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The Labyrinth: Soul’s Winding Journey · This Jungian Life Podcast

0:00
Speaker 1: It's exactly what a labyrinth or even a corn maze
0:05
Speaker 1: should do as practice in finding a new attitude, practice
0:10
Speaker 1: in finding a new orientation, practice in letting go of ego,
0:14
Speaker 1: that we will have gone to a center in ourselves
0:18
Speaker 1: as we go to the center of the labyrinth.
0:25
Speaker 2: Welcome to This Jungian Life. Three good friends and Jungian analysts,
0:29
Speaker 2: Lisa Marciano, Deborah Stewart, and Joseph Lee, invite you to
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Speaker 2: join them for an intimate and honest conversation that brings
0:36
Speaker 2: a psychological perspective to important issues of the day.
0:42
Speaker 3: I'm Lisa Marciano, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Philadelphia.
0:46
Speaker 2: I'm Joseph Lee, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
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Speaker 1: I'm Deborah Stewart, a Jungian analyst in Cape Cod. Today,
1:07
Speaker 1: Lisa and I are here to explore the deep, dark
1:14
Speaker 1: pathways known as labyrinths. And they have been famous in
1:20
Speaker 1: mythology as a kind of darkness or circular pathway. Quite
1:29
Speaker 1: a bit of puzzlement from time immemorial. Basically, there are
1:35
Speaker 1: kind of two kinds of labyrinth. This is an archetypal structure,
1:40
Speaker 1: one of which have to do with going down into
1:45
Speaker 1: the underworld and making a descent. And the other, which
1:50
Speaker 1: is famously present in the Cathedral of Chartres, has to
1:55
Speaker 1: do with an ascent and making a spiritual journey. So
2:01
Speaker 1: let's talk about labyrinths as a metaphor for human experience,
2:07
Speaker 1: a map of life, and how labyrinths are different from mazes.
2:14
Speaker 3: And I want to say that this was one of
2:16
Speaker 3: the many topics that we've done recently that was suggested
2:20
Speaker 3: by you, our listeners. If you have a topic that
2:24
Speaker 3: you'd like us to cover, you can feel free to
2:27
Speaker 3: submit that anytime. Just go to our website, thisunionlife.com, and
2:32
Speaker 3: there's a place on the top for podcasts. You could
2:35
Speaker 3: drop it down, and there's a form that you can
2:39
Speaker 3: fill out to suggest topics, and we take those seriously.
2:43
Speaker 3: So we love to hear your thoughts about what we
2:46
Speaker 3: should talk about.
2:48
Speaker 1: And I have to say that I have loved exploring
2:53
Speaker 1: this as a topic. So I want to dive in
2:57
Speaker 1: with the famous story that I think everybody has heard of,
3:04
Speaker 1: which is sort of the story about labyrinths. And that
3:08
Speaker 1: is the story of Theseus, who, in the setting of
3:15
Speaker 1: this myth, Athens, having lost a war, had to pay
3:21
Speaker 1: tribute every year to Crete. by sending seven maidens and
3:28
Speaker 1: seven youths to Crete to be sacrificed because Queen Pasiphae
3:39
Speaker 1: had had an illicit affair with a bull.
3:42
Speaker 3: It's a long story. It's a long story how that happened.
3:45
Speaker 1: A lot of family problems here. But she had created
3:50
Speaker 1: a monster, the Minotaur, who's typically portrayed as having the
3:56
Speaker 1: body of a human male and the head of a bull,
4:00
Speaker 1: but occasionally it's the other way around. But at any rate,
4:05
Speaker 1: as one might expect, this minotaur was hard to control.
4:09
Speaker 1: He had real behavioral problems and was roaming around the
4:15
Speaker 1: countryside devouring the citizens. So Daedalus, the master craftsman, built
4:23
Speaker 1: the labyrinth underneath the ground, and the Minotaur was housed
4:31
Speaker 1: there except for his annual meal of the seven young
4:37
Speaker 1: men and the seven maidens. And Theseus signed up for
4:42
Speaker 1: this because he was a hero and thought that he
4:45
Speaker 1: would dispatch with this monster once and for all. The youths,
4:52
Speaker 1: sort of like in the Hunger Games, were paraded around
4:56
Speaker 1: in Crete for everybody to get a good look. And Ariadne,
5:02
Speaker 1: one of King Minos' daughters, fell in love with him,
5:06
Speaker 1: and she helped him. She helped him by giving him
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Speaker 1: a ball of string or thread and, in some versions,
5:17
Speaker 1: a sword. So as he went down into the labyrinth,
5:22
Speaker 1: he could unroll this thread and then follow it on
5:28
Speaker 1: his way out. And the sword, of course, was to
5:31
Speaker 1: slay the Minotaur. And I think whenever we say labyrinth,
5:36
Speaker 1: at least that's what comes up for most people. And
5:42
Speaker 1: kids in particular love this story.
5:45
Speaker 3: Oh, yeah. It's a great story. Well, and it is
5:47
Speaker 3: kind of, I mean, when I was kind of researching
5:50
Speaker 3: the etymology for the word labyrinth, you know, this is
5:53
Speaker 3: the labyrinth that comes up. It was Daedalus's labyrinth and
5:57
Speaker 3: and in fact there you know there's a wonderful kind
6:00
Speaker 3: of adventure story about the archaeology of trying to find
6:04
Speaker 3: this and where was it really because it was mentioned
6:08
Speaker 3: in in the you know in the literature and in
6:10
Speaker 3: the myths and but then in you know it was
6:14
Speaker 3: it was discovered eventually and i can just imagine how
6:17
Speaker 3: exciting that must have been but there were these images
6:20
Speaker 3: that were carved into the walls of this palace at Knossos,
6:26
Speaker 3: which I think you've been to, haven't you, Deb?
6:29
Speaker 1: I have been there, and it was a wonderful experience.
6:33
Speaker 1: It still has not all been mapped out and discovered,
6:37
Speaker 1: but it's amazing how much is there.
6:40
Speaker 3: Amazing.
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Speaker 1: And underneath that palace is supposedly the labyrinth.
6:48
Speaker 3: Yes. You didn't catch my little pun there. You said
6:53
Speaker 3: it was amazing. Oh, sorry about that. But on the
6:58
Speaker 3: walls were these kind of these symbols of like a
7:02
Speaker 3: two-headed axe, the labrys. And so the thinking is that
7:08
Speaker 3: the term, which I believe that symbol was associated with Crete.
7:12
Speaker 3: And so in some sense, the word labyrinth means the
7:16
Speaker 3: house of the two-headed axe. So whatever we want to
7:21
Speaker 3: say about that. But yes, this is kind of the
7:25
Speaker 3: Ur story about the labyrinth, which I think helps us
7:31
Speaker 3: imagine it as, you know, a really rich metaphor for
7:38
Speaker 3: maybe a sort of first half of life experience. That,
7:43
Speaker 3: you know, life does feel very confusing sometimes. And like
7:48
Speaker 3: we can't find our way through. You know, Theseus needs
7:53
Speaker 3: that ball of thread from Ariadne to find his way
7:57
Speaker 3: in and then out again. Because, you know, I think
8:00
Speaker 3: the danger of the labyrinth was that one goes in
8:05
Speaker 3: and one doesn't come out.
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Speaker 1: Exactly. And it's the dark. So it's a perfect symbol
8:14
Speaker 1: for the unconscious. It's always interested me that Ariadne did
8:21
Speaker 1: not give Theseus a torch by which he might have
8:27
Speaker 1: been able to see his way. She gave him the
8:31
Speaker 1: ball of thread, and in most versions, I think the sword.
