We are living now in a crucial time of choice – a time of stupendous scientific discoveries which are enlarging our vision of the universe, shattering our old concepts about the nature of reality. Yet the delicate organism of life on our planet and the survival of our species are threatened as never before by technologies driven by a need to conquer and control nature, technologies applied with an utter disregard of the perils of our interference with the complex web of relationships upon which the life of our species depends. This time of choice asks us to bring heart and mind – the feminine and masculine dimensions of our nature – into relationship, harmony and balance.
    The feminine dimension of our nature carries the instinctual feeling values traditionally associated with the heart; the masculine dimension carries the questing, goal-defining, ordering, discriminating qualities generally associated with mind or intellect. For millennia women have been associated with the values of the heart; men with the power of the mind. But now, there is a deep impulse to "marry" these two great principles within ourselves and our culture. To understand what a tremendous endeavour this represents, we need to go back several thousand years.
    In the ancient world the Great Mother or Great Goddess stood for the principle of relationship – the hidden connection of all things to each other. Secondly, particularly in Egyptian and Greek culture, she stood for justice, wisdom and compassion. Thirdly, and most importantly, she was identified with the unseen dimension beyond the known world – a dimension that was imagined as an invisible cosmic matrix or womb. The feminine principle personified by the Mother Goddess offered an image of life as an organic, living and sacred whole; the earth and the cosmos were sacred entities. Gaia, in Greek culture, was mother of all.

The Supreme Creator

However, with the development of Judeo-Christian culture, the influence of the feminine waned. The Father as supreme creator became the paramount image presiding over Western civilization. In Christianity, the Virgin Mary carried forward the feminine principle but she was not a goddess and therefore not representative of the earth or nature. Nature and matter slowly lost the sacredness once associated with the immanence of the divine in the manifest world. Because of the powerful influence of this long formative experience on the development of Western religion and science as well as cultural beliefs and patterns of behaviour derived from it, Western civilization developed on a foundation that lacked a feminine principle equivalent in value to the masculine one. Everything traditionally associated with the feminine – nature, matter, woman and body – was devalued in relation to the masculine.
    Specifically, the idea developed that spirit was distinct from and "above" nature; that man was spiritually and mentally superior to woman, that thinking was superior to feeling and that mind should rule over and control body. Inevitably, with the rise of science, it was believed that man should vanquish and control nature. Over many centuries, these cultural beliefs created a deep imbalance in the culture as a whole as well as in the human psyche. It is not hard to see why mind came to be given precedence over heart. We can see the legacy of these beliefs in the ethos of conquest and dominance which still characterizes modern Western culture, particularly in the sphere of politics and science.
    Where there is no balance between the masculine and feminine principles, the masculine principle becomes, over time, pathologically exaggerated; the feminine principle pathologically diminished. The symptoms of a pathological masculine are rigidity, dogmatic inflexibility, the drive for omnipotence and an obsession with power and control. The horizon of the human imagination is restricted by an overt or subtle censorship. We can see this imbalance reflected today in the ruthless values which govern the media, politics, and the technological drive of the modern world. We can see the predatory impulse to acquire or to conquer new territory reflected in the drive for global control of world markets, in the ideology of perpetual growth, and in the belief that technology – including the invention of ever more powerful weapons – can solve all our problems.
    We see exaggerated competitiveness – the drive to go further, grow faster, achieve more, acquire more, elevated to the status of a cult. There is contempt for the feeling values grounded in the experience of our profound relationship with others, with other species, and with the environment.
    There is a predatory and compulsive sexuality in both men and women who increasingly lose the capacity for relationship with each other. There is continuous expansion in a linear sense but no expansion in depth, in insight.
    The result? Exhaustion, anxiety, depression, and the breakdown of marriages. There is no time or place for human relationships. There is no time for relationship with the dimension of spirit. Men and women and, above all, children, become the victims of this harsh, competitive, uncaring ethos: women, in their desire to be accepted in a world ruled by men and because the feminine value has no clear definition in our culture, are drawn to copy the pathological image of the masculine which itself incorporates fear of the feminine. So there is a double rejection of the feminine, by women and by men.

Seeking Balance

How could we help to redress the balance between the masculine and feminine in ourselves and in our culture? The priority is to bring this whole subject into our awareness, making the imbalance between heart and mind a focus of discussion. It might be helpful to ask where we ourselves may be out of balance.
    Are we driven by the cultural ethos of achieving power, material success and control, ignoring feelings of anxiety and depression and the symptoms of our body’s distress? Do we allow enough time for relationships with our family and friends, enough time for being rather than doing? Or for connection with a deeper dimension of reality?
    There are many areas where deeper insight and the need for a better balance between heart and mind could be addressed: in religion, in science, in politics, medicine, the care and education of our children, the proliferation of crime and our overcrowded prisons. Each of these invites a more comprehensive approach to the very great problems of our time. As Ervin Laszlo says at the end of his recent book Macroshift, "Planetary consciousness is knowing as well as feeling the vital interdependence and essential oneness of humankind and the conscious adoption of the ethic and the ethos that this entails. Its evolution is the basic imperative of human survival on this planet."
    The choice is between clinging to an outworn and unbalanced ethos and maturing beyond it towards a greater sensitivity in our relationships with each other and with our wider environment. If we are unable to develop this empathic capacity to relate, we will surely destroy ourselves and the environment that sustains our life.

©Anne Baring, 2002.

Anne Baring is a Jungian psychotherapist and teacher, author and co-author of 5 books including, The Myth of the Goddess and The Mystic Vision. Website: www.annebaring.com