Latest / This Jungian Life Podcast / LOW ENERGY: Where Can We Source the Drive to Take Action? (Re-Publish)

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LOW ENERGY: Where Can We Source the Drive to Take Action? (Re-Publish) · This Jungian Life Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The team is taking some time off this week, so
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: we thought we would republish one of our popular episodes
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: from several years ago. We picked this episode because this
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: is an issue that brings a lot of people into treatment,
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: low energy. Something's not quite right in some way. You
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: can't find that you have the life force to do
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: the things that you need to do or you manage
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: to do them, but it feels like you're dragging yourself
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: through the day. So how do we understand that? Sometimes
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: there are physical, biological issues that need to be addressed.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Sometimes we're maybe a little bit depressed. When things are
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: really crazy in the world, the overwhelming background anxiety that
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: we're all living with can drain our energy. But low
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: energy can also be a signal that something's not quite right,
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: but we don't yet have words for what's wrong. We
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: don't have a way to conceptualize that. And at that point,
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: it can be important to start listening to what the
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: unconscious might be trying to tell us. So I hope
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: you'll enjoy today's rebroadcast of our episode on low energy.
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: Welcome to This Jungian Life. Three good friends and Jungian analysts,
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: Lisa Marciano, Deborah Stewart, and Joseph Lee, invite you to
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: join them for an intimate and honest conversation that brings
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: a psychological perspective to important issues of the day.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: I'm Lisa Marciano, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Philadelphia.
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: I'm Joseph Lee, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
• 1:39
  Speaker 4: I'm Deborah Stewart, a Jungian analyst in Cape Cod.
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: Hi, everybody. This is Joseph on this Jungian Life podcast,
• 1:58
  Speaker 3: and I have a direct request. Would you just take
• 2:03
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• 2:19
  Speaker 3: and it would give us so much. Thank you.
• 2:25
  Speaker 4: This morning, we are going to talk about energy. energy
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  Speaker 4: for life, psychic energy, physical energy, emotional energy, that that is,
• 2:41
  Speaker 4: regardless of who you are, where you are, what you
• 2:44
  Speaker 4: do in the world, how much energy does any of
• 2:48
  Speaker 4: us have for life, for certain activities? Does it wax?
• 2:53
  Speaker 4: Does it wane? What exactly are we talking about in
• 2:58
  Speaker 4: terms of how we get into the world, what we
• 3:00
  Speaker 4: bring to the world, and how we go about various
• 3:04
  Speaker 4: activities in our daily life. What are all the factors
• 3:10
  Speaker 4: that we need to consider when somebody is maybe struggling
• 3:14
  Speaker 4: with something of where's the energy? Where'd it go? How
• 3:19
  Speaker 4: do we find it again?
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: So this is a really important topic, but before we
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: get into it, I just want to remind you all
• 3:26
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• 4:14
  Speaker 4: I can't resist mentioning that we're talking about energy. And
• 4:19
  Speaker 4: this is an energy exchange. Yes. And so we appreciate
• 4:25
  Speaker 4: and need your energy and support. And in return, we
• 4:31
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• 4:40
  Speaker 3: So back to low energy. And I've been thinking about
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: When I was a body worker for many years, and
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: then also now as an analyst, the issue of just vitality,
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: the élan vital of a person's body is something that's
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: so substantive and can be such a problem, whether it's
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: chronic fatigue syndrome or some other kind of metabolic concerns,
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  Speaker 3: or certainly in our current culture where some people are
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: working 80 hours a week. trying to donkey through a
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: very high-powered corporate career. And then, of course, all of
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: the emotional tensions that can sap our energy. But we
• 5:29
  Speaker 3: seem to live in a world where more and more
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: vitality is required. And there are more and more challenges
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: to rallying to that. I find it very curious.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's interesting, Joseph, that you said we live in
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  Speaker 1: a world that requires more and more. And I think
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: you're probably right about that, which explains this curious thing
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: that I think we've all noticed is, you know, there's
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: some people that just don't seem like they've got enough
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: juice to really make their way through their life in
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: a successful way. And I think that's part of why
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: we wanted to talk about this today, because it's not
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: always obvious why that is. You meet someone, they may
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: be very intelligent. they may have all kinds of things
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: going for them, but somehow they just can't get off
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: the block. And is it, I have wondered, is it
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  Speaker 1: because of the way our society is structured, what our
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: culture demands from us? You know, on the other hand,
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: I also think it's like, well, I don't know that
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  Speaker 1: life was necessarily so easy, you know, if you were a,
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: you know, subsistence farmer 100 years ago or 200 years ago,
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: you know, that probably required a lot of life energy
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: as well. But But it is curious to ponder. And
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: there are many, many things, I think, in our life
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  Speaker 1: now that are just really difficult, maybe not in a
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: physical sense, but in... I spent about two hours this
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: weekend kind of like paying taxes and bills and figuring
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: that kind of stuff out. And it was so taxing.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: Taxes are taxing. That I, you know, I thought, whew.
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  Speaker 1: That took a lot of energy. So there are many
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: aspects of modern life that I think are really taxing
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: in this particular way.
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  Speaker 4: Modern life is very demanding psychologically and emotionally. You know,
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  Speaker 4: I wouldn't trade places with a subsistence farmer from times
• 7:38
  Speaker 4: gone by, but at least one knows what one has
• 7:43
  Speaker 4: to do. You take your hoe, you go to the field,
• 7:46
  Speaker 4: and you work your way up and down the rows.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: Whereas today, a lot of functions are very, very demanding, very,
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  Speaker 4: very complicated, and it's not clear at any given moment
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  Speaker 4: that anybody really knows how to do all the things
• 8:05
  Speaker 4: that we're expected to do. And, of course— We have
• 8:10
  Speaker 4: to handle a multiplicity of things. Taxes, bills, household, children,
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  Speaker 4: maintenance of all kinds of appliances and cars.
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: And now the way that technology needs our attention.
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  Speaker 4: Yes, exactly.
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: You paid for the streaming service, but it doesn't work,
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  Speaker 1: so it takes an hour to figure out what's wrong
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  Speaker 1: or whatever. Yes, exactly.
• 8:37
  Speaker 4: Exactly. So we're handling a multiplicity of needs, demands, requirements,
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  Speaker 4: where I'm sure that in times gone by, that kind
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  Speaker 4: of stimulation demand was not part of daily life. And
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  Speaker 4: I think it really saps energy. I think about all
• 9:02
  Speaker 4: the stuff, I mean, people have coffee and other kinds
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  Speaker 4: of stimulants to jack up our energy, psychic energy and
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  Speaker 4: mental energy, for what is basically now, for many people,
• 9:16
  Speaker 4: a very sedentary lifestyle. So it's an odd juxtaposition of
• 9:22
  Speaker 4: our physical selves and our emotional, intellectual and job-oriented selves.
• 9:33
  Speaker 4: I sit in front of a screen a lot.
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  Speaker 3: I think we're in that realm of rapid change. I
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  Speaker 3: think prior to the Industrial Revolution, life didn't change very much,
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: and there was a psychophysical communication from the community to
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: the children. So if dad was a blacksmith, the child
• 9:58
  Speaker 3: is around the life of the blacksmith, and there's a
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  Speaker 3: kind of physical transmission. That's how we stand. That's the rhythm.
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  Speaker 3: That's the movement. That's the orientation. And in each iteration,
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  Speaker 3: perhaps something new is learned from the farmer, from the weaver,
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  Speaker 3: from the fisherman. And then all of a sudden with
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  Speaker 3: the industrial revolution and my goodness now, everything is changing
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  Speaker 3: so quickly. So there isn't enough generational experimentation for us
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  Speaker 3: to inherit any of the coping mechanisms that a previous
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  Speaker 3: generation might have experimented with. What that means is it
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  Speaker 3: takes a lot of energy to invent a way to
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  Speaker 3: sustain oneself in an ever-changing environment. And most of us
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  Speaker 3: don't realize that we are trying to create a way
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  Speaker 3: to sit for 10 hours a day, trying to create
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  Speaker 3: a way to look at a weird little computer screen
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  Speaker 3: and pretend that there are living people expressing on the
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  Speaker 3: other side of it, truly.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
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  Speaker 4: You know, what you've just said reminds me of when
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  Speaker 4: our kids were little and there was, you know, take
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  Speaker 4: your child to work day. So my husband took our
• 11:25
  Speaker 4: son to work and at the end of the day,
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  Speaker 4: you know, it was sort of like, well, how'd it go?
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  Speaker 4: You know, what was it like? And our son said,
• 11:35
  Speaker 4: he doesn't do anything. He just sits at a desk
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: and talks on the phone or something like that. But
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  Speaker 4: your point, Joseph, is so good that if you grew
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  Speaker 4: up in times gone by and your father was a
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  Speaker 4: blacksmith or a weaver or a farmer, you would be taught.
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  Speaker 4: You knew exactly what it was. And we are now
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  Speaker 4: very much sort of divided from our inherent nature that
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  Speaker 4: has evolved over millennia of us as physical beings.
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  Speaker 1: So wanting to sort of loop back into energy, to
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: life force, I wonder, because I think that, you know,
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  Speaker 1: one of the reasons this topic is interesting is because
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  Speaker 1: of this phenomenon that sometimes in the United States we
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: call failure to thrive. not failure to thrive, failure to launch.
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  Speaker 1: But it is a real issue in, for example, in
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: European countries now. I mean, I think the youth unemployment
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: rate in Spain is close to 50%. And there's high
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: rates in countries like Italy as well. And, you know,
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: there aren't good jobs in The good jobs that there
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: are are very hard to get. The kind of mediocre
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: jobs you could get don't pay very well and maybe
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: are very taxing in terms of the time it takes
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  Speaker 1: to commute there or whatever. So there's a sense of
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  Speaker 1: kind of giving up and just resigning yourself to the
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: oh well. And I'm thinking about, you know, kind of
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  Speaker 1: where our energy goes and how fear or overwhelm maybe
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: is a better word. can really dampen our life energy
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  Speaker 1: because it just feels too overwhelming to figure out how
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  Speaker 1: to do any of this. I have some young adults
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  Speaker 1: in my life and I'm just noticing the very understandable
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: terror that they're all facing about how do I figure
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: out a life when I haven't been brought up to
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  Speaker 1: see what a blacksmith does. And in that sense, then
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: the life energy can really turn on itself. You know,
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  Speaker 1: if you're a young, talented person with a certain urge to,
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  Speaker 1: you know, to do something in the world, but you're
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: too overwhelmed to figure out how to do that, then
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  Speaker 1: it becomes a corrosive inner process.
• 14:24
  Speaker 4: Mm-hmm.
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: If there's no door to self-actualize. Yeah.
• 14:30
  Speaker 4: There are too many moving parts. A lot of them
• 14:33
  Speaker 4: are really not at all explicit. You can see what
• 14:37
  Speaker 4: a weaver does. You can see what a blacksmith does.
• 14:41
  Speaker 4: So there's a vagueness and I think a difficulty accessing
• 14:52
  Speaker 4: the external world. Where are the toeholds? Where's the foothold?
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: Where do I begin? What are the steps along this path?
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: And so I'm just teasing out the difference between what
• 15:08
  Speaker 4: is one's internal life energy, motivation, desire, ambition, what have you,
• 15:15
  Speaker 4: and where does that hook up with something in the
• 15:19
  Speaker 4: external world that says, yes, come on in. Here's where
• 15:23
  Speaker 4: you start.
• 15:26
  Speaker 3: Jung said something that I think is relevant to our
• 15:29
  Speaker 3: conversation here. And this is in the volume seven of
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: the collected works. Libido can never be apprehended except in
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: a definite form. That is to say, it is identical
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: with fantasy images. And we can only release it from
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: the grip of the unconscious by bringing up the corresponding
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: fantasy images. So one of the things that I find
• 16:02
  Speaker 3: really difficult for young people is that there isn't room
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: for them to acknowledge or identify their own fantasy images.