8:36
Speaker 1: And I think it really is a representation of the
8:40
Speaker 1: hero's journey, that first half of life descent. And Theseus
8:45
Speaker 1: was a hero. He had a god as one parent
8:51
Speaker 1: and a human as the other parent, and he wanted
8:56
Speaker 1: to go. He volunteered. He was sure that this was
9:02
Speaker 1: his hero's task, was to go to Crete and get
9:06
Speaker 1: rid of the Minotaur and Athens having to pay tribute
9:10
Speaker 1: once and for all. So it's interesting that the hero's
9:14
Speaker 1: journey is a descent.
9:16
Speaker 3: Yeah, I want to just stick for another minute before
9:20
Speaker 3: we spend too much time on Theseus. I do want
9:21
Speaker 3: to talk about the poor Minotaur because I can't help
9:24
Speaker 3: but feel a little bad for him.
9:28
Speaker 1: The backstory is that in the kingdom of Crete, there
9:35
Speaker 1: were three brothers and each of them wanted to be king.
9:41
Speaker 1: And Minos really offered a plea to Poseidon, the god
9:49
Speaker 1: of the ocean and earthquakes, to please, please help him
9:54
Speaker 1: be the one who would be king. And Poseidon did.
9:58
Speaker 1: He gifted Minos with a white bull as a symbol
10:04
Speaker 1: of something special and unusual and, you know, indicating the
10:10
Speaker 1: favor of the gods for him to be king. And
10:15
Speaker 1: so he was made king. And then he was supposed
10:18
Speaker 1: to sacrifice this bull to Poseidon in gratitude. But he
10:25
Speaker 1: had become so fond of it that he sacrificed the
10:28
Speaker 1: regular old bull. And that really made Poseidon pissed. And
10:35
Speaker 1: so the curse was placed on King Minos' wife, Pasiphae.
10:43
Speaker 1: And what happened in retribution was that she was made
10:48
Speaker 1: to fall in love with this bull. And Daedalus, the
10:53
Speaker 1: ever-crafty craftsman, built her a facsimile of a bull.
10:59
Speaker 3: Of a cow, right? That she could climb inside so
11:03
Speaker 3: that the bull wanted to... The bull mated with... Right.
11:08
Speaker 3: Thought he was mating with a beautiful cow, but really...
11:11
Speaker 3: pacifier was inside.
11:13
Speaker 1: And she'd become obsessed because of the curse, got pregnant,
11:19
Speaker 1: and gave birth to the minotaur, half bull, half human,
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Speaker 1: who later became monstrous and dangerous.
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Speaker 3: Right. And I think this is a really interesting and
11:33
Speaker 3: important part of the story to have because, first of all,
11:36
Speaker 3: there's something about There's something about covening something, holding back
11:40
Speaker 3: something that really is meant for the gods, you know,
11:44
Speaker 3: and not making the required sacrifice and arrogating something that
11:49
Speaker 3: belongs to the gods to ourselves, which, of course, is
11:53
Speaker 3: kind of the principal sin, right? It's the sin of
11:57
Speaker 3: hubris or superbia in Latin. And it never goes well.
12:03
Speaker 3: It never goes well. And then there's the way that
12:08
Speaker 3: those things kind of fall down through the generations. So,
12:14
Speaker 3: you know, it wasn't really Pacifiae's fault, but she bears
12:19
Speaker 3: the brunt of it, as it were, by being the
12:21
Speaker 3: recipient of the curse. And then it's the next generation
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Speaker 3: and this monstrous offspring. And so, you know, I do
12:29
Speaker 3: feel some sadness for the Minotaur down there. wandering around
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Speaker 3: alone forever. And, you know, the thing about the labyrinth
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Speaker 3: was that, you know, it was a safe place to
12:44
Speaker 3: keep the Minotaur because it was so confusing you couldn't
12:46
Speaker 3: find your way out, right?
12:48
Speaker 1: You know, basically the Minotaur was a raging psychopath.
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Speaker 3: Or just very, very, very primitive instincts, you know, something
12:59
Speaker 3: like that, that weren't tameable. But I want to go
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Speaker 3: back to Daedalus for a second because, see, Daedalus is
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Speaker 3: sort of the author of the tragedy because he builds
13:10
Speaker 3: that cow that Pasiphae gets inside, and then he builds
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Speaker 3: the labyrinth. And I think there's something about that because,
13:19
Speaker 3: you know, Daedalus was this incredibly clever craftsman. And something
13:24
Speaker 3: about the labyrinth, for me, can carry with it the
13:27
Speaker 3: idea that that our thinking function, we can get so
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Speaker 3: lost in our thinking function, of which Daedalus is a
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Speaker 3: very good image, you know, that we can be so
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Speaker 3: clever that we can get kind of hopelessly lost, or
13:43
Speaker 3: we can get so caught up in our kind of
13:48
Speaker 3: left-brained view of the world that we can create monsters
13:53
Speaker 3: without even realizing that that's what we're doing. And so
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Speaker 3: the labyrinth seems like, at least tangentially, like a pretty
14:01
Speaker 3: potent symbol for the quality of the kind of left-brained
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Speaker 3: approach to the world where we get really lost. And
14:10
Speaker 3: what you need is the kind of clarity of the
14:13
Speaker 3: feeling function to find your way out.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's a really good point to make.
14:22
Speaker 1: And Daedalus... was an astonishing builder. I mean, imagine being,
14:28
Speaker 1: you know, the labyrinth is attributed to him. He could
14:32
Speaker 1: build a wooden or some material kind of cow for
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Speaker 1: Pasiphae to hide in. He famously, when he was imprisoned,
14:43
Speaker 1: made wings for himself and his son Icarus so that
14:48
Speaker 1: they could fly out of this prison that was way
14:52
Speaker 1: up high. But without the discrimination or the leavening, as
14:57
Speaker 1: you're saying, of the feeling function of, is this a
15:02
Speaker 1: good idea? Is this really right? It's all very much
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Speaker 1: ego and ideas, concepts that was at Daedalus' special gift.
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Speaker 1: And so Theseus needed... The leavening, the balancing that Ariadne
15:27
Speaker 1: could provide of the here is how to do it.
15:33
Speaker 1: I will give you the tools you need because you're
15:37
Speaker 1: not going to be able to solve it with your head.
15:43
Speaker 3: Right. Right. Yes.
15:45
Speaker 1: And why did she give him those things? Because she
15:49
Speaker 1: fell in love with him. So there is the generosity
15:56
Speaker 1: and that spirit when you love someone of being able
16:01
Speaker 1: to give them exactly what they need.
16:04
Speaker 3: And again, you know, like you can't go straight through
16:09
Speaker 3: a labyrinth, right? It is necessary labyrinthine. So, you know,
16:16
Speaker 3: the idea of the thread, it's the thing that kind
16:19
Speaker 3: of keeps you connected, which is also what we say
16:22
Speaker 3: about the Eros principle. The Eros principle connects us. And
16:27
Speaker 3: that's what a thread does, too. You don't lose the thread.
16:30
Speaker 3: You don't lose that sense of who you are and
16:33
Speaker 3: what you're doing and what matters to you. You can
16:35
Speaker 3: always pick that thread up. It is a symbol for
16:39
Speaker 3: the connecting principle. And that when Theseus went down into
16:45
Speaker 3: the dark twists and turns of the labyrinth, it was
16:51
Speaker 3: the connecting principle that gets him back out. So literally,
16:56
Speaker 3: it's thread. But it's also, you know, how do we
17:00
Speaker 3: connect the underworld where, you know, monstrous things can dwell,
17:07
Speaker 3: where we're scared? Yeah.
17:10
Speaker 1: To the upper world of reason and light and consciousness.
17:16
Speaker 1: It's a great symbol for the connection between conscious and
17:21
Speaker 1: the shadowy dark depths of the unconscious. And what do
17:26
Speaker 1: we need? Someone, something that represents a loving connection.
