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🗓️ 21 July 2022
⏱️ 54 minutes
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A fiendish inner spirit can prompt behavior that defies self-interest and even common sense. In Edgar Allan Poe’s story, the protagonist acts on his diabolical urge to commit murder, followed by a self-destructive urge to confess it. Jung says, “If he has done it secretly, without moral consciousness of it, and remains undiscovered, the punishment can nevertheless be visited upon him…” The impulse to take irrational and even immoral risks can cause inner torment and lead to damaging actions. The trickster within tempts us to yield to impulse, succumb to negligence, or be recklessly perverse—simply for the sake of indulging the foolish or forbidden. Posing as merely mischievous, the imp of the perverse proffers a sense of power and grandiosity. He challenges us to meet him with the power of self-reflection, ego strength, and restraint, the components of conscious choice.
Here’s the dream we analyze:
“I am with my wife and child on the North pole. We are in a small cabin. I don’t know why we are here or how we got here. It is not a familiar place, but I’m not surprised to be here. There is a blizzard raging outside. Inside it is dark; a fire is burning in a traditional cast iron stove. We huddle together by the fire. I am responsible for the fire. The door blows open, and I can see the white blizzard outside. I fear that my daughter will somehow be sucked into the blizzard. I manage to close the door. I search for firewood, but the cabin is dark and unfamiliar. I venture out into the storm and find some firewood. I return inside to tend to the fire. I find my wife and daughter asleep by the stove.”
REFERENCES:
Edgar Allan Poe stories online: https://poestories.com/read/imp
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Seminar in Jungian Studies: Philadelphia Association of Jungian Analysts:
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0:00.0 | Hello, this is Lisa and I want to let you know about a really special opportunity and that is the Philadelphia Jung Seminar. |
0:07.0 | The Philadelphia Jung Seminar meets for 10 hours on 8 weekends from September to December and then from February to May. |
0:15.5 | And it provides intimate lectures and workshops with leading Jungian analysts for an interactive experiential engagement with Jungian thought. |
0:26.0 | Next year it's going to be hybrid with two of the meetings in person that would be in September and May and the rest of the meetings online. |
0:37.0 | And this is a perfect way to deepen your understanding of Jung. |
0:41.0 | We're welcoming clinicians as well as just people who have a passion for Jung. |
0:48.0 | And so I urge you to check it out. |
0:50.0 | You can go to CGYoungPhiladelphia.org and click on Seminar and we'll also put that link in the show notes. |
1:01.0 | Welcome to this Jungian life. |
1:03.0 | Three good friends and Jungian analysts, Lisa Martiano, Debra Stewart and Joseph Lee invite you to join them for an intimate and honest conversation that brings a psychological perspective to important issues of the day. |
1:18.0 | I'm Lisa Martiano and I'm a Jungian analyst in Philadelphia. |
1:22.0 | I'm Joseph Lee and I'm a Jungian analyst in Virginia Beach, Virginia. |
1:27.0 | I'm Debra Stewart, a Jungian analyst and Cape Cod. |
1:37.0 | Welcome once again to this Jungian life. |
1:41.0 | This week we're going to talk about the imp of the perverse, the title of a short story by Edgar Allen Poe. |
1:51.0 | And the imp of the perverse is what we do when we act against common sense, we act against our own self-interest for reasons that are really not altogether conscious. |
2:08.0 | There is something that draws us to do the very thing we really shouldn't do. |
2:15.0 | So I think this is probably very familiar to most everybody and we are going to explore this perverse imp in we hope a thoughtful and rational way. |
2:32.0 | Yeah, I think it's such an interesting concept and Poe did us the great favor of coining this wonderful phrase for it. |
2:42.0 | And I think as we talk about it today, you might be wondering now what the heck are they talking about. |
2:46.0 | But I think it'll become clear and hopefully you'll be saying, oh yeah, yeah, I know exactly what they're talking about. |
2:51.0 | I'm so glad now that I have the language to discuss it. |
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