Seba.Health
Glossary
Definitions spanning depth psychology, neuroscience, addiction recovery, and convergence psychology.
Addiction Recovery
Abstinence Violation Effect
The abstinence violation effect (AVE) is G. Alan Marlatt's term for the cognitive and emotional cascade triggered when an individual committed to tota…
Addiction RecoveryCross-Addiction
Cross-addiction is the clinical phenomenon in which an individual who achieves abstinence from one substance or behavior transfers the addictive patte…
Addiction RecoveryEarned Secure Attachment
Earned secure attachment is the developmental achievement by which an individual who experienced insecure or disorganized attachment in childhood deve…
Addiction RecoveryEmotional Sobriety
Emotional sobriety is a term introduced by Bill Wilson in 1958 to describe the capacity for genuine emotional maturity and balance in recovery from ad…
Addiction RecoveryPost-Acute Withdrawal Syndrome
Post-acute withdrawal syndrome (PAWS) is the constellation of neurobiological and psychological symptoms — including insomnia, anhedonia, cognitive im…
Addiction RecoveryResentment
Resentment is the involuntary return to an emotional field organized around an unresolved wound — from the French ressentir, "to feel again." Twelve S…
Addiction RecoverySelf-Medication Hypothesis
The self-medication hypothesis is Edward Khantzian's clinical framework proposing that individuals do not become addicted to substances at random but …
Addiction RecoverySobriety
Sobriety, from Latin sobrietas ("temperance, clarity of mind"), denotes a condition of unclouded perception and freedom from compulsive intoxication —…
Addiction RecoverySomatic Experiencing
Somatic Experiencing (SE) is a body-oriented psychotherapy developed by Peter Levine for the resolution of traumatic stress. SE treats trauma not as a…
Addiction RecoverySpiritual Bypassing
Spiritual bypassing is the use of spiritual ideas, practices, or ideals to avoid direct engagement with unresolved emotional pain, psychological wound…
Addiction RecoverySpirituality Culture
Spirituality culture is the shared language, values, slogans, rituals, and unexamined assumptions through which a community defines and enacts "spirit…
Alchemy
Albedo
Albedo — from the Latin for "whiteness" — is the second stage of the alchemical opus, following the nigredo. In Jungian depth psychology, it correspon…
AlchemyCalcinatio
Calcinatio is the alchemical operation of sustained heating — burning and drying matter until only a fine powder remains. In Jungian depth psychology,…
AlchemyCitrinitas
Citrinitas — from the Latin for "yellowness" — is the transitional stage of the alchemical opus between the albedo and rubedo. Often omitted in later …
AlchemyCoagulatio
Coagulatio is the alchemical operation of solidification — the process by which diffuse, fluid psychic contents are given concrete form. It is the opp…
AlchemyConiunctio
The coniunctio — Latin for "conjunction" or "union" — is the supreme symbol of alchemical philosophy and the central image of psychological wholeness …
AlchemyLapis Philosophorum
The lapis philosophorum, or philosopher's stone, is the ultimate goal of the alchemical opus — the achievement of complete psychic wholeness. In Jungi…
AlchemyMassa Confusa
The massa confusa is the confused, chaotic mass that constitutes the starting condition of the alchemical opus. Psychologically, it represents the und…
AlchemyMortificatio
Mortificatio is the alchemical operation of killing — the deliberate destruction of an existing form so that transformation can proceed. It is the dar…
AlchemyNigredo
Nigredo — from the Latin for "blackness" — is the first stage of the alchemical opus. In Jungian depth psychology, it corresponds to the ego's confron…
AlchemyOpus
The opus, or Great Work, is the entire alchemical process of transformation from prima materia to lapis philosophorum. In Jungian psychology, the opus…
AlchemyPrima Materia
Prima materia is the raw, undifferentiated starting material of the alchemical opus — the base substance from which the philosopher's stone is extract…
AlchemyRubedo
Rubedo — from the Latin for "redness" — is the final stage of the alchemical opus, following the nigredo and albedo. In Jungian depth psychology, it r…
AlchemySeparatio
Separatio is the alchemical operation of division and differentiation — the deliberate separation of a mixed substance into its distinct components. P…
AlchemySolutio
Solutio is the alchemical operation of dissolving solid matter in water. In Jungian depth psychology, it corresponds to the dissolution of rigid ego s…
AlchemySolve et Coagula
Solve et coagula — "dissolve and coagulate" — is the master formula of alchemical transformation. It describes the fundamental rhythm of the opus: the…
AlchemySublimatio
Sublimatio is the alchemical operation of elevation and spiritualization — the raising of a dense, earthbound substance into a higher, more refined st…
AlchemyUnus Mundus
The unus mundus, or "one world," is Jung's concept of a unitary reality underlying both psyche and matter. Developed in his late work on alchemy, it r…
Convergence Psychology
Addictio
