Learning from Harold Crick and the Gemini Twins

A couple of weeks ago I attended an Oregon Friends of Jung lecture with Jerry Ruhl that I discussed a little bit in this post. I watched Stranger Than Fiction this weekend and it reminded me a lot of many of the things that Dr. Ruhl talked about. I’m going to try and summarize. The basis for his lecture was the story of the Gemini twins. If you want to read more about that, you can go here, but basically the purpose of the story is to illustrate that we have two aspects to ourselves, the earthly and the divine, that are at times at odds with each other. Sometimes we go back and forth between the two, like we can only devote attention to either one or the other and usually it’s the earthly side that wins out. He discussed how this can lead to what we call the mid-life crisis (which doesn’t necessarily happen at 40 something, it can happen much earlier or much later). The trick is to learn how to divinize the earthly, learn to let each one inform the other and become more integrated.

So that’s a lot of words that don’t make much sense. This is what he means though. We live in a world of expectations. Our families have expectations of us, our American culture has expectations of us, our churches have expectations us of and so do our jobs and we spend much of our time focusing on meeting these expectations. We go to school to be able to get a job that will enable us to provide for a family. We trudge through the work week, just waiting for the weekend to come. We rarely take the time to stop and listen to what our own inner voice or the spirit tells us we need for nourishment for our souls. Instead we focus on meeting expectations.

At some point this all breaks down though. Dr. Ruhl said it usually happens during mid-life because at that point we start to not care what other people’s expectations of us are. When I stop caring so much about what other peoples’ expectations are, I am better able to turn inside myself and listen to what my soul needs. I are better able to divinize the earthly and make my life something that feeds me instead of something that only carries out the wishes of others.

I think the message just gets a little bit jacked up at church because we are taught that we are to think of others first and not be selfish but that message gets hijacked and suddenly the message is not only to give OF yourself to others, but to completely give yourself to others to make what they want with you (example: I am long past the age when it is expected of me to marry. If I had followed counsel that had been given to me to just get married in my early to mid 20’s, I would have messed up at least two lives. I say that based on what I know about who I was at that age).

The real message is to give of myself without stripping myself of my identity. I take into consideration the earthly expectations (and by earthly, I’m including any expectation by another mortal, including those of ecclesiastical leaders). I realize though, that more important than the earthly expectations are the more specific divine ones that I have access to within myself. I also realize that it doesn’t have to be a strictly either/or situation. I can take the earthly and divinize it. I kind of like that word, I imagine myself divinizing with a wand while wearing a robe.

Relating this all to Stranger Than Fiction, Harold Crick is an IRS agent and lives a rigid life. Everything is perfectly timed and measured and counted. Then he starts hearing Karen Eiffel’s voice narrating his life, almost like it’s the beginning of his self-awareness. He unexpectedly falls in love with his polar opposite and gradually begins to live outside of his expected lines and listen to what he wants and needs. As a result, his life begins to have more meaning and resonance. It also becomes more emotionally dangerous.

Spoiler Alert: I also love how Harold Crick’s watch, what is seen as his downfall or character flaw, is what ends up saving his life in the end. That’s probably another post for another day though.