We live in a time when in particular the Anglo-Saxon countries (especially the US/UK) are becoming climbing mad (Climbing is Britain's fastest growing sport) and therapy mad - the human growth movement, psychology and mysticism are not only becoming a great force of change but have triggered powerful economic forces, (many founding Greens held such views as central, which led on to the Rio conferences, sustainable development, environmental consumerism etc!). When we see the, very often competing schools of psychology and spirituality, it is rather tempting to turn off and carry on with 'normal' life. I would urge you to read on just a little further though - for despite the conflicts in the world of psychology there is undoubtedly a psychological reality if not a spiritual reality to all our lives, although it's normal at least in British culture to ignore it and 'live in the real world'. Or alternatively to leave the whole field to 'experts', the weird, new-agers, the ill (who after all need it, you know!!) and women who are sometimes happy to assume such a savant role (men are so bad at emotions, and they make such sexist generalisations you know!!!).
What do the psychologists say about climbers? There are two often opposed styles of psychology. The first is academic which pursues psychological knowledge through experiment and intellectualisation, and is primarily centred in academia and conventional medicine (Clinical Psychologists and Psychiatrists). It largely rejects the other major division, the 'therapeutic' which is centred in the work of Freud and Jung and the numerous other developers of the line such as Melanie Klein, Carl Rogers, and more recently Alice Miller and less rigorous legions of smaller and less influential groups.
Conventional (shall we say academic) Psychology has little really to say about climbers and some would say about people in general - being concentrated on the physical mechanisms of experience and some rather shallow therapeutic methods. Reportedly, one professor of psychology recently told some disappointed students to change to English literature when they complained about the lack of human understanding in their course!
Some sport psychology has crept slowly into climbing, with an emphasis on performance and how to optimise it. The really significant work on the climber comes from the world of analysis In particular the adherents of the great Carl Jung have looked at the impulse to climb whilst Marie Louise von Franz, one of the first and most significant Jungians and the very considerable James Hillman, have much to say about many of us who climb. In Jungian speak many of us are Puer Aeterni - eternal boys, in a non-literal sense. It must be pointed out that this is in no way a critical statement, but a coinage used to give the essence of a state of emotional being characterised by certain sorts of families. It describes only one generalised aspect of the incredibly varied and individual make-up we all have.
To quote Marie Louise von Franz, the title 'Puer Aeternus' indicates a certain type of young man who has an outstanding mother complex and who therefore behaves in certain typical ways. Having a great dependence on the mother or her substitute, he shies away from committed relationships, ever seeking the god-like women, while eternally failing to find just the right job. In fact leading a provisional life. Very often they are feminist males, idealising the mother and eschewing the father.(This is NOT a critical statement!!)
Puers love to climb - it's the norm in fact to fly in some metaphorical way. Climbing and mountaineering are natural for Puers and Puellas - the female equivalent. A flight can also occur into the world of thought, for the world of emotion is one that the flyers aren't so comfortable with. The characteristic family of the Puer would consist of disturbed family relationships in some way. Normally an excessively close or in some way invasive relationship with the mother or mother figure, and a less powerful male figure, or even one that is absent for a part or whole of the childhood.
I can feel lots of resentment arising here - well it's only a theory, and after all why are you feeling so resentful about it! After all don't we agree with the feminists who tell us that women are sugar and spice and all things nice, and had no part in creating the worlds wrongs! Don't we have to look after them after two thousand years of oppression, and haven't men had an easy time of it - swanning around with all the power and leaving women alone in the family while they enjoyed themselves; you'll have gathered that this is a bit of a hot one!
Well - what do we have here then - a gender based inner emotional state arising largely in the wake of the industrial revolution. Immature men without role models to take them into the mature masculinity that those who have come across tribal society will have seen. The lack of an initiation into maturity leaves the male emotionally immature - and competitive in the way that Freud described through the Oedipus complex. Glorified yet abused by the mother, and sometimes more partner than child to her, we live in sibling rivalry . According to the admittedly flawed men's movement guru Robert Bly, a sibling society of increasingly unfounded, immature citizens is arising. Men, for centuries trained to submerge emotions, and live to work, fight in wars and die young - hold the power yes, but be individuals in close relationship to each other, no.
Men therefore are fleeing from the enveloping and yet glorifying mother, and going upwards into the intellect, and up into the mountains in very metaphorical ways to achieve that. Puellas in the same way, fly towards their own masculinity at the top of the mountain.
What does this mean to us as climbers? Should we feel put down or insulted? Should we reject such a murky view of our rather glorious pursuit with out applying the theory to ourselves? If we accept such a view, how should we end our flight from the mother complex, how should we find a sense of the comfortable masculine (for women too), in an era where the media have rounded on and destroyed the father, (as patriarch but in many other way too) and are now running down men in series and adverts as it once made women look weak and feeble.
Should we men join the new men's movement? Well, I would say no! Robert Bly, part old fashioned patriarch yet still enormously female identified poet and intellectual, has achieved much in terms of explaining the situation - indeed his groups attract large numbers of men, many of who have suffered not just emotional incest but actual sexual abuse from their mothers and fathers, and yet the whole movement fails to recognise the fact that men and women have been fellows in suffering and each sex suffers and yet inflicts it's own suffering in equal measure. It has been said that the movement, particularly the British part of it, that is still really a women's movement and can't provide mature and secure masculinity which isn't to be found within it. There are other visiting leaders, however, such as the powerful Michael Meade (unknown to me) who may have rather more to offer. British Jungians, like Andrew Samuels are not dissimilar, and perhaps should be avoided in equal measure. Samuels, predictably a feminist, equally predictably and depressingly loathes Robert Bly and the movement around him! His texts are, however, often major works in their field and for those inclined to his style of Jungian psychology are a must.
So what is to be done? Marie Louise von Franz, venerable retainer of the Jungian movement, believes in work as the ultimate 'earthing' process. Any work, to face the fear of the father, and the envelopment of the mother. I suspect this is nearer the truth. In work, it's pain and effort and yet it's achievement and satisfaction can be found that essence of masculinity. Another useful characteristic of work - it doesn't cost like therapy and it means we can afford to indulge our favourite Puer activities like climbing!
My own view is that climbing is a useful activity for the Puer, the mature and the reforming Puer. In hitting the heights, in the skill and concentration required to solve the problems encountered in the climbing and mountaineering process, we can find what we need. Achievement, grounding and of course the soaring feeling of achievement and skill. Let us not ignore that the transcendence that the Puer is often criticised for, is an essential ingredient of being fully human. The liveliness and lightness of so many climbers is surely the positive side of this 'condition'. and equates with the expanded mind of the intellectual, the aesthete and the spiritual. This striving for transcendence is not to be derided so roundly and wholly - but worked with for the roundness of personality and comfort that we all seek. It is this sense of freedom in the mountains that can give us the vision to approach our more basic problems with an overview so lacking in detractors including some notable Jungians and men's movement buffs.
It is no accident that so much Buddhism and Hinduism has been introduced into the West by trekkers and climbers and that is to be praised surely!
Puer Aeternus - Marie-Louise von Franz. A Jungian book that is readable!
Men and the Water of Life - Michael Meade. Delightful book of stories and more.
Puer Papers - James Hillman. Excellent Jungian treatises.
Iron John - Robert Bly. The starting point of the US Mythico-Poetic Men's Movement!
The Father - Contemporary Jungian Perspectives. Ed . Andrew Samuels.