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: It's as if a set of values has been placed
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: around their imaginations which sounds like you know you need
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: to be able to recoup the cost of your college
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: expenses or whatever the rules are that you're not permitted
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: to fantasize or to allow the unconscious to just talk
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: to you in terms of fantasies and as soon as
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: that process is alienated then we're kind of at sea
• 16:46
  Speaker 3: without a without a oars or without an engine, because
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: it's the fantasies that move us along. And of course,
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: the fantasies can be metaphoric. They don't always have to
• 16:59
  Speaker 3: be literal.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: You know, Joseph, I really, I like a lot of
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: what you said, and I want to pick up on
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: embroider on it a little bit. First of all, you
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: read the quote from Jung, and he mentions libido. And
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: we should just say that When Jung uses the term libido,
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: he's not talking about just sexual energy. So often in
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: the popular culture, libido means your sex drive. But the
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: way Jung used it, it's just the available life force
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: that you have for living. And it can be applied
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: in any number of ways, including towards sex, but toward
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: life as well. And then I just want to kind
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: of second this notion about fantasy. And it's interesting that
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: Jung says that Fantasy essentially is kind of the channel
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: or maybe the expression of life force. I love that.
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: Because I think it's really true. And I think it's
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: true for young people. It's true for older people, too.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: I've people that come in and often say, well, what's
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: your fantasy? You know, there's something they want. And I'll say, well,
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: what's your fantasy? And some people can do that. You know, well,
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: this is what I fantasize about. But some people absolutely can't.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: They can't fantasize. I love what you said, Joseph, about,
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: you know, fantasy being the way that the unconscious talks
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: to you. And I have to say that I am
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: really good at fantasizing. But I can see that it's
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: really served me well because I let myself have these
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: kind of, like, here's something that happened yesterday. All of
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: a sudden I went, oh my God, what would it
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: be like to climb Mount Kilimanjaro?
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: I don't know why that occurred to me, but it
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: just did. And it sort of lodged in my brain.
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: And of course, I did a couple of Google searches,
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: like how long does it take to climb Mount Kilimanjaro
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: and how much prep do you have to do? And
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: it's just sort of living in there. And I asked
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: my husband and he said, no, thank you, never. And
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: but then I'm like, OK, well, maybe like maybe my
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: kids would do it with me. Like maybe I've got
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. Nothing I've ever thought about before,
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: but I'm just letting myself have a fantasy about it.
• 19:08
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: And that means that I let myself entertain it. I
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: let myself have fun with it. I let myself, you know,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: do some internet searches about it or maybe, you know,
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: read an article or a book about it. It doesn't
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: mean I'm going to do it at all, but I
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: allow myself to have the fantasy because who knows what
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: might come of it. It might be that I wind
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: up climbing Mount Kilimanjaro or it could be that I
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: just take up hiking in a more serious way, you know,
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: or maybe nothing at all. Maybe it was just a
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: really pleasant interlude. But it is, it is sort of,
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: that is a really good example, I think, of sort
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: of how energy moves through. I mean, I had this idea.
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: And then throughout the the rest of the day, I
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: kept on coming back to it with this like little
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: jolt of, you know, which is totally surprising. This did
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: not come from the ego at all, but it was
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: like my unconscious talking to me.
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: So, Well, I'm struck by just the vitality in your
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: affect right now. Just how expressive. But I mean, literally,
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: there's like 20 more volts of energy just moving.
• 20:12
  Speaker 4: But really, you know, I'm also thinking about to expand
• 20:17
  Speaker 4: fantasy to metaphor of, you know, metaphorically speaking, what kind
• 20:23
  Speaker 4: of mountain might you want to climb? What other kind
• 20:27
  Speaker 4: of task, what challenge is like that? climbing a mountain,
• 20:34
  Speaker 4: which I doubt you will actually literalize. And what we
• 20:40
  Speaker 4: were talking about before is how externally oriented we are
• 20:45
  Speaker 4: in today's world. And fantasy is internally oriented. Where's your imagination?
• 20:54
  Speaker 4: Where is the capacity for building images? And how do
• 20:59
  Speaker 4: we get in touch in this way with something that's
• 21:03
  Speaker 4: alive inside, like climbing Mount Kilimanjaro.
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 21:08
  Speaker 4: Wow, how would that guide a person to selecting a task,
• 21:15
  Speaker 4: a career, a course of study, a project in the
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: external world if it's not rooted somewhere in the internal world?
• 21:26
  Speaker 4: And that's something that our culture does not doesn't mention,
• 21:31
  Speaker 4: and doesn't really teach people how to do.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: But you know... Go ahead, Joseph.
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: What I've come to really appreciate is that the Kilimanjaro
• 21:45
  Speaker 3: image is just the beginning of a journey. No, but really,
• 21:51
  Speaker 3: it's the beginning of a journey inside of the psyche.
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: There's another quote from Volume 16. I'll read it very quickly.
• 22:01
  Speaker 3: We shall, by carefully analyzing every fascination, extract from it
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: a portion of our own personality like a quintessence and
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: slowly come to recognize that we meet ourselves time and
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: again in a thousand disguises on the path of life.
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: And what I'm interested in is the fascination part. So
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: someone may come in and say, oh, I had this
• 22:30
  Speaker 3: fantasy of climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. And one of the disciplines
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: I've taken on in the office is, well, let's have
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: that fantasy. Well, I climbed Kilimanjaro. I said, no, no, no,
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: but tell me where it begins. And they'll say, oh, well,
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: I called a travel agent. And then I'll just keep asking,
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: and then what happens? And then what happens? And what
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: happens is after a few minutes, the conscious mind is
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: kind of run out of the beginning of the fantasy.
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: But when I encourage them to keep, keep going, then
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: the unconscious starts doing something all by itself. And it
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: will often lead someplace that I would not have expected
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: that is often deeply emotional and cathartic and incredibly interesting
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: and important. So it starts at Kilimanjaro or any number
• 23:25
  Speaker 3: of other things. But as the fantasy, as we examine
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: the fascination, which is a Jung quote, It does go
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: someplace unexpected.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's really great.
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: Where there's a lot of libido.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: That's really great, right. So being able to tune into
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: fantasy images and hold them, I want to say, the
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: correct way, which is taking them seriously but not literally,
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: is a key to tapping into a vein of energy.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: in the psyche. You know, it's like this wants to
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: go somewhere. And it did. I mean, you know, I
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: was having a perfectly lovely day yesterday, but when this
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: idea occurred to me, I was like, well, I had
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: a lot of energy. So, but I want to just
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: say further and kind of circling back to our topic
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: about kind of low energy. The truth is, we all
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: know this, that being able to be in touch with
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: your fantasies is very important. But there are plenty of
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: people who can have big fantasies and nothing ever happens.
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: So again, there's something about where does that, where is
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: that low energy? Where is that low libido? What's that about?
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: You know, the person who always says, you know, yeah,
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: I'm going to you know, I don't know, X, Y,
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: or Z. I'm going to move next year. I'm looking
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: at houses and then like nothing ever happens. I've just
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: got to get my house ready to put on the market,
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: you know, but nothing ever happens. I'd really like to,
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: you know, get a dog. I'm looking at different breeds,
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: but nothing ever happens. And it's not that, you know,
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: as you were saying before, Deb, it's not like, you know,
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: I can have this fantasy of climbing Mount Kilimanjaro and
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: never do anything about it. It's not like we have
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: to enact all of our fantasies. But there are those
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: people who seem to be able to dream and fantasize,
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: but who remain in a very stuck way and have
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: a very constricted life, who don't seem to be able
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: to marshal that libido toward an end goal in a
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: way that bears fruit. Okay.
• 25:40
  Speaker 4: I think we're talking about the connection between the unconscious
• 25:45
  Speaker 4: and the ego. And the people who say, well, you know,
• 25:49
  Speaker 4: maybe I think I'm thinking about getting a dog or
• 25:52
  Speaker 4: I'm thinking about moving to a different part of the country.
• 25:55
  Speaker 4: I hear that as a sort of initial offering from ego.
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: To the unconscious to say, hey, I'm reaching out. I
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: have this idea about a new project or about a relocation. Hey, unconscious,
• 26:16
  Speaker 4: will you come forward here and meet me? Will you
• 26:20
  Speaker 4: add some juice to this so that we have some
• 26:23
  Speaker 4: momentum for moving this idea in some direction? And it
• 26:29
  Speaker 4: might not be the specific direction of I'm thinking about
• 26:33
  Speaker 4: relocating to the other coast. Well, maybe if something hooks
• 26:38
  Speaker 4: in deep within in the interior, you know, that fantasy
• 26:46
  Speaker 4: might sort of shift and move in a whole other
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: direction and I might wind up. taking guitar lessons, for example.
• 26:56
  Speaker 4: But there can be a divide between what consciousness is
• 27:01
  Speaker 4: looking for and hoping for that is not met by
• 27:06
  Speaker 4: the unconscious, by something that has energy, that has eros,
• 27:10
  Speaker 4: that has love, that has desire of a real want.
• 27:18
  Speaker 4: versus ego declaring, let's do something.
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: Well, this puts me into Lisa's favorite place of the
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: master and his emissary. I'm amazed that I brought it
• 27:35
  Speaker 3: up first because usually I'm the last person to that party.
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: I'm wondering where you're going with this.
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: Well, it's very Kabbalistic that at a certain point, in
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: the psychophysical evolution of human beings, our ego woke up
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: and discerned that it could make decisions, set intentionalities, that
• 28:02
  Speaker 3: we had volition, in a way that was not purely
• 28:07
  Speaker 3: stimulated by that instinctive level of the body-mind, or not
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: totally stimulated by the environment. so that the ego can
• 28:19
  Speaker 3: kind of go off in its own little projects. When
• 28:26
  Speaker 3: we're in right alignment, or sometimes in our most potent alignment,
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: that the right side of the brain generates a certain
• 28:38
  Speaker 3: kind of creative image, a fantasy image, so to speak,
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: or an instinctive excitation, It puts it over to that
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: more egoic side and in a sense asks the ego
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: to find a way to actualize something, to use its
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: ability to command resources, to satisfy something that's been given
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: to the waking personality from the deeper part of ourselves.
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: So that seems to be more in the right order
• 29:11
  Speaker 3: of things in terms of energy flowing from the deeper
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: part towards the ego.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so you're talking about the ego self-access.
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: Yes, just do its own thing. So I think that
• 29:24
  Speaker 3: has to do with the idea of different parts of
• 29:26
  Speaker 3: the brain itself, the ego self-access, and whether or not
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: the ego is just kind of going along on its
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: own kind of party without much of a connection either
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: to instinct or to archetype. And without the support of
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: instinct archetype in the unconscious, it doesn't seem to have
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: the same wellspring of vitality. to support itself.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: And I think it's true when we have someone come
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: in who has this kind of low energy profile and
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: the person may feel very stuck. You know, the person
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: may feel very stuck psycho-spiritually, but also sometimes these people
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: come in and they don't have money, they're not able
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: to really find a way to make a living, or
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: they're living in a very kind of marginal life. And
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: you do, you kind of sit across from them and
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: you think, where's the energy? And I do think in
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: terms of the ego self axis and these sorts of people,
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: I'm like, where's the self? When is the self going
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: to constellate and kind of get this person out the door?
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: Because sometimes, like I said, these people come in and
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: you can see they're smart and they're, you know, they
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: have a kind of interior life. And they may have
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: fantasies of what they want to do, but somehow it's
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: like that connection is just missing. But I do think
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: there's something interesting here because we're sort of making this case,
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: which I think is true, that the energy ultimately comes from,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: let's say, the self or the unconscious, right? That that's
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: kind of where that's the furnace that we're tapping into.
