THE MOON, THE HARE, AND THE PEARL: An Intuitive Guide to the Therapist-Client Relationship (a companion for therapists and others who are drawn to their inner life), by JENAII GOLD, Ph.D., MFT. Published by Crone Press, 2020.

When Jenaii Gold, a Jungian therapist who had long had a therapeutic practice, started being wakened in the wee hours and hearing a voice exhorting her to “Write a book!” she took that inner guidance to heart. By the time she contacted me to become her Book Developer, she already had written essays that were meaningful in their own right, but didn’t always hang together as a book.

She wrote me: “I feel that the essays need to link together like a chain of pearls, that is, there should be, at best, some affinity or way in which they connect easily. I feel this is true in the beginning but I am less clear as it goes on. Since organization is not my forte [although storytelling is], I wonder is there something else that might serve? Once you asked how I saw the organization of [the essay] ‘Awakenings,’ and I said that it was a spiral. This too, is spiraled, as far as I can tell. I think that I have an associative mind and so I go through many ideas at a time.”

We worked with that. When you have an instrument that plays its own beautiful kind of music, you don’t force it into someone else’s preset mold. Stories turned out to be the common thread in this book. This included stories of the author’s own life (therapists are notable for using their own experiences for the benefit of their clients — what I call “writing about yourself as a lens rather than a focus”), and stories about some of her clients. And the organizational element we had been seeking in lieu of a rigidly logical progression turned out to be the “chain of pearls” that the author already had intuitied. As so often happens with writing a book, the earlier theoretical conception gave way to what the book actually wanted to be, and the metaphor of a “chain of pearls” came to link the individual chapters into a seamless whole.

The author initially had envisioned the book as being for new therapists and interning therapists (she’d been a supervisor of interns for many years). But I told her that, even as a non-therapist, I had received so much value from the book, and she agreed to open the readership up to include anyone who was interested. The new extended subtitle became: “A Companion for Therapists and Others Who Are Drawn to Their Inner Life.”

My role: Book Developer, Editor, Publishing Mentor

Working with Jenaii as a new author: It was a pleasure to work with Jenaii — not only because of the wisdom and aliveness inherent in her writing but also because she truly understood what working with the unconscious therapeutically means. Her stories were always alive, never didactically “instructive”; and her (by her own definition) “associative ways of thinking” — while initially sometimes mystifying as to how to frame what they were pointing towards — ultimately led to a satisfying conclusion that a less intuitive approach could never have seen coming. So I learned a great deal from her in the process of helping her bring her wish for a book about her work to fruition.” When at last the book was in print, she sent me a copy, inscribed: “Here it is at last: our pearl.” The inclusive word “our,” here, speaks as much to the author’s generosity and relational nature as it does to my involvement in the book’s coming into the world.

From the back cover: “The Moon, the Hare, and the Pearl is an archetypal guide to the practice of psychotherapy. It is an invitation to bring the power of your intuition, curiosity, and imagination to this profound practice. Whether you are a student, intern, newly licensed clinician, or experienced therapist, this book offers practical advice for walking a deeply feminine and intuitive path. If you are not a clinician but want to delve more deeply into your inner life and psychotherapy, open this book, sniff around, and allow yourself the luxury of wandering through evocative landscapes. The path of intuition in psychotherapy is a call to turn inward and engage deeply with psyche. It is filled with synchronicity and wonder. Written by psychotherapist Jenaii Gold from the perspective of the Crone, the elder who speaks her truth, The Moon, the Hare, and the Pearl is an offering to all who seek to live an authentic life.”

A brief excerpt from the book:

“Recently, my daughter-in-law asked if it was possible to teach intuition. What a great question, I thought. I do not know that it can be taught, but it can be encouraged. To allow our intuition to take its rightful place at the table, we need to lessen our dependence on other ways of knowing. If we depend too much on thinking or feeling, we are less likely to hear the quieter voice of intuition. Having feedback from the sensation function is pivotal for grounding . . . [but] over-reliance on any one function puts us in peril of not having sufficient access to other points of view, both internally and externally.

