Ancient Egypt and Modern Psychotherapy: Sacred science and the search for soul

by Todd Hayen (Author)

In Ancient Egypt and Modern Psychotherapy Todd Hayen explores what the spiritual concepts of the enigmatic ancient Egyptians can teach us about our own modern psyches and the pursuit of a meaningful life.

Hayen examines the ancient Egyptians’ possession of a concept contemporary academics have labelled ‘consciousness of the heart’: an innate knowledge of the entirety of the universe. While all human beings possess this consciousness of the heart, our modern culture has largely lost the ability to tap into this inborn knowledge. By examining the material accomplishments of ancient Egypt, and how their seemingly deeper awareness of their inner world created a harmonious outer world, we can begin to understand how modern psychotherapy, through a Jungian perspective, could be instrumental in achieving a more profound and meaningful personal experience of life.

Ancient Egypt and Modern Psychotherapy will be insightful reading for analytical psychologists in practice and in training, Jungian psychotherapists and psychologists and academics and students of Jungian and post-Jungian studies and ancient spirituality.

About the Author
Todd Hayen is a psychotherapist in private practice in Toronto, Canada. He received his PhD from Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara in depth psychology with an emphasis in psychotherapy.

Review
"Todd Hayen's book does what all good, creative scholarship does: it opens our minds to new ways of seeing something we thought we already knew. But it does more than this: it shows how we today can benefit from exploring the remarkable "sacred science" of ancient Egypt. We need not "walk like an Egyptian" to profit from understanding how they did, and their insights into the much-neglected soul seem to me to present better ways of healing our own fractured psyche than any amount of modern pharmacology. Hayen does not solve the "mysteries of Egypt;" he invites us to share with him his evident passion for embracing them. The first step in any psychotherapy is taking our inner world seriously. The reader of this book soon sees that Hayen does." Gary Lachman, associate professor in Transformative Studies at the California Institute of Integral Studies and author of The Secret Teachers of the Western World

"Despite the fact that Todd Hayen draws from a very ancient culture, his views of modern psychotherapy are fresh and insightful. He confronts us with the shadow of modern society – materialism and an accompanying empirical science – that robs us of a vital connection to soul. By pointing out that the locus of intelligence has moved from the heart to the head, he recalls the sacred science of ancient Egypt where the heart was the threshold to the soul. As a psychotherapist, Todd knows first-hand the wounds suffered by this dislocation, and presents us with a new marriage between a sacred sensibility to what really matters in life, and how to revive the neglected soul in therapy. Anyone interested in this ancient wisdom tradition and who longs to "wake up" to the splendor that lies hidden amidst the turmoil of modern society is advised not only to read this book but alchemically bring its words to life!" - Thom F. Cavalli, PhD, psychologist and author of Embodying Osiris and Alchemical Psychology: Old Recipes for Living in a New World.

"A major theme of Ancient Egypt and Modern Psychotherapy: Sacred Science and the Search for Soul is that the psyche of an individual has a direct influence on the material world that individual inhabits. In this courageous, well documented, and heartfelt book, the talented composer and depth psychologist Dr. Todd Hayen draws from his personal experiences as well as his research into the consciousness of ancient Egypt to illustrate his concern with the lack of soul in our modern materialistic and rationalistic paradigm, a concern that he places squarely in the depth psychological tradition stemming from C.G. Jung, particularly Jung’s research into the relationship between psyche and matter. The mysterious architectural achievements of the ancient Egyptians open the door to a wide-ranging survey of Hayen’s metaphysical and parapsychological interests, and to a compelling reflection on what a sacred science might look like today, especially in the context of psychotherapy. At the core of this book is a meditation on the mystery of the relationship between inner and outer, psyche and matter, and subjectivity and objectivity that opens the reader’s mind to new thoughts and intuitions concerning both ancient and contemporary experiences of the interconnections between the seen and unseen worlds." - Thomas Elsner, J.D., M.A., Jungian Analyst, faculty Pacifica Graduate Institute, USA