"Understanding" in Matriarchal Consciousness

At the outset we must clearly establish that the terms “matriarchal” and “feminine” do not refer unequivocally to women, nor do the terms “patriarchal” or “masculine” refer unequivocally to men. These are fundamental energies of the psyche that are native to all humans, and their interactions encompass all the vicissitudes of life. Quotes are from Erich Neumann’s book The Fear of the Feminine.

“We are using ‘patriarchal’ and ‘matriarchal’ as psychological terms that are to be applied only secondarily to political conditions, spheres of influence, etc. Hence a patriarchal culture and its values stand in opposition to the values and attitudes valid for a ‘matriarchal’ consciousness which itself is a primary form of all consciousness [emphasis added] and whose preferred representative is woman. In this [psychological] sense it is a step forward when the patriarchal replaces a matriarchal consciousness. But when one knows of the psychological weaknesses and dangers of patriarchal culture, whose extreme form in the contemporary West has led to a crisis endangering the whole of humanity, one will avoid the error of regarding ‘matriarchal consciousness’ as only an archaic legacy and the archetypal feminine as ‘relatively undeveloped.’”

Many are familiar with Einstein’s claim that we cannot solve the significant problems we face at the level of the thinking we used to create them. We now can refine that: it is not just the level of thinking, it is the consciousness we are in. The kind of thinking that is native to extreme patriarchal consciousness cannot solve its significant problems because it can’t “understand” the way solutions could arise that are outside of its control.

“That the processes of matriarchal consciousness are through and through uniquely and specifically different from those of patriarchal consciousness commences with the act of ‘understanding.’ Here understanding is not, as for patriarchal consciousness, an act of the intellect as a rapidly comprehending organ that perceives, works through, and organizes; rather it means conceiving. When something is to be understood, it must enter into matriarchal consciousness and in all respects this is to be understood in the symbolically sexual sense of a fertilization, ie, of a conception.”

“But this female symbolism of matriarchal consciousness goes still further, for what has ‘entered into’ must now ‘rise up’... the act of ‘arising,’ ‘rising up,’ or ‘sprouting’ captures the twofold aspect of matriarchal consciousness for which the light of knowledge ‘rises up’ just as the sprouting seed does. But once something has ‘entered into’ and ‘risen up’ or ‘sprouted,’ this ‘something’ lays claim to the entire psyche that is now permeated by the matured knowledge that the psyche seeks – indeed, is compelled – to realize with its totality.?

“This means that with the act of understanding - conceiving, matriarchal consciousness experiences a personality change [emphasis added]. ?The whole person is gripped and moved by the content, in contrast to the experience of patriarchal consciousness in which an intellectually understood content is often only filed away in one of the pigeonholes of the systematized mind.”?

Clearly patriarchal consciousness is at odds with a kind of educational experience that grips the whole person, the kind described in Mr. Chips or Dead Poets Society. The entire patriarchal educational/industrial system of compulsory schooling was designed to fit people into industrial uses.?

In either type of system, it doesn’t matter whether the instructors are male or female. It is not the gender of the instructor, but the degree of access to matriarchal consciousness that matters.?

The personality is not changed if students are run on a conveyor belt through a patriarchal structure of instruction. Often they can't remember later on what was taught. They just went through the experience to get a piece of paper confirming that their pigeonholes had been filled.

A personal connection with a favorite teacher and a creative way of engaging with the material plants the seeds that still sprout years later. It happens through a matriarchal consciousness, which changes the entire personality, and where knowledge is realized in its totality.

The bromide, “You can’t change behavior,” is? true in a patriarchal consciousness. You can only regiment behavior.

“Just as it is difficult for patriarchal consciousness to actualize something rather than only to ‘magnificently understand it,’ a matriarchal consciousness finds it hard to understand something if it cannot make it real. But here, making something real means carrying it to fruition and relating to the content in the manner of the relationship [emphasis added] in which the mother and the embryo reciprocally alter each other during pregnancy.”?

Actualizing and making something real are where creatively integrating patriarchal and matriarchal consciousness would be fruitful. But just brainstorming or ideation exercises won’t accomplish this. Matriarchal consciousness must be integrated into and expressed in the leading personalities, which can be male or female, and spread through personal connections.

You may be familiar with the saying that the fastest way to learn a foreign language is to fall in love with someone who only speaks that language. Take that in. It could change your personality.

“Hence, symbolically, matriarchal consciousness is usually not situated in the head, but rather in the heart. Here? ‘understanding’ also means an act of feeling that comprehends, and often enough this act–as, for example, in the creative process–is accompanied by an intense participation of affect so that something can burst into light and illuminate consciousness. In contrast, the process of thinking and abstraction typical of patriarchal consciousness is ‘cold,’ since the ‘cold-blooded’ objectivity demanded of it necessitates establishing distance that presupposes a cool head.”

Can you imagine an executive of an institution or corporation telling their Board of Directors, “Well, my heart is telling me…” But I promise you, a successful repeat entrepreneur would know exactly what this means. Steve Jobs was famous for it. Creative professions live by it.

In order to change the way we solve our significant problems. we have to understand what “relating” means in patriarchal and matriarchal consciousness.?

In patriarchal consciousness, relating means juxtaposition. It is impersonal.?

in matriarchal consciousness, relating means identification. It can be personal or transpersonal.?

A phrase adopted to advance women into positions of power, “The personal is political,” is a quasi-patriarchal attitude that does psychological violence to feminine nature and matriarchal consciousness. Women are put into positions of power as a matter of juxtaposition, and use patriarchal power structures to compel change through top-down policies, mandatory training, and weaponized identities that will not fundamentally change a patriarchal system; it has changed the women into its own likeness.

Society cannot be changed this way because behavior isn’t changed this way. Don’t try to change patriarchal structures from within; change men and women from within.