Jungian Psychology and Spiritual Direction
Jungian spiritual direction aims to help individuals deepen their connection with their inner selves and the divine by exploring the unconscious and embracing the wholeness of their psyche (soul).
'The Treasures of Darkness'*: Working with the Shadow in Spiritual Direction
In spiritual direction, moments of crisis often bring people face to face with aspects of themselves they would rather not see. This reflection explores the place of the Shadow in the spiritual life, and why engaging honestly with what we repress or deny can become a vital part of spiritual growth and transformation. Drawing on Jungian psychology and long experience in spiritual direction, I reflect on how working with the Shadow can become a source not of shame, but of heali
Working with our Shadow
This article moves beyond understanding the Shadow to exploring how it is lived with, contained, and gradually integrated within the spiritual life — particularly in the context of spiritual accompaniment. In my earlier article on The Spiritual Life and our Shadow, I describe the Jungian under-standing of how we learn, from early childhood, to suppress aspects of ourselves deemed unacceptable to our culture and context. They remain in our unconscious and can dramatically in
Spiritual Life and Our Shadow
Carl Jung , a 19th century Swiss psychoanalyst whose work bridges the gap between psychology and spirituality, understood our Shadow to be where we hide all the bits of ourselves we think are shameful or primitive . It is that aspect of our nature that is cast into the unconscious and held there in the dark to protect our conscious life from what we feel may be unacceptable, either to ourselves or to others. This reflection draws on many years of working with people in spiri
