Dark Seduction: The Inner Meaning of Vampires

By Bob Bongiovanni, MA

Part 1

Vampires have never been more popular. New vampire books and movies are released every year – the latest being the one called “Twilight,” following in the footsteps of the popular “Interviews with a Vampire” series by Anne Rice. A popular new television series, “True Blood,” has also been released and has gained a wide following. Jung taught us to pay attention to popular culture, because it can tell us about the state of modern consciousness. Much as we may try to deny it, we are living both a collective and an individual life, and we deny the collective only at our great peril and diminishment. So, the question for us is – why the fascination with vampire lore? What is the inner meaning here?

Of course, fascination with vampires is not new. Perhaps the earliest known image of the vampire comes from Babylonia; known as the Ekimmu, it was believed to be the ghost of an unburied person and in some cases a spirit who did not receive enough offerings. It was supposed to live underground and emerge at night to feed off the living. Dracula and other well known vampire stories have their origins in Slavic myth and legend, widespread throughout Eastern Europe. While being a model for the now known vampire, the image has changed over time. The original Slavic vampire was said to be dark blue or purple and bloated with blood, barely human like in appearance, and a true horror to behold, certainly not clad in a tuxedo or eloquent with words. This Slavic vampire was also not always a product of a vampire bite, rather an entity onto itself. People who died of an accidental or sudden death, or a suicide, could become vampires. Other situations could attribute to vampirism. A child born with a caul or teeth could turn after death. An infant who died before baptism could turn as well. If bitten by one of these vampires you could die and then become a vampire yourself. To kill a vampire they would use methods we are well aware of: burning, staking, decapitation, and holy water. But the Slavic vampire is by no means the only cultural presentation of the story. Vampire stories, with very similar elements, appear prominently in Africa, China, India, and Malaysia, though in these cultures the vampire is just as likely to be feminine or masculine.

What might vampires represent psychologically? Clearly, with such a long, cross cultural history, we are dealing with a product of the collective unconscious. It seems that vampires are archetypal, appearing in each culture as an expression of the complexes rooted in that culture, and in the European and American cultures, having to do with complexes associated with masculinity. For women, Jung termed this complex “the animus,” and for convenience sake, I will use the same term during these talks. But, in fact, I believe the complex has roots in both men and women, so we will go a bit beyond the territory that Jung explored on the topic.

So, before we look at vampire lore from a Jungian viewpoint, let’s review Jung’s thinking on complexes in general, and on the animus in particular. Early in Jung’s career, when he worked at the Burgholzli Psychiatric Hospital in Zurich, he became well acquainted with the forces that possess and hold people in their deadly grip, draining them of their individuality and energy. Where his colleagues were satisfied with merely describing and cataloging these human torments, Jung plumbed their depths and unearthed their roots. He devised a simple test, involving word association that allowed him to map out patterns of imagery and feeling that underlay human misery. He called these patterns feeling-toned complexes, later simply called complexes.

It’s tempting to equate Jung’s idea of complexes to the descriptions of psychological ailments contained in the Diagnostic Statistical Manual. That would be an oversimplification, to say the least. A complex has roots in the deepest strata of human experience, the archetypes of the collective unconscious. So, when you unravel a complex, you discover a connection to a fundamental human experience. It starts with a splintering experience, often traumatic, that creates a wound. A group of representations and a particular feeling tone become associated with this wound; if it continues to go unhealed, more and more experiences tend to glom onto this core, until it begins competing with the ego for domination of consciousness. Jung has equated these complexes with cancers. They can grow at an uncontrolled rate, coloring more and more of our perceptions, demanding more and more of our psychic energy, sapping the ego of the libido necessary to maintain its position as the center of consciousness. Eventually, people can be driven to suicide or other self-destructive behavior due to complexes. However, it’s important to realize that complexes, like archetypes, are in themselves are neither positive nor negative. One can be confronted and dominated by a positive complex, which is not experienced as unpleasant, but nonetheless challenge our individuation process.

On the other hand, since complexes have an archetypal core, Jung also referred to complexes as the via regia or “royal path” to the unconscious. If you successfully take on the challenge posed by a complex, you gain a personal understanding of an archetype, you define who you really are, and you reclaim libido in service of your individuation.

If the ailments of the DSM are not a good analogy for complexes, what would be? In his Guided Tour of the Collected Works Hopke offers a plant analogy: “A complex is like a plant, part of which exists and flowers above the ground, in awareness, and part of which extends beneath the ground, where it is anchored and fed, outside of awareness.” Swiss analyst Alfred Ribi offers a more sophisticated analogy, likening complexes to those entities known as demons.

In his book Demons of the Inner World, Ribi points out a number of compelling similarities between complexes and those horrific demons that our ancestors feared, confronted, and sometimes defeated. Demons have their own autonomy, and they often act with malice toward human beings. Their most fearsome quality is their ability to possess human beings, pressing people into their evil purposes. To face a demon is to be gripped by emotion, usually gut wrenching terror. They have vivid, often terrifying, imagery associated with them. The best way to approach demons is to confront them, relying on deep faith to protect you, and, when necessary, exorcising them. Similarly, complexes have autonomy. They lurk in the unconscious, waiting for those vulnerable moments to seize control of consciousness. They are associated with both vivid imagery and strong emotion. The only way to banish them is to confront them, expand consciousness enough to understand and assimilate them, and to exorcise their malevolent influence over our lives through analysis, active imagination, and other means. In fact, Jung advised a religious attitude to prevent possession and to deal with possessions that may occur.

Of course, the analogy with vampires is obvious. A couple of quotes from Ribi illustrate these points further:

The human being who has shed the old natural humanity and become connected to the living primal source need no longer fear demons; for whenever demons arise, a factor of healing and wholeness also arises to them and is available to them.

The psychotherapeutic function of religion – and at the same time the oldest psychotherapy – consists in providing trough its myths and symbols an expression of the wholeness and unity of the psyche. To the extent that it does this and we relate to it in this vital way, religion protects us from demons. Still today, though with ever decreasing success, the Christian cross is being raised against the demons.

Demons draw their power primarily from the fact of not being represented, honored, or indeed, even mentioned in the conscious world.

But our demons are not the principle of evil. They are a precious good, an opportunity to become whole, that somehow, somewhere got stuck – through an unfavorable stroke of fate or a trauma. Demons are our neglected and unacknowledged side. But they also want their part in our life. Since consciousness does not allow them that, they force their participation on it. In doing that, however, they show us their negative side, since they are now in the role of enemies to the conscious personality’s well-being.

Vampires, I would argue, represent or symbolize a particular type of demon complex, akin to what Jung called “the negative animus.” We will be exploring this theme in some length in the next couple of lectures, but as an introduction, Jung proposed that a woman who has had a traumatic early relationship with masculine figures – particularly her father – will tend to have a troubled internal relationship with the masculine principle. The resulting complex will have an alien, harsh, condemning voice that undermines a woman’s sense of wholeness and well-being. At the same time, he may also have a seductive quality, a sort of demon lover who may seem to carry the possibility of the idealized relationship with the father that she lacked in early life. But, in fact, giving oneself to the demon lover is deadly. On this theme, Jungian analyst Marion Woodman writes:

If she succumbs to her inner lover, he comes between her and genuine relationship, making a real man appear contemptible and sexuality seem like prostitution . . . She is vulnerable to the suave manner, the eloquence with words, the perfectionism and ideals with which she endows him, and her own hold on life is so tenuous that she sets herself up for murder either by the man who is carrying the projection or by her own inner lover.

Ironically, at the core of the father-lover complex is the father-god whom she worships and at the same time hates because on some level, she knows he is luring her away from her own life. Whether she worships him or hates him makes no difference, because in either case she is bound to him with no energy going into finding out who she herself is. So as long as she can fantasize her love, she identifies with the positive side of the father god; once the fantasy is crushed, however, she has no ego to sustain her and she swings to the oppositive pole where she experiences annihilation in the arms of the god who has turned against her.

Even from this very brief introduction, I think you can see how this theme is expressed in vampire stories. There is typically a young woman involved, in whom the male vampire has taken an interest. She resists him but is also attracted to him. If she does give herself to him, allows him to feast on her blood, she is lost. She gradually loses all sense of reality and identity. She either dies or she becomes his slave.

Consider some of these other common elements of vampire stories, which we will pursue in some more depth next week. These elements reveal that we are dealing with a complex, the negative animus:

1) The vampire is active at might, the time of dreaming, when the unconscious is closest to our waking ego.

