The effect of a magnet can be made visible using fine iron filings: they arrange themselves around the magnet and point towards its two poles. A linear pattern emerges, indicating the magnetic forces. This physical phenomenon is reflected in the patient's sensation: "It’s like I’m taking my energy inwards. I’m taking myself, my senses, inwards. I’m pulling myself into the middle."
The experience of heaven and hell
The inner state of any remedy can be experienced in both a positive and a negative way. There will be an experience, often related to the chief complaint of the patient, which is deeply unpleasant for that person, an unbearable suffering. There will always also be a diametrically opposite experience in the consciousness – a wonderfully pleasant state which is the polar opposite. We can consider these two the Hell and the Heaven for that person – and it is not uncommon for patients to actually refer to these two in that way.
Heaven: The Imponderable state is immaterial. It is energy. And it is movement. Often when Imponderable patients go deep into their inner experience they will speak of energy, usually travelling very fast, even at “light-speed”. They will talk of power, usually massive, even infinite power; and huge strength. They will describe movement, freedom, flexibility, flow, fluidity, flux. They can feel light, weightless, immaterial. And they can experience light in its other sense: brightness, clarity, sparkling, colourful. They feel enormous, expanded, often to an infinite size. They talk of the Universe, Spirit and God. They feel love and compassion, often for all of humanity. All of this is part of their “Heaven” experience.
Hell for them is of course the opposite. They complain of having no energy, being completely depleted and drained, and this is very often the chief complaint in an Imponderable case. They describe solidity, density, heaviness. They feel unbearable slowness, even to the point of immobility, being completely stuck, rigid and trapped. They feel compressed, sometimes into something very small indeed, even to a single tiny point. It is a place of no light, often absolute darkness, complete blackness. They talk of nothingness, the void and nonexistence. It is a place of malice and hatred and unspeakable cruelty. They talk of monsters, evil and devils.
Light and dark: For Imponderable patients the positive, “Heaven” state is as good as it gets: pure love, truth, fearlessness, absolute freedom and infinite expansion. The “Hell” state is very dark indeed: pure evil, absolute darkness, complete isolation, terror and abandonment. These two poles in Imponderables could be said to reflect the qualities of pure spirit and extreme materiality. The expression “black and white” is a very common phrase which these patients use which relates to this. Our world of form is based on a fundamental duality, that of light and dark, positive and negative. The shadow has to exist for us to see the light. With no darkness there would just be white forms on a white background. With no evil we would not be able to value good. Many Imponderable remedies are made from universal forces – electricity, light in various forms, magnetism. These forces are the first differentiations from the absolute, undifferentiated universal force which lies behind the material world and are therefore very close to this basic duality. Could it be that because their inner state resonates so closely with the universal play of light and dark that Imponderable patients express themselves in these starkly dualistic ways?
Common characteristics of energy remedies
“Imponderable” literally means “without weight”. But “imponderable” also means “difficult to estimate or assess” and this more subtle meaning also resonates with the intangible nature of these remedy states.
The following are some of the energies which have been made into Imponderable remedies and their common characteristics. This is not an exhaustive list, merely a selection which helps to illustrate the qualities of this group, which in turn are of course reflected on the life issues, pathologies and inner state of Imponderable patients:
Selection of imponderable remedies
• Electricitas (electricity)
• Magnetis polus arcticus (North pole of magnet)
• Magnetis polus australis (South pole of magnet)
• Magnetis poli ambo (Both poles of the magnet)
• Sol (Sunlight)
• Spectrum (Rainbow Light)
• Luna (Moonlight)
• Ultraviolet Light
• Laser beam
• Lux Jupiterus stellae erantis (Jupiter Rays)
• Lux stella polaris (The North Star Light)
• Lux veneris stellae errantis (Venus Light)
• Ignis alcoholus (Fire)
• Mobile phone radiation
• X-Ray
• Vacuum
• Positronium (Anti-Matter
• Lux foraminis nigris (Black Hole)
Common characteristics
Energy: These patients talk of energy. The most common chief complaint in these cases is chronic fatigue which is often extreme and long-lasting. They complain of others draining their energy. Of feeling depleted, that their “battery is run down” and needing to recharge. There can be an experience of a powerful energy within them, which is often experienced as warmth or a glow or heat or even burning.
