Jean Shinoda Bolen
Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D., is a psychiatrist, Jungian analyst and an internationally known author and speaker. She is a Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and a Diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, a former clinical professor of psychiatry at Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute, University of California Medical Center and a past board member of the Ms. Foundation for Women, the International Transpersonal Association, and the C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco. She is the author of thirteen books in over ninety foreign editions. She is a NGO Permanent Representative of the Women’s World Summit Foundation (Geneva) to the UN. She is in three acclaimed documentaries: the Academy-Award winning anti-nuclear proliferation film “Women – For America, For the World,” the Canadian Film Board’s “Goddess Remembered,” and “Femme: Women Healing the World.(1)In His Own Words
“One does not become a full-fledged crone automatically after menopause, any more than growing older and wiser go hand in hand. There are decades that follow menopause in which to grow psychologically and spiritually.” (Crones Don’t Whine, p. 4)
“I chose the title “Close to the Bone” when I wrote a book about life-threatening illnesses, because I knew that the prospect of death can bring patients and those who love them close to the bone—or to the soul. Sometimes it takes a life-threatening illness for folks to pay attention to this, and sometimes it’s only in the last months or years of a person’s life that the soul shines and is seen through the transparency of an ailing body.” (Crones Don’t Whine, p. 32)
“Taking stock is crucial if we are now to be choice-makers whose decisions will affect the quality and meaning of this stage of our lives. It may be the last time you have to face the truth about being in a state of denial about an addiction and its effects upon your health. It may be time to face the truth about a dysfunctional and damaging relationship. A crone-aged woman who still harbors fantasies instead of doing something for herself or with herself while she still can, is in a state of denial that she can ill afford.” (Goddesses in Older Women, p.199)
“We all share a need to be totally honest, to be able to speak to another human being who accepts us as we are, and believes in us, about what we have done and what was done to us, about what we hope for, Think about, fear, and feel… All too often, unfortunately, we hold back the full truth because expectations and assumptions about what we should feel or think and how we should act get in the way.” (Crossing to Avalon, a Woman’s Midlife Pilgrimage, p. 110-111)
Publications
- Goddesses in Everywoman: Powerful Archetypes in Women’s Lives (2014)
- Gods in Everyman: Archetypes That Shape Men’s Lives (2014)
- Goddesses in Older Women: Archetypes in Women over Fifty (2014)
- The Heart of the Goddess: Art, Myth and Meditations of the World’s Sacred Feminine (2018)
- The Millionth Circle: How to Change Ourselves and The World–The Essential Guide to Women’s Circles (1999)
- The Tao of Psychology: Synchronicity and the Self (2005)
- Crossing to Avalon: A Woman’s Midlife Quest for the Sacred Feminine (2004)
- Crones Don’t Whine: Concentrated Wisdom for Juicy Women (2012)
- Like a Tree: How Trees, Women, and Tree People Can Save the Planet (2011)
- Ring of Power: Symbols and Themes Love Vs. Power in Wagner’s Ring Cycle and in Us- A Jungian-Feminist Perspective (Jung on the Hudson Book Series) (1999)
- Close to the Bone: Life-Threatening Illness As a Soul Journey (2007)
- Urgent Message from Mother: Gather the Women, Save the World (2008)
- Artemis: The Indomitable Spirit in Everywoman by Jean Shinoda Bolen (2014)