Archetypes of Beauty: The Link between the Mandala and UFOs

By Alexander Zikas

Independent Investigator/Researcher

Introduction – UFOs as Archetypes

For some time, I have been experimenting with archetypes, a basic pattern from which psychological and/or supernatural events can be triggered allowing a person of the proper mindset to experience and commune with the collective unconsciousness or intelligent energy respectively. These events are sometimes seen as UFOs. Dr. Carl Jung, the famous psychologist and student of Sigmund Freud only scratched the surface when he introduced his groundbreaking book Flying Saucers, A Modern Myth. His theory of archetypes is much older too, originating with Plato’s Theory of Forms and Pythagoras’ numerical constructs.

As a person who has seen many UFOs, it was not long for me to realize the psychic link between them and archetypes, for the UFOs that appeared and the associated psychic events are frequently filtered in one’s cultural bias. UFOs do not initiate contact with us, but it is we who initiate contact with them through an evolution of mindset. They are all around us, so they can be tapped at any time that our mind chooses, if we alter our perceptions into the proper mindset. Our physical minds translate as best as it can these experiences, and understanding the basis behind it will allow one to experience an event closer to the reality. In other words we will experience the event closer to the archetype or true Form. But what is the true Form?

In an exaggerated confabulated state, the mind creates an elaborate fantasy around an event, such as a UFO sighting or an abduction, which may have been triggered by recent desires or fears the mind had been harboring. In audio perception, or clairaudience, we can perceive the phenomena, for example, of speaking in Tongues. In olfactory perception, we may perceive the scent to smell sweet, or if demonic, to smell of brimstone. In touch, we may be healed with energy, or terrorized with abduction. In taste, we may perceive the sensation of honey from the mouth (as occurred with St. Ambrose), or see fire from the evil dragon’s jaws. Some Greek Orthodox monks, as they commune with the spiritual world, interact with thought pattern archetypes, called elementals, which can be positive (logics) or negative (passions). In this way, the essence of human existence is based on virtues and vices, and so the archetype energies that we tap can be thought of, in the most simplest forms, as imagery around such concepts, to correlate to what one witnesses as a UFO or supernatural event. I am only going to elaborate on how aspects of Beauty play a role in manifesting UFOs. Before I do this, the reader is reminded of the virtues and vices. The four virtues are justice, tolerance, wisdom, and courage. The three spiritual virtues are faith, hope, and charity. The seven vices are anger, greed, lust, envy, laziness, pride, and gluttony.

The Mandala – the First UFO Archetype

The word Mandala is from the classical Indian language of Sanskrit. Loosely translated to “circle,” a Mandala is far more than a simple shape. It represents wholeness. The Mandala appears in all aspects of life: the celestial circles we call Earth, Sun, and Moon, as well as conceptual circles of friends, family, and community. It was this simple form, a circle, that was what Jung equated to saucer circular shaped UFOs, the prevalent shape of UFOs of his time. Unlike many of his scientific colleagues, Jung openly expressed his fascination with the paranormal, discussing esoteric phenomena, including UFOs, in many of his writings. Jung’s work in the field of dream analysis led him to a profound study of symbols. He found that many symbols were common across different cultures, even those that had had no connection with one another. This curious phenomenon caused Jung to develop the concept of the archetype, a symbol which is expressive of some deep need within the human psyche or what Jung called the collective unconscious. One of these archetypes was the Mandela, the circular symbol of wholeness. When UFO mania developed in the post Second World War period, Jung interpreted it in psychological terms. To Jung, a UFO was a Mandala, an archetypal symbol of wholeness that a frightened populace imagined in a pseudo-religious yearning for redemption. To Jung, this worldwide projection of an inner psychological need onto an external form was indicative of some tremendous change underway in humanity.

“I saw that everything, all paths I had been following, all steps I had taken, were leading back to a single point, namely, to the mid-point. It became increasingly plain to me that the Mandela is the center. It is the exponent of all paths. It is the path to the center, to individuation. ... I knew that in finding the Mandela as an expression of the self I had attained what was for me the ultimate.” C. G. Jung.