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: But I also think when we're talking about low energy
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: or low libido or people who tend to be kind
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: of low-functioning, I'm back in the kind of ego psychology
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: world of just kind of basic ego functioning. You know,
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: so that's sort of the ability to do what you
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: say you're going to do. So if you have to
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: call someone to come and help you, you know, clean
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: out your basement because it's full of junk, you know,
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: can you do that? Can you get yourself to the
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: basement and start going through it? Can you go through
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: the listings online to find someone to come help you?
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: Can you make those phone calls? There is a part
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: of it that's just like ego functioning. And sometimes people
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: are not so good at that, you know? And what
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: is that and how do we understand that? So I
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: don't know that this idea of kind of energy is
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: under ego control or it comes from the ego. But
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: certainly in high functioning individuals, most of the time, They
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: are channeling their psychic energy effectively through the ego so
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: that goals can get met and things can get done.
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: So I'm wondering about kind of ego functioning. And I
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: think we probably can all think of people that we
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: have in our life or have worked with who just
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: don't seem to have that. And why not? Why do
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: some people have it and some people don't?
• 32:37
  Speaker 3: But Jung really talked about this when he was doing
• 32:41
  Speaker 3: his word association tests. that when, so he has a
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: list of, what was it, 120 words or something like that.
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: He has a list of words that were very, very common,
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: and then he was timing how quickly people could find
• 33:01
  Speaker 3: an association to a common word. So it might be tree, lumber, water, boat, dog, cat.
• 33:12
  Speaker 4: Mm-hmm.
• 33:13
  Speaker 3: Obviously, I'm complex there. So it took a little bit
• 33:16
  Speaker 3: longer to get that next one. And then he would
• 33:20
  Speaker 3: notice that when there was an interruption in a normal
• 33:24
  Speaker 3: flow of associations, that something was interfering with the flow
• 33:29
  Speaker 3: of energy towards a common object. And out of that
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: interruption of association, he said, well, that must be a complex.
• 33:39
  Speaker 3: And normally there were life experiences or memories that somehow
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: made the associations to that object complicated or diverted or uncomfortable.
• 33:50
  Speaker 3: So from the standpoint of ego functioning, we could say
• 33:54
  Speaker 3: that when we think about a particular task, as you
• 33:59
  Speaker 3: were saying, Lisa, if the flow of associations is interrupted
• 34:04
  Speaker 3: by complexes, there isn't an easy direct relationship. to the
• 34:10
  Speaker 3: thing that we are considering, which goes then to our
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: work of where is the complex that's grabbing the energy
• 34:19
  Speaker 3: and kind of sparking it over to the side.
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: Like siphoning it away.
• 34:25
  Speaker 3: Siphoning it away.
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: So one way to think of it, which goes back
• 34:30
  Speaker 4: to the ego-self axis, is I think of the ego-self
• 34:35
  Speaker 4: axis as sort of goes from the top of the
• 34:37
  Speaker 4: head down as if it's a channel or a roadway
• 34:43
  Speaker 4: where energy can flow from consciousness to the unconscious and
• 34:48
  Speaker 4: to the self, and it goes both ways, up and down,
• 34:52
  Speaker 4: and that that channel can get blocked through life events,
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: unfortunate circumstances, patterns of difficulty, neglect, hardship, all kinds of things.
• 35:06
  Speaker 4: So instead of having a nice open flow where energy
• 35:12
  Speaker 4: goes back and forth, things are blocked. And that that's
• 35:19
  Speaker 4: the complex, so that when somebody reads that word of dog,
• 35:24
  Speaker 4: the person goes... cat, something is blocked. And I think
• 35:34
  Speaker 4: as therapists, as analysts, of course, that is what we do.
• 35:44
  Speaker 4: Where is the energy blocked? So let's see what we
• 35:51
  Speaker 4: can find that is in the way that has to
• 35:55
  Speaker 4: do with history, that has to do with experience and memory.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: But I'm going to make a case that I think
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: there are just... differences between people, because there are certainly
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: people who have horrendous life experiences and their channel doesn't
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: get blocked. And I think there are people whose channel
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: is blocked. And then I just think we're all kind
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: of probably born with different levels of energy. We all
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: just maybe are born with a different size gas tanks.
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: I mean, Murray Stein talks about this in Map of
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: the Soul. He talks about Lyndon Johnson who apparently just
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: had so much psychic energy and he just, he wrote
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: copious letters every day. I mean, if you sort of
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: look at that man's output, it's just how did one
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: human being do that? And then there are, you know,
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: I mean, I can say that I have more energy
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: than many people in my life and I drive them
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: crazy because of it. And I certainly know plenty of
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: people with more life energy than I do, but I
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: can see how I'm like, oh yeah, wait, let's do
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: this too. Let's do that. Oh, could we do this?
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: And people in my life are like head and hands, like, Lisa,
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: you have to stop. You're exhausting me. But then I
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: have people that, you know, I have people in my
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: extended family who are more that way than I do.
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, I just need to
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: go back to bed. So I think we all just
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: have different energy levels. And we have a different ability,
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: maybe almost innately, to access the energy that's there or something.
• 37:34
  Speaker 4: I think we also have different kinds of energy.
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 37:41
  Speaker 4: You know, there's the Lyndon Johnson energy or your Mount
• 37:46
  Speaker 4: Kilimanjaro energy. I'm not going on that trip, by the way.
• 37:53
  Speaker 4: And then there are people that have energy, let us say,
• 37:57
  Speaker 4: you know, really for gardening, for working outside, who have
• 38:04
  Speaker 4: energy for a reflective life, who have energy for scholarly pursuits,
• 38:12
  Speaker 4: which takes me back to what you were saying before, Lisa,
• 38:15
  Speaker 4: about fantasy of what is one's inherent nature. What was
• 38:22
  Speaker 4: I really built for? And where is my natural source
• 38:29
  Speaker 4: of energy? And that that discovery through having dreams, fantasy, reflection,
• 38:39
  Speaker 4: and introspection can put me, let's say, in touch with
• 38:46
  Speaker 4: the right kind of energy, directing it in a way
• 38:50
  Speaker 4: that is satisfying. That's the individuation process that is really
• 38:56
  Speaker 4: at the core of Jungian theory, that to become the
• 39:01
  Speaker 4: person that you were innately meant to be. So we
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: might imagine every little acorn hits the ground going, whoa,
• 39:10
  Speaker 4: I want to become an oak tree. But we're not
• 39:15
  Speaker 4: all acorns. We're all other kinds of potentials. And the
• 39:20
  Speaker 4: psyche will block energy if if we're forcing it to
• 39:25
  Speaker 4: go down a channel that is really not inherently suited
• 39:30
  Speaker 4: to our essential nature.
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: And this goes to the very difficult process of discovering
• 39:39
  Speaker 3: what we desire rather than assigning what we should desire.
• 39:44
  Speaker 4: Exactly.
• 39:45
  Speaker 3: Because you can't like something you don't like. Something... that
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: doesn't taste good will never really taste good. That we
• 39:53
  Speaker 3: discover that we're attracted to a thing or a person,
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: and you can't force it. So again, I'll hop on
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: another short quote here. From Jung, there are psychic goals
• 40:12
  Speaker 3: that lie beyond the conscious goals. In fact, They may
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: even be inimicable to them. But we find that the
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: unconscious has an inimical or ruthless bearing toward the conscious
• 40:29
  Speaker 3: only when the latter adopts a false or pretentious attitude.
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: So the unconscious has its own goals, the conscious mind
• 40:38
  Speaker 3: can have its independent goals, and if the unconscious mind is,
• 40:43
  Speaker 3: or rather if the conscious mind is if the ego
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: is hostile to the unconscious, the unconscious will just make
• 40:51
  Speaker 3: your life really miserable and can cut off the power supply,
• 40:57
  Speaker 3: cut off the access to the electricity.
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: So let's put this in the context of this kind
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: of failure to launch phenomenon. And again, I know we've
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: all seen this in our lives and in our practices.
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: Let's say we've got I don't know, let's say a
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: young man who's approaching age 30, kind of still living
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: in the proverbial basement. And maybe this person has intelligence
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: and education, but just hasn't, you know, maybe is either
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: not working at all or is kind of really underemployed.
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: How do we understand this person's inability to to tune
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: in and marshal this life energy in pursuit of goals?
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: And what can the person do about it?
• 41:53
  Speaker 4: Well, I think that's the process really of exploration. And
• 42:00
  Speaker 4: that's where the work lies. But I'm thinking that we
• 42:03
  Speaker 4: have an array here of possibilities that can be investigated
• 42:09
  Speaker 4: and considered of You know, is there some sort of
• 42:13
  Speaker 4: difficulty with anxiety, depression, some kind of a mood disorder
• 42:21
  Speaker 4: of some sort that is interfering? I have learned never,
• 42:28
  Speaker 4: ever to underestimate physiology, body chemistry, metabolism, and And it's
• 42:37
  Speaker 4: worth considering, is there some sort of physiological health issue
• 42:42
  Speaker 4: that could be contributing to this? Are there developmental blockages,
• 42:52
  Speaker 4: which we just talked about as complexes, of stages of
• 42:56
  Speaker 4: life where getting out in the world when you were
• 43:00
  Speaker 4: just going to kindergarten or hitting junior high school, that those...
• 43:07
  Speaker 4: times of life of getting out and initiating were particularly
• 43:11
  Speaker 4: difficult or marked by some kind of trauma. And has
• 43:22
  Speaker 4: there been constraints upon what's possible for you, either just
• 43:29
  Speaker 4: by family considerations socioeconomic considerations, external world inhibitors that have
• 43:38
  Speaker 4: prevented accessing resources, accessing experiences, and opportunities for personal growth.
• 43:48
  Speaker 4: So I think those are some of the things to
• 43:50
  Speaker 4: consider of reaching out and reaching into oneself for, hmm,
• 43:58
  Speaker 4: what's up with me? Where is my energy?
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so a couple of things. First of all, I'm
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: thinking about Jung talks variously throughout the collected works about
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: the need to sort of sacrifice the bliss of childhood
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: and to get out into the world. And I think
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: where some, and here's a little quote about that, one
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: must give up the retrospective longing which only wants to
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: resuscitate the torpid bliss and effortlessness of childhood. And in
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: place of that, one has to cultivate a heroic attitude.
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: So that is part of the myth of the hero,
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: is the hero is going to slay the dragon. And
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: in kind of Neumann terms, that is to slay the enveloping,
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: kind of swallowing, devouring dragon. mother that pulls us back
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: into the world of childhood. And instead, we have to
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: develop this strong ego that can go out into the world.
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: But I want to say that we're also in this
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: notion about the pu-erh, you know, the eternal youth, kind
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: of Peter Pan sort of syndrome kind of thing. you know,
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: who wants to stay in this world where you don't
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: have to really do anything. And if, I mean, I
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: think that this occurs probably most often in people who
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: are from families with some means, because often there's a
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: little bit of something that allows them to remain, you know,
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: they're not, it's not like, hey, if you don't get
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: a job, you're out on the street. It's like, you know,
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: you know, mom or dad is going to give you
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: a little money and you can stay in your basement.
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: So there is this way that, you know, I don't
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: want to cut the cord. I don't want to venture
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: out on my own. I'm too overwhelmed. And I want
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: to say something else about this because I think there's
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: been a shift in the culture. When I was moving
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: toward adulthood, I felt pretty much nothing but excitement. I
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: was excited to go to college. I was excited to
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: figure out my career. I mean, I was scared, too.
