Workshop & Lecture—November 19 & 20, 2010

The Center for Jungian Studies of South Florida is pleased to present James Hollis, Ph.D., Jungian Analyst & Author, for a special Lecture and Workshop on November 19-20, 2010, at the Riverside Hotel, in Fort Lauderdale.  In the evening session on Friday, Dr. James Hollis will introduce the characteristics of a more considered life. During the day-long workshop on Saturday, he will explore the most important aspects of life, that we respect the power of Eros; that we step into largeness; that we accept that our home is our journey, among others.
Before each of our events, the Center, requests an interview with the presenter to get the word out about the upcoming opportunity to learn more about Jung’s Analytical Psychology and how it applies to ourselves and our world.

James Hollis is a Zurich-trained, licensed Jungian analyst in private practice in Houston, TX, where he served as Executive Director of the Jung Educational Center. Dr. Hollis is one of the most widely published Jungian authors with 13 books, including Archetypal Imagination, Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life, and his most recent work, What Matters Most: Living a More Considered Life. 

Interview with James Hollis, Living a More Considered Life

CJSSF: Why the title, “What Matters Most”? And how is it that you came to write this book?

JH: I am getting to be an old guy now, and it is the privilege, and the duty, of this stage of life to step back and reflect a bit on the bigger picture, and what, if anything, one has learned along the way.  Being thoughtful about these matters is important at any stage, but a more considered life will ask of each of us to really sort through and discern what matters most to us.  I do not presume to tell others what ought to matter most to them, but I do wish to provoke them to pause from time to time and radically review what does matter to them, and whether where they are investing their energies serves those values.

CJSSF: The preface of your most recent book, What Matters Most, ends with a thought-provoking excerpt from T. S. Eliot’s “The Dry Salvages”:
Fare forward, travelers! Not escaping from the past

Into indifferent lives, or into any future….

Not to farewell,

But fare forward, voyagers.
How does this poem reflect the main message of your book?

JH: As young persons, we all believed there were definitive answers to life’s puzzles and challenges.  The older we get the more we realize there are no final answers, although there may be personal discoveries which make sense to us, and that our life is more a journey toward larger and larger questions.  Lived thusly, we are living a developmental, enlarging life and not one in which we have died before we died.   Any certainties we do acquire are for now only, and may be replaced by ever more challenging experiences.

CJSSF: In your first chapter, “Shock and Awe: That Life Not Be Governed by Fear,” you note, “But in every moment of certainty, every privileging of fractal consciousness, every necessary hubris, we also know something else!” What is it that we also know?

JH: We all know, intuitively, that we are meant to step into the full package, the full investment in our journeys.   It is not wrong to be fearful for fear, after all, is a by-product of our fragility and dependency as children, and fortunately we are creatures of infinite adaptation in service to survival.   But we may also grow imprisoned by those adaptations, the patterns of avoidance or compliance that, once protective, now are constrictive.   We all know, intuitively, that we are asked to “show up” in our lives, and serve the vocation it asks of us.

CJSSF: Chapter four of you book focuses on our need to respect Eros. Some people may interpret this to mean that we must respect the power of Love or Relationship. What do you mean when you refer to Eros, and how is Eros associated with what matters most?  

JH: Eros is the life force. One of its many forms is sexuality, but it is also expressed through creativity, and the will to push through what oppresses us; and while it may take delight in beauty, relationship, and the transcendent, it also is the tough force which refuses to quit, refuses to relinquish this opportunity for fuller expression.

CJSSF: In your eighth chapter you discuss our need to follow our creative urgencies and to find joy in our “foolish passions.” Could you talk about the role of creativity and passion in the pursuit of what matters most?

JH: Joy, and happiness, are not goals in themselves, but they are the by-product of those moments when we are doing what is really right for us.  We may will ourselves to many necessary things, thank goodness, but in the end, the autonomy of our psyche will weigh in with its own judgment.   Thus the feeling function and the energy systems are continuous, autonomous evaluative processes.    Passion comes from the Latin passio, which means suffering.   Much of our most meaningful experience will come out of suffering, the suffering of birthing a baby, the suffering of creativity, the suffering of finding our path, whatever its cost.

