Healing Estranged Sorrows
Journal of Jungian Scholarly Studies May 16, 2026 Daniel Boscaljon
This article builds on Peter Levine's work to argue that some trauma, termed 'estranged sorrows,' has no single causal event or ongoing cause of harm. It proposes that these sorrows arise from blocks to learning occurring throughout life, either from a lack of meaningful relation in early development or from being raised in an environment anchored in a cultural complex. The phenomenological approach highlights how such trauma emerges and how learning—understood as a somatic process—can help resolve it. The article concludes by extending theories of learning to argue that embodied engagement and the somatic imagination offer a form of rehabilitation important for trauma that is otherwise difficult to name or place.