The Absent Mother
The Absent Mother
Original Lecture Date: September 24, 2016
Recording Length: 1 hour, 22 minutes
Mother and mothering are essential, for our beginnings depend on her. But what if she is absent either emotionally physically, psychologically? The ramifications can last a lifetime as Jung writes in his essay on the Mother Archetype. The absent mother shows up in our dreams and our relationships. We feel a nagging and uneasy sense of anxiety, living a facade, a feeling of being an impostor and fraudulent, a gaping low self-worth and an inadequate relation to self and others. Body and psyche dissociate from the sorrow, abandonment and betrayal. Yet, these wounds can throw us into the quest for self as they open, and we begin to pay attention. The fact is that the mind retains the presence of mother, as the archetype remains alive, even if she was absent. We can re-create her by exploring the psyche, finding and expressing creativity and accessing the hope and repair.
Susan E. Schwartz, Ph.D. was trained at the Jung Institute in Zurich, Switzerland, and has a degree in Clinical Psychology. She is a member of the New Mexico Society of Jungian Analysts and gives lectures and workshops worldwide. She has a chapter in Perpetual Adolescence: Jungian Analyses of American Media, Literature and Pop Culture, and several articles on Sylvia Plath in the online journals Plath Profiles and Depth Insights. Her private practice in Jungian Analytical Psychology is in Paradise Valley, AZ.