CJSSF: In you chapter on writing our own stories, you note that, “Personhood is not a gift; it is a continuing struggle….” I can imagine that some people might think of “personhood” as an exceptionally abstract concept while others might regard it as more of a trait or someone’s static character. What do you mean by the term “personhood” in this book, and how does it relate to the theme of what is most important in life?

JH: In his essay on personality, by which he meant, personhood, Jung noted that it has a claim on us equal to a divine summons.  It means subordinating the ego’s fantasy of control, sovereignty, and comfort to embody what divinity, or nature, wishes to bring into this world through us.  When we see our being here on this planet as a form of service to such transcendent energies, we may not have a comfortable life, but we will have found our myth.

CJSSF: In your concluding paragraph, you include what I know is one of your favorite phrases from Rilke: “To have been here, to have wrestled with such things, to have lived such questions, to have kept the mystery before us, to have joyfully accepted being ‘defeated by ever-larger things’….is, finally, what matters most.” What comes to your mind when you read your own last paragraph and particularly Rilke’s admonition to experience defeat in the presence of ever-larger things?

JH: This is the path of growth, not in service to material comfort or ego satisfaction, but to  have stepped into a larger engagement with mystery.   The historic function of tribal myth and institutional religion was to induct a person into these mysteries.   If these forms still achieve this outcome, then the person is well-served; if not, he or she will be obliged to undertake a personal path of discovery. We are most fully alive when most fully swimming in the unknown.

CJSSF: I will often have a client who complains that someone else who they know, someone else who appears identified with social image, making money, their professions, raising children, or any of a number of other activities, does not suffer as he or she, my patient, does. The client will bemoan the fact that these friends, relatives or spouses appear much more confident in their ability to ascertain what is most important to them and even appear to be happy. What does one say as a therapist, or even as a friend or confidant, to such an individual that is consonant with the points you make in your book? 

JH: We can never know from outside a person’s life whether the journey they are living is the one intended for them by divinity or nature or not.   A friend once said that she wished she could just be a “happy carrot.”   She wasn’t given that option by the gods.   Our task is to be accountable for our own journeys, and the thousand choices we make daily.  That is enough good work to keep us busy, and perhaps to make us less annoying to our neighbors.

Interview by Constance-Avery Clark, Ph.D., CJSSF Board Member

CJSSF: Speaking of the differences between Dream Tending and classical Jungian dream interpretation, Jeanne asked the following questions:

Jeanne: When I watch you dream tending, what fascinates me most is how you shape-shift: the manner in which you physically change your physical being as you listen to the dream. I have witnessed you seeing the image, sometimes when it is not even in the narrative of the dream. So, if you could speak to that magical ability, I think it would serve anyone attempting to work with dreams.

Steve:   Not magical, but imaginal.  When I develop an image-centered relationship with the figures, by that I mean entering their world on their terms, images come to life, present themselves, say “Here we are.”  On the other hand, when or if we meet the dream for the purposes of interpreting or analyzing, then we’re going to bring our conscious mind into relationship with the material or content of the dream. At that moment, the visitation is lost, the actuality of its presence disappears.   To witness the activity of a living image is a very different mode of perceiving and a quality of relationship is needed. The “trick” is to meet the dream in the way of the dream. When I bring a dream-like consciousness to the dream then one thing happens; and if I bring a rational, active mind for the purposes of interpreting the dream, then something else altogether takes place. It’s not that interpretation or analysis is bad, it’s just that my preference is to first let the dream come forward to show itself as its Self, as an embodied enactment; then, secondly, to bring my capacity for insight or analysis. I think that is what you are most likely noticing. It really is a different mode all together. It’s a mode of perception that is anchored in an imaginal consciousness rather than an active, rational mind.

Jeanne: How do you teach that or suggest that people wishing to get there begin the process?

