Even though dreams refer to a definite attitude of consciousness and a definite psychic situation, their roots lie deep in the unfathomably dark recesses of the conscious mind. For want of a more descriptive term we call this unknown background the unconscious.
~ Jung, The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche, pargraph 544
Just as the body bears the traces of its phylogenetic development, so also does the human mind. Hence there is nothing surprising about the possibility that the figurative language of dreams is a survival from an archaic mode of thought. Volume 8, Paragraph 475
In the depths of the unconscious, the old, long-established life patterns are eternally repeated; at the same time, nature is also continually producing new forms, undertaking new experiments. There are still embryonic, unfinished structures to be found within the living individual of the present day, and that these, far from being meaningless, actually bear the germs of significant new forms whose nature we cannot even guess.
~ Esther Harding, Psychic Energy: Its Source and its Transformation, 1963, p. 120
This week I find myself in Iceland on an expedition hoping to be graced by a peek at the elusive Aurora Borealis, the Dawn of the North. Coincidentally my recent studies are on the goddess Aphrodite, as I try to understand in greater depth, as Tom Elsner used to say, “The Love Problem.” In reading The Meaning of Aphrodite by Paul Friedrich I have learned that the earliest form of this magnificent Goddess of Beauty and Love is named Dawn, Aurora. It is she who heralds, in radiant chroma, optimism and light, the new day.
The vision we’re seeking in this land of mysterious elegance is a living image of Dawn. It is this same goddess for whom Marie-Louise von Franz’ named her masterpiece Aurora Consurgens, Dawn Rising, an image of Divine Feminine Wisdom.
Psychologically, Aphrodite as Rising Dawn symbolizes Wisdom, the psyche’s process of creating and bringing new forms, embryonic psychic structures into being. She heralds their arrival into consciousness, the Sun ascending behind her.