PSYCHOTHERAPY
For lecture descriptions, click on the links:
TRANSFORMING THE DARK DEITY OF TRAUMA: A Passionate Path to the Inner Divine, 2019
SHAMING THE DIVINE CHILD: The Life Cycle of Individuation, 2018
EMBRACING THE SHADOW REALM LUCIDLY: Building the Capacity to Experience Bliss, 2017
EXPLORING THE SIGNIFICANCE OF RECURRING DREAMS, 2002
For course descriptions, click on the links:
DREAMS, VISIONS, PSYCHEDELICS AND NON-CONFORMING IDENTITIES: Evolving Body Consciousness within an Autoimmune Culture March 24, 2023
SECRETS, PRECOGNITION, AND SYNCHRONICITY: Approaching The Numinous in Psychotherapy August 5, 2022
THE PANDEMIC AND THE ARCHETYPE OF ADDICTION: Awakening the Healing Self in a Time of Inflammation and Numbing December 3, 2021
EMBODYING OUR PERSONAL MYTH THROUGH LIFE-CHANGING DREAMS AND VISIONS: Collecting, Digesting and Honoring the Harvest of Inner Work September 3, 2021
BUILDING BRIDGES TO INNER MULTIPLICITY IN THE INEXHAUSTIBLE DEPTHS: Breaking Down the Dissociative Walls to Our Many Selves August 20, 2021
DREAM INCUBATION AND LUCID DREAMING PRACTICES: Incubating Awareness into the Cycle of Night and Day August 13, 2021
OBJECT RELATIONS AND ATTACHMENT DYNAMICS: The Psychoneuroimmunology of Shadow Projection (Part 2) June 25, 2021
OBJECT RELATIONS AND ATTACHMENT DYNAMICS: The Psychoneuroimmunology of Shadow Projection April 16, 2021
EMBODYING SELF LOVE THROUGH INTENTIONAL AWARENESS: The Alchemy of Tantric Anatomy and the Immune System August 21, 2020
UNDERSTANDING SELF LOVE: Tantra and the Golden Shadow April 17, 2020
RITUAL AND MAGIC: And the Awakening of the Numinous October 15, 2019
TRANSFORMING THE DARK DEITY OF TRAUMA: A Passionate Path to the Inner Divine April 12, 2019
SHAMING THE DIVINE CHILD: The Life Cycle of Individuation October 2018
BUILDING THE CAPACITY TO EXPERIENCE BLISS, 2018
EMBRACING THE SHADOW REALM LUCIDLY: Building the Capacity to Experience Bliss September 2017
THE SACRED MARRIAGE: Extracting the Prima Materia from Relationships, 2017
THE BODY AND INDIVIDUATION: Physical Healing and Awareness, 2016
DREAM YOGA AND SLEEP YOGA: PATHS TO INDIVIDUATION, LIBERATION, AND ENLIGHTENMENT, 2015
NARCISSISM AND SELF REALIZATION: Transcending Toxic Self Love, 2015
EXPLORING THE PARADOX OF INDIVIDUATION AND ENLIGHTENMENT: Active Imagination, Dream Yoga, and Sleep Yoga March 12, 2015
CREATIVITY AND DESTRUCTION: Dissociation, Chaos, and the Coniunctio in the Pursuit of Bliss, 2013
UNCONDITIONAL CARE OF THE SELF: Activating the Immune function of the Psyche, Subtle Body, and Body 2012
EXPLORING THE SIGNIFICANCE OF RECURRING DREAMS 2002
JUNG AND EASTERN SPIRITUALITY, 2001
Jung used alchemy as the cornerstone of his psychology. Not until Jung was first introduced to the Taoist treatise The Secret of The Golden Flower could he begin to make sense of many of the obscure alchemical texts with which he had struggled for years. The analogies he found between these texts and his psychology of individuation opened up a new frontier for his work.
This course will focus on how the development of many of Jung’s theories are rooted in Eastern practices such as Tibetan Buddhism, Kundalini Yoga and the I-Ching, and how ancient concepts such as acupuncture and Tibetan Dream Yoga are relevant to Jungian healing processes. We will also explore how this synthesis of Eastern and Western ideas led to the evolution of contemporary mind-body healing techniques and such concepts as the subtle body and embodied dream work. Participants are encouraged to share their related experiences. Reading materials will be supplied.
This workshop will focus on the extraordinary significance of recurring dreams and how they need to be understood in terms of our psychological wellness and development. Recurring dreams may run in a short series or as continuations of another dream, or in some cases they repeat themselves from childhood to the advanced years of adult life. Recurring dreams may be the direct result of serious traumas or they may reveal creative potentials totally unknown to the dreamer. In this workshop, common recurring dream motifs will be discussed as well as clinical examples in the context of Jungian theory. Exercises to help interpret dreams of this type will be offered. Participants are encouraged to bring in examples of their own to share or reflect on in the workshop.
A wrong functioning of the psyche can do much to injure the body, just as conversely a bodily illness can affect the psyche; for psyche and body are not separate entities but one and the same life. -C. G. Jung
There is no illness that is not at the same time an unsuccessful attempt at a cure. -C. G. Jung
In this course we will explore the major themes of mental and physical health and longevity, trauma and illness, individuation and enlightenment, in light of the evolution of Jung’s synthesis of ideas on alchemy, integration of the shadow, and eastern healing traditions. We will look at recent developments in the West on such topics as PTSD, embodied trauma, intergenerational transmission of trauma, neuroscience, nutritional science, and various methods for nurturing the body through food choices, sleep, exercise.
From the Eastern standpoint, we will examine healing traditions that have been practiced and tested for thousands of years, as Jung put it, “the medical philosophies of a distant past,” such as Taoism, Hatha Yoga, Dream and Sleep Yoga, the Chakras, Tibetan Buddhism, as well as Chinese medicine and acupuncture and the use of meditation and mantras to create a refuge of peace within mind and body. We will look at how much in modern medical research and neuroscience helps verify the efficacy of these practices.
The spiraling complexity, stress, and pressures of modern life have created a vortex of toxicity and contagion that has penetrated into the psyche and body of modern humans. This is evidenced by the spiraling epidemic of modern health problems such as immune disorders, obesity, heart disease, cancer and diabetes, and anxiety, depression, and other mental disorders. The use of anti-depressants has increased 400% in the last 10 years in an attempt to avoid this suffering. By integrating ancient and modern practices, we can integrate trauma and the shadow aspects of body and psyche. We can use these practices to reclaim the energy that was used to dissociate and numb us from our wounds, perpetuate outmoded and pathological defense mechanisms, addictions, and projections, in order to overcome our resistance to lifestyle changes that can heal us. We can then use the recollected energy and “chi” for self-care and creative life force, and inoculate the immune systems of our body and psyche to better resist future infection. By making better conscious choices for bodily nourishment, we are able to create an energetic dimension that supports the higher experiences of the psyche, and by making better conscious choices for our psychic nourishment, we benefit and strengthen the body. In this way we can work to promote excellent health and long life and find our way on the path of individuation and enlightenment.
Timothy Lyons 