Episode 257 - The PIED PIPER & the terrible costs of rejecting shadow
This Jungian Life
The Pied Piper story holds a dark secret that has repelled and fascinated us for over 500 years. It asks, "What does it cost to banish our shadow?" At its surface, it looks like a simple morality tale cautioning us to be prudent and fair. Rats overrun a town, and the locals are beside themselves. A magical piper vibrantly dressed offers a solution too good to be true. His pipe weaves a tune that leads rats to their doom – and they drown in the ocean so neatly. Thrilled at first, then cunning and foolish, the town leaders refuse to pay the piper for his service. In turn, he entrances...
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Episode 256 - The ORPHAN: symbol of eros, pathos, and hope
This Jungian Life
The archetype of the orphan, closely related to the hero, evokes powerful feelings of abandonment, deprivation, and hope. From Harry Potter to Little Orphan Annie from Daenerys Targaryen to Cinderella, orphans who triumph over adversity remind us that healing the inner child is possible. The factual history of orphans is frequently heartbreaking. In the ancient world, unwanted infants were subject to abandonment or death through exposure. In the US, moved 200,00 children from NE coastal cities to live with farm families between 1853 to 1929. Journalists exposed the nightmare...
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Episode 255 - PASSING THE TEST: embracing the refiner’s fire
This Jungian Life
The word test originally referred to an earthenware vessel in which metals were smelted to separate ore from dross. Like ancient vessels holding the heat of the refining fire, our task is to contain the tension of the test. Tests smelt fantasy from the ore of reality and force us to adapt. If a test feels arbitrary or unfair, we may be failing to dissolve the dross of inadequacy, limitation, or shame. Tests require us to develop the ego strength to put our courage, morals, and perseverance on the line—and withstand the ego wounding of failure. Ultimately ego itself is put to the test. Jung...
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Episode 254 - AWAKE TO THE WORLD: Jung’s Ethical Stance
This Jungian Life
Despite volumes written on morality and ethics, how do we determine what’s right? Values distilled over time by family, faith, and nation define and denounce wrong, but the effort to banish shadow only allows it to emerge as projection onto others. We decry in ‘them’ what we deny in ourselves. Jung says, “The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality…for to become conscious of it involves recognizing the dark aspects [of oneself]…as present and real.” We have all faced a moral dilemma at some point in our lives, questioning our own judgment and...
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Episode 253 - IRRESISTIBLE INVITATIONS: the powerful seduction of possibilities
This Jungian Life
Invitations are a subtle siren song, tapping into our primal human need to be chosen combined with our thirst for novelty, making them an irresistible force. When you receive an invitation, it is a moment of recognition, an invitation to be a part of something greater, to feel wanted, valued, and accepted. In the hierarchy of human needs, the sense of belonging takes a top priority, surpassed only by our basic requirements for survival. There is power in inviting and being invited. The myth of Baucis and Philemon, who innocently invited Zeus and Hermes to dine in their humble cottage, and were...
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Episode 252 - APHRODITE’S SHADOW: Drowning in Beauty
This Jungian Life
When the goddess Aphrodite claims us too fully, over time, our bodies become abandoned temples of physical perfection, sexual allure, and romantic passion. Her seductive archetypal power has captivated us for eons, but in today’s world, the enhancements of fashion, beauty, and physical appearance have intensified veneration of this goddess. However, her enchantments can have profound consequences, particularly when it comes to aging and the pressures of perfection. In this episode, we delve into the mysterious realm of the archetype with guest Arlene Landau, Ph.D. - a...
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Episode 251 - Sacred Marriage: A Fusion of Instinct, Spirit, and Grit
This Jungian Life
Marriage is a mystery woven into the fabric of time. A 4,000-year-old contract etched in stone bears witness to its timeless significance. But what is the meaning behind this union of two souls? Jung saw the definition of marriage as an alchemy of instinct and divinity, a blending of the physical and the spiritual. It is a bond that extends beyond legal and familial ties into the realm of the sacred. The purpose of marriage is a journey of individuation, a chance for each partner to grow and flourish within the embrace of a supportive union - it is a crucible of transformation. Tempered...
