Portal of Boredom and Consciousness

Portal of Boredom and Consciousness One of the lingering images from The C. G. Jung Institute’s December 5 event (celebrating the upcoming multimedia performance of Olivier Messiaen’s Des Canyons aux Etoiles), was Deborah O’Grady’s full moon rising over a ridge to one movement of Messiaen’s symphonic piece. As we watched the white orb slip from… Read more »

Music, Liminality, and Hope

Music, Liminality, and Hope On Saturday, December 5, 2015, the C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco will hold an event in Berkeley, Inscape and Landscape: From the Canyons to the Stars, to celebrate the upcoming January performance of Olivier Messiaen’s Des Canyons aux Etoiles, Cal Performances, Zellerbach Auditorium.    I will be speaking about the Alchemy of Catastrophe: Climate Change, Spirit,… Read more »

The First Step to Mitigate Climate Change

The First Step to Mitigate Climate Change “Nature must not win the game, but she cannot lose.” This quote from C. G. Jung’s Alchemical Studies (❡229) is engraved on the wall of a subway station at 42nd street and Avenue of the Americas in New York City, an installation termed “Under Bryant Park”. The quote is… Read more »

When People and Land Lose Each Other

When People and Land Lose Each Other These days we in the Napa Valley are spending a great deal of time on the politics of land use. I am running some previous blogs on the relationship of people and land and what happens when they are separated. Migration has torn our relationship to land, leaving deep wounds in the… Read more »

Essential Oils and the Golden Mean

Essential Oils and the Golden Mean Are there scents that return us to wholeness?  I suspect so—and one of those scents for me is that of lavender essential oil. Not just any lavender essential oil, either! In fact, until we started growing lavender, I wasn’t particularly drawn to lavender’s scent. But when the mounds around our home… Read more »

The Fibonacci Sequence and the Built Environment

The Fibonacci Sequence and the Built Environment When my husband architect Donald designed our home, he used a proportioning system which he has always used, that of a series of dimensions derived from the Fibonacci sequence. This sequence is formed by starting with 1+1 and then determining each successive number from the sum of two numbers… Read more »