The goal of this presentation is to introduce the language and ideas in alchemy. It will identify the stages of the process, the substances that react together and the transformation processes that are metaphors for the difficult changes required in therapeutic work, such as mortificatio or death (i.e., a psychological representation of ego death or letting go), putrefactio or decay and purification (i.e., a psychological representation of psychic breakdown) or coagulatio or coagulation (i.e., a psychological coalescing of the ego). Images from Jung’s alchemical writing will be used as metaphors to illuminate present-day psychotherapeutic practice.
By Stephen Foster, PhD