When the soul wants to experience something, she throws out an image in front of her and then steps into it.
I often marvel at the intelligence within seeds, wondering what image of life they hold in their cells. How does a seed know what it is to become and how to nourish its growth? What impresses me even more is seeing a sprout pushing up through pavement. How do seeds know which way is up when light and warmth are blocked? And why don’t they give up when they realize they have been paved over and are hitting a stone wall? I have used examples of plant behavior to inspire my family and patients. Plants possess a source of wisdom in their genes and a sense of gravity too. They don’t give in to adversity when they run into obstacles; they push forward or find new ways to reach the light. So what signals plants to keep going and not succumb to obstacles?
The key to all forms of life is communication. This includes the ability of simple, one-celled organisms as well as the more complex ones, such as humans, to communicate with each other. It also refers to the exchange of information between systems, organs, and cells within individual bodies, and with the greater consciousness that is behind all creation.
Cellular communication evolved when one-celled organisms discovered how to pass on vital information by altering the chemistry of their environment. In times of danger they would secrete substances that led them to come together into balls of cells that could survive adverse living conditions such as droughts or temperature fluctuations. This clustering can also be seen in far more complex creatures, such as herd animals like elephants and even gray whales when they circle around and protect vulnerable members of the community from predatory attack.
Evolving organisms learned the difference between life-sustaining and self-destructive behavior at both conscious and unconscious levels, providing a pathway for the intelligence of their predecessors to be passed down to living individuals in each species. Problems arise for the human species when we do not pay attention to messages of danger because our level of consciousness distracts us. Notice I didn’t say our intelligence.
If we grow up with life-enhancing, loving messages from the authorities in our lives, we respond to danger and preserve our health and lives because we have self-esteem. We behave with intelligence and pay attention to the unconscious signals we give our bodies and that they give us. But if we grow up with rejection, our choices and reactions become self-destructive, not life enhancing. When we respond appropriately to our bodies’ signals, the intracellular communication becomes life enhancing; but when we ignore or deny the signals or we live in fear, they can be disease inducing.
Consider the man who continually says yes to overtime demands by his boss, ignoring the signals that say his body is wearing down from the stress of too much work. Disease may become his body’s response when the man ignores signs of fatigue and abandons self-care, because the disease allows him to stop working. He may suffer from the Monday morning syndrome — named after the day in the week when people have more heart attacks, suicides, strokes, and illnesses. On the other hand, if he wakes up dreading the day and feels his blood pressure rise, and he listens to his body, he will realize that he must seek another, less stressful job — must find a job that he loves doing — or change his attitude toward his job and boss. When he changes the internal messages, his body will respond with renewed health.
One mechanism of communication is imagery. Before any information can be passed on, it must be organized into a pattern or code. This pattern may delineate a figure, as a sewing pattern does; the code may formulate a thought, much like the honey bee dancing to show her peers where nectar is, or it might predicate an action, such as when a traffic light turns green. Once an intention exists, an image is born and communication begins. Communication can be a simple message, such as when a cellular switch says, “Turn on” or “Turn off,” or the message can be an intricate series of images that lead to the building of a cathedral, such as the one illustrated by my friend’s story.
There is a stone cottage that sits at the edge of an ancient copse outside the cathedral city of Wells in England. When Harry bought the property, he discovered behind it the remains of an abandoned quarry, which had been the source of stone used to build Wells Cathedral in ad 1175. I was fascinated to learn from Harry that one part of his house had been the original quarryman’s cottage, making the dwelling nearly a thousand years old.
“Beneath the tree roots and moss,” he said, “I found giant slabs of stone with chisel marks still visible. Days later, when I stood under the magnificent arches of the cathedral, it struck me how incredible it was. Because of one man’s imagination, desire, and intention, massive stones had been gouged from the earth, dragged five miles down the hill, and carved into pillars, walls, and the intricate, vaulted roof of the nave. I felt I was in the presence of the hand of God, seeing this miracle of creation manifested from one person’s initial vision. Without man’s ability to visualize and communicate complex ideas, no cathedral could or would have existed.”
