Sometimes, religious motifs have a strong pull with my psychologically. On the one hand, it's a source of fascination: I love the medieval period both philosophically and aesthetically, and I'm fascinated by movies and television shows that revolve around religious themes (like the movie adaptation of Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose). On the other hand, religious stuff creeps me out like nothing else (okay, except for maybe bees, I can't even see them on television). Exorcism movies freak me out and I can't shake those rapture movies that I saw in church youth group when I was in the ninth grade.
So, I guess it shouldn't be too much of a surprise that I had a rapture-related dream, even if I knew intellectually that it was likely a case of someone's intuition gone wrong.
I had this strange dream that some sort of anti-Christ entity had come to Earth and was chasing me. Rob had suggested I stay in a hotel with these two other women out by the airport to wait out this whole evil-doings, apocalyptic stuff that the Anti-Christ was instigating. I was worried because while I was there, I would have no idea what was happening to Rob or the cats and didn't want to be away from them while this was going on. Rob was insistent, though, so I met up with these other two women. However, one of them was still in high school and could not stay out past curfew and therefore could not spend the night in the hotel with us. It was an all-or-none sort of thing, so if she didn't go to the hotel, none of us would be able to.
I can't help but think there was something distinctly archetypal about the three women, particularly with one of them being younger. I wish I could remember more about the other woman, though.
I have to admit, I feel a little bad for the guy that had all of his rapture talk. There's something about that level of conviction towards one's intuitions--no matter how outlandish they may seem--that takes a profound level of commitment. Not that I'm condoning some of the consequences (such as people donating large sums of money) but I also know what it's like to have an intuition that something really will work, really taps into something unknown, that the world as a whole sees no value in because it doesn't make sense to them, it's too strange (sensing) or it's not systematic enough (thinking). My inclination is usually to fight for it for a bit, but I can get easily worn down by the opposition and give up.
Still, I'm not sure if this guy is an introverted intuitive. One thing Von Franz points out is that it's actually when intuition is an inferior function that a sudden vision will take hold, be taken literally and unquestioned. For the Sensing type, intuitions are unfamiliar terrain so that when they get one, they're strong and powerful, even overpowering, and usually about horrible, catastrophic events. It's the Sensing type that will have a bad dream that you got in an accident and suddenly call you up, convinced that the dream was prophetic.
It's why I disagree with the popular opinion that the central character on the (now cancelled) show Medium was an Introverted Intuitive. (Notice how when she starts having visions as a teenager, she turns to alcohol, very much an Extraverted Sensing response.) Her whole approach was very much indicative of inferior intuition: whenever she had a vision, she always took it completely literally, no matter how many times it turned out to be symbolic. She would frequently be "off" in her conclusions, and yet she never seemed to learn how to tap into the nuances of the dreams, nor recognize just how amorphous her intuitions really were. When it's your dominant function, you're comfortable with it--indeed, you have a hard time stepping outside of it--but you also know its limitations. For the intuitive this means knowing that some intuitions are spot on, but some don't make sense and some are just plain wrong.
So, I don't know, perhaps all the rapture talk was really inferior sensing. From a casual glance, it looks a lot like he was using intuition with auxiliary thinking, particularly with the attempts to "crack" the "code" and nail down a precise date. He'd apparently been trying to do this for awhile, as it wasn't his first attempt. Still, it has a lot of the hallmarks of inferior intuition as well. I'd have to know more about his habitual tendencies to really venture a guess with any conviction.
All I know is that the apocalypse seems archetypally embedded in my psyche. I suppose I can blame childhood for that, at least in part. I'm still curious about the three women, though.
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