Our abandoned, unrealized, or underdeveloped talents do not just “go away” through under-use or by tossing them off. Instead they go underground and become troublesome—sometimes tormenting—as we grow older.

You can’t just ignore or forget that which is urgent in you. If you try to shut it down, it comes back up as a mood, or an acting out, or some type of illness.

In Living Your Unlived Life, using warmth, humor, and elegant simplicity, the renowned therapist Robert Johnson, writing with fellow Jungian psychologist Jerry Ruhl, helps us understand our own heritage of unlived life—and how it must be examined and transformed if we are to make peace with ourselves and others in middle age and beyond.

The authors provide intelligent ways to explore paths not taken, without causing damage to ourselves and to others. They show how to:

ª  identify those unfulfilled hopes, yearnings, or needs that have gone “underground”

ª  discover how we unconsciously burden others—friends, spouses, coworkers—with our unlived hopes

ª  create new life options and unlock hidden talents

ª  transform fruitless fantasies or “silly” dreams into tools for inner growth by cultivating “active imagination”

ª  start truly living in the present moment

ª  revitalize a connection with God and spirit and attain peace in purpose in our mature years.

“Robert Johnson’s work always has that naked intensity that tells you you’re in the psychic house of an honest man.  In this book, he says, ‘Life is unendurable without an occasional taste of Paradise.’  He reminds us where to look for that.” —Robert Bly, poet, co-editor of The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart

“Why is it, even when we have done what we were supposed to, something still nags from within?  What is this unlived life that summons us, demands accountability from us? Johnson and Ruhl, two wise souls, effectively define this unlived life for us, provide questions and examples to lift it into greater clarity, and provide methods of dialoguing with our separated energies in service to an enlarged, more authentic personhood.” —James Hollis, author of Why Good People Do Bad Things

Robert Johnson, perhaps the most influential interpreter of Jungian psychology of our time, has written many books. Among them are Inner Gold and Inner Work.