17:34
Speaker 3: And by the way, the next chapter of the story
17:36
Speaker 3: of Ariadne and Theseus doesn't really end so well, but
17:39
Speaker 3: that may be all we need for today.
17:42
Speaker 1: Well, I think we ought to supply listeners with the
17:47
Speaker 1: ending that is both unhappy and happy. Everything works out fine.
17:51
Speaker 1: Theseus slays the Minotaur, and then they've got to get
17:56
Speaker 1: out of there, and Ariadne's got to get out of there, too.
18:00
Speaker 1: because she has, for the sake of loving Theseus, betrayed
18:05
Speaker 1: her family. So off they go in Theseus's ship, which
18:10
Speaker 1: is anchored somewhere just offshore, and they sail off, and
18:16
Speaker 1: they stop off on their way to Greece at an
18:19
Speaker 1: island called Naxos. And they stop off overnight, and uh-oh,
18:24
Speaker 1: the next morning, somehow Theseus takes off without Ariadne, and
18:31
Speaker 1: she is left stranded on the shores of Noxus.
18:35
Speaker 3: He ghosted her. Oh, exactly.
18:40
Speaker 1: And you can puzzle over how such a thing could
18:46
Speaker 1: happen that you sort of accidentally forget the woman that
18:51
Speaker 1: loves you, and supposedly he loved her, and sort of like, oops,
18:56
Speaker 1: I forgot. However, that's the unhappy ending that people have
19:01
Speaker 1: puzzled over for a long time. But the other happy
19:05
Speaker 1: ending is that the god Dionysus saw her and loved her.
19:14
Speaker 1: And in he flew in his chariot drawn by tigers.
19:21
Speaker 1: And they married and lived presumably happily ever after. Mm-hmm.
19:27
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm. And of course, you can enjoy more about that.
19:31
Speaker 3: Richard Strauss wrote a beautiful opera called Ariadne of Naxos.
19:36
Speaker 3: So that's worth listening to. So I want to just
19:42
Speaker 3: shift for a second to a different culture where there's
19:46
Speaker 3: a kind of similar meeting. So labyrinths show up in
19:48
Speaker 3: all kinds of different cultures and we can't do justice
19:53
Speaker 3: to all of them. But there is a story from
19:56
Speaker 3: the Mahabharata about the Chakra Vyuha, which I hope I'm
20:01
Speaker 3: pronouncing correctly, which is roughly translated the maze of life.
20:06
Speaker 3: And this part of the Mahabharata tells the story of Abhimanyu,
20:12
Speaker 3: who was the son of Arjuna. And when his mother
20:17
Speaker 3: was pregnant with him, Arjuna was telling him about this labyrinth.
20:22
Speaker 3: And the mother was listening very, very closely, but then
20:25
Speaker 3: she fell asleep. So she heard about how to get
20:28
Speaker 3: in to the labyrinth, but she didn't hear about how
20:30
Speaker 3: to get out. Years later, Abhimanyu was... fighting in a
20:35
Speaker 3: big battle that's described in Mahabharata. He winds up in
20:39
Speaker 3: the labyrinth. He fights very bravely, but he doesn't know
20:43
Speaker 3: how to get out. And he does perish there. So
20:47
Speaker 3: there's this sense that life is a maze, right? This
20:51
Speaker 3: is a maze of life. And if we are lucky,
20:55
Speaker 3: we've got the teachers, the tools, the ancestral knowledge to
20:59
Speaker 3: find our way out. But we don't necessarily, it's not
21:05
Speaker 3: a foregone conclusion that we're going to find our way
21:10
Speaker 3: out of the labyrinth of life, as it were. It's
21:14
Speaker 3: meant to be kind of, as you said, Deb, it's
21:17
Speaker 3: kind of a hero's quest. It's meant for the soul
21:21
Speaker 3: to enter and then hopefully exit victoriously. But like I said,
21:27
Speaker 3: that isn't... That isn't a foregone conclusion, and it requires
21:32
Speaker 3: a kind of soulful attitude towards life. It requires a
21:37
Speaker 3: connection with the gurus and the teachings, the kind of
21:41
Speaker 3: psycho-spiritual teachings in order to do that. So we are
21:47
Speaker 3: sort of born into existence, into this labyrinth, and it
21:53
Speaker 3: is our life task in some way to kind of
21:57
Speaker 3: crack the code of it and get out. And if
22:00
Speaker 3: we don't, we enter the maze again in our next incarnation.
22:04
Speaker 1: Oh, gosh. Can I be one of those maidens that
22:10
Speaker 1: goes with Theseus and then he can kill it for me? No,
22:17
Speaker 1: probably not. It never works that way. And So I
22:23
Speaker 1: want to talk a little bit about what's the monster
22:26
Speaker 1: and what's the dark. As particularly in my view, that
22:33
Speaker 1: this is very much the first half of life confrontation
22:39
Speaker 1: or labyrinthine journey. The second half of life we can
22:44
Speaker 1: get to a little later. But first we have to
22:48
Speaker 1: go down and we go down into the dark world.
22:52
Speaker 1: And my suspicion is that it has to do with fear,
22:59
Speaker 1: with our willingness to confront what we are scared of.
23:06
Speaker 1: Especially that part of young adulthood where we have to
23:09
Speaker 1: get out into life and we have to leave the protected,
23:15
Speaker 1: hopefully the protected realm of childhood or at least the
23:19
Speaker 1: known world. which I think is very much out there
23:25
Speaker 1: these days as a collective topic of discussion. That with
23:33
Speaker 1: AI and this sort of looming wave of who knows what,
23:41
Speaker 1: a complicated world, very complicated world, the path is not straight.
23:48
Speaker 1: Things are not just laid out. for a lot of
23:51
Speaker 1: young adults, that it requires going out into the world anyway,
24:00
Speaker 1: despite all these unknown knowns that one will have to confront.
24:09
Speaker 1: And it's a confrontation with shadow, a confrontation with anxiety
24:15
Speaker 1: of how do I know Once I get out there
24:19
Speaker 1: into that labyrinthine world, then I'm going to make it.
24:24
Speaker 1: And we have to go anyway. And the descent is
24:31
Speaker 1: maybe on two levels of, yes, going to school or
24:35
Speaker 1: to a training program or getting married or backpacking across Asia,
24:41
Speaker 1: whatever it is, is analogous to a kind of labyrinth
24:45
Speaker 1: and the not knowing. I really don't know, as I
24:51
Speaker 1: truck across the Himalayas, what will happen. And the Minotaur
24:59
Speaker 1: is part of us. What has to be defeated? I
25:05
Speaker 1: can feel my own teariness about this because it is really,
25:10
Speaker 1: really hard to get out there in the world and
25:16
Speaker 1: I know it was for me, and I think the
25:19
Speaker 1: world has become much more complex than it was 118
25:27
Speaker 1: years ago when I had to get out there.
25:30
Speaker 3: You know, what I'm thinking of, Deb, is I'm thinking, actually,
25:34
Speaker 3: as you talk, I'm thinking about coming-of-age novels, and here's
25:39
Speaker 3: one that I read like about 118 years ago, and
25:41
Speaker 3: I really God, it had such an impact on me
25:44
Speaker 3: at the time. And I really haven't read it since
25:47
Speaker 3: I was about 14. So my memories, you know, that
25:50
Speaker 3: was a bit ago. But did you ever read Damien
25:54
Speaker 3: by Herman Hesse?
25:56
Speaker 1: Never did.
