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Inflation, Grandiosity and the Denial of Human Limits · This Jungian Life Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: They're bigger than human. They are inflated. And of course,
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: because everything that is psyche seeks a proper balance, underneath
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: that are feelings of inferiority, one's own mortality, vulnerability, weaknesses,
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: you know, a kind of the human condition. which the
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: inflated person is seeking to deny.
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: Welcome to This Jungian Life, conversations with Jungian analysts on
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  Speaker 2: the unseen forces shaping our lives and what it means
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  Speaker 2: to be truly human in today's complex world. I'm Lisa Marciano,
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  Speaker 2: and I'm a Jungian analyst in Philadelphia.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I'm Deborah Stewart, a Jungian analyst in Cape Cod.
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  Speaker 2: Today we're going to be talking about psychological inflation, which
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  Speaker 2: is a term that Jung used. He used it many
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  Speaker 2: times throughout his writings. It is an idea that has
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  Speaker 2: important links to other concepts in psychiatry. It has practical
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  Speaker 2: applications in our lives. We see it in the stories
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  Speaker 2: of celebrities, politicians. And also in myth and fairy tale,
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  Speaker 2: it is a truly archetypal experience. None of us are
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  Speaker 2: immune from inflation. And as we'll talk about today, it's
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  Speaker 2: not always negative, but it can be. So let's do
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  Speaker 2: what we do and circumambulate inflation.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, my goodness. You know, I think in terms of
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  Speaker 1: our developmental history, and the very first task in life
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  Speaker 1: is differentiating our ego from being immersed in what we
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  Speaker 1: would call the self, being immersed in a larger, somewhat
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  Speaker 1: unconscious whole, but it is whole, and that it takes
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  Speaker 1: a certain amount of inflation, even for a two-year-old, to
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  Speaker 1: stamp his feet and say no. And yet it's developmentally necessary.
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  Speaker 1: And in a way, we could say the whole first
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  Speaker 1: half of life is a process of differentiating and developing
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  Speaker 1: ego from this mass of selfhood with which we were
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  Speaker 1: born and were originally immersed in. And so we want
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  Speaker 1: a certain amount of inflation that says, you know, I'm
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  Speaker 1: going to try out for the football team. I'm going
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  Speaker 1: to be the first one in my family to go
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  Speaker 1: to college. I'm going to take a trekking trip through India,
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  Speaker 1: let's say, of developing that sense of I and ability
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  Speaker 1: to get out in life, ability to take risk. requires
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  Speaker 1: a little inflation to offset the anxiety that always comes
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  Speaker 1: from disobeying parents, differentiating from a culture, maybe questioning one's
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  Speaker 1: religious traditions and beliefs, and staying safe in the realm
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  Speaker 1: of childhood. But as you mentioned, the problem is we
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  Speaker 1: can get identified with archetypal energy, And then that's where,
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: you know, pride goeth before a fall. Hello.
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: I want to let This Jungian Life listeners know about
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: a very special opportunity. This winter solstice, the Cosmos Institute
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: will convene its inaugural residential colloquium in Ascona, Switzerland, in
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: the magical landscape where Monte Verita and Erinos rose to
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  Speaker 2: legendary prominence as centers of artistic, spiritual, and intellectual life.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: An intimate company of scholars and participants will gather at
• 4:31
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• 4:36
  Speaker 2: of exceptional depth and beauty. Distinguished speakers, including Gary Lachman
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: and Lawrence Hillman, will offer extended lectures while shared meals,
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: unhurried conversation, and time for reflection sustain the life of
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: the gathering. I will also be among those presenting. A
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: highlight will be a visit to Erinos where Jung, Marie-Louise
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: von Franz, Mircea Eliade, Henri Corbin, James Hellman, and others
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: developed work that profoundly shaped depth psychology, archetypal thought, and
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: symbolic imagination. Registration closes November 21st, and you can visit cosmosinstitute.org
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: to learn more. That's Cosmos with a K. We'll put
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: that in the show notes, and you should know that
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: Listeners of This Jungian Life get a 15% discount on registration.
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: So I hope to see some of you in Switzerland
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  Speaker 2: this December. Right. So if we're just going to define
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  Speaker 2: it in a kind of Jungian way, inflation is a
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  Speaker 2: sort of exaggerated sense of self-importance. There's often a kind of,
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  Speaker 2: and we can talk about this more in a minute,
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  Speaker 2: but it's often accompanied by an unconscious sense of inferiority.
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  Speaker 2: But specifically in Jungian terms, it often means a kind
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  Speaker 2: of identification with an archetypal energy. And that is very,
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  Speaker 2: very dangerous. You know, the archetypes are huge energy centers.
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  Speaker 2: And when the ego becomes identified, says, I am this,
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  Speaker 2: not I'm in contact with this or this is a
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  Speaker 2: beautiful thing and it's moving through me, but I am that.
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  Speaker 2: that can be very dangerous psychologically. So it's, you know,
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  Speaker 2: it's related to, inflation is related to the kind of
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  Speaker 2: psychiatric idea of grandiosity. And we see grand, you know,
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  Speaker 2: that's a term in the DSM-5 that describes a certain
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  Speaker 2: mental state that you sometimes see in, for example, manic episodes.
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  Speaker 2: You know, if someone comes into your office and they're like, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: I'm going to run a marathon next week. And then
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  Speaker 2: I'm writing this book and this book is going to
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  Speaker 2: be really good and it's going to make me a
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  Speaker 2: million dollars. And, you know, and they're, they're kind of
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  Speaker 2: doing all this. You're like, okay, grandiosity check, you know, it's, it's, which,
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  Speaker 2: which I think is really interesting because, you know, as
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  Speaker 2: per your point of like, there are times when we,
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  Speaker 2: we need to say, we need to claim something audacious
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  Speaker 2: for ourself that can feel a little grandiose, but you
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  Speaker 2: have to have a little bit of this. But, but
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  Speaker 2: when it's really sort of ungrounded, then, then it is
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  Speaker 2: evidence maybe of some psychopathology. The other place that you
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  Speaker 2: see grandiosity is in narcissism, that sort of inflated sense
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  Speaker 2: of self-importance. I mean, it's a wonderful word because it
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  Speaker 2: comes embedded in this image of inflation. Exactly.
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  Speaker 1: It's such a good thing to really visualize as the
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  Speaker 1: person who's puffed up, who's distended. who is just unrealistically
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  Speaker 1: self-important beyond the limits of a proper sort of human presentation.
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  Speaker 1: And we all recognize it pretty immediately. Such people can
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  Speaker 1: be pompous. They can be presumptuous because they're bigger than human.
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  Speaker 1: They are inflated. And of course, because everything that is
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  Speaker 1: psyche seeks a proper balance. Underneath that are feelings of inferiority,
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  Speaker 1: one's own mortality, vulnerability, weaknesses, you know, a kind of
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  Speaker 1: the human condition which the inflated person is seeking to deny.
