Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Jung and Lacan Conference - September 2014

A Joint Jung/Lacan Conference
St John's College Cambridge, UK
Friday 12th – Sunday 14th September 2014
The Notion of the Sublime
in Creativity and Destruction
Convenors: Lionel Bailly, Bernard Burgoyne, Ann Casement, Phil Goss

One hundred years since the outbreak of The Great War, which radically changed many of the western world's rational values and belief systems, this conference brings together scholars and psychoanalysts from different disciplines to explore, through a depth psychological lens, the forces of creativity and destruction enshrined in the notion of the sublime.
Conference to include:   Keynote Lectures
Papers by Delegates
Breakout Sessions
Posters
Further information of programme details will be available from the end of March 2014 from prbd.4469@gmail.com

Monday, February 10, 2014

Analysis and Activism in Analytical Psychology - Conference December 2014


   

International Association for Analytical Psychology
with Association of Jungian Analysts, British Jungian Analytic Association, Guild of Analytical Psychologists, Independent Group of Analytical Psychologists, Society of Analytical Psychology
CONFERENCE
ANALYSIS AND ACTIVISM: SOCIAL AND POLITICAL CONTRIBUTIONS OF JUNGIAN PSYCHOLOGY
 
Friday December 5th 2014 (6pm wine and canapés reception, 7.30-10pm conference)
Saturday December 6th (9.30am-7.00pm)
Sunday December 7th (2.30pm finish)
Venue: Wesley Ethical Hotel and Conference Centre, 81-103 Euston Street, London NW1 2EZ, UK
Jungian psychology has taken a noticeable 'political turn' in the past twenty years. Analysts and academics whose work is grounded in Jung's ideas have made internationally recognised contributions in many areas. These include: psychosocial and humanitarian interventions, conflict resolution, ecopsychology, issues affecting indigenous peoples, prejudice and discrimination, leadership and citizenship, social inclusion, and economics and finance.
The conference will be of interest to activists, concerned citizens and academics - as well as to the whole range of clinical disciplines, whether Jungian or not. We particularly welcome students and trainees. It is the first occasion on which these contributors have been brought together from many countries specifically to address many of the most pressing crises and dilemmas of our time.
Speakers include: Lawrence Alschuler (Canada), John Beebe (US), Astrid Berg (South Africa), Jerome Bernstein (US),Walter Boechat (Brazil), Stefano Carta (Italy), Angela Cotter (UK), Peter Dunlap (US), Roberto Gambini (Brazil), Gottfried Heuer (UK), Toshio Kawai (Japan), Tom Kelly (Canada), Sam Kimbles (US), Tom Kirsch (US), Ann Kutek (UK), Kevin Lu (UK), Francois Martin-Vallas (France), Renos Papadopoulos (UK), Eva Pattis-Zoja (Italy), Joerg Rasche (Germany), Susan Rowland (US), Mary-Jayne Rust (UK), Craig San Roque (Australia), Andrew Samuels (UK), Heyong Shen (China), Tom Singer (US), Tristan Troudart (Israel), Luigi Zoja (Italy).
A few words from Conference Organisers Emilija Kiehl and Andrew Samuels about their vision for the Conference: https://vimeo.com/85523121
Full conference fee:   £130   (SFR 196)
Early bird full fee to end of July 2014:   £110   (SFR 165)
Concession fee (students and unwaged):   £95   (SFR 142)
Early bird concession fee to end of July 2014:   £80   (SFR 120)
For registration and hotel accommodation information: http://www.britishpsychotherapyfoundation.org.uk/BJAA/bjaa-events
Space is limited – early booking advised

Sunday, February 9, 2014

Judith L. Mitrani - 'Taking the Transference' vs. Desire to do Good

"In concluding, I wish to express my belief that many of us are drawn to the work of analysis, at least in part, by the desire to do some good. However, paradoxically, this may be the greatest obstacle to actually doing ‘good analytic work’ and therefore the greatest barrier to truly helping the patient. If unbridled, it may prove to be the most obstructive ‘desire'—in Bion's sense of the word—since our patients may actually need to transform us, in the safety of the transference relationship, into the ‘bad’ object that does harm. In terms of analytic technique, the analyst needs to be able to muster the wherewithal to see, hear, smell, feel and taste things from the vantage point of the patient. I have found it is of little use to give the patient the impression, in one way or another, that what he/she made of what I said or did was neither what I intended nor what I actually did or said. This tactic almost always misses the point and may even reinforce the patient's sense that his/her experiences are indeed unbearable.