Steve: There are about four core skills that I suggest experimenting with. One is curiosity. When we get curious, we get interested.  Rather than jumping so quickly to what we think the dream means, we get curious and follow the activity of the images and the figures of the dream.  Curiosity takes us to a very different place all together. The second, along with curiosity, is a way of listening. One way of listening is to listen for the purposes of offering an answer. So, we’re already rehearsing what the answer or the response will be before we have even listening fully to what is being presented. It’s a question of taking a deep breath, getting anchored, and becoming receptive and responsive: listening first and allowing the conversation to emerge out of the silence, rather than using our mind to fill the space. Responsive listening is the second skill. The third is to really pay attention to detail or the particularity. Rather than seeing each image is the same—for example, the elephant, or even the house—noticing how each image comes with its particular distinction.  When we view every house or creature or elephant or animal as the same, one thing happens: we go into a kind of explanatory system and begin to categorize these images. On the other hand, if we notice that each house is different in its own details and that each animal or creature has its own particularity or uniqueness or oddity, then we slow down, take the time to watch and look and carefully notice its activity; we become part of the dreamscape, part of the presentation that psyche has in mind.  The fourth core skill is patience.  In order for images to reveal who they are, we must slow down and be patient.  With patience, images will reveal what they offer from the inside out.

Jeanne: One phrase that has resonated with me for a long time that you often say is that “the body is always dreaming.”

Steve: I have a couple of ideas about that. I don’t think dreams originate in our rational mind. They originate from a deeper source. On one dimension, when there’s something going on in our body—upset stomach, maybe a place in our back where we’re feeling tight, or at the onset of a cold or flu, or more seriously, something like a cancerous growth. The body is always going to have its symptoms and the psyche is going to pick up those symptoms and most likely will be presented in the imagery of dreams. On that level, the body is always dreaming because what’s going on in the body is represented imaginatively or symbolically in the dreamtime. So, when we listen to dreams, we are always listening to the body talk about itself in one way or the next. On another dimension, images themselves come with body. They are alive and active and they walk about; and they breathe and have pulse. They certainly are not incarnate like our bodies, but in an imaginal context–in the world of dream—they’re very interactive and very embodied. So, in that context images come with body—will have emotion or feeling. It’s not only we who have emotions in response to the image. Images will come with emotions to begin with and then in turn create an affect inside of us. It’s simply a different way of appreciating dream and it’s not esoteric. It’s very ‘just so.’ When we take the time to listen to dream or to watch the actuality of the dream presentation, we see images walking about affecting one another, one figure impacting another figure. The same thing happens when we walk through a dreaming landscape.  The very spirit of place has an affective presence.  So, I think that images are filled with emotions and feelings; and they tend to evoke us or our response, as well. As embodied images ourselves, we then can allow our bodies to move with gesture or even with dance to greet the image. Then, in a curious way, we are interpreting the dream—not through words or through our mind-—but through our bodies. We’re meeting the image body of the dream with our bodies. That kind of interaction I find quite important and useful. 

Stephen Aizenstat, Ph.D. is the founding president of Pacifica Graduate Institute, a private graduate school offering masters and doctoral programs in psychology, mythological studies, and the humanities. Dr. Aizenstat is a Clinical Psychologist, a Marriage and Family Therapist, and the creator of Dream Tending, which is a method of working with the figures and landscapes of dreams as “living images.”

The interviewer, Jeanne M. Schul, M.A., first met Dr. Aizenstat at a DreamTending introductory workshop in Atlanta, GA. It was so inspiring that she immediately signed up for his six-month professional training program in Santa Barbara, CA. That began her cross-country travel that continued for three and a half years, while she pursued her doctoral coursework in Depth Psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute. She is currently working on her dissertation, which focuses on Creating Dances from Dreams. Jeanne gave permission for the Center to take excerpts from her entire interview for this presentation.

CJSSF: What is Active Imagination and where did the term originate?

LvD: Perhaps the simplest definition of Active Imagination is to say that it gives us the opportunity to open negotiations with forces or figures within the unconscious. In my understanding, Active Imagination is when we consciously focus on contents within the unconscious and how they relate to ourselves, our inner life and our outer life.  In 1913 Dr. Jung had some dreams he did not understand. Then he conceived of symbolic thinking, beginning two years of what he later called Active Imagination. It was in the atmosphere during these years, as there were others who were also working with images and allowing them to appear. We can see Dr. Jung’s process in his Liber Novus, or The Red Book, that was published this past October.

