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Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Individuation: A Jungian Reading of the Declaration of Independence · This Jungian Life Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Even on the interpersonal level, you know, people refusing to
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: talk to each other because of political differences, which I
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: think kind of flies in the face of what Jung
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: is saying here. It's like, yeah, okay, we're sort of
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: in a constant mitigated state of civil war. Bring it on.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Let's hold it. Let's hold the difference. Let's hold the tension.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Let's hold the conflict.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Really what you're saying is owning rather than blaming. It's
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: so much easier to blame. It's so much easier to
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: point the finger.
• 0:32
  Speaker 3: Welcome to This Jungian Life. Three good friends and Jungian analysts,
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: Lisa Marciano, Deborah Stewart, and Joseph Lee, invite you to
• 0:41
  Speaker 3: join them for an intimate and honest conversation that brings
• 0:44
  Speaker 3: a psychological perspective to important issues of the day.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I'm Lisa Marciano, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Philadelphia.
• 0:54
  Speaker 3: I'm Joseph Lee, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: I'm Deborah Stewart, a Jungian analyst on Cape Cod. Well, welcome.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: I'm joined today by my dear friend and colleague, Bob Shevely.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Bob and I trained together in Philadelphia, and so we
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: were part of the Philadelphia puppy pile. in analytic training
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: where we enjoyed each other a lot. So Bob, it's
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: really great to have you with us.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: Lisa, I have so enjoyed our discussions. Thank you for
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: inviting me.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's really nice. And I will say that today's
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: topic was one that I advocated for us to talk about.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: And I will say that I want to remind listeners
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: that I am in Philadelphia. And Philadelphia, this time of year,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: around about this time of year, about 250 years ago,
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: something very, very important was happening. And that's been brought
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: to my mind recently. And I thought it would be
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: really interesting to try to talk about the birth of
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: this republic. from a depth psychological perspective. It's a little
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: bit of a stretch, but we're going to try it.
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: And of course, it is the 250th anniversary of the
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: adoption of the Declaration of Independence, which took place here
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: in Philadelphia on July 4th, 1776, not too far from
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: where I sit right now. And although, of course, we're
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: talking about the American Declaration of Independence, this is a
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  Speaker 1: document that has been influenced by diverse and ancient sources
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: going all the way back to ancient Greece. And of course,
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  Speaker 1: we know that it continued to have significant impact on
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: the world around it, revolutions in South America and France
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: and some Native American declarations in a similar vein. And
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: its importance continues to reverberate even today. So I hope
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  Speaker 1: that we're not having too narrow of a frame here.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: I think this is a topic that affects more than
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: just Americans. So here we go. We're going to try
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: to take a Jungian look at the Declaration of Independence.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: In Congress, July 4th, 1776, the unanimous declaration of the
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  Speaker 2: 13 United States of America, when in the course of
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  Speaker 2: human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve
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  Speaker 2: the political bands which have connected them with another, and
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  Speaker 2: to assume among the powers of the earth the separate
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  Speaker 2: and equal station to which the laws of nature and
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  Speaker 2: nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: of mankind require that they should declare the causes which
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to
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  Speaker 2: be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they
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  Speaker 2: are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that
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  Speaker 2: among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,
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  Speaker 2: that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men,
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  Speaker 2: deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
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  Speaker 2: that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends,
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  Speaker 2: it is the right of the people to alter or
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  Speaker 2: to abolish it. Pretty powerful words. And those words help
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: us understand why there's so much resonance with humankind and
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: this particular document. You know, it's that need to separate
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: from an authority that once provided structure or strength, but
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  Speaker 2: no longer serves, and looking for authority from some deeper source.
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  Speaker 2: And that's an archetypal pattern, I believe.
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  Speaker 1: You know, one of the things in that document that
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: is so powerful is that famous sentence, we hold these
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  Speaker 1: truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights.
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  Speaker 1: And of course, that is an expression of this old
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  Speaker 1: idea called, in some cases, it's known as natural rights,
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  Speaker 1: which was, I think, most clearly articulated by John Locke,
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: the philosopher. But, you know, that idea has clear antecedents
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  Speaker 1: in ancient Greece and in medieval Christianity. But it's a
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  Speaker 1: really big idea. And I think that there is a
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  Speaker 1: Jungian version of it. I mean, of course, just to
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  Speaker 1: place this in context, right? Declaration of Independence, 1776. Jung
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  Speaker 1: is born 99 years later in 1875. So this You know,
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  Speaker 1: this would have very much been something he was familiar with.
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  Speaker 1: Jung was a supporter, we're told, of the Swiss democracy.
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  Speaker 1: He had a thing or two to say about democracy
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  Speaker 1: in general. So none of this would have been unfamiliar
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  Speaker 1: to Jung at all. But I feel like there are
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  Speaker 1: some ways in which Jung works with that idea. And
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  Speaker 1: the idea essentially is that there is something about the
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  Speaker 1: individual that that has its own dignity, sovereignty, uniqueness. And
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  Speaker 1: it's not granted that the rights that we have, this
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  Speaker 1: is the idea of natural rights, that we don't have
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  Speaker 1: them because someone gave them to us, that there's something
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  Speaker 1: innate in being human that asserts that we have these rights.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: And von Franz says, you know, in her book, in
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: her foreword to O'Dynick's book, Young in Politics, she says
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  Speaker 1: that he was a very strong supporter of les droits
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  Speaker 1: de l'homme, you know, the rights of man. Because I
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  Speaker 1: think that his psychology rests on similar assumptions.
