A is for Archetypes with Dr Douglas Thomas with Dr Lori Beth Bisbey
Dr Douglas Thomas has a private Jungian-based psychotherapy practice in Pasadena, California, specializing in LGBTQ plus issues, alternative sexualities, and Dream Therapy. He teaches as adjunct faculty at Pacifica Graduate Institute in Carpinteria, California. He’s presented workshops and talks throughout the state of California, and he’s presented papers at International Union conferences in Switzerland and South Africa. His articles have appeared in the International Journal of Jungian Studies and the Jungian Journal of scholarly studies. His essay ,My Kinky Shadow, is featured in Routledge his recent, Lee published specter of the other in Jungian psychoanalysis and in his own book, The Deep Psychology of BDSM and Kink: Jungian and Archetypal Perspectives on the Soul’s Transgressive Necessity, which was published by Routledge in September of 2023. Dr. Thomas holds a master’s degree from the USC School of Social Work, and a PhD in depth psychology with an emphasis in psychotherapy from Pacific Graduate Institute. For more information, visit Dr. Thomas’s website at DrDouglasthomas.com.
Dr Lori Beth: My pleasure. So let’s start by talking about the premise of the book. And then I want to get into some of the things that really struck me, but for people who haven’t yet read it, let’s talk about the premise of your recent book.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Right. So in the psychology of CG Jung and Sigmund Freud, both of them when they began to pioneer the field of psychology, referred to the psyche as the soul. Sometimes in their writings they would, it was in German, and sometimes in their writing, they would say psyche, which is what is stuck for what I would call the the mainstream theories of the profession. But they would also use the word Zilla in German, which means soul and depth psychology evolved in as a branch of modern psychology, that still considers the soul as an important part of what psychology is studying and looking at. So when we talk about psychology, psyche plus logos, Logos refers to talking or speaking. And so sometimes you say that psyche is the soul and the logos that is speaking is the soul speaking, depth psychology is really interested in the unconscious. The the general idea here is a different different from cognitive behavioral psychology or the other behavioral schools. depth psychology is really interested in the unconscious as the major force that determines our actions, our thoughts, our dreams, our fantasies, and our and our behaviors are all influenced most heavily by unconscious forces. So the idea behind the book was that we have some fabulous research in the field of BDSM. That is looking biochemically is what is happening in terms of hormones and neurotransmitters that are being produced during play. And we have some other really excellent books that are kind of introductions to BDSM and kink, even speaking about it psychologically, but we really don’t have anything from the union field. There was a really good book by Tom Moore, Thomas Moore called Dark arrows back in the 90s. And Lynn Cohen was a union analyst who wrote a great book about masochism, I I think was in the late 80s. So it’s been you know, about 30 years since anybody in the Union field has, has written a full book about BDSM and kink and a lot has happened And as as you know, in in those in between years. And so it seemed to me that union psychology is so well suited for what is happening in kink and BDSM, as a really affirming way, to look at the meaning and the value, psychologically, of what we are creating and experiencing. So that was the the premise for writing the book.
Dr Lori Beth:
And it’s brilliant. I mean, one of my issues a lot of the time, when I look at research, and when I look at, at what’s written primarily with research, his research is, is reductive. And yet, and yet the way that it’s reported is not. So you know, there’s some great research, but it’s very limited, in that it’s very limited. The populations that are being researched are very limited. It seems like in a lot of areas, we don’t stick to good research practice anymore. I’m, I’m amazed to see people talking about research on neurodiversity as though neurodiversity is one thing. Right?
