Episode 186 - The Archetype of the Witch: Dangerous, Denied & Dishonored
This Jungian Life
It’s witching season, the time when women of all ages embrace a mythical image of unfettered feminine power. The witch may cast spells, seek vengeance, or wreak creative havoc—as she pleases. Flying the night skies of psyche, the witch brings primordial realities into culture’s brittle convictions.
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Episode 185 - Assessing Our Psychic Inheritance
This Jungian Life
Jung said of the parent-child relationship: “Nothing exerts a stronger psychic effect upon the human environment, and especially upon children, than the life which the parents have not lived.” Jung understood that parents can unconsciously compel children to fulfill parental dreams or compensate for disappointments.
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Episode 184 - Does Analysis Work? A Conversation with Jonathan Shedler, PhD
This Jungian Life
“Talk is powerful medicine.” Renowned researcher and clinician Jonathan Shedler, PhD joins us to discuss the effectiveness of psychodynamic psychotherapy. While so-called evidence-based therapies—brief treatments conducted by instruction manuals—offer benefit for some, their status as the “gold standard” of treatment for mental distress is undeserved.
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Episode 183 - JUSTICE: The Struggle for Balance
This Jungian Life
Principles of fairness and justice have deep roots in the human psyche: we want to receive our fair share and a fair shake. When man injures man we may protest, strive for redress, and measure wrong with morality—but what about godly misfortunes? Life, myth and religion are rich with issues of injustice. Whether individual injury, social inequality, or divine mystery, over-insistence on fairness can lead to depression, resentment, and fixation.
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Episode 182 - Confronting Shadow: The Work of Self-Discovery
This Jungian Life
Psychotherapy is essentially the work making shadow conscious—all that we have not discerned, disown, or project onto others. We seldom welcome shadow, for it is marked by emotions and motivations that deflate, disturb, and dethrone ego. From family scuffles to political hostilities and outright war, we most often meet our shadow in others. Its presence is signaled by a strong urge to take action, with feelings ranging from judgment to antagonism, from pity to self-sacrifice, and from obsession to disgust
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Episode 181 - Self-Reflection: What Was I Thinking?
This Jungian Life
Jung says, “There is another instinct, different from the drive to activity and so far as we know specifically human, which might be called the reflective instinct.” Self-reflection is correlated with consciousness, and is arguably humankind’s unique and essential competency: a meta-cognitive capacity that is aware of its own awareness.
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Episode 180 - INFLUENCE: Connection or Contagion?
This Jungian Life
We have always been subject to the influence of others—it’s how we learn language, become socialized, cooperate and collaborate. It’s also how we exclude, denigrate, and assault others. Today, we are subject to unprecedented social influences. Multiplicities of media shape our ideas, identities, beliefs and values--and foster connections and communities around the world.
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SHADOWLAND: Prostitution - the story of Kay
This Jungian Life
Today we walk with Kay, a 21-year-old single mother who works throughout the American southwest as a self-described prostitute. We explore how she found her way to that life, what she aspires to, and how she holds the complicated tensions between herself, her clients, and the current culture. We shared this interview with composer Wells Hanley from I Wrote This Song For You podcast, who was moved to create a song for Kay. We hope you’ll be as touched by her story as we were.
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SHADOWLAND: a new podcast experience – September 9 on TJL
This Jungian Life
On September 9th, This Jungian Life will launch a new podcast experience - SHADOWLAND. In this series, we meet soulfully with people who live and work in the hidden places of our culture.
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Episode 179 - The Archetype of WAR
This Jungian Life
Recent events in Afghanistan have again put war in the forefront of collective consciousness. War’s destruction belongs to the mythic realm. Mars, the Roman god of war, was a primordial force whose altars were placed outside city gates. Although acknowledged, he was not accepted. His paramour, Venus, is warfare’s seductress, offering spectacle, pageantry, and glory.
info_outlineThis is Shadowland, a new podcast experience from This Jungian Life that explores the lives of people who work and take refuge in the hidden places of our culture. Lisa, Deb, and Joseph collaborate with songwriter Wells Hanley, creator of I Wrote This Song For You podcast, to bring insight, compassion, and understanding to the darker side of human experience.
Nietzsche wrote, “I am a forest, and a night of dark trees: but he who is not afraid of my darkness, will find banks full of roses under my cypresses.”
In that spirit, we meet Kay, a 21-year-old single mother who works throughout the American southwest as a self-described prostitute. We explore how she found her way to that life, what she aspires to, and how she holds the complicated tensions between herself, her clients, and the current culture.
Here’s Kay’s dream that we analyze:
“I am in a pet store with my best friend and my daughter, who is in a stroller. The woman proprietor went in the back. I saw an alligator in a cage eating a piglet and looked at my daughter’s stroller -- she wasn’t in there. Then I am somewhere running through halls trying to find her. I see a lot of kids about her age running around [but she isn’t among them]. I think she is in the ventilation system because she likes to crawl around. I tell someone to hide the weed that’s in my car so we can call the police.”
We shared this interview with Wells Hanley, who was moved to create a song for Kay. We hope you’ll be as touched by her story as we were.
You can support Wells Hanley’s creative work by becoming his patron here: https://www.patreon.com/iwrotethissongforyou
His website is here www.iwrotethissongforyou.com/
SONG: PART OF THE PLAY
music and lyrics by Wells Hanley © 2020.
I will listen
receive you
affirm you in every way
And I will hold you
but as I’ve told you
it’s just part of the play
I will undress you
and then impress you
we’ll make a game of predator and prey
I’ll be unrestrained
but as I’ve explained
it’s just part of the play
She is hiding in the walls
she is watching through a screen
She is frightened to come out
so she lingers there unseen
calling, “Mama, help me!”
I’ll be your Echo
a kind of mirror
your missing Helen I am willing to portray
And you may long to claim me
but you’ll never tame me
I’m too refined for that cliché
You see, my heart is never part of the play
See her high above the crowd
see her fall into the cage
See her flee into the walls
as she steps onto the stage
crying, “Mama, help me!”
You call me princess
tell me I’m beautiful
I’m not immune to the things you say
But when the curtain falls
I walk these empty halls
and even though I can never go, I can show you the way
and I will swear that everything’s ok
Hush little baby, don’t say a word
about what you’ve seen or about what you’ve heard
There’s a fat, hungry beast in need of a meal
so don’t ever share
no, don’t tell a soul what you feel
Music and Lyrics by Wells Hanley © 2020.
Singer: Ali Thibodeau at https://linktr.ee/deaueyes
RESOURCES:
Learn to Analyze your own Dreams: https://thisjunhttps://thisjungianlife.com/join-dream-school/gianlife.com/enroll/
REFERENCES:
The Book of Symbols, published by Taschen
Kalsched, Donald. The Inner World of Trauma