Hong Kong analysts are experiencing a double bind with demands influenced by strong neoliberal values emanating from the local economy, while the ancient culture still commands individuals to revere parents and ancestors. This difficulty has given rise to a research group of Hong Kong and non-Hong Kong analysts who have been meeting for nearly 2 years. In this presentation, four analysts from this group will reflect on the challenge of individuation in Hong Kong today, and explore this question in the light of psychic containers and the experience of home. We will discuss the topics of Filial Piety and guilt, love as a psychological container, the question of the inner home for Hong Kong emigrants, and illustrate the situation with three hexagrams from the I Ching.
In the course of our own individuation and in the analytic process of our patients we experience a pervasive sense of guilt, especially when the principle of filial piety or Hau… is not or cannot be obliged. Rather than negating the ancient culture, it is important to maintain a dialogue with the Confucius classics and folktales from the perspective of the contemporary culture. Marshall Lee will suggest that the goal is to reach a symbolic understanding of the idea of Filial Piety and of the articulation with feelings of guilt and shame that is related to it.
Hong Kong individuals are primarily “collective members” who suffer when they live alone without sufficient connections or when they do not experience the chemistry of love that creates a bond to others in a sort of mystical way. We all have the desire to be loved by others and our ability to love depends on our own experience of being loved. Without healthy love nothing is possible because it is a fundamental psychological container for healthy growth with a sense of freedom. Marie Chiu will present this container and its mutations in Hong Kong today, and ask how it can evolve to allow the possibility of individuation.
With the recent increased in the need of conformity in Hong Kong, a significant number of Hong Kongers have tried to bargain or fight for something different. A number of them have chosen to migrate to other countries with the fantasy of gaining more freedom, space, and choices, not all of which being compatible with their traditional cultural values. They left Hong Kong with the hope of a better future for themselves and for the next generations but also with a sense of guilt for abandoning home. Emma Wong will present the challenge of these expatriates who need to redefine and relocate their inner home in their way of individuation, a task often characterized by fluidity and hybridity.
The I Ching has been a model for moral philosophy as well as an inspiration for understanding the process of individuation in the Chinese culture. In particular, Jung commented on the hexagram 50 (the Cauldron) as representing the importance of a container. Brian Tam will analyze the holding and transformative functions of this hexagram. He will also discuss the hexagram 37 and family relationships as a container for facilitating social roles, correcting social conduct, and accepting one’s destiny. Further changing images to hexagram 56 (Wanderer), inform the correct attitude for “the individuation of one while carrying his ancestors”.