25:56
Speaker 3: Or Siddhartha. I think both of those are kind of
25:59
Speaker 3: in that. Anyway, but there are lots of other really
26:03
Speaker 3: beautiful coming of age stories, including one that I have
26:07
Speaker 3: read more recently, which I just loved, which you actually
26:10
Speaker 3: recommended to me. which was The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt.
26:14
Speaker 1: Oh, oh, yes.
26:17
Speaker 3: And Of Human Bondage is another one that comes to mind.
26:20
Speaker 3: I mean, there's all kinds, but I think it addresses
26:23
Speaker 3: exactly what you're talking about when we have to just,
26:27
Speaker 3: we don't have a choice, but to just sort of
26:30
Speaker 3: sally forth into the labyrinth of life and face whatever's there.
26:35
Speaker 3: And it is, it is not, it is not straightforward.
26:41
Speaker 3: It isn't straightforward. And I, you know, I look at
26:44
Speaker 3: young people today and, you know, it's like, it always
26:47
Speaker 3: amazes me that we give kids so much prep for
26:52
Speaker 3: getting to college. There's so much about like how to
26:55
Speaker 3: take the SATs and you've got people helping you write
26:59
Speaker 3: the essays. And then there's people that help you like
27:02
Speaker 3: figure out what you have to pack. When you go
27:04
Speaker 3: to college, you can get packing lists. And But then
27:07
Speaker 3: at the other end of it, it's like, oh, you're
27:09
Speaker 3: done with, see ya, you know, and like, who helps you?
27:12
Speaker 3: Who helps you with that stage? You just drop off
27:15
Speaker 3: a cliff. I mean, I remember that and it was
27:17
Speaker 3: a long time ago and it was really, I really
27:19
Speaker 3: felt like I had been dropped off a cliff. Like,
27:21
Speaker 3: what am I supposed to, what do I do now?
27:24
Speaker 3: But there was no help. There was no one. There
27:26
Speaker 3: was nothing. It was, I was on my own. And
27:28
Speaker 3: I think it's so, I think that's just true now too.
27:30
Speaker 3: And It's really, really hard. So that idea of the
27:36
Speaker 3: labyrinth of wandering lost, that there isn't a clear path.
27:42
Speaker 3: You know, when you're in high school, it's like first
27:45
Speaker 3: you take the SATs and then you get good grades
27:47
Speaker 3: and then you get your recommendations and then you do
27:50
Speaker 3: your extracurriculars and it's laid out, you know? But the labyrinth,
27:55
Speaker 3: it's not laid out, right? You gotta find your own way.
28:00
Speaker 3: So I want to read this quote from Jung that
28:03
Speaker 3: makes use of this imagery as well, which I think
28:06
Speaker 3: is sort of appropriate right here. He says, in fact,
28:10
Speaker 3: one could say that while the patient is unconsciously and
28:14
Speaker 3: unswervingly seeking the solution to some ultimately insoluble problem, the
28:22
Speaker 3: art and technique of the doctor are doing their best
28:25
Speaker 3: to help him towards it. Ars totem requirit hominem, exclaims
28:33
Speaker 3: an old alchemist, which I believe from my poor Latin
28:37
Speaker 3: means the art requires all of man, something like that.
28:42
Speaker 3: The art of alchemy requires all of us, okay? It
28:48
Speaker 3: is just this homo totus whom we seek. The labors
28:53
Speaker 3: of the doctor as well as the quest of the
28:56
Speaker 3: patient are directed towards that hidden and as yet unmanifest
29:01
Speaker 3: whole man who is at once the greater and future man.
29:06
Speaker 3: But the right way to wholeness is made up, unfortunately,
29:11
Speaker 3: of fateful detours and wrong turnings. It is a longissima via,
29:18
Speaker 3: not straight but snake-like, a path that unites the opposites
29:24
Speaker 3: in the manner of the guiding caduceus, a path whose
29:29
Speaker 3: labyrinthine twists and turns are not lacking in terrors. So
29:35
Speaker 3: the path of psychological development, the path of us getting
29:39
Speaker 3: out into life, is a kind of labyrinth that asks
29:45
Speaker 3: everything from us. And we have no choice if we
29:48
Speaker 3: want to get out in life than to give it
29:51
Speaker 3: everything we've got. Yeah.
29:53
Speaker 1: And confronting the unknown. As one of the things that
29:59
Speaker 1: over years I've come to appreciate as a really deep
30:06
Speaker 1: source of human anxiety is our egos want to know
30:11
Speaker 1: what's coming next. We want a plan, just like your
30:17
Speaker 1: analogy to preparing for college. All the guidance counselors... know
30:25
Speaker 1: exactly what it is you have to do to get ready.
30:29
Speaker 1: And then after that, we do face a labyrinth. It
30:34
Speaker 1: will twist and turn and it cannot be mapped.
30:40
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm. Right.
30:42
Speaker 1: And sometimes, you know, if it is mapped, that leads
30:47
Speaker 1: to another kind of difficulty. You know, that if dad...
30:54
Speaker 1: owns his own business, let's say, that the son will
30:59
Speaker 1: go into that business. He's the designated heir, will continue
31:04
Speaker 1: to really step up and learn the business and have
31:07
Speaker 1: a good, secure way to make a living, which might
31:12
Speaker 1: not really be that person's destiny. And I'm not talking
31:17
Speaker 1: about just vocationally. But in terms of having the opportunity,
31:23
Speaker 1: To confront himself or herself and the feelings and the
31:28
Speaker 1: process of really growing oneself versus being shepherded into safe
31:38
Speaker 1: but too small space.
31:40
Speaker 3: Yes. I mean, I think another example of that is,
31:42
Speaker 3: you know, if you were that kid who either you
31:45
Speaker 3: decided at 14 that you were going to be a
31:48
Speaker 3: doctor or maybe your parents decided that for you. There's college,
31:53
Speaker 3: there's medical school, there's residency, there's this, there's this. And
31:56
Speaker 3: like you said, it may not be so much that
31:59
Speaker 3: you're in the wrong vocation, but you didn't have a
32:03
Speaker 3: chance to confront yourself.
32:06
Speaker 1: Yeah. To build the skills and to have that difficult
32:12
Speaker 1: but necessary process of confronting yourself, knowing that you're sturdy,
32:22
Speaker 1: that you can deal with life's twists and turns and
32:27
Speaker 1: problems and setbacks. There's no real avoiding that. And I've
32:34
Speaker 1: known people, and probably a lot of listeners have too,
32:38
Speaker 1: that were safely shepherded into a particular occupational niche only
32:46
Speaker 1: to do what could have been done in the mid-20s,
32:50
Speaker 1: let's say. in the mid-40s or mid-50s, that there is
32:56
Speaker 1: no avoiding the confrontation with oneself and who one really
33:02
Speaker 1: is meant to be. The process of individuation requires discovering
33:10
Speaker 1: your innate sense of purpose and self in life.
33:16
Speaker 3: Which brings up, you know, as you alluded to earlier,
33:19
Speaker 3: a kind of second type of of labyrinth process, right?
33:26
Speaker 3: Which is an intentional journey to the center, which isn't
33:33
Speaker 3: heroic in the sense that Theseus was gonna go in
33:36
Speaker 3: and slay the Minotaur, but it's more of a submission
33:43
Speaker 3: to a greater principle. It is a surrender to a
33:49
Speaker 3: process It's a surrender of ego knowing to a process.
33:54
Speaker 3: And of course, if you've ever walked a labyrinth at
33:57
Speaker 3: a church, I know I have, the idea is that
34:01
Speaker 3: there's something contemplative about it, that you are allowing a
34:08
Speaker 3: process to take over from ego goals. I mean, church
34:14
Speaker 3: labyrinths are often just, I mean, interestingly, right, just like
34:18
Speaker 3: laid out flat. If you wanted to just get to
34:21
Speaker 3: the center, you could just walk right across. But the
34:24
Speaker 3: point is to circumambulate it, to go around, to follow
34:29
Speaker 3: the winding labyrinthine course. So there is a kind of
34:35
Speaker 3: surrender of an ego dominance in that process.
34:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a willingness implied by that. I once walked
34:50
Speaker 1: a labyrinth that a couple of people had built. And
34:56
Speaker 1: they built it sort of on a hillside and outside
35:00
Speaker 1: their house. And it was a wonderful experience. It's very safe.
35:06
Speaker 1: It's in a garden. But we really didn't know how
35:10
Speaker 1: it was going to wind into a center. Whereas the
35:17
Speaker 1: labyrinths that churches or people builds, and the one famously
35:22
Speaker 1: at the Cathedral of Chartres, are very symmetrical. There's an
35:30
Speaker 1: intricate inner design that twists and turns, but you know
35:35
Speaker 1: where you're going to wind up. And I think of
35:38
Speaker 1: that really as because of the willingness to go there.
35:42
Speaker 1: The willingness, you know, we take ourselves and we are
35:44
Speaker 1: going to walk the labyrinth. and be contemplative, and just
35:51
Speaker 1: follow the path with an intention to walk towards the center,
35:56
Speaker 1: to have a feeling, to have a reverie in a
36:02
Speaker 1: walking meditation to center ourselves. And that is very much
36:11
Speaker 1: a search for a kind of transcendence, search for an
36:15
Speaker 1: inner peace and inner wholeness that is very different from
36:23
Speaker 1: the graphic descent into chaos, darkness, and the unknown in
36:31
Speaker 1: the first half of life. And it's very much an
36:36
Speaker 1: image of the individuation journey. We can go willingly, or
36:41
Speaker 1: we can be dragged kicking and screaming down into the
36:45
Speaker 1: minotaur's den. but one way or another, there will be
36:48
Speaker 1: a labyrinth.
36:49
Speaker 3: You know, when I was doing some research on labyrinths
36:53
Speaker 3: in different cultures, one thing that we haven't talked so
36:57
Speaker 3: much about is that sometimes they're built for fun. And
37:01
Speaker 3: I've been in kind of botanical labyrinths. I believe there's
37:05
Speaker 3: one that I was in at the gardens at Hampton
37:09
Speaker 3: Court Palace outside of London. And of course, in the fall,
37:13
Speaker 3: when my kids were younger, we used to often do
37:16
Speaker 3: corn mazes. And of course, they're a little bit like halls,
37:21
Speaker 3: the Hall of Mirrors at amusement parks, which I remember
37:27
Speaker 3: when my kids were little, we went into one and
37:30
Speaker 3: the person who gave us the ticket said, just let
37:32
Speaker 3: me give you some advice. Just don't run. Okay. So
37:38
Speaker 3: we were delightfully lost and turned around and couldn't find
37:42
Speaker 3: each other. And my youngest, you know, he was like, mom,
37:47
Speaker 3: and he started running. And I was like, no, because boom,
37:51
Speaker 3: right into the wall. Because you don't know. But I
37:54
Speaker 3: think that it's interesting, right, that this factors in because
37:58
Speaker 3: there is a delight in allowing ourselves to get lost.
38:04
Speaker 1: That's actually really very interesting. Getting lost in a safe
38:11
Speaker 1: way versus really feeling plunged into something scary and too much.
38:22
Speaker 1: The ego can surmount the hall of mirrors or the
38:28
Speaker 1: corn maze or those wonderful hedge mazes that some of
38:34
Speaker 1: the palaces and kings and queens built in. and could
38:38
Speaker 1: afford to maintain, that it's really all okay. There's an
38:44
Speaker 1: inherent reassurance.
38:47
Speaker 3: And to enjoy that, you have to be willing to
38:51
Speaker 3: let go of the ego's need for control and orientation
38:55
Speaker 3: at all times. So in some ways, it is kind
38:59
Speaker 3: of practice, isn't it? It is practice for that skill
39:02
Speaker 3: of being Theseus in the labyrinth. You know, can I
39:09
Speaker 3: let go of my need to control this situation? And
39:13
Speaker 3: it's practice, like you said, in kind of a safe way.
39:17
Speaker 1: And it's exactly what a labyrinth or even a corn
39:21
Speaker 1: maze should do as practice in finding a new attitude,
39:28
Speaker 1: practice in finding a new orientation, practice in letting go
39:32
Speaker 1: of ego, that we hope if we've really done a
39:36
Speaker 1: meditative labyrinth, that we will emerge in a different space
39:45
Speaker 1: within ourselves.
39:46
Speaker 3: Yes.
39:47
Speaker 1: That we will have gone to a center in ourselves
39:50
Speaker 1: as we go to the center of the labyrinth. And
39:55
Speaker 1: that then we wind and wind our way back out
39:58
Speaker 1: again the same way that we can go in and
40:02
Speaker 1: we can go out.
40:04
Speaker 3: And to pick up on that, Deb, what you just
40:07
Speaker 3: said again, the nature of the contemplative labyrinth is it
40:12
Speaker 3: leads to the center. Which is a very Jungian idea.
40:19
Speaker 3: You know, Jung said of the self that it is
40:22
Speaker 3: the center and the circumference. And that the process of
40:26
Speaker 3: becoming psychologically whole involves wending our way toward the center.
40:33
Speaker 1: And Jung says that that was the goal. He said
40:37
Speaker 1: the goal had been revealed. One could not go beyond
40:41
Speaker 1: the center. Yeah. The center is the goal and everything
40:46
Speaker 1: is directed toward that center. And then he had had
40:51
Speaker 1: a dream and he said, I understood that the self
40:55
Speaker 1: is the principle and archetype of orientation and meaning. Therein
41:00
Speaker 1: lies its healing function. And for me, this insight signified
41:06
Speaker 1: an approach to the center and therefore to the goal.
41:10
Speaker 1: And that's exactly what a contemplative labyrinth is intended to do,
41:16
Speaker 1: is bring us to a realization of a center, you know,
41:22
Speaker 1: inside and perhaps outside, but that place.
41:29
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah. And interestingly, you know, the dream you reference,
41:33
Speaker 3: of course, is his literal dream. where he does come
41:38
Speaker 3: to the center of the town, and it's a pool
41:43
Speaker 3: with a golden tree, and it's in the middle of
41:45
Speaker 3: a square. So it's very mandala-like. And, you know, we
41:49
Speaker 3: could say of a labyrinth, especially a kind of contemplative labyrinth,
41:55
Speaker 3: that it is a picture of a mandala. So walking
41:59
Speaker 3: a labyrinth is sort of having an embodied experience of
42:03
Speaker 3: that which is about the approach to the center.
42:08
Speaker 1: And that is, I think, one of the key differences
42:12
Speaker 1: between a labyrinth and a maze. The circularity of a
42:18
Speaker 1: labyrinth versus a more linear layout for a maze. There's
42:24
Speaker 1: an entrance and there's an exit.
42:27
Speaker 3: If you're lucky.
42:30
Speaker 1: Who knows how many people are still wandering around in there.
42:35
Speaker 1: But it is an intellectual kind of a puzzle. It's fun.
42:40
Speaker 3: Yes, it's a puzzle. Yes.
42:42
Speaker 1: And we use our heads to get out of it. Yes,
42:47
Speaker 1: like Daedalus. And isn't it great that somebody came up
42:52
Speaker 1: with the idea of creating these corn stalk mazes? What
42:57
Speaker 1: a wonderful thing to do at the end of the season.
43:00
Speaker 1: But you go in and you get out and it's linear.
43:02
Speaker 1: It might have some twists and turns. But it's very
43:05
Speaker 1: different from approaching the center and then reemerging from a center.