All species react to images at some level. What makes our species unique is not our ability to reason; it is the way we use images. Even those born without sight can respond to and interpret images and symbols. Reading Braille, for example, requires the ability to perceive and recognize specific shapes and patterns that contain a meaning.
When we evolved into humans, we became more complex in our interactions with the outer world. We developed language and created works of art. But still, in a wordless greater consciousness, we sought information from a universal intelligence that could only be conceived by visual, auditory, and tactile images, and we expressed what we learned with stories and symbols. Prehistoric drawings on cave walls and desert rocks, for example, illustrate visions that were sought by humans from an invisible source during times of drought. In other locations, shamans’ illustrations provided passersby with information about how far and in what direction hunters would find life-supporting prey.
Symbols are a form of language that is understood without words and that acts as a mental shortcut. They may represent an object, a situation, a belief, a group of people, or many other possibilities. A symbol, such as the red octagonal traffic sign, may express only one meaning or, like a myth or parable, may be multilayered and deep. Such myths and parables are the symbolic stories that teach and that form the structure and beliefs of cultures and religions. These stories become embedded not only in the culture but also in the psyches of people.
Colors often share universal symbolism. People react to red with emotion (as they do to blood), to yellow as wake-up energy (sun), and to green as a positive indicator (growth). Not only does the symbolic meaning of the color affect what action we take, but it also communicates with our body, mind, and emotions at a subconscious level.
Gregg Furth writes in The Secret World of Drawings, “The symbol unlocks unconscious psychic energy and allows it to flow toward a natural level, where a transforming effect occurs. The individual encountering a difficulty now has the possibility of pulling unconscious elements into consciousness, dealing with them, and thus transcending the problem. The external problem may still be present, but it is now understood differently.”1 The new understanding is the key to growth and survival.
When words, sounds, and images become metaphors, they carry a greater meaning in a simple representation, such as the ring of a bell, and are capable of activating healing at the level of heart and mind. These symbols communicate with the body through feelings, mood, and automatic physical reactions. Symbolic images and their associated feelings can change our internal chemistry.
Followers of Buddhism, for example, learn to become aware of the stillness within at the sound of a ringing bell, their call to prayer and meditation. I often teach people to use the bell of a ringing phone as an opportunity for practicing mindfulness. One troubled woman who had adopted this practice was saved by the auditory prompt. Lost in the darkness of depression, she was just about to commit suicide when her telephone rang. The sound reminded her to go within and find that place of stillness. Once there, she realized she did not need to kill herself. She needed to learn how to live.
In the 1960s, Carl Jung’s analytic approach to psychology transformed the understanding and attitudes of psychologists and sociologists in Europe and the United States. He studied the psyche through the worlds of dreams, art, mythology, religion, and philosophy. Although he was a practicing clinical psychologist, much of his life’s work was spent exploring other realms, including Eastern and Western philosophy, alchemy, astrology, and sociology, as well as literature and the arts. His theory of the collective unconscious as expressed through symbols and archetypal characters opened the door to what is now referred to as Jungian psychology.
By Jung’s definition, an archetype is a collectively understood, symbolic character shared among entire groups of people across epochs of time. These archetypal characters are the symbols of authority and key figures in our lives. The symbols alone have great influence on our feelings, thoughts, and behavior.2
Jung acknowledged that our future is shaped unconsciously. He also observed that we act as if we were gods controlling our lives, and that once we uncover the hidden realms inside us we discover that we are influenced and changed by many unseen factors. For further reading on this subject, I recommend Joseph Campbell’s book The Hero’s Journey and his documentary dialogue The Power of Myth.3
The Book of Changes, also called the I Ching, contains the wisdom of ancient Chinese sages who organized their observations of nature into sixty visual scenarios or objects. By tossing sticks or throwing coins, one creates a pattern made up of six broken or solid lines, and the resultant symbol, called a hexagram, represents one of the sixty images. The sages’ written judgment and commentary on that hexagram is then used by the inquirer to gain insight into a problem or situation. I am amazed at what I have learned from it in times of need. In a recent time of change, it reminded me of my limitations and to act accordingly, helping me to remember that I cannot fix everything, and that I too have needs.
