carl Jung & transpersonal/depth/existential psychologies

Assignment: If circumstances permit, watch the 15-minute video (see inserted link below) on your own and then again with meetup attendees.

Afterward, we'll have an impromptu conversation on Jung and the Tarot—a good way for new members to get started exploring these ideas in a relaxed and welcoming setting.

Our discussion begins with the intriguing fact that Carl Jung himself never formally pursued a scholarly study of tarot symbolism.

Even so, many contemporary tarot practitioners draw upon Jung’s psychological ideas, especially his concept of archetypes within the collective unconscious. Anyone with an interest in tarot cards, symbolism, or archetypal imagery is warmly invited to join the conversation and share perspectives.

In modern tarot culture, the recurring figures in the deck—such as the **Fool, the Magician, and the Empress—**are often viewed as expressions of universal patterns that appear across myths, dreams, and stories. From this perspective, a tarot spread can be approached as a symbolic reflection of the psyche rather than a simple attempt to predict the future. Cards that appear difficult or shadowed are sometimes connected to Jung’s idea of the Shadow, while others resonate with the process he described as individuation.

Again, although Jung himself did not develop a theory of tarot, his ideas have become an influential framework for understanding the symbolic language of the cards and the ways they can invite personal reflection and insight.

READING ASSIGNMENT for 3rd meet-up:
PART 2, chapters 5 and 6. Pages 207-305.
I am using the 1956 Bollingen Series**.**

NOTE: Below, I am sharing a digital copy of the Collected Works that was gifted to me, for those who are unable to procure their own hard copy (a hard copy is highly recommended because it has numbered paragraphs).

Again, welcome everyone, to our free discussion circle on Symbols of Transformation (Collected Works, Vol. 5, Bollingen Series).

This volume—Jung’s pivotal reworking of Wandlungen und Symbole der Libido marks the turning point that led to his break from Freud and laid the groundwork for what would become Analytical Psychology.

Over the course of our meetings, we’ll explore its major themes: the evolution of symbols, the dynamics of libido, the emergence of the self, and the mythopoetic imagination that underlies Jung’s entire psychological project.

This group is open to both beginners and seasoned readers of Jung. All that’s required is a willingness to read, reflect, and engage. Our conversations aim to be friendly, curious, and deeply thoughtful, creating space for rigorous inquiry as well as personal insight.
Let’s begin by stepping into the transformative landscape that Jung believed shaped both the individual psyche and the collective story of humanity.

READING ASSIGNMENT for 4th and final meet-up:
PART 2, chapters 7, 8, 9 and Appendix, pp 306-462.
I am using the 1956 Bollingen Series**.**

NOTE: Below, I am sharing a digital copy of the Collected Works that was gifted to me, for those who are unable to procure their own hard copy (a hard copy is highly recommended because it has numbered paragraphs).

Again, welcome everyone, to our free discussion circle on Symbols of Transformation (Collected Works, Vol. 5, Bollingen Series).

This volume—Jung’s pivotal reworking of Wandlungen und Symbole der Libido marks the turning point that led to his break from Freud and laid the groundwork for what would become Analytical Psychology.

Over the course of our meetings, we’ll explore its major themes: the evolution of symbols, the dynamics of libido, the emergence of the self, and the mythopoetic imagination that underlies Jung’s entire psychological project.

This group is open to both beginners and seasoned readers of Jung. All that’s required is a willingness to read, reflect, and engage. Our conversations aim to be friendly, curious, and deeply thoughtful, creating space for rigorous inquiry as well as personal insight.
Let’s begin by stepping into the transformative landscape that Jung believed shaped both the individual psyche and the collective story of humanity.

REQUIRED READING ASSIGNMENT: Jung's Seminar on Nietzsche's Zarathustra. Edited by James L. Jarrett. For this meetup, read the Foreword through end of Spring Term, May/June 1935. Page V11 to page 151.

This three-part meetup continues our collective inquiry into Nietzsche and Jung, following our previous one-time meetup devoted to reading and discussing Thus Spake Zarathustra.

Having wrestled directly with Nietzsche’s poetic and prophetic text, we now turn to C.G. Jung’s abridged edition of his Seminar on Nietzsche’s Zarathustra, drawn from the original lecture series Jung delivered between 1934 and 1939. These seminars form one of the richest sources for Jung’s mature thinking and deeply inform the foundations of Analytical Psychology.

Across three sessions, we will explore how Nietzsche’s ideas in Zarathustra—the Übermensch, eternal recurrence, the death of God, and the revaluation of values—sustain and provoke Jung’s concepts of individuation, the Self, the shadow, and the tension of opposites. Jung approaches Zarathustra not merely as philosophy, but as a psychological drama expressing the fate of modern consciousness. Each meetup will combine close reading, open discussion, and reflective dialogue, linking Nietzsche’s visionary language to Jung’s symbolic and clinical insights.

I hope to conclude by comparing Nietzsche’s Zarathustra with Jung’s Red Book: two perilous inner journeys shaped by imaginal encounter, myth-making, and confrontation with the unconscious—one prophetic and philosophical, the other therapeutic and psychological—each risking transformation at the limits of the modern soul.