Constance Avery-Clark PhD, Individual & Couples Psychologist

09/13/2022

A huge marble head of the colossal statue of the Greco - Egyptian god Serapis is excavated by divers at Thonis - Herakleion, Greek City of Egypt

Photograph: Christoph Gerigk/Goddio/Hilti Foundation

www.ancient-origins.net

09/13/2022

12/25/2019

“Silence is the presence of time undisturbed.”

12/18/2019

To be normal is to be sick.

06/30/2019

“Character — the willingness to accept responsibility for one’s own life — is the source from which self-respect springs.”

06/30/2019

INDIVIDUATION - Clear and simple (but it's not so clear and simple)

ON INDIVIDUATION

"Individuation is not about bold deeds on the large canvas of history, at least not for most of us. Individuation might actually be much more difficult than that. Individuation may be simply trying to show up as ourselves more days than not. All we are asked to do by history, the gods, nature, or by fate — whichever metaphor you prefer — is to show up as who we really are. Who we really are is not meant to fit in, be normal, imitate someone else’s life. After all, that has already been done, so why repeat it? Individuation is the summons to grow up, to achieve personhood, to be a mensch.

Individuation means we contribute our idiosyncratic, eccentric, not-fitting-in-fully selves to this world. We deprive the mosaic of history whatever our tiny chip brings to the puzzle when we abrogate, flee, shun, or finesse our callings as souls. All of us know in some deep sense what our soul asks of us, what is most profoundly the right path for us, however perilous it might seem. Responding to what we know, trying to live it in our often inadequate, even broken, ways is all that life asks of us. Life asks of us jobs to earn our way, duty to serve the ties that connect us, and vocation to contribute the incredible richness that each person brings to the long trek upon which this species is embarked, and in the face of which we have so far yet to go."

- James Hollis

06/30/2019

Doubt is a profound and effective spiritual motivation. Without doubt, no truism is transcended, no new knowledge found, no expansion of the imagination possible. Doubt is unsettling to the ego and those who are drawn to ideologies that promise the dispelling of doubt by preferring certainties never grow. In seeking certainty they are courting the death of the soul, whose nature is forever churning possibility, forever seeking the larger, forever riding the melting edge of certainty’s glacier.

-James Hollis

Doubt is a profound and effective spiritual motivation. Without doubt, no truism is transcended, no new knowledge found, no expansion of the imagination possible. Doubt is unsettling to the ego and those who are drawn to ideologies that promise the dispelling of doubt by preferring certainties never grow. In seeking certainty they are courting the death of the soul, whose nature is forever churning possibility, forever seeking the larger, forever riding the melting edge of certainty’s glacier.

-James Hollis

Art | https://www.grafolio.com/story/25078

06/30/2019

ABSOLUTELY MAGNIFICENT ARTICLE. Such an inspirational message; such a difficult thing to do:

"Jung pointed out that in order to become whole, (and wholeness is largely the final project of Jungian Psychology), we must not Project our Shadow self outwards, onto other people or perceived 'enemies,' but must become aware of this Shadow within us. Not repress it, not fight it, not give ourselves over to it completely, but bring awareness to it, and in so doing allow it’s energies to become integrated with our total Self."

One of the great contributions in the work of Carl Jung was the delineation of “The Shadow,” a concept partly introduced by Freud in his conception of the “Id,” but given…

06/26/2019

PARENTS TO THEIR CHILDREN

PARENTS TO THEIR CHILDREN

"I truly believe that the history of the world would change if we could just imagine parents healthy enough, wise enough, mature enough, evolved enough to say to their growing children something like the following:

'Who you are is terrific. You are here to become yourself as fully as you can. Always weigh the costs and consequences of your choices as they affect others, but you are here to live your journey, not someone else’s and certainly not mine. I am living my journey so you won’t have to worry about me. You have within you a powerful source — call it your instinct, your intuition, your gut wisdom — which will always tell you what is right for you. Serve that, respect that.

Be generous to yourself and others, but always live what is right for you. Life is really rather simple: if you do what is right for you, it is right for you and others. If you do what is wrong for you, it will be wrong for you and others. Know that we may not always agree on things, and that is fine, because we are different people, not clones. Always know that I will respect you and value you no matter your choices, and you will always find here people who love you and care for you.'"

- James Hollis: Living an Examined Life

Art: Nothing Else Matters by Katie m. Berggren

06/24/2019

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/work-peak-professional-decline/590650/?fbclid=IwAR20Sp8iv8mTcycZY-NzBX-1AHuzJYjdTEwjWz2LfsrAqBXyy_DGTqG0FsQ

Here’s how to make the most of it.

06/23/2019

“Be there to hear … the flute of your whole existence…”