When Carl Jung was asked to write the foreword to the third edition of the English translation of the I Ching, he hesitated. He knew that, by introducing a system of divination in which one sought judgment from an ancient book upon a modern-day problem by tossing coins or casting sticks, he would incur criticism from his peers.
Having considered the risk to his respected reputation, Jung wrote, “I have always tried to remain unbiased and curious. Why not venture a dialogue with an ancient book that purports to be animated?” He decided to throw the coins and ask the book for its commentary on his “intention to present it to the western mind.” The coin-tossing ritual produced a hexagon named the Cauldron, which represented “a ritual vessel containing cooked food. Here, the food is to be understood as spiritual nourishment.”4
Many symbols in the I Ching would not have pertained to Jung’s question; indeed, most would have been totally unrelated and the commentary deemed nonsense. But the sages’ further discourse on the Cauldron was so applicable to Jung’s query that he was encouraged to go ahead. He wrote the foreword, using his own experience with the coins as a reliable example of tapping into universal wisdom using an ancient Chinese method of symbols.
John Greenleaf Whittier, an active abolitionist and one of the American fireside poets, wrote, “Nature speaks in symbols and signs.”5 How often have you pondered a question and found your answer when gazing on feeding birds in the wild or watching a sunset? More than just metaphor or story, symbols can produce emotional reactions, induce healing, and act as transformative lessons.
One woman I knew battled with depression after she moved to the West Coast. Despite the beauty that surrounded her, she struggled against suicidal thoughts as she walked along the beach on a desolate reach of sand.
I had yearned to live in this place for so many years, but now that I was here, I felt terribly alone. I could see for miles, and there wasn’t another human being in sight. I felt so depressed that if anyone had appeared I would have avoided them. That sense of isolation nearly overwhelmed me. I tried hard not to panic, and I kept saying “thank you” out loud, hoping gratitude would change my dark thoughts.
Just then a stone in the sand caught my eye. Smooth and flat, the stone was shaped like a perfectly cast footprint. I picked it up. Despite the cool weather and thick overcast sky, the stone contained the heat of the sun, and its warmth began to envelop me. I knew the footprint was a message meant especially for me, and I no longer felt alone. I also realized my sense of isolation had been brought on by my own choices.
Within the week I got involved with my community through volunteer work, and I started attending twelve-step meetings and making friends with other women in the program. There are still moments when I feel lonely, but when they happen I reach out to help someone else and walk beside another human being. The stone footprint sits on my desk as I write, reminding me of just how loved and un-alone I am.
For this woman, the stone represented a story about footprints in the sand; a story that has become a metaphor for God’s presence. The symbol transformed her thinking; it offered comfort and a reminder that she had to take steps that would make her life meaningful.
I look for signs, too, and when I find a penny, I always feel I am on the right path. Engraved on each penny are the words “In God We Trust,” which is a reminder for me to have faith, and the word “Liberty,” a reminder to be my authentic self. Abe Lincoln reminds me of my mortality and also to lighten up a bit.
We know that cellular communication happens through chemical and electrical signals that direct the cell’s behavior, but how a protein molecule knows what to do is beyond me. Creation is a miracle and is beyond our understanding. It is amazing to think of one cell — an ovum — developing into a human being, differentiating into all the components we are made of, getting them to know their role and to develop in the right place in the body to do their thing. Imagine the endless number of intercellular signals that have to be sent to each component of the body in the process of making a viable human being — a baby. And consider the signals this body receives after it is formed and throughout its lifespan.
What does a touch, a hug, or a caress say to that body about living? What do unexpressed feelings of fear, despair, and depression tell it about the desire to live? Every cell in our body is aware of our will to live and of our desires and intentions. The emotional and physical are one. Mind and matter are not separate entities. As Jung said, the psyche and soma are simply different aspects of the One Being we are.
Just as one-celled organisms react to their environments, our body cells react to physical, mental, and emotional environments both inside and outside the body. A negatively perceived image can be the path that directs us away from our intended journey; but when we turn it around and perceive it as positive, we can recover what ground we’ve lost and continue, strengthened and wiser, on life’s journey.
