James Hollis

James Hollis is an American Jungian psychoanalyst, author, and public speaker. He is based in Washington, D.C.

Life and career Hollis was born in Springfield, Illinois. He graduated from Manchester College (now Manchester University) in Indiana in 1962 with a Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree, and went on to obtain a PhD from Drew University in Madison, New Jersey, in 1967. For the first 26 years of his career, he taught Humanities at various colleges and universities, and between 1977 and 1982 he also trained as a Jungian psychoanalyst at the C. G. Jung Institute, Zürich in Switzerland.

He was Executive Director of the Jung Educational Center in Houston, Texas for many years and Executive Director of the Jung Society of Washington (JSW) until 2019. The Middle Passage: From Misery to Meaning in Mid-Life (1993) Under Saturn's Shadow: The Wounding and Healing of Men (1994) Tracking the Gods: The Place of Myth in Modern Life (1995) Swamplands of the Soul: New Life in Dismal Places (1996) The Eden Project: In Search of the Magical Other (1998) The Archetypal Imagination (2000) Creating a Life: Finding Your Individual Path (2000) On This Journey We Call Our Life: Living the Questions (2003) Mythologems: Incarnations of the Invisible World (2004) Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life (2006) Why Good People Do Bad Things: Understanding Our Darker Selves (2007) What Matters Most: Living a More Considered Life (2009) Through The Dark Wood: Finding Meaning In The Second Half of Life (2009) Hauntings: Dispelling the Ghosts Who Run Our Lives (2013) Living an Examined Life: Wisdom for the Second Half of the Journey (2018) Living Between Worlds: Finding Personal Resilience in Changing Times (2020) The Broken Mirror: Refracted Visions of Ourselves (2022) A Life of Meaning: Relocating Your Center of Spiritual Gravity (2023)

Interviews Vaughan, Alan G. (21 August 2014). "An Interview with James Hollis". Jung Journal: Culture & Psyche. Taylor & Francis Online. 8 (3): 119–130. doi:10.1080/19342039.2014.930631. Hollis, James (15 February 2018). "Living an Examined Life: The Book Brigade talks to Jungian analyst James Hollis, Ph.D". Psychology Today (Interview). Interviewed by The Book Brigade. Sussex Publishers. Hollis, James (March 2018). "'Living More Fully In The Shadow of Mortality' & 'Living The Examined Life: Steps To The Recovery Of A Personal Journey'" (Interview). Interviewed by Constance Avery-Clark. Center for Jungian Studies of South Florida. Hollis, James (29 December 2019). "An Interview With James Hollis". California Literary Review (Interview). Interviewed by Pat Dannenberg. Hollis, James (18 June 2020). "Episode 116 - Finding Resilience: A Conversation with Jim Hollis". This Jungian Life (Audio podcast). Interviewed by Joseph R. Lee; Lisa Marchiano; Deborah Stewart. Hollis, James (3 July 2020). "James Hollis Explores Healthier State of Mind Despite Media Overload - Variety". Variety (Interview). Interviewed by Steven Gaydos. Variety Media, LLC. (Penske Media Corporation).

Reception What Matters Most Writing in The Guardian, Oliver Burkeman describes the author as "a total downer", but advises the reader "[not to] interpret What Matters Most as self-help cheesiness. This blunt and refreshing work by a follower of Jung is a radical and humbling way of thinking about psychology." To which the reviewer concludes: "The short answer to that question, derived from Hollis' 40 years as a therapist, clearly is 'Not that well.'"

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