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  Speaker 2: So I want to Just read a quote from Jung.
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  Speaker 2: He's talking about kind of the stages of development and
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  Speaker 2: he talks about the sort of inflation of being a
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  Speaker 2: child where, you know, because the thing is when you're
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  Speaker 2: a child, you are the center of the universe and
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  Speaker 2: you expect everyone to care for you. And then it
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  Speaker 2: kind of goes on to the hero. And that's another
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  Speaker 2: kind of inflation. Jung writes, the colossal pretension grows into
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  Speaker 2: a conviction that one is something extraordinary or else the
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  Speaker 2: impossibility of the pretension ever being fulfilled only proves one's inferiority,
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  Speaker 2: which is favorable to the role of the heroic sufferer,
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  Speaker 2: which is a negative inflation, and we could talk about
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  Speaker 2: that more later. In spite of their contradictoriness, both forms
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  Speaker 2: are identical because conscious megalomania is balanced by unconscious compensatory
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  Speaker 2: inferiority and conscious inferiority by unconscious megalomania. You never get
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  Speaker 2: one without the other. So, you know, Deb, you were
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  Speaker 2: talking about how people who are in an inflation can appear.
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  Speaker 2: I want to say something that, you know, when we
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  Speaker 2: identify with an archetype, like it's dangerous, but it's also
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  Speaker 2: really compelling. And people who have the ability to sort
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  Speaker 2: of to kind of like live in that in that
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  Speaker 2: identification process. with the archetype, I'll say, they're often really compelling,
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  Speaker 2: charismatic people. And so there's something about the way they
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  Speaker 2: present themselves and the inflated, the inflated way they present
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  Speaker 2: themselves that often kind of works. People are compelled, people
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  Speaker 2: become their followers and their acolytes. You know, I guess
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  Speaker 2: one version of this would be, you know, the cult leader, right?
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  Speaker 2: The cult leader, just in a general way, is someone
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  Speaker 2: who has identified with, like, let's say the archetype of
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  Speaker 2: the prophet or the wise man or something. And he,
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  Speaker 2: my guess is, really believes it. And other people start
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  Speaker 2: to believe it. And you can see people that live
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  Speaker 2: in that inflated state and are sort of successful at
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  Speaker 2: that will change. kind of attract others to them. And
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  Speaker 2: other people kind of see that and they feel it.
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  Speaker 2: And what their followers are feeling is the power of
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  Speaker 2: the archetype that that particular person is able to inhabit.
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  Speaker 1: And that is very much aligned with what Jung called
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  Speaker 1: the mana personality. You know, we all know people who
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  Speaker 1: have that kind of charismatic presence. where somebody can kind
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  Speaker 1: of sort of manifest and channel this kind of larger-than-life power,
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  Speaker 1: and it can be emblematic of the hero or the tyrant.
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  Speaker 1: You know, how did religious figures attract followers? And how
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  Speaker 1: do tyrants attract followers?
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  Speaker 2: Yes.
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  Speaker 1: So it's as ever a kind of double-sided conundrum. One
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  Speaker 1: of the people that we've all read and I reread
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  Speaker 1: prior to today's discussion is Edward Edinger, whose book, Ego
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  Speaker 1: and Archetype, discusses inflation. And so if we come across
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  Speaker 1: a mana personality, this inflated, charismatic, beguiling leader, The reality
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  Speaker 1: test would be, what is that person in service to?
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  Speaker 1: Is this a puer who wants everything and hasn't committed
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  Speaker 1: to anything in particular, who hasn't made a commitment, but
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  Speaker 1: has fantastic ideas? He sees the potential everywhere. Talks the talk,
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  Speaker 1: but doesn't walk the walk might be interesting. quick and
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  Speaker 1: easy thumbnail way to describe it. People that have outbursts
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  Speaker 1: of rage, they want outer reality to conform to their
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  Speaker 1: inner sense of inflation and what they deserve. The power motivation, omnipotence,
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  Speaker 1: whatever I want, I should get. Intellectual rigidity, which I
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  Speaker 1: think is characteristic of of some leaders and perhaps especially
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  Speaker 1: very conservative fundamentalist positions politically, religiously, or just lust of,
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  Speaker 1: I want what I want because I want it for
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  Speaker 1: my own personal pleasure only, and an illusion of immortality.
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  Speaker 1: I think somewhere in the back of our minds, we're
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  Speaker 1: all very aware that we're mortal and That's not something
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  Speaker 1: we have chosen. And so we try to compensate for
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  Speaker 1: it with getting inflated and puffed up. Larger than life
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  Speaker 1: and life only, no death. So that's all the ways
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  Speaker 1: we can get inflated from angry outbursts to intellectual rigidity
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  Speaker 1: to all of these other things.
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  Speaker 2: And I want to say, too, because I mean, I
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  Speaker 2: like your your question about, you know, to what to
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  Speaker 2: what is this in service? Because there are certain like
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  Speaker 2: the very malignant examples of it. But I think there's
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  Speaker 2: been a lot of good done in the world by
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  Speaker 2: people who were kind of inflated and in service to
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  Speaker 2: something good, but still like just flawed humans with this
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  Speaker 2: is this great phrase. We all have clear feet. You know, I.
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  Speaker 2: Where I found my imagination going, and I want to
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  Speaker 2: see if I can talk about this without being too specific,
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  Speaker 2: because I just don't want to, you know, kind of
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  Speaker 2: rake anybody over the coals. But when my kids were young,
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  Speaker 2: they were involved in this wonderful choir. And the choir director,
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  Speaker 2: I just loved this man. He was amazing. And he
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  Speaker 2: just had this incredibly expansive vision for this choir and
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  Speaker 2: these kids. And this was like just one of the
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  Speaker 2: most amazing experiences. I mean, I could just start to
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  Speaker 2: cry when I talk about like what my kids experienced,
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  Speaker 2: you know, with him and this choir. And I He
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  Speaker 2: was so creative and he was he was just he
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  Speaker 2: was just incredible. But I would say there was some
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  Speaker 2: charisma there. I would say there was probably some inflation
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  Speaker 2: there in this very good way. Like he he you know,
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  Speaker 2: this choir did all kinds of like amazing social good
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  Speaker 2: in the neighborhood, too. Right. It was it was in
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  Speaker 2: service to like these incredible principals and artists. you know,
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  Speaker 2: this was a person who had a real vision for
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  Speaker 2: what music could do. And you know what? He was really,
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  Speaker 2: really hard to get along with. He was really hard
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  Speaker 2: to get along with. And eventually kind of, you know,
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  Speaker 2: the whole thing just kind of spun out in this way.
