Very often, women are crucified within themselves—torn between showing their feelings to the men who anger them or holding those feelings in. Unfortunately, there is no single right answer. Both are true. Both are rays of a “just sun” that is fair precisely because it shines in both directions. Today, I am sharing only one […]
This article is a continuation of the previous publications Images of Light, The Snow Queen and the Devil’s Mirror, and From Nigredo to Albedo, in which I explore the spiritual dimension of human projections. What this piece adds to this vital topic is an understanding of their archetypal foundation and how the process of their […]
The essential principle of synchronicity is that events occur simultaneously inside and outside of us, and that these events are meaningfully related. Synchronicity is an expression of a coincidence in time of contents with the same meaning, manifested in different forms—psychic and material. As Jungian analysts say, there is no clear boundary between matter and […]
And if, from a spiritual perspective, despair contains a hidden blessing, then at times emerging from its depths may carry a danger of its own. I hesitated for quite a while before deciding whether to share this insight into the dynamics of inner processes—an insight that also comes from Jungian analysis, and more specifically […]
“Coniunctio takes place in the underworld; it happens in the dark, when there is no light left at all. When you are completely desperate and consciousness has gone, something is born — in the deepest depression, in the deepest despair, a new personality is born. When you are at the very end of your strength, […]
There is something very important that people who have begun the process of spiritual transformation should know: this process lasts a long time. Very long. Discouragingly long. So long that one always passes through a stage of despair. This is why serious books in the field of spirituality do not give easy recipes like “do […]
The process of spiritual transformation begins with Nigredo—the darkness that enters our lives, dressed in various forms of psychological suffering: depression, fear, a sense of powerlessness and emptiness, loneliness and isolation, unrequited love, and jealousy. The awakening from the trance of the senses, fixated on the world of matter, is triggered by the alarm of […]
Science cannot provide an answer to the question of the care of the soul. This has traditionally been the domain of religion and mythology. This, however, does not apply to the concept of individuation in the analytical psychology of Carl Jung, which he formulated through his study of the fundamental symbols of religion and mythology. […]
“Every psychological truth is only a half-truth, and this too is only a half-truth.”C. G. Jung In a previous article, I shared how, as a child, I used to daydream that I would become a doctor who healed people by pulling white worms out of their heads. I remembered this fantasy many years later, after […]
**“The insight we gain by turning toward ourselves is very bitter, and that is why very few people do it; it is pikros—bitter—because it corrodes and is unacceptable to the illusions of consciousness. We speak of ‘bitter knowledge,’ ‘bitter realization,’ and ‘bitter truth,’ because self-knowledge is a bitter initial experience… …the truth given by the […]
When the soul (the individuation impulse) awakens, we are called to learn a new way of making decisions. Previously, our choices were guided by conventional notions of right and wrong. We knew what was good and what was evil, and we acted accordingly. Yet the awakening of the soul comes with the dissolution of everything […]
Or what is found at the bottom of depression Here’s something else from Jung’s analytical psychology, which for me lately has been the most valuable resource for understanding how to take care of the soul (the path of individuation). In this article, I examine the relationship between depressive states and the archetype of the Self […]