Personally, I was not satisfied with this explanation. A Mandala or circle did not have a meaning for me, at least consciously. So I began my gedankexperiment (thought experiment). As I researched with archetype tapping, it eventually occurred to me that the Mandela was part of a deeper meaning related to the Beauty archetype. By beauty I do not mean attraction to the opposite sex or lust, though these two things are a subcomponent of beauty. Rather beauty is a manifestation of our desires of good and justice, and lack of it is a manifestation of our fears and evil.

The Beauty Archetype as UFOs

When we experience seeing a (circular/saucer) UFO, it can be positive and we invest in it hopes and salvation, a need for comforting, as if it is a mother to embrace us (hence Jung’s similar associations). When that (linear/cigar/mushroom-shaped) UFO experience is traumatic, as through a presumed abduction, it is like the rape of us as we experience the void of beauty and our worst fears are realized. How is this correlation made? In abstract concepts, I propose that beauty and comfort are circular. Fear and victimization are linear. Furthermore we can all relate to this culturally, which is not necessarily true of the Mandela, though the Mandela itself is based on the Beauty archetype.

The Beauty archetype has many aspects to it, but I will only review here those associated with salvation and fear. As a male, I will further focus on the female form as an illustration of this idea, but females may easily extrapolate to the male form. Consider the female nude form. To a male, it is a form of beauty that if in perfect proportion, can encourage a male to spend countless hours staring at it, as if he were in an art museum. In perverted experience, a male can spend hours viewing pornography. Considering the female nude form, its attractive features are all curvy and circular related. Males relate to round breasts, round buttocks, curved backs, curved flowing hair, shapely legs, and the receptacle of sexuality itself. Abstractly, femininity is circular. Even curvy accoutrements like high heel shoes accentuate femininity. And with femininity we have motherhood, protection, and salvation. Hence when our inner desire seeks such comforts, someone (who believes in UFOs) may see saucers in the sky to bring hope, albeit in the form of some extraterrestrial race that can deliver salvation. That same event of archetypal energy may appear as a Marian visitation to the spiritual inclined. Is it any wonder why sightings of Mother Mary are the most frequent spiritual encounter? Thus this circular Mandala is engrained in us as a comforting association. Sexuality was just an example to visualize it. Even since ancient times, cave art related this to inner meanings.1

Lines, triangles, and squares characterize the male’s masculinity. His torso is triangular and his body straight from the waist down. His instrument of sexuality is spear shaped and pierces or attacks. His beard is square and is moustache straight. His modern fashions, like a necktie, are straight too. The man hunts and is aggressive. Man can be feared, and this fear in life generally can be filtered (by those prone to UFOs beliefs) into abduction experiences and seeing UFOs that are cigar or mushroom shaped. The negative experience of Dr. Bruce Cornet’s abduction2 was related to a mushroom shaped UFO, which others too saw in the skies of the place of his abduction many years after his event. The cigar shape UFO that allegedly crashed in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania in 1942 was followed with screams that it was the end of the world.3 Finally, when men age and develop round pot bellies and round jowls on their face, they become less virile, and play a more comforting role as in the personification of Santa Claus, or the wise old man.

Consider two forms of classic art. In one example, we have the fountain in Piazza Esedra, Rome. The frolicking female Naiads who wrestle with marine monsters in the large circular fountain in Piazza Esedra (also known as Piazza Della Republica) made quite a stir when the fountain was inaugurated in 1911. Among the stories told about this fountain are that seminarians were forbidden to look at or approach the provocative fountain and that every Sunday evening two elderly ladies, the sisters who posed for the naiads in their youth, came to reminisce at “their” fountain. The sculptor Mario Rutelli, was the uncle of Rome’s former mayor, Francesco Rutelli. The four bronze nymphs placed around the bathtub of the Fountain of Naiads, were the subject of fierce controversy that led to attempts to block the view of the nude female figures, considered too sensual.

