Boundaries of the Soul: The Practice of Jung's Psychology

I first read this wonderful book some 30-odd years ago, and I've returned to it many times since. It remains one of the best introductions to Jung's thought & basic concepts that I know. Singer's personal touch, both in her own case histories & her autobiographical anecdotes, add to the book; the feeling is one of listening to a wise woman, rather than hearing a dry lecture. Singer not only knows her material intellectually, she knows it in her soul, and that comes through on every page. This book made me start paying attention to my dreams, and gave me a much-needed framework for understanding my life at a crucial time, when I was most in need of such a framework. While the revised & updated edition is excellent, I'd also recommend reading the original 1972 edition if you can find it. For example, Singer's chapter on Jung & the Counterculture is superb, and not nearly as dated as the author herself believed; in any case, it provides a valuable on-the-spot account of Jungian thought & its intersection with the 1960s, the impact of which is still being felt today. Yet it's also fascinating to read the follow-up stories of some of her patients in the newer edition. Jung is a much better known name today than when this book first appeared, but his thought isn't always as well understood as it might be. Let Singer take you on a revelatory tour of the Psyche & learn far more about both Jung & yourself than you ever imagined. Highly recommended!

I have now read this book twice during crisis in my life and find June Singer's book on Jung the most accessible, understandable approach to Jungian analytical psychology that I have ever read. (I have read about 4000 pages of Jung's own work and undertood much of it.) It is helpful to have a woman's approach to how the analytical process actually happens. She gives away the secrets as to how analysis ought to be done by a faithful but always questioning Jungian analyst.I recommend this book for anyone who has problems, who has an interest in psychology, or wants to understand how really advanced therapies such as analytical psychology (depth analysis) actually works.

I have to give this book 5 stars not just because I found it to be a very thorough explanation of Jung's theories but also because readers much greater than I have given this book rave reviews as noted from the back cover! Admittedly, this book is not easy to get through but worth the bit of struggle; it seems everyone should be interested in psychology since it's how we think, our attitudes and resulting behavior that rules our lives and the lives of all the human beings that we come in contact with! Interspersed with Jung's theories are real life psychoanalytical scenarios most centered around dream analysis which I thought was way more real and interesting than reality TV! Prior to reading this book, I did not realize how much of Jung's theory has become a part of our lives, such as archetypes, although I think these were originally discussed by Plato, projection and transference, synchronicity and of course the individuation process. The latter is the acceptance of our humanness on a holistic level and the continuing discovery of our potential. Warning, this book may raise your level of consciousness and force you to realize that the world does not revolve around you! The sooner we all face up to the truth of our existence, that all human beings are untied, regardless of their race, color or creed, the sooner we can achieve internal and therefore external peace.

I have to write a review, since there seem to be a lot of negative comments on this board about this book, which I find misleading. Jung is not easy. If some readers think that Singer is unfocused and unscientific, I’d suggest their going to the source. Jung’s writings meander like the subconscious streams he plummets into. His thinking is generally inter-relational and holistic, not as mechanistic and "simplistic" as Freud’s theories tend to be. Jung wasn’t happy with merely restoring a patient’s ego to the status-quo; he wanted to know and understand the whole-shebang. He had an inkling that there was more to reality than rational systems could explain, and spent his life exploring this realization. Basically, Freud was a depth psychologist using a mechanistic model, where humans are seen as separate units being driven by internal "engines", whereas Jung’s model is closer to a quantum theory of the subconscious mind, with humans, indeed all reality, connected by a field on the deep level that is incompatible with "ego" functioning. All things, he seems to say, affect all other things, just as a lot of quantum mechanical experiments illustrate about the physical world. He called this "inter-realtedness" the collective subconscious for lack of a better term, I suppose. Both views, by the way, are essential; simply two sides of the same coin. Freud developed a more practical, easier to use system, but Jung is the superior theorist. I think Singer not only does an admirable job explaining Jung. Though it takes some work to read, I really like the way she illustrates examples with stories from her practice. She organizes and humanizes the often incomprehensible theories of Jung with real-world examples. I have read the book four times in my life, and have found it ever more reliable and insightful as I grow older. While I still love to ponder Jung, without Singer and her real-world case studies, I would have been lost. As an aside, I would suggest to anyone doubting the difference in the sexes to pick up Jean Shinoda Bolen’s "The Goddesses in Everywoman" and "The Gods in Everyman" for a modern, post-feminist perspective on these issues. Her point, as well as Jung’s, is that men and women are different. Equally powerful, but different.

A very nice Jungian tells how it is without jargon taking over. She is Jung's best anima ideal: grounded; related; earthy; told in plane English real life that illustrates the way in which Jung's ideas (so often inscrutable in our age of extroverted sciences & explanations) really express themselves in daily life. A great read. I only wish she had been my Jungian analyst.