Once there was a Poor Man whose sole possession was his horse. He earned his wages by carting others’ goods about. They rode out in all weathers to keep themselves fed and kept. The Poor Man was a kindly sort and loved his horse. One day Horse spoke saying, ‘I know you love me, though my loads are heavy… so I want to help you. Set me free and I will return with the means to change our lives.
The Poor Man was a bit dubious. Would Horse ever come back having tasted freedom? What if something bad happened? How could Horse discover the means to change their lives? After a while the Poor Man began to remind himself that Horse was a noble and good creature who loved him dearly and would not leave him to fend for himself and so he agreed and took off the halter. Horse galloped twice round the yard and then shot off into the forest at high speed, leaving the Poor Man standing there perplexed and in some disbelief at what had just unfolded.
In the forest, Horse found Fox’s lair and lay down in front of it, blocking the entrance. Fox was rather annoyed by this but then thought to herself that there was a lot of prime rib on Horse so she went off to see Wolf and persuaded him to come and help shift the prospective winter stores.
They pushed and pulled and heaved but all to no avail. Eventually Fox persuaded Wolf to tie his tail to Horse’s tail and try to pull him away like that. So they tried and Wolf pulled and the knot got tighter and when it was tight enough Horse leaped up and chased off back to the Poor Man’s cottage at high speed with Wolf howling behind. Wolf’s pelt was sold and with the proceeds a new life began.
If the question, ‘how does consciousness evolve?’ was discussed as fiercely as the straw man of whether we have free will or not, as though we were incapable of paradox, then Psychology might be in a happier state. Something which prevents us thinking about this is that we think we already have the answer. It seems obvious that we evolve by our own efforts. Yet such a point of view is rooted in the idea that the ego is captain of the ship not to mention the delusion that we know what’s best for ourselves.
Our story challenges the prejudice that individuation requires such great heroics. Perhaps Horse speaks to the Poor Man because he is unencumbered by all the trappings of conventional opinion and become sufficiently receptive to hear what Horse has to say.
The transformation of their situation comes about as a result of the Poor Man paying a particular quality of attention to Horse, and making a decision which seems to be against his own self interest. Its decidedly un-heroic and his friends would think he had gone mad.
The Poor Man’s gift seems to be his understanding that he cannot help himself by his own efforts. He has been driving carts for a long time and never makes more than he needs to sustain them both. He realizes Horse is his only hope even though he cannot imagine how. Yet still he obeys some deep impulse to trust Horse, his animal soul, to resolve their situation and sets him free. Horse then journeys in the Underworld where he uses guile and trickery to capture Wolf, the dangerous aspect of the Unconscious and return with his enriching pelt.
Horse seems reminiscent of Pegasus, a spiritualized instinct brought to consciousness by virtue of the hero Perseus paying a a particular kind of reflective attention to Medusa, her reflection in his shield. Buraq, the Islamic Horse, carries the prophet Mohammed through the seven Heavens serving as a bridge between worlds just as Horse in our own story acts as a bridge between the Poor Man and the Forest.
Paying attention is an underrated pastime. Jung described it as the sin qua non, the precondition of transformation..
”If attention is directed to the unconscious, the unconscious will yield up its contents, and these in turn will fructify the conscious like a fountain of living water.” C.G. Jung, CW 10, p. 163
In an Eastern meditation technique called ‘the Secret of the Golden Flower’, the meditator allows a spontaneous fantasy to evolve in the mind’s eye which, given attention, unfolds by itself revealing a Consciousness which is non-ego, Atman, the Self.
This makes paying attention a big deal. If the Poor Man had tried to go into the forest on his own Wolf would certainly have had him. When the alchemists say, ‘not a few have perished in our work’, they are referring to the ones who went into the forest by themselves, the ones who had not yet come to love Horse and pay attention to her.
Unfortunately paying attention these days is often associated with pedagogical imperatives which can kill off curiosity and wonder. Having to pay attention all too easily becomes a power struggle, taking all the pleasure out of the flowering which occurs when we give out attention to someone or something freely.
The Poor Man is saved by his poverty. He knows he doesn’t have the resources to go into the forest alone. He understands that he is not the agent of transformation unlike many who are convinced that change comes about by mighty effort and determined action. Listening to your hunches, your gut feelings and the taste in the back of your mouth, is sometimes as important.
Perhaps this is why Marie- Louise von Franz says that the success of an analysis rests entirely with the analyst and whether or not they can pay sufficient attention.
Wilhelm’s edition of the I Ching (Hex 61) says that change in even the most difficult situation can be bought about by relatedness, by paying a particular kind of attention.
‘One must first rid oneself of all prejudice and let the psyche of the other person act upon us without restraint, then one will establish contact..’
This might make the Poor Man seem like a passive player in the drama but really his skill is the difficult art of not interfering. His relinquishing control over events has the Taoist quality of Wu Wei, ‘doing nothing’, which is is at the heart of what it means to follow Dao or The Way. According to the Dao De Jing: ‘The Way never acts yet nothing is left undone’.Wu wei doesn’t mean not acting, it means a particular kind of paying attention and not getting in the way.
This kind of receptivity creates change, allows things to unfold. It is to the psyche what warm rain and sunshine are to the garden. The secret seems to be that what prompts Horse to speak at all is the Poor Man’s good heart, his love and respect for the Other, which then enables Horse to act on the Poor Man’s behalf.
