Alumni Reflections: Heeding the Collective Wake-up Call to the Power of the Psyche

Posted by Angela Borda on Jul 7, 2020 12:12:00 PM

By Nadia Thalji, Ph.D., Clinical Psychology, Pacifica Graduate Institute

In these moments of challenges, I find comfort in recalling the holding space that Pacifica provided, and continues to provide, through lasting friendships and companionship. I recall the life-changing encounters with my fellow classmates, and the precious sharing and witnessing of each other’s unfolding. 

The exposure to new concepts, teachings, and discussions. The generous exchanges with professors, mentors, and librarians. The smiling cooks who prepared delicious meals to soothe our mind and bodies after intense classes. The birds and trees that brought beauty, balance, and proportion every day.

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Posted in: Alumni, clinical psychology

Trauma is Remembered in the Body: How Somatic Studies Can Help Heal Homeless Youth and Beyond

Posted by Melissa Ruisz Nazario on Sep 21, 2018 5:15:00 PM

A blog post by Melissa Ruisz Nazario, based on an interview with Daniel Ballin, LCSW, conducted by Bonnie Bright, Ph.D.

Listen to the full audio interview with Daniel Ballin here. (approx. 31 minutes)

“Somatic studies” is an umbrella term that includes somatic psychology (working with the experience of the body to support mental health), somatic movement therapy(working with the experience of the body to promote improved movement functioning), and many forms of complementary and alternative medicine. A somatic perspectivealso flourishes within the fields of education, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, performance studies, and dance. [1]

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Posted in: Trauma, Alumni, Psychology, graduate school, depth psychology, Pacifica Graduate Institute, somatic

May 19th: Community & Connections—Inspiring Resilience and Hope

Posted by Krystyna Knight on May 14, 2018 12:36:42 PM

Community & Connections—Inspiring Resilience and Hope.  Pacifica’s “Coming Home 2018”: JOIN US ON CAMPUS or ONLINE May 19th  

In Homer’s ancient Greek classic, The Odyssey, the hero Odysseus, who has spent ten years of his life in exile, is described with eyes never dry and with his life force flowing away with his tears as he weeps for home. Many Pacifica alumni and students who have studied depth psychology, mythology, ecopsychology, somatic psychology, or related topics at Pacifica Graduate Institute can relate to the feeling that Pacifica serves as a sort of “home” for them, and once their studies end, they often long to return to the soulful landscapes of the people and the place. In his book, "At Home in the World: Sounds and Symmetries of Belonging," Jungian analyst John Hill (2010), suggests “home” is, in part, the need we each hold to create shared meaningful experiences. *

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Posted in: Alumni, Pacifica Events, Pacifica News, Santa Barbara, Pacifica Graduate Institute

Depth Psychology: Empowering Multicultural Women in the Wider World

Posted by Krystyna Knight on Apr 5, 2018 9:18:33 AM

Depth Psychology: Empowering Multicultural Women in the Wider World-An Interview with Self-Made Media Mogul, Nely Galán, MFT.  A Guest Post by Bonnie Bright, Ph.D.

Listen to the full audio interview with Nely Galán here (approx. 32 mins)

We’ve all heard the adage that success doesn’t always bring happiness, a concept Nely Galán knows well. As a Latina and a self-made media mogul who has produced hundreds of television shows, headed a TV network, and generated a significant amount of income, she felt an odd sense of relief when the economy crashed in 2008, bringing many of her projects to a halt. She realized the extent to which she felt like a hamster running around a wheel, and while she would never have tried to exit the industry if she had maintained her level of involvement in multiple projects, the economic downturn provided her a way out.

 

By that point in her life, she had been through psychotherapy and understood, from a personal perspective, how powerful it could be. Acknowledging that she had always wanted to go to school to study psychology, she took the plunge; first finishing a B.A., before applying to Pacifica, which had already been in her “mind and heart for a while,” as she reveals.

 

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Posted in: Alumni, clinical psychology, gender, leadership, vocation, depth psychology, individuation, Pacifica Students

Illness, Identity, and the Archetype of the Exile: Finding Meaning and Vitality through Depth Psychotherapy

Posted by Krystyna Knight on Mar 19, 2018 6:57:11 PM

 Illness, Identity, and the Archetype of the Exile: Finding Meaning and Vitality through Depth Psychotherapy-An Interview with Dr. Brad Chabin. A Guest Blog Post by Bonnie Bright, Ph.D.

Listen to the full audio interview with Brad Chabin here (approx. 29 mins)

C. G. Jung viewed mid-life, the time midway between entering adulthood and the end of life, as a critical time of transition. Having focused primarily on priorities like career and family, people can be left with a sense that they are missing some fundamental meaning in their lives, a promise which might be revealed in the second half of life.[1] Dr. Brad Chabin, a depth psychotherapist with a practice in West Hollywood, California, had his own experience of a spontaneous and powerful mid-life transition.