At my show, I get asked this question regularly. Tell us about neurodiversity and kink? Do you think neurodiverse people are more represented in in kink? And I can’t tell you anything? And they say why? And they get all frustrated and upset? And I say, Well, I can’t tell you anything, because neuro diversity is not one thing. That is neurodiversity is many things. And if we continue to push categories together, so that they’re all wishy washy, we will know nothing. Yes. But then there’s the stuff that you can’t really research easily. So there’s, for me, there’s two, two camps. Right. And this is the kind of stuff that it’s really difficult to research. But we still need to develop it and talk about it.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Exactly. Yeah, you’re bringing up a really good point. And some of this touches into the history, which is actually another really sort of big part of depth psychology is that we, we acknowledge that always we are living in a present that is shaped by the history, that that we come from. So the, as you say, the past is still in the present moment with us, we’re living it. But part of what you’re talking about is, you know, empirical. Quantitative Research, which is like this is very rigorous, is very important. When I go to the doctor, I definitely want to have some rigorous quantitative research behind how the doctors diagnosing me how they’re prescribing medications, what treatment they’re going to offer, absolutely. But when we come to the psyche, particularly if we are in agreement with Freud, and Jung, that the psyche is also the soul, we’re talking about something that is very, very tough to quantify. And if you’re going to subject that to some kind of a classical experimental design to conduct research on it, all I can say is good luck. I don’t think that’s going to be a good use of your time, you’re not going to get very satisfying results. If you’re trying to speak about this in a way that is quantitative, where you’re going to have some kind of a double blind, study, you know, looking at independent variables and all the rest of it. It’s very hard to prove causal relationships with the kind of psychology that you and I are talking about today.
Dr Lori Beth:
I think that’s really important that people understand that the reason that one of the reasons that you don’t hear as much about you in the in psychology, like in the UK, I mean, it still exists, but you don’t hear as much. You won’t hear as much as somebody getting. You won’t ever see somebody getting any kind of depth psychology work on the NHS is because they are looking for methods of work that can be quantified. Yeah, absolutely. In psychology, there are very few methods of work that can be quantified. And so that’s part of why some people will be less familiar with these, these deeper questions. But I think when we’re talking about sexuality, and sexual orientation, and the concept of shadow and the concept of evil, this is where, you know, you can’t do empirical research in the standard classical way and expect to learn anything.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Yeah. Well, you touching in I’m so glad you you’re moving us into sexuality because this is such an important point, that there’s only one part of sexuality that is biologically based. And so often that’s where the whole Conversation stays is what’s happening in terms of physical arousal did I get turned on, when I say to get turned on, are we just only talking about physical reactions of the body that are showing were stimulated. Because there’s this whole other part of sexuality, and anybody that’s into BDSM. And kink has got to know what I’m talking about. That is happening inside the mind, which is, I’m having some kind of a thought that is turning me on. Or I’m encountering a partner who is doing something to me part of its physical, but part of it is also the gaze into the other person’s eyes. It’s feeling into the other person’s energy. And all of that is getting into my subjective experience that is having some kind of an interaction with their subjective experience. And so there’s this other part of sexuality, that is entirely happening inside the mind.
Dr Lori Beth:
And I would argue, that has an effect on the body.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
has an effect on the body. But you know, yes. And also we’ve been we don’t want to talk about a mind versus body dichotomy. It’s an integral
Dr Lori Beth:
integral. Yeah. And so I think what you’re saying is really important. And that’s one of the reasons I’ve stopped talking about sex so much and started talking about pleasure with people. Yeah. And it’s important because people define sex in such a narrow way that even using the word gets you stuck. Like, I use the example of people who identify as asexual, what does that actually mean? Right, there’s not a good definition of asexual. No, there’s not. Because because I don’t think it’s one thing. I think this is another one where a bunch of things get conflated and thrown into an identity. And once it’s an identity, it’s very difficult to discuss in nuanced ways. So instead of talking about sex, I will I will ask somebody about, well, what brings you pleasure? And let’s start there. And I I think that leaves us room to talk about all of this.