The Inner World of Trauma: Archetypal Defences of the Personal Spirit [Hardcover]

Donald Kalsched (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 6, 1996 | ISBN-10: 0415123283 | ISBN-13: 978-0415123280 | Edition: 1

Donald Kalsched explores the interior world of dream and fantasy images encountered in therapy with people who have suffered unbearable life experiences. He shows how, in an ironical twist of psychical life, the very images which are generated to defend the self can become malevolent and destructive, resulting in further trauma for the person. Why and how this happens are the questions the book sets out to answer.
Drawing on detailed clinical material, the author gives special attention to the problems of addiction and psychosomatic disorder, as well as the broad topic of dissociation and its treatment. By focusing on the archaic and primitive defenses of the self he connects Jungian theory and practice with contemporary object relations theory and dissociation theory. At the same time, he shows how a Jungian understanding of the universal images of myth and folklore can illuminate treatment of the traumatised patient.
Trauma is about the rupture of those developmental transitions that make life worth living. Donald Kalsched sees this as a spiritual problem as well as a psychological one and in The Inner World of Trauma he provides a compelling insight into how an inner self-care system tries to save the personal spirit.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Kalsched's work is highly relevant to the current debate regarding false memory syndrome, the healing of post-traumatic stress..." -- Exceptional Human Experience

"One of the most outstanding and important contributions to the practice of Jungian analysis..." -- Mario Jacoby, C. G. Jung Institute, Switzerland

About the Author

Donald Kalsched is a psychoanalyst in private practice and a faculty member of the C.G. Jung Institute, New York.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (December 6, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415123283
• ISBN-13: 978-0415123280
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 6.8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,223,278 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

111 of 113 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best clinical Jungian book I have read in a long time!, June 28, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Inner World of Trauma: Archetypal Defences of the Personal Spirit (Paperback)

I have read and re-read this excellent book. Kalsched makes a wonderful bridge between object relations and depth psychology, bringing to bear on the problem of trauma and its attendant archetypal defenses of the self the best of both approaches.

This whole area is of great interest in clinical circles as we see so many patients with borderline, narcissitic, or schzoid characters. The understanding Kalsched offers, cast in Jungian terms, is invaluable.

The essence of the problem is that due to trauma, and keeping in mind this is almost never a single dramatic event, but rather a series of smaller, more subtle failures over time, a split occurs in the psyche. And a defense system develops to protect that essential core from further injury.

This archetypal defense system is primitive and ruthless in its efforts to guard against further assualt on the Self. It's rather like preferring the agony of the known to the terror of the unknown. Analysis with such patients is often long and difficult and the postive transference of today can rapidly dissolve into hatred and negative transference tomorrow. It requires patience from the analyst and capacity to contain the intense affects that arise.

Kalsched artfully weaves case material, theory, and fairy-tales into a challenging, readable and valuable mix.

This book is the best clinical Jungian book I have read in a long time.

89 of 91 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding Archetypal Trauma Study (BPD/DID), March 3, 2001

By 

Stephanie Silva (Urban Los Angeles) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Inner World of Trauma: Archetypal Defences of the Personal Spirit (Paperback)

From the introduction: What dreams reveal and what recent clinical research has shown are that when trauma strikes the developing psyche of a child, a fragmentation of consciousness occurs in which the different "pieces" (Jung called them splinter-psyches or complexes) organize themselves according to certain archaic and typical (archetypal) patterns, most commonly dyads or syzygies made up of personified "beings." Typically, one part of the ego regresses to the infantile period, and another part progresses, i.e., grows up too fast and becomes precociously adapted to the outer world, often as a "false self." The progressed part of the personality then caretakes the regressed part. This dyadic structure has been independently discovered by clinicians of many different theoretical persuasions -- a fact that indirectly supports its archetypal basis.

From the back cover: In The Inner World of Trauma Donald Kalsched explores the interior world of dream and fantasy images encountered in therapy with people who have suffered unbearable life experiences. He shows how, in an ironical twist of psychical life, the very defensive images designed to protect the self from further injury can become malevolent and destructive, resulting in further trauma for the person. Why and how this happens are among the questions this book sets out to answer. Drawing on detailed clinical material, the author gives special attention to the problems of addiction and psychosomatic disorder, as well as the broad topic of dissociation and its treatment.

Donald Kalsched here brings together Jung's views on trauma and re-visions many classical interpretations of Jungian theory. By focusing on the archaic and primitive defenses of the core self and the mytho-poetic language of dream and fairy tale, he connects Jungian theory and practice with contemporary object relations theory and dissociation theory. At the same time, he shows how a Jungian understanding of the universal images of myth and folklore can illuminate treatments of the traumatized patient.

Trauma is about the rupture of those transitional processes of human relatedness that make life worth living. Donald Kalsched sees this as a spiritual problem as well as a psychological one and in The Inner World of Trauma he provides a compelling insight into how an inner self-care system tries to save the personal spirit from annihilation.

63 of 64 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good reading for non-clinicians, too., April 1, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The Inner World of Trauma: Archetypal Defences of the Personal Spirit (Paperback)

Readers well grounded in Jungian concepts are most likely to find this book, in which Kalshed writes about the development of self-care systems with great insight and compassion, of value and interest. The book is readable, well written, and well organized. Part One contains clinical illustrations and the views of Jung, Freud and others on the development of self-care systems. The book is well grounded in the larger world of psychoanalytic theory. Part Two, which focuses on aspects of the daimonic in myth and fairy tales, further illustrates the perverse nature of the self-care system which both preserves and destroys. This is a book I have returned to many times.