CJSSF: What distinguishes Active Imagination from Passive Imagination?

LvD: With Active Imagination, we consciously allow images to spontaneously connect with us from the depths of our psyche. We recognize them and allow them to connect with our life in a conscious, creative, healing way. We participate with them. These images can come from dreams, deep emotion, fantasy, or even come forth from a painful place in our body. Passive Imagination would be more connected with daydreaming.

CJSSF: Why is it important to give the Imagination physical form, such as painting, sculpture, dance, dramatic encasements or through creation of ritual?

LvD: There are various ways to be with the image. It varies from individual to individual. By giving the image physical form we allow it to come closer to consciousness. The goal is learning to let things happen. When we give an image from our unconscious physical form, it impresses it on our memory, and, it helps us to be more aware of synchronistic phenomena in our life.

CJSSF: Would you share with us some of your first experiences with Active Imagination?

LvD: After I was asked to speak on this topic, I first asked my Soul if it was the “right” thing to do. It was said to me in a dream, “It is important to speak and to tell your experiences”. Since I must listen to the dream, on March 20, I will be sharing some of the stories from throughout my life pertaining to listening, and to living the image.

Linda van Dyck, M.Div. Ph.D, earned a degree in Analytical Psychology at the C.G. Jung Institute. She studied and worked in Switzerland for ten years after completing a Masters of Divinity, in psychology and counseling from Yale University Divinity School. A member of International Association of Analytical Psychology, The Association of Graduate Analytical Psychology and a senior training analyst with the IRS-JA, she is in private practice in Palm Beach, FL. She presents retreats, workshops and speaks on various topics of Jungian Psychology. 

Center Interviewer:  Ann Q. Lynch, Board Member

1. CJSSF: In your book The Way of the Small, you include a charming little box after each chapter with the title “Potent Quotes.” They present, in a small font, the quotes that you have chosen to accompany the chapters. These two quotes by Jung, above, although not in the boxes, seem very powerful in regards to the content of your book. Could you explore them and share your thoughts with us?

MG: There is a tendency, particularly from the influence of Eastern religion and its occasional misinterpretation by Westerners, to believe that the ego needs to be transcended, that one should be beyond or without ego. That is not only erroneous, but dangerous. You need a strong ego to survive and find fulfillment in life. That is why so much of analysis is concerned with building a strong ego and ego skills. Without a strong ego, one cannot confront the unconscious; one will be overwhelmed by it. Merely, one should have a strong but small ego, meaning that the ego’s ambitions, attachments, and inflation (“ego tripping”) should be kept to a minimum so that the ego does not get in its own way and obstruct a healthy relationship with the unconscious and the world. That is the way of the small and addresses the first quote.
The second quote speaks to how when the ego is made to feel small, often by some diminishing ordeal such as failure, depression, a health crisis, or loss of a loved one, it gets out of its own way so as to have an encounter with the unconscious that leads to some new insight or deepening awareness. The Self—that higher intelligence within the psyche that sends us our most illuminating dreams and guides us to realize our hidden capacities—can then emerge unobstructed. And reversely, when the Self emerges, it is itself a diminishing experience for the ego. The ego recognizes that it doesn’t really run the show, that its deepest wisdom is not its own, that it is all too human and frail. Religious experience, which comes from the Self, liberates the ego by defeating it through a realization that it is not the center of the universe, but, like the earth, just a small planet revolving around a much greater source of energy and light (namely, the Self). The realization of the Self always defeats our ego-centricity. Embracing this realization with its defeat is also the way of the small.

2. CJSSF: You mention and quote musicians, among them, Bob Dylan: “I make a song as small or as narrow as possible rather than make it a big, broad, grand thing. By keeping it so narrow, emotion plays a great part.” One classic of the Japanese literature is The Narrow Road to the Interior, by Matsua Basho, the story of a man pursuing simple life. Also, in Matthew 7:13 we read: “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.” What would be your comments about the way of the “narrow” connected to the way of the “small”?

MG: The way of the narrow is the way of the small. They’re synonymous. “Narrow” alludes to what this path or way looks like when you’re facing or traveling it; “small” alludes to the attitude and behavior on one’s part when facing and traveling it.

