“There are hardly any exceptions to the rule that a person must pay dearly
​ for the divine gift of the creative fire." 

C.G. Jung, ​Modern Man in Search of Soul, p.169

It was in 1933 that C.G. Jung wrote his great work titled Modern Man in Search of Soul. Now in 2022 - almost 100 years since its publication - we not only continue to hunger for a connection to soul, but personally and collectively we desperately need to start listening to its wisdom.  

In the first half of life we live with an intimation, perhaps a whispered presence of the destiny accompanying our life. However, the work of living as a younger person - busy in securing an education, a career, a family or more - demands virtually all of our energy, leaving very little time to attend to the soul. 

Then, as if time suddenly stood still for a moment, we look at our past with the eyes of one who has aged. No longer young nor ascending to yet another ambition, we reflect back on our life as if all those events happened yesterday. When did our children become parents? And when and how did we start looking so much older? Yet, simultaneously realizing that this is the way it needs to be. 

Jung's message about finding Soul - finding the sacred - resounds in our hearts and our soul and this is made clear when he says that virtually everyone needs to find a “religious outlook on life.”

Suddenly everything about life is different as we age. And this need, coming from some other deeper domain, calls for us to live a more symbolic and sacred life that honors our soul’s calling. Ever so clearly we now see the enormous costs involved in continuing to live out those unresolved mid-life complexes. 

Now is the time to stand face to face with our destiny. To step forward with courage to change the contours of our life and to live in greater relationship with what is most sacred in our heart and our soul.

What You can Expect From Attending the Conference

Drawing together an internationally acclaimed faculty, you will learn to recognize the shape and form of Psyche as it speaks to us of the soul waiting for our embrace. So too we will discuss the courage needed to allow many past pre-occupations and desires to fade into the realm of memory, as we consciously take on the challenge of this new way of life. 

The ultimate purpose of this conference is to offer insights from some of the Jungian world’s most respected minds, and give you a framework of how to listen to and live in accord with the needs of your soul, whatever this may entail.   

The Conference Fee includes:

• Full tuition fee
• Seven nights accommodation
• Daily Italian Continental breakfast
• Four multi-course lunches
• Three multi-course traditional Umbrian dinners
• Closing Gala Celebration dinner with live entertainment and dancing under the Umbrian moon
• Round-trip chartered bus from Rome-Assisi-Rome
• Excursion to St. Francis’ Mountain Retreat, Eremo delle Carceri
• Excursion to the town of Arezzo to visit local museums and have a local dinner
• Taxes and gratuities.​

​The conference fee does not include flights.

Download the Conference Registration Form below

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Download the Conference Schedule below

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Download the CE Information

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About the presenters:

Michael Conforti (USA) - Jungian Analyst

​Dr. Michael Conforti is a Jungian analyst and the Founder and Director of the Assisi Institute.  He is a faculty member at the C.G. Jung Institute of Boston, the C.G. Jung Institute of New York, and for many years served as a Senior Associate faculty member in the Doctoral and Master's Programs in Clinical Psychology at Antioch New England.  A pioneer in the field of matter-psyche studies, and for the past 40 years, has been actively investigating the workings of archetypal fields and the relationship between Jungian psychology and the New Sciences. 

He has presented his work to a wide range of national and international audiences, including the C.G. Jung Institute - Zurich and Jungian organizations in Australia, Canada, Colombia, Denmark, Ecuador, Italy, Russia, South Africa, Turkey, the Ukraine and Venezuela.

​He is the author of Threshold Experiences: The Archetype of Beginnings (2007) and Field, Form and Fate: Patterns in Mind, Nature and Psyche (2002).  His articles have appeared in Psychological Perspectives, The San Francisco Jung Institute Library Journal, Roundtable Press, World Futures: The Journal of General Evolution, and Spring Journal.  His books have been translated into Italian, Russian, and includes a soon to be released Spanish edition of his work. 

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Silvia Behrend (USA) - Assisi Institute Director of International Studies

​Dr. Silvia Behrend is Director of International Studies of the Assisi Institute: The International Center for the Study of Archetypal Patterns.  She develops, supports, and teaches in our programs in Latin America, Russia, Australia and Italy. She has presented international webinars and lectures in English and in Spanish and currently serves as translator and faculty in the Latin American program.  She has a private practice in Olympia, Wa as a Certified Archetypal Pattern Analyst, mentor and educator.   