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  Speaker 2: I don't really know exactly what happened, but something kind
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  Speaker 2: of cracked. And unfortunately, just it didn't last. You know,
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  Speaker 2: I think people that we love and admire who are
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  Speaker 2: doing good things in the world If we look at
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  Speaker 2: their psychic structure, we're likely to find some amount of inflation.
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  Speaker 2: And there's always that little heartbreaking way where most of
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  Speaker 2: the time our heroes are like also deeply flawed. We
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  Speaker 2: can't carry that archetypal burden because we're mortal, we're human,
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  Speaker 2: you know? The thing about becoming identified with an archetype
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  Speaker 2: is it will crush you eventually. It may not crush
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  Speaker 2: you right away, If you're an extraordinary person, you may
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  Speaker 2: be able to carry it for some period of time,
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  Speaker 2: but eventually it will crush you. So I'm thinking of like,
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  Speaker 2: you know, famous people, for example, who, you know, have
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  Speaker 2: received tons of projections. I mean, that results in a
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  Speaker 2: kind of inflation and it will work you. I'm thinking
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  Speaker 2: of in imperial Rome, the emperor rode to his coronation
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  Speaker 2: with a slave whispering in his ear, remember you are
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  Speaker 2: mortal because you've got, you know, thousands of people like
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  Speaker 2: showering rose petals on you or whatever it is to do.
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  Speaker 2: I don't really know. I don't want to get the
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  Speaker 2: history wrong here. But, you know, like, hail Caesar. And
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  Speaker 2: it's like, no, you have to remember, you're just an
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  Speaker 2: ordinary mortal. You're just human. And it's really hard to
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  Speaker 2: do that when what you get reflected back from the
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  Speaker 2: outside world is you're very powerful. People become sycophantic. And
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  Speaker 2: this is why, you know, power corrupts and absolute power
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  Speaker 2: corrupts absolutely because you're not getting that check. on inflation
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  Speaker 2: from people around you. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: And that's been ubiquitous for thousands of years for people
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  Speaker 1: in power. There, you know, people project something onto them
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  Speaker 1: and it's so easy to just digest, accept and identify
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  Speaker 1: with the projection. Everybody says, yes, sir. You don't walk
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  Speaker 1: to your next appointment. You have a chariot that takes
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  Speaker 1: you there. You have helicopters. You have all kinds of services, grandiosity.
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  Speaker 1: People want to meet you. It's very, very hard to
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  Speaker 1: not be susceptible to that.
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 1: And from a Jungian point of view, I want to
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  Speaker 1: go back to that first stage of life, where the
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  Speaker 1: task essentially is developing a strong, flexible, well-adapted, resilient ego.
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  Speaker 1: But what if that stage of life is not succeeded
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  Speaker 1: by the second stage of life, the surrender to something
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  Speaker 1: greater and the relativization of the ego, realizing that what
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  Speaker 1: Jung called the self, we could call it, God, that
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  Speaker 1: there is something greater to which we must be in service,
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  Speaker 1: that there is something greater. I alone am not the
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  Speaker 1: end all be all. And that goes back to what
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  Speaker 1: I was saying before. If we are not in service
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  Speaker 1: in a lived and experienced way to something greater, if
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  Speaker 1: we're not in service to a standard, that has a
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  Speaker 1: superior place in our being, then that grandiosity can take
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  Speaker 1: the shape of the puer, the entitled forever youth, or
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  Speaker 1: angry and entitlement spells. I want this changed. You didn't
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  Speaker 1: do what I wanted. You're fired. Power, certain kind of
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  Speaker 1: intellectual rigidity, Or just... pleasure. Whatever I want, I get.
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  Speaker 1: I can do whatever I want. Let's reference Jeffrey Epstein here. Mm-hmm.
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  Speaker 1: So one way or another, we're serving some kind of
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  Speaker 1: a god.
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 1: And we need to know which one we're serving.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I really like that. And this idea that,
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  Speaker 2: you know, again, as you set up developmentally, we kind
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  Speaker 2: of constellate the heroic ego. And for that, some inflation
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  Speaker 2: is necessary. But then the next thing that happens is
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  Speaker 2: the relativization of the ego, where we realize that, you know,
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  Speaker 2: the ego is secondary to the, you know, the self
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: or the transpersonal, as it were. And one thing, just
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: to take a little detour here for just a second
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: because it popped into my mind and it's interesting to
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: me is, I think that the Jungian idea about the
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  Speaker 2: relativization of the ego, which is essentially it's the ego,
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  Speaker 2: it's a deflationary experience, actually. I mean, if you've ever
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: had that experience, it really is like, you know, it's
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  Speaker 2: no fun, but it is an awareness, a conscious integration
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  Speaker 2: of the fact that that the ego is not entirely
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: in charge. And what it is akin to in the
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: language or the psychology of Melanie Klein is the achievement
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: of the depressive position. So just to map these ideas on,
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: you know, Melanie Klein's baby comes out entirely omnipotent feeling.
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: This is according to Melanie Klein, which of course is
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: a kind of fantasy, but it's interesting. So The baby
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  Speaker 2: comes out feeling itself entirely omnipotent, right? The baby gets hungry,
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: the breast appears. The baby believes itself able to control
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: the breast. And so there's the good breast that comes
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: whenever the baby's hungry. And then if the baby cries
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: and the breast doesn't come, that's the bad breast. And
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: that world where there's the good breast and the bad breast,
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  Speaker 2: that's the paranoid schizoid place. And that's where you believe
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  Speaker 2: yourself to be omnipotent and anything that doesn't meet your
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  Speaker 2: expectations is bad, bad, bad. And that's sort of like
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  Speaker 2: that inflated state, but also the alienation that can kind
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  Speaker 2: of be on the other side of that or what
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  Speaker 2: we were talking about before that underneath the inflation, there's
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  Speaker 2: this incredible sense of inferiority and kind of fear. And
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  Speaker 2: then the baby realizes that there is another person called
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: mother and that she's a totally different person that the
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: baby can't control and that the mother does her best
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: to meet the baby's needs. And sometimes she's fit, she fails.
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  Speaker 2: And that is this, this real developmental achievement of, of, uh, that, that, that, that,
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  Speaker 2: you know, that we all go through all the time, right?
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  Speaker 2: Like we can still like, you know, we can still
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  Speaker 2: have that experience throughout our life of like really understanding,
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  Speaker 2: for example, that I can't, I can't actually control whether
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: my spouse takes off his shoes after he plays golf.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, we can only ponder where you might have come
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: across that example. One of our husbands plays golf.
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  Speaker 2: And that we just have to like accept that that
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  Speaker 2: is what it is. And it's like, it is deflating.
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  Speaker 2: It's like, I just have to accept it. That's the
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  Speaker 2: depressive position. And it is like that relativization of the
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: ego in a sense. So there's just a kind of
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  Speaker 2: parallel way that those theories work together.