43:12
Speaker 3: So I wonder if that means it's time to enter
43:16
Speaker 3: the labyrinth of a dream.
43:18
Speaker 1: Oh, my goodness. You know, I really like that mapping
43:25
Speaker 1: of labyrinths onto a dream because a dream is not
43:31
Speaker 1: a maze. It cannot just be thought about and kind
43:36
Speaker 1: of decoded. This means this and that means that. So
43:42
Speaker 1: these two things together must mean something else. It really is.
43:47
Speaker 1: The unconscious works in a much more labyrinthine way. And
43:58
Speaker 1: we have to really enter the labyrinth. And I want
44:04
Speaker 1: to share, we have a new feature on our website, theskinnyandlife.com,
44:09
Speaker 1: where you can go, if we've discussed your dream on
44:13
Speaker 1: the podcast, you can tell us what you thought about
44:16
Speaker 1: how we did. For those long ago listeners of that
44:21
Speaker 1: NPR show, that wonderful NPR show, Car Talk, I like
44:25
Speaker 1: to think of it as kind of like stump the chumps.
44:27
Speaker 3: How do we do?
44:28
Speaker 1: So....
44:30
Speaker 3: A couple weeks ago, we did an episode on chance encounters,
44:35
Speaker 3: and there was a wonderful dream about a talking donkey.
44:38
Speaker 3: And the dreamer of that dream shared some thoughts. So
44:41
Speaker 3: I'm just going to, he has given us permission to
44:46
Speaker 3: share his thoughts. So I'm going to, I'm just going
44:51
Speaker 3: to read what he wrote. He said, Hi, Lisa, Deb,
44:53
Speaker 3: and Joseph. I'm still so moved by listening to your
44:56
Speaker 3: analysis of my dream on the podcast this morning. This
45:00
Speaker 3: dream has made a huge impact on my life. I
45:02
Speaker 3: have a very rich internal life and I'm diligent with
45:05
Speaker 3: dream work, making sure to write them down in the
45:07
Speaker 3: morning as soon as they happen. When there is a
45:10
Speaker 3: dream that stands out significantly, I'll revisit the characters of
45:12
Speaker 3: the dream and act of imagination. And some other times
45:16
Speaker 3: I will make a watercolor painting as a form of
45:18
Speaker 3: tribute to them or physical anchor in the world for them.
45:21
Speaker 3: I just love this. This particular dream, however, had a
45:24
Speaker 3: more significant impact It felt so real and turned so scary.
45:30
Speaker 3: I rarely have nightmares, so this was another reason to
45:33
Speaker 3: make it feel so charged. The first thing I did
45:36
Speaker 3: with this dream was to connect it to myths and
45:38
Speaker 3: fairy tales. I was glad to hear Deb's remarks on
45:41
Speaker 3: the fairy tale nature of this dream. The first one
45:44
Speaker 3: that came up was Po Dan, wearing that donkey skin
45:47
Speaker 3: and continuing to work steadily, even if the results are
45:50
Speaker 3: not evident right away. Another myth that was key to
45:53
Speaker 3: my understanding of this dream was the golden apples of
45:56
Speaker 3: Loch Aran, being guided by a shaggy horse or donkey,
46:00
Speaker 3: letting the reins loose and trust, then again killing and
46:03
Speaker 3: cutting it open and wearing its skin to be able
46:06
Speaker 3: to cross a threshold. All of these clues nudged me
46:09
Speaker 3: to understand that I was supposed to embrace the talking
46:12
Speaker 3: donkey in my dream. There was something I had to surrender,
46:16
Speaker 3: but instead I chose to dominate or attempt to dominate.
46:20
Speaker 3: I want to share with you that I had an
46:22
Speaker 3: active imagination session a few days after this dream with
46:25
Speaker 3: the talking donkey, and I apologized to him for my response.
46:29
Speaker 3: I told him I had realized there was no need
46:32
Speaker 3: to suppress and control him. I also made a small painting,
46:35
Speaker 3: a portrait of a donkey, and hung it on my
46:38
Speaker 3: wall as an offering of my appreciation and apology. And
46:42
Speaker 3: he gives us a link to the image, which is
46:45
Speaker 3: so beautiful. Then today, I got to listen to your
46:49
Speaker 3: dream analysis. I was so moved to hear that you
46:52
Speaker 3: found it entertaining and even funny. It really was a
46:55
Speaker 3: magical dream. At first, the donkey was so witty and charming,
46:59
Speaker 3: it felt like a really special visitation. I have to admit,
47:02
Speaker 3: your mention of the prenatal complex, repressed aggressiveness, embodying the
47:06
Speaker 3: role of my parents against myself are so helpful but
47:09
Speaker 3: also painful to recognize. I have spent years in therapy
47:13
Speaker 3: and I have come to understand what happened to me
47:15
Speaker 3: growing up a bit better. I like to think I've
47:17
Speaker 3: moved on from this. My relationship with my parents is decent.
47:20
Speaker 3: We get along and I don't feel like I hold
47:22
Speaker 3: a grudge against them. At least that's what I thought.
47:25
Speaker 3: Then I saw these connections in my dream and I
47:27
Speaker 3: realized there's still a lot more work to be done
47:29
Speaker 3: in this area. Thanks for helping me recognize that. I
47:33
Speaker 3: also appreciate the points you made through the analysis, the
47:35
Speaker 3: need to recognize that I don't have to be contentious.
47:38
Speaker 3: I don't need help from my parents. What I need
47:41
Speaker 3: is to work on my relationship with my donkey. I
47:45
Speaker 3: also love seeing myself in the donkey's playfulness. Overall, your
47:48
Speaker 3: invitation to reflect on this idea resonates with me, and
47:52
Speaker 3: I'll do my best to embody it. Let that donkey play.
47:57
Speaker 3: Thank you for dedicating time to analyzing this dream. I've
48:00
Speaker 3: been listening for years, and I've learned so much from
48:02
Speaker 3: you already that this dream analysis feels even more special.
48:05
Speaker 3: Thank you.
48:06
Speaker 1: Oh, isn't that great? So, What I'm appreciating in the
48:13
Speaker 1: context of this dreamer's very generous response, it is the
48:20
Speaker 1: importance of playing. That if we can see some of
48:24
Speaker 1: the twists and turns in our labyrinthine challenges in life,
48:30
Speaker 1: also with a somewhat playful attitude, it can often help us.
48:37
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
48:38
Speaker 1: And I have to say, in the interest of being
48:43
Speaker 1: balanced and just honest with everybody, we don't always get
48:48
Speaker 1: it exactly right.
48:49
Speaker 3: No.
48:51
Speaker 1: And I just recently corresponded and then conversed with someone
48:59
Speaker 1: who felt that we hadn't gotten it right with his dream.
49:05
Speaker 1: And in a way, This is like the false turn
49:09
Speaker 1: in a labyrinth of to be able to say, oh, okay,
49:14
Speaker 1: this is the dead end. Oh, that's part of it.
49:19
Speaker 1: Part of it for the dreamer you know and part
49:22
Speaker 1: of it for us and that's that's okay just recognizing
49:29
Speaker 1: it and kind of conferring and collaborating on you know
49:35
Speaker 1: what else what else what do you think those connecting
49:39
Speaker 1: threads for your dreamer and for the person I interacted with,
49:48
Speaker 1: the connecting thread is really important. Connecting with self, with others,
49:56
Speaker 1: we don't do it alone.
49:58
Speaker 3: And maybe the big headline here is what I love
50:01
Speaker 3: about this dreamer and all of the dreamers who sent
50:05
Speaker 3: their dreams in is taking our inner life seriously. I mean,
50:10
Speaker 3: that's becoming an increasingly rare thing in the world of AI, right?
