In the iceberg metaphor we mentioned that deep below the water line, the base of the iceberg of each personal unconscious connects with all others in the transpersonal realm. The first layer of the transpersonal is where all humans connect, and is called the 'collective unconscious.' It is here where the archetypes and symbols common to all humans can be found. In the healing work we use this area when we visit 'past lives' in the regression process.

Even deeper than the collective unconscious is the 'universal unconscious' layer of the transpersonal realm. Common to all creatures and beings in Creation, the universal unconscious contains the experiences of Deity from before manifestation though the creation of the universe, up to the present.

The Collective Unconscious

Wholeness of being means not only finding, owning and welcoming back with loving acceptance all of the parts of ourselves from this lifetime, it also means doing this with all the parts of our being throughout our careers as reincarnating souls. At the level of the collective unconscious, we do this by taking responsibility for the healing of our whole being.

It's up to us to do this because we are the aspects of our beings who are presently incarnated. Because we're here now in manifestation, we represent the most parental aspects of our beings.

This is the furthest into the future anyone has ever been, including all the other parts of our beings. We are the parts of our beings who have the most resources and tools, and we are the only parts of our beings who now have the opportunity to fill the role of healer to the rest of our parts. We can take responsibility for their healing as the loving, resourceful, parental healer and do the healing work.

Unhealed material in the collective unconscious comes to consciousness through the regression process. Sometimes the first 'stop' in following a feeling back to its origins is a past life experience. Or, if the regression process brings you to a place in childhood, and you sense there may be deeper roots to the trauma, you can 'leapfrog' (#16 in Repairing the Past) to a deeper level, back in a past life experience.

In either case, once you've arrived and viewed the scene, as the 'director' you'll go to the past life aspect in the collective unconscious. As with the child in the personal unconscious, you'll be there as the healer for the past life aspect. Inner dialogue and re-scripting the event at the time of the original trauma happen in the same ways as they do in working with the child in a present life regression.

The Universal Unconscious

Working in the universal unconscious is in some ways different from the personal and collective levels, and in other ways the same. This is the layer of reality where the original traumas occurred in the original relating between the two fundamental essences or energies of Creation; the universal masculine essence, the great yang, or 'Spirit,' and the universal feminine essence, the great yin, or the 'Mother.'

Many cosmologies and spiritual systems combine these two as one 'God' or 'Universal Oneness' without mentioning their fundamental differences. However, since the healing work happens here in the duality of manifestation, it's very helpful to recognize the distinctions between the two essential parents of Creation.

There are many places where these essences are in divine union, and yet there are many more places where they are still at odds with each other. For many people it seems impossible that Deity would be divided against itself, and yet these fundamental issues at the deepest levels of reality are the original cause of our own core issues, and the earliest wounds in our core imprints.

If we are to be truly whole, healing at the deepest layers of the transpersonal realm is essential. At first the task may seem daunting. How are we to heal traumas in the Creators of the universe that they themselves have been unable to heal?

The answer is in the totality of our human identity. Humans are much larger beings than we've been prepared to believe. Nearly all our conditioning has told us that we're flawed in various ways and don't measure up to divine standards of perfection.

But of course we're not perfect. How could we be? We're still evolving. And why would we want perfection anyway? Perfection is a deceptive standard. Once we're perfect, we have no place to go. We're finished, no room to change. Perfection is a static state that can not evolve or improve.

Creation and everything in it is evolving, including the Creators themselves. As humans, we have all the elements of Deity inside ourselves, and therefore we're ideally suited to do healing work at the level of Deity.

The original issues between Spirit and the Mother, the universal masculine and feminine essences, are still playing out in Creation, and in our lives. Our deepest core issues trace back to events in their relationship, even before time began.

In an unconscious effort to heal, traumas that are unresolved will try to draw circumstances similar to what happened during their original occurrence. This is called 'reenactment.' Since most of the traumas are lodged in the magnetic feminine essence, this draw can be very powerful. However, if during a reenactment there are not enough resources or understandings about what is necessary for the healing, the original trauma will simply repeat itself and the wound or imprint becomes deeper.

The most effective approach to the healing work at the level of the Creators' original traumas is a collaborative effort between Deity and humans. The two essential beings of Creation are unmanifest. We, however, are here in manifestation, where their original traumas surface. The issues and imprints of Spirit and the Mother are ours as well, so it's appropriate that we work together to heal them.

We can find the bottom of an imprint and its original trauma by following the present time feeling all the way back to where it first happened in the universal unconscious. In order to do this effectively, it's most helpful to enlist the help of Spirit and the Mother, our collaborators in the healing work. The inner dialogue process is a good way to begin.