The C.G. Jung Society of St. Louis is hosting a major conference at our first "Jung in the Heartland" event, November 19-22, 2009. The theme of the conference is "Portals to the Source" with major presentations by Carl Greer, Sylvia Perera, James Hollis, and Lionel Corbett. The conference setting is Toddhall Retreat Center in Columbia, IL, just 45 minutes from the St. Louis, MO, international airport.

For detailed information about this event, visit the Jung Society of St. Louis website at www.cgjungstl.org. The website has links for online registration and for downloading event information.

This conference promises to be an opportunity for learning, reflection, meeting like-minded people, and intensifying participants' own journeys toward wholeness. Our sponsoring society believes it will indeed provide a portal to the source.

For the last session of a course on dreams, I offered some questions for reflection and discussion. Here are the questions and some possible responses to them. If any Reader wishes to comment on a question or a response, please click on the "comments" icon and do so.


SOME QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION


1. Why do you think dreams are important? Dreams are an important way unconscious contents reach consciousness. Even a cursory self-reflection reveals that our attitudes and behaviors are influenced by unconscious ideas, assumptions, dynamics, feelings, memories, and imaginings. Dreams are a way we may be able to better understand these influences and deal with them more effectively—eliminating some, exaggerating others, developing and implementing those that are helpful.

2. Where do you agree with Jung’s ideas? Where do you disagree? For the most part, I agree with Jung’s ideas and theories, especially the ones we have touched on in our study together. Jung was, (as are we), confined in his milieu so that some of his notions appear to us as archaic or misogynistic.

3. Why do you think the concept of the unconscious is difficult for some? People for whom the unconscious becomes a reality HAVE to come to terms with it. For many others, a quiescent unconscious puts no demands on them, hence they have no need to deal with it, even believe in its existence. Some would argue they are the lucky ones.

4. Why do you think the relationship between consciousness and the unconscious is important? Or unimportant? The relationship is important, even vital, for someone for whom the unconscious has become a disturbing influence in his/her life. Usually the unconscious makes its disturbing presence felt through compulsions, depression, overwhelming life events—any issue for which ego consciousness alone cannot muster an adequate, adaptive response. As long as ego consciousness functions well, a relationship with the unconscious is unimportant, perhaps undesirable.

5. What is your understanding of archetypes? Archetypes are patterns of behavior. A simple example is the bird building its nest. Presumably, it is adhering to some instinctive imprint that informs its behavior. How do archetypes fit into one’s approach to the dream? When archetypal themes begin to appear in dreams, it marks an important milestone in the development of the personality. The layer of insulation between consciousness and the unconscious, i.e., the personal unconscious, has become sufficiently permeable that elements from the unconscious begin to show themselves to ego consciousness. The personal unconscious consists of one’s own history—forgotten or repressed contents, undeveloped and undesirable personality traits sometimes apparent to others but not to oneself, deeds we do not want to acknowledge. The deeper unconscious, which Jung calls the collective unconscious, is the repository of all humankind and is teeming with creative energies and patterns seeking realization and incarnation in a responsive and responsible individual consciousness.

6. What are important considerations to keep in mind when considering a dream? The most important and the most difficult consideration is that the dream is bringing NEW information to consciousness. Our natural tendency is to immediately place the information into existing categories where nothing new can enter in. Our consciousness, by its very construction is a Procrustean bed. [The notion of the Immaculate Conception, understood symbolically, is that in a sufficiently cleansed consciousness, something new has a chance for insemination and eventual birth—the saving thing.]

7. Why do dreams convince when no amount of logical argument can? I don’t know, but I do know this is a true statement.

8. Why are dreams so discounted in modern life? Our collective consciousness is all about keeping itself intact and turning the individual to its service. Dreams, by emphasizing individual development and fostering an anything-but-the-herd mentality, are naturally unwelcome to the collective.

9. Is there a resurgence of interest in dreams? Perhaps. I would be interested in other's opinion about this question.


10. There is no account of Jesus’ ever sharing a dream in the N.T. Why might that be? A real puzzle. Maybe Jesus’ statement, “I and the Father are one,” is an indication that his relationship with the unconscious was so well formed that he and it had no need for the corrections and compensations that dreams bring. Or it could be the case that Jesus lived in a multidimensional reality in which he did not distinguish waking consciousness from any other state of being. If the latter case is true, his final victory would be that of achieving a state which in itself is eternal.

11. What might the unconscious be seeking from a cooperating ego consciousness? Ah, the Big Question! Truly a mystery akin to that of the fate of the Son of Man. Did he know all before the Passion or did he live it in blind obedience to the unknown—as we must do?


12. Why does contact with deep layers of the psyche (the unconscious) have a healing effect? I don’t know, but I do know that is a true statement.



Rose F. Holt
April 30, 2009

ON THE TOPIC OF DREAMS


“It is always as if we were observing through a slit so that we only see a particular moment; all the rest is dark and we are not aware of it at that moment. The area of the unconscious is enormous and always continuous, while the area of consciousness is a restricted field of momentary vision.” [Jung, Analytical Psychology: its theory and Practice, p. 8]

“Man (sic) as we realize if we reflect for a moment, never perceives anything fully or comprehends anything completely,” [Jung, Man and His Symbols, p. 21]

Introduction

I start with the two Jung quotes above because we need to understand that our ego consciousness is extremely limited. Any event of our lives has details and information associated with it that go unnoticed by us but that may be extremely important. It is often the case that these unnoted but important elements are brought to our attention in a subsequent dream. This is one valuable way dreams can inform our ego consciousness.

The more we can expand our consciousness, the less likely we are to fall victim to unconscious forces that can make a mess of our lives. As we shall see in this course, dreams are a natural way that unconscious contents make themselves known. By taking notice of and exploring our dreams, we can considerably increase the scope of our conscious understanding. Since you are taking this course, you probably are already convinced of the value of dreams.

Some Assumptions

Following are some working hypotheses that we will hold as we take up our topic:

1. Every dream is an attempt to help us heal and move us toward wholeness.

2. Every dream is a comment on our life situation.

3. Threads from any dream can and do lead into many, many areas of our lives.

4. Through patient attention to our dreams, we can make contact with and enter into a meaningful dialogue with the unconscious. [By unconscious, I simply mean the source of those factors that influence and impact our lives in unknown ways.]

5. The unconscious is Janus-faced; i.e., it turns to us the face we turn to it.

6. Every dream is given to us for the purpose of healing past hurts, enlarging our perspective, and/or integrating portions of our personality.

7. The dream brings new information to compensate or complement our waking attitudes.

8. Our life energy, or libido, is personified in dreams, as if the psyche or the unconscious wants to draw us into a living relationship.

9. Relationships with inner figures can be as important, enriching, and rewarding as relationships with people in our outer lives.

10. Our inner and outer lives are in some way mirrors of each other. Dream work can provide for a more harmonious balance between the two.

11. The psyche has a teleological aspect, i.e., it is working towards a goal or purpose. Further, it seeks our participation and cooperation.


It seems to me that the unconscious both conceals and reveals itself. It both yearns to be seen, yet is reluctant. In analysis, a secured-symbolizing field is certainly necessary for the analysand. Such a field is also necessary for the unconscious. [Goodheart describes therapeutic containers as the “safe and secured spheres or circles in which ‘heavy’ things can safely happen.” This is the sense in which I use the phrase, “secured-symbolizing field.”] I doubt that our course will provide such a field. However, it can open us to the possibilities for creating that kind of sacred space for ourselves.

Symbols and Symbolic Meaning

Since dreams speak in the language of symbols, this is a good place to interject a few notions about symbols. Jung, in Man and His Symbols, pp. 20-27, writes:

A symbol “implies something vague, unknown or hidden from us.” . . . . “Thus a word or an image is symbolic when it implies something more than its obvious and immediate meaning. It has a wider ‘unconscious’ aspect that is never precisely defined or fully explained. Nor can one hope to define or explain it. As the mind explores the symbol, it is led to ideas that lie beyond the grasp of reason.”

“Because there are innumerable things beyond the range of human understanding, we constantly use symbolic terms to represent concepts that we cannot define or fully comprehend.”

“Thus every experience contains an indefinite number of unknown factors, not to speak of the fact that every concrete object is always unknown in certain respects, because we cannot know the ultimate nature of matter itself.”

“As a general rule, the unconscious aspect of any event is revealed to us in dreams, where it appears not as a rational thought but as a symbolic image.”

And Paul Tillich, in Dynamics of Faith, pp. 41-43, writes:

“Symbols . . . point beyond themselves to something else.” Symbols “participate in the reality of that to which they point” Symbols cannot “be replaced for reasons of expediency or convention. . .”

A symbol “opens up levels of reality which are otherwise closed to us.” And a symbol “also unlocks dimensions and elements of our soul which correspond to the dimensions and elements of reality.”

“Symbols cannot be produced intentionally. . .” Symbols “cannot function without being accepted by the unconscious dimensions of our being.” Symbols grow and they die.

What is a symbol to one person may or may not be to another. The meaning a symbol takes on is determined not in itself, but rather it is determined by the capacity of the interpreting mind. This understanding is extremely important when we are working with dream symbols.

Working with dreams is one way of increasing our capacity for understanding symbols. Symbols behave like water in that they fill up whatever container they find themselves in. Together, we will be working to increase our capacity, our ability for containing symbolic meaning.

Interpretation

All of us interpret. We assign meaning to ideas, events, and experiences. Most of us are, more or less, in the dark, i.e., unconscious of the process by which we arrive at meaning. Since the fundamental purpose of working with dreams is to render somewhat conscious that which is largely unconscious in our lives, an exploration of the process by which we interpret is in order.

As Scholes tells us, there is a significant difference “between the states of consciousness involved in receiving a text and producing one. Specifically, the text we produce is ours in a deeper and more essential way than any text we receive from outside. When we read we do not possess the text we read in any permanent way. But when we make an interpretation we do add to our store of knowledge—and what we add is not the text itself but our own interpretation of it. In literary interpretation we possess only what we create.” [Robert Scholes, Semiotics and Interpretation, p. 4]

Translating this understanding to working with dreams, it is of little value to have someone tell us their interpretation of our dream. It can be of enormous value when we arrive at an interpretation of our own dream or dream symbol. When we interpret our own dream, we add a piece of our own nature to our conscious personality.

There are, of course, universal symbols that crop up in our dreams all the time. Aid from someone else in amplifying such symbols can be helpful because their meaning is inexhaustible. However, the unique message for the dreamer is still highly personal.

You might take note that in interpreting for another, we are actually interpreting for ourselves. It is for this reason that many dream groups use the constant caveat, “If this were my dream, . . .”

One of the great delights in working with our dreams is that every dream presents us with new information that is uniquely our own. In our waking realities, much of what we are exposed to is not new. It is repetitive news, translated works, repeated stories, a fresh learning of existent knowledge—often interesting, to be sure, but not truly new. Of course, one reason dreams can be off-putting, even frightening, is that we by nature are wary and careful of what is strange, different, unknown. The danger in any work with dreams is that our ego consciousness will naturally try to fit the new content into an existing and often inadequate framework of understanding, in which case, the value of the content will be either lost or distorted.

Adding to Our Conscious Understanding
There are several possible ways in which we can add an outside content to our consciousness and assign meaning to it:

1. We can adapt something from an outside source and accept it at face value. We do this when we accept dogma as our truth or when we follow the laws of the land because we hold an assumption that our doing so is for the common good. A good deal of early childhood education holds with this way as a methodology even though there is ample evidence that children learn not what they are taught but rather what they see modeled in the behavior of significant others. Rejection or acceptance of dogma or law can be flip sides of the same coin. In either case, it is the dogma or the law that determines the individual’s behavior because the dogma or the law has taken up residence in consciousness.

2. We can achieve a modicum of distance from an idea, an event, or an experience, put it through some kind of consciousness-sorting process and accept/reject some or all, more or less thoughtfully. In this process, our own consciousness is the final arbiter of meaning and value. A potential problem with this process is that whatever is put through a particular state of consciousness, is at least to some degree, shaped and determined by that state, so that meaning and value can arise more from the consciousness than from the content itself. If the content is odious or contrary to the state of consciousness, considerable refraction of the content may take place so that it loses its value for adding something new/different to the existing consciousness. One way of illustrating this process is to consider two extremes of consciousness for approaching a written text:



Author is Authority --------------------------------- Reader is Authority

LAW ---------------------------------------------------------ANARCHY

Meaning/value determined by author –---- Meaning/value determined by reader


All of us approach any text somewhere along this continuum, and our approach is by no means a trivial choice. For the fundamentalist Christian, a Biblical text is understood literally, and its meaning and value is determined by the author whom he/she believes to be God. For a reader on the other end of the continuum who finds meaning and value in translating Biblical story as a way of understanding patterns of behavior in his/her own life, the reader determines for him/herself meaning and value. Another example of interpretation along this continuum is the varying ways people view the U.S. Constitution—meaning and value fixed by the framers or meaning and value determined by the application of the document’s principles to changing circumstances.

3. We can seek a larger context in the outer world for both our consciousness and an idea/event/experience so that our consciousness is not alone or is not the final arbiter for judgment of meaning and value. This is, of course, a tricky business because it demands a great deal of trust and faith. We are willing to yield to a higher authority (i.e., someone who can author) because we believe the higher authority has information, experience, or judgment that we lack. Sometimes the issue (idea/event/experience) is so troubling that we are relieved, even happy, to give it over to someone else. People may come into therapy with the happy expectation that the therapist will tell him/her what to do. Personal responsibility for the state of one’s own consciousness can be a heavy burden. I think we are seeing some abdication of personal responsibility and authority among the general population as we collectively try to deal with this phenomenon of terrorism. There are, of course, collective issues that must be dealt with by collective decision and action, and this too is a matter for important discernment.

4. We can seek a larger context in the inner world for both our consciousness and an idea/event/experience. If you accept one of the basic tenets of Jungian Theory, i.e., that the ego and ego consciousness are one part in a larger entity, the Self, there is existent in the inner world a context that can be extremely helpful in the discernment of meaning and value. Whether the Self is a help or a hindrance depends entirely upon the relationship between the ego and the Self—as is the case in any other interdependent relationship. If the ego is at odds with the Self and is pursuing meaning and value contrary to the intentionality of the Self, it may happen that the Self will hasten the destruction of an unhealthy facet of ego consciousness. [Assigning intentionality to the Self may be anthropomorphism. A more accurate way of stating the situation might be to say, "It is as if the intention of the Self is counter to that of the ego." We are probably on firm ground in our statement, however, since frequently the Self personifies itself in dreams.]

Let’s take a specific example to illustrate the possibility outlined in No. 4 above. This example also shows one of the archetypal patterns of human behavior portrayed in the Bible In the Spring of 2001, Pakistani official traveled to Kandahar, Afghanistan, on a mission to save the two 1,700 year-old statues of Buddha that the Taliban were threatening to destroy in their religious fervor. Mullah Omar, “Commander of the Faithful” and head of the Taliban, told the official this dream: A mountain was falling down on him (Omar). Before it hit him, Allah appeared and asked Omar why he had done nothing to get rid of false idols.” (Robert Marquand, “The Christian Science Monitor,” csmonitor.com, October 10, 2001) Omar, a person known to take guidance from his dreams, proceeded with the destruction of the ancient Buddha carvings.

There is a close parallel between Omar’s dream and that of King Nebuchadnezzar as told in the fourth chapter of the Book of Daniel. At the peak of his power, Nebuchadnezzar, full of his own might and glory, had a warning dream: “I saw a tree of great height at the center of the world. It was large and strong, with its top touching the heavens, and it could be seen to the ends of the earth. Its leaves were beautiful and its fruit abundant, providing food for all. Under it the wild beasts found shade, in its branches the birds of the air nested; all men ate of it. In the vision I saw while in bed, a holy sentinel came down from heaven, and cried out: ‘Cut down the tree and lop off its branches. But leave in the earth its stump and roots, fettered with iron and bronze, in the grass of the field. Let him be bathed with the dew of heaven; his lot be to eat, among beasts, the grass of the earth. Let his mind be changed from the human; let him be given the sense of a beast, till seven years pass over him.” (New American Bible, Daniel 4:7-14)
A year passes. Nebuchadnezzar has gone on in his arrogant way as before and then “was cast out from among men, he ate grass like an ox, and his body was bathed with the dew of heaven, until his hair grew like the feathers of an eagle, and his nails like the claws of a bird.” (NAB, Daniel 4: 30)

Had Mullah Omar been willing to look inward at the “false idols” within his own consciousness, he might have interpreted the dream as a correction of his behavior. Events of the past few years would have unfolded very differently. Had he known the archetypal story of Nebuchadnezzar, Omar might have interpreted his dream as an invitation to self-reflection and self-criticism. It could have helped him with his mental hygiene. However, he interpreted the dream as a confirmation of his ego plan, and thus you could say the Self acted to destroy an unyielding and contrary ego structure. As he was warned in the dream, so it came to pass—a mountain fell on him.

If we accept the premise that the ego is the exponent for the Self in the world, a solid working alliance between them is essential, for the only way the Self can manifest or incarnate is through the conduit of a more or less willing ego consciousness. In the cases of Nebuchadnezzar and Mullah Omar, we could say that the ego became so inflated with its own view and importance that it could no longer accept critical input from the Self.



WORKING WITH DREAMS

The best approach I have found for working with dreams is the one Jung describes in MDR:

“After the parting of the ways with Freud, a period of inner uncertainty began for me. … I felt it necessary to develop a new attitude toward my patients. I resolved for the present not to bring any theoretical premises to bear upon them, but to wait and see what they would tell of their own accord. My aim became to leave things to chance. The result was that the patients would spontaneously report their dreams and fantasies to me, and I would merely ask, ‘What occurs to you in connection with that?’ or, ‘How do you mean that, where does that come from, what do you think about it?’ The interpretations seemed to follow of their own accord from the patients’ replies and associations. I avoided all theoretical points of view and simply helped the patients to understand the dream-images by themselves, without application of rules and theories. Soon I realized that it was right to take the dreams in this way as the basis of interpretation, for that is how dreams are intended. They are the facts from which we must proceed.” [Pp. 170-71]

In approaching dreams in this manner, I think we are more able to honor and enter into the state of the dreamer, keeping in mind our earlier discussion of symbolic understanding. Over time, what begins to happen is that alchemical and archetypal processes come into play. The dreamer’s, and the analyst’s, conscious and unconscious psychological structures dissolve and reform in new, often subtle, ways that can go unnoticed for some time. Jung called this alchemical process solve et coagula.

The archetypal factor at work is the numinosum. Jung describes the numinosum as “a dynamic agency or effect not caused by an arbitrary act of will …. The numinosum is either a quality belonging to a visible object or the influence of an invisible presence that causes a peculiar alteration of consciousness.”

The numinosum appears at the moment when the dreamer begins to glimpse the luminosity of the dream or dream image or dream symbol. The numinosum both, “… seizes and controls the human subject, who is always rather its victim than its creator” and exerts effects that are “anything but unambiguous.”

“Often it (the numinosum) drives with unexampled passion and remorseless logic towards its goal and draws the subject under its spell, from which despite the most desperate resistance he is unable, and finally no longer even willing to break free, because the experience brings with it a depth and fullness of meaning that was unthinkable before.”

Working with dreams in the manner described above eventually and almost inevitably brings the dreamer to an attitude that can only be called religious in the sense that Jung uses the term: “We might say, then, that the term ‘religion’ designates that attitude peculiar to a consciousness which has been changed by experience of the numinosum.”

Through careful, meticulous association and amplification of dream images and motifs, the dreamer (with the help of the analyst/therapist) will begin to trace the personal to its archetypal roots in the objective psyche where he/she will find the source of renewal.

In some mysterious way, the healing function of the dream engages when the personal meets the archetypal. An emphasis on the archetypal without due regard for the personal can actually hinder any healing. Once when I was working hard to connect the personal and archetypal, trying to force connections, an analyst I much regarded said, “Don’t worry about the archetypal. It will show itself when it is ready.” How very right she was!

I want to share a sequence of dreams where the personal and the archetypal are so intertwined that no interpretation on my part was necessary.

S was a woman in her mid-30’s who had gone through a painful divorce, and after several years alone, had remarried. She was eager to have a child as she felt her biological clock might run out on her. She had this dream:

I discovered that my mother and her two sisters had been secretly keeping my grandmother (their mother) alive for years. However, when I was face to face with my grandmother, I saw that her eyes were brown instead of the vivid blue they were when was alive. I said, “No, this is not Grandma. Her eyes were blue.” At that moment I touched her arm. Her eyes turned blue, and I knew it was she.

Shortly after this dream, S discovered she was pregnant. The night before the child was born, she dreamed that her grandmother came through the front door of her house. Later she told me that when she awoke she knew the dream was announcing the birth. Sure enough, on that day she went into labor.

Some four months went by, and S brought a new and puzzling dream:

My grandmother comes to my house. She tells me she is bored and needs a new craft.

I asked her what she made of this Grand Mother dream. She looked very startled. Later she told me that on the way home she bought a pregnancy test. She discovered, much to her surprise, that she was again pregnant.

On the day S’s second child was born, her sister called to tell her that she had had a dream about their grandmother in which the grandmother had assured her that S and her little family would be just fine. As S told me later, she (S) immediately wondered if the sister were herself pregnant. The sister was but didn’t know it yet.
Some years go by. S brings this dream, which she had the night before she was to have a hysterectomy:

My grandmother comes to tell me her work is done. The scene shifts. There is to be an elaborate funeral for her in a huge theater. All my grandmother’s progeny are ushered into the place. The funeral service is more beautiful and moving than I can possibly describe. It is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.

These dreams were all deeply moving and held great meaning for S. She felt very much supported and loved by this grandmother who, when she was a young child, had been so loving and gracious to her. The dreams helped her realize that this loving and supportive Great Mother continued her presence in S’s life.

Rose F. Holt
January 14, 2009

C.G. JUNG


JUNGIAN PSYCHOLOGY – A DEEPER LOOK
An Online Course
Presented by Rose F. Holt, M.A., and Boris L. Matthews, Ph.D.
From January 26, 2009, through March 20, 2009


This course will cover fundamentals topics of Jungian Psychology—archetypes and myths, dreams and dream interpretation, persona, shadow, complex, typology, anima/animus, Self, and individuation. It is designed for people who have some knowledge of the subject but would like a more structured and comprehensive overview.

Online Discussion Forum: A portion of the website for this course will be devoted to a forum discussion on which participants may post reflections, questions, and responses to others’ posts.

Seminar Web Events: We will hold four online web seminar events as part of this course. Times: Mondays, 7:30 to 9:00 pm, on February 2, 16; March 2 and 16, 2009. Seminar participants will need a high-speed internet connection (DSL or cable), a webcam (to participate in the on-line discussions by video), and long distance phone service (for the audio portion of the on-line discussions).

Learning Objectives: Participants will gain greater understanding of
•The archetypal / mythic roots of human experience
•The relationship between waking (ego) consciousness and other structures of the psyche (shadow, anima / animus, Self)
•The role of the feeling-toned complex in the psyche
•Fundamentals of psychological type
•Individuation

Required Text: Memories, Dreams, Reflections by C. G. Jung. Other course readings will be posted on the course website.