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: I definitely remember being terrified. But I find that young
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: people on the cusp of adulthood now, there's something else
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: going on. And I'm sitting with this thought that there's
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: a way that childhood now, for many people, is more
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: magical and protected than it's ever been. You know, kind
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: of middle-class kids in the United States, like everyone gets
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: the trip to Disney. And there's, there's, you know, a
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: birthday is always a special occasion and, and there, there's
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: just so much emphasis on, on, on the magic of
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: childhood and then childhood ends. And what have you got
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: to look forward to? I mean, you're looking at your parents,
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: they're stressed, they're bored, they hate their jobs, you know,
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: you're the best thing in their life, but you know,
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: what is, is that, is that what we're doing here?
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: You know, it's, it's, it's, It's really hard. I mean,
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: I think that there are lots of young people now
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: on the cusp of adulthood thinking, this is not a
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: good deal. I don't want to have to give up
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: all that magic and wonder of childhood and just be
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: faced with endless decades of dragging, hauling my ass to
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: work every day to a job that I hate, you know?
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: So there's one other idea that I'll throw in here
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: because I think it's in the neighborhood and then I'll...
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: hand it over to you guys and see what you think,
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: which is this theory about optimal stress. So this theory
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: says that too little stress and you don't feel engaged,
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: you're bored, essentially. Too much stress and you're overwhelmed. And
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: I wonder if that relates to our topic that we're
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: not in the realm of optimal stress, that people feel
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: actually overwhelmed and so they just kind of shut down.
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: So I just threw a lot of stuff out there.
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: I don't know if any of that landed for either
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: of you.
• 48:09
  Speaker 4: You know where it took me is to just reality, necessity,
• 48:17
  Speaker 4: and motivation, and that the proverbial trust fund kids and
• 48:27
  Speaker 4: any financial advisor will tell you it's not a good idea,
• 48:32
  Speaker 4: does not have to get out in the world, figure
• 48:36
  Speaker 4: it out, wrestle with themselves and wrestle with a job
• 48:41
  Speaker 4: because there's a cushion there. You know, Jung says the
• 48:45
  Speaker 4: world has always been a battleground. And, you know, it
• 48:49
  Speaker 4: wasn't very long ago that if you didn't work, you
• 48:52
  Speaker 4: didn't eat. And so I think about motivation and necessity of,
• 48:58
  Speaker 4: you know, sort of carrot and stick and And we've
• 49:01
  Speaker 4: been talking about activating the carrot and in terms of fantasy, desire,
• 49:10
  Speaker 4: one's inherent nature and going forward, like you being excited, Lisa,
• 49:16
  Speaker 4: to go to college.
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 49:19
  Speaker 4: But there's also stick of, okay, so you're anxious, you're scared,
• 49:24
  Speaker 4: and we all have been. I couldn't believe when I
• 49:30
  Speaker 4: landed in college, sort of like, oh, my gosh, now what?
• 49:34
  Speaker 4: But that's the stick of do it anyway. of something
• 49:40
  Speaker 4: that pushes us out into the world. And that oftentimes
• 49:46
  Speaker 4: we discover when it's sink or swim that, by golly,
• 49:50
  Speaker 4: we can swim.
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 49:56
  Speaker 4: There's a balance there.
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: I'm sitting with this question I've certainly I experienced myself
• 50:09
  Speaker 3: as a young person struggling to find my map, you know,
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: find what I wanted. And then thinking of, of various
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: analysis also, I guess I, I keep wanting to come
• 50:24
  Speaker 3: back to this idea of fantasy. And, and again, I,
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: but the fantasy that we start with is not necessarily
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: the fantasy that we end with, but that, The fantasy
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: is the thing that beckons. Like the myth of Percival,
• 50:43
  Speaker 3: you know, the glimpse of the grail.
• 50:45
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 50:47
  Speaker 3: It's something that carries enough libido that we're even paying
• 50:51
  Speaker 3: attention to it. And then to get enough internal or
• 50:54
  Speaker 3: external support to continue to relate to the fantasy, because
• 50:59
  Speaker 3: the fantasy itself is a set of images that holds
• 51:03
  Speaker 3: and discharges a quantity of energy. And it shapes the
• 51:09
  Speaker 3: ego's relationship. So I think many people that are floating
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: on their couches or in their parents' basements, there is
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: an interruption of fantasy. I think one of the terrible
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: interruptions of fantasy is being submerged in images that are
• 51:32
  Speaker 3: generated by the collective.
• 51:33
  Speaker 4: Ah.
• 51:34
  Speaker 3: So, for instance, if I'm spending 10 hours a day gaming,
• 51:37
  Speaker 3: which is quite a reality for some people, I mean,
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: that is a fantastical world, but it's not a fantasy.
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: But in the few times that I've played around with gaming,
• 51:49
  Speaker 3: and I'm not very good at it, and it doesn't
• 51:52
  Speaker 3: appeal to me, but for about a week or so,
• 51:55
  Speaker 3: I really tried to figure something out. I would close
• 51:58
  Speaker 3: my eyes and I would see those images still parading
• 52:01
  Speaker 3: around in my mind with incredible vividness. And they started
• 52:05
  Speaker 3: moving into my dream world that it was so potent
• 52:12
  Speaker 3: to focus on anything with that much of an immersive dynamic,
• 52:17
  Speaker 3: that much energy. So I think that if watching too
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: much Netflix, for that matter, five, six hours a day
• 52:25
  Speaker 3: the way some people do, that there's a way in
• 52:28
  Speaker 3: which our spontaneous and emergent production of images is replaced,
• 52:37
  Speaker 3: but pornography for that matter. So images can come from
• 52:40
  Speaker 3: the outside in and colonize us and take an awful
• 52:44
  Speaker 3: lot of space. But we need to be able to
• 52:49
  Speaker 3: track the images that come from the inside out. And
• 52:53
  Speaker 3: of course that happens every night in dreams. So sometimes
• 52:56
  Speaker 3: just dream work very slowly can put people in touch
• 53:02
  Speaker 3: with just self-generated imagery and to notice if they have
• 53:07
  Speaker 3: any kind of an excitory, energized reaction to anything in
• 53:13
  Speaker 3: their dream life. But I am surprised when I ask
• 53:16
  Speaker 3: people to talk about any fantasy, about anything at all,
• 53:22
  Speaker 3: some people literally just grind to a halt. Sometimes they
• 53:29
  Speaker 3: will begin weeping. They'll become irritated or worse. That just
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: the invitation to open the door to whatever is on
• 53:42
  Speaker 3: the move in there is really interfered with. And whether
• 53:47
  Speaker 3: it's interfered with in terms of sharing it with another person,
• 53:52
  Speaker 3: that's one interference that they've been somehow convinced that whatever
• 53:56
  Speaker 3: is in the treasure house is a terrible thing.
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: They feel shame or something.
• 54:03
  Speaker 3: Yes, tell anyone. And if that goes deep enough, they're
• 54:07
  Speaker 3: not allowed to know what it is they want. This
• 54:12
  Speaker 3: can also be a symptom of narcissistic parenting, because if
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: the child from very early on has been subtly and
• 54:21
  Speaker 3: pervasively convinced, that what they're interested in isn't really what
• 54:26
  Speaker 3: they're interested in. What you're really interested in is over
• 54:29
  Speaker 3: here on stage right, because mommy and daddy are interested
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: in that. So there's a constant but very consistent direction
• 54:37
  Speaker 3: away from the child towards whatever that the parent or
• 54:44
  Speaker 3: parents think the child should or could be paying attention
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: to can create such a sense of alienation from that
• 54:55
  Speaker 3: self-generating center, that the self-generating center becomes bizarre, frightening, and
• 55:05
  Speaker 3: threatening in as much as if one follows the self-generating place,
• 55:11
  Speaker 3: then one now is alienated from the parental complexes which
• 55:15
  Speaker 3: are associated with survival. So there's so many intricate ways
• 55:21
  Speaker 3: that this can go awry. And when someone is alienated
• 55:28
  Speaker 3: from fantasy, then the promise of anything actually being gratifying
• 55:35
  Speaker 3: is deeply violated. So if we come down to just
• 55:40
  Speaker 3: Jung's ideas of instincts, which are generally connected to fantasy,
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: he said, we have five, sometimes six instincts. Hunger, sexuality, creativity, activity, reflection,
• 55:57
  Speaker 3: and then later in life he added religion, which is
• 56:00
  Speaker 3: really just a self-created mythology. But all of those instincts
• 56:08
  Speaker 3: are millions of years old, maybe even billions of years old,
• 56:14
  Speaker 3: and they know what they want, at least on a
• 56:17
  Speaker 3: fundamental level. Like when you're thirsty, You want water at
• 56:23
  Speaker 3: the very least. If you're hungry, you want food at
• 56:26
  Speaker 3: the very least. But we can see, even in modern culture,
• 56:33
  Speaker 3: how much can interfere with just the simplicity of hunger
• 56:39
  Speaker 3: and eat.
• 56:42
  Speaker 4: So you're really touching on instinct here. as something from
• 56:47
  Speaker 4: which we are all too often separated through all kinds
• 56:52
  Speaker 4: of artificial stimuli of screens and video games and other
• 57:00
  Speaker 4: things that come in to us from the outside. And
• 57:07
  Speaker 4: you used the word simplicity, which I like a lot.
• 57:10
  Speaker 4: And it made me think about how for eons people,
• 57:16
  Speaker 4: worked as shepherds or as farmers and worked pretty well,
• 57:26
  Speaker 4: you know, alone going up and down the rows or,
• 57:29
  Speaker 4: you know, out in the fields with the sheep. And
• 57:33
  Speaker 4: that we were immersed in our bodies, our instincts, the
• 57:41
  Speaker 4: earth and the rhythms of the earth. there was a
• 57:46
  Speaker 4: harmony to our physical life and instinctual nature that has
• 57:55
  Speaker 4: been artificially jacked up. And so, yes, you were talking
• 58:00
  Speaker 4: about people who come in and don't have access to fantasy,
• 58:04
  Speaker 4: don't have access to their own interiority. Because we've been
• 58:12
  Speaker 4: overstimulated with external world ideas, all kinds of stuff. But ultimately,
• 58:28
  Speaker 4: whatever you do, you do with yourself. So if you
• 58:32
  Speaker 4: don't have a self to do it with, there is
• 58:35
  Speaker 4: going to be a problem.
• 58:36
  Speaker 3: As we have been interfered with.
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: And I know that there are also illnesses that people
• 58:43
  Speaker 3: have which make certain things difficult. But if we're looking
• 58:46
  Speaker 3: at the average person who comes in and there's a
• 58:49
  Speaker 3: sense that their body is healthy enough to have a
• 58:53
  Speaker 3: reasonable level of functioning and that somehow is not happening,
• 58:58
  Speaker 3: then the question is, where are the instincts? And often
• 59:03
  Speaker 3: they do show up in dreams, for instance. And we've
• 59:07
  Speaker 3: spoken in other episodes. animals that seem injured or starving
• 59:14
  Speaker 3: or figures that are acting very strangely or eccentrically, that
• 59:20
  Speaker 3: something has been misdirected or an instinct has been dramatically
• 59:26
  Speaker 3: interfered with. Now, We're familiar with the sexual instinct because
• 59:31
  Speaker 3: Freud created an entire system, which is wonderful. When the
• 59:37
  Speaker 3: sexual instinct is interfered with, he cataloged very meticulously all
• 59:42
  Speaker 3: the strange things that can happen in the psyche and
• 59:46
  Speaker 3: even in the body if something just as basic as
• 59:50
  Speaker 3: sexuality is thwarted, grossly thwarted. So Freud's done a great
• 59:56
  Speaker 3: job with that. But things like creativity, activity, reflection, religion,
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 3: and hunger, very little work has been done to that
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 3: degree to say, how do we become unwell? For instance,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 3: when creativity has been grossly interfered with, the capacity to create.
