Here is latest episode of Digital Jung:
One of the fundamental premises of Digital Jung is that the modern world presents significant challenges to the experience of the inner life. In fact, the name Digital Jung really has a double meaning. It points to the fact that the same digital technology that makes both the podcast and this companion newsletter possible is also, at the same time, a serious impediment to that which is the subject of this podcast: the symbolic life.
This tension, in one form or another, runs through virtually every episode I have produced over the past two-and-a-half years. How does one live a symbolic life in a technological age? How can we find respite from a world of constant stimulation so that we can do the restorative and growth-promoting work of turning inward? As I said in the very first outing of this podcast, What Is The Symbolic Life?:
“Every tradition insists on the centrality of stillness and silence as a prerequisite for an encounter with the deeper dimensions of reality. Wisdom, in other words, is not found in the bustle of everyday life.”
This is the problem I take up in this week’s episode — Learning To Say ‘No.’ I start with a quote from a newspaper interview that Jung gave in 1931 that was titled “Americans Must Say ‘No.’” As I point out, even though Jung was speaking about American culture, the factors that he identified — the relentless tempo, the intensity of life, the hyper-acquisitiveness — have long since spread beyond the borders of the United States and, if anything, have only become more amplified.
“We are suffering,” states Jung, “from a need of simple things.” This, then, is the problem that confronts all of us today: How do we set appropriate limits to all that overloads our senses and arouses our appetites? In exploring these questions I unpack several of Jung’s statements that point to the need for a practice of what I call “everyday asceticism.”
As I say in the episode:
“An ascetic practice involves a redirecting of our psychological energies inward, a tuning out of those things on which we normally focus, so that we can tune in to the deeper dimensions of our experience.”
In this week’s episode you’ll also hear an abridged version of the well-known fairy tale The Fisherman and His Wife, which I turn to in order to discover what insights it might offer for some of the issues raised by Jung’s interview. It’s a tale that, on the surface, seems to convey a simple and straightforward message, but as you’ll see, it actually holds a few surprises.
If you’re wondering about the picture that appears on the title art below, it is an image of the enchanted flounder that plays such an important part in the story. It is taken from an 1861 edition of the Grimm Brothers’ fairy tale collection.
I hope you enjoy this latest offering from Digital Jung. You can find it wherever you listen to your podcasts or simply by clicking this link: Learning To Say ‘No’
Remainders
This week’s leftover pile included many great quotes that I wish I could have used. Here is one from Alan Watts’ book The Wisdom of Insecurity.
“Human desire tends to be insatiable. We are so anxious for pleasure that we can never get enough of it. We stimulate our sense organs until they become insensitive, so that if pleasure is to continue they must have stronger and stronger stimulants. In self-defense the body gets ill from the strain, but the brain wants to go on and on.”
Thanks for listening, and take good care!