Jung Society Melbourne Podcast

Chronic Fatigue is a complex, acquired condition whose cause is a topic of muchresearch and debate. The severity of symptoms vary, however, around a quarter ofpeople are unable to leave their home due to the multi-system impacts of ChronicFatigue. In this lecture, Robert shares examples of how Embodied Imagination canbe used to dream the dream onwards. By extending dreams into waking life, hispatients have the opportunity to experience dream characters and objects as bodystates. He explores how placebo responses can be reframed as a meaningfulresponse that can activate self-healing. Please note we include a question answerfrom the end of the lecture as it includes another valuable example of EmbodiedImagination.

The Enclosed Garden is one of the oldest expressions of civilization, and possessesa long and direct relationship to symbolism and mythology. Such a garden creates afertile place of verdant abundance, a haven of peace and quiet, shade and water,order and pleasure and a retreat from a hostile, threatening and chaotic wilderness.The world beyond the wall is boundless, expansive, universal, timeless and chaotic.By contrast, the world within the wall provides us with a sense of palpability of therich dark earth or the ‘erotic' sense of space; senses and feelings of safety, finitudeand individuality: a Temenos for the soul. This lecture explores three images of theEnclosed Garden: the Garden of Eden, the Islamic Garden and the Taoist Garden.The enclosed garden symbolises not only our coming into being, but also our journeyof becoming.

This talk explores ways to engage in climate change conversations to facilitate conscious change. Sally draws on stories from facilitating in depth discussions in a research group, where participants shared their dreams, imaginings, frustrations, grief, hopes, fears and inspirations in relation to climate change. This process enabled participants to reflect on their changing personal and collective myths, while nurturing the awareness required to sustain ongoing climate engagement and action. Engagement with the emotional and existential dimensions of climate change, can open space re-conceptualisation of the problems and innovative solutions.

This lecture discusses the loss of feminine representation, including in the changing myths and religious stories, and its impact on society. It explores challenges for women when they feel alienated from their instinctive femininity and for men when they are only able to connect with their femininity in private. There is a strong call to re-personify the feminine values, for all genders, through the re-evocation of the goddess archetype.

This lecture discusses electronic gambling machines known as “pokies” in Australia, “slot machines” in the United States of America and “fruit machines” in the United Kingdom. It explores their use of symbols, how players may be entranced by the promise of spiritual connection and let down by the lack of revelation. Regulations surrounding electronic gambling machines vary greatly around the world and continue to be the subject of fierce political and social debate in Australia.

This lecture explores the alchemical union of opposites through the symbolism of bees including love and war, sweetness and bitterness, the individual and multiplicity, regeneration and death. Circumambulating the hive is linked with mandala symbolism and the archetype of inner order.

Dionysus the Forgotten God discusses myths of the complex and fragile God, Dionysus - born of both parents and a third time reborn of the underworld. Both the last Olympian and the first to be cast out. Where the qualities of his brother Apollo fit more easily into a patriarchal framework, the qualities of Dionysus as, the sensuous god, are often rejected in the Western world.Music credit: https://www.purple-planet.com/tracks/passport

Illness, Symptom & Individuation approaches the process of integration and healing through experiences of illness and trauma in the life of the body. Mary shares a personal experience of serious, prolonged illness that evaded medical diagnosis for some time. This experience led to an intense period of change where symbolism of the inner world mirrored her experience in the outer world, and led to an embodiment of spirit.

With a focus on the big questions of the human condition – cycles of birth and death, destiny and free will, suffering and the life journey - Maureen weaves her way through ancient rituals in honour of the earth mother and Goddesses with many names, to the rise of the patriarchal era, including the Greek tragedian plays. These plays incorporated the sacred mysteries and fundamental questions, now focused on individual man. The significance of ritual in attending to and supporting our inner struggles toward Selfhood is captured in her discussion of Jung's essay Transformation Symbolism in the Mass. Please note, Maureen does refer to a number of images in the talk, examples of these or similar can be found on the internet. 

