The Anima Mundi School is a center for learning, research and reclaiming of the deep feminine & connection to the Anima Mundi—the World Soul, supported by and grounded in the psychology of Carl G. Jung.
Short-course
The Imaginal Mother Tongue
How Myth and Dreams Shape the World (Soul)
A 5-week course with Gauri Raje and Faranak Mirjalili
Artwork by Laura Krusemark for Fairytale Kitchen Spring 2022 “Soaring Serpents”
“The imaginal is much like a river. A current running beneath our vast, dense world of cities and technologies—no longer visible to the post-modern wo/man, and yet the very source of life. Like the imagination, the river was for thousands of years the wellspring of human existence and the very oxygen of the more-than-human ecologies surrounding it. The way the imaginal moves, works, loves, and destroys is also like the river: it has an unruly, abundant, life of its own. It cannot be controlled, but it can be subtly played with. Just like the rivers of our world—and the deep crisis they now face—the imaginal too is in a crisis of drying, toxicity, and pollution. Much of the work before us is to bring alive the dead rivers within our own being, to learn not only to live with these unruly currents, but to depend on them once more—and eventually, to become like these currents of love ourselves.” — Faranak Mirjalili
In many ancient traditions, humans lived in intimate relationship with the more-than-human world—a world animated by dream, myth, and the deep language of the imagination. This way of being, this belonging to the World Soul, once shaped how communities lived, loved, mourned, and made sense of their place in the cosmos. Over time, that relationship was severed. The language of the World Soul—spoken in images, dreams, and symbols—was forgotten.
In this 5-week course, we begin the work of remembering. Anthropologist and storyteller Gauri Raje will tell a myth or fairytale in the old oral way, inviting the story to move through us as a living presence. As images take root, we will turn to the dreams that begin to stir—personal and collective—and work with them in a shared field guided by Jungian analyst Faranak Mirjalili.
This is not a course in interpretation skills, but in listening. Listening to what the World Soul may be rippeling to us through story and dream, as we learn to dwell more fully—more soulfully—in a world undergoing profound unraveling and change. This course will also be a good introduction to our 3 Year Training for those who are considering application for the 2026 cohort.
Duration: each session will be between 1.5 - 2 hours.
Fee for all 5 sessions: 255,- euro
Next course will be in Autumn 2025. Dates to be released. Fill in the form below to be updated.
COURSE STRUCTURE
Week 1: Traditional Storytelling of a myth or fairy tale by storyteller and anthropologer Gauri Raje. At the Anima Mundi School we practice the ancient art of oral tellings, in this part of the workshop you just sit back and tune your ears to the images that speak to your imagination. In this old traditional oral telling by a seasoned storyteller, the myth or story becomes a living presence in the psyche and body of us and the world around us.
Week 2: Anima Mundi Dreaming. We will be doing a dream matrix rooted in our experience with the story, and open to the wider ecologies that the dreams of all participants are rippling into our conscious awareness. This specific way of doing collective dreamwork is developed by Jungian analyst Faranak Mirjalili and the Anima Mundi School team over the past 7 years.
Week 3: The Imaginal: Story, Myth and the Oral Tradition, class and talk by Gauri Raje. Here, we weave and cook with the theory and backbone of the oral tradition.
Week 4: The Imaginal: Dreams as the Mother Tongue, a class and talk by Faranak Mirjalili. In this week we dive into the language of dreams and cook with the theories (both modern and indigenous) that view dreams as animate, meaningful and significant to our lives as human beings as individuals, and a collective.
Week 5: From a Crisis of Imagination to Amor Mundi. We live in an increasing world deprived of the imaginal and violent towards any symbolic attitude, with AI taking this possibly to a next level. And yet, some of us are drawn to the world of symbols, dreams, myth and the imaginal. How do we live not in one but in both worlds without drowning in either one and losing touch with the other. How do we build bridges and become warriors of both worlds?
Next course will be in Autumn 2025. Dates to be released. Fill in the form below to be updated.
Pre-register here for our next series: