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| Contributors Present: Chie Lee, Sharon Heath, Jacqueline Gerson, Naomi Lowinsky, Karlyn Ward, Patricia Damery, Dennis Patrick Slattery, Jean Kirsch, Robert Romanyshyn, Claire Douglas, Gilda Frantz, at Saturday evening dinner. |
Book Launch Report of April 14 and 15, 2012
The experience of gathering with the contributors to Marked by Fire: Stories of the Jungian Way, was so much richer than I could have imagined!
Several of us traveled to Los Angeles for the weekend of April 14 and 15. The Saturday evening before the launch, one of the contributors, Chie Lee, President of the Los Angeles Institute, gave a dinner for the authors and their spouses. Eleven of the thirteen contributors were able to be present.
For the first time Naomi and I held the book in our hands, as Mel Mathews, publisher of Fisher King Press, mailed the first copies, hot off the press, just in time for the Launch! It was one of those several, practical matters that always make one grateful when things work out. Here was this lovely book that we had midwifed over the last year and a half, and it was everything for which we had hoped—and more!
As we gathered Saturday evening, several talked about what it meant to write his or her story. We shared a kinship libido, experiencing not only a renewed consciousness of our own roots but also of how those roots interweave with those of others. It reminded me of the redwoods of coastal central and northern California, whose roots interconnect until it is said they are genetically one tree.
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| Henry Abramovitch on Skype from Jerusalem. |
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| Jerome Bernstein, Sante Fe, joined us on Skype. |
On Sunday we had a full house, one hundred chairs filled. We met in Temple Isaiah across the street from the Los Angeles C. G. Jung Institute, as we needed more space. Christophe Le Mouel, Executive Director of the LA Institute, arranged Skype so two of our authors from Santa Fe and Jerusalem could also join us. Again, we become one with everyone present, virtually or physically, as we laughed, cried, and applauded peoples’ unique and personal journeys of individuation, mentored in part by the philosophy of C.G. Jung. The day was punctuated (to stay in an editor mode!) by refreshments provided by three analysts of the LA Institute. Our gratitude!
We celebrated resilience of spirit and of life; a holding of darkness and light, and of forgiveness and love. I returned home, full of feasting on so many levels, tired but renewed.
Read Marked by Fire: Stories of the Jungian Way to join in this celebration of life and become one with this Tree of Life. Consider ordering from the LA Institute Bookstore (please call 310 556-1193 ext. 228 or e-mail bookstore@junginla.org) as a thank you for their enormous contribution to birthing the book into the world.