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  Speaker 1: That pattern repeats and repeats. And I love the developmental
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: reference to you know, that baby is omniscient, omnipotent to
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: the extent that we can imagine any intent in a
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: small baby. But, you know, if it's three in the
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: morning and the baby's hungry, the assumption is that my
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: demand will be met with a feeding.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: I love Melanie Klein, but I was kind of, I mean,
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: it's like, I don't know, she really didn't like babies
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: very much. And I It doesn't totally land for me,
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: but it's fascinating and there's something true about it.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: But the progression is from the infant state of entitlement
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: and inflation.
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: The child tyrant, right?
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: Whatever I want should appear.
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: And, you know, the stuff that I read in social
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: work school about sort of incremental frustration of the baby.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, optimal frustration.
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: Which is really teaching, hopefully, in little digestible increments that
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: your inflated state does not rule the world. You may
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: have to wait 10 minutes for your feeding if you're
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: some number of months old. Mom had to take a shower.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: It's going to be 10 minutes until mom gets out
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: of the shower and can attend to you. Later on,
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: that may be, you know, the kindergartner who the teacher
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: tells to wait his turn. It's not your turn to speak.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: You have to wait. Keep your hand up in the air.
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: Sometimes you might not even get called on. And so
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: it goes. That differentiates the ego from this inflated... all
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: is one, I'm the only one, my frame of reference
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: is just me and what I need to, there are
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: other people, some of whom don't take the shoes off
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: after coming in from golf. And eventually that pattern, I think,
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: reaches the tipping point later in life, 40s, 50s, 60s,
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: when we have to come to terms with the disappointments
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: of life, of maybe our hopes and dreams, losing people
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: that we love to death, and really coming to understand
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: that our ego position is in the context of mortality,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: all kinds of things that are greater than we are,
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: another whole force that undergirds and kind of supervises our lives.
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: And we keep our egos. We still have our ego
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: to manage everyday concerns and just be human. But somewhere
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: we both know that we're not in control and that
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: we are under the influence, the profound and pervasive influence
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: of something greater. I sometimes think of it like this
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: is my fantasy, like being a cell in a giant body.
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: And I've located my particular position in this fantasy as
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: being just above the left elbow. And that little by little,
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: I come to an awareness of elbow. And then I
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: go one direction, there's wrist and hand and shoulder. And eventually,
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: some realization, of a greater whole that I can't really
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: wrap my one little cell-brained self around, but it's there.
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: And there's reassurance as well as a certain kind of
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: humility in that.
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: Yes. I mean, humility is the antidote to inflation in
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: a sense. I'm thinking about inflation in addiction. It is
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: classically usually an important element of any kind of addiction. Typically,
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: if you work in substance abuse and a new addict
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: comes in to the treatment program, they're sort of full of, no,
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: I don't need help. No, I got this. I can
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: do this myself. And that's why the first step in
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: the 12-step program is to admit powerlessness. Because Addicts often
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: have an unrealistic sense that they can handle things, that
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: they've got things, and there's this inflation that they can
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: do it on their own. And it's perhaps an inflation
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: born of the effects of the substance, actually, but it
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: does go to that sense of being kind of identified
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: with an archetype. And it can be a real barrier, actually,
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: to sobriety and to getting well. When I've worked with
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: people in addiction, I would say that that's one of
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: the ways to think about it. The main problem that
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: they have to overcome is this inflated sense of their
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: own ability to handle their lives. And it's once someone,
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: you know, part of hitting bottom is going, God, I
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: guess I can't do this on my own. I guess
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: I need help. I guess I was wrong. I guess
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: I've been wrong. And now I need to just admit that,
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: admit I'm powerless. and see if there's another better way.
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: So inflation is a big dynamic in addiction.
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, as if it can be attained through ego, that
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: what the addict... and in a way that's every one
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: of us, of what that person is seeking is a
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: shortcut to the high, to the sense of empowerment, to
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: feeling great. to a sense of omnipotence while in this
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: special place. And it takes the deflation. And I might
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: say it is the willingness to enter the conflict. Rather
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: than being one-sided, I'll just get high of confronting oneself,
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: And coming to terms with, I am only human. And
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: I get scared.
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: And I'm vulnerable.
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: And I surrender the first step and the 12 steps
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: to a power greater.
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: Than I. Yeah, because again, the other side of that
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: is this arrogance, right? And it's just so dangerous. You know,
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: another danger of inflation is if you really get identified
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: with the collective psyche and you're really identified with an
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: archetype and you can't sort that out, you know, what
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: happens is potentially kind of looks like, can look like
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: psychosis too. You know, that psychosis can be considered an
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: identification with an archetypal energy.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: It's very much all of these diagnoses, and we could
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: probably put the manic state and bipolar disorder in this group,
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: are really also metaphors for the human condition. And all
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: states of ego inflation in very unhealthy ways. The arrogance,
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: the inflation, The relentless seeking sometimes for transcendence.
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: With the help of a substance or power or prestige,
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: you know, the sports car, the, you know, all these
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: other emblems of success in the world are all symptoms
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: of sort of, wait a minute, you know, what God
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: are you serving beyond ego?
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah. You know, if you're a regular listener of the podcast,
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: you know that I've been pretty gripped by trying to
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: understand how AI is affecting us. And of course, the
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: phenomenon of what's been kind of colloquially dubbed AI psychosis
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: is another place where inflation comes into play because what
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: can happen, of course, I'm listening to a new podcast
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: about this now, But what can happen is, you know,
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: you're engaged with the AI and the AI convinces you
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: that you've just made a significant scientific discovery, right? So
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: this is this pattern that's repeated and lots of people
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: have had these kinds of experiences. Like, wow, you know,
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: the guy says, no one's ever thought of that before.
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: You know, it's like, really? Really? Are you sure? Because,
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: you know, I'm just a, you know, I'm just a
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: regular programmer here. It's like, no, no, no, you've made,
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: the AI says you've made a really significant discovery. And
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: there's something about how we are vulnerable to inflation, all
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: of us, that hearing that, you know, authoritatively from someone
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: or something important in our lives can tip us over
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: into a place where we kind of are, you know,
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: drinking the Kool-Aid, so to speak. And I mean, you know,
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: we don't just see this with AI psychosis. You see
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: this also, again, I think, With people who have reached
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: extraordinary heights, and as we were talking about before, maybe
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: don't have that kind of reality based contact. I'm thinking
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: about like Kanye West, which is a cultural phenomenon I
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: do not know a lot about. So I'm only going
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: to be able to kind of sketch this out. But
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: of course, extraordinarily talented people. person who got a ton
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: of attention. But then his behavior and his presentation, as
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: I understand it, became more and more bizarre. And he's
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: kind of presenting himself as if he's a prophet or
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: a king or, you know, a revolutionary. So he's, you know,
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: kind of identifying with these archetypes. And you could see
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: the sort of loss of reality testing there a little bit.