2) If the vampire is exposed to sunlight – to the full light of consciousness – he is destroyed.

3) The vampire lives off of the blood, which symbolizes human life force, much as complexes draw psychic energy away from the ego.

4) The vampire lacks the substance of a full human being. He is a projection of the psyche. Therefore, he cannot be seen in a mirror and cannot cast a shadow.

5) Especially in the more modern vampire tales, he mesmerizes his victims before they can realize his bloodthirsty true motives.

6) He may occasionally convert another male to vampirism, but for the most part, males are competitors or a source of food only.

7) Vampires can be overcome by symbols that people associate with connection to the transcendent – religious symbols, holy water, etc.

8) He has supernatural powers to fly, to change into animals, to move very quickly. Vampires are thought to be neither living nor dead and to be immortal if not destroyed by a human being. Again, that is because vampires are not bound to the human dimension, bound by time and space and the laws of physics, but are projected aspects of psyche.

Part 2

At this very moment, every one in this room is being stalked by a vampire. He is just waiting for his opportunity to seduce you, for you to invite him in, so that he can drain you of your life energy. For some of us, he will take a literal physical form – a lover, a neighbor, a coworker, a boss. He takes possession of these people in our lives and they take up his cruel and monstrous intentions. For others of us, the vampire stalks us in our inner world. He plants fears in us, then presents himself as our savior. He comes into our dreams and transforms them into nightmares. Does this sound too crazy to be true? Perhaps. Or, perhaps his greatest weapon against you is your disbelief in him.

Do I have your attention now? Good! That is the power of archetypal symbols and of storytelling. Like other mythic entities, vampires are not just theoretical constructs, created for our entertainment and education. They are living beings that have roots in our individual personalities that go deeper, to the ancestral memory at our core. We should treat such entities with respect and awe, and a bit of fear.

When we in America think of vampires, we usually conjure us stories that have come through the lense of a classic book by Bram Stoker first published in 1897 and remaining continually in print for the ensuing 110 years. As Jungians, we recognize that a book can only achieve such popularity and multi-generational appeal if it has deep archetypal themes. To very briefly recap the story, a young lawyer named Jonathon Harker travels to the most untamed border area of Europe, to Transylvania, at the bidding of a mysterious Count Dracula, who wishes to make legal arrangements to immigrate to England. It doesn’t take long for Jonathon to realize that he has become the prisoner of a inhuman monster that feasts on the blood of unwary people and it accompanied by equally monstrous feminine companions. He barely escapes back to England, but he does not escape Dracula, for it soon becomes clear that the count has followed him there. A friend of Jonathon’s, a meek and mild girl named Lucy, begins to walk the night, grower ever weaker. Blood transfusions help only temporarily, and even a prominent psychiatrist is no help; Around the same time, children begin to be murdered at night, drained of their blood. The psychiatrist calls on an elderly professor, named Von Helsing, who has an approach very similar to a Jungian – modern science is all well and good, but one must also approach disease with a knowledge of myth, legend, religion, and the darker realms of the psyche. Von Helsing recognizes that a vampire is on the loose, but it is too late for Lucy. She succumbs to the charms of the vampire at last and seemingly dies, but really becomes a vampire slave of Dracula. Jonathon’s perceptive, loving, and courageous wife, Mina, pieces together all of the evidence, which points directly to Dracula. Under the direction Professor Von Helsing, they disenter poor Lucy, who is swollen with the blood of the children, and they dispatch her with a stake through the heart. But the tale does not end there. Dracula begins to stalk Mina through horrific dreams, eventually forcing her to drink his own blood, which is the first stage in converting her to a vampire and his slave. But Mina is of greater will and insight than Lucy. She uses her new psychic connection to the count, and her growing powers of intuition, to lead a chase that takes her and her male comrades all the way back to Transylvania, where they ultimately destroy Dracula and thereby release Mina from her growing enslavement to him.

