Other Books
by John Goldhammer, Ph.D.

Under the Influence:
The Destructive Effects of Group Dynamics
by: John D. Goldhammer
(New York: Prometheus Books, 1996, hardcover - 356 pages). 

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A unique, depth psychology perspective on destructive group dynamics: cults, extremist and terrorist ideologies, religious, social, political, and business groups.

Under the Influence explores the relationships between individuals and many different types of groups from families to nation states.  Like Radical Dreaming, it discusses the impact of outside influences on individual integrity, creativity and authenticity.  Using dreams, Radical Dreaming addresses many of the issues raised in Under the Influence, which provides readers with practical ways to overcome powerful, self-destructive outer influences that prevent us from living our own lives.

Reviews & Readers' Comments about "Under the Influence":

"I have laughed, cried and been carried back to many events in my life that reflect your thoughts.  If only I had known your book at age 21!  Please have my great appreciation;  your book will be loaned out many times."
                           - Robert A. Johnson,
                                 Jungian analyst, lecturer, and best-selling author

 "I am a professor in the MBA program at Butler University.  I teach a group dynamics class each fall and always try to select a thought provoking book for the class.  I selected it (Under the Influence} for the class.  I will finish reading the last 15 pages this afternoon and can only say - 'WOW.'  A great book.  It will be both enlightening and more than thought provoking, particularly for MBA students." 
                                                        - Dr. David Luechauer.

"Just had to pass along my praise and appreciation for this piece of work. You have made a profound contribution in confronting the mass mind, the Madison Avenue sound bite, and manipulative collective. It would seem it has a future as required reading in any thoughtful curricula involving psychology and sociology."
                                                          - Dr. Christopher Rubel, MFCC

"Influence is a rich, complex accomplishment of great value and nourishment that shows the greatest threat to our mental health is making our souls obedient to another's agenda. Goldhammer turns the light on a lot of sacred cows. All parts are thoroughly researched."
          - Audrey DeLaMarte, Syndicared Book Reviewer, editor, writer

"I just want to say that your book and web site fill a huge gap in societies' proper understanding of cult dynamics and destructive thinking. Your comments were priceless. Again, a great book. I've done a lot of reading on cults and I will say your book will be one I HIGHLY recommend -- top priority read."
                - Joe Rizoli, Writer & former member of Jehovah's Witnesses

"The news is filled with reports of all kinds of cults and groups like the militias, and if you wonder why people give themselves over to these groups, I strongly recommend you read John Goldhammer's Under the Influence, which explores how to avoid the loss of one's identity and the hypnotic influence some groups exert over their members. The author tells of his own experience with a New Age group for fifteen years and examines the nature of economic, educational, political and religious groups which seek to isolate their members from their family and other relationships."
  - Alan Caruba, Editor of syndicated column, "Book Views"

"I have done my own research and study on cults, I have never seen the difference between a destructive group and a healthy group explained in a way that is as clear, understandable, and full of truth. Thanks again."
                                                     - Aerial Long, Trauma Counselor

"Just wanted to let you know that I found your book extremely well written! I read it over the weekend before writing the sales piece, and it was far from being a drudgery or even an assignment. I began reading chapters (based on initial interest) out of sequence. Before I knew it, I'd finished the whole thing!"
                      - Paul M. Howey, A/Z Texts, Writing & Photography

"Thanks so much for your book. I loved it! I think you could teach a class on this book, because you need to go over and over it. It's not something to be read just once. It's to be studied. One of the points you really drove home for me was that we need to be authentic and not be what others think we should be."
                                  - Maytrie Gregor, Insurance Claims Adjuster

"I felt empowered and vindicated after reading your remarkable book! Now I know how to help myself and others really recognize the 'dark side of groups."
                - Terri Page, Interior Designer

"I just love your book! Under the Influence needs to be in every university and public library."
                   - Barbara Gaughen, Small Business Consultant

"I found Under the Influence taking me on an eye-opening journey confronting the polarized, separatist, and controlled thinking that occurs within many groups. An extremely thought-provoking book disclosing the dark side of groups by bringing light to these dynamics. Your descriptive and thorough writing style encouraged me to reexamine the collective influences by which we, as individuals, are invariably besieged. Not only are suggestions made helping to determine the effect of control a group may already have, but ways of developing a healthy relationship with our groups. Under the Influence is definitely a book whose time has come and a must read for all who are on the path of free self-expression."
       - Karen A. Dahlman, M.A., Psychotherapist & Art Therapist

THE SAVE YOUR BUSINESS BOOK:
A Survival Manual for Small Business Owners (New York:  Macmillan/Lexington, 1993)
by: John D. Goldhammer
A small business survival book on management, business ethics, employee relations, and the environment.  Subjects include:  creative alternatives to bankruptcy, responding to lawsuits, negotiating with creditors, creating a Critical Path, reorganizing for improved performance, working with employees and customers, working with creditors and suppliers.