“In Western culture, our reliance on the thinking function is the status quo or default option. When we are faced with uncertainty, we are told to ‘think about it.’ We are not told to quiet our minds, be patient, and allow our intuition to guide us, though our ‘sixth sense’ is always operating and available. If we want to access our intuition, the trick is to tone down the volume on other ways of knowing in order to listen to it.

“Intuition is like the air we breathe; it comes so naturally that we often fail to acknowledge its presence. Recently, on the evening news, I heard a scientist speaking about finding a ninth planet whose existence he intuits and infers from its impact on other celestial bodies around it. Listening to him reminded me of how the intuitive process operates. Intuition is non-linear. It leaps like a hare across a green field, making wonderful associations and connections, with no need to explain how it got there. It can be amazingly quick, taking in many factors at once, processing, distilling, collating, and coalescing into a conclusion or impression. Intuition is synergistic; meanwhile, its methodology remains inchoate.

”. . . As psychotherapists, we accompany our clients as they navigate the uncertainties and flux of their lives, just as we do our own. Allowing intuition to take its rightful place at the table allows each of us to become increasingly at ease with new experiences. Intuition opens us to a multiplicity of factors and forces without necessarily being able to explain or justify them. Our intuitive faculty asks us to trust that we are more than we know and that our lives are informed in mysterious ways.”

— From the chapter on “Intuition: The Self and the Four Functions” / Copyright © 2020 by Jenaii Gold. All rights reserved.

Reader praise for the book:

“Your intuitive self will thank you for taking a walk with Dr. J through soulful passages of experience and wisdom with her book in hand. This book needed to be written.” — Rose-Ann McGregor, Artist

“The Moon, the Hare, and the Pearl: An Intuitive Guide to the Therapist-Client Relationship by Jenaii Gold is a book as precious as the gem in its title. The book is for anyone who is interested in the inner life and its essential place in the journey of becoming real. I love the intimacy of the author’s writing, even at the same time that it is clear how much she understands about the ways and necessities of psyche. In reading this lyrical and compelling work, I found myself opening to a deep-seated longing to be known in the way Gold comes to know the inner being of her clients. I deeply recommend this book to professionals and amateurs (lovers of the inner journey) alike.” — Naomi Rose, creator, Writing from the Deeper Self

The author on working with me: "A very special thanks to Naomi Rose, who has worked with me from the inception of this book to the finish. She has truly been a midwife to my ideas and my process, as well as keeping me afloat with affirmations of confidence and worth. We have traveled a long way together and I am grateful for our work and our friendship.”

And, in a note directly to me, Jenaii wrote: “I am so honored that my book has been of value to you. I have felt very seen by you, and that is so much of what therapy is about. We all yearn for that. There was a deep knowing that there was so much I needed to express, and that urgency was called a book. [After a while] it went from inchoate to ‘This is absolutely possible. I’m going to do it!’ — Jenaii Gold, Ph.D., MFT

If you have a book calling you to write it — whether it’s “just” a wish at this point, or you’ve already stepped into the writing but you don’t know what to do next to have it be an authentic expression of you — consider calling on me to be the midwife of the book that can only come out of you.

You can start by (any or all):

• Subscribing to my weekly newsletter on “Writing from the Deeper Self” (sign-up form below).

• Reading my books on the creative process —

  • Starting Your Book: Navigating the Blank Page by Attending to What’s Inside you

  • An Organic Approach to Structuring Your Book: A Right-Brained Alternative to Outlines

  • 10 Essential Qualities That Help You Write a Book: Watering the Seeds of the Qualities You Need

• Booking a complimentary 30-minute consultation with me to explore the book waiting in your heart.

Any way you’re drawn to do it, I can help you listen forth the book that wants to be known through you — and you will get to bloom, in the process.

Naomi Rose, Book Developer & Creative Midwife

Encouraging your flowering

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