when they encounter them in great art. And, as it happens, there is very little great art that doesn't deal with these things.
One day of Brahma has 14 Indras; his life has 54 000 Indras. One day of Vishnu is the lifetime of Brahma. The lifetime of Vishnu is one day of Shiva.
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Nefastos
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

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obnoxion wrote: Wed Jun 05, 2019 1:39 pmThese are, I think, one of the most interesting practical questions there exist. And I think these are rather questions for psychology than psychiatry (should we choose between these two). Gladly, it seems that observing religious life and spirituality through the lence of psychiatry is considered vulgar by most people equipped to have a meaningful discussions on such topics. To lump these things under the topic of mental illnesses, is simply another way of saying that one doesn't want to talk about them.

As a tiny side note, a nice coincidence: After reading your post, I opened the Wikipedia page for "psychiatry" (to check if the word held also some connotations I was not familiar with) and found from there only one quotation that had be seen important enough to be put in singular frames. It was:

"Psychiatry, more than any other branch of medicine, forces its practitioners to wrestle with the nature of evidence, the validity of introspection, problems in communication, and other long-standing philosophical issues" (Guze, 1992, p.4).

In other words, it was very nice to be reminded that optimally we do not have to choose between these psychiatric, psychological, and esoterico-philosophical points of view. Culture seems to be much less oppressive in this regard that it was, say, 25 years ago. (The quote itself is that old but its emphasis maybe isn't.)
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
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Insanus
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

Post by Insanus »

I have had quite a bit of somewhat similar experiences, but due to my sceptical (perhaps read: scared?) nature I don't accept their (familiars') semi-autonomous being very often into my conscious life. On the other hand, often times I think that even my own voice is not so much my own and that my concept of self is there to provide "pragmatic and heuristic solidity" like fra Nefastos said in other topic concerning world-views. Perhaps I'm a familiar who I'm familiar with. Perhaps I'd say that these outer familiars occur when psyche is either broken or willingly open to just listen to personality outside of mentioned solidity. Mental illness is too harsh a word to describe it since they don't necessarily cause any damage or loss of sanity.

Concerning the question of these beings mixing in the world and the deeper forms of transference: the question seems to be about the possibility of real, authentic communication in general. One angle to use is what NLP-practioners have called modeling. Modeling means that if I want to learn how to make good apple pie, I go to the master pie-maker and ask him to explain the process through his eyes. This should reveal critical submodalities in his perception during the process and therefore what I should be paying attention to in order to be like him. Submodality is unnecessarily fancy word: modality means basically some sensory thing, sight, hearing, taste etc. Submodality means brighter, darker, bigger, smaller etc. When you know the master's perceptual recipe it guides you through the path of pie.
I consider tarot cards -for example- to basically be this kind of perceptual recipes to be recognized during divination in order to experience the angle of perception to guide in achieving some given goal. Sure, the cards are just sets of symbols but their hidden temperament is revealed when one simultaneously listens to all of it's parts and this personality could be understood as a familiar spirit with relative autonomy and certain "chemistry" with the attitudes of the divinator. Making a pact -for example- with this kind of energetical being would certainly be communication with other than myself. S/he/it is the living intelligence or meaning of some closed system, limited by the symbols used to understand him. Certainly an imaginative, artistic person can see first and understand later.
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obnoxion
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

Post by obnoxion »

Insanus wrote: Thu Jun 06, 2019 3:15 pm I have had quite a bit of somewhat similar experiences, but due to my sceptical (perhaps read: scared?) nature I don't accept their (familiars') semi-autonomous being very often into my conscious life. On the other hand, often times I think that even my own voice is not so much my own and that my concept of self is there to provide "pragmatic and heuristic solidity" like fra Nefastos said in other topic concerning world-views. Perhaps I'm a familiar who I'm familiar with. Perhaps I'd say that these outer familiars occur when psyche is either broken or willingly open to just listen to personality outside of mentioned solidity.
Is not the body but a corpse, haunted by the ghost of personality? It is both Gothic and Tantric vision of man. The Gothic aspect of it must be obvious. But as for Tantric, I'm refering to such ideas as Lakulisha becoming the Avatar of Shiva in the form of reanimated brahmin corpse, and the Buddhist "philosophical monsters" such as walking skeletons, zombies and Gothuc creatures that embody false views of the self.
Nefastos wrote: Wed Jun 05, 2019 1:03 pm People usually seem to "phase out", lose their ability to track time and place, or in some other way lose their mind if cumulated stress effect becomes too intensive to handle. For me, this never seems to happen, regardless how intensive the psychic stress has become; neither do I hallucinate, which I consider a bit similar liminal experience
I consider this somewhat Shiva-like trait, because the Dancing Shiva stands on the dwarf that represents ignorance in the form of epileptic loss of memory. So I would in some way say that the state of Dancing Shiva transcends such states of phasing out. On the other hand, I see Shiva as granting a boon via the feet, as I think the first thing to overcome when viewing such imaga would be the dynamics of adrversaries.
One day of Brahma has 14 Indras; his life has 54 000 Indras. One day of Vishnu is the lifetime of Brahma. The lifetime of Vishnu is one day of Shiva.
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Polyhymnia
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

Post by Polyhymnia »

I had a cat from the ages of 11-26 who had a nasty temperament with almost everyone, but her and I were very bonded. She was also very close with my father, who passed a few years after she came into our lives. I think she was as close to anything that I would call a familiar (save for a few imaginary friends I procured at a young age, who did nothing more than entertain me) and she always seemed to know when I needed her the most. She provided me much comfort and affection during difficult times in those 15 years, and her last few years are not something that I'm proud of and haunt me to relive. I dream of her often and carry many regrets. I've had cats since then. Two wonderful, loving, affectionate cats. But none as in tune with me and my emotions as my first.
"Limited love asks for possession of the beloved, but the unlimited asks only for itself." -Kahlil Gibran
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

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After moving back into central Helsinki I've gotten daily opportunities to watch and contemplate "third nature", the living things that thrive specifically in an artificial environment (and that are therefore often either ignored or seen as pests). I've thought a lot about seagulls in particular and found a kind of an affinity for them. The Finnish expression "lokata" (from "lokki") means an aggressive kind of begging or going after leftovers; it might be translated simply "to gull". So when I, a jobless, pathologically anxious university dropout and wannabe poet, feel like society views me as human trash, which is most of the time, I console myself by imagining seagulls as my friends. Or familiars, from now on.

Cats are also lovely and make me wish that I could purr.
Tiden läker inga sår.
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Re: Familiars & psychic residue

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I like your view on seagulls. I've always felt they were unjustly hated. And never forget that one man's "trash", (or society's, in this case) is another man's (or fraternity, in this case) treasure!
"Limited love asks for possession of the beloved, but the unlimited asks only for itself." -Kahlil Gibran
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