In today's talk, Mary works with Zen Buddhist 10 Oxherding Pictures and accompanying poetry to establish a way of ‘being with' the unconscious. These ancient pictures reflect stages an individual might progress to toward enlightenment and a return to the outer world to gift their insight and care back to the community. These images are accessible on the internet. Mary notes how attention to our dreams can convey communication between our conscious everyday reality and our capital ‘S' Self. From a Jungian perspective, the paintings and poetry can be seen as a wonderful metaphor to reflect upon and be with the process of individuation. Beginning with an awareness of something not quite right, a loss of meaning, identity or energy, Mary takes us on a rich journey into the power of dreams to begin an ongoing conversation between our ego and our Self.

In today's talk Annette takes us through a rich array of voices and works that speak to the question of the definitions, potential origins and purpose of the mystical experience and religion. Ranging from perspectives in sociology, neuropsychology, myth, Jung, art and sociobiology, we consider the marked differences between religious and mystical experiences and how surprisingly common the latter are. Annette raises the possibility of a partially physiological basis for a mystical or transliminal temperament and the survival value this possesses both for the individual and society. 

Exploring the many manifestations of mother in our psyche from the Great Mother to the personal mother, the mother complex to the inner mother, Margaret draws our attention to one of the fundamental qualities of the maternal. In this talk, a rich description is provided around the ways that Mother encapsulates a primordial oneness and mystery. The invitation is to consider how we mother the unknown in ourselves, and in our world. Do we embrace mystery with openness and love, or do we attempt to control what we don't know and reject our individuality?

Beginning and ending with personal stories of his experience with depression, Peter guides us through two very different conceptualisations: A modern psychological approach that focuses on getting through depression or depression as somewhat of a curse, and a Jungian imaginative approach that takes note of the generative qualities of ‘transformational' depression. With authenticity, experiential and academic knowledge, Peter conveys the hard earned and positive qualities to be found in a depression that takes us on a journey toward individuation and integration.

In this meaningful talk, Reverend Curran points to the way that imagination enables us to step outside of ourselves and look at ourselves fully. With imagination we can take what we have experienced directly, what resides in our memory and what we haven't experienced, and work with these to produce not only images & possibilities but also changes in our embodied and psychological experiencing. In today's ‘post God present', Lesley highlights the necessity of imagination as a vehicle for understanding and working toward a relationship with the Divine whether you call that God, the universe, the infinite or the soul. She offers a strong claim that imagination is God or, in a softer version, imagination is an aspect of our human being that makes us most like God. 

In today's talk, internationally respected author and Jungian analyst Robert A Johnson speaks about the practice of active imagination, a practice that for C. G. Jung was just as important as working with dreams. With the inclusion of evocative and practical examples, Robert describes the four steps involved in active imagination toward psychological dialogue, integration and balance.  

In today's talk, psychiatrist and specialist child, adolescent and family psychotherapist, Dr Averil Earnshaw takes us on a journey through her innovative theory about the toxic familial waste that can plague our inner psychological space. She describes how family members can experience ‘age-linked major life events' noting that experiences that are ‘undigested', not spoken about or shared in the lives of adult parents, have a tendency of emerging in unexpected crises at the same age for their children. With examples ranging from Mozart to Jung to Alan Turing as well as patient cases, Averil convincingly conveys the psychological work that needs to be done in order to spare our children from unanticipated and unearned struggles.  

Jungian analyst Helen Phillips presents us with an understanding of envy from a powerful perspective, diving deep into the creative as well as destructive possibilities of envy. Drawing on a Jungian conceptualisation of the development of consciousness toward individuation, we encounter the constellation of a new archetype, coined by Brazilian psychoanalyst Carlos Byington. This Alterity Archetype seeks to open a dialogue between consciousness and the Shadow, both our own Shadow and the Shadow as experienced in others. Helen asks us to consider the ways in which envy, once relegated to the Shadow, can inform what lies at the heart of our unlived Self. 

