Laurel is a Jungian analyst and sandplay therapist from Denver, Colorado. Her psychological research focuses on the development and redemption of the feminine principle in pre-biblical Levantine images, exegetical texts, alchemy, legend, fairy tales, and in the everyday work of analysis and individuation. She lectures in the United States and abroad, and her work appears in numerous publications.
Her essay, “Redeeming Mary Magdalene: Feminine Side of the Death and Resurrection Archetype” appeared as a chapter in the Psychology Club of Zürich’s publication, Wisdom Has Built Her House: Psychological Aspects of the Feminine. The essay draws from the earliest interpretation of the Song of Songs by Hippolytus that compares Mary Magdalene to the Bride, excerpts from a medieval legend extolling Mary Magdalene’s great love for Jesus Christ, and the writings of other Christian clerics, tracing Mary ’s hidden yet meaningful role as partner to Jesus Christ in the resurrection. The writings of church fathers and clerics through the millennia even reveal how she has remained an active figure in in their imaginations, fulfilling the role of love goddess or anima of the church on an unconscious level.
Laurel’s book, War of the Ancient Dragon: Transformation of Violence in Sandplay, follows the uncanny alchemical narratives of a five-year-old boy, a bully who burned and warred his way toward a healing adaptation. His work reveals the stages of alchemical transformation described by the ancients, including the redemption of his own feminine side.
Laurel is a graduate of the Centre for Depth Psychology According to C.G. Jung and Marie-Louise von Franz, Zürich and has lectured there numerous times. She has served on the boards of the C.G. Jung Institute of Colorado and the Sandplay Therapy Association of Colorado and continues as a faculty member for both groups.