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Some of my favorite books:

Note:
While there are valuable insights in many different approaches to dream interpretation, Radical Dreaming does not use a particular psychological system or theory of dream interpretation. Instead, the focus is on allowing your dream images the freedom to speak for themselves without any labels (mythological, archetypal, Freudian, Jungian, dream dictionary) or other meanings "put on" your dreams by any "experts." Your dreams can interpret themselves! Our dreams are constantly nudging us into who we really are, our innate, often unrealized potential.

Beradt, Charlotte. The Third Reich of Dreams, translated by Adriane Gottwald. Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1968. An excellent book and a unique record of how the dreams of German citizens reacted to the social and political changes during Hitler's rise to power. You'll have to locate a used copy.

Epel, Naomi. Writers Dreaming: Twenty-Six Writers Talk About Their Dreams and the Creative Process, edited by Naomi Epel. New York: Vintage Books, 1993. An excellent book showing how dreams work with the creative process.

Frankl, Viktor E. Man's Search for Meaning: An Introduction to Logotherapy. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984. One of the all-time, best reads about the universal search for meaning and purpose.

Shafton, Anthony. Dream Reader: Contemporary Approaches to the Understanding of Dreams. New York: State University of New York Press, 1995. Shafton's book gives an excellent overview of contemporary dream research and interpretive theories and  techniques.

Van de Castle, Robert L. Our Dreaming Mind. New York: Ballantine Books, 1994. An outstanding, comprehensive review of dreaming and dream interpretation over the centuries; extremely well-researched.

Barasch, Marc. Healing Dreams: Exploring the Dreams That Can Transform Your Life. New York: Riverhead Books, 2000. This book explores the author's bout with a serious illness and how dreams aided his recovery.

Goldhammer, John D. Under the Influence:The Destructive Effects of Group Dynamics. New York: Prometheus Books, 1996. An exploration of the impact of group dynamics for the individual: social, political, religious, economic, and institutional. Compares healthy versus destructive group dynamics -- also related dreams from the author.

Bly, Robert. Eating the Honey of Words. New York: Harper Collins, 1999. An excellent book to stir up your poetic, imaginative nature and improve your interpretive skills.

Campbell, Joseph. The Hero With a Thousand Faces. Princeton, NJ:  Princeton University Press, 1968. A beautifully written look at the "Hero's Journey," using myth and legend. All of Joseph Campbell's books illustrate the value of looking at mythology and religion as symbolic stories about fundamental patterns and processes that help us understand our life.

¾. The Hero's Journey. New York: Harper Collins, 1990.

¾. Transformations of Myth Through Time. New York: Harper & Row, 1990.

¾. The Inner Reaches of Outer Space: Metaphor as Myth and Religion. New York: Harper & Row, 1986.

¾. An Open Life: Joseph Campbell in Conversation With Michael Toms. New York: Harper & Row, 1989.

Johnson, Robert. Inner Work: Using Dreams and Active Imagination Personal Growth. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1986. One of the best books for a clear explanation of Jung's "Active Imagination" process.

Kabir. The Kabir Book: Forty-Four of the Ecstatic Poems of Kabir, translated by Robert Bly. Boston: Beacon Press, 1977.

Lessing, Doris. Prisons We Choose To Live Inside. New York: Harper & Row, 1987. An excellent analysis of how we put ourselves in collective circumstances that are life-defeating. Our dreams focus on this dilemma.

Bohm, David. Wholeness and the Implicate Order. New York: Routledge, 1983. A physicist's perspective of how consciousness works.

May, Rollo. The Discovery of Being: Writings in Existential Psychology. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1983.

Canetti, Elias. Crowds and Power. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1973. A unique perspective on group dynamics and human behavior in groups and crowds.

Corbin, Henry. Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn 'Arabi, trans. Ralph Manheim. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, Bollingen Series XCI, 1969.