3. CJSSF: Would you recommend any additional reading material to those attending the lecture on February 13th and interested in the topics that your book approaches?

MG: There is a comprehensive list of books in the Notes at the back of The Way of the Small. Mystics such as Meister Eckhart and the Zen masters all trumpet the way of the small, as do American masters such as Henry David Thoreau and Abraham Lincoln. One book that nicely “says it all” is the Tao Te Ching; Stephen Mitchell’s recent translation is very inspiring.

Michael Gellert, M.A., LCSW, is a Jungian analyst in private practice in Los Angeles andPasadena. Former Director of Training at the C. G. Jung Institute of Los Angeles, he taught atVanier College and Hunter College. A Zen practitioner for 30 years, he is the author of Modern Mysticism, The Fate of America, and The Way of the Small

CJSSF Interview conducted by Lucia Leao, Board Member.

Interview by Lucia Leao, CJSSF Board Member

 THE CENTER: From the description of the workshop we learn that there will be a discussion about what “writing with the camera” means. “Youth without Youth” was based on a novella by Mircea Eliade. Are you referring to the adaptation of a written material to the screen or to what Coppola calls “poetry” in this movie, i.e. the movie as a poem?
CRESPI: I would say one derives from the other… and Scott responded very well to this question!

FEASTER: American films are valued and marketed as genres, or types of film, or perhaps based on stars. European films are valued for directors, whose main means of expression is the camera. Images in a film bear a different scrutiny from words on the printed page. In his chapter entitled, “Two Kinds of Thinking” in Vol.5, Collected Works, Jung differentiates fantasy thinking (images) from directed thinking. Participants of the workshop might review Jung’s ideas. Yes, the film is Coppola’s “fantasia” on the novel, so it is in a sense, “poetry”. But as a film critic, I would like to add that we can also use “image” more broadly to mean the film’s design, including cinematography, sound, & scoring. These qualities create the emotional atmosphere of the film, so important for Eros.

THE CENTER: While talking about “Youth without Youth,” Coppola also said that the “Orientals understood that life isn’t quite up and down as we think it is.” Do you think it was an act of courage to try to explore this concept as deeply as he did on the horizontal sceen of the movie theater or flat-screen TV? What was the greatest accomplishment of this task?

CRESPI: The ability to translate the deep and dense words of Eliade’s novella into deeply moving images.

FEASTER: I must defer to someone more competent than I to elucidate the Buddhist content of the film, although the aware laymen can surely grasp the theme of whether we reincarnate or not, which lies at the heart of the film’s narrative. But yes, Coppola as a Westerner must have had to leave his comfort zone. That having been said, I want again to add that film is not a matter solely of psychological analysis but of art. I think that it is in the domain of the new stylistic and technical elements of the film that its originality and pleasure lies.

THE CENTER: We will also talk about what age teaches about creativity. And what does creativity in this movie show about aging?

CRESPI: The fascination with the mystery of time, the eternal fantasy of having “the advantages of youth with the privileges of age.”

FEASTER: Creativity is such a mystery that no single answer to the question is adequate. A film series at the Brooklyn Academy of Music on “The Late Film” gave us the idea for the workshop. Some of the films screened we shall excerpt in the morning workshop. Perhaps, the goal of our conversation shall be to try to elucidate a little the mystery of creativity. A. O. Scott characterized the quality of late works in his review of the Brooklyn Academy series with his felicitous title, “Directors in their Magic Hour.”

THE CENTER: Is creativity represented by the young woman, by the main character’s double or by both?

CRESPI: For me the young woman can be seen as the anima (the creative feminine, the inspiratrix) and the “double” as the capacity or the “instinct” (as Jung Called it) of reflection.

FEASTER: More than creativity, I would say that the term “anima” works for Veronica and shadow for The Double — especially, if we take these terms not as absolutes but tools that help us to discern levels of meaning in the narrative. I would not be comfortable to make either character an allegory or “representation.” Veronica is real in her own right, and the Double states that he is not the Devil but a metaphysical reality which is beyond empirical proof-and I would believe him.

