Finding Our Way Back: Healing from Self-Betrayal
This Jungian Life
When we betray ourselves, we abandon our values, needs, or truths to gain approval or avoid discomfort. This leaves us disconnected, fragmented, and unsure of who we really are. These patterns often start in childhood, where conditional love or invalidation teaches us to hide our authentic selves to stay safe or gain acceptance. We see this in our daily lives—staying in unbalanced relationships, ignoring our emotions, overworking, or making choices that don’t align with who we are. We justify it, suppress what we feel, or take on others’ beliefs without realizing how much it costs us....
info_outline
ECSTATIC TRANSFORMATION: Activating the Archetype of Radical Joy
This Jungian Life
What does it mean to depose the ego and encounter the dismantling joy of the Self? Ecstatic transformation challenges our understanding of ourselves and breaks the boundaries of ordinary experience, leaving us questioning a lifetime of assumptions. It shatters our ego’s illusions of separation, shifting the foundation of our identity. It is the greater solutio where our ego and Self come face to face. This psycho-spiritual process is symbolized in the Dionysiac archetypal themes of death and rebirth through ecstatic states that transcend the rational, intensify emotion, and connect us to...
info_outline
WEDDING DREAMS: Symbols of Sacred Union and Inner Transformation
This Jungian Life
How does one reconcile and integrate opposing forces within to achieve wholeness? Wedding dreams symbolize the union of opposites that spans psychological, spiritual, and alchemical dimensions. Encountering the wedding archetype in dreams constellates an inner marriage that calls for synthesis of known and novel traits and attitudes—depicted as the merging of masculine and feminine aspects or encounters with shadow. Dream Wise: Unlocking the Meaning of Your Dreams will help you understand and prepare for inner union: https://a.co/d/9EyMMgE Alchemy called this process the hierosgamos, or...
info_outline
DECISION ARCHETYPE: the power of sacrificing options
This Jungian Life
How do we navigate the forces within us to make choices that reflect our authentic nature? Every decision acts as a bridge between the conscious mind and the unconscious depths, connecting archetypal patterns to individual choices that define human experience. Each choice reveals inner conflicts and values, compelling us to confront both personal desires and universal forces within psyche. Decision-making is not merely logical; it is a convergence of intuition, cultural imprint, and raw instinct, calling for integration rather than domination by one mode of thought. In conscious choosing, we...
info_outline
SATANIC PANIC: The Archetypal Slanderer and False Memory Syndrome
This Jungian Life
What drives us to seek meaning in the shadows, and how do we discern the real from the imagined when fear and faith converge? The rise of the Satanic Panic in the 1980s drew upon ancient archetypal fears of evil embedded in the collective unconscious, merging with societal stressors like the emergence of fundamentalist Christianity in American politics and women’s increased participation in the workforce with the resultant rise of daycare use. The archetype of the Devil as slanderer can capture a community. Even as they are prompted to accuse others of devilish behavior, they themselves are...
info_outline
Jung and Gnosticism: Discovering a Universe Of Whole-Making
This Jungian Life
What is the ultimate path to inner wholeness, and how do we reconcile the tension between the spiritual and material aspects of our existence? Take up the journey to find your lost spark this fall at Dream School: Jung’s exploration of Gnosticism enhanced his vision of the human psyche. In the Gnostic myths, Jung recognized the modern inner journey—where the Self represents the wholeness we all seek, mirroring the Gnostic Anthropos, the complete human being. Individuation, much like the Gnostic quest for spiritual awakening, becomes a journey of reclaiming our hidden divine spark,...
info_outline
CULTURAL COMPLEXES: the hidden force in modern politics
This Jungian Life
How do unconscious forces shape our collective behaviors and influence how we navigate societal conflicts and personal identity? Free yourself from the collective nightmare—discover the wisdom of your dreams this fall at Political dynamics are deeply influenced by underlying psychological forces known as cultural complexes, which shape group behavior, reinforce divisions, and heighten emotional responses to societal changes. Tom Singer, editor and fellow author of , explains that these social psychology phenomena, arising from emotions and ideas, affect how individuals think and feel....
