will I be able to read it? or intimidations of the next step
by robert aziz
According to psychoanalytical theory, a parapraxis or Freudian slip, as it is more commonly termed, denotes an error in speech or action, which although seemingly innocent betrays an unconscious anxiety or problem. Given my own clinical observations in this regard, I have not treated as insignificant the inadvertent conversion by certain individuals with whom I have spoken of the title of my journal entry intimations of the next step to intimidations of the next step. (I should say that I am being as careful as I possibly can at this moment in the spelling of these two words.)
... Continued
Not unrelated to this, but clearly far more directly to the point, would be the apprehension-laden question about The Syndetic Paradigm with which I am most frequently presented. That question being: Will I be able to read it?
Now as much as I understand that the damage of any reflective pause on my part in answering that question will be measured by the second, I am not inclined simply to respond, on the other hand, with an unreflective ‘of course you can.’ So it is at this point that it has proven to be of benefit to introduce the experiences of some of those who read my first book C.G. Jung’s Psychology of Religion and Synchronicity (1990).
Readers have typically characterized my first book as a well-written work with a very concentrated and thus challenging style. It has never been characterized as something people would breeze through, professionals included. The same is true of The Syndetic Paradigm. Its ideas and theories are thoroughly distilled and carefully presented. Both works, there should be no doubt, demanded a great deal of me so one would only imagine that a great deal would be demanded of their readership in turn.
Above all else what one needs in order to come to terms with The Syndetic Paradigm is a desire and the patience to do so. I should note that here most individuals are probably looking at a lifelong effort, much as it has proven to be the case for me. Some 30 years of work stand behind The Syndetic Paradigm so I caution my reader not to be disappointed if you find it difficult going at times or if you are unable to comprehend it fully after one read.
Is The Syndetic Paradigm a more difficult read than the first book? It certainly is a more intricate theoretical work than the first book, which would incline one to conclude that it is a tougher read. But that being said it is in one very important respect more accessible. Indeed very much in contrast to C.G. Jung’s Psychology of Religion and Synchronicity, which was necessarily subject to the limitations of working through and around Jung’s characteristically, highly contradictory theorizations, The Syndetic Paradigm has as its basis a cohesive theoretical model thus lending to it an energy and flow that did not and could not have existed in the first book. Readers, I would further add, have found the case material of The Syndetic Paradigm to be informative and most interesting. They experience The Syndetic Paradigm as something that directly speaks to them, something in which they directly see their lives and relationships, something through which they directly encounter meaning and Reality.
Will I be able to read it? If you find within yourself the desire and most importantly, despite prevailing cultural sentiments to the contrary, the patience to do so, yes, you most certainly will.
