Jungian

Garden of Earthly Delights

This is a dream (from “S”) and its amplification by Stephen Anthony Farah from our first The Way of the Dream Workshop held in November 2024: Individuation through Dreamwork, presented by Byron Gaist.DreamI am standing in my house by a large window.  I am holding on tightly to my little dog who creates a lot of domestic issues for me.  My housekeeper (also a domestic image) is standing next to me leaning out the window giving water to some giant...

Michael

Michael Eblen Farah my brother, died on the 4th of June this year, 2019.[1] Whilst a shock, his death was not entirely unexpected. He had a high risk of mortality at the time of his death and in the two or three years preceding it. He battled his entire adult life with depression and generalised anxiety disorder; and, few years ago, was also diagnosed with adult ADHD, which was certainly consistent with his behaviour and lifestyle. These issues,...

The Middle Passage, from Misery to Meaning in Midlife by James Hollis

This book review is by Lynelle Pieterse and will be explored in the bookclub. Follow this link to join the Jungian Bookclub. James Hollis received his Diploma in Analytical Psychology from the C.G. Jung Institute in Zurich, and is the Director of the C.G. Jung Educational Center in Houston, Texas. He is a frequent guest speaker who spends winters in analytic practice and writes during the summers. In his books, he elaborates on the theories of C. G. Jung. Contemplated...

COMPLEX, ARCHETYPE, SYMBOL in the Psychology of C.G. Jung by Jolande Jacobi

This is a book review by Lynelle Pieterse who manages the Jungian Book Club. Click here to buy this book. Complex/Archetype/Symbol in the Psychology of C.G. Jung (Bollingen Series (General))  

Introduction

In the foreword, Jung writes: “…the concept of the archetype has given rise to the greatest misunderstandings.” The book is a discussion about the intricate terms Complex, Archetype, and Symbol and specifically about how they are interrelated. Jolande Jacobi was an associate of C.G. Jung for many years. She is known for...

Anima Possession: Are you a spineless wimp?

This is the second part of two posts on the Classic version of Jung’s Anima and Animus theory in which I condense the information from Marie-Louise von Franz’s book Anima and Animus in Fairy Tales [1]. This post focuses on the malevolent, destructive, dysfunctional Anima and how that affects a man and also attempts to address the approach to take in order to integrate the Anima and thus render her benevolent and constructive. In the classic version of Jungian psychology, the...

Animus Possession: Are you a ball busting bitch?

In preparation for our Anima and Animus Module on the Conscious Living Programme, I re-read Marie Louise von Franz book “Animus and Anima in Fairy Tales”[1]. Whilst it is a fascinating read, I can’t say that I enjoy reading her, since her writing style is very difficult to follow.   I decided to extract the invaluable information from “Animus and Anima in Fairy Tales” into two concise posts that explains the process of integrating the Animus and Anima. This...

The Dark Side of getting to know yourself

Sia, an Australian singer, recently brought out a video that disturbed some people and drew a fair amount of criticism. The video is of an adult male and a young girl fighting in a cage. Sia responded to this criticism by saying that the two actors portray a single person, namely herself, and represent her two warring-self states. It is a wonderful depiction of the war between shadow and ego. Coming to terms with your shadow is hard, unpleasant and...

Living Courageously: a guide for the coward

When I was a kid goddamn I was scared of a lot of shit. I remember one of my best friends in primary school, Ronald[1], and I developed this fantasy that one day we would run away from home together. We were around 11 or 12 years old at the time. Being of a pragmatic nature and knowing that we would need to “live off the land” I advised Ronald that we should pack a lot of spices...

The Painful Experience of Free Will

After Stephen wrote his blog The birth of self, I felt compelled to add my 2 cents worth to the topic. It is quite a hard one to understand, yet very interesting and we have discussed it many times over the years. Does Free Will really exist? Philosophers have been debating the concept of free will for centuries. The main question is, do we have free will? This may sound ridiculous, but let's use the simple example of you deciding to drink...

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...