All of these characters have archetypal dimensions. First, of course, is Dracula. Analyst Linda Leonard describes him this way:

His life in the shadows of the night, his ability to appear and disappear in the mist, tricks us and wears us down if we have not braved the unknown forces of the unconscious. In control, fearless except before the crucifix, demonically possessed (in lore he is said to be the son of the devil), with no remorse or guilt, with penetrating powers of the age-old knowledge of the supernatural combined with demonic fury, Dracula represents our own will to power-though to gain his power we must give up our will to his. Thus ultimately those who become his victims do not resist him. But then he comes from behind in the night when we are asleep, unconscious and off guard. Perhaps his greatest power is, as the professor says, that we don't believe vampires exist, that our rationality discards Dracula as mere superstition. Nevertheless, he continues to fascinate us. Since Bram Stoker wrote his novel in 1897, it has sold millions of copies, been continuously in print, and been the theme of numerous dramatizations. As described by Richard Geer, director of the stage version by Richard Sharp: "Dracula is the essence of evil's awesome attraction. He invites us to unimaginable pleasures, he offers us sensual immortality. We admire him and are horrified by our admiration of this elegant symbol of temptation.^” (On the Way to the Wedding, page 89).

So, Dracula represents “will to power.” In that sense, he is rooted in a distortion in the masculine principle that has seized our culture for centuries. The masculine principle, at its essence, is about two things: discernment and detachment. That, in itself, is not a problem, at least to Jung, who asserted that every healthy individual needs a combination of the feminine principle, with its relatedness and universality, and the masculine principle. This holds equally true for both men and women, for the masculine and feminine principles exist in us all, though culture and physical makeup tend to predispose men to live out the masculine principle more fully, the converse being true for women. It is possible to be discerning and detached in a healthy, conscious manner. But, when there is a distortion present, discernment and detachment are done in a shadowy way, leading to suffering and destruction. For instance, one can discern a hunger for certain things in life – particularly material wealth and power over others – and lustfully accumulate these things, detached from the suffering that results when others are deprived of basic materials needs and their right to autonomy and integrity. There is much more to say on this topic, but first let’s explore some of the other characters in the Dracula story, for by understanding them, we gain insight into Dracula.

Jonathon Harker represents a much different aspect of the masculine principle. He at least attempts to remain rational and assertive in the midst of horror. He resists seduction, both out of a sense of integrity, but even more out of a sense of love and devotion to his beloved companion, Mina. Ultimately, it is this combination of rational detachment and love that prevails over evil.

Lucy represents a sort of unconscious innocence which opens itself to victimization. In Jungian terms, she is a puella, an adolescent girls who never quite comes into full womanhood. Our cultural tendency is to idealize someone like Lucy, and to expect the males in her life to protect and save her. But analyst Thomas Moore makes an observation about Jung and innocence: “Jung was concerned in much of his writing on this issue of innocence. For him, innocence, generates a shadow, a dark unconscious, potentially evil figure who is an inversion of the genteel persona presented to the world. This shadow is often projected, cast out into the world so that convenient individuals can serve as scapegoats.” (Dark Eros, page 41). This is not to excuse violence against Lucy, but in the Jungian sense, insistence on maintaining innocence is not a virtue. It may, in fact, present a one-sidedness that must be overcome in order for consciousness to emerge, and that one-sidedness tends to attract its opposite. Pure white attracts darkest blackness.

As I have hinted already, Professor Von Helsing might have been a prototypical Jungian analyst, more like a wise old man than a man of science, but incorporating both in one character. He points the way, urges depth of thinking, and emboldens action when needed. Yet, he also bring feeling and relatedness to his work. He risks his life to protect those he cares about.

But, arguably, the pivotal character in the whole story is Mina. Again, quoting form Linda Leonard:

Perhaps the central character is Mina-intelligent, loving, loyal, an industrious and efficient worker, a person of integrity. It is Mina's love for Lucy and Harker, her diligently kept journal, her openness and trust in the, Professor's wisdom, her admiration and respect for the bravery of the men, and her ability to make sense of the whole story through the morass of details and confusing events that make it possible to track down Dracula. It is also Mina whom Dracula desires most, whom he wants as his companion and helper, his queen of the night, whom he wants as "flesh of my flesh; blood of my blood; kin of my kin; my bountiful winepress." Mina is the "beloved," admired by all the men for that wonderful unity of heart, intelligence, and will forged by her own conscious work and integrity. What she says of women is true of herself: "We women have something of the mother in us that makes us rise above smaller matters when the mother-spirit is invoked.". . . Mina is the one in us who gives birth through the difficult work of love, who symbolizes the human potential for creativity, the one who must say no to Dracula whenever he tries to possess us.

