On Witnessing Our Suffering:
A story told by Jack Kornfield in The Wise Heart
I heard about a Jungian psychologist who attended a professional workshop that included a film by one of Carl Jung’s last pupils, the great dream analyst Marie-Louise von Franz. After the film, a distinguished panel of senior Jungian analysts and Carl Jung’s own grandson responded to written questions from the audience that were sent up to the stage on cards. One of the cards recounted a horrific recurring dream, in which the dreamer was subjected to Nazi torture and atrocities and stripped of all human dignity. A member of the panel read the dream out loud. As she listened, the psychologist attending the workshop began to formulate a dream interpretation in her head in anticipation of the panel’s response. It really was a no-brainer, she thought, as her mind busily offered her symbolic explanations for the torture described in the dream. But this was not how the panel responded at all. When the reading of the dream was complete, Jung’s grandson looked out over the large audience. “Would you all please rise?” he asked. “We will stand together in a moment of silence in response to this dream.” As the audience stood, the psychologist anticipated the discussion she was certain would follow. But when they all sat down again, the panel went on to the next question. The psychologist did not understand this at all. A few days later she asked one of her teachers, himself a Jungian analyst, about it. “Ah,” he said, “there is in life a vulnerability so extreme, a suffering so unspeakable, that it goes beyond words. In the face of such suffering all we can do is stand in witness, so no one need bear it alone.”
I heard about a Jungian psychologist who attended a professional workshop that included a film by one of Carl Jung’s last pupils, the great dream analyst Marie-Louise von Franz. After the film, a distinguished panel of senior Jungian analysts and Carl Jung’s own grandson responded to written questions from the audience that were sent up to the stage on cards. One of the cards recounted a horrific recurring dream, in which the dreamer was subjected to Nazi torture and atrocities and stripped of all human dignity. A member of the panel read the dream out loud. As she listened, the psychologist attending the workshop began to formulate a dream interpretation in her head in anticipation of the panel’s response. It really was a no-brainer, she thought, as her mind busily offered her symbolic explanations for the torture described in the dream. But this was not how the panel responded at all. When the reading of the dream was complete, Jung’s grandson looked out over the large audience. “Would you all please rise?” he asked. “We will stand together in a moment of silence in response to this dream.” As the audience stood, the psychologist anticipated the discussion she was certain would follow. But when they all sat down again, the panel went on to the next question. The psychologist did not understand this at all. A few days later she asked one of her teachers, himself a Jungian analyst, about it. “Ah,” he said, “there is in life a vulnerability so extreme, a suffering so unspeakable, that it goes beyond words. In the face of such suffering all we can do is stand in witness, so no one need bear it alone.”
