The Second Phase - Liminality
Alongside this process and often in conjunction with the descent into nigredo, there begin to emerge new elements of the personality that have not held a place in the persona identity before now. These may first appear in the form of dream symbols that can be quite difficult to interpret as such because they may show up as fearful and threatening figures, such as intruders, unsavory animals like snakes, beggars and other marginalized folk, and so forth.
On the other hand, there may be an influx of compensatory exuberance and inflationary energy during this period. Sudden intuitions of the dawning of new possibilities for life feel like the miraculous gift of incredible new freedom to do and be what one has not allowed oneself before. Simultaneous with grieving the loss of the past identity – as husband or wife, as son or daughter, as father or mother, as professional whatever – there arrives a burst of promise of a new life. Usually this is quite premature and should be read as a foreshadowing of distant things to come, energy to be used for new projects in the future, but often the compensatory force of this intrusion of libido is difficult to contain. This is the source of the famous "acting out" that so frequently takes place during the midlife crisis.
If grieving and accepting loss are the tasks of the first part of the process, the tasks of the second stage include containing and maintaining the freedom to explore widely and deeply and not too quickly settling for the security of new attachments and commitments. In other words, a moratorium on closure is called for, until things become more ordered and clarified. The possibility for a type of defensive maneuver that Jung aptly called "regressive restoration of the persona" leads backwards rather than forwards. In that case, the whole process may try to repeat itself in order to achieve the growth that can result in greater individuation.
The prolonged middle phase of the transformation at midlife is perhaps the most important and difficult phase of the process. In my book, In Midlife, I use the term "liminality" to speak about this phase. The term means "betwixt and between" or "in a threshold." Psychologically, it indicates being located between firm and fixed identities and in a state of flux with respect to a solid sense of self. It is a period of confusion and ambiguity, but also a time of discovery and potential transformation. The term transformation can be misunderstood in this context. It does not mean to become a different personality, unrecognizable by people who have known the midlifer before. Rather, it means to become more of what a person potentially is, to increase the range of a personality's expression, of its incarnation into everyday reality, to bring more of the self as a whole into conscious realization. Transformation phases in life are periods of emergence, when features of the personality that have been latent come to the fore and take up a place in the conscious reportoire of intersts, passions, and behaviors. Transformation signals an expansion of selfhood. And just as this is a chaotic period during the years of adolescence when sexuality is coming into play in a new and powerful way, so it is a period of chaos at midlife when what we call "shadow" and "anima" (or "animus" in the case of women) come into play.
The shadow contains features of the personality that have been rejected because they are incompatible with the social persona being constructed during adolescence and early adulthood. Certain personality elements, often quite valuable and potentially enriching in themselves, are repressed because they were found to be objectionable for moral or social reasons. In adolescent terminology, they are not "cool." Now they clammer for attention.
Are we married to nerds ?
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