Fees: $170
$195 for CE credits.

CE’s: 16 CE credits available


For additional information contact

RoseHolt@aol.com
314-726-2032

borismatthews@verizon.net
608-217-5184

The Chicago Jung Institute website has been down for a few weeks. Because of the delay in registrations the down time caused, Boris Matthews and I have changed the dates for our Short Course on Dreams. Following is more detail about the course:

A SHORT COURSE ON DREAMS
An Online Course
Presented by Rose F. Holt, M.A., and Boris L. Matthews, Ph.D.
From January 22, through March 05, 2009

Dreams have been important sources of information for individuals and groups in all times and all ages. Though often misunderstood, even dismissed, dreams have powerful and lasting effects on individuals. In this short course we will explore (1) the function of dreams, (2) ways of working with dreams, (3) some universal and helpful dream symbols, and (4) the value of dreams for furthering individual development.

Course participant will have access to a website where an ongoing forum will be available for discussions and where additional course resources may be posted from time to time. Additionally, a part of the course will be four (4) web-hosted seminars for real-time interaction between presenters and participants. Seminar time and dates: Thursday, 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm CDT, January 22; February 05, 19; March 05, 2009. Participants may join the seminar through webcam and phone or through phone only. Detailed information for seminar participant will be provided to participants when they register.

Learning Objectives:
*to understand the value of dreams
*to develop strategies for approaching the dream
*to develop an understanding of dream symbolism
*to see how dreams can facilitate individual development

Cost: $155 [plus $20 for those taking the course for eight (8) CEU credits.]
Class size is limited

Texts:
C.G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections
C.G. Jung, Man and His Symbols, Chapter 1

In these two texts, Jung gives us his most mature exposition of his understanding of dreams—their symbolism and their meaning.


If you are interested in registering or in having more information, please feel free to call me (314) 726-2032 or e-mail me, www.roseholt@aol.com. You may also sign on to the Chicago Institute website, www.jungchicago.org to register.

The Jung Institute of Chicago has decided to go to a weekend format
for its analyst training program. Because the institute website has
been down for some time, this change in format has not been broadly
announced. The Institute will probably slip the February 1, 2009,
application deadline into March or April.

Part of the rationale for shifting from a weekly academic program to a
one-weekend-each-month program is to allow people from far-flung
places to have access to training. If you or anyone you know is
interested in training to be an analyst, please take note of this
important change.


The Chicago training program is demanding and rigorous and has, thus,
an excellent reputation. To apply, one needs a clinical degree, to be
a licensed clinician in the state in which he/she works, and to have
undergone 100 hours of personal analysis.


Boris Matthews (www.borismatthews.com) will become Training Director of
the ATP in the Fall of 2009. He can answer any questions you may have
about the program and this major change in format. Boris' e-mail address is: borismatthews@verizon.net


In addition to the Analyst Training Program, the Chicago group also
offers a two-year Clinical Training Program. The next window for
applying to the CTP will be in 2010 when another group will be
admitted.

Boris Matthews and I will be offering an online course, A Short Course on Dreams, through the Jung Institute of Chicago. Following is the announcement that will appear soon on the Institute's website, www.jungchicago.org


A SHORT COURSE ON DREAMS
An Online Course
Presented by Rose F. Holt, M.A., and Boris L. Matthews, Ph.D.
From December 08, 2008, through January 15, 2009


Dreams have been important sources of information for individuals and groups in all times and all ages. Though often misunderstood, even dismissed, dreams have powerful and lasting effects on individuals. In this short course we will explore ((1) the function of dreams, (2) ways of working with dreams, (3) some universal and helpful dream symbols, and (4) the value of dreams for furthering individual development.

We will use two texts for this course: MAN AND HIS SYMBOLS, Chapter 1, by C.G. Jung, et. al., and MEMORIES, DREAMS, REFLECTIONS by C.G. Jung. Participants will have access to a restricted website where other course materials and a discussion forum will be available. A part of the course will be four (4) web-hosted seminars for real-time interaction between presenters and participants. Seminar time and dates: Thursday, 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm CDT, December 11, 18, 2008; January 08, 15, 2009. Participants can be included in the online seminar by webcam and phone or by phone only. We encourage participants to post questions, reflections, and thoughts on the discussion forum and to take part in the lively exchange in the online seminars.

Learning Objectives:

*to understand the value of dreams
*to develop strategies for approaching the dream
*to develop an understanding of dream symbolism
*to see how dreams can facilitate individual development

Cost: $155 which includes online seminar costs [plus $20 for those taking the course for eight (8) CEU credits.]
Class size is limited

Suggested Reading:
C.G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections

---------------------

If you would like additional information about the course, please e-mail either Dr. Matthews (www.borismatthews@verizon.net) or myself (roseholt@aol.com). If you would like to talk with me about the course, please call (314) 726-2032.

To enroll, please visit the C.G. Jung Institute of Chicago website: www.jungchicago.org

“Shadow Cornered” by C.G. Jung


C.G. JUNG – GUIDE TO THE INNER LIFE
By Rose F. Holt, Jungian Psychoanalyst

C.G. Jung (1875-1961)
”One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.”






Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961) was a lot of things—psychiatrist, theologian, historian, anthropologist—but above all else, he was an explorer. He explored first his own inner life, his interiority, through what he called his “confrontation with the unconscious,” then he helped many, many of his patients explore their own interiority. All this work was his primary field of research from which he developed a powerful theoretical construct, a “map” for those of us who dare to go on our own voyage into the interior. Today that field of endeavor is called Jungian Psychology or Analytical Psychology.

Before Jung, few people dared go beyond the collective understanding of human nature. Like the maps of old, the collective understanding was edged by mythical monsters, so there was a frightening prohibition against journeying there. The primary function of religions was to protect people from venturing into those areas where the roads ended-- areas of mystery, death, birth, sacred experience. Religious rites and sacraments served as containers for the sacred. They were prescriptions to keep people safe, confined within an area of understanding determined by others and sometimes misused in the interest of power. It was unthinkable, even dangerous, for people to venture on their own without benefit of the shelter of a given religious understanding. There were (and are) severe penalties for those who did so. Some who ventured successfully we remember as mystics, saints, or founders of new religions. They described their discoveries, but until Jung, few could adequately guide others to their own unique and individual discovery of their interiority. Interiority was assigned or assumed by faith and dogma, not discovered.

Jung opened the way for the many. He eventually understood that an early part of the journey is an exploration of one’s personal unconscious—that area of psyche to which experiences, thoughts, feelings, impressions unacceptable to conscious understanding were unwittingly banished. Initially, these unconscious contents reach consciousness through projection, i.e., some quality that rightfully belongs to the individual is assigned to some loved or hated “other.” Through careful attention to one’s feeling reactions, to thoughts, and to dream images and motifs, one can eventually withdraw the projection and begin to integrate this hitherto unacceptable quality—good or bad—into one’s own personality. Such withdrawal requires humility in accepting what was unacceptable and a sense of responsibility for either managing or developing the newly-discovered quality. No wonder, then, that many of us shirk the duty to work toward increased consciousness!

With continued work on oneself, these personal unconscious contents become more differentiated. There will be the projections onto people of the same gender, of the opposite gender, onto heroes and hags, onto saviors and demons. Once this clearing out of the personal unconscious is more or less complete, an entirely new territory begins to show itself, the collective unconscious, as Jung called it.

Jung demonstrated that all humankind shares not just a collective consciousness but also a collective UNconsciousness. In the territory of the collective unconscious one finds the archetypal [arche = ancient and typos = imprint] images, motifs and patterns that underlie the common experience of humankind. It is a collective heritage to which everyone may lay claim. For Jung archetypes are simply the typical patterns of human behavior. Some important ones include the journey, mother, father, the hero, home, the child, birth, the savior, king, queen. Underlying all other archetypes, Jung describes the central organizing principle of the psyche and of individuality—the Self. It is the Self that gives rise to consciousness and our sense of individual existence.

An important tool in one’s journey into interiority is the dream. Like a key, the dream has no logic to its shape. Its logic is that it turns the lock. An example might be a dream in which a loved one dies. Taken at face value the dream is disturbing, even terrifying. Like a key, however, a symbolic understanding might allow the dreamer to “open” a message that something ‘alive’ in the unconscious has died, i.e., is no longer active there. Whatever energy the figure represented might now be available to the dreamer on a more conscious level and, therefore, more amenable to the will. Same dream, vastly different approaches to it, vastly different effect on the dreamer. In working with dreams we make a kind of "Pascal's Wager." We can't know with certitude what a dream means. Therefore, let's wager on a meaning that promotes growth and enhances life because we have everything to gain and nothing to lose.

Jung demonstrated clearly that dreams carry messages from the unconscious to consciousness, and they do so in a manner finely tuned to the attitudes, needs, and desires of the dreamer. Attitude is of critical importance. The dream messenger is Janus-faced. If one dismisses the dream as unimportant or irrelevant, that is just what dreams become. However, if one takes dreams seriously and pays attention to them, dreams speak with increasing and sometimes astonishing clarity.

If one thinks about all this, it makes very good sense. Humankind has always and everywhere felt the need for story. Dreams are primarily story. They can be extremely important because they are deeply personal and capable of providing meaning and value to the individual. Research has shown that, deprived of dream sleep, an individual will become ill in a very short time. Almost everyone has had an impressive, unforgettable, even numinous dream. Almost everyone has had the experience of waking in a particular mood determined by a dream. The old adage, “A picture is worth a thousand words,” particularly applies in working with dream images. It hardly needs be said that dreams have always been an important component of psychic life and development. Only we moderns, with our “not invented here, therefore not of value” attitude, have denigrated the dream.

When one has ventured deeply enough into one’s own interiority that archetypal patterns, figures, and motifs begin to appear, something happens of singular importance. One begins to experience healing—often illusive, difficult to explain or prove, but definitively a feeling of wellness. In religious terms, this feeling is characterized by the word “salvation,” or as something akin to “God’s in his/her heaven, all’s right with the world,” but viewed experientially the feeling is a psychological fact. One’s life becomes imbued with meaning and purpose, and even a seemingly mundane existence takes on great value to one gifted in this way.

Jung writes poetically about this state:

“The state of imperfect transformation, merely hoped for and waited for, does not seem to be one of torment only, but of positive, if hidden happiness. It is the state of someone who, in his/her wanderings among the mazes of his/her psychic transformation comes upon a secret happiness which reconciles him/her to his/her apparent loneliness. In communing with him/herself, he/she finds not deadly boredom and melancholy but an inner partner, more than that, a relationship that seems like a secret love, or like a hidden springtime, when the green seed sprouts from the barren earth, holding out the promise of future harvests.” [From Vol. 14, Mysterium Coniunctionis, Para. 623, modified slightly in the interest of inclusive language.]

I think Jung is describing here the state of someone who has glimpsed that the Self is at work in his/her life and is sustained by that glimpse.

Information about the next online course, Alchemy and Psychotherapy, is posted on the Jung Institute of Chicago website, www.jungchicago.org and on the St. Louis Jung Society website, www.cgjungstl.org [Links to both sites are provided on the left side of your screen.] You can read detailed information about the course on those two sites and also enroll in one of them if you wish. If you have questions, please e-mail me (www.roseholt@aol.com) or call me (314) 726-2032.

Online courses with live video seminars are proving to be an extremely effective way for people in far-flung places to access information about Jungian Psychology, to share their thoughts, reflections, and questions, and to connect with like-minded folk. Participants can join in the audio portion of the seminars by phone, or in both audio and video by phone and web camera.

Boris Matthews, Ph.D., and I will be collaborating this Fall to do two courses, both entitled Alchemy and Psychotherapy and both using Edinger's ANATOMY OF THE PSYCHE as the primary text. One course will be offered through the Chicago Jung Institute and one through the Jung Society of St. Louis. Although basically the same outline and syllabus, our experience tells us the two courses will vary widely because of the participants, their backgrounds, and the directions in which online discussion forums and internet seminars take.

In previous online courses we have been extremely careful not to let study of Jungian Psychology become strictly an intellectual exercise. Through discussion, limited sharing of dream images and synchronistic experiences, and through approaching our subject using thinking, intuition, feeling, and sensation, we find participants become deeply involved and can effectively use their learning to enhance their daily lives. Above all else, Jungian Psychology is a psychology of practical daily life and enhanced relationships. Feedback from participants has indicated they find the material rich, rewarding, and useful.

For those new to Jungian Psychology, this type study makes a wonderful launch onto a journey of self-discovery. For those well-versed in the topic, such study deepens and adds to appreciation and understanding.

There is a site http://psychology.suite101.com/article.cfm/what_is_the_shadow where you can read short, clear, and concise essays about basic Jungian ideas. The author will be posting a number of these essays on the site in the coming weeks. The first one is on shadow.

Boris Matthews and I will be offering a new online course (including five live web seminars) beginning in September, 2008. The subject of this course will be the relationship between alchemy and psychotherapy that C.G. Jung discovered and used to corroborate his psychological theories. Participants need only high-speed internet access and a webcam to join in. The course will include readings, online disussion forum as well as live seminars. We will soon post detailed information about the course here and on the Jung Institute of Chicago website [www.jungchicago.org]. If you desire information before then, please e-mail Boris (www.borismatthews@verizon.net) or me (www.roseholt@aol.com). Continuing education units (CEU's) will be available toward fulfillment of licensure requirements.

Boris and I are finding this mode of teaching extremely effective for reaching people interested in Jungian Psychology but who do not live in an area where they have access to offerings of a Jungian Society or Institute. In the course we are conducting currently, we have people enrolled who span the country, from Alaska to Florida.

The C.G. Jung Society of St. Louis is very pleased to host Lionel Corbett, M.D., for a lecture and workshop on July 18 and 19, 2008. The Society anticipates that both events will be sold out, so do register soon if you are interested. The website address where you can see more information or register online is: www.cgjungstl.org



July 18th and 19th
“Psyche & the Sacred: Spirituality Beyond Organized Religion”
Presented by Lionel Corbett, M.D.


Spiritual structures require periodic renewal. When our spirituality cannot be contained within traditional institutions, there is an urgent need for new ways to articulate our experience of the sacred. From within the depth of the psyche, a new image of the divine is emerging alongside and within traditional Judeo-Christian images. Depth psychology gives us a language to articulate this emergence, allowing our experience of the sacred to be articulated without the need for recourse to traditional theology, doctrine or dogma. This lecture describes an approach to spirituality based on personal experience of the sacred.

Lionel Corbett, M.D., trained in medicine and psychiatry in England and as a Jungian analyst at the C.G. Jung Institute of Chicago. Dr. Corbett is a core faculty member at Pacifica Graduate Institute. His primary dedication has been to the religious function of the psyche, especially the way in which personal religious experience is relevant to individual psychology. He is the author of Psyche and the Sacred, and The Religious Function of the Psyche. He is co-editor, with Dennis Patrick Slattery, of Depth Psychology: Meditations in the Field and Psychology at the Threshold. He has also authored “Spirituality Beyond Religion”, a set of audiotapes published by Sounds True.

(no subject)

THE GOAL

 

Here is Jung writing about the goal of the work, study, and analysis we do on our journeys:      

 

"This (referring to the work of alchemists) recalls the impressive opening sentence of Ignatius Loyola's 'Foundation':  'Man was created to praise, do reverence to, and serve God our Lord, and thereby to save his soul.'"  (Paragraph 252)

 

"Accordingly, if we divest the opening sentence of the 'Foundation' of its theological terminology, it would run as follows:  'Man's consciousness was created to the end that it may (1) recognize (laudet) its descent from a higher unity (Deum); (2) pay due and careful regard to this source (reverentiam exhibeat); (3) execute its commands intelligently and responsibly (serviat); and (4) thereby afford the psyche as a whole the optimum degree of life and development (salvet animam suam).'"  (Paragraph

253)

 

We could rewrite this quote in gender-neutral language, but I think it captures the essence of what we are about when we engage in the work with psyche--in our dreams, fantasies, imagination, and daily work.

 

 

From:  AION, Vol. 9ii of Jung's Collected Works, page 165

---

Vote for your city's best dining and nightlife. City's Best 2008.

Boris Matthews and I are enjoying this new mode of teaching/learning through courses on the internet. In our current offering, "A Deeper Look into Jungian Psychology," we have added web seminars in which course participants join together online in front of webcameras to discuss readings, reflections, questions, etc. These seminars add greatly to the less-personal discussion forums.

Boris and I are formulating our next course offering (with web seminars) which will begin in late May or early June and, like the first two, will run for eight weeks with CEU credits available for those who desire them. We are considering the following:

1. A reading and discussion of one Jung text, perhaps the 1925 SEMINAR ON ANALYTICAL PSYCHOLOGY which is essentially a transcript of Jung speaking about the origins and development of his work. Another possible work might be Jung's controversial ANSWER TO JOB. Still another might be "A Study in the Process of Individuation," which is Jung's attempt to follow one of his patients via her dreams and her artwork through the individuation process.

2. A course devoted to one topic of particular interest, perhaps working with dreams or exploring Jungian complex theory or Jung's notion of the Self, or his views on Individuation.

3. We are also scheduling another "A Deeper Look into Jungian Psychology," scheduled to begin on June 2, 2008, because of the interest people expressed after it was too late to register for the first 'deepening' course. If you or anyone you know might wish to participate, please contact us.

Formal announcements and registration forms will be available on the Chicago Jung Institute website: www.jungchicago.org soon.

Of course, we want to present topics of burning interest that will help individuals in their own development and work. To that end, would you please provide any suggestions you have to help us in our planning. Boris' e-mail is borismatthews@verizon.net and mine is roseholt@aol.com

Online Course
A DEEPER LOOK INTO JUNGIAN PSYCHOLOGY
Facilitated by Rose F. Holt, M.A., and Boris Matthews, Ph.D.
March 24, 2008, through May 19, 2008

Jung’s ideas fascinate us, touch us, and ultimately can lead to discovery of sound and lasting meaning for our lives. Many people discover Jung through references in literature, various university studies, Jung’s own writings, or affiliation with a Jung Society. Jungian Psychology provides a framework for understanding the wholeness of the human person.

In this online course, we will be explore:

typology
complexes
shadow
personal and collective unconscious
archetypes
Self and individuation

The only prerequisite is a curious, inquiring, open mind. This course is oriented toward persons who want to learn more about Jungian (Analytical) Psychology, including professional counselors, social workers, and psychotherapists.

"A Deeper Look Into Jungian Psychology" offers the opportunity for people in far-flung locations to come together in a readings/discussion/seminar format. Participants will have access to a restricted website where readings will be available and where they can discuss and post on an online forum. They will also be invited to join in four (4) web-hosted simultaneous seminar sessions.

Course Objectives:

(1) develop a basic understanding of Jung’s primary contributions to psychology,

(2) gain knowledge of basic Jungian Psychological theory,

(3) have a helpful framework for dealing with people who are conflicted and often work against themselves.

(4) gain a working knowledge of complex theory and its usefulness for understanding problematic human behaviors.

(5) develop a deep understanding of the Jungian concept of “shadow” and its value for understanding ourselves.

Sixteen (16) CEU’s are available from the C.G. Jung Institute of Chicago ($25 additional processing fee)

Cost is $110
Text: C. G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections

(Additional texts may be suggested)

For further information, please visit http://www.jungchicago.org/ or http://www.borismatthews.com/

You may also contact Rose Holt [314 726-2032 or roseholt@aol.com ] or Boris Matthews [608 217-5184 or borismatthews@verizon.net ]

Some Thoughts about Persona, Shadow, and Animus

Jung speaks often of a consciousness "contaminated with unconscious contents. " I think he means that we have unconscious scripts, ideas, images, that affect our vision. What we see is often distorted by what we are looking through. It is as if we all wear eyeglasses that alter our perceptions—for better or worse. Is there something like an objective reality? Is it possible to view people and events with a measure of clarity? Who can say that his/her vision is the correct one? Often, it is in this realm that might does indeed make right. The ones who write the history books tell us how it was, but do they know how it was?

I think there is a way that every dream takes some piece of heretofore contamination out of our field of consciousness and shows it to us. Before the dream, the contamination was simply part of our way of perceiving the world. After the dream, has something changed?

In the myth retold in the slender volume, DESCENT TO THE GODDESS, Inanna has to abandon her queenly garments and descend to the underworld for the funeral of Ereshkigal’s husband. I think we can do a translation of that drama into some Jungian theory. Jung’s notion is that as long as the ego is identified with the persona (Inanna in her finery), then the shadow and the animus are bound together in the unconscious (Ereshkigal married to Gugalanna). Being unconscious, shadow and animus are then seen only in projection. The shadow is some hated, envied, or otherwise powerful person who draws the ego’s projection. The animus is a male figure who carries the projections of a woman's unrealized masculine potentiality. Often the animus is an idealized figure, but he can just as easily be seen as demonic or oppressive. The common denominator for both shadow and animus projections is energy; the projection carriers for each carry a lot of energy for the ego. Often, once the projections are withdrawn, the ego is left in wonderment when she relates with the real human being who was previously the projection carrier. What was the big deal?

I think it is often the case that when shadow and animus get together (as, say, might be dramatized in a dream), the ego is left in a bereft feeling place. The parental complexes play a huge role in the overall psychic setup because the way the budding ego develops a really fine persona (and often identifies with it) is by pleasing the parents, the primary authorities for consciousness. Of course, the finer the persona, the more outer worldly success is guaranteed. At midlife when the inner world makes itself felt, as it often does, the battle is engaged. You can see how devastating it is for one to have to sacrifice one's identity with the persona (and often how costly!).

You can also see how difficult it is to own for oneself the qualities one has projected. The distasteful, hateful ones that we have to accept with the attendant humbling. And the positive, attractive ones that we have to accept and take responsibility for. I am the one who does these terrible things that I find so unacceptable. I am the one with these potentialities that I have to work like crazy to develop and put to use. Much easier that I let someone be my bad guy and someone do all those marvelous things I so admire.

JUNG ON THE DEFINITION OF RELIGION

In a lengthy letter to Pastor Tanner dated 12 February 1959, Jung explains his psychological definition for the word religion.

First he provides a definition the ancients used: religio derived from relegere or religere, “to ponder, to take account of, to observe (e.g., in prayer).”

Then he gives the definition the Church Fathers used: religio from religare, “to bind, to reconnect,” which speaks to relationship with God. Thirdly, Jung writes of a contrasting conception that was “current in pagan antiquity: the gods are exalted men and embodiments of ever-present powers whose will and whose moods must be complied with. Their numina must be carefully studied, they must be propitiated by sacrifices . . . . Here religion means a watchful, wary, thoughtful, careful, prudent, expedient, and calculating attitude towards the powers that be . . . .”

Finally, Jung provides his own thinking about the meaning of the word religion:

“By ‘religion,’ then, I mean a kind of attitude which takes careful and conscientious account of certain numinous feelings, ideas, and events and reflects upon them.” Jung’s notions about the psychological meaning of a religious attitude are more akin to that of the ancients and pagan antiquity than to that of the Church Fathers.

C.G. Jung Letters, Vol. 2, 1951 – 1961. Selected and Edited by Gerhard Adler, Princeton University Press, 1975. “To Pastor Tanner,” pp. 482-84.