In mythology we have the tale of Leto and Zeus the swan. The Swan rapes Leto, and the swan itself is a representation of fear with is long spear shaped neck, ready to take its victim by surprise.

The Beauty Archetype and Divinity

Through this fascination of art, the beauty archetype inspires divinity and the superman within us, and our egalitarian desires. Lust is merely a lower expression of beauty that is easily comprehensible to our animal instincts, and the easily recognizable nexus to the Mandela and the saucer.

The earliest theory of beauty can be found in the works of Greek philosophers from the pre-Socratic period, such as those of Pythagoras. The Pythagorean school saw a strong connection between mathematics and beauty. In particular, they noted that objects proportioned according to the golden ratio seemed more attractive. Ancient Greek architecture is based on this view of symmetry and proportion. Modern research also suggests that people whose facial features are symmetric and proportioned according the golden ratio are considered more attractive than those whose faces are not.

While most species use physical traits and pheromones to attract mates, humans claim to rely on the inner beauty of their choices. Qualities including kindness, sensitivity, tenderness or compassion, creativity and intelligence have been said to be desirable since antiquity. We use beauty to tap the inner archetypes of a person’s internal attractiveness.

Generally speaking, an archetype can be defined as an image that is an original model after which similar things are patterned. For example, the god Aphrodite in Greek mythology embodies an ideal of beauty, which in more attenuated forms can be found in various things and people such as a beautiful dancer, a painting, a song, or a sunset. Each is full of the archetype of Beauty.

Archetypes can be likened to what Plato described as Forms or ideas that exist as pre-patterned impulses in the mind of the Good, the ultimate state of reality. These Forms were thought to be alive and purposeful, yet existed in realms too subtle to be detected by the senses. Since they could only be known through their effects, the various qualities of the world are derived from these Forms. Beauty, for instance, could never be encountered in itself, but only as a property of some concrete thing that is beautiful.

According to Carl Jung, an archetype is a universal thought form in the collective unconscious that manifests in primordial images and themes that can be found everywhere at all times, e.g., in myths, fairy tales, religious motifs, dreams, and everyday life. While an archetype clothes itself in imagery that is familiar to the time and place in which it occurs, it’s meaning is the same across cultures. As universal thought forms, archetypes are the organizing principles of reality itself. Jung referred to the archetype as the self-portrait of the instinct, by which he meant that archetypes, as primordial images, symbolize structural elements of human consciousness. Basic patterns of mental and emotional behavior are thought to be derivatives of archetypes.

One should not assume that I am suggesting that UFOs and unusual phenomena as archetypes are mere hallucinations of the mind or wishful thinking. We actually do tap into the archetypes that are intelligent energies. The only manufactured part of these experiences is how our minds color the perceptions. We see what we hope. Although the imagery is not true to form, we do tap the real archetype and thus the interaction is real in a symbolic sense. To make the experience even more truthful, we need to recognize our limitation and not let our prejudices interfere. With practice, and with Socratic humility, the experiences we have are more rewarding. To have such archetypal experiences in the first place though, requires developing a mindset conducive to initiating such events. Techniques to tap archetypes can be found in the recently released book entitled Synchronistic Adventures. 4 Archetypes not only organize the psyche within, they also connect us to the world outside. An archetype can appear in the environment as an event, person, or situation that is synchronistically related to the experiencer. An archetype may manifest in humans as needed, become known through behavior, and culminate in an event.

In the Symposium, and in the Phaedrus, Plato introduces his theory of Eros (usually translated as love). We are told of the ladder of love, by which the lover can ascend to direct cognitive contact with Beauty Itself. In the Phaedrus, love is revealed to be the great divine madness through which the wings of the lover’s soul may sprout, allowing the lover to take flight to all of the highest aspirations and achievements possible for humankind. Plato regards actual physical or sexual contact between lovers as degraded and wasteful forms of erotic expression. The true goal of Eros is real beauty and real beauty is the Form of Beauty, what Plato calls Beauty Itself. Eros finds its fulfillment only in Platonic philosophy. Unless it channels its power of love into higher pursuits, which culminate in the knowledge of the Form of Beauty, Eros is doomed to frustration. For this reason, Plato thinks that most people sadly squander the real power of love by limiting themselves to the mere pleasures of physical beauty. In modern times, this aspiration to behold beauty can manifest in UFO sightings and the spiritual benefits they provide.

