The Anger Against President George W. Bush

I wrote a piece earlier this year in which I asked people to pray that our president's actions in Iraq will create some good outcomes in the world. Those outcomes included a better life for the Iraqi people and a swift move towards an end of suffering for Israelis and Palestinians. I continue to have hope that that will occur.

I was subject to serious criticism from some friends on the left. These critics told me that I was naïve, powerless and literally aiding the enemy. I had trouble understanding why calling the president to his highest would bring out this kind of rhetoric. I do not believe that my sentiments came from any of those places, nor was they're any doubt about my strong disagreement with his action. I wrote letters, tried to organize discussions and marched in demonstrations.

But on reflection, I think I am beginning to understand. President Bush is clearly a hierarchical leader. He speaks from a place of incredible governmental power and also obviously from a place of amazing ignorance. From a psychological place of view he is an easy figure to project what Jung would call our "shadow" on to. In the most simple of terms the shadow is that part of us that we don¹t own in ourselves but love to judge others about. In this case we deny our own hierarchical tendencies and our own ignorance and we project this part of us onto the president. We are angry with him because we are not seeing our own chauvinism and our own ignorance. We like to believe in these moments that we are the righteous ones. This is not meant to say that the president is not wrong or that there are not some good hooks for our projections. But it is the projections that cloud our ability to see the world clearly and know the right actions to take. It is the dark side that Luke Skywalker struggles with under the tutelage of Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back. Luke must learn to see his own anger and hatred before he can conquer the evil in the world. This is the great lesson of that film epic.

At 61 years old, I just completed a doctorate of ministry at the University of Creation Spirituality. The most important thing I learned is how much I don't know about my field of study or anything for that matter. I find the world of wisdom and knowledge to be like an ever-deepening abyss of which I have only begun to scratch the outer gate. Understanding projections is a major part of that journey. I also noticed that those in my class that began with a strong personal model of direct social action and those that likewise as strongly believed in the need to heal one self first have begun to morph into a place where it has become necessary for them to simultaneously do direct social action while healing ones anger at the world. It is clear from studying our mystics that this is the path of enlightenment and the path that offers the greatest hope for real social change.

Victor Bremson

April 23, 2003