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  Speaker 2: Bingo.
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  Speaker 1: And I think that's part of what I really want
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: to look at today. And it has something to do
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: with the importance of the individual.
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  Speaker 2: The idea for me... that's so important that resonates is
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  Speaker 2: we are not our persona.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: So the parallel, each person carries an inherent psychic reality,
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  Speaker 2: which is the self, that archetype of wholeness, and it
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  Speaker 2: precedes ego, social role, and our collective identity. So likewise
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  Speaker 2: with the declaration, the state may be necessary, but It's
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  Speaker 2: not the source of the person's deepest values.
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  Speaker 1: Right. And in fact, the role of the state is
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  Speaker 1: to kind of protect the interests of the individual, right?
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  Speaker 2: Bingo. Same way that Jungian psychology asserts that there is
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  Speaker 2: a psychic center that's prior to collective identity and is
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  Speaker 2: constantly trying to push us toward wholeness.
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  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm. I love that. Yeah. We're not members of the
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  Speaker 1: polis first. We are first an individual. And of course,
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: Jung talked about the importance of becoming an individual when
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: he talked about the importance of individuation.
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  Speaker 2: The whole purpose of analysis. That's why he named it individuation.
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: And he makes this statement a couple of places. And
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  Speaker 1: I know you have one example and I have a
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  Speaker 1: couple of others about The importance of the individual in
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: collective life.
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  Speaker 2: Yes. In the last analysis, the essential thing is the
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  Speaker 2: life of the individual. This alone makes history. Here alone
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  Speaker 2: do the great transformations take place. And the whole future,
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: the whole history of the world, ultimately springs as a
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: gigantic summation from these hidden sources, Oh.
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: My God, I love that quote.
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  Speaker 2: I can see why you love it. It's such. a
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: big idea and such an important one.
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  Speaker 1: It is a big idea.
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  Speaker 2: But wow, what a responsibility it places on our shoulders.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, it does. And I feel like that quote
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: has real clinical relevance because I don't know if this
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: happens to you, but I sometimes get someone coming into
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: analysis and sort of saying, I don't know why I
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: come every week and talk about, you know, my conflict
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: with my kid or my, you know, it doesn't, in
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: the scope of things, my problems don't matter. And I
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: sometimes trot this quote out and say, no, no, this
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  Speaker 1: is how the whole project of humankind moves forward is
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  Speaker 1: through the little advances that we each make.
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  Speaker 2: Beautiful.
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  Speaker 1: And of course, Jung felt that as we do our
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  Speaker 1: own work, and make our unconscious more conscious and come
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  Speaker 1: into better relationship with the unconscious, we become one of
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  Speaker 1: the drops in the bucket that might lead to further
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: psychological development at the collective level. So he really felt
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  Speaker 1: that the work starts with the individual first and then
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  Speaker 1: can lead out to change in the collective. Now, you
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  Speaker 1: might disagree with that, but that is very much what
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  Speaker 1: he thought.
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  Speaker 2: No, actually, I wanted to pick up on it because
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  Speaker 2: one of the things that I often wrestle with with
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  Speaker 2: Jung and his position around the collectivity and his cautions
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  Speaker 2: against collectivity is that the collective can function in a
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  Speaker 2: way to raise consciousness. So I think of black rights
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  Speaker 2: or gay rights, that this is a collective movement and
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  Speaker 2: it can affect how people think about these issues.
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  Speaker 1: Absolutely. I think that's a great example.
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  Speaker 2: And so there's an example of it going from the
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  Speaker 2: collectivity to affecting the individual, but also we can see
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  Speaker 2: it the other way around, that in order to overcome
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  Speaker 2: whatever shadow projections some ostracized group experiences by the collective,
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  Speaker 2: you have to do your individual work. Because there's a
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  Speaker 2: great danger. If one doesn't learn to hold the tension
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  Speaker 2: of the opposites, then one becomes identified with the movement,
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  Speaker 2: becomes a crusader for the movement, and that's a kind
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  Speaker 2: of egoistic inflation.
