The body is a portal to the numinous dimensions of the soul’s life—to healing and wholeness that goes far beyond just the relief of traumatic symptoms, leading to a greater access to feelings and a renewed sense of soulful aliveness.
Jungian Analysis and Depth Psychology turn toward the deepest currents of the soul, where dreams and life experiences take on cohesive wisdom and unfold in ways that orient and guide the individual. The ancestors knew this—shamans, healers, medicine people, and spiritual teachers looked to dreams, visions, and synchronicities to guide the individual. They knew that these often spoke not just to the individual but were messages that also offered guidance to the community. This realm Jung called “the Spirit of the Depths.” Here one can re-connect with oneself and our collective body—consciously–– rather than perpetuating the unconscious group-think that is characteristic of “the Spirit of the Times.”
Much of the current research in trauma studies and neuroscience points to the primary significance of the body in accessing and working through developmental wounds that constellate complex trauma. This presentation will explore how the body remembers the affective reverberations of trauma, not in conceptual form, but more like a musical phrase; an affective pattern that gets relived and repeated. To experience the body in Depth Psychotherapy is to enter the non-conceptual world, where meaning arises from direct experience, and the nonverbal dimension of the archetype is felt.
In Saturday’s workshop, we will further this exploration through experiential practices, including Authentic Movement, to discover how the mythopoetic reality revealed in Depth Psychotherapeutic process weaves the experience of the body into a tapestry of personal meaning, facilitating deep transformation.