Fundamentals of Jungian Psychology

Taught by Rose F. Holt and Boris Matthews

Online Course Class limit of 25

Friends, $110.00; All others, $120.00 (16 CEUs)

[Friends refers to members of the C.G. Jung Society of Saint Louis. See website link below.]

Readings: All required readings will be posted on line.

Class begins on January 21, 2008 Sign up now! Limited enrollment!

This will be an introductory course covering major theoretical elements of Jungian Psychology: (1) Introduction – History and Overview; (2) Typology and Adaptation; (3) Structural Elements of the Psyche: Conscious/ Unconscious; Ego Consciousness; Persona and Shadow; Self; (4) Complex Theory; (5) Collective Unconscious; (6) Archetypes; (7) Stages of Life; (8)Individuation.

Students will be able to understand (1) Jung’s primary contributions to psychology, (2) The Jungian concept of personality type and its value for understanding ourselves, our relationships and others, (3) Complex theory and its usefulness in changing problematic human behaviors, (4) Conflict within oneself and between self and others, (5) Archetypal motifs that underlie much of human behavior.

No prior knowledge of Jungian psychology is required. This course is open to people in the helping professions and to lay persons. It is structured to give newcomers to Jung a solid, basic understanding. It will also appeal to those who have some understanding of Jung's thinking but would like to gain a more thorough and comprehensive overview of the subject. Class limit of 25. The class requires 16 hours of reading and weekly online discussion to qualify for CEUs.

You may contact Rose Holt at (314) 726-2032 or e-mail her at roseholt@aol.com, or Boris Matthews (608)217-5184 or e-mail him at borismatthews@verizon.net.

To register, go to the C.G. Jung Society of Saint Louis website www.cgjungstl.org/payonline.htm and click on the appropriate link for (member or non-member) study groups.

Rose F. Holt, M.A., received her Diploma in Analytical Psychology from the C.G. Jung Institute of Chicago in 2001. She is an analyst in private practice in St. Louis and Chicago and is active in the C.G. Jung Institute of Chicago Analyst Training Program. She also serves as Advisory Analyst to the C.G. Jung Society of St. Louis. She has taught numerous courses in all facets of Jungian Psychology.

Boris Matthews, Ph.D., is a faculty member of the C. G. Jung Institute of Chicago where he received his Diploma in Analytical Psychology in 1987. He has been board certified (1989) by the National Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis, and has practiced Analytical Psychology and Jungian Analysis since then in Chicago, Milwaukee and Madison. Dr. Matthews has translated numerous Jungian texts from German to English and is the co-author (with Ashok Bedi, M.D.) of Retire Your Family Karma.

Sponsored by the C. G. Jung Society of St. Louis
Presented by Analysts Boris Matthews, Ph.D., and Rose F. Holt, M.A.

An on-line class in Fundamentals of Jungian (Analytical) Psychology with 16 CEU's for licensed counselors, psychologists, social workers, and chaplains will start in mid-January, 2007. This course will be appropriate for people who are new to Jung's work as well as people who wish to gain a solid, organized grounding in the basics of Jung's theories.

Details will soon be posted on this weblog, on Boris Matthews' website www.borismathews.com and on the Jung Society website: http://www.cgjungstl.org/ People who wish to enroll will be able to do so online at the Society website.

If you are interested in advance information, please e-mail either borismatthews@verizon.net or http://www.roseholt@aol.com/

INTERVIEW QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS


1. What was your process for determining this was the therapy you would use?

I once went to a five-day program at Notre Dame University where I heard a Jungian Analyst talk about dreams. That exposure led me to understand that there is a whole lot in the human psyche accessible only through image and symbol. This analyst was an extremely learned and interesting person, someone worth emulating. Now, of course these kinds of thoughts were hardly conscious to me at the time. I only knew that the experience gave me a glimpse of something worth pursuing.

A few months later I found a local Jungian Analyst and began working with him. That work lasted seven years and was, for me, essentially an introduction to parts of myself that I didn’t know existed. It led me to understand the complexity of the human person and also the delight and agony of all that complexity. In short, it was a journey TO MYSELF.

I had already had a fairly successful career in the business world but never found deep satisfaction in my work. It was a job but not the “calling” that I began to feel for the world of psychotherapy. During my subsequent education to become a counselor (at Lindenwood), I learned a whole lot about different approaches to helping people. However, I never found an approach that sufficiently explained either myself to me or other people to me--other than Jungian Psychology, that is.

After graduating and working for a time, I applied for admission to do advanced study in Jungian Psychology at the Jung Institute of Chicago. In the Analyst Training Program in Chicago, I truly began to fulfill the notion of my calling. It was an arduous journey, taking me six years to complete and requiring much study and a whole lot more personal analysis. The program also exposed me to even more theoretical approaches to psychotherapy, but always the Jungian approach seemed the most adequate for it offered psychodynamic theory that best explained the inner workings of the human person. I found that it works. It offers “actionable intelligence,” to borrow a phrase.


2. In a general sense, as opposed to the personal specific goal of the client, what has changed in the client that makes you believe that they are ready to terminate therapy?

I believe the client is ready to leave therapy when he/she does leave OR when he/she has a dream that announces the end of the work. Some people come long enough to solve a personal problem, get over a relationship, work out career issues, or work through grief or trauma. Some people continue on long after the initial reason for coming has been resolved. For these clients, personal growth and development seemingly have no end. Analysis becomes an avenue for increasing consciousness and accessing contents from the unconscious that feed their creative lives.

When people pay attention to their dreams long enough and develop an ability to understand them, they realize that there is an unconscious agency actively seeking participation from them. Jung calls this agency the Self. The Self may sound like a religious term, but he (and I) mean it in a strictly psychological sense. Whatever you may call it, it is a REALITY but only for some. Above all the Self requires patience. Its language, symbolic in form, is the dream. Learning that language is difficult.


3. Do you explain the process of Jungian analysis to your client?

No. Many people who enter analysis do so because they have some intellectual notion of the process. I answer questions when asked but try never to place theory ahead of personhood. For some the theory doesn’t fit at all. To try to use it would be a disservice. I rely instead upon input from the client—life experiences, memories, his/her story, dreams, meaningful events. Psyche seems to unfold in its own way and own time. I try to follow the meandering of the psyche and not interfere too much in that process. Much better that the client be the one to begin experimenting with his/her own self.


4. What techniques are your personal favorites that you use more often?

If listening is a technique, that is the one I rely most on. I frequently check in with the client to make sure I am hearing with minimal distortion.


5. Do you use other therapies with clients and if so, what do you use and what was your experience with the other therapies?

I think I must be very bad at adopting other people’s notions when they don’t fit. I find that for me Jungian theory and Object Relations are the two approaches most comfortable and effective. However, I do subscribe to the general notion that, in psychotherapy, it is the relationship between therapist and client that heals.


6. Do you work with the chemically dependent population and if so what kind of results do you see?

I haven’t worked much with chemically dependent clientele. Those I have worked with generally moved beyond dependence once they got the notion that their behavior and attitudes meant a great deal to that unconscious agency, the Self. [Just an aside here: Alcoholics Anonymous is a very effective approach to chemical dependency. Jung himself was the analyst for one of the founders of AA.]


Rose F. Holt
Jungian Analyst
October 31, 2007

ONLY THE SHADOW KNOWS

I don’t know which is more disappointing, the news about Senator Larry Craig or some of the reactions to that news. The shock wakes of scandal that have engulfed the GOP in recent years shouldn’t surprise us. It is a well known psychological fact that the repressed parts of our individual personality (our shadow) must be contained, projected, or acted out in some fashion. In one extreme the repression leads to fanaticism, i.e., to an overcompensation for doubt. In the other extreme, there are visits to brothels, gropings in men’s rooms, beatings of those unfortunate enough to carry a projection for us. An inability to hear and understand someone radically different from ourselves is an attempt to escape the radically different in ourselves.

What is true for the individual is also true for the Party.

Along with the implosion of the Republican Party in recent years, there is the oft-asked question of why our good intentions often lead to such disastrous and unintended consequences. Most of us believe George Bush decides and acts out of a fine intentionality. Unfortunately, we see what disastrous consequences lurk behind the high-flown rhetoric about democracy, God’s will, and honing to the philosophy of Jesus Christ. Whence the catastrophic disparity? We need look only to the psychological mechanism of shadow repression for an answer.

Containment of shadow elements of our personality can actually lead to considerable character development. Look at recent reports that Mother Theresa long entertained doubts about the existence of God. Her ability to admit to the doubts and her courage to go on in her work in spite of them, only enhance her reputation as someone fully human—like us.

Or President Clinton. It was his final and full confession, his profession of great sorrow, and his hard work of reconstructing all he had forfeited that won back the hearts and minds of his family, of the American People, indeed of the world. No one doubts the days and nights of anguish and sorrow Clinton suffered or the suffering he visited on others.

During this difficult period, others (Larry Craig and Newt Gingrich, Tim Hutchinson, to name just three) were calling for President Clinton’s head. To hear them tell it, Clinton was unfit to be president, a sinner beyond forgiveness or redemption, even “a naughty boy.” We now know what lay beneath their dark condemnations. We can understand their deep need for someone to carry their unbearable projections.

Clinton did the psychological work of integrating his shadow, and he emerged a better man, more fully human. The shadow sides of Craig, Gringrich, and Hutchinson have essentially destroyed their careers and wrested away their power. They erred on the side of an understandable desire to appear more fully divine, i.e., without fault, omnipotent, and righteous. Turns out, it is a most difficult task to be and appear more fully human.

What a different outcome we might have had over the past six-plus years were Bush able to entertain, contain, and even integrate his shadow side—his grab for absolute power, his demands to be the “Decider,” his inability to admit error, his imperial disregard for anyone who is not on his side, his inability to see that he is the maker of his own unintended consequences. Bush suffers from the human fallacy of the divine right of kings. He, and we, would fare much better if Bush were interested in being a really decent human being.

Bush had the opportunity to be a Lincoln. Instead, he will go down in history as a Hoover. The story is told that in the depths of the depression, Hoover thought the nation needed a song to “cheer it up.” He got his song: “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?” Bush’s song??? “Oh, Lord, it’s hard to be humble when you’re perfect in every way.”

Now, that most difficult question: What does Bush carry for me and for many Democrats?

EMPOWERMENT OF FEMININE VALUES

In our class last session, we read and discussed The Odyssey. It quickly became apparent that Odysseus struggle to return home may be a quintessential masculine psychological and developmental story, but it didn’t resonate with the women in the class. And Penelope’s passive role as the long-suffering and take-a-perennial-backseat wife didn’t resonate either.

I want us to entertain in this course, Empowerment of Feminine Values, this question: Is it the case that ego consciousness for both women and men has been overlaid with patriarchal, hierarchical structures to such an extent that feminine values are neither recognized nor lived in modern cultures?

Another way to ask the question is with an image. Image our emerging consciousness as a very large balloon. Now imagine that balloon being inflated inside some kind of structure--large, small, rectangular, circular, but a definite bounded structure. That balloon will take on the shape, volume, and size of its limited environment. Now imagine yourself confined inside that balloon. What will its interior feel like? Is it possible to imagine anything outside the balloon? What happens when you hear things emanating from beyond the balloon skin?

Now step outside the balloon and take a look. Imagine there are many structures with many inflated balloons in your sight. Imagine there are even connections between the balloons so that travel through them and outside them is possible. Imagine getting stuck in one balloon temporarily, that you are unable to find the door to escape.

When ego consciousness is confined to one ‘balloon,’ as it were, we say that it is an ego identified with its consciousness. With the ability to step outside and examine several or many ‘balloons,’ we are talking about an ego that is disidentified, an, ego that is free to travel, more or less, between and through various states of consciousness. The ‘one-balloon’ state can lead to an ego consciousness that finds life boring and sterile: There is nothing new under the sun. I am the way I am, and the world is the way it is; I can’t do anything about it.

On the other hand, an ego that has the ability to entertain various states of consciousness is much freer. Such an ego may be capable of changing itself and the world it finds itself in.

However, like Chinese boxes, there may be balloons around balloons around balloons. Let’s remember that in our analogy, balloons not only limit, they protect. Sometimes that protection is a very necessary thing. We might label that protection psychological defense mechanisms, for example. There are, however, healthy defense mechanisms and not-so-healthy ones.

This little text, Descent to the Goddess, is a challenge to a common psychological state. Let’s call it the good-mother complex. The angry, devouring, haggish, and powerful mother figure is a frightening reality for many of us, and we will go to great lengths to avoid her, even so far as to deny her very existence. Women and men are acculturated to demur to the negative mother but not to respect her. The energies bound up in this very real but largely unconscious archetypal figure can emerge in insidious and often damaging ways. Perhaps they emerge in men as flight over fight and in women as self-destructive tendencies. Men simply will not engage with angry women. And women have few healthy outlets for justifiable outrage, and hence tend to internalize it.

If our primary symbol for this dual-natured mother archetype is Mother Earth, we can readily understand the outrage she is expressing at the ways she has been treated. Fortunately, our species is starting to listen up.

As we read and discuss this text and our topic over the next several weeks, let's pay attention to our dreams, to synchronistic experiences, to the 'balloons' of our lives. Perhaps in doing so we can enter into the realm of the Great Mother and give her more authentic expression in our lives.

Here are some other texts that are relevant to our topic.

The following extensive quotation is an excellent discussion of complexes, both from a theological and psychological perspective. In another section of this paper, Doran expresses significant disagreement with Jung over issues Jung raised in Answer to Job. The entire article, while difficult, is worth the effort. I selected this excerpt to add to our understanding of a basic Jungian concept—the autonomy and power of complexes.

From: J. Marvin Spiegelman (ed.), Catholicism and Jungian Psychology, Phoenix, AZ: Falcon Press, 1988.

“Jung and Catholic Theology,” by Robert M. Doran, pp. 55-59.

B. Complexes

The relation between the intentional spirit and the sensitive psyche, however, is a reciprocal one. If our intentional operations have a constitutive influence on the quality of our psychic life, it is also the case that the quality of our psychic life has a great deal to do with the ease and alacrity with which intentional operations are performed. There is, if you want, an affective self-transcendence that accompanies the spiritual self-transcendence of our operations of knowing, deciding, and loving, and that is strengthened by the authentic performance of these operations. But this affective self-transcendence is also a prerequisite if the sustained fidelity to the performance of these operations is to mark one’s entire way of life. And as we know all too well, the movement of sensitive consciousness can interfere with the performance of intentional operations. There can be felt resistance to insight, manifest in the repressive exercise of the censorship; there can be a flight from understanding, a desire not to judge, a resistance to decision, a habitual lovelessness. There can be other desires and fears that affect to a greater or lesser extent the integrity of our operations at the different levels of intentional consciousness. There may be required a healing of the psychic blockages to authentic operations before the sustained performance of intentional operations in their normative pattern of inquiry and understanding, reflection and judgment, deliberation and decision can characterize our lives. Intentionality analysis may very well provide the key to what constitute authentic psychotherapy; but it remains that such therapy may have to occur before one’s intentionality can be, not analyzed, but implemented in one’s own world and concomitant self-constitution.

Such therapy would be a matter of freeing the psychic energy bound up in what Jung called negative complexes, so that this energy is free to cooperate rather than interfere with the operations through which direction is to be found in the movement of life. Jung described a complex as “the image of a certain psychic situation which is strongly accentuated emotionally and is, moreover, incompatible with the habitual attitude of consciousness. This image has a powerful inner coherence, it has its own wholeness and, in addition, a relatively high degree of autonomy, so that it is subject to the control of the conscious mind to only a limited extent, and therefore behaves like an animated foreign body in the sphere of consciousness.”²¹ But in the same paper Jung distinguished a negative from a purposeful aspect of complexes. Complexes usually function as compositions of inferior sensibility, but their negative traits can be transformed if the ego assumes toward them the proper attitude. The key to the proper attitude is to regard the complex not only as a symptom but also as a symbol. The symptom points backward to causation, the symbol forward to the reorientation and balancing of conscious attitudes. Complexes are the structural units of the psyche as a whole. Each unit is constellated around a nuclear element, a focus of energy and content, value and meaning. These constitutive units of the psyche enjoy a relative independence from one another and from the conscious ego. Even the ego is a complex of energies and representations bearing on the familiar, everyday tasks, functions, and capacities of the individual. The healthy psyche is one in which the ego remains in contact with other complexes, preserving them from the dissociation from conscious awareness that grants them a second authority that thwarts the aims and objectives of the ego. And the key to this contact is to adopt a symbolic approach to the complex. As we have just emphasized, what Freud would explain causally in terms of dissociation or displacement Jung will retrieve by symbolic association. The retrieval is not a denial of the causal approach, but a sublation of it into a viewpoint that balances Freudian archeology with a teleological approach. And, we have argued, the finality of the psyche can be disengaged with greater precision if one views it as a tendency to participate in the ever higher organizations constituted by authentic intentional operations.

The structure of consciousness disengaged by Lonergan provides a helpful framework for the incorporation of the complex theory into a contemporary Catholic theology. The levels of intentional consciousness constitute what Lonergan calls a creative vector in consciousness. It moves, as it were, from below upwards. “there is development from below upwards, from experience to growing understanding, from growing understanding to balanced judgment, from balanced judgment to fruitful courses of action, and from fruitful courses of action to the new situations that call forth further understanding, profounder judgment, richer courses of action.”²² To the extent that one’s consciousness proceeds smoothly and uninterruptedly from experience to insight, from insight to judgment, from judgment to decision from decision to new experiences, insights, judgments, decisions, one is effecting a series of cumulative and progressive changes in the world and in oneself. Moreover, each successive level entails a further degree of self-transcendence. To move out of the stupor of the animal to the intelligence of the human being, one must transcend the merely sensitive desire for participation in the rhythms of the body, as well as the intricate subtleties of the flight from understanding. To move from insight to truth, from what might be so to what really is the case, one must move beyond the state of noncommittal supposition and hypothesis constituted by the second level of consciousness, to the verification of one’s suppositions and hypotheses constituting the third level. And to do the truth, either by bringing one’s actions into harmony with what one knows or by the creative praxis of constituting the new world that should be but is not, calls for yet a further degree of self-transcendence. But the psyche has to participate in the self-transcending capacities of the spirit if one is to be able to perform these operations. And for that participation there may be required a depth-psychological discovery and healing of the affective obstructions to creativity. This depth-psychological maieutic will be an understanding and overcoming of negative complexes. But the negativity of the complexes received specific meaning when the psyche is understood as the sensorium of the transcendence through which human beings constitute their world and, concomitantly, themselves.

What we have said is tantamount to a theological sublation of the complex theory into the theology of moral impotence and the need for grace. Autonomous psychic complexes that would prevent one from participating in the creative adventure of the human spirit are to be regarded always as victimized compositions of energy formed as a result of the violence done to one’s psychic whether by significant others, oppressive social structures, or the misuse of one’s own freedom and responsibility. Psychic spontaneity as such is never morally responsible for its own disorder. Disordered complexes are the victims of history. Victimization by others and self-victimization usually conspire with one another in the genesis of psychic disorder. The constitution and causation of psychic disorder will vary from person to person, so that no general, exhaustive, or exclusive mode of causation may be determined. But what counts is that the causation is always a matter of victimization.

The process of understanding and healing negative complexes will often take a person back to his or her earliest memories or beyond. But healing is conditioned by the adoption of a particular attitude on the part of the subject affected. We tend spontaneously to believe that we can adopt one of two postures to our own affective disorder. We can either repress it further, or entirely renounce moral responsibility in its regard. Repression constricts the emotional energy gathered in the complex, and eventually this energy will be explosive. Moral renunciation, though, is just a capitulation to the power of the energies constellated in the complex, and simply strengthens these energies, making it ever more difficult for one to move to a new position beyond the disorder. From a theological point of view, victimized complexes are the fruit of the sin of the world, a dimension of what the Scholastics referred to a peccalum originale originatum. To the extent that one has freely conspired in their formation, they are also the fruit of personal sin. And the redemption of the energies bound up in these complexes must be effected, not by repression, nor by moral renunciation, but by a healing love that meets one at the same depth as the disorder. The victimized dimensions of ourselves will not be healed by judgment and condemnation, but only by mercy and forgiveness. Redemptive love must reach to the wound and even deeper, and must touch it in a manner contrary to the action that was responsible for the victimization.

There is, then, an alternative to repression and moral renunciation. But that, too, has its difficulties. The alternative is to participate in the compassion of a redemptive love in regard to our disordered affections. This means, first, recognizing that the complex is a victim of oneself or of history or of some combination of these, and ceasing to hate oneself for what one cannot help but feel. It means, next, adopting an attitude of compassion in regard to our affective disorder. It means, finally, allowing there to emerge from this recognition and compassion a willingness to cooperate with whatever redemptive forces are at hand to heal the disorder and transform the contorted and fragmented energies, even to consolidate these energies into psychic participation in the self-transcendent quest for direction in the movement of life.

The difficulty with this alternative is that it is impossible to implement, unless there be some power from beyond ourselves to release us into the requisite posture. For to be compassionate toward the negative emotional forces that derail us from the direction to be found in the movement of life is to be intelligent, reasonable, and morally responsible in their regard, and this is precisely what we are rendered incapable of by reason of the force of these complexes. Again, adopting the alternative is a function of an affective self-transcendence that is not at our disposal precisely because of the power of the complexes. Although the solution is clear, one is unable to avail oneself of it because the requisite willingness is lacking. And there is nothing one can do to provide oneself with that willingness. We can acknowledge the reasonableness of a certain manner of proceeding, and still be unable to act in accord with it. We are doomed to adopt toward the victimized complex one of the attitudes that will further victimize it. We cannot emerge from the vicious circle of disordered affective development. Let me add that moral impotence due to affective disorder is especially acute with regard to complexes rooted in one’s earliest experiences, in experiences coincident with or preceding one’s earliest memory. For these are often impossible to objectify in a way that illuminates us as to what we are negotiating.

If we are to reach a freedom to treat our emotional darkness with compassionate objectivity, that freedom must be given to us. We will not find it in a creative vector that moves from below upwards in consciousness. It must come from beyond the creative vector. In the final analysis it can come only from the reception of an unconditional love that puts to rest our efforts to constitute ourselves with inadequate resources. The love that can sustain the movement of the healing vector from above downwards in consciousness, moreover, is itself beyond all human capacity. All human beings are incapable of sustaining their own healing from victimization by the sin of the world, let alone the healing of another. Human love will simply further victimize unless it is itself free of the distortions and derailments of affectivity that are inevitable under the reign of sin. No human love will heal, unless it is itself participation in divine love. No human being can be the source of another’s redemption from evil.

A human love, moreover, that would truly participate in divine love, and so that could mediate healing, must be able to be a victim of the darkness of the one to whom it mediates the gift of redemptive love. Then the healing will be mediated precisely in and through the suffering of the one who loves. And one knows oneself to be sufficiently healed to be an instrument of divine love, only when one can endure precisely the same kind of suffering as that which caused one’s own victimization, but without being destroyed by it again.

There is much more that could be written about the dynamics of healing. But this is not the place for such comments. My purpose is to emphasize aspects of Jungian psychology that can be employed in Catholic theology, and at this point I have tried only to show that the complex theory can provide help to the development in interiorly differentiated consciousness of a theology of moral impotence, sin, and the need for and gift of grace.

