For the major portion of their education, most students have been involved in a manipulation of the conscious area of their personalities. It is no wonder that most of them are anxious and feel frustrated when confronted with the task of writing. The reason for this is that they have not paused long enough to consider the internal resources available for use in their writing.
A primary tenet of EH 301 as taught by Dr. Rockwood has been reliance on the unconscious for creative material through a study of its nature. The only way for a writer to reap the benefits from this source is to have an understanding of its inherent qualities. By reading material concerned with the personality in general, and the unconscious in some detail, I have acquainted myself with the often ignored force of the psyche. Living in a country that has benefitted from the Industrial Revolution and the development of the conscious faculty has been an experience that seems one sided. I now realize how this mode of life has obstructed certain avenues of enlightenment.
If one examines the contents of dreams as we have done, one sees a wealth of creative material waiting to be realized. Thanks to the efforts of the instructor, Dr. Rockwood, a student in this course does much of the work in finding a way to the discovery of the contents of the unconscious. The course material could not be taught in a general way as are most other courses, because each of us has a different relationsip to the unconscious.
The fact that Dr. Rockwood does not to take a negative attitude to individual eccentricities of students aided each of us in finding a valid means of communication with the unconscious. The instructor's belief that the unconscious cannot communicate properly when the individual is thwarted by discouragement is well-founded. As "tour guide" for all of our individual trips, any means of criticism was worthwhile; however, because of limited time and the scarcity of individual attention, encouragement was the best form of advice.
While the first part of the course was concerned with the manifestations of the unconscious and their presence in past as well as contemporary times, the second part dealt with writings pertaining to the psychological essence of creativity. For a long time the layman has labeled the artist's behavior as eccentric in a derogatory sense. In the literature, some of this behavior has been explained, and consequently it has lost—to me, at least—a major portion of its negative connotation. Many people use the term "weirdo" to describe an artist. I don't think that this would be the case as frequently if these people who criticize artists realized the psychological context in which artists perform their tasks. No doubt many of us have felt the experiences that, for example, so-called neutrotics have undergone, but most of us have been afraid to admit it. This realization in itself is enough to make one see that the unconscious is a powerful force and that the behavior attributed to the creative process is explainable and not really so foreign to the so-called normal person after all.
So now we have examined some of the intricacies of the unconscious aspect of the personality. Through dream analysis we have ventured to a part of ourselves that has too long been ignored as a source of meaningful information about life experiences, and we have in this course recorded the milestones in our journey by means of expository compositions of—I think—unusual depth. Those of us who are want to stay in touch with this source of creativity and expresssion that we have experienced in Dr. Rockwood's EH 301 are determined to continue searching through our dreams for that elusive "true self."
© Copyright 2002 by Robert J. R. Rockwood. All rights reserved.