Becca Tarnas
Archetypes, Synchronicity, and Magic
July 19, 2026 — 10 AM PT/ 1 PM ET/ 6 PM GMT
In recent years, astrology and magic have caught the collective imagination and are enjoying an unexpected renaissance through new social platforms. Astrology and magic have ancient roots and persisted across the centuries through multiple evolving world views before the modern, scientific mind disavowed them. Yet, while astrology is being quietly accepted in certain small corners of the academic and depth psychological spheres, magic is still firmly barred at the gates. How can we even begin to understand astrological magic in the contemporary world? Doing so requires reconciling different cosmologies and paradigms, synthesizing ancient and medieval spiritual and religious perspectives with modern philosophy and psychology to bring forward language and concepts that speak to our place in an evolving cosmos. In light of such a synthesis, this presentation will explore archetypal theory and the concept of synchronicity—a term coined by the depth psychologist C.G. Jung—to illuminate a contemporary understanding of astrological correlations and magical praxis.
Becca Tarnas, PhD, is Assistant Professor in the Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness program at the California Institute of Integral Studies. She received her doctorate from CIIS, where her dissertation, The Back of Beyond: The Red Books of C. G. Jung and J. R. R. Tolkien, brought depth psychology, literary imagination, and archetypal inquiry into a richly original dialogue. Her work moves at the intersection of philosophy, literature, ecology, and consciousness studies, with a particular gift for illuminating the imaginal dimensions of human experience.
She is an editor of Archai: The Journal of Archetypal Cosmology and the author of Journey to the Imaginal Realm: A Reader’s Guide to J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. Her scholarship and public work reflect a sustained engagement with C.G. Jung, Tolkien, archetypal studies, and the ecological imagination, and she is currently researching and writing a biography of Stanislav Grof, one of the co-founders of transpersonal psychology.