Following on from my previous post on the illusive real, I now think it is important to provide a proper definition of what that is, by virtue of a more in-depth interrogation of what is meant by the concept. I also provide examples of how a deeper understanding of the illusive real has the potential to foster a playful and rich engagement with metaphysical reality.
Firstly, given that the word illusion is associated with deception, it is often considered to be a human encounter with something that isn’t real. Etymologically, illusion consists of the Latin components in(against) and ludere (play), which form illudere (to mock) and finds its way to the English illusion, associated with deception. I will argue in this article, that due to this original antagonistic conjunction, the illusion has become over-identified with its deceptive component and has been divested of its important and meaningful associations with play and creativity. Perhaps more importantly, as a result of this over-identification, experience of illusory encounters are perceived to be outside of reality, whereas I argue, they should be considered very much part of it.
Psychoanalytically, the illusion is either a wished-for internal object, forming part of a necessary developmental process, a psychotic defence, or simply, a common, neurotic, untruth which we tell ourselves as a means of tolerating anxiety. Within this epistemology, the deception must therefore be mourned to see reality. As Winnicott understood, the capacity for illusion signifies the beginning of an important developmental process. In the early stages of life, the infant relates to the breast as-if it were under her control. If an infant is fortunate enough to grow up in what Winnicott calls “the facilitating environment”, which consists of “a good enough mother” who can tolerate the infant’s anxieties, then she can become slowly and gradually dis-illusioned, arriving at a place where she can relinquish the phantasy that the breast is under her magical control. This gradual loss of omnipotence is an important developmental milestone, as it introduces the child to an experience of mourning at the earliest stages of life, and bolsters her potential to tolerate disappointment. It also enables her to have psychological resources at her disposal later in life when she faces difficulty, by providing her with the capacity to think symbolically and play with ideas, to see other perspectives, rather than relying on omnipotent defences such as entitlement, superiority, or concrete thinking, all of which relate to the illusion stage of development. Importantly for Winnicott, this process of dis-illusion and mourning form the basis of the capacity to play; the child no longer only acts as if the breast were under her control, she now realises that she is doing so; she can think about what she does and she has her first encounters with meaning. All of this makes sense, as the illusion – as we have seen, etymologically, signifies a resistance to play, and the incapacity to mourn the illusion not only means the continuation of concrete thinking, but also the attachment to a wish, which is a self-deception. There is, therefore, certainly great value in this process of dis-illusion, as it brings us closer to truths about ourselves, particularly because the way in which we deceive ourselves can cause us plenty of problems later in life.
All of the above provides us with a strong argument for the divestment of the illusion, and this divestment becomes a necessary stage of getting at a truth about one-self - but does that necessarily mean that this truth is “reality” itself? I would argue that there is far more too reality than this: firstly, Winnicott ‘s paradigm contains the implicit assumption that the child’s illusion is “not real”, and he explicitly states that all that the arts or religion are really for is to help us to come to terms with, or sublimate our illusions. This is essentially reductive and myopic, for the illusion not only provides one with a means of accessing as-if states of perception in order to play, but also opens one’s heart to visionary encounters with the mystical, numinous, and the sacred, and to tolerate, enjoy, and find meaning from them; the illusion is therefore part of human experience that is entirely bona fide.
As I wrote in my previous posts on relational presence, the immanent longing of adolescence and its concomitant illusion of eternal love, rather than only being part of a developmental or psychosexual phase that we pass through, also becomes an important experience of an orientation towards a transcendent, metaphysical reality. This profound experience of yearning is both elusive and illusory; hence the hybrid neologism of the “illusive real”. Importantly, the word elusive, like illusion, evolves from ludere, though where the prefix of illusion is against, the verb to elude’s prefix is away from.
If we look at this through the lens of secular materialism, the “illusive” signifier bars access to play through deception in the ways described above, and this access is only granted once the infant comes to terms with the reality of her omnipotent self-deception. However, I would argue that, although the mourning of the illusion can help the child to play due to the newly acquired capacity for as-if states of mind, the disavowal of the reality of the illusion forecloses versions of play which are not based on mourning alone. Moreover, as the illusion is not considered to be real in materialist terms, this compounds the occlusive impact of these two prefixes and forecloses playful engagement with the illusion. If, on the other hand, we can countenance the counterintuitive notion that the illusion is part of the very fabric of reality – which, as an idea, I aver, is inherently playful - then this can broaden and enrich our experience of reality itself. In this way the prefixes of illusion and elude indeed bar us from play and creativity, but this does not mean that we should disengage from them, as if we perceive them only as indicators of hollow deception (not real). Instead, we should do the opposite, and playfully engage with these strange trickster-like elements of language so that we see them for what they are, as sphinx like ciphers which hold the potential of experiences of the unchartered real. This now equips us with a means of engaging with play at a greater depth, and we become more open to experiences of the anomalous, the numinous, the mystical, and the sacred. Children intuitively know how to play in this way, and they engage with the illusive real without any problems. As they grow up, they may become artists, and discover ingenious ways of playful engagement with the illusive real, through Surrealism, Dadaism, ritual theatre, and automatic drawing; they may grow up to become magicians, who engage through the I-Ching, the Qabalah, or tarot cards; the magician is a perfect archetype for the illusive real as s/he represents engagement with play, esoteric knowledge, and eternity.
Whether children, artists, and magicians engage with illusion through play, artistic practice, ritual, or esoteric knowledge, all are driven by a curiosity to know what lies beyond, and, to play with reality. Use your illusion, but remember it is real.