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  Speaker 1: You know, I love this idea that you're sharing, and
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  Speaker 1: I want to just kind of maybe take it a
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  Speaker 1: little bit further, which is, I hadn't ever really thought
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  Speaker 1: about it that way before, that the collective might further
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  Speaker 1: a consciousness in an individual, but of course you're right
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  Speaker 1: about that. And Jung, as we have often pointed out
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  Speaker 1: before on the podcast, really distrusted collective psychology. He thought
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  Speaker 1: that mass psychology was always going to be of a
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  Speaker 1: lesser degree of consciousness than the individual. And we can
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  Speaker 1: understand why he was so, I mean, first of all,
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  Speaker 1: you know, he was an intuitive and he was Swiss,
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  Speaker 1: but But he lived through both World Wars. So, of course,
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  Speaker 1: he distrusted mass movements because he had seen some really
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  Speaker 1: ugly consequences of those. But I'm even thinking, Bob, I mean,
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  Speaker 1: you gave two great contemporary examples. But if you think
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: about what was going on, you know, in the 13
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  Speaker 1: colonies 250 years ago, I mean, I don't have a
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: deep knowledge of American history, but there certainly had been
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: kind of revolutionary fervor in the colonies, but, you know,
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  Speaker 1: before Thomas Paine and before the Declaration, it didn't sort
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: of emerge de novo out of nothing, but it crystallized something.
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  Speaker 1: And then, you know, so Thomas Jefferson retired to this
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: little house on Market Street. It's still there. You can
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: go visit it. By the way, I invite everyone to
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: come to Philadelphia and see the places where all this
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: took place. So we hold up in this little house
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: that today is called Declaration House, and he writes the
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: Declaration of Independence. And then it's edited, I think, by
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: Franklin and Adams, a couple other people. And then they
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: adopt it on July 4th, but they don't start reading it.
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  Speaker 1: The first public reading, we think, is in Philadelphia on
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: July 8th. And then they publish it and they give
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: it to people to transmit it up north and down south,
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: then send it on boats across to try to get
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: the word out. But what I'm thinking, as per your point, Bob,
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  Speaker 1: is that there was an idea, a fervor, a feeling maybe,
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  Speaker 1: something arising in the collective that then is distilled, let's say,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: by Jefferson's words in this document. And so in some
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: of the places where this is read, you know, in
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: Philadelphia and in Boston and The crowd erupts into cheering.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: There's ringing of bells. They pull down the royal insignia
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: off of what today is Independence Hall. And they do
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: that same thing in Boston. Something has been lifted up
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  Speaker 1: into full conscious awareness because of this, I want to say,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: mass movement, right? Because of this cultural movement.
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: To illustrate what you were just saying, and I just
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: checked with AI on this, so we'll take it with
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: a grain of salt. But here's kind of like a
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: sense of how impactful this was. So yes, on July 4th,
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: Congress adopts the final text, and John Dunlap produces the
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: broadsides overnight. Then from July 5th to the 7th, Copies
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: leave Philadelphia by express riders, post riders, military couriers, and newspapers.
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: Congress orders that the Declaration be claimed throughout the colonies
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: and the Army. And as you mentioned, on July 8th
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: in Philadelphia, the first known public reading occurs. Crowds celebrate.
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: Church bells ring. Symbols of royal authority are attacked. Same
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: thing happens in New York City on July 9th. Mm-hmm.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: The Declaration is read to Washington's troops that evening. Crowds
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: tear down the equestrian statue of George III at Bowling Green.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: And I love this. Lead from the statue is later
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: used to make musket balls.
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: Well, there's an Enantiodromia.
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: Yep. And then it goes on and on, you know,
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: from the 10th through the 12th, Trenton, Annapolis, Wilmington and Dover, Delaware, Williamsburg, Virginia.
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: not until mid to late July does it reach New
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: Hampshire and North Carolina and South Carolina in late July.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: And finally, early August in Georgia. So it took a
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: long time. It wasn't instantaneous, but you can get from
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: July 8th, that first to the beginning of August, like
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: a snowball rolling downhill. It was gathering energy precisely because
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: it was so resonant.
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah. This brings to mind this thought that I remember
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: being introduced to by, of all things, probably a junior
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: high school history teacher. And I remember he said, ideas
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: are one of the most powerful weapons. And I thought,
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: what are you talking about? But ideas are powerful. And
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: the ideas that we just read, that you just read, Bob,
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: in this document were really powerful ideas that had immense
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: consequences here. And then, you know, just a couple decades later,
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: huge consequences in France and on and on and on.
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: And of course, we have to say that as beautiful
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: and ideal as it is, it was built on hypocrisy.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: Because it says right there, all men are created equal,
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: but we were a country that had enslaved peoples. And
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: of course, that's the great fault line that was built
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: in to the Republic from the beginning that would erupt,
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: you know, less than 100 years later in the Civil War.
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: But there had to be an answer to that because
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: it was a noble... ennobling vision, but it really set
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: the challenge and showed up the hypocrisy of these ideals
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: of natural rights at the same time that Jefferson, the
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: man that wrote this incredible document, owned slaves.
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: It's hard to imagine. Yeah. You know, that there could
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: be such a split.
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: But that's the nature of the psyche too, right?
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: Bingo. Yeah.
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we have this noble principle that was dissociated from
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: the lived reality of the time, which was slavery.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: It's well put, well put.
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: I'm thinking, though, how difficult it is for us as
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: individuals to hold the tension of the opposites, not to
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: identify with one side or the other. You know, to
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: own the fact that That I have shadow. And that
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: that's part of me. That's, I think, the great challenge
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: that Jung provides.
