Fall 2015 Archives - Oregon Friends of Jung

Synchronicity: Nature & Psyche in an Interconnected Universe

What are the academic and scientific roots of Jung’s psychology? How does his psychology hold up today? Jung’s 1912 Fordham lectures on the “Theory of Psychoanalysis” represent Jung’s growing theoretical differentiation from Freud. Soon after delivering these lectures, Jung resigned his position at the University of Zurich (in 1914) and did not fully resume academic work until 1933. In between these periods Jung underwent the inner experiences that led to the development of The Red Book.

Examination and comparison of these two periods reveal a tremendous shift in emphasis on what constituted science for Jung. In this lecture we will look at this shift and how Jung’s experiences leading to The Red Book were integral to this change. The scientific tradition associated with the German Romantic movement is key to understanding Jung’s transition. His rich friendship with Wolfgang Pauli, as well as the rise of the New Sciences of Field Theory, also influenced Jung’s model of the psyche and his contributions on Synchronicity. We will explore the resurging interest, re-valuation, and further understanding of Jung’s contributions in light of some branches of contemporary science, especially Complexity Theory with its concept of Emergence, and epigenetics, the study of non-DNA transmission of hereditary information, as a form of somatic, collective memory.

Self-organization, Emergence and Synchronicity in Analytical Psychology

Many of us have experienced synchronicities without truly having tools to grasp what underlies these events. As an integral part of bringing The Red Book to a close, Jung formulated the concept of synchronicity. We will reconsider this cosmological principle in the light of a new scientific paradigm. The study of complex adaptive systems, in particular, affords a unique opportunity to reassess and revise several of Jung’s key concepts, including synchronicity, in line with his own evolving model of the psyche. In this workshop we will review and apply these concepts to experiences of the interactive field in analysis. We will observe self-organizing processes in analysis which lead to experiences of emergence in which what happens goes beyond the sum of the contributions by either analyst or analysand. In this vein, we will draw upon clinical presentation of the use of empathy, enactments, parallel processes and moments of complexity, including synchronistic occurrences within the context of analysis.

Living a Conscious Life

What makes a conscious life? Before becoming conscious, things just happen. When we challenge habits and patterns that constrain our lives, we begin to find inner authority; life gains greater choice, purpose, and meaning. Even those aspects of experience that we don’t want and would never choose, can be made meaningful. This lecture explores how to claim inner authority, navigate change, loss, and suffering, and step into the journey of a lifetime — becoming who you truly are.

Individuation, Impermanence, Imperfection

Individuation is Carl Jung’s term for finding meaning and purpose in life. How do you know when you are on the right path? Why do big ideas about achievement and enlightenment just get in the way? When can you trust your inner guide and when must you apply discipline and ethics to curb the urgings of unruly instincts? Jung believed we find meaning through the struggle with confounding oppositions, such as good/evil, love/hate, inner/outer. In this workshop we will relate Jungian psychology to the Zen perspective of Wabi-Sabi. We will explore the necessity and beauty of flaws and failings, of things modest and humble. Lecture, discussion, and practical exercises will help cultivate appreciation for what is impermanent, imperfect, and unfinished in life.

Suggested Reading: Wabi-Sabi: for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers by Leonard Koren

Psychic Birth and Rebirth through Analysis

“The neurosis is as a rule a pathological, one-sided development of the personality, the imperceptible beginnings of which can be traced back almost indefinitely into the earliest years of childhood. Only a very arbitrary judgment can say where the neurosis actually begins. If we were to relegate the determining cause as far back as the patient’s prenatal life, thus involving the physical and psychic disposition of the parents at the time of conception and pregnancy—a view that seems not at all improbable in certain cases—such an attitude would be more justifiable than the arbitrary selection of a definite point of neurotic origin in the individual life of the patient” (Jung, CW 16, 257-258).

“The whole life of the individual is nothing but the process of giving birth to himself; indeed, we should be fully born when we die.” Erich Fromm

Birth and rebirth are powerful themes that can shape a person’s development within analysis at any age and stage of life. They contain timeless and profound archetypal and developmental meanings that stimulate our development and relationship to the Self. This lecture will focus on ideas regarding birth and rebirth, and their expression in analysis. The ways that analysis can give birth to the self will come to life through imagery, session dialogue, and Dr. Marlo’s inner experience in her work with a patient who experienced psychic birth through analysis.

Birth of the Self

How can analysis birth the self?

We will explore this question by illuminating ideas about birth. Nascent stirrings of the Self often initiate the labor of analytic work, which can be influenced by our life stories, including our birth story.

Birth is a topic that is pregnant with meaning. It can be a signifier of the un-symbolized, unimagined, and un-experienced. It can manifest as a regressive, developmental experience, suffused with body or implicit memory. Birth can also act as a symbol or metaphor, and be expressed as a second birth or rebirth. Finally, it may emerge in the efflorescence of self-development involving a more related connection to the Self–a precursor to more complete development, heralding transformations in being and spirit.

These ideas come to life through Dr. Marlo’s presentation of an emergent process of birth, development, and transformation from over 15 years of analysis with a woman who began analysis dissociated from her self/Self.

Using evocative imagery, session dialogue, and Dr. Marlo’s inner experience, this workshop intimately examines what happens behind the consulting room door, allowing participants to reflect on their experience in analysis and examine the practice of analysis and its transformative potential.