Walking with Jung

I remember sometime in 1995 or thereabouts always feeling tired. 

I would sleep long but still wake up exhausted. I went on vacation, still the same. I knew

I had to discover something new.

I remember sometime in 1995 or thereabouts always feeling tired.  I would sleep long but still wake up exhausted.  I went on vacation, still the same.  I knew I had to discover something new.  One Saturday morning I saw that there would be a Jung Festival at the Ateneo.  I didn’t know much about Carl Gustav Jung.  Knew only that he was a psychiatrist like Sigmund Freud, did not know differences in their beliefs, but curiosity killed this cat.  I joined and liked the activities so much that I even asked to be allowed to join the sessions for psychotherapists conducted by Katherine Asper, a brilliant Jungian who had spent some of her childhood in the Philippines.

Let me tell you about the Jung activities.  They are fun.  Always a lot of laughter mixed in.  Always a lot of teasing and giggling but at the same time you’re getting insights about yourself, learning to analyze dreams, getting to know yourself much better.   The Jung Festival I went to then was apparently the first in the Philippines.  Now, after 18 years more or less, there is another one. 

It began last Thursday with a fun launch at Carissa Mabasa’s house.  We were four on the launch committee — Carissa, Sonia Roco, Bernie Quimpo and I, but Bernie went abroad and that left the three of us to prepare.  I think we did a good job though it was a lot of work.  Under the gentle eyes of Carissa I did a basic book on Runes, a Nordic way of giving us insights into ourselves, the world, and the future. 

The three of us also put our heads together on a Centering Garden, which you can play with.  It has a square wooden box, tools, semi-precious stones, sand, stones and pebbles and a candle.  You can center yourself by setting up a sand rock garden, using your implements to design on the sand, and scattering your stones.  You can pick leaves and flowers from your garden and put them there too. 

 Sonia Roco created a wonderful book on the mandala that will take your breath away.  Then I created earring cuffs, very fancy new earrings that you will die for.  Don’t worry, after the launch we will set up a page called Magick and Wisdom and you can look at these grown-up toys there and order from us.  That’s another thing I particularly enjoy about the Jungians.  We all love to create and play with our toys.  It’s part of enjoying life.

 Actually as I write this on Wednesday night, I am dead tired.  I’ve been up since six this morning working on the earrings.  Then I had to teach a class.  Then I had to write this column.  But I think it was all worth the effort.

 After the launch the 2nd Jung Festival named “Kasama ni Jung” begins with a seminar on Exploring the Self on July 25  and 26 and Aug. 1  and 2.  This to me is the most important seminar for people who are still wondering about themselves and what will happen to them.  This is the seminar I found most useful in the first Jung Festival.  It begins with a test you have to answer about things you like and don’t like.  Then you score the test and find that it’s supposed to determine which of the Greek goddesses you are.  There are three types:  the virgin goddesses, the relationship goddesses, and the beauty Aphrodite, who is a transformational goddess.  Much to my amazement my highest score was Hestia.  Who?  You never heard of her, right?  Most nuns are Hestias.  She is Hestia in Greece, Vesta in Rome.  Ever heard of Vestal Virgins?  Those are her groupies.  She is the third of the virgin goddesses.  The virgin goddesses — Artemis, Athena and Hestia — are very independent so they don’t marry well, which explains me.

 There are also three relationship goddesses.  Hera, is the classic wife, who blames every infidelity of her husband on the woman he is being unfaithful with.  It is nobody’s fault but hers.  Never is it her husband’s fault and much less hers.  Demeter is the mother who is also in charge of all the plants, the grain, everything you feed your children.  She is heartbroken because her only daughter Persephone was kidnapped.  And finally, there is Persephone, the daughter, who was stolen from her bother by Hades and made the queen of his underworld.

 Then there is Aphrodite, the most beautiful of them all, and the most daring.  She is transformational.  Of course, these goddesses are code names for a set of traits.  They are take-off points for us to go inside ourselves but they just make the sessions so much more fun.

 Why am I writing this?  To encourage people who can afford it to take these courses.  They will spell the difference between being happy with what you have even if it doesn’t look like much and being unhappy with the quantities that you have.  This is a course that will make you happy.

 I hope I see you at least one of these sessions.  The poster is posted for you.

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