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And in a sense, you know, I think there's
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: something about the nature of democracy that makes room for that.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: Because the nature of democracy itself is that it doesn't
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: have to be all one thing or another. There's room
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: for sort of open conflict there. And so in some sense,
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: it's a, you know, and Jung does write a little
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: bit about democracy. And I think I have a quote
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: in there somewhere that I want to look for. But first,
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: I want to just share another one of my favorite,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: favorite Jung quotes. The most important political, social and spiritual
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: work we can do is to withdraw the projection of
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: our own shadow onto others. So I think that's that's
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: what you're getting at. Exactly. You know, democracy is so imperfect, right?
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: But it's never looking for absolutes. I mean, I think
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: when it works, it's all about compromise, right? It's about
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: the workable solution, not the perfect solution. And that somehow
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: makes room for our own messiness.
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: It parallels our own psychic structure.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: We are messy.
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: As much as our ego ideal wants to say, this
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: is me, it's one of the great truths of Jungian
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: psychology that, no, we're not just this one thing.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: We are this amalgam of disparate parts, and that it's
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: our responsibility to hold all of those disparate parts together
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: in some form of a conscious whole.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: Just building on that, I want to read something from
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: this really great book called Young and Politics, and it's
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: by Walter O'Dynick. And this is about Jung and democracy.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: And in this paragraph that I'm going to read, he
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: is quoting Jung, so you'll hear that. Democracy, Jung thinks,
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: is one way of modifying and balancing the warlike instincts politically.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: It allows them to expend themselves in the form of
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: domestic quarrels called political life. He argues that democracy is
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: really a highly psychological institution which takes account of human
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: nature as it is and makes allowances for the necessity
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: of conflict within its own national boundaries. In a democracy,
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: the individual's frequent enmity toward others, his need for aggressiveness,
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: and his desire for power are given free reign within
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: the limits of a constitution, law, and a tolerable level
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: of crime and corruption. It is not too far off
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: the mark to say that democracy is a chronic state
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: of mitigated civil war and anarchy. But by accepting, introverting,
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: and then limiting the instincts for hostility and aggression to
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: the domestic sphere, Democracy, to a certain extent, decreases the
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: need for foreign enemies and wars, and this, of course,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: has to do with shadow projection again. Jung maintains that
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: both domestic and foreign conflicts could be reduced still further
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: if men learned consciously to introvert some of their aggressiveness
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: directly into their own psyches. Much of the national mitigated
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: state of war would soon come to an end if
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: everybody could see his own shadow and begin the only
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: struggle that is really worthwhile, the fight against the overwhelming
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: power drive of the shadow. So, an interesting Jungian take
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: on democracy.
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: Really dense, and I think brilliant. What a great quote. Yeah,
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: that's the work, withdrawing the shadow.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes. And this idea that you know, as you said,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: we are this mix of disparate parts and we kind
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: of just have to come to terms with that. We
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: can't pretend that we're just one thing, right? That's a
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: kind of fundamentalist mindset that there's only one way to
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: be and we are only one thing. And of course,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: whenever we get there, we've mightily split off our shadow,
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: which inevitably means we're going to project it and it's
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: going to cause problems.
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: And it seems to me that that's one of the
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: core issues in our public life today, the degree to
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: which shadow is being projected by both sides.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: Yes. Yes. And you see this at the national level
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: in politics and internationally too. And you also see this
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: a lot even on the interpersonal level, people refusing to
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: talk to each other because because of political differences, which
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: I think kind of flies in the face of what
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: Jung is saying here. It's like, yeah, okay, we're sort
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: of in a constant mitigated state of civil war. Bring
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: it on. Let's hold it. Let's hold the difference. Let's
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: hold the tension. Let's hold the conflict. Let's own it.
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: Let's own that we can be aggressive.
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: Really what you're saying is owning rather than blaming. It's
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: so much easier to blame. It's so much easier to
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: point the finger. I mean, it's kind of one of
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: the core dynamics of addiction as well, right? It's not
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: me that is the problem. I don't have a problem.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: It's you name whatever the excuse is. And codependency, it's
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: the same dynamic. I don't have any problems as I'm
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: just taking care of my partner or whomever who has
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: the problem and refusing to see. how their own behavior
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: is enabling or toxic.
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: You know, I want to go back again to this
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: idea that's just, I find so fascinating, the natural rights idea.
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: I just want to pick out a little bit more
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: because it's such a deep idea. Because I think what
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: it essentially is saying is that these are not rights
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: that have been constructed, they've been discovered. It's like they
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: just exist. And it is a pretty radical idea, but
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: one that I think a lot of people have intuited.
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: And one of those people who intuited it was a
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: Neoplatonic philosopher named Plotinus. And he, Jung uses this idea,
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: Plotinus has this idea of the monad. and he talks
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: about it as being the one. And Edinger picks up
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: on this in his book, Ego and Archetype. And it's
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: this idea that the kind of psychological sense of the
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: monad is that all authentic being occurs when we live
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: and speak out of our unified and unique individuality. So
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: there it is, a neoplatonic philosophy, this idea of the one,
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: that innate experience of wholeness that I think you know
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: you made the point earlier Bob it is an I
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: think as far as I can tell it is an
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: experience an intimation of the self it's a subjective experience
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: in some sense but one that has been again I
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: think kind of known intuitively by people throughout the centuries
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: that there's something inherent in me that rests on a
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: transpersonal basis And that's why these rights, you know, Jefferson
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: says they're rights that are given by God. And I
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: think if we're looking at that psychologically and not necessarily doctrinally,
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: it's the same idea. There's something larger than ego, or
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: as you said before, certainly larger than persona, that's being
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: implicated here.
