Abstract

This article looks at traditional treatment methods for severe emotional disorders and presents an alternative, integrative approach. It distinguishes between negative ideas that are generated from inside of a person and strong detrimental impacts that seem to attack from a source outside of the person. Two thousand years ago, these outside forces were called “evil spirits,” and the procedure used with them was exorcism, which is still being used in the Catholic Church today. Exorcism casts out the dark force entity, which would be the psychological equivalent of repressing, dissociating, or splitting off a problem. The alternative method presented is facing the negative ideas by whatever name they are called (evil spirits, dark force entities, or demons), finding the cognitive distortions motivating their destructive behavior, and transforming the entities with the light of consciousness. In Jungian terms, the process is one of facing our shadow material rather than running from it. A case example is included, demonstrating the Soul Detective protocols the author developed to shift a longstanding pattern of deep sadness.