Bridging the Ideal and the Real

This talk was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 4/18/2001. Pittman describes his near death experience when he was a five year old child. He was critically burned over 1/2 of his body and for 3 days was near death. This amazing story was blocked out as an important event in his life when he entered therapy as a 30 year old priest. Seeing he needed therapy himself when he began counseling people who came to his ministry, it was six months into it before he realized it was an important event to tell his psychiatrist. There is so much we don’t want to remember that we repress, project, deny, whatever it takes to not have to experience the pain, the loss, the memories as that is our psyches way of surviving. He tells two more personal stories of life and death and then ends with the meaning he derived from these experiences.

This talk was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 4/7/91. Pittman describes how the holiness in each of us is projected when we meet a highly developed soul such as the Dalai Lama. Resurrection, a new birth is continuous throughout our lives as it is deeply desired in the psyche of everyone. It is infectious to us when we meet someone of this stature and consciousness as we are seeing and feeling our own divinity in his presence. As spiritual beings with a deep unconscious need to express rebirth time and time again.

In part 4 of the series given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. in April of 2004, Pittman describes the nature of the Jungian concept of the Self with a capital “S”. A synonym is God within, Buddha nature, Christ, etc. The Self occupies the center and circumference of our life which includes everything about us, conscious and unconscious including our shadow. Our Ego tends to take up residence in a safe corner with our attachments and ego defenses until we make the conscious effort to surrender to the urges of the Self. The Self will orchestrate accidents, illness, bankruptcy, divorce, etc. to get us to change. It's goal is to beckon us to become our whole self. Establishing our connection to this intrapsychic relationship (which Ed Edinger calls this the ego-Self axis) melds us to a transpersonal goal to become self-validating and true to ourselves. This empowers us in the arena of meaning, authenticity and our deepest truth.

These audios are not the best but the content is so good, I felt it was worth it to publish them. Please share them with whomever you feel would enjoy this very thought provoking series on analytical psychology. — Rebeca Eigen, web master

In part 3 of the series given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. in April of 2004, Pittman is describing the nature of the Jungian concept of complexes, (where we have coalesced energy around a particular archetype), how they are formed and what we can do to in the second half of life to integrate our complexes so that they can serve us instead of us serving them. As Jung said, “We don’t have complexes, they have us.” He elaborates clear descriptions of the two primary archetypes we all have, the Mother and Father complexes. Other complexes clearly give us what he called a body bell. We get a visceral response to something said or done in the environment that causes us a reenactment of our complexes. This gives us an opportunity to become aware of what is driving us in order to integrate them into consciousness. We don’t get rid of them, we integrate them.

In part 2 of the series given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. in April of 2004, Pittman elaborates on the attachments and defenses we all express. He gives detailed examples of suppression, repression and denial along with idealization or illusion (which is also a form of denial) we use to hang on to the romantic delusion of the magic other. To have these defense mechanisms is a natural part of our ego development and encourages us not to shame ourselves for being human. He says as long as we are going two steps forward and one backward, we are still headed toward in the right direction to individuation.

This 4 part series was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. in April of 2004. Pittman begins with a humorous and mind provoking song by Terry Allen that gave him the title for the series. He then goes on to elaborate on the developmental stages of the ego as it leaves the unconscious. By nature we lose soul when we are developing ego so the process involves becoming our own authority and this is a long, slow process that we all embark on. The Self is guiding us all along to let go of the defenses and attachments we developed along the way that keep us from subordinating to the Self and fully embracing our individuation.

This talk was given at Bridget’s Place by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on March 5, 2005. Pittman describes our ego’s evolutionary development starting from childhood to  becoming an adult. Our ability to make choices in the beginning is shaped by our parents, surrogate parents, church, government, society, etc. He emphasizes the struggle everyone faces to become ourselves not what everyone expects of us. This talk given in 2005 is helpful to guide us in our ability to exercise our freedom to choose in the present day when we are pressed to make choices that go contrary to what society expects of us. He describes the importance and spiritual necessity of becoming our own authority.

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 6/18/1989. (scratchy in places but very worth hearing anyway).
Pittman describes the biblical story of David and Bathsheba which is about our instinctual human nature and the unconditional love God has for us. This complex story because involves eros, sexuality and forgiveness and has both a subjective and objective truth simultaneously. It reveals the way even when the outer world mores and ethical values would condemn David, that all things worked together for good. {Amen is his last word but the mp3 provided had cut it off.)

