The trickster is an equal opportunity prankster: it gets everyone at some time or other. Indeed, our best qualities can be the very ones that trigger a trickster event. Fortunately, the trickster sabotages us to save us. Professor Shumate will model the principle with a personal story of a trickster event,  which precipitated her lifelong research on this subject. Personal stories from her students and colleagues will also be used to illustrate the way in which the trickster manages to fulfill our  unconscious desires even while frustrating our conscious expectations.

She invites participants to bring stories of their own trickster events, or those they have witnessed. Exercises will help  participants experience the trickster, identify trickster moments in their personal histories, and find their own, unacknowledged trickster strategies for dealing with trickster reversals.