21

22

Aquinas Institute of Theology in St. Louis, in conjunction with the C.G. Jung Society of St. Louis, will offer a one-hour graduate-level course, "Fundamentals of Jungian Psychology," this Fall. The core of the course will be a Friday lecture and a Saturday workshop on "Shadow Work" October 5-7, 2007, in St. Louis led by James Hollis. I will facilitate a two week on-line discussion prior to the Hollis weekend and a two week on-line discussion following. Participants will submit a three-five page paper as part of the course requirements. Readings for the course will include: BOUNDARIES OF THE SOUL by June Singer; WHY GOOD PEOPLE DO BAD THINGS by James Hollis; and an article from QUADRANT, "An Outline of Analytical Psychology," by Edward F. Edinger.



For more detailed information, please visit the Jung Society of St. Louis website http://www.cgjungstl.org/ or contact me at roseholt@aol.com or (314) 726 2032. For information about enrollment, contact Jared Ainsworth-Bryson, Director of Admissions, Aquinas Institute of Theology, at ainsworth-bryson@ai.edu

JUNGIAN READING OF THE ODYSSEY, Robert Fagles, trans.




INTRODUCTION to First Class


The word “Odyssey,” according to Webster, means: “a series of adventurous journeys usually marked by many changes of fortune.” In Jungian terms, the story can be understood as the ego’s individuation once a certain stage of development has been reached. We can liken it to the Biblical story of the Israelites. It took someone like Moses to lead the people out of bondage, through the wilderness, to the edge of the promised land. In this story, again looked at from a Jungian frame, a “Moses” kind of consciousness is necessary but only up to a point. Here Moses represents a gathering of psychic energetic forces, all leading toward a single goal–freedom for the personality. In other words, a degree of integration of the ego with an attendant increase in free will. A look at Biblical story as the code for the development of the personality would make for a fascinating study in itself. However, in this course we are going to read and discuss Homer’s ODYSSEY in hopes of finding relevance for us today.

Homer wrote down this epic poem some 2700-2800 years ago. The outline of the story, as summarized by Aristotle in the fourth century B.C., is this: “A certain man has been abroad many years; he is alone, and the god Poseidon keeps a hostile eye on him. At home the situation is that suitors for his wife’s hand are draining his resources and plotting to kill his son. Then, after suffering storm and shipwreck, he comes home, makes himself known, attacks the suitors: he survives and they are destroyed.”

So, how are we to look for relevance in a story almost 3,000 years old? THE ODYSSEY emerged at a time when ego consciousness and its unconscious substratum were more closely allied than they are today. Today our individual consciousness is so well developed that, for most people, the existence of the unconscious is not even a consideration. But just because we are unaware of something doesn’t mean that “something” does not exist.

As we read and discuss, keep in mind that (1) the unconscious often personifies its contents, (2) events and experiences we explain today with notions like “hunches” or intuitions or luck or neurosis, our Greek ancestors explained as actions or interferences of the gods, and (3) the boundary between a waking and sleeping state was most probably not so well defined 3,000 years ago.

If you accept the reality of the unconscious, or at least can entertain the hypothesis that the unconscious exists, (and I assume you do or can since you are interested in things Jungian), then you can readily see that the unconscious personifies its contents because that is the way we are presented unconscious contents in dreams.

As for my second premise, that we have new notions and words for explaining what are truly ancient and universal experiences, simply consider how very recently much of daily phenomena were explained away by superstition.

Perhaps the best way to explain what I am driving at here is to consider some of the contributions of Immanuel Kant. One of Kant’s basic ideas was that there are two world, the phenomenal and the numinal. He argued that there is a great deal about the phenomenal world that we can understand and agree upon, that indeed our minds are constructed in such a way that we experience this world in the same ways. We all can agree about time, distance (width and length and depth), and cause and effect. The numinal world, Kant argued, we should leave to religion; There is little we can agree upon about it and for that reason shouldn’t try.

After Kant, much superstition fell away. (As modern events prove, there is little about the numinal world that we can agree upon and much we can fight over. Fruitlessly, I believe.) Standardization took root. We all have light bulbs that fit, time definitions that work for us. There is universal agreement about the measurement of length. Before Kant a foot was the measure of the king’s foot. When the king changed, so did the length of the foot. And cause and effect is such an accepted fact that few moderns can accept any other explanation for events.

Jung was a student of Kantian Philosophy. However, he took Kant one step further. He believed that the numinal world gives rise to the phenomenal and continues to influence and provide energy to it. The conscious mind and its unconscious substrate are Jung’s parallel notions of the phenomenal and the numinal. If we were inclined to use theological language, we would talk about the continuing incarnation of the godhead.

If you think about all this a little, it makes some sense. We are hard pressed to give up ideas of space and time and cause and effect in our waking realities. However, in the world we experience while asleep, i.e., when the conscious mind is somewhat shut down, the rules of space and time and cause and effect simply do not apply. That is one reason it is so difficult to work with and understand dreams–they force us to think “outside the box,” as it were. If we bring our conscious mind and its constructs to the dream, we will simply make the dream fit into one of our preexistent categories of understanding. If, however, we allow the dream to break up those categories, then dreams may possibly bring something quite new and original into consciousness. In fact, the very word analysis helps explain the work: lysis means “loosening.” The task in analysis is “loosening” the rigid consciousness that we work so hard to acquire in our first decades. You can see then why dreams so often contribute to a more creative consciousness.

You can see, also, why the work of analysis can lead us straight into conflict. A well-bounded, adapted, and functioning consciousness is necessary for the world, and there are great worldly compensations for it. It is the task of consciousness to discriminate and exclude. The price to be paid is that too much exclusion ay leave consciousness in a desiccated existence. “There is nothing new under the sun.”

Returning now to THE ODYSSEY. I urge you to read the story without giving it a whole lot of thought. Read it as you would read a novel. If something strikes you, note it for discussion. Let’s see together if in our reading and discussion we can feel our way into the world of Odysseus and his crew, into a consciousness somewhat emeshed with the unconscious background.

Homer’s great work is archetypal. By archetypal, I mean something very simple: an archetype is a pattern of human behavior. The two primary archetypes of THE ODYSSEY are “the journey” and “coming home.” Reading THE ODYSSEY may help us feel our way more deeply into our own archetypal patterns of journey and home.


Rose F. Holt
January 15, 2007

Our local Jung Society in St. Louis is extremely pleased to host Robert Moore in the Spring, March 30 and 31, 2007, for a Friday evening lecture and Saturday workshop. Details of the Moore event will be posted on the St. Louis Jung Society website (link on the left side of this page) soon. We urge everyone to sign up early as we expect a full house for this exciting event.




Here is a wonderful photo and quote that I copied from the Boston Jungian Society Website. That site address is: http://www.cgjungboston.com/


"One must never look to the things that ought to change. The main question is how we change ourselves." C. G. Jung

C.G. Jung in 1949

On September 15, 2006, the Saint Louis Jung Society hosted a panel discussion of four local Jungian Analysts--Sheldon Culver, Shirley, Fontenot, Ellen Sheire, and myself. My contribution to the forum follows:


STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Presentation for Analysts Panel Discussion - September 15, 2006

The question for this panel discussion, “What is rippling your waters?” is a good one for any of us to reflect on. It has surely provided a lot of reflection for me. I want to thank the Jung Society Board for this opportunity and for their very hard work to make these kinds of programs and events possible.

The subject that has most gripped me in recent weeks has to do with states of consciousness. It is an extremely broad subject but one that lends itself to some brief discussion.

Of compelling interest to anyone is: what is the state of consciousness that I find myself in and why is it important to know that state? Examining one’s own consciousness is a questionable endeavor for we are apt to find what we want to find rather than what is more objectively true.

It seems to be the case that each of us has a conscience that is a state sometimes discernibly different from our usual mode of being within ourselves. Even the word ‘conscience’ in its derivation (con = with and scio = to know) implies a knowing with something other. The effect of conscience is that we feel a dissonance, often in the body, when our ego state or ego action strays too far from this implied other. This often vague dissonance can be a most helpful guide in any examination of consciousness

How does one examine one’s own consciousness, especially while necessarily and hopelessly stuck inside it? I think the answer to this question is one of the most important that Jungian Psychology attempts to provide. Jung thought that by taking a very long view, by studying what others in different epochs had to say about certain issues, one could develop an Archimedean point of view. By “Archimedean,” Jung meant in a psychological way what Archimedes expressed for physical reality: Give me a fulcrum sufficiently removed, and I can apply force that can move the earth.

When Jung studies and comments on works from Eastern philosophy, world mythologies, and from ancient alchemical texts, he is giving us an Archimedean point of view for modern consciousness. Even though modern individual experiences are short-lived and limited; images from the unconscious fleeting and illusory; and states of consciousness sporadic and discontinuous, Jung demonstrated that an aggregate view—gained from many texts from many eras—shows an unfolding process in which all humankind is involved.

This process is not random. It consists of regularly occurring images, motifs, and patterns that Jung called archetypal (from arche = ancient and typos = imprint). Our experiences of archetypes go primarily unnoticed even though archetypes are universal and everyday. In subtle but powerful ways they determine our patterns of behavior. For example, most of us have lived through one such pattern, having experienced the sadness, loss, and sterility of a Demeter state of consciousness when Persephone (that youthful, forward-looking younger daughter state) is snatched away.

Or consider the pattern of Aphrodite, Hephaestus, and Aires. When Aphrodite and Aries have an illicit affair, Aphrodite’s husband Hephaestus makes a net and entraps them, exposing the affair. That ancient myth describes the universal pattern of a consciousness that unwittingly sets up a situation to make sure his/her questionable behavior is uncovered.

Our modern consciousness, unmoored from the underlying and continuous unconscious, can get stuck in one state or can transition unnoticed from state to state. Today we label someone bipolar when he/she swings from Demeter to Persephone states, often with dire consequences. Knowing the pattern we are living, that is to say making the pattern conscious, may lead us to make different choices. And bringing an underlying unconscious archetypal pattern into consciousness has a healing effect. It is as if we need story, especially our own story, to connect us with universal human experiences and emotions—this universal archetypal bedrock--and to end our modern states of alienation from ourselves and others.

Why this need, we can’t be certain, but we do know that without story an individual grows ill. Dreams, in some fashion, connect us with our ‘story.’ When not allowed to dream, an individual will become psychotic in a remarkably short time.

Dreams are a fine way for examining our conscious state. When we remember a dream, it is as if the Dream Giver (perhaps the Self in Jungian thought) has filmed a drama from a point of view removed, then says, “Here, take a look at yourself and your relationships with psychic figures and events from my perspective.” Any of you who have examined dreams no doubt have seen archetypal figures and motifs in them, perhaps Mother, Father, Home, the Journey, Conflict, the Child, the Automobile, Moon, Sun, Stars, Earth, Fire, Water, Air, Sacrifice, the Scapegoat, to name a few.

Why all this interest in states of consciousness? I think with some degree of self knowledge, one can learn to choose one’s state without identifying with it. When identified with a state, one is trapped, things are as they appear. As one ancient put it: We must “learn whence is sorrow and joy, and love and hate, and waking though one would not, and sleeping though one would not, and getting angry though one would not, and falling in love though one would not. And if thou shouldst closely investigate these things, thou wilt find God in thyself . . .” [Collected Works of C.G. Jung, Vol. 11, Para. 400]

Someone I know personally described disidentification this way: “When you look at your dreams, it’s amazing the information you get that’s different from your perception, information that gives you a different way of walking through life. You don’t have to go through it the same old way any more. I used to go strictly with my feelings that were raging around, would get stuck in them. Now I find that if I can go over them, process them, those feelings don’t hang around for days. I am unstuck then.”

Ultimately, there is a creative state of consciousness much to be desired. The best attempt I’ve seen to explain this creative state is from Toni Morrison:

“I’ve said I wrote The Bluest Eye after a period of depression, but the words ‘lonely, depressed, melancholy’ don’t really mean the obvious. They simply represent a different state. It’s an unbusy state, when I am more aware of myself than of others. The best words for making that state clear to other people are those words. It’s not necessarily an unhappy feeling; it’s just a different one. I think now I know better what that state is. Sometimes when I’m in mourning, for example, after my father died, there’s a period when I’m not fighting day-to-day battles . . . . When I’m in this state, I can hear things. . . . . It has happened other times . . . At that time I had to be put into it. Now I know how to bring it about without going through the actual event.” [Black Women Writers at Work, New York: Continuum, 1984, edited by Claudia Tate, p. 189-9]

You might ask a most practical and fundamental question: how do we self-examine, how do we discover precisely what our state of mind is? Here are some ways: (1) Paying attention to dreams and dream images, a topic I touched on earlier; (2) observing synchronicities that occur in our life; (3) watching for repeating patterns in our own behavior; (4) being mindful of the unintentional effects we have on others and on events; (5) mapping our own psyche for the complexes (which act like mine fields) that exist in our unconsciousness and that explode or erupt occasionally; (6) being more or less aware of the triggers that set off our complexes; (7) paying attention to our emotional state and its many variations and swings; (8) entertaining fantasies that can provide information to our ego state; (9) observing which characters we resonate with in literature and film; (10) noticing who gets under our skin and asking why; and (11) above all, having an awareness that ego consciousness is embedded in something larger than itself that exerts pressures, that influences attitudes and behaviors, and that has real affects.

In our shared interest in Jungian Psychology, we are making an additional effort. By relating to Jung’s ideas and the images he explores, by developing a relationship with them, we are in effect establishing a better relationship with the Unconscious. Or we are at least studying the map Jung provides for our own journey. The psyche, or the Unconscious, consists of images and patterns that picture vital activities which are full of meaning and purpose. When we do make the kinds of efforts I have described, it is as if a connection gets made from one’s small personal existence and experience to some underlying source of all existence and experience, and the individual has an ‘ah-ha’ realization that is satisfying and helpful. The ‘ah-ha’ is of the nature of the experience one gets when a mathematical proof “clicks”. There is a feeling of completeness and unshakeable certitude. Many of you may remember that feeling from your study of geometry in high school.

It would seem to be case, the Unconscious also gets something of an ‘ah-ha’ when connections between consciousness and the Unconscious occur.

The word psyche is a Sanscrit word that also means “butterfly” so that in the word itself is an understanding of the experience of transformation or metamorphosis. If the ego is an epiphenomenonon of the psyche, that is to say, the ego is formed on the substratum of the archetypal bedrock and takes on its patterning, then the ego, too, will be subject to psychic transformations. However, without an awareness of the underlying nature of the psyche and its pattern of regular, somewhat predictable transformations, the ego will simply be dragged through the transformations and may experience primarily the suffering. Or the ego may simply try to numb itself to all experience, in which case the baby has definitely been thrown out with the bath water. With memory, knowledge, imagination, patience, and perseverance, an individual can better weather the suffering and storms that are part and parcel of transformation.

I will be presenting a Study Group, "Introduction to Jungian Psychology," for the C.G. Jung Society of Saint Louis this Fall. The course will meet on eight Thursdays from 7:30 to 9:30 pm. Meeting dates are: September 7, 21; October 12, 26; November 9, 30; December 14, 21. We will be exploring fundamental concepts of Jungian Psychology. Our text, which will be provided to participants, will be a Spring Journal article by Edward Edinger. This study group should be of interest to those who want to familiarize themselves with Jung's theoretical foundation as well as to those who desire to refresh their understanding of Jungian Psychology. The study groups are always occasions for deep discussion of absorbing and enriching topics.

For more information or to enroll, go to the Society's excellent website: www.cgjungstl.org

The St. Louis Jung Society is offering excellent programming for this Fall, beginning with an Analysts Panel Discussion, "What's Rippling Your Waters?" on Friday, September 15, from 7:00 to 9:30 pm. Detailed information is available on the Society's website.

Rod Johnson, a writer and artist, who attended the last Jung Society "Jung Readings" Course on the subject of complexes, has captured the essence of parental complexes in his succinct poem, "Our Favorite Ghosts." Rod's poem:

Ghosts are with us all the time, hanging around,
Sometimes their presence is obvious, even obnoxious,
Like when I get bombastic with my wife
Who then smiling says, "Who let J.T. in?"
J.T. is that grandiose part of dad I try to keep locked up.
But you know ghosts. I'm told they go through walls.
Or, I come on weak, meek, disorganized, invite caring.
"Hi, Mom. Speak up. Wht do you need?"

Alone with my wife's live-in folks
We know we need to set places at table for the four
And leave room in the bed in case they demand notice.
They do deserve honoring but somehow
Always show their worst traits. Or are those
The only ones we'll notice them for.
Not for all the good stuff for which we
Want to take full credit.

Pat Spear, a friend with a long-time interest in Jung, read my blog essay, "The Ego as Complex," and very kindly sent me her thoughts on the subject of complex. Following is Pat's commentary:

In The Essential Jung Storr wrote that Jung seemed to link the complexes with unconscious personalities. He quotes Jung as saying that complexes can have us. Every constellation of a complex postulates a disturbed state of consciousness. The unity of the consciousness is disrupted and the intentions of the will are impeded or made impossible…(p. 38).

In The Portable Jung, Joseph Campbell quotes Jung as he describes how isolation can activate the unconscious (p. 331) and discusses freeing oneself from childhood (p. 339). "So that when in later years, we return to the memories of childhood we find bits of our personality still alive, which cling round us and suffuse us with the feeling of earlier times. Being still in their childhood state, these fragments are very powerful in their effect. They can lose their infantile aspect and be corrected only when they are reuinited with adult consciousness. This 'personal unconscious' must always be dealt with first, that is, made conscious, otherwise the gateway to the collective unconscious cannot be opened" (p. 339).

So to answer your questions: In my experience, the intention of the complex is to preserve the status quo, and is not conscious. It derives its energy as a split off piece of the personality in order to maintain its integrity. It begins as benevolent (i.e., when first established, its purpose is to protect the psyche) and over time becomes malevolent (cf. Kalsched). The triggers that set a complex in motion are an unconscious emotional field and sensory experiences, and in the case of addiction, the need for a “rush of pleasure” to restore balance or compensate.

The ego complex is a manager, like a director or conductor, with an intent to organize experience. (And now that I’ve written all this, I would like to say that not only does Jung’s theory now align with quantum physics, it’s also shamanic and exists in all the shamanic traditions I’ve studied from around the Earth.)
----------------------------------------------------------

Thank you for your thoughtful analysis, Pat. Should any other readers wish to add to this discussion, please e-mail me your input, and I will post it also.

THE EGO AS COMPLEX

According to Jung, consciousness AND the personal unconscious are made up of various complexes, one of which is the ego/shaow complex. The ego complex is somewhat different from other complexes in that the ego complex is the center of consciousness. The shadow part of the complex resides in the unconscious and consists of all those qualities not admitted to consciousnes, their having been excluded in the conscious development of the individual. That is to say, in our conscious, waking reality we experience life through one agency which we commonly call the ego. All those formative experiences not acceptable to the ego or which the ego has not the ability to incorporate are encapsulated in the shadow which remains unconscious as long as is necessary for the functioning of the ego personality.

At the center of every complex is an archetype. Archetypes, and hence, complexes, are composed of opposites: good mother/bad mother; punitive father/loving father; victim/persecutor, to name a few. Usually, the ego recognizes one side or pole of the complex but not the other. The one not recognized, or residing in the unconscious, we meet through projection. Thus, if we recognize (or identify with, i.e., think we are) the victim, we meet the persecutor 'out there' in our projections. Of course, to qualify for a projection the object of must have some hook that makes the projection possible.

But what, following this line of thought, would be the archetype at the core of the ego complex? It is--again according to Jung--the Self. Underlying the exprience of the ego, or the "I" of my experience, is the Self, the organizing principle and center of the personality that has the ego as its exponent in the world. Recognition of the Self as a reality has the effect of deposing the ego from its usual center and replacing it with some felt sense of 'other' of which 'I' become the subject. We find this idea usually expressed in religious language, such as: "Not I but Christ that lives in me," (St. Paul); or "My heart is restless, Lord, until it rests in thee," (St. Augustine).

Here is how one patient of Jung's expressed the sense of well-being and wholeness that recognition of the ego's home in the Self wrought:

"Out of evil, much good has come to me. By keeping quiet, repressing nothing, remaining attentive, and by accepting reality--taking things as they are, and not as I wanted them to be--by doing all this, unusual knowledge has come to me, and unusual powers as well, such as I could never have imagined before. I always thought that when we accepted things they overpowered us in some way or other. This turns out not to be true at all, and it is only by accepting them that one can assume an attitude towards them. So now I intend to play the game of life, being receptive to whatever comes to me, good and bad, sun and shadow forever alternating, and, in this way, also accepting my own nature with its positive and negative sides. Thus everything becomes more alive to me. What a fool I was! How I tried to force everything to go according to the way I thought it ought to!" [ALCHEMICAL STUDIES, Para. 70]

The ancient text, the I CHING, expresses the same notion in this (paraphrased) way: Only when we accept things exactly as they are and accept ourselves as we are, only then will a light form out of events to show us the way.

For anyone interested in further training/education in Jungian Psychology, there will be an Open House at the Chicago Jung Institute at which attendees can meet like-minded people, explore available programs and have questions answered.

Following is the announcement/invitation:

The C.G. Jung Institute of Chicago announces AN OPEN HOUSE RECEPTION for the CLINICAL TRAINING PROGRAM and the ANALYST TRAINING PROGRAM Friday Evening, January 6, 2006, at 6:30. For information and reservations call 312-701-0400.

The Clinical Training Program provides a two-year program for licensed mental health professionals in Analytical Psychotherapy--a therapeutic approach that utilizes a symbolic perspective within the context of a highly personal interactional field.

The Analyst Training Program prepares licensed and experienced mental health professionals for certification as Jungian Psychoanalysts through an in-depth study of Analytical Psychology as well as personal analysis and clinical supervision. The C. G. Jung Institute of Chicago is approved by he American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists. The C. G. Jung Institute of Chicago maintains responsibility for this program and its content. Check our website for other programs www.jungchicago.org

You may also click on the link to the Chicago Jung Institute on this page.

INTENTIONALITY AND THE COMPLEX

In a paper Jung wrote in 1911 for delivery at an Austrailasian Medical Congress, he describes some of his research into the phenomenon of the complex. [“On the Doctrine of the Complexes,” C.W., Vol. 2, pp. 598-604] In this early paper, he makes some interesting statements.

Explaining that complexes touch on very sensitive areas of the patient’s psyche, areas he/she is hiding even from him/herself, Jung states: “In many cases the aroused complex is by no means approved by the patient, who even tries in every way to deny, or at least to weaken, the existence of the complex. Since it is therapeutically important to induce the patient to self-recognition, i.e., to a recognition of his ‘repressed’ complexes, one must take this fact into careful consideration, and proceed with corresponding care and tact.” [Para. 1351]

And later on, “. . . . the complex and its association material having a remarkable independence in the hierarchy of the psyche, so that one may compare the complex to revolting vassals in an empire.” [Para. 1352] Jung ascribes a great deal of autonomy to the complex, so much so that the complex is, “at any moment liable to bend or cross the intentions of the individual.” [Para. 1352]

Even at this early point in his work, Jung describes the ego itself as a complex, one that “may well be set parallel with and compared to the secondary autonomous complex.” {Para. 1352] A secondary autonomous complex can thrust the ego aside and take a central role in the functioning of the individual without the ego’s awareness that it has been displaced, however temporarily. “…. A strong complex possesses all the characteristics of a separate personality. We are, therefore, justified in regarding a complex as somewhat like a small secondary mind, which deliberately (though unknown to consciousness) drives at certain intentions which are contrary to the conscious intentions of the individual.” [Para. 1352]

The statements above raise some interesting questions:

(1) What might be the intention of any given complex? To protect the individual from anxiety? To checkmate behaviors that could be injurious to the overall well-being of the individual? To force the individual to change and grow?

(2) From whence does the complex derive its motive force, its energy for action?

(3) Is a particular complex of a benevolent or malevolent nature? Can we know?

(4) What are the triggers that set the complex in motion?

(5) What is the intention of the central complex of the psyche, the ego-complex?

It is this last question, I will address in what follows. We all know about ego intentionality. We work, we play, we earn money, we relate with others. We expend our ego energies in numberless ways. Is there, however, an overriding, perhaps central intentionality that takes priority—or should take priority—in our lives?

Jung writes about this question in AION when he discusses the relationship between the ego and the Self: The ego is dependent upon the Self, or “belongs to” the Self, but is also directed towards the self “as to a goal.” [Para. 252] He goes on to translate Ignatius Loyola’s opening sentence to “Foundation” from theological language into psychological language:

Loyola: “Man was created to praise, do reverence to, and serve God our Lord, and thereby to save his soul.” [Para. 252]

Jung’s reformulation of Loyola’s opening sentence: “Man’s consciousness was created to the end that it may (1) recognize (laudet) its descent from salvet animam a higher unity (Deum); (2) pay due and careful regard to this source (reverentiam exhibeat); (3) execute its commands intelligently and responsibly (serviat); and (4) thereby afford the psyche as a whole the optimum degree of life and development (salvet animam suam).” [Para. 253]

In this portion of AION, Jung is arguing for the importance of self-knowledge, for a fuller understanding of the ego’s utter dependence upon the Self. His words have an uncanny and frightening applicability to events that have opened this new millennium:

“Only an infantile person can pretend that evil is not at work everywhere, and the more unconscious he is, the more the devil drives him. It is just because of this inner connection with the black side of things that is so incredibly easy for the mass man to commit the most appalling crimes without thinking. Only ruthless self-knowledge on the widest scale, which sees good and evil in correct perspective and can weigh up the motives of human action, offers some guarantee that the end-result will not turn out too badly.” [Para. 256]

Reflections on Jung's "Answer to Job"

There is an account in fiction that might help us understand what Jung is getting at in his "Answer to Job." In considering this topic, we would do well to remember that when we talk about "God" that we are really talking about our images and ideas about God. GOD is precisely what we do not know because whatever the entity God is, that entity is far beyond our human understanding.

In our course [St. Louis Jung Society "Jung Readings"], we are grappling with our images of God, trying to make them conscious and, in doing so, trying to see if they fit our reality. Most of us received our personal God-image while we were very young. And for most of us, that God-image is like our eyeglasses, that is to say, simply something which we see the world through but of which we are usually unaware. That said, let me return to the fictional account that will serve as an example.

The example comes from Robertson Davies’ THE MANTICORE, the second book in his DEPTFORD TRILOGY. David Staunton, a successful but very neurotic barrister from Toronto has suffered a mid-life crisis. His symptoms are so severe that he takes himself to Zurich where he enters analysis with Dr. Johanna von Haller. David suffers from a father-complex. He has been shaped, formed, and dominated by his father; and in spite of considerable evidence to the contrary, can only see his father in a positive light.

After about a year of analysis, working with dreams and gathering together the threads of his life story, David has developed a fuller and more complete picture of his father. He has a dream, biblical in style, which he reports to Dr. Von Haller.

"‘I dreamed I was standing on a plain, talking with my father. I was aware it was Father, though his face was turned away. He was very affectionate and simple in his manner, as I don’t think I ever knew him to be in his life. The odd thing was that I couldn’t really see his face. He wore an ordinary business suit. Then suddenly he turned from me and flew up into the air, and the astonishing thing was that as he rose, his trousers came down, and I saw his naked backside.’

‘And what are your associations?’

‘Well, obviously it’s the passage in Exodus where God promises Moses that he shall see Him, but must not see His face; and what Moses sees is God’s back parts. As a child I always thought it funny for God to show his rump. Funny, but also terribly real and true. Like those extraordinary people in the Bible who swore a solemn oath clutching one another’s testicles. But does it mean that I have seen the weakness, the shameful part of my father’s nature because . . . . .? I’ve done what I can with it, but nothing rings true.’

‘Of course not, because you have neglected one of the chief principles of what I have been able to tell you about the significance of dreams. That again is understandable, for when the dream is important and has something new to tell us, we often forget temporarily what we know to be true. But we have always agreed, haven’t we, that figures in dreams, whoever or whatever they may look like, are aspects of the dreamer? So who is this father with the obscured face and the naked buttocks?’

‘I suppose he is my idea of a father–of my own father?’

‘He is something we would have to talk about if you decided to go on to a deeper stage in the investigation of yourself. Because your real father, your historical father, the man whom you last saw lying so pitiably on the dock with his face obscured in filth, and then so dishevelled in his coffin with his face destroyed by your stepmother’s ambitious meddling, is by no means the same thing as the archetype of fatherhood you carry in the depths of your being, and which comes from–well, for the present we won’t attempt to say where.’"

In this dialogue, Davies may have had in mind an interesting and controversial statement Jung makes:

"I look upon the receiving of the Holy Spirit as a highly revolutionary fact which cannot take place until the ambivalent nature of the Father is recognized." [COLLECTED WORKS, Vol. 18, Para. 1551]

All of Davies’ DEPTFORD TRILOGY is an interesting read and in many ways a fine introduction to some basic concepts of Jungian Psychology. I selected this particular passage to help illuminate Jung’s "Answer." The character David is not a religious man but he has an unconscious and very masculine God-image that has been mediated to him through his personal father and through other significant men in his life. The same is true also of his feminine God-image which was mediated to him through his personal mother and through other significant women, including his stepmother. For "God" in both these instances, you could simply substitute "Power" because it is these masculine and feminine power-images that have formed and shaped David’s worldview, that is to say, shaped how he sees the world and how he seems himself and his role in that world.

As long as his vision is truncated by a one-sided development, David necessarily holds a narrow and rather naive conscious view of himself and his world. His complexes around mother and father make him sensitive and prone to black moods and fits of anger. What he has repressed about both figures, the good and the bad, lies unconscious in his psyche and rises up to bite him in ways that eventually are debilitating. He cannot deal with his father’s cruel and controlling ways because he literally cannot see them. He cannot deal with his birth mother’s influence and power over him because he simply does not recognize them.

In his analysis, he is able to uncover aspects of his unconscious personality (also mediated to him through mother and father) that have bedeviled him for decades and to gain a certain degree of freedom from behaviors and compulsions that previously controlled him.

Of course, each of us is in some ways a "David Staunton." We each have had our worldview and our personality shaped and influenced by significant people in our history. We each are blind to certain influences and forces that are very real but fall outside our field of vision. The more completely we think we see, the more vast our blind spots.

The prevailing and unquestioned image of God that has been mediated for us is that of a loving, kind, benevolent, omniscient, all-powerful deity. No matter our personal experiences to the contrary, most of us cling to the prevailing God-image. Jung, in the essay we are studying, calls all these God-image assumptions into question. He does so in a way that was upsetting when he published this work in 1952 and is upsetting when we read this work still. We might do well to reflect on the question of WHY calling these God-images into question and examining them are so disturbing. After all, if Jung’s notions about the God-image are only ideas and theories, why do they upset?

INTRODUCTION TO READINGS COURSE

JUNG’S ANSWER TO JOB
February 3, 2005

In this course, we are going to take up one of Jung’s most controversial works, his Answer to Job. First, some background. Jung wrote Answer in 1951. On May 29, 1951, Jung wrote to Aniela Jaffe’: "So it goes all the time: memories rise up and disappear again, as it suits them. In this way I have landed the great whale; I mean "Answer to Job." I can’t say I have fully digested this tour de force of the unconscious. It still goes on rumbling a bit, rather like an earthquake. I notice it when I am chiselling away at my inscription (which has made good progress). Then thoughts come to me, as for instance that consciousness is only an organ for perceiving the fourth dimension, i.e., the all-pervasive meaning, and itself produces no real ideas." [Letters, Vol. 2, pp 17-18.]

Again, on July 18, 1951, he wrote to Aniela Jaffe’: "I am especially pleased that you could get into such close relationship with the second part of my book (Answer). So far most people have remained stuck in the first. I personally have the second more at heart because it is bound up with the present and future. If there is anything like the spirit seizing one by the scruff of the neck, it was the way this book came into being." [Letters, Vol. 2, p. 20]

Clearly, Jung felt more that his "Answer to Job" wrote him not vice versa. And he valued the second part of the work more than the first part. Let’s keep that in mind as we read and discuss the book. Which parts hold meaning for us?

In a letter to "Dr. H," dated August 30, 1951, Jung wrote: "You must pardon my long silence. In the spring I was plagued by my liver and had often to stay in bed and in the midst of this misere wrote a little essay (c.a. 100 typed pages) whose publication is causing me some trouble." [Letters, Vol. 2, p. 21]

Even before his "Answer" was published (in 1952), it provoked a firestorm of controversy, criticism, and rebuke. What was the firestorm all about? Jung’s biographer, Vincent Brome, writes:

"If one understands Jung’s thesis correctly, Job reveals a hubris which involves a higher form of justice than God himself and the challenge is met by the incarnation of Christ. In this interpretation Christ appears as a deliberate attempt to set right the balance between good and evil, to redeem the injustice God has committed toward Man. This perfection of God is achieved by union with Divine Wisdom or Sophia, the feminine counterpart of the Holy Spirit which reappears under the image of the Virgin Mary." [Jung, Man and Myth, p. 254]

Only two years earlier, the Catholic Church had issued a papal pronouncement on the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin, an event Jung saw as an expression of the collective unconscious that was a sorely-need feminine compensation for the patriarchal one-sidedness of Christianity. As we shall see, Jung thought it was God’s estrangement with, or ‘forgetting’ of, Sophia that allowed him to treat Job so harshly.

Again, I quote from Brome’s biography:

"There were those who felt that Answer to Job simultaneously committed the sins of blasphemy and arrogance: blasphemy that he should attempt to unravel the metamorphoses of the Holy Spirit in the manner of a neo-Gnostic and arrogance in making it conform to his own theories. Fierce controversy followed, with one school reading the book simply as a psychological explanation of Man’s conception of God, while others recoiled from the notion that any imperfection had ever appeared in the Holy Spirit. Ellenberger believed that the book could also be understood ‘as a cry of existential anguish from a man desperately seeking for a solution of the greatest of all philosophical riddles, the problem of evil’

"There remained a hostile handful who claimed that Jung had now appointed himself psychiatrist to God, diagnosed a divine sickness and successfully cured the Patient by applying his own theories. Eric Neumann, his old friend in Israel, wrote on 5 December 1951, "[Answer to Job] is a book that grips me profoundly. I find it the most beautiful and deepest of your books. In a certain sense it is a dispute with God similar to Abraham’s when he pleaded with God on account of the destruction of Sodom. In particular it is for me–for me personally–also a book against God who let 6 million of his people be killed, for Job is really Israel too.’" [Brome, p 254]

Jung’s reply to Neumann (January 5, 1952) clearly shows that he recognizes just what his "little essay" displays: ". . . the arrogance I had to summon up in order to be able to insult God? This gave me a bigger bellyache than if I had the whole world against me." [Letters, p. 32]

There were many reactions to Jung’s Answer. Victor White, a Dominican priest and close collaborator/friend of Jung’s, wrote a scathing review of the book. His views were so counter to Jung’s that the difference eventually ended their relationship. "As one critic put it succinctly if inelegantly, the two scholars (Jung and White) were able to maintain a respectful and cordial tone to their disagreement until Jung ‘cornered God the Father, pinned him to the nearest couch and promptly set about psychoanalysing him.’ Jung found God ‘guilty of being unconscious, having projected his shadow upon humanity, and of perpetuating a considerable amount of injustice and evil.’ When Jung concluded that Christian theology deprived God of the possibility of having a shadow, White was bound by the tenets of his faith to declare him wrong." [Bair, Jung, A Biography, p. 546]

For anyone interested in God, or in the nature of God, or in one’s relations with God, Jung’s ‘little essay’ raises disturbing questions. How does one reconcile the sometimes warring, vengeful, dangerous God/Yahweh of the Old Testament with the loving, compassionate, merciful Son of God of the New Testament? How is it that God could forget the covenant he made with God’s People and turn against them with such wrath at times?

In our readings course we will be revisiting one of the early issues of Christianity, the Marcion heresy. Marcion lived in the second century CE and held beliefs that were counter to those prevailing in Christian circles at the time. He believed there was no way to reconcile the Gods of the Old and New Testaments; their differences were just too great. He also believed that Jesus had revealed certain ‘truths’ that were available only to a select few (Gnosticism). And he believed that Christ’s nature was divine without the human element that the early church insisted upon. All three of these beliefs were eventually declared heretical.

As we study Jung’s Answer, we will be revisiting these ancient heresies and examining them for ourselves. Did the early Church Fathers settle these issues once and for all? Why are they important today? What do they have to do with us? Why should we care? What is the true nature of this entity we call God, the nature of the Christ/Man? Can we know?
I think exploring these kinds of questions and considering possible answers for ourselves is important because such exploration can be of help in our uncovering, i.e., making conscious, and possibly reformulating a living myth for our own lives.

If our myth is of a kind, loving, compassionate Father God, how do we reconcile a world in which evil runs rampant? If we are made in the image and likeness of this God, from whence evil? What about this God who allowed six million of his chosen people to die in the Holocaust? Elie Weisel has said the holocaust should make us revisit everything we ever thought about God. And what of the recent Tsunami?

If, as Jung suggests, the role of the conscious human being is to stand with God against God, what does that mean for us? Of course, a kind, loving, compassionate, all-knowing, all-powerful God had no need for such a posture on our part.

One way of looking at our Judeo-Christian scriptures is to see them as the ‘story’ of an individual and collective and unfolding/development of consciousness. It begins with the evictions from the idyllic garden of Eden, that state of not-knowing and innocence of childhood. There is the Moses kind of consciousness that unifies the personality/culture with law and order, leads it out of bondage, through difficult and dangerous passages. What about the God that strikes Moses down for a simple act of disobedience after decades of faithful service? That Moses consciousness cannot enter the ‘promised land.’

We will be examining the Job-type consciousness that keeps insisting God remember his better nature and the covenant God has made. Job does indeed stand with God against God. But what kind of God is it that needs a human reflection to remember his nature? What is the level of consciousness of the human person who does not question, does not reflect, does not accept any mirroring that would crack his/her belief system? Such a one is in dire need of a ‘Job’ to expand the controlling myth of his/her life.

And there is the Jesus-type consciousness that stands all prior understanding of the nature of God on its head. Where Yahweh would flatten the enemy, destroy it totally, this new God-Man shows and lives out a totally different kind of victory. As Jack Miles’ explains, ". . . Christians who have bound themselves to Christ sacramentally in his death will find themselves bound to him as well in his glorious resurrection. Their victory and God’s will be over death itself rather than over any one death-dealing human enemy. God will have achieved this victory for them not by defeating his human enemies but by allowing himself to be defeated by them and then triumphing impersonally over the defeat itself rather than personally over he enemies who inflicted the defeat." [Miles, "The Disarmament of God," p. 3, http://www.jackmiles.com/default.asp?id=28 ]

Or, put more succinctly by Anthony de Mello in his little story, "The Coconut":

"A monkey on a tree hurled a coconut
at the head of a Sufi.
The man picked it up, drank the milk,
ate the flesh, and made a bowl from the shell.

Thank you for your criticism of me." [The Song of the Bird, p. 163]

If we view our actions, both personally and collectively, in the light of a scriptural mythology of developing consciousness, those actions tell us a great deal about the state of our consciousness. Do we focus on defeating our enemy and raining fire and shame on their heads or do we focus on defeating the defeat our enemy has visited upon us?

I started this introduction with background and will return to background here. Jung wrote Answer in 1951 when he was 76 years old. He spent three months of intense effort revising it. Deidre Bair in her recent biography writes about the last two decades of Jung’s life. (He died in 1961.)

"In the last two decades of Jung’s life, coinciding with the isolation and introspection imposed by the war, those who were close to him noticed changes in his attitude toward the world at large. In one of her succinct pronouncements, Jolande Jacobi described the major one: ‘He really wasn’t interested in anyone’s private life anymore. He was only interested in the ‘Big Dreams,’ in the collective archetypal world.’ Using his two infarcts as his excuse, he curtailed public appearances and refused to meet most new people. He . . . cut his analytic calendar drastically, seldom seeing more than four persons in any given day and then mostly for fifteen-minute conversations . . ."

His behavior created concerns for those around him. Jacobi put it this way: "‘When journalists came we were trembling and hoping that Muller the gardener gives the interviews because he is closer to reality. Jung lived now in another world.’

There were more visible extremes in his behavior as well. During the three months he took to revise the original text of Answer to Job, he closeted himself away for long hours each day, writing to the point of exhaustion. Jacobi described him as ‘moody in a rude and crude way, like a peasant . . . furious all the time.’ The usually fastidious Jung sometimes went several days without shaving or (as some of his intimates inferred) bathing, but Emma was always there to see that he wore clean clothing." [Jung, A Biography, p. 528]

SYLLABUS - JUNG READINGS COURSE
"Answer to Job"
Winter- Spring, 2005


Text: C.G. Jung, "Answer to Job," in Vol. 11, Psychology and Religion, of The Collected Works, pp. 357-470, Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J. ["Answer to Job" is also available as a single publication and in The Portable Jung, Edited by Joseph Campbell.]
Class 1 - February 3 Introduction to Course
Reading: "Prefatory Note," pp. 357-58
"Lectori Benevolo," pp. 359-63
Class 2 - February 17 Reading: "Answer to Job," pp. 365-66
"Parts I, II, III," pp. 367-97
Class 3 - 7 Reading: "Parts XI, XII, XIII," pp. 419-44
Class 6 March 3 Reading: "Parts, IV, V, VI, VII," pp. 397-409
Class 4 - March 24 Reading: "Parts VIII, IX, X," pp. 409-18
Class 5 - April - April 21 Reading: "Parts XIV, XV, XVI, XVII" pp. 444-59
Class 7 - May 5 Reading: "Parts XVIII, XIX, XX," pp. 459-70
Class 8 - May 19 Summary Discussion

For additional information about this course, please click on the link to the St. Louis Jung Society on this page, or you may phone Rose at (314) 740-6207 or e-mail her at roseholt@aol.com


Rose F. Holt
January 16, 2005

INTRODUCTION TO COURSE: EXPLORING JUNG’S MYSTERIUM CONIUNCTIONIS

St. Louis Jung Society, Fall 2004 September 23, 2004


WHY STUDY THIS DIFFICULT WORK?

First, you must accept some underlying assumptions—or at least entertain certain hypotheses.

1. The Unconscious is real. It exists. It influences and affects everyone's everyday life. It is a living phenomenon—the teeming, ever-creative source of life.

2. The ego does not create or give rise to the Unconscious. Rather, the Unconscious gives rise to and supports the ego.

3. Establishing a relationship with the Unconscious is worthwhile and beneficial to everyday life.

4. Just as in other relationships, the more we know, understand, and accept the other, the richer, deeper, and more satisfying the relationship.

5. The unconscious wants to be seen and understood.

6. Ego consciousness plays a vital role in the process of relationship. It seems that nothing changes or emerges from the Unconscious without an ego to serve as its agency. The ego serves—wittingly or not.

7. The Unconscious is capricious in nature.

In our work together we will make a sort of Pascal’s Wager. Remember his wager? "It makes more sense to believe in God than to not believe. If you believe, and God exists, you will be rewarded in the afterlife. If you do not believe, and He exists, you will be punished for your disbelief. If He does not exist, you have lost nothing either way. "

Substitute our word, “Unconscious”, for “God” in this paragraph, and you will better understand the approach we will take for our time together. I’m certainly not advocating anything of a religious nature with this approach. Rather, to me, the whole matter comes down to practicality and a simple question: What approach will benefit us the most?

With that behind us, let’s return to our question: Why study this difficult work? Edinger tells us that Jung’s Mysterium is like the Unconscious itself. It is oceanic. Just like work with our own psyche or unconscious, it is difficult to get a foothold, to understand, to sort out the myriad of images and storylines. Understanding and relating to our own psyche or Unconscious is a daunting task. However, for those of you who make the effort, you already know the effort is well worthwhile.

And just what does this effort consist of? Paying attention to dreams and dream images; observing synchronicities that occur in our life; watching for repeating patterns in our own behavior; being mindful of the unintentional effects we have on others and on events; mapping our own psyche for the complexes (which act like mine fields) that exist in our unconsciousness and that explode or erupt occasionally; being more or less aware of the triggers that set off our complexes; paying attention to our emotional state and its many variations and swings; entertaining fantasies that can provide information to our ego state; and above all, having an awareness that ego consciousness is embedded in something larger than itself that exerts pressures, that influences attitudes and behaviors, and that has real affects.

In this course, we are making an additional effort. By relating to Jung’s ideas and the images he explores, by developing a relationship with them, we are in effect establishing a better relationship with the Unconscious. The psyche, or the Unconscious, consists of images and patterns that picture vital activities which are full of meaning and purpose. These images and patterns are not random. They are uniform and recurring patterns or archetypes. Our western way of explaining physical phenomenon is largely by the mechanism of cause and effect. I am uptight and anxious because my early formation occurred during the great second World War is an example of cause and effect thinking. An equally valid way of ‘explaining’ physical phenomenon is to ask, “To what end or goal is this event, behavior, occurrence aimed?” A third way of explanation is to explore the possible patterns that make the event, behavior, occurrence necessary for the pattern to complete itself. It is this third way that Jung explores in his great work.

The value of knowing and recognizing these archetypal patterns is that when they manifest themselves in our personal experiences, we can see them. Why is that important? It is the case that healing in analysis occurs when the individual recognizes the connection between the personal and the archetypal. It is as if a connection gets made from one’s small personal existence and experience to some underlying source of all existence and experience, and the individual has an ‘ah-ha’ realization that is satisfying and helpful. And, it would seem to be case, the Unconscious also gets something of an ‘ah-ha’ when those moments occur.

Let’s take some examples. The word psyche is a Greek word that also means “butterfly” so that in the word itself is an understanding of the experience of transformation or metamorphosis. If the ego is an epiphenomenona of the psyche, that is to say, the ego is formed on the substratum of the psyche and takes on its patterning, then the ego, too, will be subject to psychic transformations. However, without an awareness of the underlying nature of the psyche and its pattern of regular, somewhat predictable transformations, the ego will simply be dragged through the transformations and will experience primarily the suffering. Or the ego may simply try to numb itself to all experience, in which case the baby has definitely been thrown out with the bath water. With memory, knowledge, imagination, patience, and perserverence, the ego can better weather the suffering and storms that are part and parcel of transformation. Simply remembering one’s own adolescence and knowing that it is a major transformation in everyone’s life can be of enormous help to any parent with teen-age offspring.

