The Unclad Soul

Best-selling author, Jungian analyst, and post-trauma recovery professional, Clarissa Pinkola Estés, has written, “Asking the proper question is the central action of transformation—in fairy tales, in analysis, and in individuation. The key question causes germination of consciousness. The properly shaped question always emanates from an essential curiosity about what stands behind. Questions are the keys that cause the secret doors of the psyche to swing open.” This is the essence and the work of psychotherapy. A properly framed question can probe one’s deepest inner spaces and dislodge a revealing answer. But let’s broaden the scope a bit. More than the work of therapists, physicians, and psychiatrists, thoughtful questions offer all of us insights and discoveries we may or may not be aware of. We live in a time of flimsy answers. Our politicians are not interested in questions. They only want to provide their own solutions, even though they may be unworkable and unwante...

In her fascinating book, Dark Age Ahead , journalist and urban studies specialist Jane Jacobs writes about great cultures that come to a defeating and devastating close. The Roman Empire is an obvious example and she writes eloquently about its sad ruin. Her big point is that cultures die, even great brilliant ones, from what she calls “mass amnesia.” Meaning, the people of that culture just stubbornly forget the beauty of what they had created and trade it for something sinister, ugly, selfish and inferior. She writes, “Many subtractions combine to erase a previous way of life, and everything changes as a richer past converts to a meager present and an alien future.” Ms. Jacobs’ important book is a warning to Americans to beware of succumbing to “mass amnesia” and losing what was once a culture of genius, inventiveness, humane compassion, acumen and skill. Today we are getting a startling look into sections of our society that are seemingly unaware they are forgetting these v...

I watched on C-Span last night Secretary of Health & Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, return to Congress’s Roman Arena, known as the House Energy & Commerce Committee hearing. There she was once again thrown to the Republican lions who had a delightful time ranting and fuming against this public servant. I watched her wither and age in the hour I forced myself to view the spectacle. She does not come across as a warm person, but then not many people have sunny dispositions while being stomped and chewed to pieces by drooling lunatics all in a frenzy of uncontrollable rage. The petty insults, the sneering condescension, the harassing bitterness spewed by Republican members of the Committee were a shameful and atrocious display of partisan politics. Many made no attempt to control their tempers. Some of their outbursts were blatantly acts of bullying and some even bordered on just outright cruelty. To treat a woman, a professional member of the President’s Cabinet,...

Are you as tired as I am of this political bullshit that is destroying our sense of what America is supposed to mean and how we as a society are supposed to live? I was trying to watch Meet the Press this morning on TV. The host, David Gregory, a bought and paid for political hack if there ever was one, was interviewing David Axelrod, one of President Obama's senior political advisors. In spite of the news that the economy is making some feeble but honest signs of recovery, Gregory had nothing but criticism and hand wringing and just blathering on and on about how bad things are and how Obama has failed. I finally just turned it off and wanted to drain a bottle of vodka at 9:30 in the morning. I mean, what in the world has happened to this country? How did we get to the place where our, OUR, elected officials RUN and CONTROL and DECIDE how much money we will make, where it will be spent, and who gets to get all the rewards and who doesn't? What happened to freedom? W...

When I was a kid growing up in grade school we were graded on our ability to get along with other children. Our report cards listed "citizenship" as a requirement for a student's progress. No one is born a good citizen. Like so many other important lessons in life we learn this from our parents, from the church, from teachers and coaches, and from other significant people in our lives. Hopefully, politicians, people in Congress, military leaders, and others in government are models of good citizenship. But today, we have lost interest in this. There is a distrubing lack of respect for the presidency. Some of it is the result of the behavior of past presidents. Bill Clinton disgraced himself and his office by his crude impulses. George W. Bush was so ill prepared to be president that many of his statements and actions embarassed the nation and diminished his high position. But none of that excuses the raw, obnoxious behavior of so many today who simply disr...