The Mystery of And . . . .

“Every explicit duality is an implicit unity” – Alan Watts

The Stuckness of Either/Or

Do we solve our problems?  I mean, do we really solve our problems in the sense that we can say to ourselves, “that issue or situation is firmly in the past – been there, done that”?

We can often enter into psychotherapy or analysis with the attitude that the thing that brought us into the therapy is a problem that needs to be solved.  We believe that we can apply all our cognitive and problem-solving skills toward getting through whatever is confronting us.  This prevailing mindset of modern culture and some therapeutic paradigms, can sometimes lead us astray or down the wrong path.

If we approach life’s challenges as if they are problems to be solved, we make an implicit assumption that what we are facing is wrong or shouldn’t be happening or that this is not the way life should be going.   We think that if we change something or change our thinking, then maybe we will get it right.

This can quickly turn into an either/or, black/white approach to life’s challenges, and we can quickly find ourselves stuck.

Our culture is filled with this kind of dualistic thinking, and it is so easy to fall into this unconscious trap.  I am good and my neighbour is bad.  I am right and you are wrong.  This option is good, right and safe. The other option is bad, wrong, and unsafe.  What is happening shouldn’t be happening to me now!

This mindset and the language that accompanies it attempt to solve life’s problems by separating the various options. We come by it honestly. This dualistic way of thinking is hardwired into our system to ensure that we survive.  However, we mistakenly think that if we approach life this way then we can find our way to a quick and easy solution to the perceived problem.

Yet it also contributes to being stuck.

And . . .

We miss the full experience of life’s complexity, richness, and fullness when we can sit with our lives’ problems rather than trying to solve them.

Let’s share an example.

A woman who loves her husband and values her family life becomes attracted to a woman and wants to begin a relationship.  She questions her sexual identity but doesn’t want to give up the family life that she has built for herself.  As she sits in this problem, she holds her head in her hands and experiences the despair that this dilemma poses for her. She is paralyzed in the either/or and she can’t find her way out.  “BUT I love my husband and my family, I don’t want to leave them. I don’t want to destroy my family. BUT, I want a relationship with this woman.  There is something that I need to discover about myself that only she can give me. “

In her dilemma, she is hanging on the cross of the psyche, holding the tension of two opposing forces, which is tearing her apart.  She bounces back and forth between the two – do I stay with my family or do I have a relationship?  The implication is that if she chooses one, she must dismiss the other option.  She is stuck, caught in an either/or viewpoint because she believes that it must be one or the other.

“And” and Tension of Opposites

Sometimes the challenge that we face is, in fact, a dilemma between two things that are positive, or two things that are of equal and right value, but not for the sake of truth or the immense subtlety of actual personal experience.

Jim Collins, in his bestselling business book “Built to Last” writes about the “Genius of the AND,” which is the ability to hold the complexity of the problems facing us in all their dimensions and paradoxes.  He suggests that instead of feeling the need to choose between this or that, we look at the situation from the perspective of AND.

We do this every day – we manage and hold opposite forces in our lives.

Staying at the office to finish a project or attend a child’s performance.

Going to the gym or sitting on the couch watching television.

Fighting for a promotion or collaborating with a colleague.

Business Coach Tim Arnold led a group I was in through an exercise that illustrated this beautifully.  He asked us to breathe – just simply breathe – inhale and exhale, inhale and exhale.  Then he asked us to hold the inhale and waited to see what would happen.  Of course, we couldn’t hold it for long, our bodies demanded that we exhale from the buildup of oxygen. He pointed out that with every dilemma that we face or tension in our lives between two alternatives, if you overload one side to the neglect of the other, within no time, you experience the downside of that choice and you will flip to the other side of the tension – just as your body filled up with carbon dioxide. We need to exhale and breathe in a fresh perspective.

Jungian Approach

Paradox and the tension of the opposites are unavoidable.  C.G. Jung wrote in his commentary on “The Secret of the Golden Flower: A Chinese Book of Life” that “the greatest and most important problems of life are fundamentally insoluble.  They must be so, for they express the necessary polarity inherent in every self-regulating system.  They can never be solved, but only outgrown.”

In the introduction to Erich Neuman’s “Depth Psychology and the New Ethic”, Jung writes about paradox and argues that the solution cannot come from outside us. It must come from deep within us.  This is the only one that we can expand our consciousness and discover what lies in the unconscious.

And thus, to live our existential questions in life, we must develop the capacity to hold the paradoxes.

Questions for Reflection

1) Where in your life do you create a false dichotomy between two equal values? Reflect on your language – how many times do you use “but” or “should”?

2) Can you think of an “either/or” decision that made you regret the choice you made? Do you envision what would have happened if you made the other choice?

3) Reflect on a time when one decision you made contributed to another and so on. Did you find an outcome that made you happier than you were before? For example, going on a last-minute trip with a friend and finding the love of your life there. You probably worried about making the decision but were happy with the result. Reflect on these moments.

Christina Becker
January 2023

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