Knowing, too, that parenting itself is one of those universal, archetypal human experiences can help adults to understand and, if desired, modify their own personal ways of expressing this pattern in a very important and personal way. In other words, we don’t necessarily have to live out a particular pattern we discover in ourselves. But if we don’t know about the pattern, we will live it out unconsciously—often with effects that we would avoid if we knew how to avoid them. Imagine that you are a bulb plant about to give rise to a spring bloom. Whether you identify with the bulb or with the bloom can make a considerable difference in how you experience that period of painful splitting and pushing upward to the light. Better still if we can realize we are both bulb and bloom!


OUR APPROACH TO THIS TEXT

I have chosen Edinger’s lectures on Jung’s book, Mysterium Coniunctionis, (Volume 14 in Jung’s Collected Works) because Edinger is able to make Jung’s work more accessible. Even though we will be using Edinger as our portal, we will run into much that we do not understand, and we will be frustrated. It is as if we enter a mental state like the California goldminers of old. We will stand patiently in the stream, sifting through a lot of silt and ore, looking for that occasional flash that will make our effort worthwhile. Keep in mind that Jung and Edinger have already done a huge presort so that what we are presented with is mostly gold—although we won’t often recognize it. Edinger argues that the content of Jung’s Mysterium is the content of the collective unconscious, the objective psyche, transmitted through Jung’s highly-developed consciousness.

Jung’s great work is also his last. He spent his 70’s working on it and considered it the culmination and synthesis of all his earlier researches. As with all the important issues and directions in his life, Jung’s move into alchemy was presaged by a dream. This is his statement about the dream, one in a series he discusses at greater length in Memories, Dreams and Reflections:

"Before I discovered alchemy, I had a series of dreams which repeatedly dealt with the same theme. Beside my house stood another, that is to say, another wing or annex, which was strange to me. Each time I would wonder in my dream why I did not know this house, although it had apparently always been there. Finally came a dream in which I reached the other wing. I discovered there a wonderful library, dating largely from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Large, fat folio volumes, bound in pigskin, stood along the walls. Among them were a number of books embellished with copper engravings of a strange character, and illustrations containing curious symbols such as I had never seen before. At the time I did not know to what they referred; only much later did I recognize them as alchemical symbols. In the dream I was conscious only of the fascination exerted by them and by the entire library. It was a collection of medieval incunabula and sixteenth-century prints. The unknown wing of the house was a part of my personality, an aspect of myself; it represented something that belonged to me but of which I was not yet conscious. It, and especially the library, referred to alchemy, of which I was ignorant, but which I was soon to study. Some fifteen years later I had assembled a library very like the one in the dream." [MDR, p. 202]

In alchemical texts, Jung found processes described which paralleled the processes he observed in the dreams of his modern patients. The alchemist observed and practiced his art in his his/her laboratory, an art that consisted of “separation and analysis on the one hand and synthesis and consolidation on the other. For him there was first of all an initial state in which opposite tendencies or forces were in conflict; secondly there was the great question of a procedure which would be capable of bringing the hostile elements and qualities, once they were separated, back to unity again. " [Vol. 14, p. xiv] The beginning of the work was not self-evident, and the end-state even less self-evident. Generally, the alchemists found common elements or ideas in the end-state: “. . . the ideas of its permanence (prolongation of life, immortality, incorruptibility), its androgyny, its spirituality and corporeality, its human qualities and resemblance to man (homunculus), and its divinity.” [Vol. 14, p. xiv]

From his researches, Jung concluded that there is in the Unconscious, or the psyche, an ancient and ongoing process that tends toward an endgoal—wholeness or realization of the Self. He called this development “individuation,” the process in which opposing tendencies in the personality can be separated, analyzed, understood to some degree, and synthesized in such a way that a lasting connection and dialogue between ego and Self is established. The alchemists term for the process of separation and analysis was solve et coagula, dissolve and coagulate. Their term for the endstate was lapis Philosophorum, or the “Philosopher’s Stone,” which they equated with Christ. (In his work, Jung considers Christ as one symbol for the Self.)

Using Edinger’s lectures as an aid to understanding alchemical language, we will explore the images and processes of alchemy which, as Jung so carefully and methodically demonstrates, are parallel to those that take place in our own psyches if we but can recognize them. Recognition is critically important for the reason I cited earlier: It is the case that healing in analysis occurs when the individual recognizes the connection between the personal and the archetypal.

Edinger gave these lectures at the Jung Institute in Los Angeles in 1986-87. The lectures were audiotaped, and the book we are using is one compiled and edited by Joan Dexter Blackmer. This is the first paragraph of her “Foreword:”

“Mysterium Coniunctionis has been an object of fascination for me from the very start of my acquaintance with Jung’s work almost twenty-five years ago. For many years I read at it and struggled unsuccessfully to grasp its heavily veiled meaning. Its images and phrases kept coming back to me as apt symbols of my experience, but always clothed in the riddles that symbols present—riddles that defied solution.” [p. 14]

Add to that quote, this one from Edinger: “This book can’t be read the way one reads an ordinary book—it has to be worked on the way one works on a dream. Initially, almost every sentence will present you with something that is more or less unfamiliar, and that adds up to a whole series of defeats for the ego. But if you can disidentify from the ego sufficiently, then that may enable you to keep going.” [p. 18]

What to Expect

The student of this work will:

1. discover fresh insights into the development of his/her own consciousness,

2. develop an understanding of the structures of the ego and the Self, as well an understanding of the relationship between the ego and the Self,

3. probe the mechanisms of projection,

4. learn to appreciate the role of fantasy and active imagination in personality development.

Analytical Meaning of Sacrifice

If, as Jung tells us, we worship as divine the life energies that flow through us, (1991, 83) then the release or the harnessing of new energies will be experienced as an incarnational event. For the individual who has been gripped by his/her own inner, autonomous energies, the one whose ego has entered into a cooperative relationship with those energies, incarnation becomes a matter of life and death. The relationship is also a great paradox because the refusal of the energies is a refusal of life while the embrace of the new energy can be felt as the death of some vital part of one’s identity. In other words, incarnation requires sacrifice, and sacrifice entails suffering. Sacrifice (making sacred), Incarnation (giving flesh to) and consciousness (a knowing with) are closely related terms. All three imply the presence of an Other. In this way of understanding the psychological nature of the human person, ego consciousness is the repository for incarnating energies.

Early in his life Jung wrote, “the whole art of life shrinks to the one problem of how the libido may be freed in the most harmless way possible” (318). Later in discussing his “Joining with the Primitive to Kill Siegfried” dream, Jung describes the process by which he was able to free the libido he had invested in his heroic attitude (1965, 180-81). At the time of the dream, December of 1913, he felt great loss and sorrow as he realized that part of his own personality was dying. Some years after the dream, Jung notes that in sacrificing his heroic ideal (symbolized by the murder of Siegfried), he gave up his superior function, thereby allowing the released libido to work toward a new adaptation to life (1989, 48-49).

In his old age, Jung wrote, “My raison d’etre consists in coming to terms with that indefinable Being we call God” (Jaffe, 1979, 207). Jung was cautious about using the word “God,” but I don’t believe he ever strayed far from equating God or the God-image with life force or libido.

In the journey toward a wider consciousness, many levels of sacrifice are necessary. Ultimately a fairly conscious ego can learn to participate in the sacrifice of itself when it is able to give up closely held attitudes, let go of relationships that no longer fit the life situation, or, paradoxically enough, sacrifice life situations that no longer fit an essential relationship. The ego begins to understand that the Self as the organizing principle of the psyche is unfolding itself in a slow and often painful process in one’s life that tends to some end or goals obscure to ego understanding. The Self serves mystery and it serves the divine. “But everything divine is an end-in-itself, perhaps the only legitimate end-in-itself we know” (Jung, 1969, 250). The Self makes the ego its object. The ego in turn learns to offer up in service to the Self, i.e., to sacrifice to the Self, “the fruit of attention, patience, industry, devotion, and laborious toil” (253). The Self demands the maximum sacrifice from the ego, and the conscious ego seeks to make that sacrifice.

Sacrifice is more than a way of expressing our relationship with the divine; it is also an avenue by which the divine enters into the human realm and the human person partakes of the divine. “We must overcome death by finding God in it. And by the same token, we shall find the divine established in our innermost hearts, in the last stronghold which might have seemed able to escape his reach (Teilhard, 82).

Probably at a very deep level of our being we recognize the necessity of sacrifice. We know that every living thing feeds off other living things. We know that the sun must set for the sun to rise. We bring new human life into the world only through labor pain. Though we anxiously work to avoid suffering, to make ourselves secure, we cannot hide from the fact that we are by nature suffering animals. The foundational myth of our culture tells us that our separation from God, our fateful decision to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, set us up for toil and suffering and death. Knowledge, or consciousness, a knowing with, is bought only with suffering and sacrifice and death, both on real and symbolic levels.


Religious Significance of Sacrifice

Abraham’s willingness to kill his only son at the behest of God is a religious working of the theme of sacrifice. Abraham has kept faith with his God, had faithfully executed his commands, and had been rewarded richly in his old age with the birth of his son Isaac and the promise that God would maintain his covenant with Isaac and his descendants. Then an enormous sacrifice was demanded of Abraham—his beloved son and with him the promise of the future—and Abraham was compliant to this highly irrational demand (New American Bible, 1986, Genesis 22: 1-18).

The increase of consciousness, i.e., the deeper understanding of God brought about by the indwelling of the divine in Abraham, and the fuller participation of God in human nature, afforded by Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice, signaled a change in the relationship between God and humankind. Perhaps in the Abraham-Isaac enactment there was too little presence of God in human nature for Abraham to find God in Isaac’s death. Did Abraham, with of course God’s help, intuit this fact, and was that the reason the sacrifice was halted?

Another replay of our theme in the Judeo-Christian tradition has God sacrificing his only son. Here God more fully partakes of the event; he no longer watches from a distance removed. It is God’s son, in whom he is well pleased, who is sacrificed. The indwelling of the divine in the human plus the sacrifice the divine carried out on itself seems to have been sufficient to make God more conscious of the human condition and to make humankind more conscious of God. In this sacrifice the incarnation of the divine allowed a human being to share in immortality. Hence, the resurrection represents the incarnation itself, and the appearance of the risen Christ to ordinary people represents the possibility of its realization in human consciousness.


Sacrifice in Fairy Tale

In “the Girl Without Hands” (Grimm, 1977, 113-18) the miller has been forced to chop off his daughter’s hands after he made a deal with the devil that would bring his family worldly riches. The daughter suffers her loss passively. Eventually she is faced with a choice—stay with the father and accept his loving care (the same father who chopped off her hands!) or give up this questionable security and venture into the world on her own. She leaves the confines of the family and courageously strikes out on her own. This is the moment she begins a conscious sacrifice.

A fruitful way to explore this tale is to consider the daughter as the developing feminine ego and her relationship with the other characters and the situations in the story as the unfolding and growth of the ego within the encompassing psyche. When looked at in this way, sacrifice becomes a major theme.

We follow our heroine through a series of adventures in which she submits to the insecurities of the unknown. Eventually she is able to grow new hands. Like Odysseus and Telemachus, our male heroes discussed below, she reaches a new and higher level of relationship with transpersonal powers that is reflected in her everyday existence. She is empowered by forces she meets in her own psyche when she has the courage to engage them.

The tale could be the story of a modern woman caught up in patriarchal values. Her introjected parents (the miller who made the bad deal and the mother who realizes it but is powerless to change it) would have her stay infantile and in their care, crippled but safe. Our modern woman may be faced with the choice of staying safely in the confines of a traditional marriage, in the role of “mother” long after her children need her, or in a good job in a corporation. If she stays or if she goes, the cost is high. The price for staying is the sacrifice of manifesting herself in that world (her hands). The price for going is the sacrifice of her life as it is, perhaps uncomfortable but known, perhaps unfulfilling but safe. Either choice she makes involves sacrifice. If she can forego safety and win through to new hands, she may become a mature and nurturing woman to herself and to others, someone who power to effect change, to put a stop to deals with the devil.


Sacrifice in Myth

In the Odyssey Odysseus and Telemachus, father and son, undergo a number of sacrificial experiences, Odysseus on his journey home and Telemachus in the search for his father. In some ways their experiences are similar and parallel. Odysseus in trial after trial is stripped of everything—his family, his ships, his crew, until finally, having given up his heroic identity, he reaches home, his beloved Ithaca. The reader understands that the hands of the gods are at work in every experience the father and son have. Odysseus and Telemachus, however, simply experience suffering, hardship, sacrifice, as well as ease without conscious understanding that they are at the mercy of and in service to warring divinities.

There comes a moment though when Odysseus stands his ground with Circe, a goddess who lives on the island of Aeaea. He relates cooperatively with her so that, with her help, he begins to learn to actively participate in sacrifice. Circe cautions Odysseus and counsels him about the dangers of the Sirens. He listens carefully, abandons any heroic attempt to deal with them, and strategizes with his crew about avoiding them. He uses beeswax to seal the ears of his comrades, and he commands them to lash him fast to the mast so that they can sail beyond the spellbinding song of the Sirens. No heroic engagement here; a wise avoidance with the help of a deity.

What does Odysseus sacrifice in this courageous act? The Sirens promise to make him and his comrades wise, to tell them about “the pains that Achaeans and Trojans once endured on the spreading plain of Troy when the gods willed it so—all that comes to pass on the fertile earth, we know it all!” (Homer, 1996, 277). Circe has told Odysseus the dangers of listening, of the danger of their being drawn into the realm of the Sirens. There will be no sailing home, no greeting from wife and children. Instead Odysseus and his comrades will be drawn into a kind of death for the Sirens have “round them heaps of corpses, rotting away, rags of skin shriveling on their bones . . .” (273) Odysseus has to forego the temptation of succumbing to intellectual understanding devoid of life.


Sacrifice in Clinical Material

Diane, a woman in her middle forties who had spent her career working up the corporate ladder, came into analysis suffering from meaninglessness and depression. She had divorced some years earlier and more recently had quit her job when the corporation where she worked offered a generous separation package to a number of middle managers. Although she had agonized over leaving the job, she felt the need for time off, having worked except for brief vacations since she was a teen. She quickly established a new lifestyle, considerable reduced from before, and entered analysis.

The decision to quit work had certainly felt like a huge sacrifice, but Diane was buffered from it by the notion that she would eventually return to the corporate world. Like the Handless Maiden, she had had to give up a lot of herself to fit into her former life situation. Slowly she began to explore areas of her personhood that she had truncated in the interests of rather one-sided relationships, economic independence, career advancement, and success in a male-dominated environment.

About one year into her analysis she had the following dream: I am in a church. On the altar Mark is nailed to a huge cross. The service is about his sacrifice. It is horrible, and I am amazed to see that he is looking about with great interest at what is going on in spite of his suffering.

Diane felt the pain of this dream so strongly that after she told it, she sat weeping through the remainder of the session. When I tried probing into her feelings, she screamed at me to be silent. She was unable to engage other than to stay in the room.

From our previous work I knew Mark was a man Diane greatly admired and respected, someone upon whom she projected heroic qualities of intellect, power, and ability. This part of Diane, perhaps her identity with her first function, thinking, was being sacrificed. She could only witness passively in the dream. She certainly suffered great pain in her waking reality as she began to realize she could not return to her former way of life, but she had little consciousness of what was happening to her.

Some two years later, Diane entered into a relationship that held great promise. Over time, however, she realized that she was back in a situation that cost her too much of her essential self. Painfully and slowly she reached the decision to withdraw from the relationship. This sacrifice was made on a conscious level, although she entered into the process with considerable hesitation. After some months of intense loneliness and pain, she had this dream: I am on a journey with an unknown man. We arrive at a junction that requires much effort to cross. On the other side there are many trees that have been turned into timber. The man says to me, “Now we must go to church.” I am surprised and ask, “Why?” He says, “Because we share the Paschal Mystery.”

The dream seemed to contain precisely the confirmation Diane needed about her decision, and it gave her great comfort. She associated the Paschal Mystery with the death and resurrection mysteries of the Catholic faith, the willing sacrifice of the son and his later transformation. The dream caused her to revisit her earlier crucifixion dream and to glean considerable understanding about it and what it had effected in her life at the time.

I noted to myself the motif of the trees-to-timber, something Edinger writes about, “The general symbolism of falling trees in dreams indicates that some major quantity of libido is in the process of transit from one level of awareness to another. . . . Whenever you encounter a dream like that, be on the lookout for what is going on in the life of the patient. Very often it is the conclusion of some type of unconscious relationship” (1994, 76-77). Jung also tells us that a sacrifice often occurs at an important point of crossing (1991, 347) which is a motif in this dream.

Eventually Diane entered into a new relationship, one that can encompass the whole of her personality and one in which she and her husband meet on equal ground. Her attitude today allows her to enter consciously and meaningfully into sacrifice—although not without pain—and to see sacrifice as a necessary cooperative enterprise. Often she feels her life as a slow, sometimes painful, sometimes joyful, working out of issues with which she cooperates but which is tending towards aims of which she is but dimly aware. Not a religious person in the traditional sense of the word, she has said she occasionally feels a “sort of joyful hope like a really spiritual person might feel” in her day-to-day lived experience. She has a job that she enjoys. Although it lacks the “glitz and the fast pace” of her former work, it allows her to earn a living and to employ her skills in a fuller expression of who she is.



References
Edinger, Edward F. (1994). A Seminar on C.G. Jung’s Symbols of Transformation. Los
Angeles, CA: The C.G. Jung Bookstore.

Grimm Brothers. (1977). Grimms’ Tales for Young and Old (Ralph Manheim, trans.).
New York: Anchor Press.

Homer. (1996). The Odyssey. (Robert Fagles, trans.). New York: Viking.

Jaffe, Aniela. (1979). C.G. Jung: Word and Image. Princeton, N.J: Princeton
University Press.

Jung, C.G. (1961). Memories, Dreams, Reflections. New York: Vintage Books.

Jung, C.G. (1969). Psychology and Religion: West and East. Collected Works. (Vol.
11). Bollingen Series XX. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.

Jung, C.G. (1989). Analytical Psychology: Notes on the Seminar Given in 1925.
Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.

Jung, C.G. (1991). Psychology of the Unconscious (Beatrice Hinkle, trans.). Princeton,
N.J: Princeton University Press.

New American Bible. (1968). New York: Catholic Book Publishing Co.

Teilhard de Chardin. (19

There is a new biography of C.G. Jung just recently published. It is JUNG, A BIOGRAPHY by Deirdre Bair, published by Little, Brown in November, 2003. I recommend the book highly. It is available from the Chicago Jung Institute Bookstore with a nice discount for members. Click the link to the left of this page for the Chicago Institute web site.

Following is the syllabus for the next "Readings in Jung's Psychology" Course. For information about registration, click onto the link to the St. Louis Jung Society on the left side of this page.



SYLLABUS
READINGS IN JUNG'S PSYCHOLOGY
Winter 2004

Presenter: Rose F. Holt


Class Meeting Time and Dates: Eight Thursdays, 7:30 pm to 9:30 pm. January 8, 22; February 5, 19; March 4, 25; April 15, 29. 2004.

Location: St. Louis Office of Rose F. Holt

Text: Analytical Psychology: Notes of the Seminar Given in 1925, C.G. Jung. Edited by William McGuire, Princeton University Press, 1989.


Schedule of Readings

Week 1: "Introduction," pp. vii-xvi. "Lecture 1, 23 March 1925," pp. 3-8.

Week 2: Lectures 2, 3, 4, pp. 9-34.

Week 3: Lectures 5, 6, 7, pp. 35-57.

Week 4: Lectures 8, 9, 10, pp. 58-71.

Week 5: Lectures 11, 12, 13, pp. 82-100.

Week 6: Lectures 13, 14, 15, pp. 101-133.

Week 7: pp. 134-160.

Week 8: Discussion and Summary


Rose F. Holt 12/23/03
phone: (314) 726-2032

A Review of Rapture Encaged

by Rose F. Holt

Rapture Encaged: The Suppression of the Feminine in Western Culture by Ruth Anthony El Saffar, Routledge, 1994.

I read Rapture Encaged, The Suppression of the Feminine in Western Culture when it was first published in the spring of 1994. Impressed with the author's ability to articulate questions that had lived wordlessly in me for some time, I reread the book at that time more carefully. My third reading, done for this review, reinforced my initial opinion that this is an important work, a work that synthesizes psychological theories about women, modern feminist theory, and historical perspective on the place of women in Western culture. Rapture Encaged is one of those rare and wonderful finds--a "living" text that engages the reader in such a way that both text and reader are changed and in-formed in the engagement.

In this slender volume, Ruth Anthony El Saffar explores key questions about women's psychology: (1) Is there "an authentic female vision that patriarchal cultures, from the Greeks to the present day, have systematically sought to deny and expunge?" (2) "Can we say that there is a feminine essence that is not the result of cultural conditions, or conversely, can we say that cultural conditioning is not an expression of essential human nature?" (3) Are there "available models for living out a full feminine identity" in patriarchal culture? In everyday parlance men might echo Freud's oft-asked question, "What do women want?" Or women, "Why can't I have the kind of relationship I have with my women friends with my husband, lover, co-worker, etc.?" And all of us must ask why, in a country overflowing with bounty, we cannot access the nurturing capacities of mother and father for care of children who live in poverty. Clearly we have much to gain from a deeper understanding of the role of cultural conditioning in defining who we are, how we live, and how we relate.

El Saffar asks and explores her questions in a scholarly, intellectual fashion. Her use of the autobiography of an illiterate seventeen-century Spanish nun, Isabel de la Cruz (coupled with the historical context she provides) as a highly-polished mirror to reflect twentieth-century life, is nothing short of brilliant. She gives us an Archimedean Point sufficiently grounded in historical perspective and distant enough that we can use it for an exploration of "the feminine" and "the masculine" today. Most clearly she explains how power imbalances continue to cripple men and women as we seek to live in life frames defined too narrowly by our patriarchal culture.

The author shows us the inadequacies of psychological theories that stress autonomy and independence when she states: "It is not enough for women simply to be in 'right relations' with the masculine. For the masculine, as it has been layered into the psyche over generations of patriarchal power, has a deadening effect on the expression of feminine power that allows neither men nor women to cultivate soul, or connection with the female aspects of the godhead."

She also shows us the ways in which women, if they adopt men's theories about human development, find themselves in a double bind. "The woman who functions in culture is inevitably one separated from the mother, and therefore split off from her source of power. What power she does acquire comes from her role as relational to a man, on whom she depends for her name, her success, her money, her well-being?"

Indeed, a woman's experiential reality may be quite different from that of a a man, but as long as she submits to a man's frame of reference for her experience, she will never trust her own process. Her understanding of self, her very being, then depends upon reflection from a man. His is "solar" consciousness; hers "lunar" consciousness. His life is defined by activity; hers by passivity. Anyone who has reflected sufficiently upon his/her own reality, recognizes how narrow and limiting, how patently untrue, such notions are. Yet they persist. My conjecture is that a lot of women's perceived passivity is simply a defensive maneuver to avoid pejorative and inadequate labels.