info_outline
DOG SYMBOLISM IN DREAMS: companions, protectors, and guides of souls
This Jungian Life
How does the dream maker help us when we’re lost and alone in the wilderness of our lives? Let your inner dogs guide you to a deeper understanding of yourself—discover the wisdom in your dreams this fall at We love dogs, and they love us. For millennia, they have held deep symbolic meaning in mythology, religion, and literature, often serving as protectors, guides, loyal companions, and a connection to our instincts. When it comes to dog symbolism in dreams, they can embody emotional support, intuition, or boundless enthusiasm. Whether acting as guardians, like in ancient myths, or...
info_outline
JUNGIAN ALCHEMY: the secret of inner transformation
This Jungian Life
Do you need a map to chart a massive inner transformation? Jungian alchemy provides a symbolic framework for individuation, connecting ancient alchemical traditions with analytical psychology to illustrate the psyche's transformative process toward individuation. CG Jung saw alchemical imagery as symbols for inner psychological processes, where the work of transforming base metals into gold paralleled the transformation of unconscious material into conscious awareness. This alchemical process deepens our understanding of confronting our shadow, inspires us to differentiate our true...
info_outline
DRAGON: The Archetypal Monster and Ally Within
This Jungian Life
Across the globe and through the ages, dragons lurk in our myths and dreams, haunting us as primal forces of terror and transformation. Found in almost every culture, these creatures are potent symbols of the instinctive unconscious, embodying both the dangers of the natural world and the depths of our psyche. In Western mythology, they emerge as fearsome enemies, threatening to drag us back into chaos. Eastern traditions, however, revere dragons as wise and transformative beings, symbols of transcendent power and enlightenment. The battle with the dragon mirrors our inner struggle to confront...
info_outlineIf the passage into fullsome adulthood is avoided, a person can be trapped in the world of childhood. This protected realm is a nexus of potential, defined by avoiding the rigors of the real for the pleasures of possibility. Peter Pan, who chose to remain in never-never-land, is a well-known image for the flighty ingenuousness of the puer or puella. What stops libido from becoming more grounded in order to engage in more purposeful, ego-strengthening commitments? Charles Dickens’ Bleak House portrays a protagonist who felt that dedication and discipline were intolerably confining. Rapunzel, however, broke out of her elevated tower when a prince kindled her desire to bond in a more earthly way. If an initiatory experience does not activate libido, and the protected world of childhood is not sacrificed, entrapment in a marginal life may ensue.
Dream
I was in a dark forest at night with my youngest son (he's 10). We were standing at the top of an exterior staircase attached to a house, which was situated at the edge of a large clearing in the forest. The house had bright spotlights shining onto the clearing, and I could see small animals all wandering through it. I felt like I wanted to go into the forest, but had to wait for something. I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. A mountain lion had appeared on the edge of the clearing. As soon as it stepped into the clearing, it changed into a very large snake. It began slowly making it's way through the clearing, killing the small animals. It was killing them, but not eating them. I saw it begin to "devour" a smaller poisonous snake. The large snake had it's head tipped back in such a way that I could see it had a hole in the underside of it's throat. So it was clamping the smaller snake with its teeth, swallowing, and pulling it through its mouth, but the smaller snake was falling out through the hole in it's neck back onto the ground. My son and I began to run down the stairs and skirt around the edges of the clearing. I needed to get into the forest at a certain location and it was on the far side from the house. I stopped briefly when I noticed a dead kitten right at the edge of the forest. It had been ripped in half by the snake. Another kitten was there. It was so young it's eyes were not open. It was trying to crawl into the forest for safety. I felt...like I was rooting for it. Hoping for it to survive. But I had no urge to pick it up and help it. The large snake noticed us running. It changed back into the mountain lion and began after us before we could get to the far end of the clearing. I noticed a hunter's tree stand just inside the forest at the side of the clearing we had made it to. We ran for it. I kept checking to make sure my son was still with me. I began running up the stairs to the tree stand, and when I reached the top, noticed he was no longer with me. I panicked, began looking around. I noticed a black panther was now in the trees below the stand, jumping from branch to branch. The mountain lion was staying back because of it. The panther jumped up into the tree stand beside me, and changed into my son. "I keep forgetting I do not need to be afraid for you" I said to him. And then I woke.