Author - Stephen Farah

The Library of the Mind: imaginal photography and your thinking function

    Logos, reason, (directed) thinking, animus, intellect, imaginal photography C. G. Jung divides the mind into four distinct psychological functions: thinking, feeling (or evaluation), intuition, and sensation.[1]  The function we are going to consider in this post, thinking, is the psychological function which, following its own laws, brings the contents of ideation [ideas] into conceptual connection with one another. It is an apperceptive activity, and as such may be dived into active and passive thinking.  Active thinking is an...

March 31, 2014
By Anima and Animus, Jungian Themes, , , 0 Comments
Read more...

The encounter with the Shadow: a key moment on the journey to individuation

The shadow, Applied Jungian Psychology, The Wolf of Wall Street Discussion about the shadow can be split into three broad categories: Everything has a shadow – more specifically, every choice, every action, and every encounter, carries within itself a shadow. This is the simple idea that what is explicit, what is seen, what is manifest holds an implicit opposite. Our intentionality is directed to the “object” in a specific fashion. The philosopher John Searle describes it as consciousness having an "aspectual"...

January 30, 2014
By Jungian Themes, Shadow, , , 5 Comments
Read more...

Understanding your brand: what would you look like as a coffee shop?

One of the tremendous gifts we have inherited from Jung is a better appreciation of the power of imagination. The imaginative (image making) faculty grants us access to areas of psyche that are not accessible in any other way. Images from the unconscious (which is where our images come from in any imaginative exercise) have a holographic-type nature, in that they contain a depth of information that goes far deeper than the surface of the image and affords access to otherwise...

January 5, 2014
By Jungian Themes, Persona, Practically, , , 18 Comments
Read more...

The Individuation Project: a Jungian journey to self actualisation

Individuation is the act of becoming a distinct and integrated unity. It is the explicit realisation of what was previously implicit and latent. Once a rose individuates it is no longer just a flower or even just a rose; it is a rose of a definite and distinct type. Now naturally in the case of a rose this is just what it always was, it was always a rose of this type. However, this distinct type and its characteristic...

December 3, 2013
By Individuation, Jungian Themes, 8 Comments
Read more...

Counter-transference:the Obscene Other

In my last post Transference: the Saviour the Madonna and the Slut, I dealt with the issue of transference and some of the ways this affects our lives and our relationships. Now I want us to consider the flipside of that coin, counter-transference. Simply, counter-transference is what happens when someone transfers onto you and you react to their transference. This reaction can take two typical forms: You transfer your unconscious contents onto them in response to their transference, which means...

October 21, 2013
By Jungian Themes, Transference, , , 5 Comments
Read more...

Transference:the Saviour, the Madonna and the Slut

At the very heart of psychoanalysis is the issue of transference- counter transference. Transference is a technical term describing a somewhat mysterious phenomenon that occurs when the patient 'transfers' their relationship with one or both of their parents onto the psychoanalyst. We are dealing with this topic in the November Foundation Module, and I want to share just a little about it with you. When we say they 'transfer' this relationship, what is meant is that, this is done unconsciously. On...

October 15, 2013
By Jungian Themes, Transference, , , , , , , 16 Comments
Read more...

What is in a Name (?): of Roses, Storm-breakers, and a Jung Man

“A rose by any other name... “ is not a rose actually, it may look like a rose, smell like a rose, draw blood as a roughly grasped rose is want to do, but, you will grant, it simply cannot be a ‘rose’. A passage (a footnote to be precise) from Jung’s essay on synchronicity[1] made quite an impression on me when I came across it a few years ago. It has to do with that very strange...

April 28, 2013
By Individuation, Jungian Themes, , , , 6 Comments
Read more...

Personal Branding and the Jungian Persona

Jung identified the persona as the bridge between the ego and the external world; in just the same way as the anima forms the bridge to the inner world. The persona is simply your public personality, the face you show the world. The better developed your persona is the better you will get on in the world. This is a generalisation and suffers the limitations of any generalisation. Naturally some people get on pretty well with a very poorly developed...

April 7, 2013
By Jungian Themes, Persona, , 9 Comments
Read more...

What Story are You Telling (?): a Peek Behind the Scenes of Personal Narratives.

I want to share an exercise with you that I have found to be quite illuminating.[1] This exercise, seemingly very simple (almost simplistic), provides a powerful tool to examine the nature of the story you are telling. This exercise can help you to: Locate yourself and your narrative. Discover what archetype/s you are constellating in your personal narrative. Better understand what it means (i.e. how it feels and influences) to constellate an archetype in your narrative and sense of identity. Perhaps most importantly...

February 4, 2013
By Archetypes, Jungian Themes, Narrative Analysis, Practically, , , 6 Comments
Read more...

The Master: sex, love and scientology

I recently watched the film The Master, a the second time with Anja (the love of my life). [1]  It is an exceptional movie, well worth a second viewing. The first time I saw it what captured me were the outstanding performances by Joaquin Phoenix and Phillip Seymour Hoffman. The film and the acting have been received with widespread critical acclaim and the biggest opening day ticket sale revenue of an art house film in the States. I would say the performance...

January 3, 2013
By Book and Movie Reviews, Individuation, Jungian Themes, , , 2 Comments
Read more...