On 10th, September, 2018, the Teachers’ Day, Institute of Analytical Psychology invited Dr. Joan Chodorow giving a lecture to all the postgraduate students and teachers in Hexian Conference Centre in City University of Macau. The topic was ‘Jung’s active imagination’. Heyong Shen, the Dean of the institute, hosted the lecture.
Dr. Chodorow told the childhood story and experience of herself to introduce the origin of how she encountered IMAGE, NON-VERBAL EXPRESSION, ACTIVE IMAGINATION and DANCING THERAPY. She experienced the flow of the inner image when she was on the swing in childhood. She noticed the importance of non-verbal expression in her families who used multiple languages in communicating. She started the Dancing Therapy when she knew the theories of Jung.
Dr. Chodorow introduced the difference of active & passive imagination. She led the lecturees to experience how the inner mood expressing by the body, and how to use the body to express the inner mood. At the same time, Dr. Chodorow led all the lectures to feel the space of spirit and the body.
At last, Dr. Chodorow shared her experience of providing the Dancing Therapy in the mental hospital. She mentioned, the patients who has mental problems always repeating the acts or movements, like keeping hands fisted, keeping the back knocking the wall… all these movements are the expression of their inner world. In the Dancing Therapy, therapist provides a ‘mirror image’ by the body, and to extend the patients’ ‘space’. The patients’ mind and spirit make a development and transformation in this process.
In the end, Dr. Chodorow invited all the lecturees to join the workshop of Dancing Therapy in the next two days.