Carl Jung described four different types of consciousness that we all possess. On one axis we have the Thinking and Feeling functions, on another Sensation and Intuition. Individuals and cultures tend to favour one type of consciousness at the expense of another, leaving the complimentary function in the shadows. In this talk, Robert explores our Western, English speaking world's Grail Myth, as a representation of and guide to healing our inferior Feeling function given our culture's over reliance on thinking. Like the famous Fisher King in the Grail Myth, our Feeling consciousness has been wounded. This talk explores the creation and healing of that wound. Please note a very small portion of the talk was re-recorded for quality and there are some occasional audio distortions in the question and answers portion near the end of the talk. 

Dr Peter O'Connor, a retired psychologist with an abiding interest in Jungian Depth Psychology, speaks about the “human fragility and human failure” experienced at the heart of the mid-life crisis. He describes how the first half of life involves a pursuit of the qualities traditionally associated with the sex of one's birth but that in mid-life, those qualities of wholeness that were sacrificed, in order to pursue seemingly masculine or feminine attributes, demand to be recognised and integrated. The appearance of the Anima in men and the Animus in women heralds an opportunity for either a mid-life projection onto the external world (the affair, the career change, the pursuit of intellectual or spiritual fulfillment) and/or the integration of these once abandoned qualities into the Self.  

In this wonderful talk, Joan Harcourt brings the wisdom of Marion Woodman, Jean Shinoda Bolen, Jane Prétat as well as her own life experience and work with older women's groups to the powerful image of the Crone. Once a source of respect, healing and wisdom, with the rise of patriarchy the image of the Crone was diminished and demonised. However, as Joan says, the word ‘Crone' is derived from Corona, the word for Crown. With age and experience, the Crone conveys an ability to sit with conflict; to stay with embodied and imaginal knowing and allow the energy of grounded reality and new options to arise for both women and men. 

With reference to Homer, Hesiod and the Orphics, Dr Chris Gribbin provides a rich exploration of two versions of death and the afterlife in Ancient Greece. Myth captures so much of what humanity understood then and understands now, of how we make sense of the world and each other. Chris conveys how the ancient Greeks did not have a codified system of beliefs and that for many, the ritual act of sacrifice to the gods was far more important than individual ideas. Either way, we all end up in the Underworld and it turns out, one version of the Underworld might be a little bit more hopeful than another. We hope you enjoy this wonderful invitation into the afterlife. 

Today we explore the wonderful Adventures of Pinocchio with Jungian oriented psychotherapist Anne Di Lauro. Anne invites us to consider the powerful archetypal energies and images present within the story including the Child and the Puer Aeternus, the Hero's Journey, the Father, the Anima and the Mother. This talk provides fascinating insights into the developmental experiences of Pinocchio as he moves towards individuation and realness.  

Today we'll be listening to mindfulness therapist Colin Thompson as he takes us on a journey from the origins of Buddhism to modern practice. Ranging from the understandings of the Buddha to Jon Kabat Zinn, W. H. Auden, Ezra Bayda and Carl Jung, Colin describes how mindfulness develops our attention to the present moment. The intersections between Jungian psychology and mindfulness are explored particularly with reference to the Shadow and the Self archetypes. This episode also includes a short mindfulness exercise.  

In today's talk, David Tacey explores the similarities and differences between spiritual experiences and mental illness. He describes the relationship between our sense of a discrete self, the Ego, and a larger sense of an interconnected spiritual self through the Unconscious. From the mystical experience to psychopathology, David details how the Jungian conception of the psyche provides us with immense insight into the ways in which this relationship can benefit or harm us.  

