“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
I was fortunate this week to attend a couple of performances of the National Poetry Slam in Oakland, where over 400 young people in 72 teams from around the country spilled their guts in highly sensitive, creative, politically-charged, original poetry. No one read their poems; they all recited, with shamelessly strong emotion. To get a sense of what they were doing, check out www.youtube.com/user/ButtonPoetry, where you can subscribe and receive a daily poem video, or click on www.YouthSpeaks.c
An excess of involuntary tension dries out the body’s tissues –muscles, connective tissues and bones. When we manage to let go of some of it, they begin to rehydrate.
To follow the invitation to present the results of my research in this area at the 4th Fascia Research Congress involved an effort that proved excessive for my economy. Therefore, I handed the decision whether to go or not over to destiny. I was willing to bring forward my knowledge, my work power, my time and my being but, due to t
The paranoid imagination seeks itself: it constantly projects its unacceptable fantasies outward. This is the only way such people can see (and potentially know) themselves: in the image of the demonized Other.
Although both salvation and perdition fell on the individual Protestant of the seventeenth century, the entire community might suffer for one person’s sins; so each person was responsible for upholding group morality. Individual sin polluted, with consequences for all New England. Minister
Readers of this blog may recall that one of the basic themes of the myth of American Innocence is what I have called the Paranoid Imagination. Previous essays on this subject include The Paranoid Imagination, Porn (Parts one and Two) and Sacrilicious! (Parts One and Two). Here, I’d like to review some of those thoughts and then show one of the ways the paranoid imagination expresses itself in our current political madness.
The paranoid imagination is rooted in the constant anxiety that our Purita
It is often a great relief in the midst of our busy lives to create some ceremony and space for the larger and sometimes unseen questions we otherwise ignore, forget or stuff down into the unconscious. Ahh, at last, here is an hour, a day, a weekend to strip myself of the daily accumulation of demands, directions, distractions and disassociations, to allow the bare elements of meaning and value in my life to take center stage! Oh and look, right outside my door here as I step through the thresho
The Plenaro Dream
‘The difference between the "natural" individuation process, which runs its course unconsciously, and the one that is consciously realized is tremendous. In the first case, consciousness nowhere intervenes; the end remains as dark as the beginning. In the second case, so much darkness comes to light that the personality is permeated with light and consciousness necessarily gains in scope and insight. The encounter between conscious and unconscious has to ensure that the light t
The kings of the world are growing old,
and they shall have no inheritors.
Their sons died while they were boys,
and their exhausted daughters abandoned
the sick crown to the mob.
Ranier Maria Rilke wrote these words 110 years ago, at the beginning of a century in which the myths of modernity, so recently constellated, would gradually collapse into the utterly demythologized world that we have inherited.
In this world, all of our institutions – especially the political and diplomatic roles once held b
The Iran Negotiations have been a Circus and a Charade
Part One
Are you celebrating Barack Obama’s deal with Iran? It is certainly a good thing, but have you had the same experience that I’ve had over several years? Has it occurred to you that this business has seemed particularly loony – even for the madhouse of American politics?
The system is broken. We can see this in countless examples, from corrupted voting machines to mass apathy to exclusion of alternative parties to Donald Trump and a pr
The Dream: The Vision of the Night
by Max Zeller
A classic in the field of dream analysis, The Dream: The Vision of the Night is a collection of essays, lectures, and vignettes by Max Zeller whose career included a law degree, a brief imprisonment in a Nazi Concentration Camp, study at the Jung Institute in Zurich, Switzerland, and thirty years of in-depth work as a Jungian analyst.
In the eighteen pieces of this collection, Zeller intersperses theoretical writings, compassionate and incisive case
Soul and aloneness are as a dolphin swimming in deep ocean waters. Discovering soul, we experience an enhanced sense of connection with others and a remarkably cohesive sense of self. Yet, there remains an essential aloneness. It is not loneliness, which often betrays disconnection from self and intimate others; rather, it is a sense of inner wholeness, completion within oneself.
C.G. Jung wrote, "I had to understand that I was unable to make the people see what I am after. I am practically alo
This morning after I completed my yoga practice I opened an ancient mystical text and read the faith is at the center of the self. Yogic philosophy teaches that life is a meditation on the self. We contemplate truth to self the entirety of our life and look to live in accord with our nature. Then we have lived life well.
A colleague wrote, "...our unconscious hopes and dreams, our goals and ends, pull us toward our transformation from fatedness to destiny" (Psychoanalytic Dialogues 25.3 p. 309).
....Starbucks management would not have made fools of themselves by printing invitations on their coffee cups to discuss big topics like racism in America. Consulting DP: "It's a nice idea, but you're the container people, right? You wouldn't serve super-hot coffee without an adequate container, would you? If you're serious about furthering these difficult discussions, how about spending some of your revenue on paying diversity consultants and community leaders to facilitate safe and effective d
When the waves crest
In Australia
Sometimes you can see dolphins
Or other fish
Backlit by the sun
Suspended in the clarity of water.
That moment of perfect balance
Before the wave crashes
And dissipates
Leaves scant traces of shells
Which will be brought back into the ocean
Soon enough.
This image appeared in a recent session as a client was describing the sense of despair after a wonderful vacation with family. Why, after such a good time, were the memories of beach, tides, and laughter tin
Shortly after I posted Part Two of this essay, the Charleston murders occurred. Then came the debate over the Confederate flag and the predictable Republican rants that the South had fought the Civil War primarily over the question of state’s rights (which, I argue, it won on that question), not over slavery (it won on that one as well). Yes, there has been some good news this week, but we should be aware of the larger picture. As America looked at itself, arsonists burned seven African-American
C.G. Jung writes to Dr. Schmitt (December 20, 1945). "In alchemy...is presumably meant a transformation of the destructive fiery spirit into a spiritus vitae. You are in the midst of an inner confrontation with yourself which is of the highest general importance....we must also inquire whether something that wants to go upwards has not taken a false route downwards into the body."
Today I'm completing my recovery from medical congestion. Psychologically, I've been blocked up. It went into my body
I recently started a new painting, using a canvass big enough to use up some old paint. It was to be a study of yellows, with burnt sienna, vermillion red and other odds and ends I had accumulated over the years. So I mixed the old paint with walnut oil, hoping to reconstitute it enough to have it slide on the canvass. I quickly discovered that is not how it works. I ended up with thick leaden lines that killed any life in their vicinity. So, I left it for a while, thinking I would see it w
One of the upcoming psychological methods is Energy Psychology, which has recently been given the ability to give Continuing Education Credits by the APA. I just came back from presenting a workshop, Transforming Energy Psychology into a Comprehensive Transpersonal Psychotherapy, at the annual conference for the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology in Virginia, about why it would be important to add Transpersonal and Depth Psychology perspectives to their tradition. You can read the a
One of the upcoming psychological methods is Energy Psychology, which has recently been given the ability to give Continuing Education Credits by the APA. I just came back from presenting a workshop, Transforming Energy Psychology into a Comprehensive Transpersonal Psychotherapy, at the annual conference for the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology in Virginia, about why it would be important to add a Transpersonal and Depth Psychology perspectives to their tradition.
You can read the
In Part One of this essay I argued that the first two of the South’s objectives were actually met. For at least a hundred years after the war, the great majority of African Americans, even if they were legally free, were unable to control their destinies. They were not slaves, but most could not vote, most could not live where they chose to, and participation in the American Dream remained an abstract ideal. Meanwhile, white supremacy was the dominant, de facto thinking in government, educationa
