The following review comes from http://sites.google.com/site/cgjungmontreal/mindell, by Alice Johnston, Newsletter Vol. VIII, No. 8, March 1983

Dreambody: The Body’s Role in Revealing the Self. By Arnold Mindell. (Santa Monica, CA: Sigo Press, 1982, 219 pages.)

In a recent interview reported in Bulletin, the newsletter of the Analytical Psychology Club of Los Angeles, Jungian analyst Edward F. Edinger reflects on the farsightedness of Jung’s views. So far was he ahead of his time (five or six hundred years in Edinger’s estimation) that even Jungians are not aware of some of the implications of his writings—the product of his psychological experience. Edinger feels that he has a glimmering of what Jung was saying, and finds comfort and hope in “the power, the potency and the versatile adaptability of the dynamic of life—biological life.” Perhaps the man who has worked most consistently in this psychoid hinterland of Jungian research and therapy is Arnold Mindell, an American based in Zurich.

Over the years a number of Mindell’s articles on synchronicity and transference phenomena have appeared in Quadrant, the journal of the C. G. Jung Foundation in New York. There were references to his interest in Carlos Castaneda’s shaman hero, don Juan, in Donald Lee Williams’ excellent study, Border Crossings (Inner City Books, 1982). Dreambody, however, represents the first opportunity for readers to appreciate the full significance and scope of Mindell’s orientation—what Edinger would consider “a new world view.”

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Here is a video that Amy made explaining the Dreambody concept. You will see a brief, beginning example of working on a body symptom and the connection between the body symptom and a dream.

Click the Video screen below.

Here is an excerpt from Arny’s book “Working with the Dreaming Body” with an introduction by Stephen Bodian, which was published in the Yoga Journal January/February 1986.

Click here for the excerpt

For most of us, and for many therapists, the body appears as a central topic only when there are severe symptoms. After completing my Jungian studies and becoming a training analyst in the 1970s, I realized that if dreams were meaningful, the same must be true for all dreamlike experiences. So I proceeded to see how the dreaming mind appears not only in our nighttime dreams, but all day long in every little thing we notice in and around ourselves. I was amazed to discover the dreaming process in our everyday minds and in all our body experiences. [more...]

We are thankful to Dr. Pierre Morin of Portland, Oregon, for pointing us to the concept of allostasis. Homoeostasis is the tendency of psychological or biological systems to reach equilibrium. Allostasis includes maintaining stability by employing variability.

It seems to us that homeostasis is usually understood as a system’s ability to adjust to near equilibrium deviations, whereas allostasis is our innate ability to achieve stability and homeostasis even under extreme situations driving us far from equilibrium.

In process oriented thinking, allostasis includes the use of innerwork, sensing the dreaming body, outer social awareness, worldwork, etc.

See Wikipedia for more.  According to Wikipedia, allostasis is the process of achieving stability, or homeostasis, through physiological or behavioral change. This can be carried out by means of alteration in HPA axis hormones, the autonomic nervous system, cytokines, or a number of other systems, and is generally adaptive in the short term. (see “The concept of allostasis in biology and biomedicine”. Horm Behav. 2003 Jan;43(1):2-15. McEwen BS, Wingfield JC. (Laboratory of Neuroendocrinology, The Rockefeller University)

The concept of Allostasis was proposed by Sterling and Eyer in 1988 to describe an additional process of reestablishing homeostasis, but one that responds to a challenge instead of to subtle ebb and flow. This theory suggests that both homeostasis and allostasis are endogenous systems responsible for maintaining the internal stability of an organism. Homeostasis, from the Greek homeo, means “same” while stasis means “stable;” thus, remaining stable by staying the same. Allostasis was coined similarly, from the Greek allo, which means “variable;” thus,”remaining stable by being variable”.
– Sterling, P. and Eyer, J., 1988, Allostasis: A new paradigm to explain arousal pathology. In: S. Fisher and J. Reason (Eds.), Handbook of Life Stress, Cognition and Health. John Wiley & Sons, New York.

– Robyn Klein Phylogenetic and phytochemical characteristics of plant species with adaptogenic properties MS Thesis, 2004, Montana State University Chapter 3.

The rainbow medicine picture briefly summarizes some of the many processwork approaches to body experience. Rainbow medicine, introduced in Arny’s book, “Quantum Medicine”, encompasses allopathic and alternative medical treatments, as well as work with the deepest parts of ourselves, the new work we are calling the “processmind,” (PM). PM experience helps to bridge the gap between the symptom and the everyday mind.

Interview with Arny Mindell

interviewed by Tamara Scarlett-Lyon, [email protected]

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How do you define “healing”?

I don’t use the word in therapy because I don’t consider people to be sick.

Read more…

Process oriented movement work is the art and science of noticing and appreciating our intentional movements while also exploring unintentional and spontaneous movements as the seeds of our on-going dreaming process. When we explore these movements with awareness we can enrich our experience of everyday life and discover ourselves as unending creativity.

To read more about movement work, click on Amy’s article: Movement Work in Process Oriented Psychology

Amy's Dreambody Essence

Arny's Recent Picture of process oriented movement work