Our analysands’ developmental need to house their ‘bad’ objects and unendurable experiences in us is primary. Within us, these objects and the experiences that have created them may find an opportunity for rehabilitation and transformation. For example, the experience of the ‘abandoning object’ that we become—during holidays, weekend breaks, silences and especially in the absence of our understanding in the analytic hour—may have the chance to become an experience of ‘an abandoning object who takes responsibility for having abandoned the patient’ and who, at the same time, is able to keep the patient in mind sufficiently to be able to think about how he/she might feel about having been abandoned. Most importantly, that same object may also be experienced by the patient as able to bear being ‘bad’, which in itself is ‘good'! Furthermore, when reintrojected by the patient in this modified form, the ‘bad’ object is not so ‘bad’ at all: it is human, ordinary with all the ordinary human frailties imaginable, but it is bearable. In this transformed stare, the ‘bad’ object (which is now the contained) is enhanced with a ‘container’ (the analytic object), and the patient will be well on his way towards ‘being’ a thinking and feeling individual." (p. 1102)

Judith L. Mitrani, (2001). ‘Taking the Transference’. Int. J. Psycho-Anal., Vol. 82, pp. 1085-1104

Monday, February 3, 2014

Erel Shalit - On Self and Meaning in the Cycle of Life

      In old age, hearing becomes impaired and vision more blurred. For some, this provides an opportunity to open the senses to the pulsation of the soul, to hear the echoes of the sounds that arise from the depths, and perceive the reflection of the patterns that take shape under the sea.
      This may be the transparency and the invisibility of not being seen by others, and the fear of being run over by the phenomena, the appearances of this world. However, as has been mentioned, it entails exchanging the reality-oriented ego-vision for the inward gaze—like Oedipus upon tearing out his eyes, and the seer Tiresias, or Samson. When blinded to this world of appearance, the inner world of transparent, invisible psychic substance may open up, to be sighted. This change in the ego-Self relationship marks a release of the ego from the persona of social roles. It is the invisibility of allowing oneself to be a beggar, a wanderer, or an old fool—not in the social, but in the psychological sense.
      In order to attain a sense of integrity in old life, rather than suffer severe despair, Erikson emphasizes the importance of reflection. The reflective instinct is specifically human, and determines “[t]he richness of the human psyche and its essential character,” says Jung. Reflexio, which
means ‘bending back,’ “is a turning inwards, with the result that, instead of an instinctive action, there ensues ... reflection or deliberation.”
      “What youth found and must find outside,” says Jung, “the man of life’s afternoon must find within himself.” Jung calls reflection “the cultural instinct par excellence.” Reflection on one’s life is instrumental at every developmental stage, unless it takes precedence over living one’s life. In
old age, the proportions alter, so that reflection on one’s life becomes at least as important as merely living it.
      When cut off from one’s inner depths, the personality shrinks as the ego dries up and becomes limited. A reflective state of mind, however, enables the depths to be reflected in the mirror of one’s Self and soul. Henry Miller tells us in Colossus of Maroussi that he did not know the meaning of
peace until he visited the principal sanctuary of Asclepius at Epidaurus, where dream incubation began around 600 BCE. In the intense stillness and the great peace at Epidaurus “I heard the heart of the world beat. I know what the cure is: it is to give up, to relinquish, to surrender, so that our little hearts may beat in unison with the great heart of the world.” Henry Miller makes it clear that Epidaurus, principally, is an internal space, “the real place is in the heart, in every man’s heart, if he will but stop and search it.”
      Reflection and imagination constitute the intangible substance of soul, which Hillman suggests refers “to that unknown component which makes meaning possible,” and which he imagines “like a reflection in a flowing mirror.” (p. 177-8)

Erel Shalit (2011) The Cycle of Life: Themes and Tales of the Journey, Fisher King Press.

Dr. Shalit's most recent work is The Dream and its Amplification, Erel Shalit & Nancy Swift Furlotti, eds. (2013, Fisher King Press).

Sunday, February 2, 2014

C.G. Jung's Collected Works Available in Digital March 1st

For the first time, The Collected Works of C. G. Jung will now available in English as individual e-books and as a complete digital set. Both the individual volumes and the set are fully searchable.
  • The main volumes, Vols. 1-18, are available for individual purchase.
  • The set--available at a special introductory list price of $499 ($399 when pre-ordered through Amazon) - includes Vols. 1-18 and Vol. 19, the General Bibliography of C. G. Jung’s Writings. (It excludes Vol. 20, the General Index to the Collected Works.).