In today's talk, David draws on his experience as a lecturer and teacher at La Trobe University. He weaves student's voices throughout revealing a deep yearning for what spirituality represents. He notes how in this generation young adults frequently turn toward their inner world and intuition rather than structured religion as a trustworthy source of guidance and meaning making. The intimate relationship between Jung's concept of individuation and the spiritual journey is described. This talk includes some answers to audience questions at the end and also a reference to suicide.

In today's talk David invites us to consider the fundamentals of our assumptions about consciousness noting our long Western tradition of locating soul or rationality in the human mind and ignoring larger forces or consciousness present in the Earth. David explores Jung's  idea that while the human psyche certainly has an impact on the world, the soul of the world, that is, the collective unconscious in humanity as well as the earth, similarly has an impact on individual human experiencing.

In today's talk David explores the spiritual side of wellbeing. Taking us from the healing arts of Ancient Greece to the present day, he describes what is missing in modern medicine. He suggests that healing must include paying attention to both the Ego and the Self, that is, the spiritual dimension of our being.  

In an exploration of the Greek and Roman goddess of the hearth and flame, Joy Norton describes a wise woman archetype of the Self. She brings our attention to Vesta's qualities of stillness, focusing and reflection, and how vital it is that we invite Vesta into our busy everyday living. Please see relevant images on our Facebook page.

Today's talk Individuation as a Homecoming to Self is the first part in a series entitled Jung's Depth Psychology: Developing a Relationship with Mystery given by David Tacey to the Jung Society of Melbourne. In this talk, David explores key Jungian concepts such as the Ego, Self, archetypes and the unconscious all toward understanding the process of individuation. David eloquently describes our psychological maturation: from an original experience undifferentiated from the unconscious through to a necessary struggle with the world as we develop our Ego, and finally to the task of coming into relationship with the wisdom of human experience across millennia, that is, the world of archetypes and the Unconscious.  

Join us as we listen to Rodney Ravenswood's wide-ranging talk on the power and reality of archetypal energies in our personal and cultural lives. Taking inspiration from Jung's famous inscription “Called or not, God is present”, Rodney weaves an intriguing path through many manifestations of the symbolic life from 1960s and 70s musical lyrics to The Da Vinci Code. 

Today we'll be listening to a talk given by recently retired Jungian analyst, speech pathologist and academic Gillian Clezy. Having worked in Australia, Britain, the USA, Hong Kong and mainland China, Gillian grew up in Turkey and Egypt and has a wonderfully rich academic as well as lived experience of the development of language. Exploring parallels between the development of language from infancy and our therapeutic path toward individuation, Gillian delves into the ways we form relationships between images and words. She's just written the first part of her autobiography Switchback: An Inner and Outer Journey to be published later this year.     

Listen to analyst Patrick Jansen speak about the many overlapping insights and experiences gained from guided Buddhist practice and Jungian psychology on our way to wholeness and compassion.  

Mary Duffy, a Melbourne artist and art therapist takes us on a powerful journey into Jung's famous Red Book. A collection of encounters with the figures and contents of his inner psyche, and written commentaries and explorations of these, the Red Book, in combination with the context of Jung's life during its generation from 1913 until 1929, provides us with the foundations of active imagination, the archetypes of the psyche and a roadmap for each individual on their journey to Self. 

An architect and analyst explore the power of symbolism inherent in domestic and public buildings. With a focus on classical Greek architecture, Jung's house at Bollingen and personal dreams, they describe the ways architecture holds vital information about the personal, cultural and collective unconscious. 

Jungian analyst Margaret Becher takes us on a journey with the fairy tale The Girl with No Hands. Through her lived experience, synchronicities, dreams, poetry and literature, Margaret explores the way her evolving relationship with a negative animus ultimately brought her into an experience of Selfhood. 

Join us as analyst Kevin Toohey dives into the symbolism and knowledge found in the fairy tale of the Frog Princess. Fairy tales can serve as rich guides on how to be with, accept and understand our unconscious. The Russian fairy tale of the Frog Princess provides an insight and instruction for men on how to respect and integrate their Anima or feminine qualities. 