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: It's core to Jung's typology of... The psyche that at
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: the center is the archetype of wholeness. And our job
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: is to acknowledge that and relate to it in a
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: kind of dynamic way. And it's in that relating, in
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: that picking up the challenges, you know, where there's a
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: kind of a give or take that transformation takes place.
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: You know, as you were talking, I was thinking about
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: the compensatory function of dreams. We always have an ego,
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: a dream ego. How we see ourselves, how we experience
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: ourselves in the dream. But all the rest of it
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: is a challenge. Along the lines of knock, knock, knock. Well,
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: I know you see it this way, but would you
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: consider this? Consider that?
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what the dream makers say. So I want
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: to go back to what you were talking about a
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: minute ago, which is how any of this might be
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: relevant to what's going on in today's political life. And
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: this idea that we each have this, you put it
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: so well before, there's something innate in us that we
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: just sense that rests on this transpersonal basis. We have
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: to acknowledge that this is true of everyone else. And
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: if you can really take that on board, it makes
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: an ethical demand on us to acknowledge the independent subjectivity
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: of even our enemies. And when we can't do that,
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: we're in the neighborhood of splitting, which is this, you know,
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: a psychological defense where we take half the problem and
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: we say we don't know anything about that. It's out there.
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: So it's splitting. I'm all good and you're all bad.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: It boils down to asking self the question, where is
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: that otherness? Where is that otherness in me? Which I'm
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: not great on biblical quotes, but it's that quote around
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: the idea of don't complain about others. the speck in
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: your brother's eye until you remove the log from your own.
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so that is the discipline, right?
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: And I think that, you know, one way to think
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: about it is if you feel very hot under the
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: collar about a political figure or, you know, something going
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: on in the culture, it can be helpful to just
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: at least ask yourself the question, where is that in me?
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: I mean, Jung made the point that Shadow projection doesn't
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: happen unless there's a hook. In other words, if you're
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: projecting your own greed on someone, better believe it. The
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: person you're projecting on is undoubtedly greedy. But the key
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: thing is, does it fill you with a disproportionate amount
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: of energy? Because if it does, then you might be
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: looking at some disowned quality in yourself. And this has
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: complete relevance in political life. So you look at someone
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: who's denigrating a group of people, for example, or people
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: of another country or another race, and it's like, hmm,
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: I wonder what they're up to. What's going on for
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: them psychologically that they have to exert all of this
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: energy kind of projecting something on these people? That's something
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: they don't want to know about, about themselves. And conversely,
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: you know, if you are... you know, very, very angry
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: at a given politician, let's say, and no names will
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: be used. I mean, not that there isn't plenty to
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: be angry about with lots of politicians. It's not that
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: it's not real, right? That's not what we're saying. But
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: it is an invitation to get curious, right? It's an
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: invitation to get curious about why that particular thing has
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: so much energy for you.
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: It's so much easier to look at the hook To
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: be captivated by that.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: Yes. Well, you know, when we do that, it fills
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: us with self-righteousness, which is a kind of inflation.
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: That's exactly the thought that I was having, which is
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: it's so much easier and simplistic to be right. I'm
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: in the right. How convinced am I that I'm in
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: the right to the degree that it shuts out difference
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: and otherness that might just have something to do with
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: me as well.
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: And curiosity, you know, I think it also shuts down curiosity. So,
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: I mean, I don't want to wander too far into,
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: you know, an analysis of what might be going on
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: in the United States politically right now, but somehow there
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: has to be some curiosity about the people we disagree with.
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: It's like, I wonder why they think that. I wonder
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: what real, like real curiosity, you know, like there must
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: be something I don't understand, right? Exactly.
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: And with that attitude, that opens up space to listen
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: and receive as opposed to foreclosing space. If I can
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: have curiosity about what's going on with the other, then
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: there's space to start to listen in a real way.
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: And I might just learn something about myself.
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: And if enough of us did that, we might, I
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: don't know, there might be a little bit less political polarization,
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: which would probably be helpful right about now. Because it
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: sure is hard to solve problems when we don't even
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: have the same frame of reference for reality. You know,
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: it's concerning.
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's, I guess, the core there is how do
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: we start to bridge that?
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: And.
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: It's not by saying, you have to change. It starts
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: by saying, how do I need to change? How can
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: I be curious? What might I learn? What's valid in
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: the other's position that is helpful for me? So, Lisa,
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: there's a quote we had discussed before we started recording.
