Announcing the long-awaited new book, Earth, Climate, Dreams: Dialogues with Depth Psychologists in the Age of the Anthropocene, based on the global symposium of the same name:
Over time, humans in western cultures have undergone a profound restructuring of the psyche, resulting in a traumatic sense of separation from nature and the larger forces that sustain us. In modern day, this egoic isolation contributes to a growing set of challenges on ecological, psychological, and social fronts.
Industrial development, technological advancement, the rise of consumerism, and increasing populations—combined with a tendency to prioritize science and rational thought over tending nature and honoring age-old wisdom traditions—are among the key contributors to the complex and situation at hand.
The growing set of ecological and social challenges
we face are now may be linked to the notion of an era now informally called the
Anthropocene—a term referring to the significant impact of human activity on
the planet.
The current ecological and climate crisis to
which we have contributed requires that we reflect on our situation from a
depth psychological perspective, contemplating how we might tap into the
underlying archetypal themes at work in the culture and begin to articulate
them in ways that inspire and move us to personal and collective action.
If humans are going to deal with climate change, ecological destruction, and the recognition of an age in which we are changing the very structures of our world, then we need both social and psychological transformation. Indeed, without some understanding of our psychological processes and our unconscious dynamics, it is unlikely that any social change we can generate will solve the problems we face. Our primal and psychological drives will continue to worsen the crisis.
Earth, Climate, Dreams—New Perspectives
A new book, Earth, Climate, Dreams: Dialogues with Depth Psychologists in the Age of the Anthropocene, edited by Depth Psychologist Bonnie Bright and Anthropologist Jonathan Paul Marshall, faces the psychological issues of ecological collapse with hope.
In this powerful and compelling collection of dialogues, psychotherapists, educators, scientists, and scholars with an interest in Depth Psychology discuss their approaches to these problems with Bonnie Bright, Ph.D., a certified transpersonal coach and the founder of the global organization, Depth Psychology Alliance. Together, they contemplate psychological issues of ecological collapse, our conceptual separation from nature, the cultural complexes that drive us, and the importance of attending to dreams as a mode of reconnection—amongst other Jungian, depth, and transpersonal modalities for engaging with what may well be the challenge of our age and of ages to come.
Contributors to the depth dialogues include:
Bonnie Bright, Ph.D. (Symposium Creator and Host), Certified Transpersonal Coach; Founder/Director Emerita, Depth Psychology Alliance
“Culture Collapse Disorder: What the Bees Can Teach Us”
Stephen Aizenstat, Ph.D., Chancellor and Founding President of Pacifica Graduate Institute
“Dreams and the Animated Earth”
Susannah Benson, Ph.D., Academic, Researcher, Educator, and Counsellor
“Navigating the Great Transition”
Jerome Bernstein, Jungian Analyst
“Dominion Psyche, Reciprocity Psyche, Borderland Consciousness”
Michael Conforti, Ph.D,. Jungian Analyst
“The Role of Primary Narcissism in the Ecological Crisis”
Nancy Swift Furlotti, Ph.D., Jungian Analyst
“Revisiting the Well at the Dawn of Life: Teachings of the Maya”
Sally Gillespie, Ph.D.. Jungian-oriented Psychotherapist
“We Need to Talk about Climate Change, with Depth”
Veronica Goodchild, Ph.D.. Jungian-oriented psychotherapist; Professor Emerita at Pacifica Graduate Institute
“Dreams, Synchronicities & our Relationship to the Earth”
Jeffrey Kiehl, Ph.D., Jungian Analyst and Senior Climate Scientist
“Facing Climate Change through a Jungian Lens”
Jonathan Marshall, Ph.D., Anthropologist and Senior Research Associate at the University of Technology Sydney
“Depth Ecology and Climate Change”
Robert Romanyshyn, Ph.D., Depth Psychotherapist; Emeritus Professor of Psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute
“The Frankenstein Prophecies: The Untold Tale”
Susan Rowland, Ph.D., Chair of MA Engaged Humanities & the Creative Life at Pacifica Graduate Institute
“Dionysus: Revisioning Psychology & Literature in Jung & Hillman”
Erel Shalit, Ph.D., Jungian Analyst (d. 2018)
“The Human Soul in Transition at the Dawn of a New Era”
Earth, Climate, Dreams is based on the 6-week online symposium of the same name, produced in 2017 by Bonnie Bright. In the original symposium, viewers from around the globe met in community via video to discuss what they watched and learned in the dialogues; to honor the earth and the part of each individual in it; to make meaning via ritual; and to share dreams, images, metaphor, story, and poetry.
Participants engaged knowing that the goal of the symposium was not necessarily to identify hard and fast solutions in the moment, but rather to show up and be fully present, acknowledging and witnessing the ecological impact that humans are effecting on the planet, and to hold the questions that are emerging in our relationship with earth at this time in our evolution.
Engaging with Earth, Climate, Dreams
Those who are interested in the topic are encouraged to engage with the book in the spirit of presence and imagination, opening their hearts and minds as they peruse the complex terrain of challenges and issues in modern culture.
Videos of the original interviews are currently open source on YouTube or at www.DepthInsights.com. Organizations and individuals are welcome to utilize all materials (with proper credit) in educational and inspirational endeavors. The book is available on Amazon in both paperback or Kindle formats. For those that feel moved, reader reviews on Amazon are welcomed.
About the Editors
Bonnie Bright, Ph.D., spent fifteen years in the corporate world working in media and technology before earning Master’s degrees in Psychology from Sonoma State University and in Depth Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute, where she also earned her Ph.D. She is the founder of Depth Psychology Alliance, an online community for Jungian and depth psychologies. She created Depth Insights Journal and served as Executive Editor for six years. Bonnie also produces audio and video interview podcasts on depth psychological topics for Depth Insights. She is a certified Transpersonal Coach, and an Archetypal Pattern Analyst who has also trained extensively in Holotropic Breathwork™ and the Enneagram. She uses psychological, somatic, and shamanic perspectives in her work with individuals who are interested in spiritual awakening, supporting them through issues such as spiritual emergency, psychedelic integration, breathwork praxis, transcending blockages, making creative breakthroughs, and more. Learn more at www.DepthInsights.com.
Jonathan Marshall is an anthropologist and currently a Future Fellow at the University of Technology Sydney. He is currently researching the unintended consequences of climate technologies. Previously he has written about living online, online gender, the ways computer software does not work, and the social psychology of climate. Author of Jung, Alchemy and History: A Critical Exposition of Jung’s Theory of Alchemy (Hermetic Research); Living on Cybermind: Categories Communication and Control (Peter Lang), Co-author of Disorder and the Disinformation Society: The social dynamics of information, networks and software (Routledge). Editor of Depth Psychology, Disorder and Climate Change (JungDownunder). Co-editor of Environmental Change and the World’s Futures: Ecologies, Ontologies, Mythologies (Routledge); and Crisis, Movement, Management: Globalising Dynamics (Routledge). He is an unpublished novelist and failed musician.
View all contributors BIOGRAPHIES
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