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: You know, another celebrity example that comes to mind is
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: which is another cultural phenomenon I'm endlessly fascinated with for
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: some reason, is Elizabeth Holmes and the Theranos story. So
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: for those of you who may not know, she dropped
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: out of Stanford. She was this young, bright thing, and
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: she started this company called Theranos that got all of
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: this investment from these famous people and all of this attention.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: And I think she was on the cover of Fortune magazine, maybe?
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: She was on the, you know, she always appeared, you know,
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: with this She had her blonde hair back in a
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: ponytail and she had a black turtleneck, sort of like
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: Steve Jobs. And she, you know, she was like this phenom, right?
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: She had started this incredible company that was going to
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: be able to run all kinds of tests for common different,
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: you know, diseases and deficiencies and that kind of thing
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: from a single drop of blood. That was the hype.
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: And it was a fraud. It was a total fraud.
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: So there's a question, did she... Was she high on
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: her own supply? Did she believe it? Did she know
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: she was, you know, defrauding people out of their money
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: when she got them to invest in her company? But
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: she eventually was convicted and I believe is now still
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: in jail.
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and that is that tendency toward omnipotence. You know,
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: that we can start presenting things that are untrue to
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: other people, but eventually... We're susceptible to believing our own PR.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: On the other hand, consciousness, when it's all inflated, cannot
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: go on forever without taking the unconscious into account. And
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: the unconscious can be activated within, and it can also
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: happen on the outside as fate. Yeah. Wow, this looks
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: a little too good to be true, don't you think?
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: And the reality principle, it is too good to be true.
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: This does not work. And eventually, that inflation gets like
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: a balloon. It gets punctured. And we see these falls
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: all the time, reminiscent of the original fall from the
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: Garden of Eden, of what happened to Jeffrey Epstein, what
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: happened to Elizabeth Holmes.
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: Well, and you mentioned the Garden of Eden, but in
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: some way, the other story here is the story of Icarus.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: Icarus, of course, is a really great example of inflation.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: His father, Daedalus, was the master craftsman magician who created
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: the labyrinth in which the Minotaur was housed. and many
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: another thing, but eventually was imprisoned way at the top
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: of the castle or fortress. And what he did was
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: to gather feathers from the birds and make wings for
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: himself and for his son Icarus. So he made wings
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: and they were affixed to planks or branches, whatever, with wax.
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: The actual construction turns out not to matter that much
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: because this is a story. But the lesson in it
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: is that off they're going to take, they're going to
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: take off from the window at great height. And Daedalus
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: tells his son Icarus, don't fly too high or the
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: heat of the sun will melt the wax and you'll fall.
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: But also don't fly too low. because underneath we're going
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: to be flying across this great river, and the fog
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: and damp can weigh down your wings and also cause
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: you to crash. So off they go, and Daedalus takes
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: his own advice. But Icarus is so enchanted with his
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: newfound ability to fly that he just soars up above. And,
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: of course, the sun heats the wax and melts everything.
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: the wings off of the rigid structure and it crashes.
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: Right. And that is, you know, that is, of course,
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: a kind of fundamental image of hubris and arrogance and
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: what we would call inflation. You know, that you flew
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: too close to the sun. You lost touch with the
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: reality principle. You thought you were special. You thought that
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: the rules wouldn't apply to you. And that, and And so,
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: you know, to your point, Deb, inevitably, usually when we're
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: inflated for a long period of time, if that's kind
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: of where we live, we are set up for a fall.
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: And we are fascinated with people who fit this pattern
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: because it is a profoundly archetypal pattern. And so, you know,
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: I mean, story after story and movie after movie and,
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: you know, on people like Elizabeth Holmes, for example. I mean,
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: I just, I like consume all of the media about
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: that story, you know, because it's archetypal and we sense that,
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: you know. So the other example is Phaeton, which is
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: really interesting too, because Phaeton was the son of Helios.
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: So Phaeton was the son of Helios, the sun god,
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: and he finds out that that's his father and he's
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: He's boasting about it and his peers say, no, that's,
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: you know, we don't believe that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: he goes, he goes to Helios and Helios is really
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: glad to meet him. And Helios swears on the river
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: Styx that he will grant him whatever wish he wants.
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: And Phaeton says, I want to drive your chariot. Because
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: of course, Helios drives the chariot of the sun across
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: the sky with these, these powerful horses every day, you know,
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: comes up in the morning, goes across the sky and,
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: you know, then goes over here in the West or
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: whatever in the evening. And so Phaeton says, I want
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: to drive that. I want to drive that baby.
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: I want to take the car, Dad.
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: And Helios is like, no, no, no, no, no, you
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: can't do that. That's a really bad idea. Please don't
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: ask me that. But Phaeton says, no, that's what I want.
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: And so Helios has to grant him that. So, you know,
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: it's sort of like, you know, Phaeton is like the
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: original Nepo baby, you know, because he's, you know, he's
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: got this powerful father. And then he gets access to this, like,
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: incredible thing because of who his dad is. But what
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: does he do? He doesn't know what he's doing. He
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: can't control the horses. When he goes too high, the
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: earth freezes. When he goes too low, it scorches the earth.
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: And it's like, it's a disaster. And Zeus, to save
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: the world, because, you know, he's about to destroy the world,
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: Zeus hurls a thunderbolt at the chariot and kills Phaeton.
• 41:36
  Speaker 2: So it's a tragic outcome.
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: The other example that is a little different from both
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: Phaeton and Icarus, who are both young men who take
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: on way too much and have to suffer the consequences,
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: is Prometheus. And the story of Prometheus is that he
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: angered the gods by kind of short shrifting them on
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: a sacrifice. It looked like he was offering them the
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: better part of the sacrificial animal, but he really wasn't.
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: And then the gods withheld fire from humans, and Prometheus
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: decided to steal fire and give it to the humans
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: to defy the gods, but bring fire to humanity. which
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: in a way is emblematic of the beginning of culture.
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: Once you have fire, once you can start fires, once
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: you can cook food, it's a monumental game changer. The gods,
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: of course, punished Prometheus for this by chaining him to
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: a rock, and every day vultures would come and eat
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: his liver, which was live, live liver food. which was
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: thought to be the source of life, the seat of life.
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: And then every night it would heal, and so it went. Now,
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: this one is a little more nuanced than just foolish, arrogant,
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: inflated young men who think they can fly or drive
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: the chariot of the sun, in that it was a
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: gift for humankind. at the expense of the gods.
• 43:35
  Speaker 2: Well, and also, like, Prometheus knew what he was doing.
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: He knew he was going to experience consequences, right? So
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: he kind of chose this path. You know, in a way,
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: Prometheus has a lot in common with Christ, right? He
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: kind of sacrificed himself to bring something to humanity. So
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: there is some inflation in it, but it's kind of
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: like in service to something, right? Rather than just his
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: own arrogance. Yeah.
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: And That that is the crux of taking something big on.
