This class will take a deep and wild dive into Psyche’s process of transformation into the Goddess of Soul. Her fall into the underworld calls archetypal Eros, the god of love, down to earth and brings him into realization of his divine nature—anima—and their transcendent union transforms Psyche into the Goddess of Soul and Eros into Divine Love.

What does this mean for us as individuals, for the collective, and what does this mean in myth and psychoanalysis? Throughout history’s retellings of this archetypal pattern, Psyche as Soul has been the main focus for refinement, but in this class, we will focus on how Psyche’s story asks for necessitates the embodiment of Eros to become conscious. This is a story where both archetypes mutually transform each other.

We will explore the lesser-discussed individuation of Eros as young love’s shadows and insecurities and the necessitation of ego’s individuation away from the ruling imago constructs or status quo. Psychoanalytic concepts such as projection, complex, thinking and feeling, embodiment, consciousness and the unconscious will be explored.

The goal is to discover together a new hermeneutic key to the mystery of soul’s sublimation alongside the alchemical individuation of conscious love on the personal and transpersonal levels as well as ecological and collective levels. Together, we will indulge in meaning-making, connecting through symbolic play and multilayered amplification of the myth, its images, and contemporary media. Participants are encouraged to share their dream images, synchronicities and stories and will hopefully come away with a deepened understanding of their soul’s story.

OUTLINE

PART ONE - April 3 (8:30 - 10:00 pm EST) - The Abduction of Psyche: Daemon Lover and Love in Shadow

PART TWO - April 10 (8:30 - 10:00 pm EST) - Psyche’s Knife and Monstrous Eros: Psyche’s differentiation, Eros’s Secrets (Imago Complexes), Aphrodite as Death Mother

PART THREE - April 17 (8:30 - 10:00 pm EST) - Psyche’s Descent: Tests of Earthly Love, Soul in the Underworld, Psyche’s Last Task and the Dark Feminine

PART FOUR - April 24 (8:30 - 10:00 pm EST) - Individuation in Love and Descent of Spirit: Imago Consciousness Continued and Falling into Soul, Meeting with Anima in the Darkness

PART FIVE - May 1 (8:30 - 10:00 pm EST) - Sacred Re-Union and The Third Stone: Making the Lapis, Rubedo of Embodiment and Soul’s Rising  

FEATURING

Analysis by Jungian Psychotherapist Alexis Durgee @alchemicaltoil
Storytelling with Jungian Analyst Faranak Mirjalili @Faranak.Mirjalili
Master Storyteller Gauri Raje @Gauri2012