50:13
Speaker 3: So I'm so moved by this dreamer who writes his
50:15
Speaker 3: dreams down and he does active imaginations. And, you know,
50:18
Speaker 3: he bothered to send us his dream, as many of
50:21
Speaker 3: you have. And, you know, if you'd like to make
50:24
Speaker 3: more room for that, you can consider joining our dream school.
50:28
Speaker 3: which is where we help give you these tools and
50:32
Speaker 3: make space for you to connect with other people who
50:34
Speaker 3: are doing this too. Let's jump into this week's dream.
50:49
Speaker 3: It's a female dreamer who's 35 years old and she
50:54
Speaker 3: is unemployed and the dream is called Big House. bigger basement.
51:00
Speaker 3: And she says, it's a recently recurring dream and a
51:02
Speaker 3: very large and fancy glass house with many rooms. It's
51:07
Speaker 3: always night. There's a ladder that leads to a steep,
51:11
Speaker 3: something that's a little hard to read, but steep staircase
51:14
Speaker 3: that's dug into the wall. And I end up in
51:17
Speaker 3: an impossibly large cavernous basement. There are windows, but they're
51:21
Speaker 3: so high up that it's still quite dark. The room
51:25
Speaker 3: is filled with antiques. I'm usually alone here, but recently
51:29
Speaker 3: there was a homeless man hiding from me among mannequins,
51:33
Speaker 3: though I was trying to avoid him. The first time
51:36
Speaker 3: I came here, I found tunnels leading further underground and
51:39
Speaker 3: it felt dangerous. I remember being very scared and trying
51:43
Speaker 3: to find a way out. I woke up before finding
51:46
Speaker 3: an exit and dreamed since I have consciously avoided the
51:49
Speaker 3: tunnels because they scare me. I always want to rummage
51:52
Speaker 3: the antiques and take beautiful things home, but I never
51:55
Speaker 3: seem to have time. And asked about context, she mentioned
52:01
Speaker 3: stress from financial issues and caregiving after her partner's surgeries
52:07
Speaker 3: and main feelings. She says, nervous, fear in the tunnels
52:11
Speaker 3: and fear of the homeless man. I felt rushed, which
52:14
Speaker 3: led to frustration over not being able to bring home antiques.
52:19
Speaker 3: And she says, I really love thrifting, but I often
52:21
Speaker 3: can't afford to shop. Basements and too many open windows
52:25
Speaker 3: at night are frightening.
52:28
Speaker 1: Well, wasn't this the perfect dream?
52:30
Speaker 3: I know.
52:32
Speaker 1: After having discussed labyrinths and going down into the dark?
52:38
Speaker 3: And it was totally, it was just totally synchronicity. Yeah,
52:43
Speaker 3: I mean, definitely this basement with all the twists and
52:45
Speaker 3: turns definitely conjures up the idea of the labyrinth. And
52:48
Speaker 3: I think everything that we talked about in kind of
52:51
Speaker 3: the first half about having to go down there and
52:53
Speaker 3: confront the Minotaur. And in this dream, it's the homeless man. There,
52:58
Speaker 3: you know, there it is. And it's scary. And there
53:01
Speaker 3: it is. I also want to point out that this
53:04
Speaker 3: is a basement filled with treasure. And the other mythological
53:09
Speaker 3: image that came up for me is Aladdin and the
53:12
Speaker 3: magic lamp. Because as you remember from that fairy tale,
53:16
Speaker 3: he has to go down into a dark underground space
53:20
Speaker 3: that is filled with mountains of treasure. And the man
53:27
Speaker 3: who kind of has tasks him with doing this says,
53:30
Speaker 3: you know, you can fill your pockets with what you want.
53:33
Speaker 3: The only thing I want is that kind of crappy
53:35
Speaker 3: old lamp. So just make sure you give me that
53:38
Speaker 3: crappy old lamp. But there's a treasure house down here.
53:44
Speaker 3: So I just want to, you know, this is a
53:47
Speaker 3: really interesting psychic space that this dreamer is experiencing.
53:52
Speaker 1: Yep. What I associated all of this to, it's interesting,
53:57
Speaker 1: there are so many themes here, is the dream that
54:00
Speaker 1: Jung had about the house with many levels, that he
54:05
Speaker 1: goes in at an above-ground level that's 17th century or
54:09
Speaker 1: something like that, and then he goes down one more
54:13
Speaker 1: story because he's so intrigued, and he sees something that
54:17
Speaker 1: dates from medieval times. And then he goes down into
54:22
Speaker 1: a subterranean level and there's something else. And he finally
54:26
Speaker 1: opens a trap door into a small earthen basement and
54:33
Speaker 1: finds two skulls. And it's listed someplace else as something
54:39
Speaker 1: else in his memoir, but we all call it the
54:42
Speaker 1: two skulls dream. But here our dreamer goes down and finds... Antiques,
54:52
Speaker 1: like in Jung's dream, things from the past that have value.
54:59
Speaker 3: Yes.
55:01
Speaker 1: So I'm thinking, okay, she wants to rummage through the
55:06
Speaker 1: antiques and take them home, but never seems to have time.
55:12
Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
55:14
Speaker 3: And also, you know, what we have down there, we
55:18
Speaker 3: have anonymous figure. who's been dispossessed. He's homeless. But my
55:24
Speaker 3: guess is he's got something important for the dreamer. So
55:27
Speaker 3: we could say something like, we might formulate something like this.
55:31
Speaker 3: This dreamer has access to, I want to say, a
55:34
Speaker 3: storehouse of valuable things from the past, but isn't able
55:39
Speaker 3: to approach it with the right attitude yet to allow
55:44
Speaker 3: herself to be kind of enriched by it because she's
55:48
Speaker 3: a little too frightened of it. which is totally understanding. Sorry, understandable.
55:53
Speaker 3: Because what we're talking about here is we're talking about
55:56
Speaker 3: the unconscious. And the unconscious is frightening. And so to
56:00
Speaker 3: go down in the unconscious, you're afraid you're going to
56:03
Speaker 3: get lost. You're afraid there's no way out. You know,
56:08
Speaker 3: very scared, trying to find a way out. Jung was afraid,
56:11
Speaker 3: I'm going to go down in the unconscious, I'm not
56:12
Speaker 3: going to find a way out. That is indeed very frightening.
56:16
Speaker 3: And it does sometimes happen to people. And we call
56:18
Speaker 3: that psychosis. But there is a lot there that's rich.
56:21
Speaker 3: And there's even someone who seems to know the terrain,
56:26
Speaker 3: even though he seems a little frightening. But on balance,
56:30
Speaker 3: I think this is such a positive dream. And I wonder,
56:34
Speaker 3: especially because it's repeating, I would encourage the streamer to
56:38
Speaker 3: think about doing an active imagination with it, maybe having
56:41
Speaker 3: a conversation with the homeless man. And say to the
56:43
Speaker 3: homeless man, what do I need to learn? What are
56:46
Speaker 3: you here to teach me?
56:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's up? You know that, and that's, I'm thinking
56:53
Speaker 1: much the same thing. And I'm thinking that the dream
56:56
Speaker 1: itself says that he's homeless. Our dream ego is afraid
57:02
Speaker 1: that he's also dangerous.
57:04
Speaker 3: Right.
57:05
Speaker 1: The dream itself does not say that he did anything
57:11
Speaker 1: that was threatening or, or menacing in any way. And I,
57:18
Speaker 1: This is a bit of a reach, but our dreamer
57:20
Speaker 1: is unemployed. And I'm wondering if there's a link between
57:26
Speaker 1: that and a part of one that can feel homeless,
57:31
Speaker 1: you know, when we're betwixt and between jobs or haven't
57:35
Speaker 1: been able to find one. There's an anchor to being employed.