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I'm thinking of this young man that
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: I know just in my personal life who is really
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: extraordinarily bright and creative, but he is having such a
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: hard time kind of finding his way because he has
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: really kind of crippling obsessive-compulsive disorder. And, you know, he
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: is now receiving... kind of cognitive behavioral treatment for that.
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: And I think it's having some good effect. But the
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: thing is that, you know, I know him quite well.
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: And my diagnosis of the problem, and of course I
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: could be wrong, but it goes to what you were
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: just saying, Joseph, because he's a very soulful person and
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: a deep thinker, and I think has a kind of
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: strong spiritual capacity to But his upbringing and worldview is
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: such that he cannot admit any of that. You know,
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: he kind of laughs at me for being interested in dreams,
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: for example. And at one point, he did share a
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: dream with me that he was living in a really narrow,
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: very narrow, narrow house. And to me, what I imagine
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 1: is that I think this person has an expansive soul
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: and needs a way to relate to the larger order
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: of things, but he's shut that down. And so it
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: kind of comes out through the obsessive compulsive behaviors. You know,
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: I might be wrong, but my fantasy is that if
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: he would take up philosophy, for example, or really kind of,
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: you know, get interested in, you know, the nature of
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: the cosmos or you know, read a lot of literary fiction,
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: that some of the pressure that his psyche is under
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: might be released a little bit. But I did want
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: to say, you know, so what we've been talking about,
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: you know, if you think your channel is blocked, what
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: are some things you can do? And I don't pretend
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: that this is an easy or quickly solved problem, but
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: I do have some suggestions that When I'm working with
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: someone and I feel like that channel is blocked, here
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: are some questions that I ask them. So what did
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: you want to be when you were a kid? And
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: a lot of times there's a very quick answer to that. Oh,
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: I wanted to be an astronaut or something. But it's like, no,
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: I mean, there was like what you told the adults,
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: you know, but what did you imagine doing? What did
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: you fantasize about doing when you were a kid, you know?
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: And oftentimes there's many things and they might be, you know,
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: sort of strange. But if we allow them to kind
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: of take shape and take form, you know, we could
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: be curious about that and sort of see where there's
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: a germ, see if there's something back there that was
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: there before the works got gummed up that we can find.
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: Another question is, what are you really good at? Like,
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: what are you the best at in the whole world
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: of anyone you know? You're the one who makes the
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: best tomato sauce. Or you're the one who always knows
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: where things are. Or it doesn't have to be like,
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: I'm really good at, you know, winning law cases. It
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: doesn't have to be that grandiose. It could just be
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: something small. It could be, I'm really good at thinking
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: up clever solutions to things. I'm really good at, I'm
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: the one people call when something goes wrong and they
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: need a listening ear, or I'm really good at making
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: people laugh. It's like, find that thing, because often the
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: thing that we're just really, really good at has some
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: connection to our destiny and why we're here. And then
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: the other thing, and I know we've talked about this
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: before on the podcast, is I'll say to people, follow
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: the energy. Like me with my silly thing yesterday about
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. It's like, you know, when that happens,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: when you find yourself, you know, passing a storefront and
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: you see like beautiful yarn and you're like, oh, I
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: don't know, maybe I'll decide to knit. Like, don't just
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: shut that down. I'm not saying you should run in
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: and spend $ 200 on knitting supplies, but let that live
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: with you. Let that live with you. You know, imagine
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: learning to knit and what would that be like? And,
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: you know, Is there a version of that you want
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: to bring alive in your life? But even just before that,
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: just let yourself have the fantasy. Notice it. Value it.
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: Value the fantasy. And see what happens if you start
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: doing that. And just as you go through your life
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: day by day, where's the energy? What are the things
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: we have to do? What are the things you want
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: to do? What are they?
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 4: I often ask people to just notice what they like.
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 4: And it's surprising that that goes by the boards a
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 4: lot of the time. You know, I like going out
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 4: to lunch. I like that first cup of coffee in
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 4: the morning. But to start literally noticing and take a
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 4: little journal around with you. It could be small. It
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 4: could be anything. But start paying attention of just noting
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 4: down little random thoughts, a little notation. It says to psyche,
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 4: I am paying attention. I noticed that you're starting to
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 4: practice self-reflection. And of course, we all do things that
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 4: we don't necessarily like, but it follows along with what
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 4: you were saying, Lisa, of, you know, where's my natural energy?
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 4: Where's the fantasy? What was this little spark of a
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 4: crazy idea that I had while I was driving to
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 4: the grocery store?
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 4: To develop a connection with your own interior. And my
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 4: other thought is, really seems not to fit with a
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 4: sort of psychoanalytic orientation, but is just do something. Just
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 4: do something.
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: Uh-huh.
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 4: Have novelty. Break out of your pattern.
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: Do something different.
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 4: Go somewhere. Go for a walk. It seems pretty silly.
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 4: I mean, why would you drive downtown and walk around
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 4: the park? Well, why not? It's like your analogy to
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 4: walking by a knitting store and having an idea. It
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 4: doesn't mean that you're going to spend the money on
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 4: knitting supplies. But have some different experiences because oftentimes things
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 4: from the external world can find a niche in the
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 4: internal world, can spark something. So change the channel, get
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 4: out of a rut. go for something that is novel
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 4: and see if you like it.
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: Deb, that is really good advice because I think another thing,
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: we didn't talk about this, but I think it's not unimportant.
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: Another thing that can happen when we get in one
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: of these low libido, low energy states is we're actually
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: overwhelmed by our choices. And we have a fantasy that
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: there is one correct choice. And so we feel paralyzed.
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: So we could, you know, go to this graduate program
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: or that graduate program, or do we want to study this,
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: or do we want to study that, or should we
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: take this job or that job? And sometimes the choice
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: just feels too momentous, and so we kind of do nothing.
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: And I think your advice is, you know, just do something.
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: I mean, honestly, when you're stuck, just do something. Make
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: one move And don't worry too much about whether it's
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: a move in the wrong direction. I mean, you know,
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: as long as it's fairly low stakes, I wouldn't say, okay,
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: I'm going to commit to this, you know, $ 400, 000 graduate program. No,
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: maybe not that. But, you know, do something. Just, you know,
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: do something and do something maybe you haven't done before.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: You know, I mean, there's a kind of exhortation to
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: sort of try something that's a little challenging every day.
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: You know, do one thing that's a little scary or
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: difficult that you haven't done before. And I think that's
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: a good practice.
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 3: It reminds me a little bit of an interesting parameter
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 3: that some people are riding on. the tension between maximizing
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 3: an experience versus satisficing an experience. And what they're finding
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 3: is that because of the multiple options that we have
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 3: and perhaps the great capacity that people have in the
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 3: marketplace now to get the best, only the best, or
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 3: the greatest, or the most gratifying, that if we're looking
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 3: at having only the best, just the right thing, that
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 3: that's correlated with depression, paralysis, this inability to take action.
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 3: What they find is that if people develop a criteria
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 3: of satisficing, that, you know, I'm going to do an
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 3: activity that's just satisficing.
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 4: That is a ghastly word. I know, isn't it?
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 3: I didn't make it up. And what they wanted to
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 3: do was somehow step outside of satisfying. But what's an
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 3: activity that would just be satisficing? Well, maybe that would
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 3: be enough to just take a walk around the block.
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 3: It doesn't have to be maximizing everything.
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: That's interesting. That's really interesting.
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 3: So just a little bit of creativity, a little bit
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 3: of self-reflection. What basic body need have I not touched
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 3: on that would just be satisfying? Maybe I can't give
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 3: myself a shower, but what if I stuck my head
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 3: under the kitchen sink and just cleaned my hair with
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 3: some nice warm water? That sounds odd, but for some people,
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 3: that's kind of what they can get to if they
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 3: don't even have the energy to shower. But it's remarkable
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 3: how good that feels.
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 3: If you can't get the other stuff going. So just
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 3: a little bit of satisfaction in any of these areas
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 3: can be enough to let a little quantity of energy
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 3: free up. And if that becomes available in the system,
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 3: then other more dynamic images can gain some energy and
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 3: we can find ourselves willing or capable of taking another larger,
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 3: more dynamic step. So just as you were saying, Deb,
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 3: any activity, if we know that we're looking for action,
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 3: any bit of creativity, any bit of sexuality, which could
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 3: be something just pleasurable, as pleasurable as just running your
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 3: fingers up and down the inside of your arm to
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 3: give you a sense like, oh, that feels good. That's
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 3: a nice feeling. I haven't thought about that feeling nice
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 3: for a long time. And self-reflecting is just sitting there
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 3: and talking to yourself. The religious function, I think, has
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 3: to do just with indulging the mythic world, which for
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 3: some people might just be reading Rumi's poems. We don't
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 3: have to make a big commitment to the religion of
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 3: our childhood to be brushing against some kind of a cosmology.
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 3: some kind of a fantasy about something that's greater than us.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 3: But again, I think what we're all saying is just
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 3: a little taste of something that tastes good can be
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 3: enough to just point the compass in a direction and
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 3: create a little spark, a little bit of vitality. And
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 3: that builds up over time.
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 1: Well, perhaps we should switch to a dream. And before
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 1: we do, I just am going to plug Dream School.
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: So we talked this episode a lot about how tuning
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: into your dreams can be a way to get you unstuck.
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: And Dream School is a tool that can help you
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: tune in, can help you. We have help in there
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: for recalling your dreams, recording your dreams, and then understanding
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: the messages that come. are one of the principal ways
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: that I look to when I'm working with someone who's
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: very stuck. You know, I'll say, bring in the dreams.
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: Let's figure out what your psyche, what your soul needs
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: you to do. And Dream School will give you the
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: tools to learn how to do that. So we have
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: a sort of special dream today because this dreamer submitted
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: a dream back when the podcast was fairly new. and
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: we analyzed one of her dreams for her. It was
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: in 2018. And then she submitted this dream recently, and
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: the dream references our interpretation. So we thought it was
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 1: a great example. There's some common imagery. It's a wonderful
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 1: example to look at these two very beautiful, complex dreams,
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: and kind of contrast them and kind of see the
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: shifts in her psyche. So I think I will start
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: by reading the original dream. And this dreamer is, I
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: don't have her age then. Let me just see how.
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 3: Old she is now.
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: So she's 50 now, and this would have been about
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: five years ago, I guess, that we did her first dream.
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: So here's the first dream. I'm in a bathhouse, a
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: Turkish bath, and I'm sitting immersed in a pool of
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: warm water to my waist. I'm sitting with my back
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: to a rectangle column made out of black granite. I
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: have my arms stretched like a crucifix, and my hands
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: are holding onto the column that is behind me. The
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: pool is made of green granite. To my left, There
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: is an altar made out of cubic-shaped granite, and on
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: it sits a woman who is a sage, a seer,
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 1: a fortune teller, or a magician. She is wearing a
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: long dress and is sitting cross-legged. My back is hot
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 1: and dries the film of water on the column. And
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: as the column dries, my back leaves marks on the column.
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 1: The marks are magical symbols. They resemble the Japanese Zen
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 1: art that is done by a water-wet brush on a
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: black rock, and it fades as the water dries. The
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: woman comes and looks at these marks and she is flabbergasted.
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: She says she has never seen magical marks such as these.
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: In the bottom of the pool and in front of me,
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: There is a piece of green granite with a circular
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 1: metal inlay and a ring attached to the circular metal.
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 1: It resembles the remains of a counterweight that would have
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 1: been used in opening the gates to a castle. I
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: look at it, and with the power of my mere stare,
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: the rock floats up to the surface of the water
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: and glides on the surface. Then the rock starts skipping
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: on the surface of the water three times and lands
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: on the skirt of the woman who is back on
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 1: the altar. And let's take a minute and listen to
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 1: what the three of us said about this dream back
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 1: in 2018.
