Weekend with Donald Kalsched

According to C.G. Jung, the human personality contains a vital spark or sacred “core” that must personalize and embody in the course of a person’s development if optimal psychological health and ensouled living is to become possible. But when trauma strikes the developing psyche of a child, a split occurs in which the vital core of the Self retreats into the unconscious where it continues to live in “suspended animation” under a spell cast by the powers of the psyche’s archetypal survival system. The result is significant unconscious suffering in the person’s life, often leading to destructive behavioral patterns and depressive symptomatology. Depth Psychotherapy offers the opportunity for renewed contact with the lost core of the Self, and hence for renewed feeling—life, creativity, and relatedness—but not without fierce resistance thrown up by the psyche’s defensive powers. In this struggle, the analytical process provides a crucial inter-active “field” within which the patient’s unconscious suffering becomes conscious in the love/hate relationship of psychotherapy. In this slide-illustrated workshop, Donald Kalsched will explore these themes with the help of clinical examples, dreams, and relevant mythological material.