Compassionate Rebel

By: Gwendolyn Alley aka Art Predator

Apr 21 2013

Tags: Consciousness, depth psychology, earth day celebrations, Nouriani

Category: Photography

3 Comments

The Earth seen from Apollo 17. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As we approach Earth Day 2013, I am working on a Ecopsychological paper for my Post Jungian Psychology class and reviewing the readings we’ve done looking for pertinent quotes and ideas to support my thesis. These quotations from a 2011 essay by S. Nouriani seemed pertinent not only to my paper but to the planet’s Earth Day celebrations so I thought I would share them here.

“We are at a point in the evolution of consciousness and the history of human-kind where we must begin to integrate the collective shadow of humanity—or it will destroy all human life on Earth.” 

Nouriani (2011 p. 97) quotes Singer (2003) as suggesting that “to deal with charged cultural complexes, we have to withdraw our negative projections and take in the darkness that we have projected onto the Other…

Our personal and collective shadows can turn anything into a weapon of mass destruction. 

Can we recognize that each of carries a destructive shadow that needs to be integrated?

The process of integrating both the personal and the collective shadow is essential if there is to be a next stage in the development of collective human consciousness.

Perhaps, the collective environmental activism to preserve the “blue planet”  is, symbolically, the beginning of this emerging consciousness that is inclusive and embodies the wisdom of the Earth.” (Nouriani 2011 p. 27-28)

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