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: What are you serving? And Prometheus made a conscious choice.
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: It shows how ambiguous inflation is. Sometimes it's necessary, but
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: it's risky. You need to know what you're getting into.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: ahead of time to at least envision the possible consequences
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: of this.
• 44:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I'm thinking of like cultural examples of inflation,
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: one of which, of course, is the Manhattan Project. It's like,
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: you know, let's let that genie out of the bottle.
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: Can't put that back in. Boy, you know, and it's,
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: you know, talking about arrogating godlike power. And the other one,
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: sorry to ring this bell again, But is AI, you know,
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: like we're charging forward and there's more and more people saying,
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: what are we doing?
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah. You know, it makes me tear up a little
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: bit to think about your reference to the Manhattan Project
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: of harnessing nuclear energy.
• 45:19
  Speaker 2: For destructive purposes.
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: And the devastation that it wrought. And now it is
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: in the hands of mere mortals. in various countries around
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: the world. And will we be able to contain this?
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: Or are we like Phaeton, driving the chariot of the gods,
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: harnessing ourselves to archetypal power and thinking we can master
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: it because, I said it before, I'm going to reiterate it,
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: you can't go too far without involving the unconscious. our complexes,
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: our shadow, all of it. We're only human taking on
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: this godlike power. And then AI. Right.
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: And, you know, I mean, you don't really have to
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: go looking for it. You're just kind of thumbing through
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: the paper. What you see is, thumbing through the paper,
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: scrolling through the paper, let's be honest. You know, Bill
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: Gates and others are writing about this latest thing that
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: happened where these AI agents broke into this other platform.
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: And it's like, whoa, we are going to lose control
• 46:38
  Speaker 2: of this. We have created something that's out of our
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: control and where there's hubris and arrogance and inflation. What
• 46:49
  Speaker 2: I've been reading is that the people in Silicon Valley
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: joke that they're making God bad, bad, bad. That's inflation. That,
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: you know, and I've heard that, I've heard, you know,
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: I've heard that that's the language that they use. And
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: it's like, wow, you can spot that one a mile off.
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: That's inflation and it's dangerous.
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And the higher we go, the faster and more
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: severely we fall. And Prometheus is a great example of
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: this because it He wasn't simply killed by Zeus's thunderbolt.
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: He was chained to a rock and made to suffer
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: the devouring of his liver every day from a wound
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: in his side and its healing every night. So far
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: from being empowered, he was vulnerable and helpless. One way
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: or another, these psychic forces will be honored. There's no
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: real escape from them. The old what comes up must
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: come down. And sometimes with consequences that are catastrophic to
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: our ego and ego writ large as culture.
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: Our soul is eaten.
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: Yes, exactly.
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: You know, I mean.
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: So let's look at this topic through the lens of,
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: you know, one of my favorite things, a fairy tale,
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: because one of my favorite fairy tales deals with this.
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: And it is the tale of the fisherman and his wife.
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: So just really quickly, for those of you who may
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: not remember it, A fisherman lives in a very modest
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: little hubble with his wife and he's out fishing and
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: he catches this fish and this fish says, you know,
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: please don't eat me. You know, throw me back. And
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: the fisherman says, oh, talking fish. I'm going to throw
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: him back. You know, smart. By the way, if you
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: ever meet a talking fish, definitely, definitely throw it back.
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: You heard it here. So he goes home and he
• 48:59
  Speaker 2: tells his wife, he's like, guess what happened to me
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: at the office today? I caught a talking fish. And
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: his wife said, you threw it back? It's going to
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: be able to grant a wish. Go back and find
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: that fish and ask it to give us a really
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: lovely cottage. So the fisherman goes back and he calls
• 49:18
  Speaker 2: for the fish and the fish appears. And, you know,
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: he says, well, you know, my wife would like a
• 49:24
  Speaker 2: really nice cottage. And the fish says, go back home.
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: It's been granted. So he goes home. There's this lovely
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: little cottage with kind of roses growing up the door and,
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: you know, cute little thatch roof and everything. And it's
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: just really charming. He goes in and his wife is like,
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: this is great. Soon after, she goes, I really want
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: a nice big house. So go back to that fish
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: and ask him. And so he does. And the fish
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: once again grants the wish. But it becomes increasingly inflated
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: from a nice little cottage, which you could totally see that, right?
• 49:58
  Speaker 2: To a bigger house, to a giant palace. Then she
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: wants to be king. And then she wants to be Pope.
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: And I think the final thing is she may be
• 50:08
  Speaker 2: asked to become God. Yeah. Is that right?
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: That's the way I remember it anyway.
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And that time the fish is like, sorry, go home.
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: And they're back in their hovel, which actually is a
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: really good outcome, you know, given how inflated the fisherman's
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: wife was. Or we might imagine that it's kind of a,
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: you know, a man's anima, perhaps. It's one way of
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: understanding the story. But whatever that force is that the
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: fisherman's wife is symbolic of, that desire in us for
• 50:41
  Speaker 2: more and more and more, the more we get, the
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: more we want, and we keep on asking for more
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: and more and more, and we violate that relationship with
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: the life-giving principle of the self, which is represented by
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: the fish. So if you play nice with the self,
• 51:00
  Speaker 2: if you have a good relationship with the self and
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: you're relatively... And you have a reverence and humility. The
• 51:08
  Speaker 2: self is like the talking fish that will grant you wishes.
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: But if you try to become, if you develop an
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: extractive attitude where you're going to demand that this gives
• 51:21
  Speaker 2: you whatever you want, eventually you're going to come upon
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: hard times. You know, related to this, Bonfrance talks at
• 51:30
  Speaker 2: one point about the nature of creativity. And she says,
• 51:33
  Speaker 2: you know, when you have a creative idea, be careful
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: that you don't think that you came up with it
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: because you didn't. The creative unconscious did. And you better
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: be aware of that and you better be grateful. And
• 51:43
  Speaker 2: if you're like, oh, I just I just I was
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: really good. I just came up with a creative idea.
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: You know, it's like it's like it'll keep on giving
• 51:50
  Speaker 2: for a while and then it's going to cut you
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: off at the knees in some way or send you
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: back to the hovel. Yeah.
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: And that that is a great illustration of the fairy tale.
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: at some point, if not acknowledged, it will do what
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: the fish did in the tail and send you right
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: back to the beginning.
• 52:12
  Speaker 2: If you're lucky. If you're lucky. It doesn't throw a
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: thunderbolt at you.
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: But it's another great caution of arrogating archetypal power or
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: the power of the gods to yourself. But, you know,
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: we haven't touched on negative inflation yet. And we probably
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: should at least give that a quick pass here. Negative
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: inflation is sort of the divine victim.
• 52:48
  Speaker 2: The heroic sufferer.