As a clinical leader, Silvia has co-developed and co-implemented programs and retreats for the Assisi Institute, for Gonzaga University in the Doctoral Leadership Program, as well as many intergenerational programs utilizing the arts as a means of individual and collective transformation. As senior faculty of the Assisi Institute, she hosts national and international webinars on many subjects;  dream pattern analysis, the field of leadership, psychological development, the creative, unconscious communication, voice of psyche and others.  She has researched and published articles on the transformational power of art, the archetypal fields of leadership and exile. 

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Magda Di Renzo (Italy) - Jungian Analyst

Dr. Magda di Renzo is a Jungian Analyst, Psychologist, developmental psychotherapist, and member of the ARPA (Association for Research in Analytical Psychology) and of the IAAP (International Association for Analytical Psychology). She is the founder and director of the School of Specialization in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy working with the development issues of children, at The Institute of Orthophonology (IdO) of Rome. She is in charge of the Developmental Age Psychotherapy Service of IdO, and has promoted many researches in the field of childhood and adolescent pathologies, including the Turtle Project for children with autism. 

Lecturer in many schools of specialization in psychotherapy, she is the author and co-author of numerous publications, including Il colore vissuto (1998), Fiaba, disegno, gesto e racconto (2005), I significati dell’autismo (2007), Sostenere la relazione genitori-figlio nell’autismo (2011), Le potenzialità intellettive nel bambino autistico (2011), Il processo grafico nel bambino autistico (2013), and Autismo Progetto Tartaruga (2020).

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Jacqueline Dürmüller (Switzerland) - Jungian Analyst

Jacqueline Dürmüller is a Jungian Analyst who, for more than twenty (20) years, has worked with children and adults in a private practice and also includes the use of Sand-Play in her clinical practice. She graduated from The Adler Institut, Zürich, and from the Research and Training Centre in Depth Psychology according to C.G. Jung and Marie-Louse von Franz, Zürich. She is a published author and lectures internationally. Her main interest is in the symbolic understanding of inner and outer human experiences. Jacqueline is also a mother and grandmother. She and her husband - Jungian Analyst, Hansueli Etter - live in the former house of Marie-Louise von Franz and Barbara Hannah in Küsnacht, Zürich, Switzerland.

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Dr. Hansueli Etter (Switzerland) - Jungian Analyst

Hansueli F. Etter is a long-time colleague of M.L. von Franz, and founding member of The Research and Training Centre for Depth Psychology according to C.G. Jung and Marie-Louise von Franz in Zürich. He is also the president of the Foundation for Jungian Psychology in Kusnacht.

Dr. Etter has a PhD in Anthropology and lectured for many years at the University of Basel. He graduated from the C.G. Jung Institute in Zürich in 1982 and works in private practice. His main interest and research lies in the topics of the religious dimension of Jungian psychology and in the secret relation between psyche and matter. He is a published author of many books and papers in German and in English.

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Robert M. Mercurio (Italy) - Jungian Analyst

Robert M. Mercurio is a Jungian analyst in Rome, Italy.  He holds university degrees in philosophy and management as well as the Diploma in Analytical Psychology from the C.G. Jung Institute, Zürich.  Formerly a member and training analyst of the Centro Italiano di Psicologia Analitica (C.I.P.A.) he is currently a Training Analyst, dozent, and President of the Associazione per la Ricerca in Psicologia Analitica (A.R.P.A.).  He is also a member of the Zürich Association of Analysts (A.G.A.P.) and of the International Association of Analytical Psychology (I.A.A.P.).  His publications include a short book on the significance of the stone, essays on various aspects of analytical psychology, and two essays published by the Guild. 

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Riccardo Mondo (Italy) - Jungian Analyst

Riccardo Mondo, psychotherapist, psychologist, Jungian analyst at the Italian Center of Analytical Psychology, and Director of the magazine of Mediterranean Analytical Psychology, Enkelados. He is a founding member of the Study Center of the Mediterranean Institute of Archetypal Psychology.  Riccardo also serves as the scientific manager of Ars Hillmaniana.

Essayist and lecturer, among his publications we mention the collaboration with James Hillman, Dear Hillman. Twenty-five correspondence with James Hillman. ed. Bollati Boringhieri, In Places of Making Soul ed. Magi, and the recent publication on The Wounded Healer ed. Magi.He lives and works in Catania ( Italy) as an analyst and he teaches in various psychotherapy training institutes.

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