Jean Shinoda Bolen, Jungian analyst, psychiatrist, and internationally known speaker and author wrote this, her first book, in 1979 but nothing in it makes it dated. The topic is ageless. It’s been many years since I first read this book; the information may have been new and thrilling for me long ago, but I can say that now, the information is validating and comforting, supporting my world view. Reading about the Jungian concepts of archetypes and the collective unconscious makes me feel refreshed and re-connected to ideas which I still feel strongly in my heart. And Shinoda Bolen’s premise that these ideas based on Jung’s life work can be compared to the idea of the Tao in Eastern religions, to the idea of universality, to the idea that all is connected, strikes a deep chord in me. It feels true and beautiful. As she says in the book’s final chapter, “In considering how all of the many parables, metaphors, spiritual teachings, and psychological insights noted in this book might fit together, I have the following impressionistic, subjective conception. It seems to me that the Christian vision of the Kingdom of God, the Eastern vision of the Tao, Jung’s idea of the Self and synchronicity, the right hemisphere’s intuitive way of perceiving totality and containing opposites, the parapsychological evidence for consciousness separate from brain or body, and the new reality as seen by quantum physics are all part of the same ineffable, invisible, meaning-giving 'something'.”Recommend? Yes, with the following caveat: to anyone contemplating reading this lovely, slim volume, I would say first make sure you are familiar with the work of Jung and have a basic understanding of the ideas of archetypes and the collective unconscious. THE TAO OF PSYCHOLOGY is like a riff on these ideas…variations on a theme, if you will. One must be familiar with the original for it to really make sense.
http://www.jeanbolen.com/
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