This talk has two parts by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on October 20 and 27th, 1996. In part two, Pittman recites two poems, one by William Butler Yeats and another one by William Blake. Then tells us what the poems mean to him. He describes the sacred task we each have to become conscious in order to evolve the creator. As Jesus said, “One discovers one’s life by giving it up.” Ultimately the entire Cosmos benefits by our becoming authentically ourselves. In his profound way, he has another view of the human being’s role in the 2nd coming.

This talk has two parts by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on October 20 and 27th, 1996. In part one Pittman explores six basic reasons we all fear change. He is speaking from the standpoint of developmental psychology and part two will be based on theology. Pittman explains the process of how our developing ego and its attachments to outer world people and rewards will be taken from us by the Self (the center and circumference of the soul) if we derive our identity and meaning from anything or anyone outside of us. He says the ultimate fear behind all fears of change is non being or death. This fundamental anxiety is in every human being and becoming reconciled with our own death is the ultimate meaning of the Christian myth. 

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 3/27/1987. The American extroverted and materialistic way of our culture would much rather avoid the reality of death. We value old things but we don’t value older human beings. Life and death are very real and at the same time there is something immortal in us that transcends time and space. He talks about another kind of death we humans struggle with which is giving up our expectations that others live the way we want them to. He then describes two childhood experiences with death that led him ultimately to his calling to fully live his life for something greater than himself.

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 3/14/1987. Speaking on the trinity in a way you have never heard, this talk is both intriguing and thought provoking. Speaking first on family systems, the self I am, the self you see in me and the way the spirit transcends both as the third. He then tells two stories that personalize what he is conveying — three persons who are one and the same in the trinitarian experience.

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 12/13/1987. Pittman continues from the previous talk that something has to die so that something new can be born.  He describes the role of John the Baptist who came before Jesus and he also tells some stories from his youth that explain the anticipation and apprehensiveness he felt as a boy about the responsibility to let Christ be born in him. 

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 11/28/1987. Pittman tells the bible story preceding the birth of Christ that symbolizes something dying so that something new can be born. Life doesn’t allow us to stay in the same place although we know there will be excruciating pain to break the boundaries and birth the new story in us, the story that is begging to be born. Can you bare it? Can you go forward even if you are afraid of what it’s going to cost you to do so? Happy New Year!

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 11–22-1987. If an angel came to you today, what would it look like? Angels as messengers come in many ways and as a storyteller, Pittman invites us to see the many forms an angel can arrive and he doesn't believe they look like white statues with wings, halos and gowns. Do we want to be entertained by the story of how the angel came to Mary to tell her of the coming Messiah or will we let the story become our own personal story as Christ is born in all of us.

This talk was given by Rev. J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on October 20, 2002 at The Women’s Institute. We’ve all heard the saying that what we don’t know can’t hurt us, but the truth is our unconscious behavior, attitudes and drives that motivate us can hurt us. Jung called these invisible archetypal effects in us complexes. They are our psychic energy. When we are willing to become responsible for our many selves, our unconscious helps us nightly through our dreams to see into the invisible world within us. In the book, The Undiscovered Self, Jung spoke about the moral responsibility we each have to become conscious.

Pittman McGehee, D.D. speaks at the Paths to Healing Conference at Christ Church Cathedral in Houston, Texas on 1/27/01. He describes the relationship between body and soul as bodies ensouled. Speaking of St. Augustine who embraced the Manichean philosophy, and how our culture which is very Augustinian, (puritanical), believes that instinctuality is bad. St. Augustine believed in original sin and that somehow we should transcend our bodies (matter), unconsciously hating matter (denotes his mother complex). As spiritual beings trying to become human, nature is our Mother and our five senses are the way we experience the holy. This is not a great recording (due to age of cassette) but it’s a great talk so I am posting it anyway. Enjoy

In Part 2, McGehee continues answering questions from the audience.

In this talk given in San Antonio on May 15, 1998 at the C.G. Jung Center of San Antonio, Pittman McGehee, D.D. describes a new way of looking at darkness as containing a place for transformation as becoming conscious is not an easy thing to do. The Self is using our mistakes, failures and suffering as opportunities for our increased consciousness and urging us towards wholeness. This teleological world view recognizes the power in our suffering is just our process and something we need to enter into rather than avoid.  

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on April 9, 1989. McGehee describes two of the post resurrection appearances to show what happened before that are pivotal to the way Jesus comes to us in our everyday quotidian life. Usually when we hear the story of the appearance to Saint Paul on the road to Damascus, we don’t get the details of what came before that are important to the conversion of Saint Paul. There is the wisdom in Judaism given by his teacher, Gamaliel to Saint Paul to help us understand why Paul went through what he did and why God chose him to represent Christ to us.