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Yes, exactly. Right. And I know that A is for archetypes, so we should probably bring it bring that in because the one of the fascinating things about archetypes, look, this is one of my pet. Pet subjects really, I mean, and the book is called archetypal perspectives right? It’s young in an archetypal perspectives on the souls transgressive necessities is the subtitle for the book. Because I think that people really do not fully understand archetypes at least the in the way that Carl Jung pioneered the concept. We have become similar to some of what you’re saying about sex and sexuality, and research. We’ve become very reductive in our understanding of archetypes. So we speak of them almost the same way that we would talk about figures on in the tarot deck of cards. Yeah, right. Oh, it’s the king. It’s the queen. It’s the trickster. It’s the Empress. It’s the I don’t know the Crone. Look, the these are figures that have been part of human consciousness for for centuries. But that’s not the same thing as an archetype as what Jung understood it. It’s not simply the image. But what he said was that an archetype is something that exists at the deepest structure of the psyche, right. And it is shaping our mode of perception and our experience of reality. He compared it, let me give you a couple of metaphors, because he said, an archetype is not something that you saw here, again, we can’t empirically prove it. An archetype is not something that you can pick up and measure and weigh and quantify. But it is something that we know exists because we see its influence. So he, he compared it to like some of these chemical experience experiments, where you have like a vapor trail after some kind of a chemical interaction has occurred, and because of the vapor trail, you know, that one chemical chemical must be in there because you can see its effect. Right? He spoke also, this is a really helpful metaphor. He said, think about what he called the axial system of a crystal. That’s a lot of words. But if you think about how crystals work, just think about water, we got water molecules, and if they heat up they become vapor. Right? And if they become very cold, they turn into ice and ice is a crystalline structure. Okay. When you’ve got a glass of water, where is where’s the blueprint? For those crystals, because when you’re drinking the water, you don’t see it. But when you freeze it, it’s suddenly there. Right. And in a similar way, the archetypes are existing in the psyche, but you don’t see them until the particular combination of factors come together. And it crystallizes, and it forms and at that point, you have something that is working both in the imagination and on the physical plane in the physical world at the same time, and that’s what makes the experience archetypal, is that usually, if we have an archetypal experience, it grabs us It seizes us, you have that gasp of like, Oh, my God. And at that moment, you know what we say we’re no longer in Kansas, you know, there’s this sense of your your world and your reality has been shaken by something and it’s shifted, and you’re suddenly seeing things in a different way. And, and often, when we’re grabbed by our complexes, you know, there’s an archetypal experience is taking taking over because will say, Oh my gosh, I don’t know what God into me. I was not myself in that moment. I something came out of my mouth. I don’t know who was saying it. i It’s not something I would even normally say or do. That’s usually the calling card of an archetype that has come up and grabbed you. Okay, so, when we’re talking about sex and sexuality, you can see how this is really exactly what we’ve been talking about. Partly imaginative and partly physical.
Dr Lori Beth:
I love I love the analogy. I’m also really conscious of the the archetypes that run runs throughout my life. Yeah, see my I run with tricksters? Yeah. I run with tricksters. I’ve always run with tricksters. I describe early on an encounter a spiritual encounter for me, where I was told there’s think of life like this mountain, right? This was when I was being told, there’s this lovely long, windy path up to the top, that you can take it slow and steady, and you will learn a lot of things along the way. And then there’s the path that goes straight up. It’s a lot faster. But it’s a lot harder. The challenges are a lot harder. It’s a lot more intense. It brings more intense peaks, but it also brings more intense lows. And I was asked which would you choose? I was Yeah, I was 17. So in typical 17 year old fashion, I said let’s go the fast route. And, and that’s my life, right? Like i i You know, they are at every point. I have particular tricksters I deal with their every point. We have good communication.