Addictio names the Roman legal act of formally surrendering a debtor to his creditor as a bonded servant. From ad + dicere ("to speak toward"), the ad…
Convergence PsychologyAffect Regulation
Affect regulation is the capacity to modulate the intensity, duration, and expression of emotional states — a capacity that is not innate but forged t…
Convergence PsychologyApatheia
Apatheia (ἀπάθεια) compounds a- ("without") and pathos ("feeling"), designating the Stoic ideal of freedom from being moved. Not mere calmness but the…
Convergence PsychologyAsebeia
Asebeia (ἀσέβεια) is the Greek term for impiety -- the failure to tremble before what is sacred. It is the negation of sebas (σέβας), the root from wh…
Convergence PsychologyBiopsychosocial-Spiritual Model
The biopsychosocial-spiritual model extends George Engel's original biopsychosocial framework by adding a fourth dimension — the spiritual — to the un…
Convergence PsychologyConvergence Psychology
Convergence psychology is a clinical framework that draws psychodynamic, somatic, and neuroscientific approaches into a single treatment model. Rather…
Convergence PsychologyDaimon
Daimon (δαίμων) names a divine power or intermediary force that seizes mortal life from without. In Homer, daimones were neither good nor evil but den…
Convergence PsychologyEpistemic Trust
Epistemic trust is Peter Fonagy's term for the capacity to regard knowledge transmitted by another person as relevant, generalizable, and trustworthy.…
Convergence PsychologyEusebeia
Eusebeia (εὐσέβεια) compounds eu ("good, right") and sebomai ("to feel awe"), designating the body's capacity for right reverence — the art of trembli…
Convergence PsychologyLogoi Psychēs
The logoi psychēs are archetypal soul logics — recurring patterns of thought, valuation, and behavior that emerge when a culture subordinates the feel…
Convergence PsychologyMoral Imagination
Moral imagination is the capacity to perceive, feel, and act from an embodied sense of value — one arising from lived experience, relationship, and th…
Convergence PsychologyNepsis
Nepsis (νῆψις) is the Greek word for sobriety in its original sense: not the absence of alcohol but the presence of watchfulness. The Desert Fathers a…
Convergence PsychologyNostos
Nostos (νόστος) names the homecoming — the sacred return that completes the hero's journey. In Homer, the entire Odyssey is a nostos, the restoration …
Convergence PsychologyPascho
Pascho (πάσχω) is the Greek verb meaning "to undergo, to be affected, to suffer." Its conjugation encodes a radical claim: in the present tense, pasch…
Convergence PsychologyPathos
Pathos (πάθος) names the capacity to be affected — the structural openness of the living body to forces that exceed its control. In Homeric Greek, pat…
Convergence PsychologyPenthos
Penthos (πένθος) names the grief that colonizes the soul — the heavy, settling weight of loss that accumulates over time. Distinct from algos (sharp, …
Convergence PsychologyPneuma
Pneuma (πνεῦμα) means breath, wind, or spirit — the shared atmosphere circulating between gods and mortals in archaic Greek thought. The Stoics transf…
Convergence PsychologyRatio Crucis
Ratio crucis is the logic of crisis — a patterned distortion of the feeling function in which the subject converts emotional experience into problems …
Convergence PsychologyRatio Desiderii
Ratio desiderii is the logic of longing — a patterned distortion of the feeling function in which the subject projects the constituting experience out…
Convergence PsychologyRatio Matris
Ratio matris is the logic of emotional compliance — a patterned distortion of the feeling function in which the subject dissolves into the needs of ot…
Convergence PsychologyRatio Pneuma
Ratio pneuma is the logic of spiritual ascent — a patterned distortion of the feeling function in which the subject exits the process of being constit…
Convergence PsychologyReason of the Heart
The reason of the heart is a mode of knowing distinct from rational, discursive thought — a capacity to discern meaning, worth, and rightness through …
Convergence PsychologyReligion
Religion, from Latin religio (conscientious observance), denotes the psyche's inherent orientation toward the numinous. The ancient world understood r…
Convergence PsychologySebas
Sebas (σέβας) names reverential awe — the involuntary somatic trembling before what is sacred. Operating exclusively through the Middle Voice verb seb…
Convergence PsychologySophia
Sophia (σοφία) is the Greek word for wisdom -- a knowing that is simultaneously intellectual and relational, earned through experience rather than acq…
Convergence PsychologyThumos
Thumos (θυμός) is the most prominent psychic entity in the Homeric corpus, appearing over 750 times. Derived from the verb thuō ("to seethe"), it deno…
Convergence PsychologyTlao
Tlao (τλάω) is the Homeric verb meaning "to endure, to bear, to dare." It is morphologically defective — it has no present tense in the Homeric corpus…
Convergence PsychologyTop-Down vs. Bottom-Up Regulation
Top-down regulation operates from the prefrontal cortex downward, using cognitive strategies — reappraisal, verbal processing, insight — to modulate e…
Depth Psychology
Active Imagination
