This Jungian Life Podcast &#8211; Joseph Lee, Deborah Stewart, Lisa Marchiano

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Every Hero’s Journey Aug 06, 2020

Show notes

DREAM WITH US, and we’ll teach you how to interpret them!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The hero’s journey has been the stuff of story from earliest times. Today’s popular heroes include Harry Potter, Frodo, Spiderman, Neo, and Luke Skywalker. They are all ordinary guys who suddenly receive the Call to Adventure, mythologist Joseph Campbell’s term for the beginning of the journey.

The would-be hero first declines, then answers the call; he suffers tests and trials, succeeds with help from unexpected sources, and returns with the gifts of all he has learned. The hero’s journey is the human story--we are all called to be more, often in seemingly mundane ways.

As we go to work, raise children, and experience setbacks, we are called to sacrifice personal interest and ego-driven desires for the sake of something greater. The hero’s journey is a metaphor for the inner adventure Jung described as individuation, ‘the treasure hard to attain’ and life’s true goal.

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COVERED: An Archetypal Take on the COVID Mask Jul 30, 2020

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DREAM WITH US, and we’ll teach you how to interpret them!⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠Masks are the symbol of COVID life, and they have archetypal roots as old as humankind. We ward off evil microbial forces with bandanas, neck gaiters, patterned fabrics, and high filtration medical masks. Masks provide access to our shape-shifting potential, connect us to our instinctual depths, mediate our relationship to the spirits, and open a portal to the mythic realm of story and drama.

Masks waft us into new identities: children become superheroes or face-painted animals; women apply make-up, men craft beards, and everyone wears sunglasses that shade us from more than sunlight.

We also wear a social mask, persona, and present different aspects of ourselves to colleagues, Facebook friends, and family—but if we identify with the faces we present to the world we risk defining ourselves according to fixed and superficial attributes. Masks in all their forms affect the experience of wearer and viewers.

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If you’ve been struggling in the dark, trying to find the keys to unlock yourdreams, help has arrived. Order your copy of ⁠⁠⁠⁠Dream Wise: Unlocking the Meaning of Your Dreams⁠⁠⁠⁠ from the hosts of This Jungian Life podcast and open the secret door.

Not Alone: Finding the Inner Companion Jul 23, 2020

Show notes

DREAM WITH US, and we’ll teach you how to interpret them!⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠When you’re down, and in trouble, and you need some loving care...

You just call out my name, and you know wherever I am,

I’ll come running to see you again…you’ve got a friend.

Carole King song

The companion has a beloved place in our hearts. Famed modern-day teammates include Captain Kirk and Spock, Frodo and Samwise, Batman and Robin, and Sherlock Holmes and Watson. The companion serves and supports the hero, contributing quieter gifts of guidance, capability, and devotion. Every companion is an image of the inner Other, and is present whenever gifts of wisdom, care and guidance are received. Our bodies, instincts, and feelings recognize and respond to the companion: a night’s sleep and dreams ease anxiety, a quandary melts into resolution, a new idea shines in mind. The Companion is already and always there.

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If you’ve been struggling in the dark, trying to find the keys to unlock your dreams, help has arrived. Order your copy of ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Dream Wise: Unlocking the Meaning of Your Dreams⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ from the hosts of This Jungian Life podcast and open the secret door.

Creativity: Drawing from the Inner Well Jul 16, 2020

Show notes

DREAM WITH US, and we’ll teach you how to interpret them!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The root of create, “to bring something into being out of nothing,” echoes divine creation. Ideas arise from mysterious sources, yet creativity is such an intrinsically human function that Jung considered it one of five human instincts, together with hunger, sexuality, activity, and reflection (a function of consciousness). Positive circumstances foster creativity: the ability to engage imagination, seek novelty, hone competency, and pursue autonomous, intrinsically rewarding activities. Stress inhibits new possibilities, and rigid societies and personalities fear creators, as new ideas and images challenge the status quo. Creativity can also be quashed from within, and one’s internal cynic, doubter, and deflator often shows up disguised as reason. It takes confidence and courage to surmount uncertainty, obstacles, and potential disappointment. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said: “Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.” What wants to come into the world through you?

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⁠We’d like to take a crack interpreting your dream.⁠⁠

If you’ve been struggling in the dark, trying to find the keys to unlock your dreams, help has arrived. Order your copy of ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Dream Wise: Unlocking the Meaning of Your Dreams⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ from the hosts of This Jungian Life podcast and open the secret door.

The Religious Attitude: What Do You Worship? Jul 09, 2020

Show notes

DREAM WITH US, and we’ll teach you how to interpret them!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The religious instinct is as basic as the need for food or shelter. Psyche seeks and selects a central, organizing life principle whether consciously or unconsciously chosen. Secular deities range from food, money, or even science, to the gods of addiction; false gods lie behind neuroses and pathology. Traditional religions and cosmologies offer connection to large, well-ordered frameworks of myth and meaning. Realizing one’s place in the context of larger realities has the potential to connect us to mystery and numinous experience; then we belong to something greater. For Jung the decisive question was whether a person was related to the infinite: “It seems as if it were only through the experience of a symbolic reality that man, vainly seeking his own ‘existence’ and making a philosophy out of it, can find his way back to a world in which he is no longer a stranger.”

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⁠We’d like to take a crack interpreting your dream.⁠⁠

If you’ve been struggling in the dark, trying to find the keys to unlock your dreams, help has arrived. Order your copy of ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Dream Wise: Unlocking the Meaning of Your Dreams⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ from the hosts of This Jungian Life podcast and open the secret door.

Dissociation: Encountering Our Inner Exile Jul 02, 2020

Show notes

DREAM WITH US, and we’ll teach you how to interpret them!⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠Jung discovered the psyche’s dissociative nature through his Word Association Test. Subjects would delay or make nonsensical responses to ordinary words associated with troublesome personal memories or traumas. Dissociation, our autonomous psychic “circuit breaker,” exists on a spectrum from ”spacing out” to disorders that interfere with life functioning. Psychotherapy could be considered the practice of healing dissociations, as treatment entails bringing banished contents into consciousness with feeling and understanding. Fairy tales such as Sleeping Beauty frequently depict dissociation as enchantment, abduction, or dismemberment. Reconnection with consciousness is the happily-ever-after resolution, for dissociation takes psychic energy that should be available for life. Giving our inner exiles a seat at the table of consciousness is crucial to wholeness.

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⁠We’d like to take a crack interpreting your dream.⁠⁠

If you’ve been struggling in the dark, trying to find the keys to unlock your dreams, help has arrived. Order your copy of ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Dream Wise: Unlocking the Meaning of Your Dreams⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ from the hosts of This Jungian Life podcast and open the secret door.

The Transcendent Function: Getting Unstuck Jun 25, 2020

Show notes

DREAM WITH US, and we’ll teach you how to interpret them!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The transcendent function comes in all sizes, from “aha” moments to epiphanies. A new orientation to a dilemma arrives unthought, recognized, and right. Perhaps there is a moment where loneliness gives way to solitude, or heartbreak yields to a larger sense of self. Apprehension of a new attitude--sunlight breaking through clouds--has overcome the impasse, bringing freshness, spaciousness and possibility. Engaging the tension of an emotional struggle without giving in to premature, one-sided action can prepare the way for the unconscious to unite with consciousness. The transcendent function can also be sought through practicing active imagination or involvement in expressive arts, a practice Jung encouraged. He said that the transcendent function “is a way of attaining liberation by one’s own efforts and of finding the courage to be oneself.”

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