57:39
Speaker 1: I work here. I do this. I have spent a
57:45
Speaker 1: lot of time working. And it can be kind of
57:49
Speaker 1: disconcerting and a homeless experience to be unemployed.
57:54
Speaker 3: In the outer world, she's very aware of stress from
57:58
Speaker 3: financial issues. In the inner world, she has a veritable
58:02
Speaker 3: treasure house.
58:04
Speaker 1: Yes. However, the treasure in the inner world, represented by antiques,
58:14
Speaker 1: cannot be taken up above to the outer world. And
58:19
Speaker 1: this reminds me of a theme in fairy tales about,
58:22
Speaker 1: and in mythology, where you cannot take the treasures in
58:29
Speaker 1: the magic mountain or down in the underworld realms. You
58:34
Speaker 1: cannot take those treasures out into the real world. There
58:38
Speaker 1: has to be a separation.
58:41
Speaker 3: Although it doesn't say that in this dream. And what
58:44
Speaker 3: I want to offer is kind of what would that
58:46
Speaker 3: look like in someone's life? Now, I don't know this person,
58:50
Speaker 3: so I'm going to just be making this up, but
58:51
Speaker 3: just to see what this might look like. And of course,
58:54
Speaker 3: anytime you do this, you're risking really oversimplifying things. But
59:00
Speaker 3: just to see if we can lean into this a
59:03
Speaker 3: little bit, if you're in your daily life, maybe say
59:06
Speaker 3: very worried about financial stress, but in the inner world,
59:11
Speaker 3: you're having a very rich experience of appreciating your dreams,
59:15
Speaker 3: of getting interested in yourself. You know, the riches in
59:18
Speaker 3: the inner world at that point, as Deb, both you
59:21
Speaker 3: and I know, they're not like an answer to the
59:25
Speaker 3: outer world dilemma yet, yet. But they may lead you there.
59:34
Speaker 3: So it might be that you're worried about the financial
59:36
Speaker 3: stress and it seems like, oh, I've got to go
59:38
Speaker 3: out and get a job. And maybe you do. I'm
59:40
Speaker 3: not saying you can just disappear into your inner life
59:43
Speaker 3: and your dreams. But it might be that if you
59:45
Speaker 3: go into the inner world and you value it and
59:48
Speaker 3: you dialogue with it, that might be where you find out,
59:52
Speaker 3: you know what? Let me look here for a job.
59:56
Speaker 3: Or maybe it would be interesting to consider this. then
1:00:00
Speaker 3: you have access to intuitions, you have access to the
1:00:05
Speaker 3: wisdom of your dreams, possibly to the wisdom of your body.
1:00:08
Speaker 3: And it might be that although you do need to
1:00:11
Speaker 3: be focused on outer world things, that tuning into these
1:00:15
Speaker 3: treasures in the inner world may lead you somewhere you
1:00:18
Speaker 3: didn't expect to go that might wind up being an
1:00:22
Speaker 3: answer to your problem.
1:00:24
Speaker 1: So one of the other places this dreamer could go
1:00:27
Speaker 1: in active imagination is, To spend more time rummaging.
1:00:32
Speaker 3: I like that. Right?
1:00:35
Speaker 1: Of just, of not be quite so purposeful or I
1:00:42
Speaker 1: want to rummage and take beautiful things home. Just rummage.
1:00:46
Speaker 3: And see what you find.
1:00:48
Speaker 1: See what happens. That it's not quite that sort of
1:00:53
Speaker 1: purposeful cause and effect thing. I'm also going back to
1:00:57
Speaker 1: the very beginning of the dream, which is a large
1:01:00
Speaker 1: and fancy glass house with many rooms. And it's always night.
1:01:09
Speaker 1: It's always dark. And yet glass is transparent. You know,
1:01:17
Speaker 1: I suppose if it's really dark glass, it might not be.
1:01:20
Speaker 1: But it's brittle glass. It's often transparent, the old saying
1:01:26
Speaker 1: about people who live in glass houses. In the myth
1:01:30
Speaker 1: of Psyche and Amor, the famous myth, our heroine starts
1:01:37
Speaker 1: out living in a glass mansion, or like a glass mansion.
1:01:42
Speaker 1: It has invisible walls. So there's something about glass that
1:01:47
Speaker 1: lets us see where there's transparency. It can be shattered.
1:01:54
Speaker 1: There's a brittleness. But it also separates us from real
1:02:00
Speaker 1: contact with the thing that's on the other side of
1:02:05
Speaker 1: the glass. Mm-hmm. So I'm really just sort of sitting
1:02:10
Speaker 1: with that a little bit and pondering of what would
1:02:12
Speaker 1: that actually feel like to live in a glass house?
1:02:18
Speaker 3: You know... I want to go back to your idea
1:02:22
Speaker 3: about rummaging for a second, because I think that's really lovely. And,
1:02:26
Speaker 3: you know, the thing about thrifting, which she mentions in
1:02:30
Speaker 3: her associations, is it is always a little bit like
1:02:33
Speaker 3: a treasure hunt. I mean, I love thrifting too, because
1:02:36
Speaker 3: you never know when you're going to walk in and
1:02:38
Speaker 3: find like some fabulous designer that's exactly your size, that's
1:02:42
Speaker 3: in really good shape, that costs $ 20. You know, it happens.
1:02:46
Speaker 3: And yes, and it's, And so it's that idea that
1:02:50
Speaker 3: you don't know what you're going to find. It's the
1:02:54
Speaker 3: unexpected thing. I mean, if you need a little black
1:02:57
Speaker 3: dress for an event, then you go to Macy's because
1:03:02
Speaker 3: you're going to find a little black dress there. If
1:03:04
Speaker 3: you want to see what you can see, one of
1:03:08
Speaker 3: my kids came home the other day wearing the most
1:03:11
Speaker 3: fabulous suede pants. And I said, where did you get those?
1:03:15
Speaker 3: He said, I thrifted them. And I said, oh my God,
1:03:19
Speaker 3: they're fabulous. You know, it's like, where did you find those?
1:03:22
Speaker 3: You know, you just don't, you know, you didn't know
1:03:26
Speaker 3: you were going to find those when you went thrifting
1:03:28
Speaker 3: that day. And it's, we have that experience when we
1:03:33
Speaker 3: rummage around in the psyche, when we let ourselves play
1:03:37
Speaker 3: and explore. And sometimes when we're feeling really stressed about something,
1:03:42
Speaker 3: that playful rummaging instinct goes away. And we think, I
1:03:48
Speaker 3: can't afford to do that now. I can't afford that.
1:03:52
Speaker 3: I need to be more solution-focused. But sometimes when you're
1:03:57
Speaker 3: really in a tight spot, playing and rummaging is exactly
1:04:02
Speaker 3: what you need to do to break an impasse.
1:04:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, and she says, I love thrifting, but I often
1:04:08
Speaker 1: can't afford to shop. Right. But you can always afford
1:04:12
Speaker 1: to rummage and just see. And it is a great
1:04:16
Speaker 1: image for the mental process of that kind of playfulness,
1:04:23
Speaker 1: non-directed thinking. You know, we sort through the bin that
1:04:30
Speaker 1: holds all the old plates and other kinds of tableware.
1:04:37
Speaker 1: We're not being goal-oriented. We're sort of pawing through and
1:04:41
Speaker 1: looking at this and looking at that. There's a reverie.
1:04:46
Speaker 1: And an enjoyment and a time out from directed thinking.
1:04:53
Speaker 3: Yeah. And we wish this dreamer all the best in
1:04:57
Speaker 3: her rummaging. Absolutely. Thanks for listening. To submit a dream,
1:05:03
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