Jung’s Inner Guides: The Secret of The Red Book
This Jungian Life
You're invited to join us for a free Zoom seminar on Dreams and Art on Saturday, September 13th, at 10:30am ET. . --- Jung’s Red Book is the primary research record of his systematic experiments in active imagination after the break with Freud, combining calligraphic German text and paintings that document dialogues with his inner guides—especially Philemon and Salome—which became source material for his innovative psychological concepts: Psyche’s autonomy, the collective unconscious, the transcendent function, and individuation. The Red Book reveals the secret source of his...
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The Creative Power of Inner Tension
This Jungian Life
You're invited to join us for a free Zoom seminar on Dreams and Art on Saturday, September 13th, at 10:30am ET. . Holding the tension of the opposites means that when you’re pulled hard in two different directions, you don’t rush to choose or shut one side down—you keep both viewpoints in mind and let each be heard with equal rights, as if two people were debating inside you. If you can stand that pressure without fleeing, something new appears from the unconscious: a symbol or fresh idea that is a living, third thing that includes truth from both sides. This is the transcendent function...
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IMAGINATION: Jung’s Path to Creativity and Inner Freedom
This Jungian Life
Imagination is a central organ of human perception, as vital as the senses, through which we access meaning, creativity, and the unconscious. It first appeared as an evolutionary leap that allowed humans to run mental simulations, project into the future, and innovate new tools, myths, and symbols. It operates voluntarily—when we actively plan, rehearse, or fantasize—and involuntarily, through dreams, hypnagogic images, and sudden inspirations. It offers insights we could not have predicted. Imagination provides the bridge between unconscious and conscious life, most present in active...
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SOLUTIO: The Alchemy of Letting Go
This Jungian Life
Solutio is Psyche’s method to facilitate transformation: our rigid ego is softened in symbolic water, allowing outworn attitudes to unbind. We can see this reflected in dreams of oceans and baths, or a wall of our house dissolving. This can show up when we slough off our work persona or a creative depression brought on by retirement. Analysis itself—ana-lysis—a deliberate loosening, can deepen the process by offering a safe container to let go and yield to the process. The work is careful because the waters that purify (baptism or tears) can also drown us (psychosis or crowd contagion)....
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Jack and the Beanstalk: When Magic Calls Us Into Life
This Jungian Life
Jack and the Beanstalk is a symbolic prescription for psychological growth, teaching us to climb out of darkness, confront the giants within, claim the gifts of our unconscious, and transform our ordinary lives. Join us as we reveal the secret meaning hidden in the fairytale. Read along with the . LOOK & GROW If you’ve been struggling in the dark, trying to find the keys to unlock your dreams, help has arrived. Order your copy of from the hosts of This Jungian Life podcast and open the secret door.
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THE QUICKENING: Discovering New Life Within
This Jungian Life
Dreams about pregnancy and babies symbolize something new taking shape within us, like a creative project, a hidden talent, or a psychological shift that's quietly developing beneath our awareness. These images express the mysterious tension we sense during periods of growth, change, or potential, drawing our attention inward and challenging our current identity or circumstances. When our symbolic baby finally arrives in the dream, it reveals a hidden part of ourselves that is now ready to enter consciousness, creating both excitement and anxiety about how this new aspect will fit into...
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Wounds into Wisdom: Carl Jung’s Private Life
This Jungian Life
Carl Jung’s discoveries are woven into our common understanding. Introvert/extravert, shadow work, typology, persona, and synchronicity pop up in casual conversations all the time. Negotiating with our inner figures, now used by Internal Family Systems, was pioneered by him. Although we have adopted his ideas, few know how they were forged from his personal struggles. Today, we honor Jung’s 150th birthday by sharing stories from his life and how they shaped his groundbreaking insights. Find the dream we analyze . Find the books we reference . LOOK & GROW If you’ve been...
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Calcinatio and the Alchemy of Honest Suffering
This Jungian Life
The calcinatio stage in Jung's alchemy is about being put through inner fire—it's when the ego undergoes a kind of burning away of projections, illusions, and inflated ideas about itself. This stage often brings intense suffering, frustration, and confrontation with parts of yourself you'd rather avoid. It's about staying awake in the heat long enough to discover the truths behind your defenses. Sometimes it's like sitting in hell and roasting. This raw, honest suffering is necessary for individuation. It's not punishment—it's Psyche's way of depotentiating false structures so that...
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DISCOVERING A NEW ARCHETYPE: The Buddhabrot Fractal Bridging Math, Myth, and the Collective Unconscious
This Jungian Life
The Buddhabrot pattern springs from a simple algorithm: you take thousands of starting points, run each one through the same formula over and over, and chart only those whose values grow without limit—these “divergent” paths form the spectral Buddha-like silhouette. Once you recognize the pattern, you see it everywhere. It’s visible in the rosette stained glass windows of Notre-Dame de Paris and Chartres, numerous representations of the buddha, as well as in the Vāstu-Puruṣa-Maṇḍala used as blueprints for Indian temples, and in the ancient chakra symbols that are now so...
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The Handless Maiden: A Tale to Heal the Wounded Feminine
This Jungian Life
Everyone faces a moment when they are tempted to sacrifice their true self to chase wealth, approval, success, or security, but doing so strips away their strength and leaves them hollow. To reclaim their lost agency, a person must embrace the uncertainty and vulnerability they've been avoiding. They must stand alone, undefended, and trust the wisdom hidden in their wounds. The Handless Maiden fairytale will help us understand the path back to wholeness. Read along with our dream interpretation . LOOK & GROW If you’ve been struggling in the dark, trying to find the keys to unlock...
info_outlineThe alchemical term nigredo means black or blackening, and is associated with decomposition and putrefaction. As a psychological state, nigredo is “the great suffering and grief” which the detached forces of nature inflict on the soul.
We realize in sorrow that what we thought were truths were illusory. Individuals may have taken pride in their virtues, talents or good fortune; societies may have touted their cultural superiority, military prowess, or wealth. When we are stripped of easy beliefs, we have no defense against the desolation of nigredo.
But as surely as a seed releases its urge to life underground, blackness is also a place of incubation. Jung states, “Everything psychic is pregnant with the future.” Our task is “to be at home in the darkness of suffering and there find germs of light and recovery” from which new life will come.
Dream
I was arriving to a commotion in a beautiful open-space garden beside the university building where I graduated. As I was approaching the crowd, I wondered who it was that everyone were so excited about. I was carrying a sort of notebook and was wearing a sort of girly school outfit that indicated that I was a student again.
I was surprised to see a slender gay man who was topless and with a floral headpiece dancing in a circular motion or like he was just so free and flowing and everyone was hoping he would notice them. He was dancing backed up by 3-4 women with floral crowns and white flow-y gowns. He was just so fluid and beautiful. Then he looked at me. And I knew he liked me. When his dance was finished and everybody had left, he came to me and said hi. And then, we kissed. It was a deep and profound kiss; I have never been kissed that way.
With our tongues doing the talking, we communicated to each other. He told me, 'Why are you so sad?' I said I was afraid. Then I woke seeing my sleeping baby beside me.
Reference
Edinger, Edward. Anatomy of the Psyche: Alchemical Symbolism in Psychotherapy (Amazon).