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: That's rather lengthy, and I'm taking it, I acknowledge that
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: I'm taking it a bit out of context, but Jung
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: is talking about the great divide, and he's, in this case,
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: referring to the Iron Curtain, which was one of the
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: great political splits of his day. And he's talking about how,
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: when we have this shadow projection, there's a general neuroticizing
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: that takes place and, quote, a dissociation of personality analogous
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: to the splitting of the world today by the Iron Curtain.
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: This boundary line, bristling with barbed wire, runs through the
• 35:33
  Speaker 2: psyche of modern man, no matter which side he lives. And,
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: just as the typical neurotic is unconscious of his shadow side,
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: So the normal individual, like the neurotic, sees his shadow
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: in his neighbor or the man beyond the great divide. Yeah.
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: I mean, Jung right there is taking his idea of
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: shadow and projection and applying it to the collective level
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: and identifying how very dangerous that is.
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: And toxic, and it leads to the kind of stalemate,
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: the dysfunctionality, the kind of polarization that we're seeing today. Mm-hmm.
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: So I'm going to just do a quote throwdown.
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: Bob, because.
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: Go for it.
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: Got another one for you. That's a mic drop quote
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: from Solzhenitsyn, which goes right to that same quote that
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: you just read. It's so great. If only it were
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: all so simple. If only there were evil people somewhere
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary to separate
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: them from the rest of us and destroy them. But
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: of every human being. I think Jung would 100% endorse that.
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And don't complain about the speck in your brother's
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: eye until you remove the log in your own.
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: We've known these truths for thousands of years, and yet
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: it takes a kind of discipline to remember. But it matters.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: The stakes are high.
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: Yes, and I loved when you floated the topic at
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: the last minute.
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: I did. I totally did this to Bob at the
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: last minute. We were planning something else. I'm like, please,
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: can we talk about this?
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because it matters.
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: Because it really is important. It's critical. I mean, we
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: are at a very, very, very dangerous time when we
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: have the power to destroy ourselves. We've got to get
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: a handle on this.
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: You know, I know we've talked about this before on
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: the podcast, but, you know, Jung was asked, you know,
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: do you think humanity is going to make it? And
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: he said, maybe we might just pull through if enough
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: people do their own psychological work. And, you know, I mean...
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: Jung really did believe that individuals doing their psychological work
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: could aggregate to mean that humanity would progress and develop.
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: In fact, I want to bring up something else that
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: Odinek says here, because it's ultimately, I think, a pretty
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: sobering view. Jung wasn't sure we were going to make it,
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: but he did see a way And, you know, I
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: suppose some people would say, well, that's ridiculous. You know,
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: people sitting in their little studies reading old books. Is
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: that really going to change the world? But I'm not
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: really sure I have a better idea about what might. So,
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: you know, we might as well get to it. So
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: here's what O'Doenig says. He spends the last... The last
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: chapter is called Some Thoughts on Democracy, and he's comparing...
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: what Freud thought about human nature and what Jung thought
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: about human nature. And it's maybe a good place to
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: wrap this up. He says, in the end, therefore, here
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: lies one of the essential differences between Jung and Freud.
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: Freud remains mired in a patriarchal and egoistic view of
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: man and morality. Consequently, the implications of his psychology are reactionary.
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: From his patriarchal and personalistic view of the unconscious, all
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: he sees is is a mass of individuals, each driven
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: by chaotic, aggressive, and egoistic instincts. Hence, for Freud, the
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: preservation and advancement of culture and civilization can only be
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: based on repression, both internal and through the firm rule
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: of the superego, and external through the dictatorship of a
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: leader or the power of the state. Jung, on the
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: other hand, has a conception of the psyche that allows
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: for a natural development of the individual and the society
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: that could lead to a harmonious and democratic resolution of
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: the political and moral conflicts of mankind. So that's what
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: we got, I think, as far as I can tell.
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: I like one of those options better than the other.
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: Me too. So speaking of all this, let's change to
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: a dream. And Bob, you brought it up before, but
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: I think it's worth mentioning that dreams are part of
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: how the psyche self-regulates when we become one-sided and tend
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: to think that we have all the answers, for example,
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: it will be largely our dreams that will remind us
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: that we don't. So again, just even how important dreams
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: are as we try to navigate this difficult time. Today's
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: dreamer is a 49-year-old man who works as a lawyer.
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: and he has called his dream Long Lost Child Given
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: Up for Adoption. And here's the dream. My wife and
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: I are staying at this resort, but it's not very
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: luxurious and feels a little bit like a hospital. It's
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: very cramped, and we have a room that's connected to
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: a bigger room with tons of people staying in it,
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: so you feel like you don't really have any privacy.
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: I have to go to my tiny room to take
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: calls for work on my computer. We all walk down
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: to the cafeteria, and there are kids running around. One
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: is a toddler that looks like my niece when she
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: was a toddler. She grabs my leg and hugs me.
