In this terrific episode, Latter-day Faith host Dan Wotherspoon brings on his good friend and a Jungian analyst, Christine Chao, to talk about the psychological insights of Carl Jung and, especially, how they relate to good mental, social, and spiritual health. In their conversation, Christine introduces us to Jungian terms and ideas, many of which we likely already heard of yet don’t really understand all that well. If you’ve heard of concepts such as the collective unconscious, archetypes, complexes, dream analysis, individuation, Shadow, and others, Christine wonderfully elucidates these, illustrating them from her own life experiences as well as those of her colleagues and Jung himself. Following this tour through many of the basic insights, the discussion turns to difficulties she and others have with Jung the individual and also with some of his teachings. In this section we can find many similarities with Latter-day Saints who are forced to wrestle with bad ideas and hurtful teachings by Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, and other LDS leaders while still recognizing the brilliance and spiritual power they ushered into the world. C.G. Jung understood human as well as spiritual development, and this episode closes with the way he responded near the end of his life to questions about whether or not he believed in God.
Listen in! You’ll love meeting Christine and will find much here to chew on!
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…thoroughly unprepared we take the step into the afternoon of life; worse still, we take this step with the false assumption that our truths and ideals will serve us as hitherto. But we cannot live the afternoon of life according to the programme of life’s morning; for what was great in the morning will be little at evening, and what in the morning was true will at evening have become a lie.
C.G. Jung, Collected Works, Vol. 8, para 784
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Links:
“Introversion and the Mormon Experience,” Mormon Matters podcast, December 2014.
Latter-day Faith Virtual Fireside, March 19th, 7 to 9 pm Mountain Standard Time.
Topic: Expanding our Understanding of Prayer.
Read more about it and sign up for the free link to join the Zoom discussion!
Latter-day Faith Retreat, March 27th to 29th, Salt Lake City (Murray area).
“Understanding and Navigating Healthy Faith Journeys”
Read more about it and register soon! We hope to see you at the end of the month!