Edinger, Edward. Anatomy of the Psyche: Alchemical Symbolism in Psychotherapy. La Salle, Illinois:  Open Court, 1985. A very detailed and well-done exploration of the psychological symbolism of Alchemy.

Hillman, James. Dream Animals. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1997. Hillman's work is valuable because he gives readers a fresh way to look at and imagine dream images. But watch out for the "archetypal" psychological labeling he lapses into on occasion.

¾. The Dream and the Underworld. New York: Harper & Row, 1979.

Von Franz, Marie-Louise. Archetypal Dimensions of the Psyche. Boston: Shambhala, 1994.  One of the best, original, Jungian dream workers.

¾. With Fraser Boa, The Way of the Dream. Boston & London: Shambhala, 1994. An excellent Jungian-oriented book on dreams and dream interpretation.

¾. On Dreams and Death. Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1987. A fascinating exploration of dreams reported just before death.

¾. Dreams: A Study of the Dreams of Jung, Descartes, Socrates, and Other Historical Figures. Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1991.

¾. Projection and Re-Collection in Jungian Psychology. La Salle & London: Open Court Publishing, 1980.

Johnson, Robert, Balancing Heaven and Earth: A Memoir of Visions, Dreams, and Realizations. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1998.

¾. Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the Psyche. San Francisco: Harper Collins Publishers, 1991.

Jung, Carl G. Dreams, translated by R.F.C. Hull. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1974.

¾. Memories, Dreams, Reflections, translated by Richard and Clara Winston. New York: Random House, 1973. Jung's autobiography and a good book to read as an introduction to the general concepts that characterize Jungian psychology. Modern "Jungians" have unfortunately turned much of Jung's original and immensely valuable work into organized dogma. As a result it is rare for a Jungian analyst to even come close to the real meaning or intent of dreaming.

¾. The Undiscovered Self with Symbols and the Interpretation of Dreams, translated by R.F.C. Hull. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1990.

Kast, Verena. The Dynamics of Symbols: Fundamentals of Jungian Psychotherapy, translated by Susan Schwarz. New York: Fromm International Publishing, 1992.

¾. Imagination as Space of Freedom: Dialogue Between the Ego and the Unconscious, translated by Anselm Hollo. New York: Fromm International Publishing, 1993.

Keen, Sam and Anne Valley-Fox. Your Mythic Journey: Finding Meaning in Your Life Through Writing and Storytelling. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1973.

LaBerge, Stephen. Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming. New York: Ballantine Books, 1990. Controlling dreams aborts their true potential, except in special cases for the treatment of trauma.

Lifton, Robert Jay. The Protean Self: Human Resilience in an Age of Fragmentation. New York: Basic Books, 1993.

Loughead, Flora H. Dictionary of Given Names with Origins and Meanings. Glendale, CA: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1958. A wonderful reference guide (No longer in print) for the original meaning and origin of names that sometimes pop up in a dream.

Lutyens, Mary. Krishnamurti: the Years of Fulfillment. New York: Avon Books, 1983

Oliver, Mary. Dream Work. New York: The Atlantic Monthly Press, 1986. A great collection of poems that will inspire your dreaming and your imagination.

Peat, F. David. Synchronicity: The Bridge Between Mind and Matter. New York: Bantam Books, 1987.

Rilke, Rainer Maria. Selected Poems of Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Robert Bly. New York: Harper & Row, 1981.

Samuels, Andrew. The Political Psyche. New York: Routledge, 1993. Samuels explores how the outer world's political convictions influence individual psychotherapy.

Sheldrake, Rupert. The Presence of the Past: Morphic Resonance and the Habits of Nature. Rochester, Vermont, Park Street Press, 1988.

Stekel, Wilhelm. The Interpretation of Dreams: New Developments and Technique. New York: Liverright, 1943. (You'll need to find a used copy)

Talbot, Michael. The Holographic Universe. New York: Harper Perennial, 1991.
A thought-provoking look at the wondrous workings of consciousness.

The Rag & Bone Shop of the Heart, edited by Robert Bly, James Hillman, and Michael Meade. Harper Collins Publishers, New York: 1992.

Van der Post, Laurens. Jung and the Story of Our Time. New York: Vintage Books, 1975. A unique and interesting biography of Carl Jung.

Watkins, Mary. Waking Dreams. Dallas, TX: Spring Publications, 1984.

Wilhelm, Richard, translated by Cary F. Baynes. The I Ching or Book of Changes. New York: Bollingen Foundation, 1977.