This book describes how dreamwork can help alleviate depression, in both long-term and time-limited psychotherapy, and in self-treatment. The author shows how dreams shed light on issues contributing to depression-including drug and alcohol abuse, divorce, death and bereavement, conflicts about sex, health and body image, parenting, workplace stress and burnout, and ancestral, intergenerational trauma. Greg Bogart presents a synthesis of Jungian and existential psychotherapy, detailing how attention to archetypal symbolism brings into immediate focus new responses to pressing life challenges. He shows that allowing oneself to be affected by dream images and narratives promotes emotional, relational, and spiritual rejuvenation.

This book describes how dreamwork can help alleviate depression, in both long-term and time-limited psychotherapy, and in self-treatment. The author shows how dreams shed light on issues contributing to depression-including drug and alcohol abuse, divorce, death and bereavement, conflicts about sex, health and body image, parenting, workplace stress and burnout, and ancestral, intergenerational trauma. Greg Bogart presents a synthesis of Jungian and existential psychotherapy, detailing how attention to archetypal symbolism brings into immediate focus new responses to pressing life challenges. He shows that allowing oneself to be affected by dream images and narratives promotes emotional, relational, and spiritual rejuvenation.

There have been many previous books on the physiology of dreaming, the history of dream interpretation, and the meaning of specific dream symbols. But there have been relatively few books exploring the moment-by-moment process of interpreting dreams. This book guides you through this interpretive process, and illustrates how dreamwork promotes emotional, relational, and spiritual transformation. It explores how working with dreams enhances our emotional life, deepens our capacity for relationship, and helps us gracefully navigate change and transitions. The author shows that dreamwork is a natural antidepressant, is effective in transforming anger, bereavement, couples conflicts and impasses, and aids the process of individuation. The book explores archetypal themes and complexes, synchronistic experiences and spiritual awakening in dreams, and representations of the body in dreams. The final chapter, "Taming Wild Horses", explores animal dream symbolism and its importance for enhancing our human sexuality. The book also describes the Dream Mandala, a method of self-transformation through the union of opposites - the charged polarities of the personality.

There have been many previous books on the physiology of dreaming, the history of dream interpretation, and the meaning of specific dream symbols. But there have been relatively few books exploring the moment-by-moment process of interpreting dreams. This book guides you through this interpretive process, and illustrates how dreamwork promotes emotional, relational, and spiritual transformation. It explores how working with dreams enhances our emotional life, deepens our capacity for relationship, and helps us gracefully navigate change and transitions. The author shows that dreamwork is a natural antidepressant, is effective in transforming anger, bereavement, couples conflicts and impasses, and aids the process of individuation. The book explores archetypal themes and complexes, synchronistic experiences and spiritual awakening in dreams, and representations of the body in dreams. The final chapter, "Taming Wild Horses", explores animal dream symbolism and its importance for enhancing our human sexuality. The book also describes the Dream Mandala, a method of self-transformation through the union of opposites - the charged polarities of the personality.

Explains how to successfully navigate each of the nine stages of spiritual apprenticeship, from choosing a teacher to teaching others
- Explores how to approach a teacher for initiation, including gauging your inner response for trust and resonance with the teacher
- Reveals how most students eventually need to separate from their teacher and how to negotiate the emotional conflicts that can arise at this stage
- Shares his encounters with several provocative spiritual mentors and details spiritual lessons learned through confronting doubts and fears
In the search for inner awakening and self-realization, a spiritual mentor can be key to advancement. Yet the process of finding an authentic spiritual teacher who resonates with you can be daunting, especially for anyone who has had a negative experience with a guide. Exploring the emotional nuances of mentoring relationships, Greg Bogart details the nine stages of spiritual apprenticeship, from choosing a teacher to teaching others, and explains how to successfully navigate each.
The author explores how to gauge your inner response for trust and resonance with a teacher and then how to approach them for initiation. He explains how the teacher-student relationship affects the student's state of consciousness over time and how most students eventually need to become independent from their teacher. Describing emotional conflicts that can arise at this stage, he shows how wise teachers accept our need to separate and graduate while immature teachers try to thwart and control us.
Openly sharing his own interior journey, the author illustrates the lasting resonance of his encounters with several provocative spiritual mentors, including Swami Muktananda and Dane Rudhyar. He shares stories showing how unpredictable "crazy wisdom" teachers cause us to confront doubts and sharpen our commitments and how "fierce" teachers expose our fears and lack of confidence, rousing dormant energies and expanded states. Examining practices in Hindu and Tibetan Buddhist Yoga, Sufism, and Jewish and Christian mysticism, he also explores the deeper mystical aspects of the guru-student relationship.
The author shows how, ultimately, initiation leads the spiritual seeker to find the teacher within and how this can naturally lead to teaching others. Describing nine stages of the spiritual seeker's journey, the author affirms that a direct path to self-liberation is still attainable through initiation in the company of sages.

Astrology and Meditation explores the idea that the most powerful astrological technique is a quiet, meditative mind. The book presents astrology as a form of active meditation where we contemplate whatever is arising with expectancy, receptivity, and conscious use of will to shape what unfolds. The author presents meditations on the spiritual lessons of the planets and zodiacal signs, and, with the plentiful use of case histories, describes the technique of symbol amplification, which enables us to unfold the deepest meanings of chart symbols. The book ends with a discussion of astrology as a spiritual practice, a training for perfection that can instill qualities such as discernment, humor, steadiness in times of suffering, and an expanded capacity to love.