Solve et Coagula
Solve et Coagula:
a principle of alchemy meaning "dissolve and coagulate". According to this principle, a substance must be broken down before it can be built up into something new.
I recently started listening to This Jungian Life and they were discussing the Jung’s late-in-life fascination with alchemy. My understanding of alchemy was a bunch of Medieval pseudoscientists mucking about with early chemistry and trying to figure out how to turn straw or lead into gold. Turns out, much of the practice was really METAPHORICAL. Who knew?
The lead represents something common, or even harmful. While the gold is really understanding, knowledge, and personal power. Fascinating. Alchemy, then, is turning the mundane or painful into the source of learning.
A major concept in alchemy is solve et coagula, which means to dissolve and coagulate. To break apart, to be destroyed, and then to come back together. Before something can be re-formed, it must be destroyed.
What if we looked at our own lives with the idea that being broken apart was necessary for change, for our ability to grow in personal power? Would that change how we viewed the shattering moments of our lives? The darkest times, when our drinking had us so low, that was the “solve” part. Now, we get to “coagula” and shape the lead of those negative experiences into the gold of our new life.