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Posted in: Counseling Psychology, Alumni, clinical psychology, soul, depth psychology, imaginal, psyche, Pacifica Students

How Pacifica's M.A. Engaged Humanities Program has transformed my life

Posted by Nikole Hollenitsch on Aug 25, 2017 12:25:07 PM

Stories from recent graduates of Pacifica's M.A. Engaged Humanities and the Creative Life Program 

"Pacifica's M.A. Engaged Humanities and Creative Life Program has transformed my life in the best way, giving me a language to speak my truth, and a frame through which life and everything I do seems more meaningful and connected to everything else. The program trained me to live creatively in every single area of my life. I'm less fearful since I studied at Pacifica. I am more free since I completed the program. I am a wife and a mother, and I make a living as a screenwriter for the Hispanic audiences in the US. And I am a performer. Life is still the same life, but I process it in a richer way. I like and honor being a lot of things at the same time. I don't constrain myself to be only one thing, one role any more. This is all thanks to the Engaged Humanities and Creative Life Master's Program I did at Pacifica Graduate Institute."

Mariangelica Duque Wife, Mother, friend, Screenwriter, Mentor, Performer and more


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Posted in: Alumni, transformative, creativity, humanities

A Deeper Relationship with the Mind: Counseling, Creativity, and Transcendence

Posted by Nikole Hollenitsch on Feb 7, 2017 10:10:09 AM

A Deeper Relationship with the Mind: Counseling, Creativity, and Transcendence An Interview with Adrianna Attento
A guest post by Bonnie Bright, Ph.D.

Even before getting her Master’s degree in Counseling psychology at Pacifica, Adriana Attento was working in the field of psychology. During that same period, she was also doing a lot of writing—meeting with a friend to free write next to the ocean every morning for an hour—and she was also meditating as a regular spiritual practice. Somehow, she now believes, the combination of these two practices opened something up for her, creating a “flow, and abundance of images that images that felt very potent.”

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Posted in: Counseling Psychology, Therapist, Alumni, depth psychology, meditation

Depth Psychology and Careers of the Future

Posted by Nikole Hollenitsch on Feb 6, 2017 3:09:17 PM

A guest post by Craig Chalquist, Ph.D.

If you haven’t figured out what kind of career you want, consider the possibility that it hasn’t been invented yet.

Events in our highly interconnected world change so rapidly now that what were formerly considered safe, stable careers can vanish overnight or be exported to other lands. I have a friend who decided a while back to give up on career pursuit worries and just drive a taxi. Surely that would be a safe bet? Everyone needs to get around. That, of course, was before Uber and Lyft.

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Posted in: Alumni, Psychology, vocation, depth psychology

How Memory Tending Can Transform You: An Interview with Dr. Daphne Dodson

Posted by Nikole Hollenitsch on Sep 19, 2016 12:35:29 PM

A guest post by Bonnie Bright, Ph.D.

You may have donated that Times of Your Life Paul Anka 8-track to charity when it didn’t sell at the last neighborhood rummage sale, but the words to “Good Morning Yesterday” live on. Sometimes it is hard to find the “memories you left behind” as Anka sang in 1976. Sometimes, as Freud argued, those memories sink below the level of our consciousness, but continue to work on us in various ways even decades later. Sigmund Freud even formulated a term “return of the repressed” to explain where neurotic symptoms originate, writing that

illness is characterized by the return of the repressed memories -- that is, therefore, by the failure of the defence.... The re-activated memories, however, and the self-reproaches formed from them never re-emerge into consciousness unchanged: what become conscious as obsessional ideas and affects¹

Jung, too, expressed the opinion that our memories can torment us to a dangerous extent when he wrote,

It may be that the majority of hysterical persons are ill because they possess a mass of memories, highly charged with affect and therefore deeply rooted in the unconscious, which cannot be controlled and which tyrannize the conscious mind and will of the patient.²

You don’t have to be a depth psychologist to notice when, at times, memories of your own rise up unexpectedly out of nowhere, often instigating powerful emotions. It happens for me with a handful of certain memories show up, surprising me with their content and their intensity, making me wonder why a certain memory would arise for me when millions of others are lost.

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Posted in: Trauma, Alumni, transformative, symbol, images

A Second Ph.D.; An Alumna Story

Posted by Nikole Hollenitsch on Apr 27, 2016 1:13:25 PM

An interview with Ph.D. Clinical Psychology Alumn Sarette Zecharia, Ph.D.

Please tell us about your professional life since you graduated from Pacifica.

When I graduated from Pacifica in 2000, I had moved to Scottsdale Arizona. I did my post doc through the Superior Court of Arizona in the Probation Department. From there I went into private practice and continued to explore more alternative methods to help empower patients to truly value themselves and shine as vibrant divine beings. Through the years, I have also partnered with various clinics to ensure an integrative approach to care and have focused heavily on working with chronic pain at a physical, emotional, mental and spiritual level. On the side, I have taught as adjunct faculty at various universities and lectured prolifically on topics in my expertise, bringing awareness and empowerment to attendees to find their way.

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Posted in: Alumni, clinical psychology, graduate school, vocation