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 3: The first thing I can feel is that it's a
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 3: very complicated dream and it would take a lot of work,
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 3: maybe over even weeks or months, to really unpack and
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 3: metabolize the various components of it. But if we start
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 3: at the beginning with the image of a person immersed
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 3: in a pool of of warm water, the first feeling
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 3: that I have is this relaxing down in consciousness, that
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 3: abaissement that Jung talked about, that the ego needs to
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 3: relax down into the fluid of the unconscious to begin
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 3: to catch glimpses of, you know, the things that are
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 3: on the move in the deep.
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 4: And I'm thinking about the alchemical image of people in
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 4: the bath and the alchemical process of salute to you
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 4: where old complexes and so on can dissolve. Old ego structures,
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 4: et cetera, can kind of melt into the water. The
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 4: feeling tone, it seems like it's safe. And a Turkish bath,
• 1:18:25
  Speaker 4: it's all very acculturated, right? Of people would go to
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 4: bathhouses and it would be warm water.
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it seems like this dreamer has... You know, sort
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 1: of specific associations with that from her.
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 4: Versus, let's say, being out in the ocean. But here
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 4: there's a lot of structure, especially a lot of granite.
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's black and green.
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 3: Does the black and green kind of speak to you? No.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 1: I'm just noticing it. I don't have a particular... An
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: immediate association, yeah. I'm feeling myself moving into this dream
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 1: kind of slowly. And maybe that's part of that kind
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 1: of sinking in that you talked about, Joseph.
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 3: Well, it's definitely inviting us in. I think about the
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 3: kind of guided meditations some people do at workshops. And
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 3: this almost sounds like something you could induct somebody down
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 3: into to have a certain kind of encounter with. stepping
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 3: away a little bit from the narrative and just looking
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 3: at the sequence of some of the images. So we're
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 3: sinking down in the water, then she's in a crucifixion position,
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 3: then there's a woman sitting on a cube. So I'm
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 3: thinking a little bit about what does it mean for
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 3: an analysand, for any of us, to have a moment
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 3: of crucifixion, to have the hands pinned or extended right
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 3: and left. Her arms are stretched out and she's holding
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 3: the column. So that's different than being nailed to a cross.
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 3: There's a decision involved in this. Even if we were
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 3: to adopt the position right now and we reach out
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 3: to the right and left, there's this decision to hold
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 3: a certain amount of tension. Mm-hmm. and to conduct or
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 3: be a conductor for a tension between two things or
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 3: several things. So there's some agency in the dreamer's mind,
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 3: which is reflected perhaps in their comments, the context, that
• 1:20:25
  Speaker 3: they have been doing work. And they have been very
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 3: active in this work. The next image of the woman
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 3: sitting on the cube is an archetypal image from.
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 3: The tarot series, tarot cards, and the high priestess, which
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 3: is the second tarot card in the sequence. And often
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 3: what we'll see are as a female figure sitting on
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 3: a cube between two pillars, which are thought to be
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 3: the pillars of Solomon, white and black. And as she
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 3: sits holding a scroll, which is often a symbol of
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 3: the Torah and has symbols on it, Hebrew letters, perhaps
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 3: not unlike the symbols that the woman's back is leaving
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 3: as the water dries, which are the laws of the
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 3: universe and also the secret recordings of the unconscious. And
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 3: one interpretation or several images of the high priestess has
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 3: her robe, as it cascades to her feet, turning into water.
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 3: And it is an idea that the watery substance of
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 3: the unconscious is an extension of this primal feminine. And she's,
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 3: you know, having an encounter in the dream with the
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 3: substance of the unconscious itself.
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's sort of, I think that the themes
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: that you're lifting up there, you can also see that
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 1: in the fact that these magical symbols, apparently of great potency,
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 1: you know, that the sage is flabbergasted at them. They're
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 1: left by the dreamer's back. And so this is something
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 1: that's happening sort of behind us, like outside of consciousness,
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: you know, but there's something really potent there that's moving
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: in the unconscious.
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 3: It reminds me also of some of the images that
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 3: are familiar in kundalini yoga, where you'll have an image
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 3: of the sage and then coming up the spine of
• 1:22:22
  Speaker 3: the sage, there will be a Sanskrit words or letters
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 3: which are inscribed. the images of the chakras or these
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 3: ideas of energy centers ascending and intricate kind of dialogues.
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 1: That's an interesting amplification. Just going back for one second
• 1:22:42
  Speaker 1: to the crucifix, Joseph, which you did a really good
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: job with, and to say that we often understand the
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 1: image of the crucifix as holding the tension of the opposites.
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 1: As you point out, it is done voluntarily. She's not
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: nailed there, but there is a kind of willingness to
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: submit to this betwixt and between place and to hold that.
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 4: I'm aware that I feel very hesitant about saying anything
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 4: much about this dream, given the dreamer's history and background.
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 4: All these very magical and it seems to me very
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 4: promising symbols in the dream. I'm kind of reluctant to
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 4: deconstruct it in a way or make meaning.
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 1: Out of it.
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 4: I'm interested in the shadow figure of this woman who
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 4: is the sage, a seer, a fortune teller, or a magician.
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 4: And what this... Sage, seer, fortune teller may be a
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 4: healing kind of compensatory image that the psyche has generated
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 4: because the dreamer, dream ego really needs this. And the
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 4: symbols are in the back and those water paintings, I've
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 4: seen them where you have a special board and you
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 4: can make some kind of a drawing with a wet paintbrush.
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 4: And as the water evaporates, the image fades. So it
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 4: may imply that there are some things that are not
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 4: in consciousness, but maybe are coming into being.
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 3: I can understand your caution, Deb, that when somebody brings
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 3: a dream that is full of very archetypal images, as analysts,
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 3: we often have a sense that there's a lot of
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 3: power in the psyche, there's a lot of energy, and
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 3: that we don't want people to become overwhelmed. or as
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 3: they're managing it.
• 1:24:41
  Speaker 1: You want to treat it reverently.
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 3: Yes, exactly.
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: So you want to be careful not to manhandle it. And,
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: you know, there's also sometimes, and I don't get the sense,
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 1: this is true of this dreamer, but it's hard to
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 1: say for sure. Sometimes these big archetypal dreams are kind
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 1: of a defense. You know, it's sort of a kind
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 1: of spiritual bypass sort of phenomenon.
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 3: Right. So sometimes a person could be really facing a
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 3: very concrete, suffering in their lives and they'll kind of
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 3: ascend to a very spiritual or very philosophic attitude to
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 3: cope with it for a while sometimes it really helps
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 3: them get through a rough spot and then at another
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 3: time in their life they'll have to reland on what
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 3: happened when perhaps it feels safer to really experience the feeling.
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 3: But I think something that's encouraging, Deb, based on your
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 3: respect for the dream, is the idea that an enormous
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 3: counterweight has constellated in the second half of the dream.
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 3: So she talks about this big metal circle, which is
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 3: linked into the granite with a ring on it. And
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 3: if we think about it as a counterweight, just like
• 1:25:51
  Speaker 3: a counterweighted window. So these old windows were extremely heavy,
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 3: so they would run a rope from the bottom window
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 3: up along the sides and down into the casing of
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 3: the wall. And inside the wall, there would be a
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 3: very heavy lead weight. So the window would be balanced,
• 1:26:08
  Speaker 3: and it would just take a little bit of energy
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 3: to lift the window up, and it would normally be
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 3: too heavy for somebody to move. So here we have
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 3: a counterweight window, which would be used to create some
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 3: ease in lifting the impossibly heavy castle door. But right
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 3: now it's floating, so it can't really do its job.
• 1:26:29
  Speaker 3: It's not supposed to be floating. It's supposed to be
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 3: as heavy as a castle door. But her magical power
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 3: in the dream prevents it from actually being as weighty
• 1:26:39
  Speaker 3: as it would need to be to be effective. So
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 3: this goes a little to your idea about whether or
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 3: not it's difficult at the moment. to allow the counterbalancing
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 3: weightiness to land, but its potential is there.
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it skips on the surface. So there may
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 1: be a way that there is some deep content here
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 1: that can only skim across the surface of it for now.
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 4: And land in the lap of the shadow figure, the
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 4: woman who's back on the altar. So something needs to
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 4: be spiritualized, perhaps.
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 3: For now.
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 1: But there is someone to hold it. There is an
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 1: energy in the psyche that can hold it.
• 1:27:22
  Speaker 3: Yes. The other thing that is floating through the dream
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 3: very lightly at the moment, between the image of the
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 3: crucifix and the word altar being used several times, and
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 3: altars are often places of sacrifice, as well as places
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 3: where objects of veneration could be placed. So there is
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 3: this theme of sacrifice.
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 1: Implication that something might need to be sacrificed.
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 3: Yes. And again, this is all just our speculation, but
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 3: perhaps there is an excessive spiritualization, an airiness that might
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 3: have to be sacrificed in order for the weightiness, the
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 3: counterweight to be fully land which would then could be
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 3: used to open a door that could not be opened
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 3: otherwise in the.
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 1: Psyche yeah i think that's it i think so.
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 3: Too thank you to the dreamer for sharing.
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 1: This okay so let's let's see about the new dream
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 1: so as i mentioned this is a 50 year old
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 1: woman she works as a judge she titled this dream
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 1: silvery lake so this is the new dream I am
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 1: sitting crying. in meditation. I'm sitting against the outside wall
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 1: of an old Swiss-German building with white walls and exposed
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: brown beams. Above my head, there is a narrow porch
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: on the second floor of this building. and it is
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 1: giving me shelter. The porch is also made from dark
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 1: brown wood, similar to the exposed beams. In front of me,
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: there is a vast lake that is silvery color under
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 1: the beautiful moonlight. As I meditate, the moon goes through phases.
• 1:29:18
  Speaker 1: It is a crescent and then becomes full. I am
• 1:29:22
  Speaker 1: not sure how long I am here, but when the
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 1: moon becomes full, There is a high tide and the
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: water rises so that it comes all the way to me.
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 1: I am submerged in this water up to my waist
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 1: and I continue meditating. The water is surprisingly warm and
• 1:29:42
  Speaker 1: is exactly the same temperature as my body, so I
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 1: don't feel it at all. At this point in the dream,
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 1: I remember a dream from four to five years ago
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 1: where I was in a magnificent Roman Persian bath. This
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: submergence in the high tide reminds me of that dream,
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: and I even remember the interpretation that this Jungian life
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 1: had of that dream. I continue my meditation, and slowly
• 1:30:10
  Speaker 1: the lake water recedes. And to my amazement, I am
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 1: completely dry. The tide is over. I know that I
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 1: now need to get up and go and lead my
• 1:30:21
  Speaker 1: journalist and lawyer friends. I get up and go. Now
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 1: I'm in the old library building. It reminds me of
• 1:30:30
  Speaker 1: Trinity College Library. I can see the ceiling curved or
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 1: arched beam. I can also see the beams under the floor,
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 1: which is unusual. The beam below the floor mirrors the
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 1: beams over the ceiling, and as though I have laser eyes,
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 1: I can see inside the building structure. This is the
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: place we work or I am coming to meet my collaborators.
• 1:30:54
  Speaker 1: I have a file of paper under one arm as
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: I walk along this room. And so here's the context.
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 1: She says, the dream you interpreted in 2018 was remarkably significant.
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 1: It unfolded over four years of my life as I
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: became very involved with Zen practice. I know this dream
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: is saying something similar and has similar significance. It even
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 1: made a reference to the bath dream you interpreted. This year,
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 1: I have begun some collaboration with fellow Iranians who are
• 1:31:27
  Speaker 1: journalists and lawyers, and we are focusing on environmental issues
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 1: and justice. I recently came back from a Zen yoga
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 1: teacher training with the same Zen master. My perspective in
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: life has drastically changed over the past year as I
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 1: embarked on a number of Zen practice retreats with high intensity.
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: I am still in analysis and have been for eight years.