THE CENTER: In an interview, Coppola said that the movie is “a love story wrapped in a mystery.” Is the mystery kept intact even after we finish watching “Youth without Youth”? Does the main character unveil its own mystery?

CRESPI: I would like to return the question to you! I think that each one in the audience ends up seeing a “different” movie in a certain sense… I am always amazed by the way in which one person is struck by a detail or a scene of a movie that leaves another one completely untouched. So the question of the mystery kept intact or not will be answered in different ways by each spectator. Personally, I like to play with the options that Coppola (Eliade?) leaves open to our imagination.

FEASTER: The auteur theory began as a self-conscious attempt to treat film not just as entertainment but as expressing a director’s self-conscious world view. In a genre film, like “The Godfather,” Coppola, could be assured of an audience (those who like gangster films) but also of a vehicle to express his view of the corruption of American capitalism. Now, in an independent film, self-financed, his auteur pretense seems more humble. This is a critic’s answer to the ‘mystery’ question.

THE CENTER: The symbol of the Rose appears so significant in the film. And there are three roses. Would you care to comment on the symbol of the rose and/or the number three?

CRESPI: The red rose may have been chosen because the color of a red rose indicates giving of one’s self for the purpose of greater evolvement. Red also indicates the material plane that we are now living on.

The rose is mentioned all throughout ancient history. There is evidence that the Romans imported masses of roses from Egypt. There are also stories of Cleopatra having the floor of the banquet hall carpeted with roses 2 feet deep for Mark Anthony. In the Song of Solomon in the Bible, it is written, “I am the rose of Sharon…” along with in Isaiah, “I rejoice and blossom as the rose…” These are early clues that the rose has always been a sacred symbol. When researching the symbolism of the rose, one finds many interpretations. The rose carries the meaning of purity or heavenly, passion, transmutation, completion, of consummate achievement and perfection in addition to being an ancient symbol of joy. Today most people think of the rose as a symbol for love. It is all of these meanings. When secret societies and gatherings met in medieval times, a rose was hung from the ceiling at a meeting indicating a demand for discretion. In Roman times the rose was sacred to Venus. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the symbolism changed with the rise of Christianity and the ancient meanings were changed when the Catholic Church began incorporating them into their beliefs. Instead of belonging to Venus, the rose became the flower of the Virgin Mary and she was deemed to be the Rosa mystica. It is definitely a feminine symbol.

The number three is usually considered a “symbol” of process or movement . . . In this case it could be towards individuation or a transformation of consciousness . . .

FEASTER: Interpreting the third rose as a symbol both fits the critical criterion of narrative context and Jung’s idea of the objective reality of the non-space-time realm in Memories, Dreams and Reflections, namely a visitation to the living of the dead.

RELATED READING:

Scott Feaster and Roger Jerome Radloff Jung Goes to the Movies 
Scott Feaster In Search of the Rose: CG Jung Meets Orson Welles
John Beebe The Presence of the Feminine in Film

Center Interviewer: Lucia, Leao, MA

Lucia Leao: In the movie “The Lives of Others,” the turning point for Wieler is when he listens to Sonata for a Good Man, played on the piano by Dreyman, the playwright. It seems that in that scene he is at the same time getting in touch with his Shadow¹ and with his Anima². According to Jung, that is the order in which one gets closer to the Self. What would you say makes music so powerful in this process?

Danila Crespi: Music is the language of emotion par excellence, a universal language everybody understands, where reason, the rational, has little influence. And emotion (e motion) moves us. In the film, the music – Sonata for a Good Man – is a complex and haunting piece. It is tender and at the same time powerful, it seems to trigger a state akin to a meditation, taking Wieler to some deep place where mysterious connections occur. And, yes, that moment is a turning point, it is the beginning of a transformation, and we, the spectators, are there to observe how this man slowly separates himself from that collectiv“ism” he has lived in and for all his life, and begins to assume the responsibility and the path of the ‘individual’ that he truly is.

LL:The theme for the 2008-2009 program of the Center of Jungian Studies of South Florida is “Image and Individuation – Jung’s Path to the Self.” Wieler’s contact with the lives of others is made through sounds (music and words) and not visual images. Would you say that the process of transformation presented in the movie is more intense (or less intense) because of that?

