NIGREDO Nigredo, "the raven head", the "skull", or "black work" this is the phase of destruction, or putrefaction. The alchemist destroys all the dangeorus and disgragated elements that are present in in his/her subtle bodies (mental and psychic). On the mental level, the initiate destroys all his egos (the many aspects of his/her external personality, yet not his/her real identity) that we can call, according to Carl Gustav Jung, the self. On the psychic level, he/she will destroy all the crystallized, unprocessed and unresolved emotions. These experiences are present in our unconscious memory (for this reason they cannot be resolved on a mental level), they have not yet found an explanation, nor a solution. The destruction of the external egos and the emotions during the stage of Nigredo lead the physical body to the end of tensions, that are usually kept active by ego and disgregated emotions. Such a process of disgregation can be activated through self observation, understanding how the different egos, the various personalities and the emotions are formed. Such elements often crystallized during childhood and adolescence, via family and social conditionings. If you are thinking now about the re capitulation mentioned by Carlos Castaneda in his work, this is a correct connection. These elements need to be destroyed, since they take away free will from people, instead they force him/her into needs produced by lack that come from what they learnt around them and consider correct, because they are practiced by most people around them. By observing them, he/she becomes aware of what has happened and he/she can then destroy them consciously in order to purify such subtle matter (mental and psychic bodies) in a conscious way during the subsequent alchemical phase. The time in which we live through the Nigredo is tragic, devastating, upsetting and destabilizing, because all the things we used to found our life are in doubt and destroyed. Only after complete destruction there can be a new step.
THE BADGER November 2018
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