If language is the house of being, the language of a man's experience, if essentially different from a woman's, can never touch her where she lives, let alone help her come home to herself. To be labeled "animus-possessed" or "fused with the mother" for disagreeing with a frame that doesn't fit is a further negation of her selfhood. These terms may express something of a man's experience of woman, but what do they tell a woman about herself?

How different, for example, are the experiences of Isabel and Jung. ". . . unlike the Jung of the confrontation with the unconscious, Isabel did not experience God's power as terrifying, because her encounter with the unconscious was not precipitated by the sudden irruption of loss into an otherwise extraordinarily successful life . . . Rather she sought in the unconscious a place of refuge from her unremitting experience of failure in the world."

One way I have found for engaging this book (the way that convinced me it is a living text) is to select one of the author's finely-tuned sentences and reflect on it. For example, "It took me many years to realize that Jung's 'feminine' was yet another captivated and diminished expression of women, one that is nothing more than a reflection of the male psyche."

I don't believe it is helpful to women's cause to blame Jung for what he was unable to do precisely because of his male psyche. Rather it is time that we women expxress for ourselves out of the female psyche the essence of the feminine. Further, we must do so with the intellectual rigor that El Saffar demonstrates. A Jungian analyst herself, she obviously values Jung's work highly but is unabashedly frank in challenging his ideas when she finds him wide of the mark, misogynistic, or simply out-dated.

What better definition of a Jungian analysis can we find than the words this author uses to describe the process of Isabel's telling her life story: ". . . Isabel, who through the dictating of her autobiography had an opportunity to experience herself mirrored, for the first time ever, in the outer world. Through the process of co-creating her autobiography, Isabel was able to see herself take shape as a whole being, with a history, a purpose, and value."

El Saffar's book is brilliantly written, quietly but firmly persuasive, and enormously engaging. However, it ends abruptly. She does not adequately answer the questions she raises. The reader is left with a feeling of incompleteness. The book needs a final concluding chapter. I feel frustration at what is left unsaid, unasked, unanswered. I found myself asking questions like: And so, where to from here? What is the current state of theorizing about women's psychology? Who is doing it? Why, as women, do we shrink from the task? Do we women use the power imbalance, real and crippling as it is, partially as an excuse for not accepting full responsibility for the development of our own uniquely feminine psychology? Why can't we more fully reflect goddess energy and values in our culture?

The book is cut too short. Tragically, so was the life of the author. Ruth Anthony El Saffar died of cancer at age 52 on March 28, 1994, one week before Rapture Encaged was released.


[This review was first published in The Round Table Review, September/October 1998, V. 6, No. 1.]

C.G. JUNG READINGS CLASS – FALL 2003
Rose F. Holt, Presenter


To enroll in this class, contact the St. Louis Jung Society by e-mail @ www.cgjungstl@aol.com, by phone at (314) 533-6809, or through the St. Louis Society website link on the left of this page. Enrollment will be limited to ten.

Class Meeting Time and Dates: Seven Thursdays, 7:30 pm to 9:30 pm. September 11, 25; October 9, 23; November 6, 20; December 4

Location: St. Louis Office of Rose F. Holt

Text: Two Essays on Analytical Psychology by C.G. Jung, Second Edition, Princeton University Press, 1966. [Vol. 7 of Jung’s Collected Works]



Course Syllabus

We will divide this important work of Jung’s into four parts: I. Introduction (Week 1); II. Psychoanalysis (Weeks 2-4); III. The Relations Between the Ego and the Unconscious (Weeks 5-6); IV. Summary (Week 7)

Schedule of Readings

Week 1: “Prefaces,” pp. 3-8. “Appendix II, The Structure of the Unconscious,” pp. 269-304.

Week 2: “Psychoanalysis,” pp. 9-18. “The Eros Theory,” pp. 19-29. “The Other Point of View,” pp. 30-40. “The Problem of the Attitude-Type,” pp. 41-63.

Week 3: “The Personal and the Collective (or Transpersonal) Unconscious,” pp. 64-79. “The Synthetic or Constructive Method,” pp. 80-89. “The Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious,” pp. 90-113.

Week 4: “General Remarks on the Therapeutic Approach to the Unconscious,” pp. 114-118. “Conclusion,” p. 119.

Week 5: “Preface,” pp. 123-125. “The Effects of the Unconscious Upon Consciousness,” pp. 127-171.

Week 6: “Individuation,” pp. 173-241.

Week 7: Review and Summary Discussion

A Review of The New God-Image by Rose F. Holt

The New God-Image: A Study of Jung’s Key Letters Concerning the Evolution of the Western God-Image by Edward F. Edinger. Chiron Publications, 1996.

Jung once remarked that his life’s work has been to encircle the “central fire” with a series of mirrors but that necessarily there were gaps where the mirrors met. In The New God-Image, Edward F. Edinger provides a great deal of fill-in for one of Jung’s gaps. The book is from audio tapes of a series of lectures Edinger gave in the Fall of 1991 as part of the Analysts’ Training Program at the C.G. Jung Institute of Los Angeles. In the lecture series Edinger drew on letters Jung wrote about the on-going transformation of the god-image and in so doing wove together a coherent understanding of Jung’s thinking about this vital topic.


The opening sentence of the book is startling: “The history of Western man can be viewed as a history of its God-images, the primary formulations of how mankind orients itself to the basic questions of life, its mysteries.” My reaction as I read those words was, “Well, yes, of course!” I remembered a similarly startling statement from an old theology professor: “We all have a theology, whether we know what it is or not.” Edinger helps make conscious some of the theological underpinnings of Jung’s depth psychology. Those underpinnings inform a good deal of the theology of modern peoples—whether we understand them or not.


In the Introduction, Edinger gives us a survey of the six major stages in the evolution of the Western God-image, stages through which each individual passes in the development of consciousness. The sixth of these stages, Edinger tells us, is individuation, the discovery of the psyche. Jung discussed religious imagery as the phenomenology of the objective psyche in two of his late works, Answer to Job and Aion. Edinger, however, believes Jung’s clearest statements about the God-image and its transformation are to be found in letters he wrote during his last ten years, from 1951 to 1961. As material for the lectures, Edinger selects fourteen of the letters, dividing them into three major subject areas: (1) Jung’s epistemological premises, (2) the paradoxical God, and (3) continuing incarnation.


Edinger tells us that there are three steps involved in understanding Jung’s material concerning the new God-image. One must be able to perceive the new God-image and that requires mastering certain epistemological premises. One must actually perceive for one’s self this living reality and the impact it has on one’s own psychology as well on the psychology of the collective. Jung (and analytical psychology) can teach the how, but it is not something taken as an article of faith. It is something one must do for one’s self, a kind of God-has-no-grandchildren concept. And the third step requires a developing awareness of one’s own role in the transformation of the God-image, one’s part in the process of continuing incarnation.


Part I, the first four chapters of The New God-Image, is devoted to the necessary epistemological premises. In these chapters Edinger presents a rather fine crash-course on Kantian philosophy. Jung was very much influenced by his early studies of Kant and never wavered about the import of Kant’s contribution to the theory of knowledge. Jung wrote in 1957: “. . . here that threshold which separates two epochs plays the principal role. I mean by that threshold the theory of knowledge whose starting-poing is Kant. On that threshold minds go their separate ways: those that have understood Kant, and the others that cannot follow him”


Edinger ends Part I by talking about the redemptive power of Jung’s work and the impact it had on his own personal redemption. Edinger explains the Marcion Heresy, an early Church split in which Marcion argued for a complete departure from the Old Testament Yahweh in favor of a new all-loving God. Had Marcion won the day, there would have been no continuity with the past. It is a split suffered frequently by moderns—the idea that one need not be concerned with history, that one can supersede and disregard all the old gods. There is a warning in the I Ching about such an attitude—it is dangerous to cling to the tops of the trees without regard for the roots. A consciousness split off from the levels or stages of evolutionary collective development is in a vicarious and unredeemed state. Jung’s work, according to Edinger, has a great value not only for redemption of the individual but also for redemption of collective human endeavors—alchemy, mythology, philosophy, and more primitive aspects of existence—by demonstrating how each is a manifestation of the eternal, ever-living psyche.


In Part II Edinger explores the topic of the paradoxical God, the God who needs humankind, who incarnates in the human to bring Himself to consciousness. This view of incarnation assigns enormous dignity to the meaning of human suffering as well as huge responsibility for how one handles suffering. The psyche has as one of its functions, the assignment of meaning, and meaning lends significance. Edinger quotes Jung in this regard: “Buddha’s insight and the Incarnation in Christ break the chain (i.e., the Nidhana-chain of suffering) through the intervention of the enlightened human consciousness, which thereby acquires a metaphysical and cosmic significance.”


Lastly, Edinger covers Jung’s ideas of the continuing incarnation. Key questions arise if we accept Jung’s notion that the ego, as exponent for the Self, has a role in incarnation, that psychological maturity means “the responsible living and fulfilling of the divine will in us.” Such questions include: “What is that? How can we do that? How can we even know the divine will? . . . It is the problem of distinguishing between the ego and the Self.” Edinger gives us some fine examples from Jung’s letters, from Melville’s novel White Jacket, and from clinical case histories to illustrate how the paradoxical Self manifests itself in human experience and the care a conscious ego must exercise in relating to it.


In a particularly poignant passage Edinger explains that, “In Jung’s view one is not entitled to pray for anything at all, except one thing: remind the Self to go easy on the ego, that it is expecting too much. One must remind the Self how things are up here in the material world, and thus not break the fragile bonds of the ego by demanding too much. Take it easy, let up a bit.”


One can approach this book in several ways. As an aid for understanding Jung’s formulations about the Self, it is superb. For a quick survey of historical ideas about religion and philosophy, it is a solid primer. It is fine explanation of the thinking of Jung in his later years. Edinger was a man who studied and worked in the area of analytical psychology for more than forty-five years. In the Preface to his book, The Aion Lectures, he offers some advice on reading Jung: “. . . you should realize that Jung’s consciousness vastly surpasses your own . . . If you make the assumption that you know better than he does and start out with a critical attitude—don’t bother, the book (Aion) isn’t for you . . . To read Jung successfully we must begin by accepting our own littleness; then we become teachable” (p. 11). Not bad advice for approaching The New God-Image.


This review was first published in The Round Table Review, January/February 1999, V. 6, No. 3.]

Readings Class
May 22, 2003

Our class met for its eighth and final session on Thursday, May 22. We devoted the two hours to a review and summation of the material we read and discussed. Our general conclusions were:

1. Reading Jung is difficult, rewarding, and satisfying; and we could reread everything from the eight weeks with interest and enthusiasm.

2. We have entertained and discussed difficult and interesting concepts that create many more questions than answers. [One member of the group pointed out that seriously reflecting on questions is a good deal more productive and leads to deeper insight than does focussing on knowledge and theory alone. We certainly did that!]

3. Although we developed general understanding of concepts like individuation. complex, archetype, collective unconscious, persona, shadow, anima/animus, self, our understanding has brought us to the need for further reading and study to help flesh out and bring the ideas even more to life.

Having one member bring and share her notes from the previous meeting has been most helpful and appreciated.

In the Fall, I will offer another "Jung Readings Course" under the auspices of the St. Louis Jung Society. For information, see the St. Louis Jung Society Website by clicking on the link on the left of this page.

A key concept of Jungian Psychology is that of the "Self." Jung writes: "The self, in its efforts at self-realization, reaches out beyond the ego-personality on all sides; because of its all-emcompassing nature it is brighter and darker than the ego, and accordingly confronts it with problems which it would like to avoid. Either one's moral courage fails, or one's insight, or both, until in the end fate decides. The ego never lacks moral and rational counter-arguments, which one cannot and should not set aside so long as it is possible to hold on to them. For you only feel yourself on the right road when the conflicts of duty seem to have resolved themselves, and you have become the victim of a decision made over your head or in defiance of the heart. From this we can see the numinous power of the self, which can hardly be experienced in any other way. For this reason the experience of the self is always a defeat for the ego." [C.W., Vol. 14, Para. 778]

In our "Jung Readings" class this week, we talked about the reasons it is so difficult for the ego to fully apprehend and consider the demands of the Self, let alone respond to them. A full apprehension and consideration would require decisions and responsibilities that the individual is rarely fully prepared for. I found this quote which, I think, helps us understand why our ego development often lags behind the demands of the Self. Jung seems to imply that it is often, if not always the case, that the ego simply cannot keep up, that necessarily the ego must suffer defeat in order to have an experience of the Self. Another way of saying the same thing is that it is impossible to will oneself not to will, which is a precondition to experiencing a greater will.

Jung stresses the need for an ethical, moral responsibility toward the demands of the Self and the images of the unconscious that appear to us in Memories, Dreams, Reflections:

"It is equally a grave mistake to think that it is enough to gain some understanding the the images and that knowledge can here make a halt. Insight into them must be converted into an ethical obligation. Not to do so is to fall prey to the power principle, and this produces dangerous effects which are destructive not only to others but even to the knower. The images of the unconscious place a great responsibility upon a man (sic). Failure to understand them, or a shirking of ethical responsibility, deprives him of his wholeness and imposes a painful fragmentariness on his life." [P. 192-3]

Jung writes of two kinds of thinking. The first kind is linear, learned, goal-oriented, directed and the kind of thinking we strive for in our consciousness. The second kind of thinking is circular; often disorienting and confusing to consciousness, not directed by consciousness; more given over to play and fantasy, and is the very basis of creativity. This second kind of thinking relies on symbol and image a good deal while the first kind finds itself more at home with words and thought.

Symbolic thinking, however, can be acquired and can greatly enrich our normal, more linear, word-based consciousness. Following are some helpful ideas about symbols from C.G. Jung and Paul Tillich:


Jung, in Man and His Symbols, pp. 20-27, writes:

A symbol “implies something vague, unknown or hidden from us.” . . . “Thus a word or an image is symbolic when it implies something more than its obvious and immediate meaning. It has a wider ‘unconscious’ aspect that is never precisely defined or fully explained. Nor can one hope to define or explain it. As the mind explores the symbol, it is led to ideas that lie beyond the grasp of reason.”

“Because there are innumerable things beyond the range of human understanding, we constantly use symbolic terms to represent concepts that we cannot define or fully comprehend.”

“Thus every experience contains an indefinite number of unknown factors, not to speak of the fact that every concrete object is always unknown in certain respects, because we cannot know the ultimate nature of matter itself.”

“As a general rule, the unconscious aspect of any event is revealed to us in dreams, where it appears not as a rational thought but as a symbolic image.”


Tillich, in Dynamics of Faith, pp. 41-43, writes:

“Symbols . . . point beyond themselves to something else.” Symbols “participate in the reality of that to which they point.” Symbols cannot “be replaced for reasons of expediency or convention . . .”

A symbol “opens up levels of reality which are otherwise closed to us.” And a symbol “also unlocks dimensions and elements of our soul which correspond to the dimensions and elements of reality.”

“Symbols cannot be produced intentionally . . .” Symbols “cannot function without being accepted by the unconscious dimensions of our being.” Symbols grow and they die.

Notes for February 20 Class - "Readings in Jung's Analytical Psychology"

In considering the relationship between the conscious mind and the unconscious, we might well begin with this quote from Jung:

"The conscious mind moreover is characterized by a certain narrowness. It can hold only a few simultaneous contents at a given moment. All the rest is unconscious at the time, and we only get a sort of continuation or a general understanding or awareness of a conscious world through the succession of conscious moments. We can never hold an image of totality because our consciousness is too narrow; we can only see flashes of existence. It is always as if we were observing through a slit so that we only see a particular moment; all the rest is dark and we are not aware of it at that moment. The area of the unconscious is enormous and always continuous, while the area of consciousness is a restricted field of momentary visions." [Jung's Collected Works, Vol. 18, Para. 13]

If we accept Jung's view, our level of certainty of knowledge is immediately diminished. Whatever we think we know is always and necessarily only a partial knowledge. What we can see is limited and, as we shall see, highly conditioned by the living context that we are. Our responsibility then is to work to increase our consciousness to the degree possible through education, dialogue, self-reflection, and a careful consideration of the ways in which we make decisions, hold values, influence others; indeed, by the ways we live our lives.

Some key ideas from our reading of de Laszlo's Text:

Jung, especially in his later works, focused on the symbolic expressions of the human spiritual experience. He observed, described and collated spiritual experiences in (a) imaginative activities of the individual and in (b) the formation of mythologies and religious symbolism in various cultures.

Archetypal symbols, that is to say, archaic imprints emerge from the deeper recesses of the psyche and are carriers of the process of individuation. Individuation is the inner experience of psychic growth of the human person and is frequently reflected in a series of symbolic images seen in dreams. Jung has given us a fairly complete exposition of such a dream series in his book, Psychology and Alchemy. Generally speaking the process of psychic growth we call individuation is characterized by an individual's movement from a state of conflict to a state in which he/she experiences greater freedom and unity of personality. Conflicts and problems are not left behind or resolved and solved. Rather, the individual learns to grapple more creatively and to engage fully in the issues and both his/her personal and collective lives.

Symbols are extremely important in the unfolding of the psychic process because through symbols the individual accesses new energy and new life. Symbols arise spontaneously and cannot be conjured up or manufactured. Archetypal symbols emerge from from the collective unconscious, the source of energy and insight in the depths of the human psyche which has been operatingfor aslong as records are available. The activity of the collective unconscious in the human psyche always has and still does aid, encourage, enable, even force spiritual development in the individual. (By spiritual, Jung does not mean the religious devotion to a dogma or creed. Rather, he is pointing to a certain vitality and self-reliance that develops in the person when he/she discovers the source of treasure that lies within the psyce. For a keener understanding of the differentiation Jung makes between religion and a personal religious attitude, see pp. 506-20. As long as the individual seeks answers or meaning or absolute authority outside him/herself, those goals remain elusive. Individuation is the seeking and the partial discovery of the treasure within, partial because individuation is lifelong process that has no clear conclusion or completion other than death.)

"Archetypes, so far as we can observe and experience them at all, manifest themselves only through their ability to organize images and ideas, and this is always an unconscious process which cannot be detected until afterwards." [de Laszlo, p.103] When archetypal images appear to the individual, they have a numinous character. Almost everyone has had such experiences, but they are extremely difficult to talk about or to communicate to another. The experience of an archetypal image brings with it an unshakable, even if uncommunicable certainty because it is the image itself that conveys meaning.

Like instincts, archetypes influence consciousness by regulating, modifying and motivating conscious contents. Consciousness develops and resides somewhere between the instinctual world of nature and the archetypal world of the spirit.

Jung has demonstrated that the individuation process follows a general unfolding that is characteristic and somewhat universal. There is a chaotic assortment of imagesthat slowly changes into well-defined elements and themes: (1) chaotic multiplicity and order (2) duality (3) opposition of light and dark, upper and lower, right and left (4) union of the opposites in a third thing (5) quaternity (square, cross), rotation (circle, sphere) and (6) finally the centering process and a radial arrangement that usually follows some quaternary system. The centering process is the climax of the process and is therapeutic. Examples of dreams that illustrate this final process can be found in the "great clock" dream of Wolfgang Pauli's (Jung's Collected Works, Vol. 12) and in a dream of Jung's, his "Liverpool" dream which he recounts in Memories, Dreams, Reflections.

C.G. JUNG SOCIETY OF SAINT LOUIS Program:
Readings in Jung’s Analytical Psychology
Presented by Rose Holt

This group will read and discuss the following selections from C. G. Jung’s works: “On the Nature of the Psyche,” “Relations between the Ego and the Unconscious,” “Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious,” and “On the Nature of Dreams.” These readings provide a conceptual foundation that is fruitful for someone working to understand Jung more deeply as well as for someone seeking a solid introduction to Jung’s thinking.

TEXT: The Basic Writings of C. G. Jung, Ed. Violet S. de Laszlo. Princeton/Bollengen, 1990.

CEU’s are available for this course through the C. G. Jung Institute of Chicago by individual arrangement with the analyst for an additional fee of $10.00.

Rose Holt, a Jungian analyst who divides her private practice between St. Louis and Chicago, is a diplomate of the C. G. Jung Institute of Chicago.

Details:
8 Thursdays (1/30; 2/20; 3/6,20; 4/3,24; 5/8,22 in 2003)
Home in Central West End, St. Louis, Missouri

READINGS IN JUNG’S ANALYTICAL PSYCHOLOGY
Course Syllabus [for those enrolled in the course]

Dates: Thursdays - January 30; February 20; March 6, 20; April 3, 24; May 8, 22 in 2003.

Time: 7:30 – 9:30 P.M.

Text: The Basic Writings of C. G. Jung, Ed. Violet S. de Laszlo, Princeton University Press, 1990


Schedule of Readings and Discussion

January 30: Introductions, Syllabus, “On Reading Jung,” “Jung’s Two Kinds of Thinking,” Definitions

January 30: Writings pp. 39 – 71:
“The Significance of the Unconscious in Psychology”
“The Dissociability of the Psyche”
“Instinct and Will”
“Conscious and Unconscious”
"The Unconscious as a Multiple Consciousness”

February 20: Writings pp. 72 – 106
“Patterns of Behaviour and Archetypes”
“General Considerations and Prospects”
“Supplement”

March 6�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������

Jung, writing on the mechanism of projection:

"As events in wartime have clearly shown, our mentality is distinguished by the shameless naivete' with which we judge our enemy, and in the judgment we pronounce upon him we unwittingly reveal our own defects; we simply accuse our enemy of our own unadmitted faults. We see everything in the other, we criticize and condemn the other, we even want to improve and educate the other. There is no need for me to adduce case material to prove this proposition; the most convincing proof can be found in every newspaper. . . . . But as everyone knows, our self-awareness is still a long way behind our actual knowledge. When we allow ourselves to be irritated out of our wits by something, let us not assume that the cause of our irritation lies simply and solely outside us, in the irritating thing or person. In that way we endow them with the power to put us into the state of irritation, and possibly even one of insomnia or indigestion. We then turn round and unhestatingly condemn the object of offence, while all the time we are raging against an unconscious part of ourselves which is projected into the exasperating object." [C.G. Jung, THE STRUCTURE AND DYNAMICS OF THE PSYCHIC, Vol. 8, Para 516]

C.G. JUNG SOCIETY OF SAINT LOUIS Program:

Readings in Jung’s Analytical Psychology
Presented by Rose Holt

This group will read and discuss the following selections from C. G. Jung’s works: “On the Nature of the Psyche,” “Relations between the Ego and the Unconscious,” “Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious,” and “On the Nature of Dreams.” These readings provide a conceptual foundation that is fruitful for someone working to understand Jung more deeply as well as for someone seeking a solid introduction to Jung’s thinking.

TEXT: The Basic Writings of C. G. Jung, Ed. Violet S. de Laszlo. Available locally or from the Chicago Jung Institute, (847) 476-4848 or (800) 697-7679, for $19.95.

CEU’s are available for this course through the C. G. Jung Institute of Chicago by individual arrangement with the analyst for an additional fee of $10.00.

Rose Holt, a Jungian analyst who divides her private practice between St. Louis and Chicago, is a diplomate of the C. G. Jung Institute of Chicago.

