Steven Herrmann
William James and C.G. Jung:
Doorways to the Self
Chosen by the International Association of Jungian Studies as one of four finalists for its 2020 Book Award
Praise from Murray Stein:
Steven Herrmann is one of those rare individuals who can brilliantly bring intellectual prowess and visionary depth together in a graceful dance of prose and poetry.
In this work he presents the many crossovers and parallels between two similarly gifted thinkers, C. G. Jung and William James.
A comparative study of these two giants of modernity is long overdue, and Steven Herrmann is perfectly prepared to cover this match in all its splendor.
ABOUT THIS BOOK
Steven Herrmann offers each reader an intriguing journey through the open and curious exploration of human nature by two of the most influential psychologists of our times: the philosopher William James, Harvard Professor and founder of American Psychology, and C. G. Jung, who expanded our view of psyche and the nature of the unconscious.
Based on historical research and a nuanced reading of their works, Steven Herrmann elucidates their reflections on the streams of consciousness, psychophysics, pragmatism, pluralism, yoga, spiritual democracy, vocational dreams, synchronicity, transmarginal fields, and the Self.
“Doorways to the Self ” is not a mere metaphor but an invitation to recognize the living spiritual reality that exists in every person. This book is an important contribution to the history of psychology in America and the influence of James on C. G. Jung, as well as a fascinating exploration of what it means to be fully human.
IF YOU PURCHASED THIS BOOK IN OCTOBER 2020, see the information at the bottom of this page.**
Steven Herrmann, Ph.D., MFT, is a Jungian analyst practicing in Oakland, California, and an analyst member of the C. G. Jung Institute of San Francisco. He has lived and worked in the Bay Area his whole life.
He is interested in the historical roots of analytical psychology and its relevance for today, vocational dreams, sandplay, synchronicity, the psychology of Yoga, and spirituality.
Steven is also a Jungian literary critic and a scholar in the fields of American poetry, Jamesian pragmatism, analytic psychology, and spirituality.
Dr. Herrmann has presented papers at the C. G. Jung Institutes of San Francisco, Chicago, and Zurich, and he has published five books that have been well received, nationally and internationally.
His analytic research has focused on the subject of vocational dreams as doorways to the self, an idea that came to him while he was meandering through the hallways of Yale Divinity School, before delivering a talk entitled, “C. G. Jung’s Vision of Spiritual Democracy,” during the Summer of 2015―at the same University, coincidentally, where William James and C. G. Jung both lectured. His interest in James began while he was a teaching assistant at the University of Santa Cruz, where he first read James’s 1902 book The Varieties of Religious Experience. It is not theology, doctrine, or religious dogma that interests Steven most as an author, but similar to James and Jung, it is the phenomenology of spiritual experience, plain and simple: the pragmatic, analytic, scientific view of the psyche, and its self-path towards health, healing, wholeness, and human love.
Steven is the happy father of a son and a husband. He loves to garden, cook, hike, swim, run, write, and water redwood trees. He has a private practice in Oakland, California.
Visit Steven's social media sites, which include videos of his lectures, as well as interviews.
View this lecture by Steven Herrmann
to the Analytical Psychology Club of San Francisco
other books by Steven Herrmann
(2018) Emily Dickinson: A Medicine Woman for Our Times. Cheyenne, WY.: Fisher King Press.
(2016) William Everson: The Shaman’s Call, Expanded Edition. New York: Eloquent Books.
(2014). Spiritual Democracy: The Wisdom of Early American Visionaries for the Journey Forward.
Foreword by John Beebe. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books (Sacred Activism Series).
(2010) Walt Whitman: Shamanism, Spiritual Democracy, and the World Soul.
Durham: Eloquent Books.
(2009) William Everson: The Shaman’s Call. New York: Eloquent Books.