What Dracula wants most from Mina – what he must have to survive – is blood. Of course, blood is deeply symbolic. From ancient times, blood has symbolized the seat of the soul and the basic life force. Ancient Greeks, for instance, used to flow blood into the graves of the recently deceased to energize the soul in the other world. As the embodiment of a complex, he has no life force of his own. He must feed off of the life force of living humans.

Within the context of Christianity, blood is a particularly powerful image. Listen to this quote from a dictionary of Christian terms relating to blood. This dictionary was certainly not written with vampirism in mind, but consider the vampirism implications of these words:

It is no accident that wine is the symbolic vehicle for blood, as the language of intoxication with the blood of Christ runs throughout the writings of medieval saints and mystics, notably women. For these mystics, rooted in doctrine, blood is the gateway from the human to the divine; it gives "life" like mother’s milk, bringing humanity and God into the most intimate relations, as between a mother and child or, perhaps closer to the spirit of wine, between a lover and her beloved. For many medieval Christian saints and mystics, blood inspired ecstasy. Their poems and prose works often link the highly erotic language of Song of Solomon, centering on desire and the marriage bed, with drinking the blood of Christ. The image of drunkenness as mystical union is ancient, but the descriptions of ecstasy love-drunk with Christ’s blood are distinctly medieval. The aspect of fertility in blood sacrifice, which has an unavoidably sexual connotation (however sublimated), brings Christianity into contact with ancient Greek mystery cults of Dionysus, the god of wine. Both religions link the human body to divinity and immortality through the erotic symbolism of drinking wine/blood. (http://www.wadsworth.com/religion_d/special_features/symbols/blood.html)

There is also an archetypal association between the willing or unwilling sacrifice of blood in order to appease divine beings. Consider, for instance, that ritual sacrifice worldwide has been predominantly blood sacrifice; it is with blood that gods are bribed, appeased, or enlisted in human enterprises, as hunting or war. For the Inca of Peru and the Aztecs of Mexico, (human) blood sacrifice ensured cosmic regularity; for the Israelites, blood sacrifice established and maintained the covenant of God with his people. In each case, ritually spilled blood reinstates or ensures the continuation of order (fertility) and proper human relations with the gods. So, when a god-like vampire claims human blood – or is willingly offered blood by one mesmerized by his power – he and his victim are enacting a pattern that is deep in the human psyche.

Returning to the theme of distorted masculinity expressed in the Dracula story, Jungian analyst Phil Goss proposes a different view of negative animus, which has been cited by Jungians as the core message in the Dracula story. The question, of course, is how to play with a force that can be so toxic, so dangerous to physical and psychological life. How does one survive the onslaught of a vampire? That is one of the themes for next week. But, I would like to conclude this week by noting the recent transformations in the image of the vampire in modern American culture. In 1918, the silent film Nosferatu depicted the vampire as utterly inhuman, monstrous, and completely unsympathetic. This was fairly consistent with Bram Stokers depiction. But, by 1931, Bela Lugosi presented a very different film image – still frightening, but much more human, even suave, clad in tuxedo with his formal manner. By 1973, author Anne Rice depicted a very different image of vampires. She separated vampires into two different camps. The first camp were scornful of humans, like traditional vampires, seeing mortals as either food or potential vampires. The second camp were somewhat tormented by their vampire needs and their immortality. It seems to me that what occurred in the interim was at least a partial withdrawl of projected animus. Now, vampires are more like us – prone to possession by unconscious forces, but retaining some capacity to act humanely, to regret suffering inflicted on others, to reflect on what might be possible if only the complex would withdraw its domination of the personality. That has led some mortals to now have sympathy for the vampire, to participate in the humanizing of the vampire, even if it poses great risk. This has progressed further, up until even now. Last night, I went to the film Twilight, a vampire saga involving a love affair between a teenage girl and her vampire boyfriend. The theater was filled with young girls and women, from early adolescence through adult. The atmosphere was electric, particularly due to the excitement of the younger women. When the teenage vampire, named Edward, came onto the screen, looking much like James Dean, the girls literally swooned and screamed, and continued to do so periodically for the rest of the film. The young female lead, named Bela, reminiscent of Bela Lugosi, exhibited the typical angst of the average teenage female – divorced parents, forced relocation to a new school, struggling to fit in and be understood. Enter the vampire boyfriend, strikingly handsome, and obviously desiring her in every way. He saves her from a car accident and from a gang rape. He want her, but he also fears his desire to feast on her. Even when they kiss, he must restrain himself, because he thinks he may not be able to stop. Ultimately, he risks destuction by a purely evil vampire to save his mortal girlfriend. In one notable scene, she says: “I know three thing for certain about Edward. First, he is a vampire. Second, there is part of him, perhaps even a dominant part of him, that wants to kill me. Third, I am completely in love with him.” Although Edward is significantly more human than Nosferatu, he is still somewhat dominated by the negative animus, with all the bloodthirstiness that comes with that complex. Why would she fall so deeply in love with him? Linda Leonard coins the term “demon lover” to describe this type of attraction. In describing the demon lover, Leonard says, “he halts our progress by possessing us. This state of possession is experienced in many different ways – for example, through obsessive jealousy, any form of addiction, the state of being a perpetual willing victim, feeding off the blood of others, or offering up one’s own lifeblood or creativity to another.” There is a telling scene in the movie, where Bela is being sped out of town, chased by a horrific monster, when she sees other teenage girls, enjoying simple fun with their human boyfriends, and Bela has a moment of reflection. What might her life had been if she had taken one of the many invitations she had from human teengage boys to be a simple teenage girl. But, she looks over at her heroic, handsome, vampire boyfriend, and her regrets disappear. This, it seems, is her destiny. Or is it really?