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 11–20-1988. McGehee states that we have to see things as they are before we can see them as they aren’t. We have to be wiling to see both sides. In order to do exactly that, Eve gave us that opportunity when she risked going against the conformity of what she was told to do by God. Lucifer asked her (meaning the light bearer) to see choice as a gift of freedom. The freedom to see 2 sides instead of one. It is the archetypal feminine voice inside of us that says yes. 

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on October, 1989. Pittman talks about the fundamentalist in all of us as a result of placing authority outside ourselves. We always have to make choices and an adolescent ego always looks to an authority for their decisions. We all get dizzy from the myriad of choices we have to make and our ego doesn’t want to be wrong or make mistakes. He reminds us that our ego is all we are able to tolerate about ourselves and fundamentalism is a reaction to the age of reason. Maturity takes a very long time to achieve for most of us as we develop the capacity for paradox. 

This Sunday School class was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on February, 14, 1988. Pittman talks once again about the Greek words for love, Eros, Philia and Agape, but this time he uses stories in the bible about David which are in the Old Testament in Sammuels. There are 3 stories about King David he uses to describe these 3 different ways that we love. As he says, “Read scripture, you’ll feel better about yourself.” :)

Pittman McGehee was asked to give a 15 minute talk on Play in Houston at the University of Houston Center for Humanities called Visions for Houston. So the beginning of this talk is about someone happening in the news at the time (Ginsberg) who was denied the ability to serve his country because of smoking marijuana and what a miserable theology it was to not forgive misdeeds and experimentation. Then he described play for 15 minutes which wasn't long enough so this Sunday School class taught on 11/8/87 gave him an opportunity to elaborate on it and he begins by saying we are all conceived in play in order for creation to continue. What is play for human beings is the question. He says the opposite of play is not work and only you know what that looks like for yourself. Then in his usual humorous style of story telling he speaks of going to Bennihana’s for his son’s birthday and I will let you all hear how he tells it. Enjoy! 

We live in a culture of narcissism centered on ego and ego gratification and most of us think love is a synonym for excitement instead of the Jungian view point of a Self for a Self, what Martin Buber calls an I-thou relationship. We are each barely conscious of who we choose to love as the unconscious seeks to reenact earlier relationships that have been left incomplete. In this talk, Pittman McGehee differentiates for us 3 kinds of love, the light and dark side of each. Erotic love known as Eros, friendship, Philia or love of kinship and Agape, a word to describe a subject for a subject, God’s love for us. If we are seeking wholeness and healing, we move towards a love that transcends and transforms both. Instead of repeating patterns endlessly, we can learn from them. This talk was presented at the Women's Institute on 2/13/2000.

McGehee describes that what we deem to be evil and the worst thing that ever happened to us, may be the best thing that ever happened to us and that this autonomous and mysterious God that we must be related to is in charge. We are not. We are however in charge of our responses and to be a person of faith we will live our life boldly, knowing we can begin again and no matter what happens, we can start over. Grace which is a gift to us allows that to happen. This talk was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. at the Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class on 9-9-90.

FYI this talk was given the week before the one I posted last week, 9-23-90 so they are out of order. In this talk, McGehee describes the difficulty of being males who learned from their fathers and other men in authority that to be masculine is to compete and defeat other males. The reemergence of the feminine within men is the capacity to be in intimate in relationships with either gender by sharing fears, fantasies, feelings, and failures. Ultimately, it is to be a person who is called by God to learn to love.

Pittman McGehee begins by quoting Carl Jung. “Nature does not care about higher consciousness. Neither does society. Society is only interested in achievement and that for the most part, posthumously. In this talk, he explains the 3 most common rituals that men in our culture use to achieve the task of separating from their personal bond with their Mother. As they strive to form their identities, men’s inability to be vulnerable later in life is confusing and painful because developing higher consciousness requires they become vulnerable which is not what they have learned in order to become men. Pittman sees the necessity of the reemergence of the feminine side in the masculine to be a key to the soul work of becoming human. This talk was given at Sunday school class at Christ Church Cathedral on 9-30-90. 