DC: In the movie, Wieler hears and doesn’t see. He hears the words (and the music) of others, but he is not a man of many words himself. Yet we, the viewers, are subtly, and yet powerfully, informed by what we see. I think that the visual images, the treatment of the color palette, are profoundly telling in this movie, especially as they guide us in establishing the differences between Wieler the “collective man” and Dreyman “the artist”. For example, the contrast between Wieler’s apartment and the interior of Dreyman’s place immediately tells the viewer about the absence of soul in Wieler’s life. The sequence of the quick visit of the prostitute also says so much about the total absence of Eros in that poor man’s world . . . One could say that, as the sounds, the music, the words, penetrate Wieler’s psyche, his inner images begin to form . . . and transform.

LL: The transformation process occurs also for Dreyman, the playwright, and also through music. It is interesting to know that Sebastian Koch, who plays Dreyman, had never played piano before, learned to play Sonata for an Old Man and played it in the movie. He also ended up purchasing a “grand piano” for his home, and to this date it is the only piece that he plays, albeit in a marvelous way! Would you comment on how, in Jungian terms, the process of individuation³ of one person may create a chain effect and bring about changes of a bigger dimension?

DC: I would like to quote Jung when he says: “ … the bond established by the transference – however hard to bear and however unintelligible it may seem – is vitally important not only for the individual but also for society, and indeed for the moral and spiritual progress of mankind.” “Individuation has two principal aspects: in the first place it is an internal and subjective process of integration, and in the second, it is an equally indispensable process of objective relationship.” So, you see, the process of individuation carries inherently a supreme responsibility!

LL: Would you say a few words about why you chose this movie for the movie discussion?

DC: I can’t really say much, since it was not a very reflected choice. When suggesting films for this next season, it sort of came spontaneously to my mind. I had been deeply moved by the film when I first saw it (by the way I remember seeing it the Sunday afternoon right before the Oscar ceremony where it won the award for best foreign film!) and was equally moved the second and third time I watched it. It is masterfully produced and directed, and acted, it touches on so many layers of complexity of the human psyche, of life in the outer world of our society and life in the inner world of our privacy. And then, it turned out to fit to a “T” with the topic of this 08-09 program at the Center: “Image and Individuation – Jung’s Path to the Self.”

Danila Crespi, MA, LMHC, is a Jungian Analyst practicing in South Beach. She was a founding member of Venezuelan society of Jungian Analysts and is the Training Director of the Florida Association of Jungian Analysts and a member of the Inter-Regional Society of Jungian Analysts. She has a multi-lingual practice with a special interest in psychological readings of myth, film and the arts.

Definitions for Jungian terms that appear in this interview. From Jung’s Map of the Soul, by Murray Stein.

¹ Shadow: The rejected and unaccepted aspects of the personality that are repressed and form a compensatory structure to the ego’s self ideals and to the persona.

² Anima: The archetypal images of the eternal feminine in a man’s unconscious that forms a link between ego-consciousness and the collective unconscious and potentially opens a way to the self.

³ Individuation: The process of the psychic development that leads to the conscious awareness of wholeness. Not to be confused with individualism.

CJSSF: You have an unusual resume, being a financial advisor and also a spiritual director. How do these two aspects relate to each other?

Patrick Parham: I sometimes refer to myself as a recovering capitalist. The first half of life has to be about building a personality, leaving home, finding a mate, creating an identity. In males, particularly in this culture, that involves competition and the measure of your success is measured in money. By about 30 one has learned all that one can from success, in the second half of life we learn from love and suffering. If one gets stuck in a first half head in the second half of life individuation slows down. I believe this applies to nations as well as individuals. My own life led to an inward journey filled with the psychology of Jung and a revisiting of my own religious and spiritual tradition. I see my life as a progression one leads to the other. If one is to be aware, awake and conscious one has to do the work. You have to go within.

Patrick Parham, M.A., spent 25 years in global trade, headquartered in New York while also living in Japan, Switzerland, and Jamaica. He currently teaches at St. Thomas University and is a trained Spiritual Director. Patrick also serves as Treasurer of the Center for Jungian Studies of South Florida.