Relationships offer a path to heal our emotional trauma through divine alchemy. Alchemy is the ancient mystical art of transmuting base metals into gold, and is a metaphor for intimate relationships. Divine alchemy refers to the transformation of unconscious emotional material, often associated with trauma—pain, conflict, shame, fear, and unmet needs—into authentic connection, intimacy, and inner wholeness.
With divine alchemy, love becomes less about seeking comfort and more about awakening. This transformation doesn’t just refine our connection with another—it refines our relationship with ourselves.
It begins not by fixing the other, but by turning inward. This isn’t easy. Through conscious effort, relationships become the crucible that reveals our inner gold.
The Alchemical Challenge of Love
As Carl Jung observed, “The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.” Relationships ignite transformation. They bring to the surface what has been buried in our unconscious—our childhood wounds, shadow aspects, unintegrated emotions, and unspoken needs. Often, the more intense our reaction, the more our unconscious patterns are being triggered.
In attempts to heal and find wholeness, codependents tend to merge in relationships. However, growth, individuation, and wholeness require the opposite: separation that permits authentic connection between two autonomous individuals.
Our Partner as a Mirror of the Disowned Self
A central alchemical insight is that our partner often reflects our unconscious traits, both the light and the shadow. According to Hal Stone and Sidra Stone, creators of Voice Dialogue and pioneers in understanding the psyche’s subpersonalities, we tend to project both our disowned parts and our unrealized potential onto our partners.
This means that our partner often reflects unconscious traits within us. What we admire, such as creativity, adventure, or spontaneity, may be qualities we long to reclaim within ourselves. What we resent—control, selfishness, emotional intensity—may mirror rejected or underdeveloped parts of us.
For instance, if our partner is direct and bold and we shrink in response, we may have disowned our assertiveness. Or if we see them as irresponsible or chaotic, perhaps we’ve over-identified with order and control. Relational alchemy is the art of using the mirror of the other to reclaim and reintegrate the lost pieces of the Self.
Pain as a Portal to Childhood Wounds
Most of the emotional pain that arises in relationships is not new—it’s ancient. Emotional pain in relationships often echoes unresolved childhood wounds. Our current pain may seem worse than that in our childhood. One explanation is that our body and psyche are reacting to feelings as we did as a vulnerable child or infant, which we may not even remember, who felt invisible, rejected, smothered, or not good enough (shame). We developed adaptive defenses: withdrawal, denial, people-pleasing, rebellion, or emotional shutdown. These once-helpful survival strategies now get activated in our adult relationships, often in distorted or destructive ways.
These are not flaws but signals to investigate and heal. As adults, we are no longer powerless children. We can meet these old wounds with compassion, set protective boundaries, and express needs maturely.
From Projection to Ownership
Instead of attacking or withdrawing when conflict arises, we pause to look within. What unmet needs or feelings are being triggered? What does this remind me of from my childhood? What am I projecting onto my partner? This is the move from unconscious reactivity to conscious ownership.
Example: Instead of, “You’re so selfish for going out with your friends again,” we ask ourselves: Why am I afraid of being left? Am I uncomfortable asking for closeness?
We can also express directly: “I’m feeling left out and lonely tonight. I’d love to feel more connected this weekend. Can we make some plans together?”
This is not self-sacrifice—it’s self-responsibility, which builds authentic intimacy.
From Criticism to Assertiveness
Assertive communication is one of the essential tools of relational alchemy. In my work, books, and webinar How to Be Assertive, I teach that assertiveness expresses our thoughts, feelings, needs, and boundaries clearly and respectfully, without guilt or aggression. It allows us to honor ourselves while staying connected to others. Instead of lashing out or retreating, assertiveness sounds like:
- “I feel overwhelmed and need some space to regroup.”
- “I value our time together and want to make plans in advance.”
- “I’m not okay with being yelled at. Let’s talk when we’re calm.”
This form of self-expression transforms conflict into connection, and it reclaims our voice without domination or submission.
From Emotional Dependence to Emotional Autonomy
Many of us carry the unconscious belief that our partner is responsible for our happiness, security, or sense of self. But this dependency often leads to power struggles, disappointment, or quiet resentment.
