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Life and death depend on listening. All we need in life is one person who gets us, who understands and wants to keep understanding. This is food for the soul, nutrition for the mind, and sustenance for life.

A young man made his way into depth therapy. Through the years he made significant progress, healed deep pain from hidden trauma. One session he told me, "If I wouldn't have gotten here all those years back, I wouldn't be alive right now. You took me where I was, understood me when I felt lik

Do you remember the film, “Il Postino?” A barely literate postman steals one of Pablo Neruda’s poems to impress his lover. When Neruda catches him at this plagiarism, the postman blurts out, “Poetry does not belong to those who made it. It belongs to those who need it!” How about William Carlos Williams: “It’s difficult to get the news from poetry. Yet men die every day – miserably – for the lack of what’s in there.” Or Hafiz: “The great religions are ships; the poets are lifeboats. Every sane p

As a coach/guide who is in the process of integrating (as and when appropriate) evolutionary astrology into working with people through their Saturn and Uranus-oriented life transitions, a recent awakening of my own occurred on holiday. I was at sea, relaxing with the gentle rocking of the Mediterranean ocean as the ship swayed and dipped with the waves. I thought this a timely metaphor of the nature of individual Souls as part of the vast sea of the collective, out of which we all emerge, yet a

‘The Impossible Mountain Climb’ Dream: My wife and I were to climb or walk up this very steep mountain, using ropes which were provided. We had trouble, so we left and were to try another time.

We arrived back at the hotel/resort type place and parked, walking to the building that was on the edge of a deep ravine. There was a little gully, with a yellow rope that might help us get up onto the deck. I tried the rope and could not lift myself up to get up onto the deck, so I tried to climb the fenc

A patient left depth therapy one day and, as they did, stated, "I've learned to trust the vibes I pick up from people. They're as real as the time of day or temperature." I like the way they described energy, vibes, the sense we get from others or situations.

This person suffered from a background of childhood trauma. They learned to cope by making everything "nice." By so doing, a young child could feel safe in what would otherwise appear as a hostile world. But, as an adult, the defense of maki

The True Tale of the Unconscious Emissary 

Boston, Summer of 1970.

I lived in a communal apartment that we called “The Zoo”. We had little money but plenty of books, art supplies, records, condoms, wine and pot. We ate more macaroni than vegetables or meat. Our dining table was a door resting on milk crates; our most important possessions were our record player and a water pipe made from a one-gallon bottle lashed to a couple of roller-skates. We were several college students and hippies, includin

When we feel foggy, we're clogged. There's too much that has come our way. We have trouble processing everything mentally. Too much stimulation equals fog. Effectively, we shut down when our mind can't take in even one bit more.

Dreams, that wondrous state in which our conscious ego recedes and our deeper self comes to the fore, help to sort through the clogs. A depth psychologist, Dr. Antonino Ferro, wrote in his book, In The Analyst's Consulting Room, depth therapists dream of their patients so

Though we generally think of mid-life as an individual process, as a universal function, it applies to cultural changes as well. The similarities are notable, and Jung's, Two Essays on Analytical Psychology, highlights the parallels.

Regarding the conversion of opposites at mid-life, Jung wrote: "Just as before... disorders arose because... opposing fantasies were unconscious, so now other disorders arise through the repression of former idols." The shift in focus over the last generation is unde

Leona Tockey (1925-2015)

Leona Tockey had one hell of a story, or in mythological terms, a cycle of stories all centering around a heroic figure who traditionally leaves the comfort of the known, descends into the underworld and returns sadder but wiser. Born in 1925 in Montana, she suffered years of sexual abuse by her father. As an adult she married, raised five children and lived a conventional middle-class life. In her mid-fifties she became a psychotherapist. Her healing involved writing a 1

The IAJS is a multidisciplinary association dedicated to the exploration and exchange of views about all aspects of the broader cultural legacy of Jung’s work and the history of analytical psychology.

http://jungstudies.net/

I’m judgmental and tend toward the curmudgeonly. That said, I freely admit to enjoying typologies, systems that classify everyone. They can be useful up to a point, but they can be fun (There are three kinds of people in the world: those who can count, and those who can’t). So here’s another one. I divide people into three main groups in terms of how we communicate with each other. These are ridiculously broad generalizations (that’s another thing I do), so I invite you to see if or what part of

A psychoanalytic colleague shared an NPR interview with Oliver Sacks in which he talked a bit about having been in therapy practically throughout adulthood, its relevance, and meaning: "Dr. Sacks you've been in psychoanalysis for 46 years with the same analyst. Do you think this has anything to do with your seemingly healthy mental well-being? Dr. Sacks replied: 'I think my analyst knows me very well and I think he likes me, which helps me like myself, and that's something that has not always be

Tension, Water and the Tracks of History

The last days of August… the poster about the excess of involuntary tensions and the water that keeps the tissues of our bodies supple and elastic is at the graphic designer’s… the exploration of the tracks of history in the body last weekend revealed to the participants roots that penetrate deeply into the Earth, nourish body and soul and help them to approach matters, personal and ancestral, that are awaiting some kind of resolution, and to let go of oth

The White Dragon - Becoming the Spirit

The dream opens up in a Civil War battle which I believe it’s the Second Battle of Manassas in Virginia (a.k.a. Bull Run) and the Confederates are knocking the Union force back which I am a part, but then Union troops rally and we drive the Confederates back breaking their line and forcing them to surrender and the war is won for the Union.

                                Photos from Wikipedia

I have both flags, the Confederate ‘Stars and Bars’ that was captur

"The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook," wrote the father of American depth psychology, William James. Not everything needs to be covered, looked at, explored. Dream symbols speak to us naturally. They do not need to be minutely dissected to gain sustenance from them. Gently, they offer guidance, meaning, soul food.

A survivor of religious trauma shared, "My dream showed us looking at a radioactive waste pit. We were to know it was there, but not approach. It was cordoned o

While meditating, I had a startlingly real, dream-like vision of being chased by a malevolent presence until rubber-legged and exhausted, I was able to run no more. To my immense surprise, when I turned around to face my fate, I found out the dreaded enemy was me, my split-off, vulnerable, frightened-to-death self, in need of understanding, compassion and love.

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CC Jean Stimmell                     Facing M

There comes a time when we sense things aren't working. The old ways don't cut it. We feel wobbly and like the world isn't what we thought. It's time to consider a different perspective.

William James, father of American Depth Psychology, wrote, "The world we see that seems so insane is the result of a belief system that is not working. To perceive the world differently, we must be willing to change our belief system, let the past slip away, expand our sense of now, and dissolve the fear in our m

“My so-called personality is a persona through which soul speaks.”  (Hillman in Re-Visioning Psychology)

James Hillman used to remind us that if you don’t think you’re talking to yourself--that there isn’t a constant stream of chatter in your mind and body (dreams of course carrying the largest cast of characters and their chatter, shouts, murmurs, and demands) --you’re kidding yourself. And part of his message regarding this substantially unconscious inner dialogue was to help us get real about