Human beings perceive life from a dualistic perspective, through which we understand that where there is light, there is also shadow. However, a shadow is merely the absence of light. If you face the sun, you don’t experience the shadow. Perception, then, affects our health; and most often, the way we perceive is our choice. Disease is a loss of health, not a punishment. Lost health is to be looked for and recovered, just as you would seek to find your lost car keys rather than assume God wanted you to walk home.
Consider the ancient symbol in which a serpent is entwined around a staff. Originally it signified Asclepius, the Greek god of healing and medicine. The rod, or staff, of Asclepius, adopted as a logo by medical organizations around the world (one example is the American Academy of Family Physicians), illustrates this duality with intriguing symbolism. Snake venom is a deadly poison. But in ancient China and India it was used to treat a variety of conditions, from opium addiction and skin cancers to problems with the liver. Today its medicinal uses include treating diseases affecting the immune system, such as MS and AIDS. And experimental studies with cobra venom have provided data that suggest it slows down the growth rate of certain cancers.
Another interesting characteristic of the snake is its ability to shed its skin. When a snake finishes molting, it appears newly hatched, just as a sick person who recovers from disease emerges rejuvenated. When we change our perspective and face the sun rather than the shadows, it’s as if we are newly born: the body experiences our renewed love of life, and self-induced healing can result.
Historically, the staff carried by a traveling physician might have offered comfort and support to the onlooker, or it might have represented pain and death, depending on the condition of the patient and the skill of the practitioner. The serpent and staff combined into one symbol create a vivid reminder, for both practitioner and patient, of the positive and negative aspects of medical treatment.
As a physician-healer, I prefer to focus on symbols that reflect the power of love. We must remember as we care for each other that darkness, cold, and spiritual death exist only where there is no light, warmth, or love. The first image representative of healing that comes to my mind is that of the heart in an open palm. This symbol originated with the Shaker sect, who settled in the northeastern United States and followed a spiritual discipline of hard work and simplicity while devoting their lives to God. The hand represents charity, and the heart, compassion. The two combined imply a loving welcome and nonjudgmental acceptance, so the hand performs the act that the heart desires.
The therapeutic effect of compassion is infinite and immeasurable. A physician’s genuine care for his or her patients enhances healing and can even eliminate the need for medical treatment or surgery. When a person receives caring attention, a live message enters his body at the cellular level. A young man dying of AIDS once shared with me his belief that “what is evil is not the disease, but to not respond with compassion to the person living with the disease.”
Compassion doesn’t have to come from outside sources. It can also be tapped from within. One of the imagery exercises I practice with my ECaP group involves turning fear or pain into a visual metaphor and working with that image. If you are struggling with fear or pain, try the following exercise. Imagine your fear or pain symbolized by a crying infant. Seated comfortably, close your eyes and imagine walking through your house, following the sound of that baby’s heartrending sobs. As you enter a room, you find the child lying in its crib. Pick it up and hold it gently in your arms; rock and soothe the baby until it is comforted and stops crying. Then, carefully hold the baby away from your body. Be aware that it is not you, but that you can embrace it and learn from it. What lesson does this baby have to teach you?
This metaphor of the crying infant teaches you that your fear and pain provide an opportunity to walk into your shadows, attend to them, hold them, and soothe them. They should not be ignored or denied, but embraced and loved. The same exercise can be done when you are dreaming. Instead of running from the demon that appears, turn to face it in your dream; ask why it is there and what it wants of you.
It is no accident when one symbol appears in multiple countries, cultures, and eras and carries similar meanings in each despite the physical or chronological distance between occurrences. In modern science, for example, a triangle (which is also the Greek symbol called delta) symbolizes “a change.” Weather forecasters will place a triangle in front of the letter T to signify a change of temperature, just as a nurse will draw one in front of the letters BP on a patient’s chart to record a change in blood pressure.
The Alcoholics Anonymous logo is a triangle inside a circle, which represents that, for alcoholics to remain sober and enjoy long-term recovery, they must change their behavior and attitudes. Pyramids, built by ancient societies on both sides of the world, represented transformation, or change, from life to death, from this world to the other. Native Americans use triangles in their pottery, weavings, and jewelry to symbolize the portal through which spirit enters the newborn or returns to the ancestors.
