[Xmca-l] Re: CoExperiencing as a Philosophy of Practice.

[Larry Purss]

Mike, the declaration that cultural mediation [in particular the symbolic
level] is a key element can put aside psychoanalysis and psychotherapy
and turn to Vygotsky's own way of including this symbolic level of
coexperiencing. Listen for the implicit movement marking the felt sense of
having *fallen away* from a *source* and then finding one's way back to the
*source* [and in this return entering *deeper* levels.  I am referring to
page 62 of Vasiliyuk's article "Prayer Silence, Psychotherapy".

Vygotsky is exploring  a *deeper* layer for experiencing suffering. Not a
hedonistic flight from suffering, not masochistic consolation, not routine
platitudes [always a silver lining] but a spiritual sublimation of sorrow.
Elevating and deepening into the layer of experiencing the *source* by
transforming this suffering by return to the eternal.
Vygotsky images his life as *my star* in the heavens *marked* by sorrow.
His personal life and his Jewish life *marked* by sorrow. BUT this star is
IN THE HEAVENS.  So the meaning of suffering [the falling away from the
source] is not in fleeing from the suffering but in returning to the
*source* [the eternal, the deepest layer of consciousness] . The meaning is
*found* in the ELEVATION of suffering, elevtion on the wing OF A PRAYER TO
GOD. The transformation of suffering IN GOD.

Vygotsky's metaphor is a personal particular  *image* expressing a deeply
felt layer of experience. But within the particular unique felt image there
is a general [not universal] plot [mytheme] that is historically
traceable developing  symbolic cultural imaginary.

The plot can shift what is *source* [God, sublime, the *self*] and this can
be historically traced[including the work of experiencing the authentic
true *self* in psychology].

 Suzanne Kirschner has traced these transformations in this myth from
religious origins, transformed within the Romantic movement, and shifting
into psychological theories today.

The point I am offering is that Vygotsky as Vasilyuk his project was
touched by this mytheme. Peirce in his speculative musings, also was pulled
into this mytheme.

I am not suggesting this plot is fundamental or foundational but the
yearning for this plot to be universal envelops and embodies us into this
particular myth and is experienced as a deeply felt *truth*. It is only one
of the *key elements* but it is a significant one of the keys to the
philosophy of practice.
The shift to secular themes [such as naturalism] does not change the
underlying plot structure but does change the images that *have us*.
Vygotsky saw his *star* ELEVATED to the heavens that transforms suffering
which is the experience existing within a symbolic truth,






On Thu, Nov 5, 2015 at 5:00 PM, mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu> wrote:

> Hi Larry--
>
> Thanks for your continuing explication of your reading of Vasiliuk. Putting
> aside psychoanalysis and psychotherapy for a moment, I am totally behind
> the delaration
> that  *cultural mediation OF experience* which is a KEY ELEMENT", plus
> co-experiencing as the necessary condition for that cultural mediation.
>
> mike
>
> On Thu, Nov 5, 2015 at 4:17 PM, Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Vasilyuk is developing the *philosophy of Practice* as a psychotechnical
> > *system*.
> > He says in his historical outline of the different *basic foundations* on
> > which psychology has relied [from suggestibility to *becoming aware* to
> > *emancipation* to reliance on learning  to reliance on experiencing to
> the
> > current reliance on experiencing [as existential/humanistic] which is
> > intersecting with todays reliance on productively producing internal
> > psychological transformations oriented to enriching the meaning of being.
> >
> > Vasilyuk says the task exploring the changing reliances of psychology as
> a
> > practice is not to describe the *factual* history of psychology and the
> > reliances of psychotherapy but to elicit the logic of history. In other
> > words to *listen* to the evolving IMPLICIT plot that gives meaning and
> > direction to the subsequent acts of the development of psychology. (page
> > 11)
> >
> > One of the key elements Vasilyuk identifies is the concept of *cultural
> > mediation of experiences*. He says:
> > Historically cumulative experiencings with standard situations
> crystallize
> > in various SYMBOLIC FORMS; when a person experiences crises, his
> > consciousness might get connected to these symbolic forms, an so the
> > process of experiencing, without losing its personality-oriented
> > uniqueness, gains ADDITIONAL DEPTH AND PRODUCTIVITY. (page 18).
> >
> > It is this additional depth and productivity as symbolic that Vasilyuk is
> > generating within his evolving implicit *plot* oriented to transforming
> > psychology in order to enrich the meaning of being.  This is also the
> theme
> > Vasilyuk is relying on in his other article *Prayer, Silence, and
> > Psychotherapy*. This is the living symbol of prayer on the boundary of
> > experiencing and silence/stillness.
> >
> > Here is Vygotsky exploring the *depth* of symbolism in his own words:
> >
> > Ophelia's tragedy [a personification] is exactly LIKE a lyrical
> > accompaniment, that towers over the entire play, which is full of the
> > dreadful torment of INEXPRESSIBILITY, of the most profound dark,
> > mysterious, and SACRED melodies that in some incomprehensible and
> > miraculous way REVEAL AND EMBODY what is most exciting, most allusive,
> and
> > touchingly important, what is DEEPEST AND DARKEST, but what is most
> tragic
> > that is OVERCOME and enlightened, and what IS MOST MYSTICAL in the entire
> > play. Thus tragedy turns into PRAYER .... as though with an oblational
> and
> > expiatory and PRAYERFUL light, it gives religious illumination to the
> > tragedy." (page 61 of Vasilyuk's article.)
> >
> > Vasiliuk then comments: "No matter how much the devotees of Marxist
> > materialism try to conceal Vygotsky's religiosity from themselves and us,
> > it is perfectly obvious that THESE words [LP -1st order words]  could
> only
> > have been written by a person with deep personal EXPERIENCE with prayer."
> > (page 61).
> >
> > To sum up, I am MARKING [for orientation purposes]  the concept of
> > *cultural mediation OF experience* which is a KEY ELEMENT of
> coexperiencing
> > psychotherapy AS philosophy of practice. I believe that the same
> *symbolic
> > gravity* can be expressed through changing images. The plot of "falling
> > away from* and *returning to* can be expressed in multiple symbols such
> > as turning away from God, turning away from the natural sublime, turning
> > away from one's true authentic self, These images are expressing
> different
> > *reliances* but are sharing the same symbolic plot as the cultural
> > mediation of experiencing. The IMPLICIT deepening of coexperience that is
> > now emerging in Russia since the 1980's that Vasilyuk is plotting may be
> > implicitly enveloped in this same mytheme of falling away from *the
> source*
> > and then the return to this *source.
> >
> > The book *The Religious and Romantic Roots of Psychoanalysis* by Suzanne
> > Kirschner has plotted this particular myth flowing through Western ways
> of
> > experiencing the meaning of being. She is tracing the roots of the
> > emergence of Freudian psychoanalysis but it is the more general
> philosophy
> > of practice as including this KEY ELEMENT of cultural mediation as
> > deepening coexperiences that I am highlighting.
> > As Vasilyuk says: the task is to LISTEN FOR *the evolving IMPLICIT
> > plot that gives meaning and direction to the subsequent acts of the
> > *development* of psychology [including the KEY symbolic element that
> > *deepens* experience beyond the personal existential.
> >
> > Larry
> >
>
>
>
> --
>
> It is the dilemma of psychology to deal as a natural science with an
> object that creates history. Ernst Boesch
>