Socrates explains that while all men desire beauty, some are in love and some are not. We are all ruled by two principles. One is our inborn desire for pleasure, and the other is our acquired judgment that pursues what is best. Following your judgment is being in your right mind, while following desire towards pleasure without reason is outrage. Following different desires leads to different things. One who follows his desire for food is a glutton, and so on. The desire to take pleasure in beauty, reinforced by the kindred beauty in human bodies, is called eros. We see the beauty of our spouses not only in the forms their bodies make, but also in their face, a more complicated pattern of symbols.

Socrates says that madness given as a gift of the gods provides us with some of the best things we have. There are, in fact, four kinds of divine madness. From Apollo, the gift of prophecy; from Dionysus, the mystic rites and relief from present hardship; from the Muses, poetry; and from Aphrodite, love.

Socrates embarked on a proof of the divine origin of this fourth sort of madness. Then begins the famous Chariot allegory, a centerpiece of Phaedrus, and the famous and moving account of the vision, fall, and incarnation of the soul. A soul, says Socrates, is like the natural union of a team of winged horses and their charioteer. While the gods have two good horses, everyone else has a mixture: one is beautiful and good, while the other is neither. As souls are immortal, those lacking bodies patrol all of heaven so long as their wings are in perfect condition. When a soul sheds its wings, it comes to Earth and takes on an earthly body which then seems to move itself. These wings lift up heavy things to where the gods dwell, and are nourished and grow in the presence of the wisdom, goodness, and beauty of the divine. However, foulness and ugliness make the wings shrink and disappear.

The immortal souls that follow the gods most closely are able to just barely raise their chariots up to the rim and look out on reality. They see some things and miss others, having to deal with their horses; they rise and fall at varying times. Any soul that catches sight of any one true thing is granted another circuit where it can see more. Eventually, all souls fall back to Earth. Those that have been initiated are put into varying human incarnations, depending on how much they have seen; those made into philosophers have seen the most, while kings, statesmen, doctors, prophets, poets, manual laborers, sophists (taught to argue and win, even if wrong), and tyrants follow respectively.

Souls then begin cycles of reincarnation. Philosophers maintain the highest level of initiation. They ignore human concerns and are drawn towards the divine. While ordinary people rebuke them for this, they are unaware that the lover of wisdom is possessed by a god. This is the fourth sort of madness, that of love. One comes to manifest this sort of love after seeing beauty here on Earth and being reminded of true beauty as it was seen beyond heaven. Socrates says that beauty is among the most radiant things (interpret as UFOs to some) to see beyond heaven, and on Earth it sparkles through vision, the clearest of our senses. Jakob Böhme (1575 – November 17, 1624) was a German Christian mystic and theologian. Böhme had mystical experiences throughout his youth, culminating in a vision in 1600 that he received through observing the exquisite beauty of a beam of sunlight reflected in a pewter dish. He believed this vision revealed to him the spiritual structure of the world, as well as the relationship between God and man, and good and evil.

Conclusion

In the Phaedrus, Socrates makes the rather bold claim that some of life’s greatest blessings flow from madness, and he clarifies this later by noting that he is referring specifically to madness inspired by the gods. The next time you see a UFO, pay very close attention to its shape. Examine the thoughts you have been keeping in the recent past. Are you in need of a savior to deliver you from fears, or are you a leader yearning to lift human society to greater heights? Know thyself and maybe you will understand what that UFO sighting was meant to provide you. Once you understand yourself and seek to fortify your mindset, subsequent events in your life involving unusual phenomena may be more rewarding and truer to the form of their divine reality.

Reference

1. Synchronistic Adventures, http://SynchronisticAdventures.googlepages.com/home

2. Ibid

3. Ibid

4. Ibid