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: The heroic sufferer, forever incapacitated, forever unjustly somehow victimized by people,
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: God's life, fate, anything. It's not my fault, but I'm
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: just attacked and suffering from all sides. And it's sort
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: of like the inverse of the kind of inflation we've
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: been talking about, where we arrogate godlike powers to ourselves.
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: We're identified with a deity. I can do anything, which is, no,
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: I'm suffering and I'm swollen with with resentment and bitterness
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: and kind of possession by a kind of awful helplessness
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: with entitlement to be given to and rescued and compensated.
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, yeah, that's really great, Deb. And I mean,
• 53:54
  Speaker 2: I think like we can probably all identify a little
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: bit of that in ourselves, right? And also, you know,
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: probably people in our lives, you know, I'm thinking that
• 54:03
  Speaker 2: the person who's always like, oh, my God, work was
• 54:07
  Speaker 2: so hard this week. I have so much to do.
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: And it's, you know, it's just like, it's okay. It's like, okay, okay.
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: You know, I remember, I remember as a, here's a
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: little story about negative inflation. I remember in college, there
• 54:23
  Speaker 2: was a sort of very typical exchange that you would have.
• 54:27
  Speaker 2: So you'd be walking across campus and you'd run into
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: a friend or an acquaintance and you'd be like, hey,
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: how's it going? And invariably, both people would go, oh
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: my God, I have so much reading. I have 600
• 54:40
  Speaker 2: pages of reading this week. There's no way, you know,
• 54:42
  Speaker 2: it's like both people would be in this. And it
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: was just so, it was like, it was quickly so
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: absurd because the only conversation you ever had with anybody And,
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: you know, it's like, well, okay, that's just how it is.
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: Just like get on with it, you know, and shut
• 54:55
  Speaker 2: up and stop complaining. But it was just like there
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: was something exciting about suffering so much with this impossible
• 55:04
  Speaker 2: amount of reading, you know?
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: Yes, it was sort of like a holy martyr.
• 55:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: Staggering, staggering under the burden of all those books. But
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: suffering it nobly.
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: Exactly. So noble. But you have to make sure that
• 55:21
  Speaker 2: everyone knows because otherwise it's no fun.
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah. We've all been there in that place of righteous,
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: undeserved suffering and looking balefully at that teacher or parent
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: and suffering. Silently, but with meaningful glances until hopefully the
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: other person feels guilty or feels sorry for you or
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: asks what's wrong because the source of redressing that terrible injury,
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: it appeared from the outside and therefore somebody out there
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: has to fix.
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: It, which is.
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: Also horribly disempowering.
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: You know, I think the sort of like takeaway of
• 56:16
  Speaker 2: negative inflation is it's when you feel special because you're
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: suffering in some way. There's some specialness and entitlement that
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: goes along with your suffering. Just, you know, just the
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: way that, you know, the obverse sort of normal inflation
• 56:33
  Speaker 2: is you feel special because you're so great. Negative inflation
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: is you feel special because you're so hard, hard done,
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: hard done by.
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: Yes, we talk about it. I'm reminded of how unattractive
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: we find it when someone is in that place. It
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: often summons up, at least in me, a feeling of aggression.
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: I'll remember that, Deb.
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: You know, but also when we're kids, I don't think
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: anybody is entirely foreign to this, It gets us to
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: snap out of it and recover our own agency.
• 57:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. Right.
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: Some of that can be in service to a better
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: attitude and a more realistic adaptation that comes from wanting
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: someone else to solve my problem.
• 57:35
  Speaker 2: Well, I would love for us to talk about negative
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: inflation more sometime. I think it could make a great
• 57:40
  Speaker 2: standalone episode. But perhaps for today... We can switch to
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: a dream.
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: Today, our dreamer is a 37-year-old woman who's a project manager,
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: and she has entitled her dream, The Bear at the Window.
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: I was in the living room of a house I'm
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: not familiar with in waking life. It felt somewhat small,
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: though cozy and had yellow walls. It was the end
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: of the day with the sun setting and becoming darker outside.
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: I turned to notice that a giant bear was at
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: the window and was standing on its back legs looking in.
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: It pulled off the screen from the window like a
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: human would. I walked to the hallway to get out
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: of the way of the bear that I realized was
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: coming in through the window. But then, instead of the
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: big bear, a baby bear entered through the window and
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: approached me curiously. This is when I felt the ping
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: of fear knowing that I was now standing in between
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: the baby and mama bear. I turned to find a
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: way out as I anticipated the mama bear to attack
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: me upon entering. For context, she says, this dream occurred
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: the night before my 37th birthday. I've been feeling excited
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: for 37, but not particularly celebratory. I'm married without children,
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: partly due to our decision, but partly due to ovarian
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: damage from medical treatments in my 20s. My work and
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: friendships have not been feeling particularly fulfilling lately, and I've
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: been questioning making changes in how I invest my time
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: and energy. The main feelings in the dream were a
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: slight discomfort from being in a small living room and
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: hallway space, comforted by yellow painted walls, curious about the
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: bear at the window, anxious and fearful upon seeing the
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: baby bear enter through the window, And she adds, a
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: childhood friend had a small living room with yellow walls,
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: though not nearly the same as in my dream. I've
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: previously related bear symbolism to my sense of expression and
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: throat chakra, as though I am meant to learn through
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: the symbol of the bear.
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 2: Well, so here we sort of have almost a fairy
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: tale set up.
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 2: And it specifically reminds me of the fairy tale, Rose,
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 2: I think it's called Rose Red and Rose White.
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, exactly.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 2: Which is these two sisters living with their mother in
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: a little cottage and a bear comes and asks, you know,
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: can I sleep here tonight? And the fairy tale goes
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: on from there. So that it put me in a
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: mind of, oh, an encounter with a bear. That is
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 2: a common thing that happens in fairy tales.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: But at the ending of that fairy tale is very
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: different from what happens in the dream. Because the ending
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: of that fairy tale is that the welcoming attitude of
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: the two sisters and the mother, the feminine, results in
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: the transformation of the bear into the prince.
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: This dream does have this kind of fairytale aesthetic with
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: this really cozy living room. And then there's this kind
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: of anthropomorphic bear at the window standing on its hind
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: legs and like removing the screen. And you think, ah,
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: this is interesting. And she seems to have kind of a, like,
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: I think it's an appropriate attitude toward the bear. She's
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: like kind of trying to get out of its way.
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 2: She's not terrified, but she's also like not overly familiar
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 2: with it, which is kind of like a good thing.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: That's a good way to kind of think about bears
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 2: or the unconscious. And then this baby bear comes in.
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 2: And what I kind of love is the baby bear
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: is approaching her with curiosity. And, of course, I mean,
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 2: it's a really interesting image, and I'm not sure where
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 2: I want to go with it. But I do want
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: to say this, like, yes, in this sort of real-world test,
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 2: if you're between a mother and its baby, that's very bad.