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: I immediately realize that this is the child that my
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: wife and I gave up for adoption before we had
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: our first child. And it seems like the kid knows
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: it as well and is crying and holding me very tightly,
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: and it's very emotional for me as well. And I
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: look back to yell to my wife that this is
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: the child we gave up. Then the toddler runs up
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: the ramp ahead of us and I run up the
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: ramp after her and I'm trying to find someone to
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: talk to at the staff to let them know that
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: that's actually our kid, but I can't find anyone at
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: the front desk. Then I wake up, but I'm actually
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: still in the dream and I'm telling the people in
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: our crowded room about the dream I had with this
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: baby hugging me. In the dream, my wife explains that
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: it was impossible since that child is so young, not
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: to mention that we never had a child we gave
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: up for adoption. I laughed and realized that it couldn't
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: have happened. Then I wake up from that dream into
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: actual reality. So for context, he says, my dad passed
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: away recently and I'm still grieving. My mom had a
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: miscarriage and has told me about dreams in which she
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: had seen my dad reunite with a child in heaven.
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: My wife and I have been going through difficult times
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: as our kids are all near college age or college
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: age and we're facing an empty nest. but also having
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: our own challenges with our midlife marriage. The main feelings
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: in the dream were mostly positive, real excitement about finding
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: the child. I genuinely believed that we had given up
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: a child for adoption while I was in the dream.
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: It was a huge adrenaline rush to have found her
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: and very emotional when she was hugging me. It was
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: confusing and disappointing when I realized it was impossible for
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: that to be my child because she was so young.
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: And for associations, the dreamer says, the child in the
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: dream looked like my sister's oldest daughter when she was
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: a toddler. So such a dream, huh?
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: With so much energy in it as well. The title
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: for me was very potent, that there was a long
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: lost child. And that discovering that child released so much energy, excitement.
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: There's lots of tensions in the dream too, and I
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: think that's right there in the setting. We're staying in
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: a resort, a place of leisure, of relaxation, but oh no,
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: it's not what it all seems on the surface. It's
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: really a little bit more like a hospital, a place
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: where we recover from sickness, and it's cramped. And you
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: don't have any privacy.
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: So it's full of lots of interesting stuff, right? First
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: of all, even the word resort, like if you think
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: about that, I mean, it would be interesting to look
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: at the etymology of resort. But you think about a
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: vacation and, you know, vacation is kind of for restoration.
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: I mean, it is supposed to be somewhat healing, if
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: you will, right? But who would want to stay at
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: a resort that was like a hospital? I mean, you're right.
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: It's just like right there at the top. You're like, uh-oh.
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: But on the other hand, a hospital is where you
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: go to receive treatment and healing. So maybe this dreamer
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: is really in need of some rest and some healing.
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: And perhaps this is even the right setting for it,
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: even though it's pretty crowded. There's a lot of people there.
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: I also thought kind of in that same vein, Bob,
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: I thought it was so interesting and probably totally realistic.
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: Here he is on vacation, but he has to go
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: to his tiny room to take calls for work. So
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: I imagine that many attorneys probably do take calls for
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: work on their vacation. But that struck me too, you know,
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: that he's supposed to be resting, recuperating, and here he
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: is working. Of course, the real kind of emotional payload
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: of this dream is this kid right if we're looking
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: at the the telos of the dream the new thing
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: in the dream it's this child and of course that
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: is an archetype Jung wrote a beautiful essay on the
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: nature of the child archetype there's so many things we
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: could say about the child archetype it can be a
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: symbol of the self it's related to the past it's
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: also an image of futurity And this particular child is
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: a toddler, so maybe three or four years old, which
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: is interesting. And of course, it's so moving that she's
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: a long-lost child.
• 46:29
  Speaker 2: And she recognizes him. Yes. You know, there is this
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: connection that exists because it's reciprocal. So there is a
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: way in which the image is so numinous for this
• 46:45
  Speaker 2: dreamer especially when we know that he states he's facing
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: empty nest syndrome. So, yes, we can literalize it in
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: that way, but it seems to me that the corrective
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: is that there's nascent energy that's arising that recognizes him,
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: that he's very happy to experience, in spite of being
• 47:17
  Speaker 2: in grief over the loss of his father. And I
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: think the transition in his marriage, our challenges in midlife,
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: is particularly important in this dream. There's a way in
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: which that's the corrective.
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: I had the same feeling about that, right? And of course,
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: it's not uncommon for marriages to to kind of go
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: through a difficult phase as the kids leave because it's
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: almost like you have to reimagine what the marriage is
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: for once you're done raising kids. You know, it's like, well,
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: what am I still doing with this person? We finished
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: the job we had together. Do I want to stay
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: with that person? So a lot comes up for couples
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: around that time. And one of the things I, and
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: I imagine, Bob, you're sort of thinking the same thing.
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: This is not just any child, right? This is a
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: child that he had with his wife So it is
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: a product of the partnership that was given up before
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: they had their first child. And so I wonder if
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: it is a kind of image of something lovely in
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: the relationship that had to be, in effect, given away
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: when they became parents. So was there something about the
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: connection between the two of them in that period before
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: they had children that to look back on now and say, wow,
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: we lost that somewhere along the way. And you may
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: have had to because the kids come along and then
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: it's just like, yeah, it's like a bomb goes off
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: in your life. But it feels very positive to me
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: that there is this lovely thing that existed at that
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: time that now exists. perhaps is there to be reclaimed.