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Yeah. And we can also, you know, expand that, right? Because yes, there’s like trickster energy there. Because it’s, you know, the Trickster is sort of like, yeah, yeah, we’re not going to do things the normal way, sorry, yeah, we’re off, you’re gonna have a good time over here, just checking something else out, gonna, causing a little cause a little bit of mischief here with whatever you know, was going to be the formal plan for today that’s off, off. But there’s also you know, we can speak of it in terms of a spirit of adventure. So there’s an adventure, we can think of it in a spirit of exploration, because I’m not, I’m not going on the established trail, I’m going straight up the mountain. See you later. You know. So that’s what I want to also get at is that with the archetypal imagination, there’s a lot more going on, than these kinds of traditional categories that we think of, because that’s, that’s a very reductive understanding of what an archetype is. So we always want to come back to the imagination as it is living and presenting itself to us in our lives, and say, what else is going on here? Right, because there’s all kinds of images and figures and that’s the other part of understanding the archetypal approach to the imagination, is that the psyche is constantly expressing itself and communicating with us through images. When we’re asleep, and the conscious mind is turned off or turned down to low, then the unconscious becomes active through our dreams, and dreams are expressing themselves primarily through the language of images. And what we don’t realize in our daily lives, is that the imagination is still working. and operating much as it is at night, it’s just that the conscious mind is turned up high now. And so we’re focusing our attention on our daily concerns and whatever it is we have to do to get through our lives. But the images are still in forming and shaping and influencing what it is that we are perceiving and responding to. Right. And then you think about how that’s also true when we have sexual
Dr Lori Beth
Absolutely. And I think what’s really interesting about that is if if you do if you view life in a particular way, and I recognize some people don’t view it in this where I’m at I do so I will always be asking what else is there? What else is there? Particularly if something isn’t going in the way as expected? The part of trickster energy is is capitalism, being a catalyst, catalysts, start off reactions, and then see what happens. And so you know, every so often, oh, what’s going on? Wait a minute, hang on, step back, what’s going on here? But that as part of sexual interaction, particularly as part of BDSM, is embedded in the BDSM. It’s how I believe it’s how we have profound experiences in BDSM, which are not, not everybody has that not everybody wants to seek that not everybody wants to look at that. And I understand that. But for those of us who do, having a multi layered experience comes from actually being in touch with what else is working through me here.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Exactly. You said, I couldn’t have said it better myself. That’s perfect. Yeah.
Dr Lori Beth:
And which is I find fascinating. So when you are writing about each of the various different archetypal areas, the one that grabbed me the most at the moment was evil. Yes, was this idea of, because I talk about walking the very edge of the abyss. And, and having contacted real evil in the world, early in my life that has stayed present. And it stayed present in dreams. It’s a presence in archetypes. It’s so there’s been that presence there. And the working with that, as with an understanding that we all have shadow. Yeah, we all have shadow. Whether or not we would label our shadow evil is another discussion for another time, because that could go on forever.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
And I want to, I want to be really clear here bringing up the word right from the beginning, because this is a really, first of all, it’s really important when you look at what’s happening in the world. Second of all, it’s an extremely rich and fascinating topic. And it’s it’s very relevant to kink and BDSM. But I want to be clear about what it is that I’m talking about when I use the word because it can mean a lot of different things, depending on on who’s using it. Right. And I am not using it with a particular moral judgment behind it. Right. What I the way that I address it in the book is that I say, look, rather than talking about evil as human behavior, because we look in history, we have plenty of examples of people that have been incredibly vicious, and malicious and destructive and cruel. And they’ve committed abhorrent acts that surpass the moral imagination, right? That we’ve got that though, that’s what I call literal, literal facts, literal acts that have been perpetrated. But there’s also a reality of the psyche or reality of the imagination. And as you’re saying, if it shows up in dreams, dreams are not literal, but dreams are real. Right? The dream really happened. But the dream itself is not a literal enactment. You know. And so I’m not talking about the perpetration of evil or the, the moral condemnation, but rather to say in the sexual imagination, evil is a soul image. Evil is a specter that is present that fascinates us. And if you don’t think it fascinates us, one more you and I are making this recording, we are actually just a few days away from one of the most exciting holidays of the year, when everybody is fascinated by evil and that’s Halloween. And you look at the lengths Have people go to, to create a blood soaked haunted house out of what used to be their little suburban home? You can’t tell me that we’re not fascinated with evil and the way that we can transform the world into play, to play with the nightmare aspect of the human psyche. Right? So that’s what I’m getting at, when I’m talking about evil and BDSM, and kink.