Active imagination is a method developed by C.G. Jung in which a person deliberately engages unconscious contents — images, figures, affects — while m…
Depth PsychologyAnima
The anima is Jung's term for the autonomous soul-image in a man's psyche — the archetype that personifies his relationship to the unconscious. The ani…
Depth PsychologyAnima Complex
The anima complex forms when the anima archetype — the soul-image that mediates feeling, value, and psychic depth — operates unconsciously as an auton…
Depth PsychologyAnimus
The animus is Jung's archetype of unconscious logos — conviction, opinion, and discriminating judgment operating autonomously within the psyche. In cl…
Depth PsychologyArchetypal Psychology
Archetypal psychology is a post-Jungian tradition founded by James Hillman that shifts psychology's center of gravity from ego, development, and diagn…
Depth PsychologyArchetype
An archetype, in C.G. Jung's analytical psychology, is an inherited, purely formal pattern within the collective unconscious that organizes human perc…
Depth PsychologyAte
Ate (ἄτη) is the Homeric experience of divine blindness -- a temporary clouding of normal consciousness in which a person acts against their own inter…
Depth PsychologyAutonomous Psychic Complex
An autonomous psychic complex is a semi-independent psychic structure operating according to its own organizing principle, beyond the control of consc…
Depth PsychologyCollective Unconscious
The collective unconscious is Carl Jung's term for the deepest stratum of the psyche — a transpersonal layer that is not built from personal experienc…
Depth PsychologyComplex
A complex is an emotionally charged cluster of ideas, memories, images, and associations organized around a central theme and formed primarily in earl…
Depth PsychologyComplex PTSD
Complex PTSD (C-PTSD) is a trauma-related condition resulting from prolonged, repeated interpersonal traumatization — most often childhood abuse, negl…
Depth PsychologyDepth Psychology
Depth psychology is a clinical and theoretical tradition that treats the unconscious not as a repository of repressed material but as a structured, pu…
Depth PsychologyEgo (Jungian Depth Psychology)
The ego is the central complex in the field of consciousness — the seat of identity, memory, and will. In Jungian psychology, the ego is not the total…
Depth PsychologyEgo-Self Axis
The ego-Self axis is the dynamic channel of communication between the ego — the center of conscious awareness — and the Self, the archetype of wholene…
Depth PsychologyEnantiodromia
Enantiodromia (Greek: ἐναντιοδρομία, "running counter to") is a concept in Jungian depth psychology describing the principle that any extreme psycholo…
Depth PsychologyEros
Eros (ἔρως) is the Greek god and force of desire -- the power that moves a person toward what completes them. In the earliest sources, eros is a formi…
Depth PsychologyFeeling Function
The feeling function is one of Jung's four functions of consciousness, responsible for assigning value and worth to psychic contents. Unlike emotion, …
Depth PsychologyFeeling-Toned Complex
A feeling-toned complex is a cluster of emotionally charged ideas, memories, and images organized around a central affect. First identified by Carl Ju…
Depth PsychologyImage
In depth psychology, image names both a psychic presence and the soul's primary activity. To image is a verb — the psyche's continuous production of f…
Depth PsychologyImaginal
The imaginal is a mode of psychic awareness that engages autonomous images as living realities rather than fantasies or abstractions. Coined by Henry …
Depth PsychologyIndividuation
Individuation is C.G. Jung's term for the lifelong developmental process through which a person differentiates from collective norms and integrates un…
Depth PsychologyInferior Function
The inferior function is the least-developed of Jung's four functions of consciousness — the polar opposite of the dominant function and the one most …
Depth PsychologyInflation (Jungian Depth Psychology)
Inflation is the expansion of the ego beyond its proper limits through identification with an archetype, the persona, or unconscious contents. Jung de…
Depth PsychologyKradie / Kardia
Kradie (κραδίη), also appearing as kardia (καρδία), is the Homeric heart -- the organ that leaps, trembles, and endures. Unlike modern sentimentality,…
Depth PsychologyLogos
Logos (λόγος) is the Greek word for word, reason, account, and proportion -- the principle that gathers, discriminates, and makes intelligible. Heracl…
Depth PsychologyMother Complex
The mother complex is an emotionally charged network of images, attitudes, and behaviors rooted in the earliest relationship to the mother or motherin…
Depth PsychologyMyth
Myth is the deep architecture of the psyche — a living symbolic pattern that shapes how human beings imagine, feel, and act. From the Greek mythos ("s…
Depth PsychologyNoos / Nous
Noos (νόος), later contracted to nous (νοῦς), is the Greek faculty of inner vision -- the organ of clear perception that grasps a situation whole befo…
Depth PsychologyParticipation Mystique
Participation mystique is a term Jung borrowed from the French anthropologist Lucien Lévy-Bruhl to describe a state of unconscious identity between a …
