Exploring Our Collective Social Unconscious as a Mirror of Our Times

 

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PAST CONFERENCE
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Dreaming the Landscape of the Present Social Unconscious 2025

On November 9th, NAPsaC offered a town hall discussion on the US election for analysts and training candidates to help decompress election-related anxieties worldwide. We now provide an opportunity to explore further the deepest anxieties about the global rise of self-destructive and destructive impulses and the multiple and contrasting ways we try to cope.

Social Dreaming allows participants to explore anxieties and defences without needing to rush to interpret or find solutions, thus fostering negative capabilities and opening and deepening horizons. We will gather four times. Participants share dreams and associations that talk to each other within the Matrixes, allowing new links and connections and the potential discovery of new thoughts.

The term 'Matrix' distinguishes these meetings from task-oriented groups focused on problem-solving or decision-making. In Social Dreaming, dreams and associations belong to the Matrix and offer a view of the present social unconscious. The focus is not on the dreamers, who remain anonymous, or on the group's psychodynamics, which are not interpreted. Each Matrix will last an hour and will be followed by a half-hour Dream Reflection Dialogue to explore and identify emotions, themes, and thoughts that emerged during the Matrix.

HOSTS:

Dr Maria Pia Conte
Psychiatrist and Psychoanalyst. Full Member Società Psicoanalitica Italiana. Past President Centro Psicoanalitico di Genova. Guest Member British Psychoanalytical Society. Member of the Violence Committee of IPA. Member of Social Dreaming International Network.

Carlos Remotti-Breton
Training candidate at the British Psychoanalytic Association. Organisational & Group Relations Consultant. Executive Director of OPUS an Organisation Promoting Understanding of Society. Member of Social Dreaming International Network and, since 2020, The London Social Dreaming Hub host.

Contact admin@napsac.info with any questions

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RECORDINGS OF PAST CONFERENCES
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Chaos Unleashed: Global Turmoil in the Consulting Room

Chaos Unleashed: Global Turmoil in the Consulting Room is the title of NAPsaC’s latest tri-regional panel, addressing issues of interest to psychoanalysts worldwide. The increasing influence of the external world--global terrorism, climate change, politics and racism--are now seeping into the consulting room, evoking some of the deepest anxieties within the internal worlds of our patients and ourselves, and inevitably impacting modern analytic work. The sense of safety that the analytic room and sessions have often offered, even in fantasy, has of late been increasingly challenged.

NAPsaC Presents "Mothering Alone"

Mothering Alone comes from a study conducted by Mary Kay O’Neil who writes, “We are all aware that single motherhood is not a new phenomenon, nor is mothering restricted to women. Mothering is not gender related; men parent alone, same gender parents mother, non-binary people mother, as do parents of surrogate and in-vitro children. Our focus today is on women mothering alone (whether they are married or not). Much of what we will discuss may apply to different family constellations, however, ‘mothers’ in these different constellations have different strengths and dilemmas and are not our focus.”