Transcendence, the Unconscious, and God Our Ally
Before I started this post, I asked my wife, “What are you doing?” “I’m thinking,” she replied. This afternoon we moved some old couches from our living room to an upstairs room. With the open space in our living room, my wife is pacing, thinking how to fill it. Now that I’ve read Daniel Lieberman’s Spellbound, I’m not sure if I should encourage her to keep thinking. As her conscious mind “weighs the pros and cons of each alternative,”[1] the unconscious part – the part that is REALLY in control, according to Dr. Lieberman[2] – is also at work. And the more complex this decision becomes, the greater the risk of becoming dissatisfied. Lieberman wrote that “more time spent thinking about which brand to buy (will lead) to lower levels of satisfaction.”[3]
Spatial contemplation aside, Lieberman wants us “to discover how (the unconscious) influences our behavior and how we can join forces with it to enrich our lives and make ourselves whole.”[4] Ultimately, he aims to help us have a more “meaningful existence.”[5] And to have such an existence, Lieberman tells his readers that they “have to move away from a materialist, pragmatic approach to life toward a more cosmic, transcendent one.”[6] Let’s come back to transcendence in a minute. First, there were connections to earlier readings.
Spellbound’s connections to other texts
As I read Spellbound, I thought, “Lieberman HAS to intersect with other authors we’ve read.” This proved to be true. Lieberman highlights Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow, in his Top-Down vs. Bottom-up section. Lieberman writes, “You…engage in top-down processing when you suppress reactions to emotions, staying calm in a crisis or mastering your anger.”[7] However, bottom-up thinking is the faster more gut-reaction system 1 thinking that Lieberman also refers to as “experiential processing.”[8] Such processing “generates ideas that come to us in the form of intuition.”[9]
It’s also no surprise that Lieberman makes the connection to Joseph Campbell’s The Hero With a Thousand Faces. I highlighted an editor’s summary of Campbell’s Hero’s Journey in an earlier post.[10] Lieberman references Campbell’s “mythological motifs” in Star Wars and Harry Potter, particularly drawing attention to each story’s characters’ influence from their darker shadow sides.[11] In those stories, Luke, Han, and Harry Potter make “aspects of the shadow conscious”[12] in order to achieve a sort of “balance, finding the mean between the extremes of anemic rationality and wild instinct.”[13]
Lieberman’s unconscious and biblical comparisons
Let’s go back to the term “transcendence,” because transcendence is where Lieberman wants to land. He states, “Self-transcendence is a prize worth pursuing.”[14] But how? Lieberman is going to suggest that a partnership needs to be formed between the conscious and the unconscious.[15] But what does it mean? Lieberman defines transcendence as a “word that means ‘to go beyond.’ In the mystical tradition, transcendence refers to rising above the apparent duality of opposites.”[16]
Transcendence in the Bible?
One author writes, “For though the term transcendent is not itself biblical, it is a convenient way of grouping together certain biblical ideas. Scripture often speaks of God as ‘exalted’ (Ps. 57:5; 97:9). He dwells ‘in heaven above’ (Deut. 4:39; cf. Eccl. 5:2), even ‘above the heavens’ (Ps. 8:1; 57:5). He is ‘enthroned on high’ (Ps. 113:5); indeed, he is himself the ‘most high’ (Ps. 97:9). So transcendence is a convenient term to summarize these ways in which God is ‘above us.’”[17]
Transcendence and God
There are disciplines that Lieberman describes that can help accomplish transcendence. One of these is “loving kindness.” Loving kindness brings “us closer to the mystical goal of universal love.”[18] The problem with loving kindness is that even when we want to love others, we fall short. Lieberman says that when the time comes to deploy loving kindness, “you may not do what you intend.”[19]
This sounds a lot like the challenge Paul presents in Romans 7:18b – 19: “For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.”
Lieberman writes, “For our actions to correspond with our intention, we need the help of the unconscious.”[20] If that weren’t enough, Lieberman poses the question, “What if we could learn how to recognize the influences of the unconscious, and make it an ally in helping us become who we were meant to be?”[21]
As Christians, we have an Ally similar (and dissimilar) to how Lieberman refers to the unconscious. Where Paul says he does the things he doesn’t want to do, WHO does he turn to? “Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ.”[22] Our Ally is the transcendent God.
Timothy Keller writes, “The Gospel is that Jesus Christ came to earth, lived the life we should have lived and died the death we should have died, so when we believe in Him we live a life of grateful joy for Him. If these things didn’t happen, if they’re just parables, what you are saying is that if you try hard enough, God will accept you.”[23] Paul knew that where there was desire to do good, there was an inability in his own strength to do so. For the Christian, “for our actions to correspond with our intentions,”[24] we need Christ. We need a righteousness that is alien to ours (sounds like Lieberman’s unconscious?). We need Jesus to live the righteous life we want to live, and we need his Spirit to fill and empower us.
As Lieberman’s unconscious “is alien to the ego,”[25] so is the righteousness of Christ, applied to us. Having the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, we walk with God’s Spirit to produce the fruit (see Galatians 5:22) we can’t in our own power. God is our ally – God is helping us! This is how we connect with transcendence.
[1] Daniel Z. Lieberman, Spellbound: Modern Science, Ancient Magic, and the Hidden Potential of the Unconscious Mind, Dallas: BenBella Books, 2022, Kindle version, 26 of 308.
