The Tao of Psychology: Synchronicity and Self - Softcover

Bolen, Jean Shinoda

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9780062500816: The Tao of Psychology: Synchronicity and Self

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0062500813 ISBN 13: 9780062500816

Publisher: HarperSanFrancisco, 1982

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Shows how synchronicity (the phenomenon of meaningful coincidences) occurs in and enriches ordinary life; provides the key for each individual to interpret the synchronistic events in his or her life; and gives fresh insight into those relationships, dreams, and flashes of perception that touch and transform our lives.

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From the Author:

As befitting a book about synchronicity, from its inception this book (and my becoming an author) came about through a series of synchronistic circumstances. which brought me together with my editor. The Tao of Psychology was published in 1979, and went out into the world without publicity or marketing efforts, which was typical for a first-time author, minimal print-run book. Readers then wrote to me of the uncanny timing and coincidences that led them to read it. Whether by word of mouth, or by synchronicity, I am delighted that it is still in print, some twenty years later, and am glad that it now has a Mark Rothko painting on its cover, besides. Synchronistic events in my own life played a significant part in the events that I wrote of in Crossing to Avalon: A Woman's Midlife Pilgrimage. They also contributed to the writing of Close to the Bone: Life-Threatening Illness and the Search for Meaning.

From the Inside Flap:

A woman dreams about an event which then happens. A man thinks about being out of contact with an old friend; the phone rings and the caller is that friend. Someone experiences sympathetic pains while a relative undergoes surgery....

The Tao of Psychology rejects the commonly-held notion that these are interesting, but isolated events. Such uncanny coincidences often bring in their wake an all-too-fleeting awareness of being part of an infinite yet meaningful whole. The Tao of Psychology explores the interrelationship between "meaningful coincidences" and the intuitive sense that we are part of the oneness of the universe. The underlying principle is called Tao in Eastern philosophy and synchronicity in Jungian psychology. Coincidental events which are significant to us and cannot be explained in any rational way are synchronistic.

Now, Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D., shows how to apply this important concept to everyday life. She shares her methods of recognizing authentic "meaningful coincidences," shows how they function as "waking dreams" -- compact, symbolistic messages to the consciousness -- and demonstrates her "Agatha Christie approach" to unraveling the meaning of each occurrence. To appreciate a synchronistic event, one needs the ability to note an inner subjective slate, a thought, feeling, vision, dream, or premonition and to intuitively link it with a related outer event. Each synchronistic experience is unique; Dr. Bolen's methods allow the reader to enter this wholly new, individualistic means of experiencing.

The Tao of Psychology also points out how synchronicity operates as the foundation of the Tarot, horoscopes, and--most importantly--the I Ching. By relating the concepts of the Tao and synchronicity, Dr. Bolen reveals important links between Western psychology and Eastern spirituality, right brain and left, the individual and the external world. An understanding of this principle also sheds light on research into parapsychology--especially such areas of ESP as precognition, telepathy, and clairvoyance.

Synchronistic events can assure us when we are on the right life-path and advise us when we are not; at the most profound level, they reassure us that we are not mere observers, but always participators in an interconnected cosmic web.

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