Vibrant Jung Thing: Jungian Images and Reflections

The Holly and the Ivy

Once again the Holidays have rushed to be upon us.  It often seems that, once we hit the first day of December, the calendar somehow catapults us forward through the month of December and into Hanukkah, Christmas and then the New Year. 

It's a busy time, full of a combination of demands upon us, social times, and a tidal wave of various and sometimes conflicting emotions.

It's a season that emphasizes joy.  Consequently, people who are going through a range of very common difficult human experiences can find this season particularly hard.    

For the recently divorced, separated or bereaved, the holidays, with their emphasis on family togetherness, can be a brutally difficult time.  Living with the reality that a relationship that once promised love and acceptance is no longer there, and often, dealing with limited access to children at a time of the year that may have had particularly intense connections with children in the past can be a particularly difficult emotional experience.

For many people, even encounters with relatives at this time of year can also be ambivalent or difficult.  It can be painful to realize that relationships with family members, that should be filled with closeness and trust are in fact much more tentative and superficial.  Where in earlier times, connections with relatives may have been much closer and warmer, now geographical distance and time constraints keep us much more nearly at arm's length.

Yet there is another character to this time of year, when the days grow short, and we long for the return of light and warmth.  This is a season which possesses an archetypal character and which has held significance for people probably just about as long as there have been people and they have been noticing their environment.  I think here of the words of an old carol of the season:

The holly and the ivy, when they are both full grown,

Of all the trees that are in the wood, the holly bears the crown.

Refrain:

Oh, the rising of the sun and the running of the deer,

The playing of the merry organ, sweet singing in the choir.

These are lines well known to many who come from the Christian tradition, as they come from a famous carol, "The Holly and the Ivy".  This carol actually has pre-Christian origins and may well date back over 1000 years. I believe that this carol points to some of the transpersonal meaning and significance of this season. 

For many centuries, people have always taken the evergreen holly and ivy indoors during the winter in the hope that the occupants of the house would survive difficult conditions just like the hardy holly and the ivy. The colours of the Holly and Ivy, green and red are traditionally associated with the winter solstice.

From very ancient days, people have always met the solstice with courage and hope, and faith in the return of the sun.  For us, too, these holidays call us to recognize that within ourselves which is evergreen, perpetually living and growing, even in those seasons and times when the warmth and light of life can seem very far away indeed.  In Jungian terms, to find this evergreen part of ourselves is to find the permanent and indestructible core of our unique personhood, the Self.  It is at that place within us that we touch the divine. 

I'd be very interested in your comments about how you approach the Holiday season. Are there symbols in this season that bring you life joy and hope?

My very best wishes to each of you on your individual journey to wholeness, especially in this Holiday season,

Brian Collinson

Website for Brian's Oakville and Mississauga Practice: www.briancollinson.ca

Email: brian@briancollinson.ca

Get "Vibrant Jung Thing" posts delivered to your email using the "FeedBurner" box in the left column!

PHOTO CREDITS: © Dink101| Dreamstime.com ; © Tinabelle| Dreamstime.com

© 2009 Brian Collinson

Your Own Personal Myth

Mythology has been a matter of vital importance throughout the time that humans have been upon this planet. Myth-making is one of the fundamental ways that humans understand and make themselves at home in the world.  Myth-making is an expression of the deepest parts of the human psyche.  In the symbols that appear through dreams and in the rest of our lives, we find the touchstone for our own personal mythology. which is the truth of our lives expressed in a way that is far deeper than mere statements about our lives can express.

© Joanne Zh| Dreamstime.com

Carl Jung was one of the first people to speak of individuals as having their own personal myth.  He believed that, in the contemporary era, it was going to be a matter of psychological necessity for more and more people to find their own mythology or narrative for their lives.  He stressed that it was only in finding their individual mythology that many contemporary people would be able to find the sense of fulfillment and grounding in life that would make a meaningful life possible.

 

Are you one of those people who needs to explore and develop your own mythology?  Has that process already started within you?

What does it mean to find your own mythology?  Above all, it means to take seriously the symbols in your life, and to treat them as a unique reflection of your own deepest being.  It means accepting that I am a mystery only partially known to myself, and that my vocation and purpose in my life is to understand as fully as possible the symbols and images that appear from within myself.  It means understanding and accepting that I am something greater than simply my own ego or conscious self.

© Jose Tejo| Dreamstime.com

A man dreams that he sees a huge tree, greater than any sequoia, planted in the front yard of his house.  It grows greater and greater, and finally no one can ignore that it is there...

A woman dreams of a dolphin that visits her, and beckons her on a journey...

A man dreams of finding himself on a sea voyage on a beautiful sailing craft that belongs to a goddess-like woman...

Does your own myth beckon to you?

Individu- What???

I'm enjoying the process of writing this blog on a regular basis, and having the chance to communicate with all of you about different aspects of what it is to be a therapist and a Jungian in Halton and Peel Regions in this continually surprising "place" that we call suburbia.  I'm really open to any of your comments, either privately via email, or in the comment sections on the blog.

Carl Jung developed the idea of "individuation" to describe the individual journey that human beings undertake in their lives.  I believe that this is a very useful way of looking at things, and that it helps people to answer the question "What is it that is happening to me in my life?"

Jung's idea is that the journey of our lives takes us on a more and more individual path.  That we are in the process of becoming more and more uniquely ourselves.  Jung often used the analogy of an acorn and an oak tree, saying that the potential to be an huge oak tree is latent in the acorn, waiting to expand and to become.

© Micheal Armstrong | Dreamstime.com

The Symbolic Power of Home

Suburbia is fundamentally linked with the symbolism of "home".  And the symbolic reality of Home runs incredibly deep in the human psyche.

In the western world, one of the greatest and most profound tributes to the depth and power of this symbolism is found in Homer's Odyssey.  In that great poem, the hero Odysseus struggles through overwhelming difficulties and trials, motivated above all else by his desire to return to his home, Ithaca, and his wife Penelope and son Telemachus.  The wily and resourceful hero succeeds in his quest, only after many years, and much loss and sorrow, and returns home, where he finally encounters his wife again.

Then Ulysses in his turn melted, and wept as he clasped his dear and faithful wife to his bosom. As the sight of land is welcome to men who are swimming towards the shore, when Neptune has wrecked their ship with the fury of his winds and waves- a few alone reach the land, and these, covered with brine, are thankful when they find themselves on firm ground and out of danger- even so was her husband welcome to her as she looked upon him, and she could not tear her two fair arms from about his neck. Indeed they would have gone on indulging their sorrow till rosy-fingered morn appeared, had not Minerva determined otherwise, and held night back in the far west, while she would not suffer Dawn to leave Oceanus, nor to yoke the two steeds Lampus and Phaethon that bear her onward to break the day upon mankind. [Homer, trans. Samuel Butler, The Odyssey, Book XXIII]