Because no parent is perfect, psychoanalyst D.E. Winnicott developed the concept of the “good-enough mother.” He suggested that while emotional support is necessary, developing true autonomy requires frustration, boundaries, and learning to self-regulate. The same is true in adult love.
In the above Example, we can ask, “Am I expecting that my partner make me happy?” (or “heal my loneliness, depression, or emptiness?”) We might then ask ourselves, “What can I do right now to comfort and connect with myself?”
The challenge is to stop expecting rescue and to start resourcing ourselves. We can still need and rely on our partners, but not from a place of helplessness. We step into our sovereignty, and from there, create a relationship of mutual support rather than dependency.
From Blame to Responsibility—and No Blame
Blame is the language of unconsciousness. We avoid the shame we’re unaware of by judging and blaming others or by absorbing guilt and blame that other people project onto us. An abuser blames the victim, and the victim blames the abuser. But, in relationships, “there are no villains—only victims and collaborators.”
We co-create the dynamics we suffer from, and that recognition is where true empowerment begins. That doesn’t mean we are responsible for our partner’s abuse, but just the opposite – for our response. It’s an invitation to undertake the difficult task of changing the power dynamics and/or leaving the relationships.
As we evolve, we move through stages. In moments of insight, we swing the pendulum from blaming others to blaming ourselves. But real alchemy happens in the third stage: finally, no blame—just curiosity, compassion for ourselves and our partner. Then we have a conscious choice.
Instead of looking for a perpetrator, we start looking for a pattern. We ask:
- What is this conflict trying to teach me?
- What role am I playing?
- What do I truly feel—and how can I express that?
- What do I truly need—and how can I express that or meet the need myself?
This is the shift from ego to soul, from fear to growth. As Erich Fromm said in The Art of Loving, love is not just a feeling—it is a skill that must be practiced with awareness, humility, and care.
Alchemy in Action: A Case Study
Let’s say Taylor often feels dismissed when their partner, Morgan, interrupts during conversations. Instead of angrily declaring, “You never listen to me!” Taylor pauses, reflects, and realizes that being interrupted evokes old feelings of invisibility from childhood. Rather than blaming or retreating, Taylor says: “When I’m interrupted, I feel disregarded—it touches a sensitive place for me. Can we slow down a little so I feel heard?”
Here, Taylor takes back the projection, names the inner experience, and asserts a need—not from blame, but from vulnerability. This is alchemy. It might require exploring and healing an earlier trauma of being unseen with a therapist. In conjoint therapy, Morgan might reveal that interrupting was modeled by one parent or that it was the only way Morgan could be heard. Now the couple is building bridges of compassion and empathetic, authentic communication.
Conclusion: Transmuting Love, Transmuting Self
The divine alchemy of relationships is a soulful, lifelong path. It demands courage, self-reflection, and patience. But the reward is profound: a relationship that doesn’t just soothe our wounds, but awakens our wholeness.
Our partner may not be the cause of our suffering, but they are the mirror in which our unconscious becomes visible. The question is not, “How do I fix them?” but “What is this dynamic revealing in me?” Inevitably, a change by one partner changes the other, as well as the dance steps in the relationship.
From the fiery crucible of conflict, misunderstanding, and vulnerability emerges the gold of deeper intimacy, mature love, and liberated selfhood.
Lead vs. Gold in Relationship Alchemy
| From Lead (Unconscious) | To Gold (Alchemical Transformation) |
| “You never listen to me!” | “I feel unheard. I’d like more connection.” |
| Expecting rescue or completion | Practice autonomy and self-care |
| Over-giving, acquiescing, resenting | Set boundaries and express needs clearly |
| Criticism and blame | Assertive communication |
| Suppressing anger | Name and own anger constructively |
| Projecting fears or traits onto a partner | Recognize and integrate disowned parts |
| Childhood defenses (denial, withdrawing, | Inquire, be present, and assertive |
| Pleasing, rebelling) |
It is difficult to do this work on our own without a guide or therapist, because we don’t know what is unconscious. Our patterns remain unconscious to protect us from painful and traumatic memories, and because we lack the knowledge, model, and skills to protect ourselves and respond differently. You can begin by healing shame and doing the exercises in Conquering Shame and Codependency: 8 Steps to Freeing the True You, How to Raise Your Self-Esteem, and How to be Assertive.
© 2025 Darlene Lancer