Dr Lori Beth:
And I think that that, I guess the way that I come at it is, is, is very, very similar to my initial spiritual learning, which is that it’s humans who dichotomize Yeah, the divine doesn’t dichotomize there isn’t good or evil, there isn’t the morality there. It’s we who assign morality. And so I think when we talk when we end up talking about evil in the psyche, and we talk about evil, talking about playing with that, for holidays, and for sexuality, we are making that dichotomy that’s allowing us to look at stuff that we find very hard to approach to play with stuff that we find very hard to approach. The moral judgment is, I think, the part that gets in the way. And it’s often why people engaging in BDSM, find it difficult to go certain places. Because the more the moral judgment that’s put on actually acting these things, as opposed to thinking them, drawing them talking about them. Right, and BDSM, we actually act eventually.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Yes, we do. And this is touching on one of the points that Jung made, which I think to this day remains rather controversial, but in my mind was incredibly perceptive. Because you consider the time that he was living in, he lived through World War One and to live through the Nazi Holocaust extermination of 6 million Jews, the United States dropping two atomic bombs. And he so he said, Well, evil is clearly a force that is at work in the human imagination that then gets unleashed out into the world. And we have to recognize that this thing is real, and come to terms with it. Right? But what is evil at one point in history may not be regarded as so evil at another point in history. And so there’s this moving target in terms of what it is that we’re talking about. And it is up to each of us to form a subjective judgment about how it is operating within our own lives. So it’s not that it doesn’t exist, but the morality is our subjective morality.
Dr Lori Beth:
And I think it’s really interesting, because it’s the same thing with kink. What’s kinky at one time is not kinky at another, I managed to I ran across this completely complete non sequitur, just before I came on to record this was that the new Speaker of the House is absolutely. Advocating yet again, trying to legislate getting rid of anal set gets an annual sex and oral sex getting rid of sodomy again. Here we go again, okay, here we go. Because in my talks, one of the things that I say is I asked people to think of something that would have been kinky 40 years ago, that isn’t kinky. Now, anal sex is one of the most common things that comes up because it is so normative now. It’s unbelievably normative in all populations. So it’s it’s no longer homosexual sex, it is just there, right? And yet, there is a man in America who has quite a bit of power. For those of you who don’t understand what the Speaker of the House is, that’s a big deal. And he is actively trying to get legislated. And he has been for years that this is illegal again.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Yeah. Yeah. Well, then I think that that’s a good example. Right? I mean, sexuality is right, right there. And for somebody like the Speaker of the House, who has these very traditional, dare I say, kind of retroactive, fundamentalist, religious views, right, then there, they will say that those are evil acts. Yes. Right. So you can see how subjectively we’re talking about two very different things. Because, you know, what I’m talking about is willful, like I’m talking about the fantasy image, the fantasy impulse of willful malicious, cruel destruction, right, you know, at its most extreme, he’s talking about what might be just a normal night of good sex in somebody else’s bedroom.