Consider the following poem by M Mercedes Giron-Cerna, titled “Dracula”:

When men are gone,

ignorance of this union

where no alive man sits,

gives vent to a deep red demon

who lives in an empty corner of night,

better than complete oblivion,

he holds down the curtain on morning,

an Image,

beautiful and deadly,

growing out of dry bones ad bitter dirt,

shaped by forced labor in a stone country without trees or running water.

He devours the gentle sweet thoughts that caress the softest
folds,

blooming flowers wither and faith turns in on itself

my being, crawling on its belly away /rom the identifying

light,

believing itself a grey worm,

it is reluctant to come out at all.

The air begins to stink of decay

propping up corpses, all in a row,

the eyes glaze over

I forget to light a candle,

enslaved, not in love, with a dream demon,

smiling down on me

from a cemetery plot.

Part 3

How does one thwart an attack by a vampire? It’s not likely that you are going to find Bela Lugosi in your basement tonight. The vampires we are discussing are patterns of trauma and limitation which we may encounter within ourselves or in the people we encounter each day. If we succumb to these patterns, we lose ourselves. It takes a great deal of energy to individuate, to become more and more who we really are, to claim our unique identity and destiny. Vampires – internal and external—divert energies to less worthy purposes, to fears and insecurities. They are symbolic of what Jung called complexes, particularly the negative animus, a particularly virulent disruption in the masculine principle.

I will suggest ten strategies today. There may well be others, but these are the ones I feel are grounded in Jungian theory and reflected in the folklore about vampires.

1) Believe in the existence of vampires.

This is the most basic step. None of the others will work if this one is ignored. Vampires, like all complexes, attempt to claim our identity. On some level, we know that we are feeling or acting in a way that is not consistent with our true identity. Internally, vampires are moods that descend on us, giving rise to impulses which we may feel compelled to act upon. Externally, vampires are people who carry these types of patterns for us. This is not to excuse our tendency to project. Sometimes, we just use people like screens on which we project our fears and limitations. But, sometime people really do carry the complexes. They have given themselves over to fears and limits, and they actively want others to feel fearful and limited. The trick is to recognize the patterns, in ourselves and others, and not just consider them normal.

2) Ground yourself in your feelings.

Pay attention to your feelings. Don’t ignore that you are experiencing emotion, perhaps strong emotion. Name the feelings, preferably out loud. What is the reaction? How do the feelings shift when you hear yourself say them? If you tell someone else, “here is how I am feeling,” how does the person react. If the person is consumed by vampire patterns, he or she will attempt to convince you that you don’t have the feelings, that you shouldn’t have the feelings, or that you shouldn’t talk about the feelings. Trust your feelings and what they want you to do more or do less.