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Episode 250 - The Schizophrenia Complex: How Do We Love Those in Chaos?
This Jungian Life
Guest Eve Maram, PsyD, is a clinical psychologist and Jungian analyst in Orange, CA. Her book, The Schizophrenia Complex, presents a clear-eyed and compassionate understanding of our encounters with severe mental illness. The submergence in unconscious chaos that defines schizophrenia triggers negative emotions in others—yet Jung on psychosis showed that we are different from those patients only in degree. Significantly his Word Association Test proved that the unconscious influences everyone’s daily life in multiple ways. Moreover, Jung’s psychiatric work with psychotic...
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Episode 249 - Bipolar Disorder: A Jungian Perspective
This Jungian Life
Imprisoned by the sea with his son Icarus, mythological craftsman Daedalus constructed wings to escape. Beeswax held feathers in place, so Daedalus told Icarus not to fly too high or too low: the sun’s heat would melt the wax and sea spray would weigh the wings down. Elated, Icarus flew too high--and fell. Like Icarus, the moods of people with bipolar disorder swing from soaring into mania to sinking into depression. This disorder affects at least 2% of the population worldwide, with genetics by far the major contributor. BP is a major cause of disability and can also be a factor in...
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Episode 248 - Inside the Mind of the Scam Artist
This Jungian Life
Conned, swindled, or bilked, about 50 million Americans were ripped off by scammers in 2020. What deadens a person to preying on another? Tricksters commit crudely constructed fraud. Jung said they are “not really evil [but do] the most atrocious things from sheer unconsciousness and unrelatedness.” Cheaters may have behaved decently until tempted by need and opportunity and then become caught in a web of deception. Narcissists exploit others due to an inflated need for admiration and status that forecloses empathy and relatedness--and crooks turn predation, power, and risk-taking into a...
info_outlineWe tend to think of revolution as a people’s push-back against perceived oppression—a reaction to rulership that has rejected fairness, change, and accessibility. When a rigid power structure reigns supreme—often presenting as idealism, spirituality, or cultural integrity—it can generate opposing force as an effort to restore rightness and realize renewal. For Jung, revolution “is not conversion into the opposite but conservation of previous values together with recognition of their opposites.” He adds that to quite a “terrifying degree, we are threatened by wars and revolutions which are nothing other than psychic epidemics…modern man is battered by the elemental forces of his own psyche.” For revolution to be more than warring between opposites requires the capacity to mediate conflicts within ourselves and establish a new internal order.
You say you’ll change the constitution
Well, you know
We’d all love to change your head
You tell me it’s the institution
Well, you know
You better free your mind instead
The Beatles: Revolution
Here’s the dream we analyze:
“I am in some sort of tech office. Someone is here who is trying to steal data. My goal is to discover their identity, get the disc they are trying to smuggle and get out. At one point, a female friend from church is standing across the room from me. She has a sniper rifle with a scope on it, trained on me. I think maybe I can try to duck or run quickly behind something, but I know that I won’t get there in time, and she will shoot me. I am not sure what is going to happen. I also sense that she is friendly toward me, she may even be smiling, but she still has the sniper rifle trained on me. Then she is right in front of me. I take the barrel of the rifle and hold it up to my forehead and tell her it is okay, she can shoot me if she needs to. I close my eyes and am genuinely unsure of what is going to happen. Time passes. She decides not to shoot me after all. I am vaguely aware that there is a studio audience watching all of this like it is a reality show or a game show of some kind, and I’ve won “sympathy points” by doing this. The church friend has disappeared, and I continue looking for the infiltrator. I see a guy I noticed earlier, and I think it can’t possibly be him; that would be too easy. But then I see he has a CD under the cushion of his seat--it is him. When he is not looking, I retrieve the CD. I am very nervous to do this, but I do not get caught. Now I need to get out of the building with the CD. But the sense of terror is gone. I am sure he is not going to catch me, and I can probably leave as I please. I am weirdly sad that the sense of apprehension is gone.”
REFERENCES:
Joseph Henderson and Dyane Sherwood. Transformation of the Psyche: The Symbolic Alchemy of the Splendor Solis. https://a.co/d/3D98biA
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