Power: A remedy state relating to universal forces will naturally have a theme of power. Patients talk of being strong, powerful people. Or of feeling confident to confront others abusing their power. They are often adventurous, brave and fearless, sometimes to the point of recklessness.
Movement: Movement is a main characteristic of the positive Imponderable state. Movement is felt in a dynamic way: fast, in any direction, unlimited and freeing. The opposite experience of immobile, rigid and stuck is felt as painfully negative.
No Boundaries: This can be felt positively as part of the free, mobile, expanded state. It can also be a negative state creating a feeling of lack of physical substance and inability to have healthy boundaries. There can be a feeling of merging into others, experiencing their sensations and emotions.
Universal: Many of these forces are universal and this translates to a feeling of vast expansion, absence of limits and even experiences of communion with the Divine and feelings of enlightenment. It can be difficult to distinguish between true spiritual experience and pathology in some of these cases.
Common themes in imponderable cases
Severe childhood trauma
- Early experience of death: A very common life event in these cases is an early experience of death. Most commonly this will be loss of a parent, often violently in for example accidents, or through illness. Often the patient will have felt the need to support the surviving parent, in the process suppressing their own grief and thereby failing to go through any kind of grieving process. After the remedy memories of these and of course other buried traumas emerge, either through dreams or into waking consciousness.
- Abandonment: This can be related to the death of a parent or the effect of being rejected by their mother at birth or shortly after. Other common stories can be prolonged hospitalization, either as a premature baby kept for long periods in an incubator or as an older child. In the latter case, usually there is a feeling of having been left by their parents without explanation. Conflict and separation of the parents is another story related to this feeling of abandonment. The sense of aloneness is extreme – the feeling is of being completely alone in the whole Universe, that there is no one else around, anywhere.
- Prolonged violence and abuse: These patients may have been constantly frightened by a violent parent, experiencing physical violence to themselves or often of the father to their mother. They may say “I experienced abuse of all kinds: physical, psychological and sexual.”
- Intense fear: The fear may relate to abuse of a more subtle kind. A not uncommon story is of being raised in a very strict environment with harsh rules and a rigid lifestyle. They may have been brought up in a very severe religious environment or in a cult with threats of hell and damnation.
Dissociation
The effect of the extreme trauma is to create a state of dissociation. Some of my Imponderable cases have been amongst the most traumatized patients I have ever seen in my practice. Most people do not have the psychological strength to cope in a healthy way with such extreme and prolonged trauma even as adults, let alone as children. When life in the material world is so unbearable one strategy is to become virtually immaterial. They can say they feel nothing in their body, as if their body is immaterial, invisible or just not there. They can feel separate from their physical body. Or that they feel nothing below their neck.
Immaterial
Not being in their body leads to a feeling of immateriality. This can be feelings of lightness or of floating but is often more extreme. They can say they feel like a ghost or a spirit or even that they do not exist at all.
Lack of boundaries
Being immaterial they lack boundaries. This is related to feelings of expansion but is usually felt as a negative experience. They feel as if they merge into other people. They are unable to distinguish where they end and someone else begins. They are overly affected by others’ emotions and experiences and are deeply disturbed by accounts of suffering of all kinds. These “leaky boundaries” are part of the process loss of energy and vitality.
Power and energy
It seems that being in this state of consciousness of lack of physical substance, immateriality and poor boundaries is conducive to entering an Imponderable state. Perhaps this is the “invitation” which allows an Imponderable archetype to become absorbed into one’s consciousness.
Many Imponderable patients have an interest in metaphysics. This can take many forms: interest in philosophy, esoteric knowledge, various forms of spiritual inner work – meditation, yoga, religion. Perhaps this orientation towards development of consciousness can also engender an openness to the sort of intelligent energy patterns which relate to the Imponderable group of energies and forces.
In whatever manner it happens, once someone is in an Imponderable state it hugely impacts their consciousness. They can feel very powerful.