3) Pay attention to your body.

Your body has a wisdom that your mind often disregards. If your heart is pounding, if you feel a bit dizzy, if you feel muscle tension or a gnawing pain in your stomach, these are all meaningful signals. Fatigue is particularly significant in regard to vampires. Vampires devour our energy, including our physical energy. They compel us to disregard our body’s sensations and vulnerabilities. If we feel an impulse to take unnecessary risks, drive our bodies past reasonable endurance limits, dismiss needs for food or comfort, there is a danger that vampires are nearby.

4) Find humor in the situation.

In her book Addiction to Perfection, Marion Woodman writes, “One thing that complex hates is fun; it reduces everything to grim responsibility.” If you can’t find any level of humor or fun in the situation, the vampire may be present. The same is true of certain people in our life. If they become angry or indignant at even the slightest sense of fun, they are probably driven by the complex.

5) Notice if you feel more cynical and “flat” and less creative or inspired.

These are the first “victims” of the vampire. Vampires block creativity and inspiration. When they are blocked, a vampire might be present, either internally or externally.

6) Equip yourself with a powerful symbol that links you to the transcendent.

In the old vampire legends, people protected themselves from vampires by holding up a powerful symbol, like pure silver, a crucifix or holy water. What might this mean psychologically? Symbols link us to the transcendent. The symbol is powerful because it feels connected to our deeper core, to the greater pattern of meaning. If your encounter leaves you doubting the reality of the transcendent, it’s further evidence of a vampire attack. Vampires thrive when we feel isolated and alone in a flat world, devoid of meaning.

7) “Go into the daylight.”

In many vampire legends, the vampires cannot live in the light of day. They are literally reduced to dust. Psychologically, this means that vampire complexes recede when we allow the light of objective consciousness to shine on the situation. This requires us to be able to step back and see things as an outsider might see it. Regardless of our history, or the eloquence of our vampire, certain things are simply true and other things are false. Can we name them as such. Going into the daylight also means violating unhealth patterns of secrecy – to send the vampire away, we might need to talk to someone about what is happening, particularly someone who has our best interests at heart.

8) Pin it to the earth.

To kill a vampire, it needs to be pinned, to have a stake put through its heart into the earth, connecting it to the ground so it can’t shift forms, can’t lash out, can’t disappear into the ether. Pinning to the earth means bringing something down to material reality. Vampires tend to engender an obsesssion with perfection, disregarding human dimensions and consequences. In the domain of perfection and abstraction, there is no room for compassion, for understanding of uncertainty and failty. Give voice to your compassion for yourself. Embrace your humanness, in all its weakness. Notice the reaction.

9) If seized by an impulse, do an active imagination where the predominant question is “And then what?” Ask it over and over again.

Vampires, like all complexes, are immediate and impulsive. They don’t concern themselves with the future or with consequences. They don’t care if we suffer or even if we die. They impregnate us with impulses, and they get impatient when we don’t act on these impulses immediately. Before acting on an impulse, defy the vampire and explore consequences.

10) Balance the negative with the positive

The negative animus is so prevalent in our culture, we forget that there is also a positive animus. Where the negative animus is unrelentingly critical and deprecating, the positive animus emboldens and inspires. The negative animus says, “You are going to fail. Just give up.” The positive animus says, “Make your mark. You can do it.” When faced with an embodiment of the negative animus – a vampire – one can summon up an embodiment of the positive animus. There are a variety of positive animus figures from myth and legend – for example, the Archangel Michael, Krishna, or Sir Galahad. In the Dracula novel, the heroin Mina is accompanied by several positive animus figures, including an American cowboy. The trick is to find some image of the positive animus that feels as real and as compelling as the vampire.

Jung talked about four stages or roles for animus, and said that each stage calls forth a different image or symbol. These stages also tell us what qualities we might look for in a positive animus:

The athlete -- Also referred to as the thug or the muscleman, Jung described it as the embodiment of physical power.

The planner -- This stage embodies the capacity for independence, planned action, and initiative.

The professor -- Also referred to as the cleric, it embodies "the Word."

The guide -- Like "Sofia," this is highest level of mediation between the unconscious and conscious mind.