Details:
8 Thursdays (1/16,30; 2/20; 3/6,20; 4/3,24; 5/8)
Home in Central West End, St. Louis, Missouri
Address will be given to registrants
7:30 – 9:30 P.M.
Friends, $85
All others, $95
Limited to 10 registrants

To register, Call (314) 533-6809, or e-mail: cgjungstl@aol.com

For information about the C.G. Jung Society of Saint Louis, visit their website at http://members.aol.com/cgjungstl

EGO, SELF, MEANING, AND VALUE

Recently on National Public Radio I heard a writer talking about the importance of St. Augustine’s CONFESSIONS. He said this book represents the first time anyone took himself so seriously, looked so deeply into his own thoughts and experiences, and attempted to share what he found. The CONFESSIONS marked a new dimension in the human project, a new way of human understanding of the project of being human. If the New Testament represents a shift in and a redefinition of the covenant between God and the human person, Augustine’s work is a refinement of and an elaboration of the human side of the covenant. August discovered a new way of reflecting on himself.

Why is self-reflection so critically important to our development, not just important to understand who we are now but also to understand something of that person we are on the way to becoming? I think the answer lies in the role of self-reflection in our ability to assign meaning. Developing a capacity for finding/assigning meaning is crucial:

“. . . this means that the process of interpretation is not complete until the student has produced an interpretive text of his or her own. This is perhaps the place where psychoanalysis has the most to teach literary pedagogy. Both Freud and Lacan stress the importance of the patient’s ‘putting into words of the event’ (Jacques Lacan, THE LANGUAGE OF THE SELF, [Baltimore, 1968] p. 16) in order for any therapeutic effect to be obtained. It is never enough simply to tell the patient what must have happened, to raise his consciousness, so to speak. The patient must verbalize for himself. … . I am not suggesting that psychoanalysis and literary interpretation are the same thing, or even that they are highly analogous processes—only that psychoanalysis has demonstrated consistently for over three-quarters of a century that there is a significant difference between the states of consciousness involved in receiving a text and producing one. Specifically, the text we produce is ours in a deeper and more essential way than any text we receive from outside. When we read we do not possess the text we read in any permanent way. But when we make an interpretation we do add to our store of knowledge—and what we add is not the text itself but our own interpretation of it. In literary interpretation we possess only what we create.” (Robert Scholes, Semiotics and interpretation, [New Haven, 1982] p. 4).

All of us assign meaning to ideas, events, and experiences. Most of us are, more or less, in the dark, i.e., unconscious of the process by which we arrive at meaning. Since the fundamental purpose of Jungian Psychology is to render somewhat conscious that which is largely unconscious in our lives, an exploration of the process itself is in order. There are several possibilities for the ways in which we add an outside content to our consciousness and assign meaning to it:

1. We can adapt something from an outside source and accept it at face value. We do this when we accept dogma as our truth or when we follow the laws of the land because we hold an assumption that our doing so is for the common good. A good deal of early childhood education holds with this way as a methodology even though there is ample evidence that children learn not what they are taught but rather what they see modeled in the behavior of significant others. Rejection or acceptance of dogma or law can be flip sides of the same coin. In either case, it is the dogma or the law that determines the individual’s behavior because the dogma or the law has taken up residence in consciousness.

2. We can achieve a modicum of distance from an idea, an event, or an experience, put it through some kind of consciousness-sorting process and accept/reject some or all, more or less thoughtfully. In this process, our own consciousness is the final arbiter of meaning and value. A potential problem with this process is that whatever is put through a particular state of consciousness is, at least to some degree, shaped and determined by that state, so that meaning and value can arise more from the consciousness than from the content itself. If the content is odious or contrary to the state of consciousness, considerable refraction of the content may take place so that the content loses its value for adding something new/different to the existing consciousness. One way of picturing this process is to consider two extremes of consciousness for approaching a written text:

Author is Authority------------------------------------Reader is Authority

Law---------------------------------------------------------------------Anarchy

Meaning/value determined by author---Meaning/value determined by reader



All of us approach any text somewhere along this continuum, and our approach is by no means a trivial choice. For the fundamentalist Christian, a Biblical text is understood literally, and its meaning and value is determined by the author whom they believe to be God. For a reader on the other end of the continuum who finds meaning and value in translating Biblical story and understanding patterns of behavior described in the Bible as having application to the patterns of his/her life, the reader determines for him/herself meaning and value. At least for these two extremes, the text is held in common. Think how much more extreme the positions can become when even the texts dictated by God are different and are understood as law, as in the Bible and the Koran.

Another example of the importance of method of interpretation is the U.S. Constitution. Is the Constitution a static document whose meaning was fixed by the framers and is to be understood that way? Or is the Constitution a living document that needs new interpretation and adaptation to changed circumstances, and that is the meaning intended by the framers? People fight wars over the meaning and value they assign to ideas without an ounce of understanding of the process by which they came to hold that meaning and value.

3. We can seek a larger context in the outer world for both our consciousness and an idea/event/experience so that our consciousness is not alone or is not the final arbiter for judgment of meaning and value. This is, of course, a tricky business because it demands a great deal of trust and faith. We are willing to yield to a higher authority (i.e., someone who can author) because we believe the higher authority has information, experience, or judgment that we lack. Sometimes the issue (idea/event/experience) is so troubling that we are relieved, even happy, to give it over to someone else. People may come into therapy with the happy expectation that the therapist will tell him/her what to do. Personal responsibility for the state of one’s own consciousness can be a heavy burden. I think we are seeing some abdication of personal responsibility and authority among the general population as we collectively try to deal with this phenomenon of terrorism. The public, even the Congress, is piling more and more authority upon Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Ashcroft. There are, of course, collective issues that must be dealt with by collective decision and action, and this too is a matter for important discernment.

4. We can seek a larger context in the inner world for both our consciousness and an idea/event/experience. If you accept one of the basic tenets of Jungian Theory, i.e., that the ego and ego consciousness are one part in a larger entity, the Self, there is existent in the inner world a context that can be extremely helpful in the discernment of meaning and value. Whether the Self is a help or a hindrance depends entirely upon the relationship between the ego and the Self—as is the case in any other interdependent relationship. If the ego is at odds with the Self and is pursuing meaning and value contrary to the intentionality of the Self, it may happen that the Self will hasten the destruction of an unhealthy facet of ego consciousness. [Assigning intentionality to the Self may be an anthropomorphism. A more accurate way of stating the situation might be to say, "It is as ifthe intention of the Self is counter to that of the ego." We are probably on firm ground in our statement since frequently the Self personifies itself in dreams.]

Let’s take a specific example to illustrate the possibility outlined in No. 4 above. This example also shows one of the archetypal patterns of human behavior portrayed in the Bible that we have seen lived out in recent events. In the Spring of 2001 a Pakistani official traveled to Kandahar, Afghanistan, on a mission to save the two 1,700 year-old statues of Buddha that the Taliban were threatening to destroy in their religious fervor. Mullah Omar, “Commander of the Faithful” and head of the Taliban, told the official a dream: A mountain was falling down on him (Omar). Before it hit him, Allah appeared and asked Omar why he had done nothing to get rid of false idols.” (Robert Marquand, The Christian Science Monitor, csmonitor.com, October 10, 2001) Omar, a person who took guidance from his dreams, proceeded with the destruction of the ancient Buddha carvings.

There is a close parallel between Omar’s dream and that of King Nebuchadnezzar as told in the fourth chapter of the Book of Daniel. At the peak of his power, Nebuchadnezzar, full of his own might and glory, had a warning dream: “I saw a tree of great height at the center of the world. It was large and strong, with its top touching the heavens, and it could be seen to the ends of the earth. Its leaves were beautiful and its fruit abundant, providing food for all. Under it the wild beasts found shade, in its branches the birds of the air nested; all men ate of it. In the vision I saw while in bed, a holy sentinel came down from heaven, and cried out: ‘Cut down the tree and lop off its branches. But leave in the earth its stump and roots, fettered with iron and bronze, in the grass of the field. Let him be bathed with the dew of heaven; his lot be to eat, among beasts, the grass of the earth. Let his mind be changed from the human; let him be given the sense of a beast, till seven years pass over him.” (New American Bible, Daniel 4:7-14) A year passes. Nebuchadnezzar has gone on in his arrogant way as before and then “was cast out from among men, he ate grass like an ox, and his body was bathed with the dew of heaven, until his hair grew like the feathers of an eagle, and his nails like the claws of a bird.” (NAB, Daniel 4: 30)

Had Mullah Omar been willing to look inward at the “false idols” within his own consciousness, he might have changed his behaviors, and events of the past year and one-half would have unfolded very differently. Had he known the archetypal story of Nebuchadnezzar, Omar might have interpreted his dream as an invitation to self-reflection and self-correction. It could have helped him with his mental hygiene. However, he interpreted the dream as a confirmation of his plan, and thus you could say the Self acted to destroy an unyielding and contrary ego structure. As he was warned in the dream, so it came to pass—a mountain fell on him.

If we accept the premise that the ego is the exponent for the Self in the world, a solid working alliance between them is essential, for the only way the Self can manifest or incarnate is through the conduit of a more or less willing ego consciousness. In the cases of Nebuchadnezzar and Mullah Omar, we could say that the ego became so inflated with its own view and importance that it could no longer accept critical input from the Self.

When you work with your dreams, "it's amazing the information you get that is different from your everyday perception, information that gives you a different way of walking through life. You don't have to go on in the same old way any more. I used to go strictly with my feelings that were raging around, would get stuck in them. Now I find that if I cann go over them, process them those feelings don't hang around for days. I am unstuck then. It's that old thing--the truth will set you free. So my perception is not always the truth of me or of my situation. I don't have to be stuck in my perception." [Cheryl]



"It is always as if we were observing through a slit so that we only see a particular moment; all the rest is dark and we are not aware of it at that moment. The area of the unconscious is enormous and always continuous, while the area of consciousness is a restricted field of momentary vision." [C.G. Jung, ANALYTICAL PSYCHOLOGY: ITS THEORY AND PRACTICE, p. 8]

ON DREAMS

Almost everyone has, at one time in his/her life, had an impressive dream that stays in the memory. Whether you declare the dream meaningless or not, the memory lingers and is evoked by particular peoples, places, and experiences. The mere fact that the dream continues to occupy psychic space is an indicator that it has some kind of effect and that the effect is a lasting one even if it is limited to an occasional thought or emotion.

A dream of this nature brings up an important question: Do dreams, in and of themselves, have meaning, or does the dreamer, by reflecting upon the dream and its images assign meaning to it? If the answer to the first part of the question is yes, the discovery of a dream's meaning could be important in that the dreamer will add a valuable content to his/her conscious understanding. Depending upon the impact and weight of the dream, the added value could be considerable. If, on the other hand, the answer to the second part of the question is yes, the dreamer may assume a certain responsibility to create or assign meaning, in which case the result will be the same--a more or less important content is created in the conscious life of the dreamer.

It seems to me that the mystery of the dream presents us with a peculiar and important decision. We can ignore the dream(s) and explain it away as caused by something we ate, saw, heard--a fragment not related to anything important about us or our lives. Or we can take a more empirical approach in which we consider the hypothesis that dreams have, or could have, important meaning, then set out to test our hypothesis by looking deeply into our own experience of dreaming. By adopting the second approach, we have everything to gain and nothing to lose--even if our decision proves to be wrong--for the simple reason that any reflection on experience can provide for enrichment of our consciousness.

The Jungian approach is, of course, the latter. There is no doubt that dreams have been an important factor in the development of peoples throughout history. Until more recent times, dreams have generally been understood to bring messages, warn, enrich, frighten, correct, and enoble the human person. The Bible assigns considerable importance to dreams and their function in the developing relationships of God with God's people. It may even be the case that in the developing/growing covenant between God and the individual, the dream is one of the tools of communication and negotiation.

In working with dreams over the years, I have developed a set of working hypotheses/assumptions for approaching the dream. Fundamentally, I believe every single dream has two purposes: to heal in some way and/or to cast light on the personal situation of the dreamer.

Following are some additional assumptions about dreams that might prove helpful in exploring the dream as helpful counsellor for waking reality and for increasing consciousness because finding/making meaning is one of the primary needs of the human person:

1. Through patient attention to your dreams, you can make contact with and enter into a meaningful dialogue with the unconscious. [By unconscious, I simply mean the source of those factors that influence and impact our lives in unknown ways.]

2. The unconscious is Janus-faced; i.e., it turns to us the face we turn to it.

3. Every dream is given to us for the purpose of healing past hurts, enlarging our perspective, or integrating portions of our personality.

4. The dreams brings new information to compensate or complement our waking attitudes.

5. Our life energy, or ibido is personified in dreams as if the psyche, or the unconscious, wants to draw us into a living relationship.

6. Relationships with inner figures can be as important, enriching, and rewarding as relationships with people in our outer lives.

7. Our inner and outer lives are in some way mirrors of each other. Work with dreams can provide for a more harmonious balance between the two.

8. The psyche has a teleological aspect, i.e., is working toward a goal or purpose. Further, it seeks our participation and cooperation.

". . . the psyche is the most tremendous fact of human life. Indeed, it is the mother of all human facts, of civilization and of its destroyer, war." [C.G. Jung COLLECTED WORKS, Vol. 9i., Para 206]

Never in modern life has an understanding of psyche and of one's relationship to psyche been more important. It is a hubris of ego-consciousness that it believes it is self-made. All evidence indicates that ego-consciousness arises from psyche to which it owes its existence and on-going life. An ego that ignores the fact of its psychic roots is in peril. Like the individual, a world too unconsciously under the sway of psychic processes can easily succumb to barbaric behaviors, untempered by conscious understanding and correction.

One of C.G. Jung's fundamental contributions to the fields of psychology and epistemology is his concept of archetypes. For Jung, an archetype is a pattern of behavior. You can liken this concept to that of the structure of a crystal. While the crystalline structure predetermines the architecture of the actual crystal, until the crystal is given real form in matter, the pattern exists only as a concept. The archetype, then, is an abstract concept that has real lived meaning only when filled in with actual human experience. Like Kant's categories, an archetype is an a priori structure of cognition.

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of all progress that it is made by passing through some stages of instability
And that it may take a very long time. [PierreTeilhard de Chardin]



Jung believed that the individual has to adapt to some degree to external realities, but he also believed that adaptation to the realities of one's own inner life is just as essential. About his therapeutic goals, he says: "My aim is to bring about a psychic state in which my patient begins to experiment with his own nature--a state of fluidity, change, and growth where nothing is eternally fixed and hopelessly petrified." [COLLECTED WORKS, Vol. 7, P. 46]

Paraphrasing Ignatius Loyola, Jung describes the role and function of consciousness: "Man's (sic) consciousness was created to the end that it may (1) recognize (laudet its descent from a higher unity (Deum); (2) pay due and careful regard to this source (reverentiam exhibeat); (3) execute its commands intelligently and responsibly (serviat); and (4) thereby afford the psyche as a whole the optimum degree of life and development (salvet animan suam). [COLLECTED WORKS, Vol. 9ii, p. 165]



THE EFFECT OF THE UNCONSCIOUS UPON CONSCIOUSNESS

Unconscious contents, especially those that belong to the personal unconscious, make themselves felt through symptoms, actions, affects, opinions, fantasies, and dreams. The general relationship that exists between ego consciousness and the unconscious is compensatory. When the relationship works, i.e., when there is a balance and harmony between them, there is self-regulation of the psyche. When the relationship goes awry, when there is too great a deviation between the ego attitude and an unconscious process, then an imbalance sets in.

An example of this compensatory mechanism occurs when, for example, we hold a low opinion of someone--too low and not reality based. We might have a dream of that person in an exalted position. Or perhaps we work too hard, are too ego-driven, overly-ambitious and too goal-oriented. The unconscious may compensate such an ego state by withdrawing psychic libido. Depression or lethargy sets in. We might dream our car is stalled, or we are trying to run and our legs won't move, we can't get to the airport on time, etc. The unconscious has withdrawn its cooperation.

A solid working alliance with the unconscious is of great importance to the well-being and functioning of an individual. Complexes interfere with our everydfay functioning, a clear sign that unconscious material is pressing for admission to ego consciousness. When unconscious material is placing pressure on our ego consciousness, we may have dreams of unwelcome intruders or upsetting and troublesome visitors.

No one has any obligations to a concept; that is what is so agreeable about conceptuality--it promises protection from experience. The spirit does not dwell in concepts, but in deeds and in facts. [MDR, p. 144]

Certainly the ego and its will have a great part to play in life; but what the ego wills is subject in the highest degree to the interference, in ways of which the ego is usually unaware, of the autonomy and numinosity of archetypal processes. Practical consideration of these processes is the essence of religion, insofar as religion can be approached from a psychological point of view. [C.G. Jung, MEMORIES, DREAMS, REFLECTIONS, p. 353]

This (the unification of the divided components of the personality within the psyche of the individual) would form a counterbalance to the progressive dichotomy and psychic dissociation of collective man.

It is of supreme importance that this (unification) process should take place consciously, otherwise the psychic consequences of mass-mindedness will harden and become permanent. For, if the inner consolidation of the individual is not a conscious achievement, it will occur spontaneously and will then take the well-known form of that incredible hard-heartedness which collective man displays towards his fellow men. He becomes a soulless herd animal governed only by panic and lust: his soul, which can live only in and from human relationships, is irretrievably lost. But the conscious achievement of inner unity clings to human relationships as to an indispensable condition, for without the conscious acknowledgment and acceptance of our fellowship with those around us there can be no synthesis of personality. [COLLECTED WORKS, Vol. 16, Para. 443-44]

When you work with your dreams, "it's amazing the information you get that is different from your everyday perception, information that gives you a different way of walking through life. You don't have to go on in the same old way any more. I used to go strictly with my feelings that were raging around, would get stuck in them. Now I find that if I cann go over them, process them those feelings don't hang around for days. I am unstuck then. It's that old thing--the truth will set you free. So my perception is not always the truth of me or of my situation. I don't have to be stuck in my perception." [Cheryl]


"It is always as if we were observing through a slit so that we only see a particular moment; all the rest is dark and we are not aware of it at that moment. The area of the unconscious is enormous and always continuous, while the area of consciousness is a restricted field of momentary vision." [C.G. Jung, ANALYTICAL PSYCHOLOGY: ITS THEORY AND PRACTICE, p. 8]

ROSE F. HOLT, Jungian Analyst

Offices:

Chicago (773) 293 -4606
St. Louis (314) 726-2032
]
Voice Mail: [314 740-6207]
e-mail: roseholt@aol.com

For a fictional account of a Jungian analysis, see Robertson Davies' THE MANTICORE.

C.G. Jung: The Self is the principle and archetype of orientation and meaning. Therein lies its healing function.

C.G. JUNG "The energy of the central point, (the Self), is manifested in the almost irresistible compulsion and urge to become what one is, just as every organism is driven to assume the form that is characteristic of its nature, no matter what the circumstances." [COLLECTED WORKS, Vol. 9i, Para. 634]

Complex - An unconscious psychic content made up of associated ideas and images clustered around a central core. The core is an archetypal image. When constellated, affects emerge which upset the psychic balance and interfere with the customary functioning of the ego. Every complex has an archetypal core, and the core consists of a pair of opposites. If we identify with one part of the complex, one of the pair, the other is unconscious and we will know it only in projection, i.e., it truly belongs in our own personality but, for various reasons, we cannot own it and so it will land on some thing, place, or person. An example of this identification/projection mechanism could be in a mother-complex. If the personal mother was a too-good, always available, always a giving mother for us, that is the kind of mother we most probably will introject. The negative mother, the other part of the archetypal mother, we will find in the world, perhaps in a person, an institution, or even in the matrix of our lives (interestingly enough, mother and matrix derive from the same root word.) We could speculate in a similar way on the father-complex. You can see how important, how vital, it is for each of us to reconcile, to the degree that we are able, the opposites that belong to the archetypal core of our complexes.

ROSE F. HOLT, Jungian Analyst

Offices:

Chicago, IL (773) 293-4606
St. Louis, MO (314) 726-2032

Voice Mail: [314 740-6207]
e-mail: roseholt@aol.com




Unconscious - The source of those factors that influence and impact our lives in unknown ways. Jung distinguished between the personal unconscious and the collective unconscious. The former consists of those behaviors, attitudes, personal characteristics, experiences that we have repressed because they were too painful or too embarrassing for us to acknowledge as belonging to us and to our history. The latter, the collective unconscious, is the repository of human heritage and of things that have never been conscious. Under certain conditions, contents of the unconscious, both the personal and the collective aspects, can become conscious, i.e., can make themselves known to an ego.

Jungian Analysis is a particular approach to psychotherapy that works to harmonize conscious and unconscious factors so that the individual becomes more or less reconciled to his/her own complexities. Jung's view of the psyche is that beyond the personal levels of the psyche, there are active factors that seek recognition by ego consciousness. Unrecognized and split off, these factors cause unpleasant neurotic symptoms. These symptoms can result in a conscious situation of distress that may serve to activate the reconciliation process, a process Jung calls "individuation."

Jungian psychoanalysis is a journey of self-discovery. Dream themes and symbols as well as life patterns are the guides we follow. Dream images and symbols compensate one-sided or too-restrictive conscious attitudes, and thus serve as an "inner teacher" that can round out and complete the personality.

C.G. Jung: The Self is the principle and archetype of orientation and meaning. Therein lies its healing function.

ROSE F. HOLT, Jungian Analyst

Offices:

Chicago, IL (773) 293-4606
St. Louis, MO (314) 726-2032

Voice Mail: [314 740-6207]
e-mail: roseholt@aol.com


Analytical (Jungian) Psychology is based upon the work of C.G. Jung (1875-1961), a Swiss psychiatrist who spent his life working to understand and to "map" the human psyche. He demonstrated that the psyche, like the body, is fairly uniform in fundamental ways, manifesting itself in people's lives in universal patterns which he called archetypes, or "ancient imprints." Just as a bird has an inate pattern of a nest which serves as a guide, Jung saw that human beings also have inate characteristic and repeating patterns which inform our existence. Central to the archetypes is Jung's notion of the Self, the architect of order and meaning. The Self, according to Jung, envelops and surrounds the individual ego, influencing and guiding while also seeking its own fulfillment in the ego. If ego consciousness strays dangerously far from the Self, the ground of being of the ego, disastrous consequences can result. Important and impressive dreams, emotions and affects, as well as significant life events/patterns are the primary ways the Self communicates with the ego

In the Jungian approach to psychotherapy/psychoanalysis, analyst and client work together to facilitate better relations between the ego and the Self. Through careful attention to the client's history, early traumas, relationships, significant events, and through examination and discussion of the client's dreams, analyst and client may establish this critical ego-Self relationship. Work with dreams is important because the images in dreams "are symbols, that is, the best possible formulation for still unknown or unconscious facts, which generally compensate the content of consciousness or the conscious attitude." [Jung, COLLECTED WORKS, Vol. 14, Para 772] Focus on and discussion of dream images are techniques for understanding the messages the Self is trying to convey via the dream. The dreamer begins to glimpse his/her role and function in the psychic background and see in what ways he/she is at odds with psychic unfolding.


Psychological maturity, for Jung, is the individual's commitment toward the responsible living and fulfilling of the archetypal dimensions of the psyche and the demands of the Self.