There is power in looking into the darkness as we recognize the parts of us that we repress, collectively and individually especially our cultural obsession with the body and human sexuality. Anything repressed doesn’t go away, it comes out in a distorted form hence perversion and obsession so prevalent around us. He talks about our shadow needing to be loved and how in order to get us to our wholeness, the Self within us will do so even if it creates havoc for the ego and the shadow will importune consciousness. Pittman describes the anxiety that becoming conscious entails, the wounding as we encounter the Self but also that there is meaning in our suffering and to have the faith that nothing will destroy our relationship with God/the imago dei/the Self. This took place at the San Antonio, C.G. Jung Center on May 15, 1998.

Part 1 of a talk given to the Jung Center in San Antonio, Tx on May 15, 1998, McGehee lays the groundwork for ego development as it is the beginning of our becoming conscious human beings. Reframing our failures, our mistakes, even illness and accident, any crisis that leads to suffering is the Self’s way (the God image within) to lead us to greater consciousness. We are accustomed to seeing light as positive and dark as negative but from the Self’s position, darkness is a process we need to enter into instead of avoid or distract from in order to become complete.

This Sunday School class talk was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on December 30, 1990. There are five childhood fears that McGehee singles out to describe but the biggest of all is non-being. To understand the remedy for that we graduate into our own self hood, our own containment by leaving Mother behind who convinced us we could not live with out her and finding out no one can do our life for us but us. Most of all we each have to find and become our selves, we have to have a relationship with our Creator. Entering into this alone is an undescribeable joy.

This Sunday School class talk was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on December 23, 1990. The prologue of the Gospel of John carries within it the origin of all things —breath that worded us into existence and the doctrine of grace. To be what we were created to be by God who conceived of you and delights in your presence — your authenticity to be.

This Sunday School class talk was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on December 16, 1990. Christmas time can be a joy filled time and a time of despair and depression. Pittman weaves our hopes and fears together and skillfully makes them acceptable so that something more substantial can occur when both are integrated.

This Sunday School class talk was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on April 17, 1988. This story is about his coach at Oklahoma State University and it is so funny that you will love it. It is as he says his chance at reconciliation and becoming real. 

Using a humorous story about an article about a baseball team, Pittman McGehee tells a tale about the cosmic game of life and how Jesus came along to change the game. This Sunday School class talk was given on September 13, 1987.

The ego has its own value system of what quality of life is for us and an essential part of our ego development is to acquire material things, power to get them and self worth derived from having accumulated matter and time. We all want more time. The problem is our ego thinks it's all that is of our psyche. It gets confused when it believes that the more we can acquire of net worth, the more we can justify our worth and being which can lead to narcissism (he describes Donald Trump as an example of what narcissism looks like). Eventually the soul (the subtle body) that we also are is enriched by gifts that the world cannot give us. This talk was given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. at the Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in 1991.

This talk is about our human ego and our soul and our imbalanced state that begins by building a lightness and a darkness in order to conform with what is acceptable in our environment and in our society. This leads to a fairly significantly unbalanced view of life. If we ignore the darkness long enough, we’ll become that which we have ignored and there is no other way to become aware without going into the dark, the way of the cross. The teeter totter is always there before us. The Self in us is calling us to the fulcrum. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 5-29-88 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

In this talk, Pittman shares the idea of balance vs integration, coming to a realization that there are some things in our psyche that are just not for us. Attitudes or associations we may have been dealt in our early days by parents, culture, family, etc. and the necessity of embracing that which we most fear. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 5-15-88 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

This is a story about the day Pittman’s Father died and the way men live with their ties cutting their bodies and feelings off at the neck. His intimacy at the end with his Father is revealing of the four Fs (feelings, failures, fantasies and fears) that he had a chance to hear before his Dad passed not knowing it would be the last time he saw him. In his Father’s life time, men would seal themselves off from so much because that is what they had to do. Even now, I would guess many men can relate to this kind of quiet desperation where their inner world is kept hidden from those that mean the most to them and even from themselves as they stoically stay on the left side of their brains. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 9-16-90 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

Pittman gives three stories at the beginning and then takes you through a bible story of Pentecost where they begin to understand that the holy spirit doesn’t dwell in heaven but within each human being. The surprise ending is a perfect symbol for each of us. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 5-22-88 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

Pittman begins by describing our need for Mother (matter) being transcribed into material and that although it is important to have our material and physical needs met, it is also not what gives our life meaning. We all run into ruts, hardship and the walls that life brings, when we need someone else to be Christ for us and show us what’s possible. What is the possibility in that divorce, that sickness, that accident that befell us? In every crisis there is a new genesis waiting to be born in us. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 5-17-87 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

I find it interesting that I posted this twice (Rebeca Eigen) and to me everything means something. I hope it will mean something extraordinary for you too!