Often, they actually are unusually strong – able to lift a car for example or perform other physical feats of strength far beyond the norm. They can describe a feeling of invincibility, of being able to achieve anything.
And their life stories do often reflect very high levels of achievement: playing sport at an international level, becoming champions in their event. Thet can have supreme confidence and a fearless belief in their ability.
Expansion
Another quality conferred by the Imponderable state is expansion. This expansion is unlimited, described as vast, infinite. They can feel at one with the Universe, united with God, in communion with the Divine. Often their descriptions bear striking similarity to those given by those considered true spiritual adepts. Sometimes it seems there is a blend of real spiritual development together with the pathological elements conferred by the Imponderable state.
Humanitarian
This state of expansion is often accompanied by an attitude of service at a universal level. There is a love of humanity and desire to serve society. But this is not limited to one’s family or local community or even just one’s country. It is a compelling desire to help all of humanity and the worldwide community. It can take the form of a saviour or God complex – the feeling that it is up to them to save the world. They can describe themselves as the instrument or tool of God, which is an interesting conception given the role these fundamental forces play in creating and sustaining our material world. Often one of the first effects of their remedy is to relieve them of the huge strain this inevitably creates in their minds.
The feelings of power, energy, expansion, fearlessness, supreme talent and desire to serve can be seen as the positive experience of the Imponderable state. But no force exists in isolation. Newton’s Third Law of Motion states: “For every action force there is an equal and opposite action force. A Single force is impossible: there is always an equal and opposite force.”
If the positive state is so great, what then can we expect as the negative state?
Powerlessness, exhaustion
In the negative state the feeling of lack of energy is extreme. Even young people can suffer severe chronic fatigue syndromes which are completely debilitating and last for years. Often, they are afflicted by this after years of dynamic activity, achievement and success. The ensuing collapse is a devastating contrast to their previous feelings of invincibility and omnipotence. This exhaustion is usually their chief complaint. A characteristic is the feeling that their energy and power is drained by others. This may relate to the lack of boundaries and often leads to an aversion to company.
Density, heaviness, immobility, compression
In the positive state there is a feeling of freedom of movement, lightness, flexibility, speed of action and flow. The opposite state is a painful experience of heaviness, density and immobility. In opposition to vast expansion there is intense contraction.
This polarity is in many ways the essence of the Imponderable state. Most Imponderable remedies have this fundamental opposition at heart:
A positive experience of movement, weightlessness and expansion in contrast to a negative state of immobility, heaviness and density.
There is also a feeling of being in a void, a place of nothingness, complete emptiness. This can be described as a black hole – this is not in itself an indication for the remedy Black Hole, which has distinct characteristics. Many Imponderable patients speak of a black hole.
Duality
The deep inner experience of opposite physical forces and sensations is matched by a profound awareness of the fundamental duality underlying the material world. The patient’s narrative is likely to spontaneously reflect this with expressions like “black and white”, “good and evil” and “light and dark”.
Evil
The dark side in Imponderable cases is very dark. There can be a deep consciousness of evil which manifests as fear of ghosts, the dark and of possession by the devil. These patients can feel as though they themselves are fundamentally evil.
Persecution of the feminine
The dark side of this state has a definite theme of suppression and abuse of women and feminine qualities. There are echoes of the worst abuses of women in the Middle ages in Europe, with patients frequently reporting dreams, visions and memories of women being burnt at the stake, buried alive or killed and injured in other horrifying ways.
The outsider
These patients often describe themselves as outsiders. They do not feel accepted by their families, peers and society in general. They feel they do not fit in, which in some ways is true – they are usually far from ordinary people. Imponderable remedies are usually in the Syphilitic or Leprosy miasm. These are the two most extreme miasms and the deeper the miasmatic state the more is the sense of isolation.
Hiding one’s Light
This theme is connected to the theme of being an outsider. Within their Family Imponderable patients often feel so different that they cannot express their true nature.In particular the experience is that their innate power, talent and ability is not welcome. They have a choice: express their full potential and quality and suffer resentment, jealousy and rejection from their friends and family, or contain their inner light to avoid the pain of isolation. This is reflected in the polarity between the deepinner sensations of expansion and contraction.