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 2: On the other hand, I really like that something from
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 2: the unconscious is coming toward her with curiosity. So what
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: are you thinking, Deb?
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: I was thinking very much really the same thing. And
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: as I was reading The Dream, which I had not
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: read previous to the podcast, I could feel myself sort
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: of smiling, thinking, oh my gosh, you know, the... This
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: very human action of this bear that can pull a
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: screen off a window and then presumably open the window
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: and then pop the baby through the window. I'm thinking, oh,
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: something really interesting and good and great is going to happen.
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: This is an offering.
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's interesting. I like that. I like that.
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: But that's not where the dream went. And so here's
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: a classic dream theme. of when people often dream that
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: they're being pursued, being stalked, or are scared about what
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: it might be, of what needs to be faced, what
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: needs to be interacted with that's being symbolized by the bear.
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: What is the right attitude that the dream maker is asking?
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: And there's a clue here that The baby bear approached
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: me curiously. So the tone is, it's not hostile. We
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: don't know what might happen, but what might have happened
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: had the dream ego not tried to run away?
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: You know, that's a great point, Deb, and it also
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: brings me back to the fairy tale and your point
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: about the fairy tale because the bear shows up and
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: they're like, okay, come on in, you know, and that
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: winds up being the right thing to do is like
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: let the, and it's really such a sweet fairy tale
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 2: and I would recommend that the dreamer take a look
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 2: at it because if I recall, the bear kind of
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 2: hangs out with them all winter. Doesn't he stay there
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 2: all winter? And like, you know, they're just like curling
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: up by the fire at night with a big bear.
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 2: It sounds really, sounds really great. But as per your point,
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: you know, one of the things that we talk about
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 2: with dreams, of course, is that this is kind of
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 2: a rule of dream interpretation that came out of this
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 2: analyst who worked with Jung, that everything in the dream
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 2: is just as it should be, except perhaps the attitude
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: of the dream ego. So the dream ego, the I
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: in the dream, the woman in the dream is like, oh, no,
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: the bear is going to get me. What if that's
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: not right? What if the bear, and I like what
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: you said, it's like an offering. I mean, I hadn't
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 2: thought of that. But yeah, maybe the mama bear is like, here, baby,
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 2: go into the house. So, you know, one thing that
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 2: might be interesting for this dreamer to do is go
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 2: back and do some active imagination with this dream. And really,
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 2: the dream ego is making an assumption that the bear
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: is going to be dangerous. That might be the wrong assumptions.
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: It might be that the bear wants the dreamer to
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: engage with the baby. It might be that the bear
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 2: wants to entrust the baby to the safekeeping of the
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: dream ego. And how different would it be if the
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: dreamer welcomed to the baby? I mean, you know, it's
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 2: something to play with. I'm not sure that that's the
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: right attitude, but it might be.
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: But that's what the dream presents is here's what happened. Now,
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: what do you dream ego do with this?
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: And one clue for me here is that the dream
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: itself does not give any portrayal of animosity.
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 2: Of violence or threat.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: Right. You know, it does not say in the dream
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: that the mother bear roared and thrust her baby through
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: the window or, you know, that the baby bear growled
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: or reached out its paw to claw the dream ego.
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: In other words, nothing bad has actually happened except that
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: now there's a baby bear in the house.
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 2: Right. Like maybe now you go open the door and
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: you say, come on, mama bear, come in, your baby
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 2: bear is in here. I mean, look, the good news
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 2: about this dream is something in the unconscious that's lively
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 2: and young is approaching this dreamer with curiosity. There's some
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 2: contact being made with this very big energy. I mean,
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 2: there is this big archetypal energy.
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: Very, very big energy that often has to do with
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: mother and child. You know, all the famous stories are
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: And you just referenced it of don't get between mama
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: bear and a cub. If you're walking in the woods
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: and you see a bear cub, you know, mama's not
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: far away. And boy, show me bad. You better get
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: out of there. So I'm thinking two things here. One
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: is she's in the living room where we live, the
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: space where we live, of a house that felt somewhat small.
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: It was cozy. And had yellow walls, which are positive.
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: But then she says in her associations, slight discomfort from
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: being in a small living room and hallway space. So
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: she's in a place where it's right around her 37th birthday,
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: the night before. Dream Maker can often send us a
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: dream at one of these places. sort of points in
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: life that are significant. She's in a space that's a
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: little too small. It's cozy, it's comforting, but it's a
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: little too small. Then we have the visitation by mama
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: bear and baby bear of something new. And I might,
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: in active imagination, I might imagine going toward the baby bear,
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: maybe offering him some water. And asking baby bear and
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: mama bear through the window, what are you doing here?
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: Why have you come to visit? What are you here
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: to teach me to tell me you've arrived? Okay, you're here.
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: That's a big deal. Please help me understand.
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 2: You know, one of the concepts that we actually talk
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 2: about in our book, DreamWorks, is this idea about telos
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 2: and kind of where is the telos in the dream,
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 2: which is something that the union analyst, Pat Berry, writes about. And,
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 2: you know, we kind of took our inspiration from her.
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 2: But I like asking that question because sometimes there's something
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 2: that's really surprising. A lot of times there's something surprising
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 2: in a dream and it can be helpful to pay
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 2: attention to that. So of course it's surprising that she
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 2: looks up and there's a bear in the window. That's
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 2: one surprise. But in some sense, it's like, okay, I'm
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 2: dealing with that. I'm moving away. And then there's this
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 2: big surprise that all of a sudden there's a baby
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 2: bear there. Like, wow, that is not where, you know,
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 2: any of us thought this was going. So the big,
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 2: the exclamation point in the dream is the baby bear.
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 2: The baby bear is the thing that kind of carries
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 2: the forward momentum in the dream. It's the thing that
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 2: brings the new meaning to the dream. So I really
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 2: like your idea, Deb, of just kind of like approaching
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 2: that baby bear. I mean, I just kind of want
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 2: to pick it up and cuddle it.
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 2: But, you know, kind of what, hey there, what do
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 2: I need to learn?
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, bears have famously been sort of, very sort of
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: humanized as, you know, Goldilocks and the three bears. Bears
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: can stand on their hind legs like humans. They're, you know,
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: at least purportedly very protective of their offspring, very strong
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: mother-baby associations, which takes me to the mother-daughter associations of
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: our dreamer, that our dreamers married without children. partly due
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: to a decision and partly due to medical treatments that
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: may have interfered with fertility. She's also saying other relationships
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: haven't been especially fulfilling. So here's a relationship with mother
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: bear and baby bear in the context of human relationships
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: with friends that aren't fulfilling. And lack of a destiny
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: as a mother.
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 2: So the unconscious is bringing something new into that equation.
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 2: And there's an invitation to explore something.
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 2: Thanks for listening. To submit a dream, suggest an episode topic,
• 1:11:32
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• 1:11:37
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• 1:11:40
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