Immortality, mourning and ritual

The impact of the word ‘immortality’ and its meaning unfold personally and collectively with issues pertinent to us all. This word came unexpectedly as an auditory experience to a woman who had little background or familiarity with anything religious or spiritual. She was at a crisis without knowing how to make sense of what happened to her. Sadly, she said, ‘I need more human parts as these are not developed in a relational way inside myself from early in life.’ From childhood so many aspects were not encouraged by parents for this highly intelligent girl including areas of education, the spiritual, intellectual, or aesthetic. In myriad ways, the early creation of the self was inundated with environmental failures and distorted early mirroring. Her quest for self began as an isolated child, taking herself to church on her own, looking for something. This chapter will explore the concepts in Jungian analytical psychology of the transcendent function, the alchemical stage of the nigredo and the use of ritual in the processes for unwrapping the psyche. This includes the death and rebirth cycles arising from the unconscious to consciousness and addressing the dead and dissociated parts of the psyche. These topics are generally ignored when the culture encourages a person to go on rather than mourn, reflect, take time to grieve, currently and particularly around abortion. The unprocessed material lays in the conscious and unconscious waiting for attention and transformation

Art · Immortality · Literature · Psychoanalysis · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health · History · Philosophy · Psychology