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: It's not lost on me that the wife says, I
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: don't know what you're talking about. That couldn't have happened.
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: That's one of the big challenges in the dream that
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: it seems to me. And how do we read that?
• 49:13
  Speaker 2: You know, is it a reference to some conflict that's
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: existing in the relationship or this need to reclaim some
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: kind of a satisfying role relationship now that the kids
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: are leaving? Or another way to read it is that
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: there might be a way in which he can have
• 49:39
  Speaker 2: access to that energy. But part of the tension in
• 49:42
  Speaker 2: the relationship is that his wife isn't quite there yet.
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: You know, because she acts as this corrective in the dream. No, no, no, no,
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: that's not reality. Don't go down that path. You're making
• 49:58
  Speaker 2: it up.
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: And I wonder if that's part of the significance of
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: waking up in the dream. So there's, you know, before
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: he actually wakes up, So that there's this experience of
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: like some either it's a kind of either it relates
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: to the actual outer relationship with the wife where she's
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: sort of, I want to say, takes the magic away.
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: And, you know, so it's possible that the child, like
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: I was positing, relates to something between the two of them.
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: After all, it is their child. It's also possible. possible
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: that the child represents some aspect of him that that
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: is some you know a little it's the divine child
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: right and that's where it's an image of the self
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: some some real potentiality within himself that is available to
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: be reclaimed and it may not have much to do
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: with the really with the relationship with his outer wife
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: And I would say one of the interesting things that
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: Drummer might do is say, well, how old do you
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: think the kid is? Well, maybe she was four. So
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: what happened four years ago or what happened three years ago?
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: You know, what might this child be relating to in
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: you or in your life?
• 51:17
  Speaker 2: And in amplifying that, I also wonder, well, what are
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: his associations to, I think it's his niece.
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: You know, because that's who it is in the dream.
• 51:30
  Speaker 2: And what were those experiences? What were those energetics? What
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: were those dynamisms? What was that like for him?
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: Oh, I like that. I like that, Bob. Yeah. Yeah,
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: that's really great. So there is a way that it
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: all kind of gets dismissed at the end, which feels
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: a little sad to me. And he says it was
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: confusing and disappointing. You know, because he's, as you said,
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: he's made this tremendous discovery. It's full of energy. And
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: then it's kind of dismissed. Oh, that couldn't happen.
• 52:04
  Speaker 2: So we have to ask, what part of him is
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: dismissive of this nascent childlike energy? There's a real contrast
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: between having to do the work of an attorney and
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: playing with a child.
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: And so there's this great polarity, if you will. And
• 52:28
  Speaker 2: it seems to me that that's one of the challenges
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: that the dream presents, but also the potentiality, because it
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: seems very alive. If one can allow oneself to not
• 52:45
  Speaker 2: be dismissive, to rather do some active imagination around being
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: with his niece at that time, or just to recall
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: what what that was like, what kind of energy did
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: that bring, did that constellate? I think there could be
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: something very powerful there.
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I really like that. And I want to say, too,
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: you know, being a lawyer requires a lot of sort
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: of rational thinking. And being able to access the unconscious
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: sometimes means that we need to let that go to
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: sleep for a little bit. And I'm reminded of what
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: Jung did when he you know, kind of had his
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: confrontation with the unconscious. He said, I need to find
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: that energy of being a child again. And so he
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: would go out back and play in the dirt with
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: little stones and sticks, kind of building little creations. So yeah,
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: so there, I think he is, I think you're exactly right.
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: I think he's being invited into a childlike space which
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: is the place from which we can most easily meet
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: the unconscious. And that is probably, you know, not a
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: very typical, it's probably not a place he spends a
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: lot of time.
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: But it releases such profound energy. Oh, I want to
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: find the quote again. It's a huge adrenaline rush to
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: do that.
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: So there is this, my feeling part feels the self
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: calling into that adrenaline rush to let go and play.
• 54:33
  Speaker 2: It's a really powerful dream.
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: It is. And you're right. It's so beautiful that she
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: recognizes him and hugs him and that he wants to
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: claim her. He wants to find someone and say, this
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: is our kid. And that's really lovely, too. And it
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: just makes me a little sad that it kind of gets,
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: there's some distancing from that later in the dream.
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: Well, in the dream, she runs up a ramp. So
• 54:58
  Speaker 2: there's something about ascending that she's bringing into the current situation,
• 55:03
  Speaker 2: moving to a higher plane, perhaps.
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: Or moving toward consciousness, maybe.
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: Ah, I like that. Yeah, that hits the nail on
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: the head, Lisa.
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: And, you know, I think it's worth saying that with
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: any dream, you know, this is not where the ball
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: stops rolling. This is sort of a snapshot of where
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: things were in the psyche, you know, the night that
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: Dreamer had this dream. So this little girl, she's not
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: going away. She's in there. And that relationship will continue
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: to evolve for sure.
• 55:39
  Speaker 2: I love that note of hope, encouragement, and, might I add, curiosity.
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: Yes. Thanks for listening. To submit a dream, suggest an
• 55:52
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• 55:57
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