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 1: Life is at its most peaceful and happy, while not
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 1: much has changed outwardly. And in terms of feelings in
• 1:32:01
  Speaker 1: the dream, she says, calmness, resolve, happiness. The silvery lake
• 1:32:07
  Speaker 1: and moonlight was beautiful. I do think there is something
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: about the Swiss architecture and the lake. Perhaps a Jungian
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 1: reference or Lake Zurich? Not sure. I have always wished
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 1: to see Trinity College Libraries. And in terms of association,
• 1:32:24
  Speaker 1: she says, the moonlight and the silver colors of the
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 1: lake and the moon are contrasted with the warm glow
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 1: in the old library and the warm wooden walls and floors,
• 1:32:34
  Speaker 1: which were very earthy. Being washed by the lake water
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 1: without feeling cold or wet was amazingly pleasant.
• 1:32:44
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 1:32:50
  Speaker 1: So I'll just start by pointing out these themes. So
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 1: there's sitting cross-legged. There's obviously being in water up to
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 1: her waist. There is, she mentions in the first dream
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 1: that the column is wet, and then as it dries,
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 1: these marks are left. In the second dream, she notes
• 1:33:12
  Speaker 1: that it's the thing she's leaning against, I think, is dry.
• 1:33:16
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: And there's a lot of kind of strong spiritual imagery
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 1: in both dreams. Interestingly, one of the things that's really
• 1:33:28
  Speaker 1: different is there is no sage, magician, fortune teller figure.
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 4: It strikes me that this dream that you just read
• 1:33:42
  Speaker 4: has a real internal consistency. that the dream from four
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 4: or five years ago didn't have. We have in the
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 4: dream from 2018, there is this sage, magical woman, a
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 4: fortune teller or magician, magical symbols. And then in the
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 4: second half of the first dream, the counterweight does not
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 4: act as it should. She says the counterweight moves just
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 4: from the power of her stair that floats up to
• 1:34:21
  Speaker 4: the surface of the water and glides on the surface
• 1:34:24
  Speaker 4: and starts skipping and landing on the skirt of the sage. So,
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 4: This is a sort of magical kind of occurrence in
• 1:34:36
  Speaker 4: the dream that does not comport with what we sometimes
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 4: call the real-life test of what would happen in real life. Well,
• 1:34:44
  Speaker 4: a counterweight should have weight because its weight is what
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 4: helps you lift, let's say, the castle door. The weight
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 4: is needed. Now, this dream, everything is really much more consistent.
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 4: She's meditating. There's water. There's moonlight. The moon goes through phases.
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 4: High tide. She continues meditating. She's in sync with the
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 4: water temperature, which is the same as her body temperature.
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 4: And then it recedes. And then she says, I now
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 4: need to get up and go and lead my journalist
• 1:35:29
  Speaker 4: and lawyer friends. I get up and go. So I'm
• 1:35:34
  Speaker 4: really noting that after this experience in the dream, she
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 4: engages in a real activity. She's going to engage with colleagues, lawyer.
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 3: And.
• 1:35:52
  Speaker 4: Do something in the world. So the hint of escapism
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 4: that I might think of in the first dream is
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 4: absent in this dream.
• 1:36:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, just to tip our hand here, we have not
• 1:36:11
  Speaker 1: re-listened to our interpretation of the earlier dream, but I
• 1:36:14
  Speaker 1: remember that, Joseph, you picked up on the counterweight and
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 1: I don't remember if we use this term, but it's
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 1: basically kind of an image of a sort of spiritual bypass.
• 1:36:26
  Speaker 1: You know, it's like it's all kind of magical and great,
• 1:36:28
  Speaker 1: but something's not, doesn't have the gravitas it should. And
• 1:36:31
  Speaker 1: I agree with you, Deb. This dream hits really differently.
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 1: The other important thing is obviously this moon that goes
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 1: through phases and there's this kind of tide that rises
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: and falls with it, which really conjures up this image
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 1: of a kind of process that just needs to take
• 1:36:49
  Speaker 1: a certain course. amount of time. It's very similar, actually,
• 1:36:52
  Speaker 1: to the imagery in the fairy tale, The Nixie of
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 1: the Mill Pond, where this woman is trying to rescue
• 1:37:03
  Speaker 1: her lover, I think. And she goes to the mill pond,
• 1:37:09
  Speaker 1: and at one point it's just his head that's above
• 1:37:11
  Speaker 1: the water, and then she has to come back. And
• 1:37:13
  Speaker 1: I think she has to come back at the full moon,
• 1:37:15
  Speaker 1: if I'm not mistaken. The next time she comes back,
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 1: more of him is revealed. And then finally enough of
• 1:37:21
  Speaker 1: him is revealed that she can rescue him. I might
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 1: have some of those details mixed up, but it's that idea.
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 1: So it's this idea of a sort of developmental sequence
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 1: over a long period of time. And that's really portrayed
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 1: beautifully in this dream.
• 1:37:39
  Speaker 3: I'm going to pull up an image, which we don't
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 3: normally do on the podcast, but I think it would
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 3: be interesting. I'm hoping this is coming across. This is
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 3: the tarot key number 18, the moon. Can you guys
• 1:37:58
  Speaker 3: see that? Is it coming across?
• 1:38:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I can see it. I don't know if people
• 1:38:04
  Speaker 1: on YouTube will be able to see it, and certainly
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 1: our podcast listeners won't, Joseph. So why don't you just
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 1: describe it for me?
• 1:38:11
  Speaker 3: Sure, and I will. So the 18th tarot, card in
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 3: the sequence of the major arcana is called the moon
• 1:38:23
  Speaker 3: and it depicts a pool of water in the front
• 1:38:30
  Speaker 3: and a golden path that leads up various hills up
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 3: to a violet mountain. From the water there is a
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 3: violet crayfish that passes by rocks and vegetation, passes by
• 1:38:44
  Speaker 3: a wolf, and then a dog from grassy fields to
• 1:38:50
  Speaker 3: plowed fields and between two towers clearly built by human beings.
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 3: And above it is a moon that is in various phases,
• 1:39:01
  Speaker 3: but the power of the moon. So when we were
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 3: listening to the dream, I was thinking of the magnetic
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 3: power of the moon to draw. And so in the dream,
• 1:39:17
  Speaker 3: it seems to be drawing the tide. and that as
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 3: the water or the tide continues to rise as she's meditating,
• 1:39:29
  Speaker 3: that the water meets her and it is the same
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 3: as her body temperature. So I'll just stop at that point.
• 1:39:37
  Speaker 3: So in Tarot Key 18, what it's depicting is the
• 1:39:42
  Speaker 3: magnetic draw of evolution, that from the primordial waters, these
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 3: crustaceans are drawn forward in some way that is remarkable,
• 1:39:58
  Speaker 3: becoming wolves and then wolves refine and through human intervention
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 3: into dogs and then mammals evolve into human beings. And
• 1:40:07
  Speaker 3: there is a promise that life is continuing to be
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 3: drawn forward in this evolutionary process to the next stage
• 1:40:17
  Speaker 3: and the next stage. And the fact that this somehow
• 1:40:23
  Speaker 3: is related to her being in a meditative state, what
• 1:40:28
  Speaker 3: that suggests is that meditation for her is in some
• 1:40:34
  Speaker 3: way facilitating an evolutionary process, which many of the yogic
• 1:40:40
  Speaker 3: traditions claim to be true. Now, in yogic traditions, there
• 1:40:45
  Speaker 3: is an idea that meditation actually draws a substance up
• 1:40:49
  Speaker 3: from the base of the spine called the kundalini, which
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 3: just means the serpent force, that there's some kind of
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 3: a vitality in the body that is released and rushes
• 1:41:02
  Speaker 3: forward and facilitates the activation of unconscious material. And the
• 1:41:09
  Speaker 3: activation of those latent images puts pressure on the ego
• 1:41:13
  Speaker 3: to develop. So many people that practice both meditation and
• 1:41:17
  Speaker 3: kundalini yoga often go through periods of great intensity because
• 1:41:23
  Speaker 3: material has been activated and now demands accommodation. But there
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 3: is a path of evolution that is intrinsic to human beings,
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 3: which Jung talks about in terms of telos. that there
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 3: is a way forward. We might traverse that path slowly,
• 1:41:45
  Speaker 3: but sometimes if we avail ourselves of a kind of dynamism,
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 3: we might be able to make that happen faster, almost
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 3: in the same way that putting a tomato plant in
• 1:41:58
  Speaker 3: a hothouse makes it grow under extraordinary conditions so things
• 1:42:04
  Speaker 3: come to fruit more dynamically because It's enhanced. So she's
• 1:42:12
  Speaker 3: in a process where something magnetic, something much larger than herself,
• 1:42:17
  Speaker 3: the full moon, is drawing a tide. And because I
• 1:42:21
  Speaker 3: live at the coast, a full moon can pull the
• 1:42:27
  Speaker 3: ocean or the bay dozens of feet higher onto the shore.
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 3: And if there's a wind or a storm, it can
• 1:42:36
  Speaker 3: really move enormous amounts of energy. And that seems to
• 1:42:42
  Speaker 3: be happening. The other thing which I find very important
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 3: is the idea that the water is the same temperature
• 1:42:50
  Speaker 3: as her body. That seems very, very important. And there's
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 3: two associations. One is with amniotic fluid. And that's really
• 1:43:01
  Speaker 3: like a cellular memory of returning to a primal, gestating, place.
• 1:43:08
  Speaker 3: But interestingly, the alchemists also said that their furnace, or
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 3: the athanor, where remarkable transformations would occur later in life,
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 3: must be kept at a warm, moist, equable heat. And
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 3: equable means a kind of homeostasis. And what the metaphor
• 1:43:33
  Speaker 3: is that it too is the human body. that the
• 1:43:39
  Speaker 3: second alchemical birth happens in the regulating heat of your
• 1:43:44
  Speaker 3: own body, facilitated by this meditational evolution. So I have
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 3: a sense that she is in a very substantive process.
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 3: And the last image where this is leading, which I
• 1:44:02
  Speaker 3: just thought was absolutely remarkable, She's granted a kind of
• 1:44:09
  Speaker 3: magical power that she now has x-ray eyes, laser beam eyes,
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 3: which means that she now can see underneath the surface
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 3: of things, which some people might say is a symbolic attitude,
• 1:44:26
  Speaker 3: understanding metaphor. Some people quite literally develop a spiritual sensitivity
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 3: that their intuition is so remarkably... attuned that they are
• 1:44:38
  Speaker 3: able to see patterns and sense things that are happening
• 1:44:43
  Speaker 3: in the soul and even in the community before they
• 1:44:46
  Speaker 3: emerge into the conscious life. And what she sees is
• 1:44:53
  Speaker 3: that that which is below is as that which is
• 1:44:58
  Speaker 3: above and that which is above is as that which
• 1:45:03
  Speaker 3: is below. which is one of the hermetic ideas and
• 1:45:09
  Speaker 3: part of the tablet of Hermes Trismegistus and is said
• 1:45:18
  Speaker 3: to be this recognition of spiritual continuity. Another way, which
• 1:45:28
  Speaker 3: was related to our earlier podcast, and you were saying this, Lisa,
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 3: that there is a demand that the inside and the
• 1:45:38
  Speaker 3: outside of our personality become congruent, and that we might
• 1:45:43
  Speaker 3: become unwell. And this goes to the Gospel of Thomas,
• 1:45:48
  Speaker 3: that if you bring forth what is in you, it
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 3: has a medicinal value, but if you don't bring forward
• 1:45:55
  Speaker 3: what is in you, that it will hurt you, that
• 1:45:58
  Speaker 3: it can become poisonous. So I find this to be
• 1:46:04
  Speaker 3: just a remarkable spiritual dream. And how wonderful that towards
• 1:46:11
  Speaker 3: the end that she is meeting her collaborators. And the
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 3: inner collaborators could be all of these wonderful inner capacities,
• 1:46:21
  Speaker 3: inner figures, the self, the functional complexes, all of her
• 1:46:27
  Speaker 3: creative capacities, as well as having outer correlates. really finding
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 3: a community of people that are deeply supporting her in
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 3: this evolution that she is facilitating through her own efforts,
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 3: through her own discipline and her commitment to align with
• 1:46:49
  Speaker 3: those magnetic forces that are drawing all life slowly or
• 1:46:54
  Speaker 3: quickly forward in an evolution. So those are some of
• 1:47:00
  Speaker 3: my fantasies about this.