Depth PsychologyPersona (Jungian Depth Psychology)
The persona is Jung's term for the functional psychic structure that mediates between the ego and the external social world. Derived from the Latin wo…
Depth PsychologyPhren / Phrenes
Phren (φρήν), and its plural phrenes (φρένες), designates the Homeric organ of thinking-feeling located in the chest. Neither brain nor heart but a re…
Depth PsychologyPolytheism
In depth psychology, polytheism is not a religious doctrine but a metaphor for the psyche's inherent plurality — what Hillman called a "polytheistic d…
Depth PsychologyPsychological Projection
Psychological projection is an unconscious process in which an internal psychic content — whether personal or archetypal — is perceived as belonging t…
Depth PsychologyScapegoat
The scapegoat is a psychic role in which one individual absorbs and carries the shadow material of a group. Originating in the Hebrew azazel of Leviti…
Depth PsychologyShadow (Jungian Depth Psychology)
The shadow is the unconscious counterpart of the ego — a functional complex containing traits, desires, and qualities that consciousness has rejected …
Depth PsychologyShadow Work
Shadow work is the sustained clinical and personal practice of confronting, differentiating, and integrating the contents of the Jungian shadow — the …
Depth PsychologySoul
Soul is a depth-psychological perspective — a mode of perceiving that emphasizes interiority, multiplicity, and symbolic complexity. Distinguished fro…
Depth PsychologySoul-Making
Soul-making is the central aspiration of James Hillman's archetypal psychology. Borrowed from the poet John Keats, the term designates the psyche's fu…
Depth PsychologySoulwork
Soulwork is a disciplined engagement with the soul's own material — its images, feelings, fantasies, and symbolic patterns — especially those that hav…
Depth PsychologySpirit
Spirit is an archetypal orientation toward the heights — toward order, purity, transcendence, and singularity. In depth psychology, spirit names the p…
Depth PsychologySymptom
A symptom, from Greek symptoma ("that which befalls"), is a psychic event — an image, mood, bodily state, behavior, or recurring situation — that sign…
Depth PsychologySynchronicity
Synchronicity is a term coined by Carl Gustav Jung to designate a meaningful coincidence between a psychic event — a dream, vision, or premonition — a…
Depth PsychologyTemenos
In Jungian depth psychology, temenos refers to a sacred, bounded space that contains and protects the process of psychological transformation. Borrowe…
Depth PsychologyThe Numinosum
The numinosum is the felt charge of the sacred — the raw affective power that archetypal images carry and that seizes the ego in encounters with force…
Depth PsychologyThe Self
The Self is the central organizing archetype of the psyche in Jungian analytical psychology — the totality of the psychic system, encompassing both co…
Depth PsychologyTranscendent Function
The transcendent function is Jung's term for the psyche's self-regulatory process by which a sustained tension between conscious and unconscious posit…
Depth PsychologyUnconscious
The unconscious is the totality of psychic contents not presently available to conscious awareness — from forgotten memories and repressed emotions to…
Depth PsychologyWindow of Tolerance
The window of tolerance is a concept introduced by Daniel Siegel describing the optimal zone of autonomic arousal within which a person can process co…
Neuroscience
Allostatic Load
Allostatic load is the cumulative physiological toll exacted by chronic stress on the body's regulatory systems — the price the organism pays for sust…
NeuroscienceAmygdala Hijack
Amygdala hijack is Daniel Goleman's term for the phenomenon in which the amygdala — the brain's threat-detection center — triggers a fight-flight-free…
NeuroscienceDefault Mode Network
The default mode network (DMN) is a constellation of brain regions — principally the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, posterior cingulate cortex, and a…
NeuroscienceDopamine Reward Deficit
Dopamine reward deficit describes the neurobiological state in which chronic substance use downregulates the mesolimbic dopamine system, producing a b…
NeuroscienceEmbodied Cognition
Embodied cognition is the principle that cognitive processes — perception, reasoning, emotion, decision-making — are fundamentally shaped by the body'…
NeuroscienceInteroception
Interoception is the process by which the nervous system senses, interprets, and integrates signals originating from within the body — including heart…
NeuroscienceNeuro-Psychoanalysis
Neuro-psychoanalysis is an interdisciplinary field that integrates psychoanalytic theory with affective neuroscience, cognitive neuroscience, and neur…
NeuroscienceNeuroplasticity
Neuroplasticity is the brain's intrinsic capacity to reorganize its synaptic architecture in response to experience, learning, injury, and sustained b…
NeurosciencePolyvagal Theory
Polyvagal theory is Stephen Porges's neurobiological framework proposing that the autonomic nervous system operates through three phylogenetically ord…