Dr Lori Beth
Absolutely. And and it’s and so I think that when we look at this and we look at how Help people enact this, it explains why kink and BDSM are still so stigmatized, and why people are still so frightened. Particularly when you’re looking at authority transfer relationships and more extreme kinks. I get asked all the time, how do you know the line between healthy and unhealthy? And I keep saying to people, do you think it’s a concrete line? Do you think I can say to you, somebody who enjoys being cut with a knife is unhealthy. And somebody who enjoys imagining it is healthy. That’s it. I can’t say that. For some people being cut with a knife would be incredibly unhealthy. For other people that would be just healthy expression of their sexuality. I can’t I can’t make that judgment for a whole group. But people continue to look for us to define this is evil. Right here.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Right? Well, and the thing is, like we’re saying Lori Beth, people are fascinated with it. And we’re drawn to it like a moth to the flame, and and kink and kink and BDSM. We’re privileging it really, I mean, in my opinion, we’re for grounding it. And just a number of a few examples here. You know, the play space we usually refer to as a dungeon. And then we’ve got chains and whips and floggers. We’ve got these instruments that used to be instruments of torture in the Middle Ages. And we’re repurposing them as instruments of pleasure. But at the same time that we want the pleasure one a little bit of that Hellfire in there. I mean, that’s why they used to call him the Hellfire Club. Yeah, you know, we want a little bit of that resewn That, that shiver of like, oh, you know, I want to be scared. I mean, there’s some people that really like it’s not going to be a good scene unless it’s a little bit scary or a lot scary, right? And so, in, that’s why I’m saying we’re, we’re privileging evil in this play. And it’s incredibly important to me, because we are creating an intentional container. That is a space that is negotiated and consensual, where we’re saying, Yes, this is what we’re going to bring into this space, and we’re going to explore it. And we’re going to discover these parts of ourselves that we may not know that well, because society has not given us that many opportunities to check it out. But you know what, we’re going to check it out here together. That, to me, is really deep psychological work. And it’s work that is beneficial to the whole society. Because when you get to know your own shadow, when you get to know those aspects of you and your partner, where evil is present, you’re much less likely to act that out in an unconscious way in your daily life. And we have countless examples, all you have to do is look at the headlines any day of the week, countless examples of how evil is unleashed out into the world on a regular basis, in a way that is unexamined and unconscious by the people that are perpetrating it.
Dr Lori Beth:
I mean, we should say that our bias is of course that examining things gives us the opportunity to understand them and change them and make choices. Whereas not if something’s unexamined, then you have no opportunity to get to restrain it to get in the way of it. It is it becomes impulsive, it just explodes. And and and I understand there are some people who don’t see the world that way. Yeah,
Dr Douglas Thomas:
yep. And, you know, we have to acknowledge, like you said earlier, it’s not like everybody that’s into kink, and BDSM wants to be psychological, or that you have to be go go out there and enjoy your play if you want to without examining it a whole lot. But I think for a lot of us, the meaning behind it is a part of what makes it so darn pleasurable.
Dr Lori Beth:
Yeah. And and if you’re looking at that, then oftentimes when you’re looking at people who choose longer term relationships, and so they’re not just choosing episodic scenes, they’re choosing whether they’re actual committed relationships and a long term or they’re committed play relationships, where they’re seeing with somebody over and over again over the years, but not having any kind of romantic connection to them. There’s an opportunity to develop depth. And I would say to explore these things much more intensely. Yes, if you’ve got an ongoing relationship, because you can make that container really solid, that that safe space has to be really solid to go to some of the places that people go.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
It does and I think that this touches into one of the other really important points that makes union psychology unique in my opinion, which is the idea of wholeness, that his point of view is that what the psyche is really working towards through the unconscious, is for us to become more whole, that the unconscious is producing these aspects of our own personality that we have not allowed to be part of our conscious selves. You know, we’ve been raised in a particular family and a particular community with a particular history, and there’s some things that are acceptable, and there are other things that are very unacceptable. And those unacceptable parts get repressed. And then as we get older, we start to feel that we’re not complete, that we are not living a whole life. And what happens in BDSM, and kink is that a lot of those suppressed parts of our personality come forward, and we’re able to integrate them. And often there’s some anxiety about that, which I think we’ve touched into in our conversation today. But hopefully, there’s a working through and like you’re saying, with the intensity and the intimacy that comes from long term relationships that are working with these aspects of the human psyche, you start to feel like a much more fulfilled, complete person. And you’re able to take that forward with you into other relationships and other parts of your life in a much more conscious and self actualized way.
Dr Lori Beth:
So to me, one of the things that comes up that would be really interesting is for somebody who was so inclined to be really looking at their dreams as they go through this, these experiences, and keeping track of their dreams as they go through these experiences, and even getting professional input in order to analyze and have a look at that deeper level. But remembering that the scene doesn’t end when, when it finishes. And I mean, we all know that because we talk about aftercare, and we talk about, you know, that sometimes people you know, have things they think of or field days later, so we know it doesn’t end immediately, but to actually be paying attention to the fact that, you know, the psyche is here throughout the whole thing. And if you’re going to play in those areas, you’re going there are going to be impacts. And perhaps it might be an idea to take a look at how you integrate those impacts.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Perfect. You know, you’re also touching on the the psychological concept of play, because I know that there’s some gangsters who will object to the term play, you know, because it’s suggested as something that’s frivolous or capricious or light hearted, versus it being, you know, some kind of a really serious craft that has a lot of depth and care and intentionality behind it. But psychologically, what we’re talking about is that, that in between space between our internal fantasies and the external enactment of those fantasies, right, and so, for somebody, a psychologist like DW Winnicott who was a British psychologist, not a young man, but a brilliant psychologist, he said that that play is constantly taking place, not just when you’re doing the scene, and I’m not that he was into BDSM. But I’m going to take what he said and apply it. Yeah, it’s not just when we’re in the dungeon of the play space that we’re playing. It’s days later, when you’re thinking back about the scene, and just reflecting on it, and wondering, wow, was, was that okay? Or that I enjoy that so much more than I expected? I wonder why. That all of that kind of interrogation, and that deconstruction, the deconstruction that’s happening of the experience is play that psychological play.
Dr Lori Beth:
And I understand that people, some people have an issue with play, but I think it’s because the concept of play is is very two dimensional to them. I mean, if we look at what what we what children use play for children use play for a lot of things. Only one of them is to have fun, right? they use play, to socialize, they use play to gain mastery over things that challenge them. So to me, I always see BDSM and kink as adult play. Yeah, because it’s a very similar process. And you’re using it for very serious things. I think, again, that’s another one of those, just like the term sex, which has a very narrow, very narrow definition. Play also, I think, has quite a narrow definition for a lot of people and they, they get insulted as though you’re saying that what they do isn’t serious. And for me, it couldn’t be further from the truth. I live this so I think it’s incredibly serious. It informs my entire Life, but I still see it as play.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Yeah, well, and that’s why in a sense, we are talking about giving each other permission to play with evil as a soul image, so that we don’t literally enact it unconsciously on people out in the world. And not even so that but simply because evil is so darn fascinating. Yeah. That why why wouldn’t you want to get better acquainted with that, as long as we’re not turning it into some kind of malicious, willful destruction? You know, with an intentional cruelty behind it, it’s going to seriously harm somebody.
Dr Lori Beth:
And that’s really where the work is for people is figuring is figuring those lines and understanding those impulses in themselves. And, and I fully agree that this is a way to help not enact in the world. Yeah. It’s similar to reading stuff and watching stuff, you know, going to the horror movies and watching the horror movies and talking about them and engaging with those archetypes and understanding where that features in you. It’s just an extension of that it’s actually in my view, no, no different.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
Yeah, I completely agree. I think you really got it. And that’s, that’s what that chapter of the book is really doing a deep dive and looking at,
Dr Lori Beth:
you know, yeah, I can’t recommend this book enough, guys, it’s gonna be a hard read for some of you, particularly if you don’t have the background. But I would suggest taking the time. If you don’t have the background of young at all, there are some actually really good basic readers out there, quite a few of them. And so it might be worth kind of getting an overview of not only Jung’s theories but Jung’s life because the historical context is quite important in the way all of his works are read. But then I’m a big fan of Jung. So I, you know, I recommend it’s always worth in trouble to kind of delve into that. If they want to find the book and if they want to find you whether the best ways to do that.
Dr Douglas Thomas:
So the book is published by Rutledge and you can find it on their website, or which.com. It’s also for sale on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and I believe all the major websites for booksellers. If you want to reach me happy to talk with anybody that hears the podcast and has questions or wants to engage the website, the email address is Douglas at https://drdouglasthomas.com And you can just go to the website, Dr. douglas.com. And there’s a button there to contact me.