[2] Ibid., 1.
[3] Ibid., 60.
[4] Ibid., 2.
[5] Ibid., 218.
[6] Ibid., 218.
[7] Ibid., 65.
[8] Ibid., 66.
[9] Ibid., 66.
[10] “A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.” See: Joseph Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces (New York: Joseph Campbell Foundation, 2020), “Prologue.” From the Editor’s Forward to the 2020 Collected Works Edition, Kindle.
[11] Lieberman, 114-116.
[12] Ibid., 112.
[13] Ibid., 112.
[14] Ibid., 219.
[15] Ibid., 219.
[16] Ibid., 211.
[17] See https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/essay/divine-transcendence-immanence/.
[18] Lieberman, 244.
[19] Ibid., 245.
[20] Ibid., 245.
[21] Ibid., 1.
[22] Romans 7:24-25, ESV.
[23] See “Tim Keller: Why Christmas Matters” here: https://relevantmagazine.com/faith/why-christmas-matters/.
[24] Lieberman, 245.
[25] Ibid., 221.
About the Author
Travis Vaughn
8 responses to “Transcendence, the Unconscious, and God Our Ally”
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Hi Travis,
I am SO glad that you walked me through this. You wrote “Having the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, we walk with God’s Spirit to produce the fruit (see Galatians 5:22) we can’t in our own power. God is our ally – God is helping us! This is how we connect with transcendence.”
Amen….
On a rabbit trail…Conscious/Unconscious, Use your Default Mode Network all seem vaguely familiar to our AHA moments in Fall 2022.
Then what about 10% of our brain used (90% unused?) I discovered is a myth!
Ultimately, the notion of using 10% of the brain is not only incorrect, but irrelevant. Hecht mentioned that after a debilitating injury or stroke, some people can restrengthen abilities “with other parts of the brain kind of taking over the function” that the damaged region had controlled. The incredibly plastic mind can rewire itself when a region is lost or damaged, so what comprises 100% can change. Even with a portion of the brain injured or removed, every mind can find a way to work at its fullest capacity https://www.livescience.com/health/neuroscience/do-we-really-use-only-10-of-our-brains
My goodness, when can get lost on these rabbit trails. I am glad you brought me to the Holy Spirit our HELPER…transcendence here I come!
Russ, rabbit trails are good and lead us to ask questions that we might otherwise never ask. That has certainly been the case for me in much of our reading. My mind consistently takes an excursus on some of the topics that have come up. It did a great deal of that a couple of weeks ago in our reading of Glanzer.
That being said, I too have wrestled with statements about how little the brain gets used. That may be the case, but I appreciated your reference to how other parts of the brain strengthen the parts that have been damaged. I like the idea of the brain working at its fullest capacity — thanks for bringing that up! And where the brain has trouble holistically bringing that to fruition, I am thankful that God’s Spirit helps us in our weakness. Amen to the Holy Spirit being our HELPER.
Travis,
You have such a gift to unpack difficult concepts. I have been giving much thought to the realm of transcendance because there is such mystery in all that the subconscious realm brings up. The word transcendance also conjures up hesitation as we were always heeded to stay away from transcendentalism which did have many problematic beliefs.
As we all surmise the reading, I wonder what God thinks of all this. He probably chuckles and says, I understand it all. Just look to me.
As always, thank you for your well articulated thoughts.
Thank you, Esther! Your words are encouraging, especially after I occasionally come to the end of a post I’ve written and wonder whether or not I’ve made any sense at all. Seriously — you have encouraged someone who has regularly wrestled with imposter syndrome.
And yes, I do think God quietly (and sometimes not so quietly) reminds me/us to “Look to me”… “look to My Son.” This thought came to me more than a few times while reading Lieberman. The connection to transcendence as a landing point in Spellbound reminded me of how significant it is that transcendence begins with God.
Well, I must say your imposter syndrome makes me feel better (I think that sounds self-serving). You are thought of so highly in the group in all you say and write…truly you are.
By the way regarding the Switch book. It is an excellent coaching model that we often use when someone is struggling with motivational issues in moving forward. Everytime I actually show the picture and unpack it with a client, the lights go on and we are able to gain much clarity in processing motives and how to move forward.
I really like how you took time to unpack Transcendence and to overlay it onto your worldview. I think that this is important to understand how the concepts do and don’t agree with a Christ-centered perspective.
On another note, your treatment of the conscious vs subconscious set off an “ah ha!” in my head. Did you ever read Switch? In that book there is an analogy of the elephant and its rider that seems appropriate here… we may think we are in charge of our thinking but just like sitting on top of an elephant, we are totally NOT in charge!
Jen, I’ve never read Switch! I will look that up on Amazon in 3, 2, 1…
Travis,
I love how you connected Leiberman to Campbell, Kahneman, and the Bible. Admittedly, I struggled with parts of this book. I appreciate how you weaved it together into a powerful close. Your closing was brilliant, you wrote, “As Lieberman’s unconscious “is alien to the ego,”[25] so is the righteousness of Christ, applied to us. Having the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, we walk with God’s Spirit to produce the fruit (see Galatians 5:22) we can’t in our own power. God is our ally – God is helping us! This is how we connect with transcendence. YES…this IS how we connect.