Monday, December 26, 2011

JONATHAN YOUNG IN ST. LOUIS APRIL 20-21, 2012





Jonathan Young will present on APRIL 20-21, 2012, in St. Louis:


Lecture: The Inner Life of Fairy Tales - The Ugly Duckling
Friday, April 20, 2012, 7:00 p.m. - 9:30 p.m. (2 Continuing Education Units)

Location: First Congrational Church UCC, 6401 Wyden, Clayton Missouri 63105

Fee: Friends - $15; Others $20; Full-time Students - $10

Workshop Through the Dark Forest - to Find Strength in Stories
Saturday, April 21, 2012 10:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. (5 Continuing Education Units)
Location: First Congrational Church UCC, 6401 Wyden, Clayton Missouri 63105

Fee: Friends - $15; Others $20; Full-time Students - $10

Website: C.G.Jung Society of St. Louis  [For additional information or to register]
Phone: (314) 533-6809 (voicemail; we will return your call as needed)
Email: cgjungstl @ sbcglobal.org



Jonathan Young, PhD is a psychologist who assisted mythologist Joseph Campbell for several years at seminars -- and was the Founding Curator of the Joseph Campbell Archives and Library. As a professor, Dr. Young created and chaired the Mythological Studies Department at the Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara. His recent book is SAGA - Best New Writings on Mythology, volume 2.

Saturday, December 03, 2011

DREAMS, DREAM INCUBATION, AND THE SANTA BARBARA HEALING SANCTUARY



Robert Bosnak, a renowned Jungian Analyst, presented at the Jung in the Heartland Conference during the second week of November, 2011.  Dr. Bosnak, a Zurich-trained analyst, has developed a unique way of working with dreams, a process partially based on ways the Greeks utilized dreams in their practice of medicine.  His techniques involve helping the patient make connection with the somatic impact of dream images and feelings, a connection he believes can have a profound healing effect both for psychic and bodily ailments.  Over the four days of the conference, Dr. Bosnak demonstrated his approach to dreams with different attendees.  One of the demonstrations was with a woman suffering from necrosis of her knee tissue.  In prior sessions long-distance over Skype, Dr. Bosnak had worked with the woman in a process of "dream incubation" which involved focussing on dreams possibly related to her health issue in an attempt to use her dreams as an approach to healing.

My one concern about the rather elaborate techniques Dr. Bosnak uses is that he must give the patient detailed, specific direction in the working of the dream.  There is a power differential already present in any analyst-patient relations, and Dr. Bosnak's approach seems to heighten that differential.  However, my concern did not seem shared by any of the individuals Dr. Bosnak worked with.

Dr. Bosnak's presentations will be available by streaming over the internet or on DVD's from the St. Louis Jung Society soon.  For more information, go to www.cgjungstl.org.

One of the more powerful and educational of his presentations involved a demonstration of "entrainment," the way analyst and patient can become aligned in a felt way in the shared energy field.  It is in this shared field that powerful transference and countertransference dynamics have a palpable presence.  It is out of this kind of "field effect" that healing of the psyche and of the body can occur.

Dr. Bosnak has recently joined the Santa Barbara Healing Sanctuary where his approach to dream incubation along with other alternative approaches to health and wellness are practiced.  For further information about the Sanctuary, go to:  http://www.sbhsanctuary.com/about.html