Numbers too are symbols. All religions and cultures have, for example, seven days in a week, and the number seven represents a cycle of life. The number eight represents a new beginning. The number four represents completion or wholeness, just as the earth has four seasons and four directions.
Another kind of symbol consists of more than one image joined together in a metaphor, parable, or story. It illustrates a lesson or idea that people can easily grasp and experience. I began telling stories for two reasons. One of these reasons was beautifully illustrated by the author Isabel Allende during a lecture she gave several years ago and which I attended. When Allende related a Jewish proverb, its lesson really hit me, and I never forgot it. The proverb contains the question: What is truer than Truth? The answer is: A story.
I often spoke at Yale, trying to convince other doctors during grand rounds that the health improvements my ECaP patients were experiencing after joining the support group were genuine. When people heal their lives, I said, their disease heals, too. I cited various journals and articles, but the references I made to scientific data just opened the door to further arguments. Doctors would say to me, “I can’t accept that.” Some would even start yelling at me. “That’s a poorly controlled experiment,” they would tell me. Or they would say of whichever reference I cited: “That’s not a good journal.”
I even found that when I tried to do research, people would tell me, “What you’re saying doesn’t make sense, so we’re not going to fund your research.” Then others would say, “You’ve done no research, so why should we believe you?” I couldn’t produce an acceptable answer in either case. People got angry at me and, finally, did research to prove I was wrong. When their results proved instead that my claims were correct, people in the medical profession began to open up to new possibilities.
One graduate student at Yale who was working on his master’s thesis did a study involving the women with breast cancer in our support group. He came up with statistics that showed a significantly better survival rate among patients who embraced a mind-body-soul approach in a group that focused not on disease but on living life and taking responsibility for one’s own recovery. It was impressive. When his professor saw these statistics derived from scientifically gathered data, he said, “That can’t be true. You will have to change the control group.”
You see, the student did the research and came up with something people didn’t want to accept. His professor told him it couldn’t be true, so he had to fix it. I explained to the student that people didn’t have to be in my group to be survivors, that there are exceptional patients all over the world. To appease his professor, the student found a sufficient number of other individuals who did as well as those in our support group; this new data showed no significant difference between patients who embraced a mind-body-soul approach to their treatment and patients who didn’t. Doctors accused me once again of lying, because “the research didn’t prove anything.”
What I learned was that if you got up in front of the same group of doctors and told a story about a patient, nobody walked out angry, since all I was doing was telling a story. It didn’t threaten their belief system. It was an anecdote, a case history. But the story would have a significant effect. It would open the door and, a month later, if they had a “crazy” patient in their office, they’d say, “Hey, Siegel, you’ll enjoy this.” And then we’d start talking, and they’d begin to open their minds. Those stories became symbols of human potential for self-induced healing.
Instead of categorically disbelieving anything you can’t consciously see, hear, or feel, at least open your mind and be willing to consider new ideas. Be like Jung and the great philosophers. Be like children and let your curiosity lead you into the wonder of life. Pay attention to symbols and archetypal characters and let them be your teachers.
In the next chapters, we will look at dreams and drawings and learn how symbols in them open the door to our inner wisdom. The mind is an incredibly powerful tool that can lead a person to survival or death, depending on the person’s beliefs. What you believe is communicated to your body and affects how treatments, and the side effects of treatments, manifest within you.
Look through a magazine for archetypal characters and symbols. Perhaps you will find a doctor, a judge, a candle, a dollar bill, or a red rose. Ask yourself whether its meaning is personal, universal, or perhaps both. Notice any emotions it evokes. Throughout the day, make a list of the symbols you consciously and unconsciously interact with. Notice what role they play in your thinking, emotions, behavior, and choices. Is one of the archetypes or symbols a frequent feature in your dreams? If so, what do you think it communicates to you?
Cut out a symbol that reminds you of a loving feeling, and tape it to your mirror or fridge as a love letter to yourself. Create shrines of love throughout your home, as I have in ours.