Resonance of Masks

In ancient Greek theatre, masks were used not only to make it easier for the actors to play more than one part and go beyond their real identity, but also they helped to amplify the voice and amplify the character being played - in other words, they served to create resonance.  Just so with the Jungian idea of persona - the mask we put on to present ourselves in a suitable way, to help us be in tune, resonate, with society.   We can have multiple persona to suit each different situation.  The Champernowne Summer Course provides the opportunity to experiment, to 'play' with different parts of ourselves and see where it takes us. With this knowledge we have more resources to tap into, not only for enriching ourselves, but also to use for the masks of persona.

How black and white are our attitudes and judgements: this is good, this is bad; its a male dominated world.  But life is more complex.  The Hindu God Shiva reflects this - both destructive and creative, half woman half man, meditative and daemonic.  Tomorrow, Saturday 18th March, there is a workshop at the C G Jung Club London where Shiva will be vividly experienced. 

Meditation
Tomorrow, Thursday 16 March at 7.30pm, Martin Liebscher will talk to the C G Jung Club London about meditation and the role it can play in enabling us to find our true nature - what Jungians call the journey of individuation.  In this fast running world the need to create the space to let in the Jungian collective unconscious, the religious God, is more needed than ever.  All religions pray or meditate, but we don't have to be part of a religion to be in communication with this vital 'other' in our daily life.  It impinges on us anyway, how much better to relate to it. www.fisu.org.meditation/centres www.londonmeditationcentre.com www.kmclondon.org www.lbc.org.uk www.shambala.org.uk www.kmlondon.org www.willwilliamsmeditstion.co.uk www.sahajayogalondon.co.uk/meditation

Beautifully Unique

Miranda Hart, on Desert Island Discs Radio 4 Extra Sunday 29th November, said it was a long time before she could look in the mirror and say to herself she was "beautifully unique".
The day before, Jean Shinoda Bolen gave a seminar to the C G Jung Club London entitled 'Path with Soul / Path with Heart - The Inner Compass'.  Her theme was that each person is unique in their particular mix of God-given characteristics ('God-given' used here because it is a well-known phrase - but it is not meant to mean the God of any particular religion, but whatever understanding of the Divine each individual has a sense of) and the importance of valuing, seeing as beautiful, whatever we are.  With the exigencies of the culture of the day, all too often our God-given self becomes hidden or distorted from even ourselves.
Jung said that analysts should put to the side everything they have 'learnt', because, if not, stereotyping can set in, which goes against appreciating the uniqueness of the client and helping them to realise they are "beautifully unique".

Plant Soul

In the Radio 4 Extra play ‘Family Tree’ (9.15-10.00pm Tuesday 20 October) a boy turns into a plant, his mother tends him until he is 30 years old and gets too big to be indoors and is dying.  Experts tell her the plant is being killed with kindness, needs to be cut back and planted outside.  She plants him in the botalnical gardens.  She has become frail and uses up all her energy doing this.  She lies down beside him to rest, he drop all hi leaves carefully on her.  She would have died without their protection and is found by a gardener.  The chief gardener thinks the boy-plant is dead, but the one who found the mother does not, moves it to his shed, tends it with great care and it grows a shoot.  He leaves his mobile by the plant and the shoot touches it to phone home.  The gardenr sees the number and rings it.  The house is on the market (the mother has been put in a home) and the estate agent answers.  The gardener goes round, sees the damp mark on the carpet where the plant pot stood, the marks on the branches were and realised this was the plant’s home.  The chief gardener burns the plant, which still looks mainly dead.  The gardener rescues seeds from the burnt shoot, one survives, he grows it until it is a small pot plant and gives it to the mother. It is her grandchild.  The voice over in the play is that plant, now old and a large tree, having cast its seeds far and wide.  It comments on people finding looking at trees and feeling a connection, reminds us how we die, are buried, become part of the earth and then part of the plants “We are not as distinct as we think” is the finale. 

This is resonant with Jungian psychology which speaks of the ‘One World’, that everything is connected to everything.   There was a C G Jung Club London – Guild of Pastoral Psychology seminar on 17^th of October with Thomas Moore speaking about ‘Care of the Soul and Spirit in a Secular World’.   He spoke of Thomas Aquinas writing that we have a human soul, an animal soul and a vegetable soul. How we need to be in touch with all of these aspects of soul.  To quote Thomas Moore from the seminar “Why do we have plants in our house? - - Feeling the need to vegetate.  - -  We grow out of this earth, we are not on it, we came out of it. - - That is our partciipation, that is not another species somewhere, but we can participate, we can trust our vegetable instincts.  If we don’t do that  we live only from our mind level of soul, which is extremely valuable but not the whole story. - -  Going down into our roots.”

Radio 4 Extra Familly Tree drama about our vegetable soul resonates with C G Jung Club London seminar 17 October speaker Thomas Moore