Evelynne Joffe is the Director of the Institute of Esoteric Studies in Melbourne and in today's talk she takes us on a journey through history, illuminating the many ways in which Judaism has retained the feminine face of God even as it appears to honour a particularly masculine deity. Evelynne evocatively conveys how both images of the mother and father God within need to be active if we are to become whole.  

Join us as we listen to world renowned author and Jungian analyst Robert A. Johnson as he takes us through two myths, the Greek story of Oedipus and the Indian story of Nala and Damayanti (from the Mahabharata) in order to understand what constitutes the feminine in our psyche. He describes how, in our predominantly patriarchal society, we might retrieve our feminine from the unconscious for a better, balanced and happier life. For relevant images, please look at our Facebook page. 

Exploring the spiritual experiences and hopes of colonial white Australians, Dr Veronica Brady talks about our migrant past, initial hopes for a Great Southern Land, the false myth of the noble pioneer and our abuse of Aboriginal people. She describes how in Australia the old all-powerful God is dead, but in his place, we might turn to Spirit, the God who suffers, dies and hopes, and fits well with the real heroes of our Australian culture, the battlers.  

Mary Symes talk on Ariadne and the Bull takes us on an in-depth journey through the myth. She explores the psychological tensions and tasks the myth requires women to attend to if we are to find a fruitful and meaningful union between our feminine and masculine energies. For relevant imagery, please look at our Facebook page. 

Brian Clark's Reclaiming Eros includes descriptions and explorations of the many iterations of Eros, covering the god's evolution and his modern faces. Brian draws our attention to the ways in which the energies of Eros bring the opposites of love and isolation together, giving rise to authentic experiences of intimacy and love that always include awareness of loss and separation. For relevant imagery, please look at our Facebook page. 

In Where Did the Gods Go? Peter invites us to explore Jung's ideas of the Self archetype or the 'God Within'. While religion once helped to contain and structure this urge, today we need to find other ways of engaging with this archetypal energy. Peter goes on to describe what Jung calls numinous experiences and the benefits for the Self of attending to these.  

Professor Chris Mackie talks about The Symbolic Descent in Greek Myth. In his exploration of two stories (Priam retrieving his son Hector's body from Achilles, and Jason retrieving the Golden Fleece) Chris draws our attention to powerful themes of love and courage. As our very human heroes embark on quests that bring them face to face with death, Chris also describes the very different heroic qualities present in much older artistic imagery of these stories. 

Lorraine Walker is a Jungian analyst now living and working in Shepparton. We hope you enjoy Lorraine's exploration of inflation in today's talk where she beautifully describes the dangers and benefits inherent in coming into contact with powerful archetypes.  

Listen to Dr Claire French speak about Jungian psychology and the its understanding and portrayal of the feminine. As a renowned lecturer she's given many talks to the Society and if you enjoy today's talk, make sure to check out her autobiography, My Upside Down World scheduled for release late 2020.

Enjoy Terence McBride's talk on the “Archetype of the Wounded Healer” exploring ancient rites of healing and the Jungian therapeutic approach. Please note – as slides were referenced during this talk, we have included relevant images on our C.G Jung Society Melbourne Facebook page:https://www.facebook.com/JungSocietyMelbourne/

Join us as we listen to Patrick Jansen eloquently describe the Jungian process of analysis including what it feels like to explore dreams, get in contact with the unconscious and the benefits of this kind of psychological work. 

Dr David Tacey is Emeritus professor of literature at La Trobe University and a specialist in Jungian ideas. Today David explores a Jungian perspective on the move from formal religion to modern spirituality and the intriguing relationship between spirituality and Jung's process of individuation. 

Delve into the core concepts of Jungian psychology with analyst Annette Lowe as she describes a Jungian map of the psyche and provides a glimpse into the times and experiences that shaped Carl Jung's life and innovations. Please check out our Facebook page to view the visual map of the psyche provided by Annette.