Pittman begins with a humorous story from childhood about a dozen baby chickens all colored for Easter that his Father had brought home. Only one survived and grew up to be inferior as it had white feathers with purple tips. The shadow side of us is like that — different, rejected, inferior in some way — embracing this part of us is our our Easter story. Jesus took it all on. He did not deny his humanity and neither can we. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 3-19-89 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

Pain is a peculiar human possession. We do not become close truly intimate without pain. Each of us has to take the risk of loving another as there is no wonderful love story without pain which informs us that we are alive. Christianity at it's most basic level integrates the pain as part of the passion. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 6-21-87 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

Marion Woodman, in her book Addiction to Perfection does a definitive job explaining that our addictions whatever they may be are symbolic of our need for Mother. Our need to reconcile either too much Mother or not enough nurturing from the human being who was our Mother. What matters to us in the beginning is to have our basic human needs met, our physical needs met but the dark side of that is when we decide that materiality is what gives our life meaning. When we begin to worship that is when we get into trouble. The second question of what is possible only comes about when someone can be as a Shaman, a healer, a counselor for us and can give us a different perspective. The job of the church is not to judge us for our human imperfections and limitations. Every crisis, every failure and every wall we run into can be the new Genesis that Christ re presents us with which is a new possibility so that we can begin again. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 5-17-87 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

How do we know a piece of art, a song or wisdom or even the taste of water? Can we even know that which we cannot comprehend? How would I know what you know. Pittman describes the two bookends of knowing God. One is the anthropomorphic God who hears, who walks and talks like a human being which is simplistic on one bookend and on the other bookend of the teeter totter of our life is a God of nothingness where silence is all we know if we are honest with ourselves. In this proposition of the dialectical theism is knowing something that is beyond our own comprehension but in between there are things we can say. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee, D.D. on 11-15-87 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

Pittman begins with the sadness he felt when he received notice of a friend/hero who had died when he happens upon a tv lecture by a female doctor about the endocrine system and male testosterone. As men, it is our transcendence and goodness, our imago dei which is even more than can be captured in any moment of time. On Father’s Day Pittman experiences three separate conversations; his 10 year old son who was with him, his 16 year old son’s letter and his Fathers phone call in a synchronicity that captures the complicated psychology of men at different stages of life all in one day. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee on 6-14-87 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

Pittman begins by telling the story of hearing that Jesus was riding in to Calgary on an ASS and how that made him laugh as a young boy who was hearing it in a church of all places. Life is filled with ironic and humorous comedy when we don’t take it so seriously it can sustain us in times that we are going through tragedy that is unexplainable. He talks about the unconditional love of God for us as we are, to follow our calling, to trust our intuition no matter who approves or agrees with us as Jesus did. These thoughts and more are in this delightfully humorous yet poignant talk. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee on 4-12-87 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

Human nature says everyone will have a different sexuality — a personality and mystery of it's own. In this talk, Pittman defines Gods gifts of sexuality 1) procreation 2) to experience union (with another and with God) and the responsibilities of bringing another human being into the world. We have a higher calling when it comes to sexual union because when we love one another, we love God also. This mp3 is a talk given by Pittman McGehee on 2-15-87 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

The nature of human beings is to be religious and Pittman gives two etymological descriptions of the word religion — to bind back which presumes something is broken and to tie up as in the mooring of a boat (or an anchor). Christianity does not offer any of us safety as it rains on the just and the unjust but it offers us a way to see and listen to something we haven't seen before and grow.  We are all broken, or feel lost and need direction and religion gives us something to drink to quench our thirst, A great place to see how our memory and our imagination have a place in our spiritual unfolding. He also describes the symbolism, the depth of meaning in the movie Children of a Lesser God about two people came together to help each other as they expanded their capacity to see and listen to and through each other to heal. This mp3 is a talk given by Pittman McGehee on 1-3-87 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas. 

Pittman tells a poignant story of a childhood experience of the fear based preaching of an Evangelist and a high school friend who had the integrity to not let it affect his choices. The healing he experienced through his parents unconditional love gave him a foundation of a God who loves us all unconditionally, even in our imperfection. And regardless of his disagreement with that kind of hostile take over of Christianity, he could not judge or throw rocks knowing that God works in mysterious ways in all our lives. This mp3 is a talk given by J. Pittman McGehee in 1987 at Christ Church Cathedral Sunday School class in Houston, Texas.