• 1:47:02
  Speaker 1: Those are great.
• 1:47:04
  Speaker 4: This is an unusual dream, building on what you've just said, Joseph.
• 1:47:11
  Speaker 4: This is a very affirming and confirming dream. Most of
• 1:47:19
  Speaker 4: the time, our dreams offer some sort of a corrective.
• 1:47:25
  Speaker 4: It might be a really... contradictory position where the dream
• 1:47:29
  Speaker 4: maker is saying, nope, you know, I see this totally differently.
• 1:47:34
  Speaker 4: It might be some difference. Yeah, I agree with this part,
• 1:47:40
  Speaker 4: but the dream maker says, I see this part a
• 1:47:42
  Speaker 4: little differently. It's unusual when a dream is as unambiguously
• 1:47:50
  Speaker 4: affirming as this. And it really seems to hark to
• 1:47:58
  Speaker 4: the work that this dreamer has been doing in her
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 4: spiritual and meditative practice since that first dream she offered
• 1:48:07
  Speaker 4: us in 2018.
• 1:48:09
  Speaker 1: You know, Deb, it's true that dreams are not often confirmatory,
• 1:48:15
  Speaker 1: but I do find that if you're in a long-term
• 1:48:19
  Speaker 1: depth process, you have more confirmatory dreams. You know, if
• 1:48:24
  Speaker 1: you've been working with your dreams for a while, your
• 1:48:27
  Speaker 1: earlier dreams are like, no, you're not getting it. You
• 1:48:29
  Speaker 1: got to do more of this, less of that. But
• 1:48:32
  Speaker 1: then eventually you sort of sync up with the self
• 1:48:34
  Speaker 1: and the dreams and we're like, good job, good job.
• 1:48:37
  Speaker 1: Pay attention to this, but overall you're doing good. And
• 1:48:40
  Speaker 1: You know, and it's interesting because if you look at
• 1:48:42
  Speaker 1: the resolution of both of these dreams, I mean, there
• 1:48:46
  Speaker 1: isn't a strong resolution in either. But the first one,
• 1:48:49
  Speaker 1: it's really open-ended, right? It's like the counterweight just lands
• 1:48:53
  Speaker 1: on the skirt or whatever of the seer. And it's
• 1:48:56
  Speaker 1: sort of like we are just left in the middle
• 1:48:58
  Speaker 1: of the story. But Deb, as you pointed out, and
• 1:49:02
  Speaker 1: I think this is just so important for this dream,
• 1:49:05
  Speaker 1: you really put your finger on it. She has this
• 1:49:07
  Speaker 1: process in the Silvery Lake. And then she moves into
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 1: the library. So something is happening. Either she's meeting inner
• 1:49:16
  Speaker 1: collaborators or she's moving out into the world, maybe both.
• 1:49:21
  Speaker 1: And the library is a much earthier place. You know,
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 1: there's a sort of dark earth, earth-toned wood, then the
• 1:49:29
  Speaker 1: silvery lake. So we've left the realm of the spiritual.
• 1:49:33
  Speaker 1: But we've been able to carry that gift into this
• 1:49:36
  Speaker 1: different environment. And it's a library. It's a special library.
• 1:49:42
  Speaker 1: So it's a place of wisdom and learning. And she
• 1:49:46
  Speaker 1: can now kind of access that. So I think that
• 1:49:50
  Speaker 1: in terms of, you know, we should talk sometime on
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: the podcast. I would like to talk about a dream series.
• 1:49:57
  Speaker 1: This is a series of two. But it does show
• 1:50:00
  Speaker 1: you how dreams are like a little x-ray into your
• 1:50:04
  Speaker 1: psychic development to even just compare and contrast these two dreams.
• 1:50:10
  Speaker 1: And Joseph, I loved what you said about the water
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 1: and her relationship with the water is really different in
• 1:50:16
  Speaker 1: these two dreams. For one, the first dream, it's a bath.
• 1:50:19
  Speaker 1: It's a gorgeous bath, but it's a bath. This is
• 1:50:21
  Speaker 1: a vast lake. And And also she has this wonderfully
• 1:50:27
  Speaker 1: pleasurable experience. I love that you brought up amniotic fluid.
• 1:50:30
  Speaker 1: That's just really brilliant. I also thought of the alchemical
• 1:50:33
  Speaker 1: aqua permanence or the divine one that she's somehow bathing into.
• 1:50:38
  Speaker 1: So really, really, really lovely. And thank you so much
• 1:50:42
  Speaker 1: to the streamer for coming back to us with this dream.
• 1:50:47
  Speaker 3: I'm so turned on by the dream, I just want
• 1:50:49
  Speaker 3: to say a few more things.
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 1: Oh, absolutely.
• 1:50:52
  Speaker 3: The water that does not wet the hand is mercury.
• 1:50:59
  Speaker 3: Of course, if any of you have seen liquid mercury,
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 3: it's that strange substance. It's a metal, but it actually
• 1:51:07
  Speaker 3: doesn't saturate anything. And when something is surrounded by mercury
• 1:51:12
  Speaker 3: and then heated up, It acts as the great solvent,
• 1:51:16
  Speaker 3: and often in alchemical work, an ore would be crushed,
• 1:51:21
  Speaker 3: it would be put in a vessel, the mercury would
• 1:51:24
  Speaker 3: be boiled with it, and then the mercury would take
• 1:51:29
  Speaker 3: the gold, separate it out, and then the mercury would
• 1:51:33
  Speaker 3: vaporize and then go into a cooling coil, and then
• 1:51:36
  Speaker 3: the gold would be left coating the surface, the inside
• 1:51:40
  Speaker 3: surface of the vessel. So mercury is the universal, don't
• 1:51:45
  Speaker 3: try this at home because it'll make you very unwell.
• 1:51:47
  Speaker 3: Mercury is dangerous. But in the ancient world, they thought
• 1:51:52
  Speaker 3: the mercury had created the gold and then would then
• 1:51:56
  Speaker 3: exit the chemical reaction unchanged and ever pure. So to
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 3: be in and out of the silvery liquid that leaves
• 1:52:08
  Speaker 3: you dry is very much like transformative mercury.
• 1:52:14
  Speaker 1: And and the divine water the aqua permanence is contained
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 1: in the vase hermeticum in in the in mercury's base
• 1:52:22
  Speaker 1: and of course mercury is hermes their their equivalents so
• 1:52:28
  Speaker 1: that's that's brilliant yeah yeah.
• 1:52:30
  Speaker 3: Right so and i i would just love to read
• 1:52:33
  Speaker 3: the emerald term it Emerald tablet of Hermes before we
• 1:52:36
  Speaker 3: finish because I think it's like in the space. Deb,
• 1:52:38
  Speaker 3: you wanted to say something.
• 1:52:40
  Speaker 4: I'm just noticing the feeling tone among the three of
• 1:52:44
  Speaker 4: us and for this dream, which the dreamer says that
• 1:52:49
  Speaker 4: the feelings in the dream were calmness and satisfaction and happiness.
• 1:52:56
  Speaker 4: And there's been a contagion effect that we're all resonating with.
• 1:53:04
  Speaker 4: to what a wonderful dream, what a confirming, affirming dream,
• 1:53:10
  Speaker 4: and that there's more and more and more. Something has
• 1:53:15
  Speaker 4: come toward her and given her this very special dream.
• 1:53:20
  Speaker 1: And Joseph, I want to let you say what you're
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 1: going to say, but I'll just say that I've had
• 1:53:27
  Speaker 1: the pleasure of getting to know this dreamer just a
• 1:53:30
  Speaker 1: little bit because we've corresponded about about the first dream,
• 1:53:35
  Speaker 1: because anyway, and I know that the time of the
• 1:53:38
  Speaker 1: first dream, she was, there was some very difficult material.
• 1:53:42
  Speaker 1: And I'm just really tickled to hear her say that
• 1:53:46
  Speaker 1: life is sort of as good as it's ever been.
• 1:53:49
  Speaker 1: But anyway, so, you know, even without knowing that, though,
• 1:53:53
  Speaker 1: we came to understand that by the images in the dream.
• 1:53:57
  Speaker 1: And I can just confirm it because I know her
• 1:54:00
  Speaker 1: just a tiny little bit. But Joseph, what were you
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 1: going to say?
• 1:54:04
  Speaker 3: And also, so wonderfully, as she goes into this transformative water,
• 1:54:09
  Speaker 3: she comes out, and then she goes into life, because
• 1:54:12
  Speaker 3: she is going to then lead her fellow lawyers and journalists,
• 1:54:18
  Speaker 3: which is much that process of illumination, that somebody is transformed,
• 1:54:24
  Speaker 3: but then has a kind of duty to the world
• 1:54:27
  Speaker 3: at large, which is so fantastic. And you'll hear that
• 1:54:31
  Speaker 3: in the Emerald tablet of Hermes because as far as
• 1:54:37
  Speaker 3: the energy ascends, it then descends back down to earth. True,
• 1:54:46
  Speaker 3: without falsehood and certain and most true, that which is
• 1:54:51
  Speaker 3: above is as that which is below and that which
• 1:54:54
  Speaker 3: is below is as that which is above for the
• 1:54:59
  Speaker 3: performance of the miracles of the one thing. And as
• 1:55:03
  Speaker 3: all things are from one, by the mediation of one,
• 1:55:08
  Speaker 3: so all things have their birth from this one thing
• 1:55:12
  Speaker 3: by adaptation. The sun is its father, the moon its mother,
• 1:55:19
  Speaker 3: the wind carries it in its belly, its nurse is
• 1:55:23
  Speaker 3: the earth. This is the father of all perfection or
• 1:55:29
  Speaker 3: consummation of the whole world, Its power is integrating, if
• 1:55:34
  Speaker 3: it be turned into earth. Thou shalt separate the earth
• 1:55:39
  Speaker 3: from the fire, the subtle from the gross, suavely and
• 1:55:44
  Speaker 3: with great ingenuity. It ascends from earth to heaven, and
• 1:55:51
  Speaker 3: descends again to earth, and receives the power of the
• 1:55:55
  Speaker 3: superiors and of the inferiors. So thou hast the glory
• 1:56:03
  Speaker 3: of the whole world, therefore let all obscurity flee before thee.
• 1:56:09
  Speaker 3: This is the strong force of all forces, overcoming every
• 1:56:14
  Speaker 3: subtle and penetrating every solid thing. So the world was created,
• 1:56:22
  Speaker 3: hence were all wonderful adaptations of which this is the manner.
• 1:56:28
  Speaker 3: Therefore am I called Hermes, Trismegistus having the three parts
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 3: of the philosophy of the whole world. What I have
• 1:56:36
  Speaker 3: to tell is completed concerning the operation of the sun.
• 1:56:41
  Speaker 3: So people spend their whole lives unpacking that.
• 1:56:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:56:46
  Speaker 3: There's much in this dream which lends to that.
• 1:56:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there is. What a beautiful dream. We hope you've
• 1:56:52
  Speaker 1: enjoyed our extended discussion of it. Thanks for listening. To
• 1:56:57
  Speaker 1: submit a dream, suggest an episode topic, or join our
• 1:57:00
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