Carl Jung and the Paranormal, Part 12: The Final Breakthrough

This post is the final one of a series on the paranormal experiences of Carl Jung, founder of Analytic Psychology.

For the initial posting that began this series, click here.

In 1944, Carl Jung broke his foot. Not only that, he also had a devastating heart attack. Near death in a hospital, he proceeded to have visions that changed his life.

These visions that came and went were so strong he knew he must be close to dying even though no one said this to him . His outlook got reinforced when a nurse told him she saw a bright glow all around his body.

Photo courtesy of NASA

At one point in his visions, Jung found himself high in space, looking down at the earth. Put simply, this is what he saw:

The blue light of earth and the deep, rich colors of the land areas
The continent of Asia below him
Snow on top of the Himalaya Mountains
The Arabian Peninsula
Part of the Mediterranean

Remember, this was 1944, way before the age of orbiting space craft and artificial satellites. When Jung later asked a friend in the scientific community about what he saw, the friend told him that the only way anyone could actual see such things would be from 1000 miles in space.

Space art courtesy of NASA

Into his vision a gigantic, dark  chunk of stone appeared. As he stared at it, Jung noticed an entrance. Attracted to the entrance, he went through it and found a room where an Asian man dressed in white was meditating. There were little niches in the walls all around the room containing oil lamps.

As Jung approached the man, all sorts of strange things occurred:

His entire earthly existence seemed to wash away as if the essence of who he was had  been annihilated.
Everything he had ever done, seen or planned left him completely.  An extremely painful experience at first.
Finally, as he realized he had been stripped of his identity, he also understood that he no long needed or wanted anything at all.
At that point, he accepted what was happening and realized the loss of his identity didn’t matter.

Suddenly, Jung’s awareness shifted and he found himself about to enter a huge temple. He knew without a doubt he would soon be meeting people inside the temple who had the answers to all of his questions. Finally, he would truly understand his existence.

Photo courtesy of NASA

Again, Jung had his  awareness yanked in another direction before he could actually get inside the temple. Once again, he saw the earth far below him. But as he stared at it, he noticed something odd in the region of Europe.

Something seemed to be between him and that portion of the earth. Whatever the “something” was, it appeared to be getting bigger and coming towards him.

When :it” finally arrived, the object turned out to be the doctor who was treating Jung in the hospital. Immediately, Jung recognized the strength of his doctor’s spirit that allowed him to make the journey all the way from earth.

Instantly, the doctor and Jung began to communicate–telepathically. The doctor told Jung that the earth had asked him to be its representative. This, the doctor said,  was a protest against Jung’s impending death.

As soon as the doctor delivered his message, the vision collapses and Jung was back in his hospital bed and back to his very painful illness.

It took three weeks for Carl Jung to really make up his mind that he truly wanted to live. In fact, he initially developed an almost violent resistance to his doctor because Jung blamed the man for spiritually pulling him away from death’s door. When he was finally able to let that blame go, Jung started worrying about his doctor. He came to believe that the man’s life was in danger because his spiritual trip up into space from Europe had drained so much of his life force.

After listening to Jung’s  description of the vision and the possible danger, the doctor dismissed it all as hallucinations. Angrily, Jung argued with the man, trying desperately to save his life.  Those discussions went nowhere.

Turned out that Carl Jung was his his doctor’s last patient. Once Jung had fully decided to live and was able to sit on the edge of his hospital bed, his doctor died.

According to Jung, the time after his illness was the most insightful and productive of his career. He died in 1961.

For those who are interested in Jung’s theory of synchronicity, here’s one for you. Last week, I broke a bone in my foot. Until I sat down a while ago to write this article, I had actually forgotten about Jung’s broken foot. The heart attack hasn’t occurred yet and I would just as soon allow the coincidences between me and Jung to stop at one.

For other postings about Carl Jung’s supernatural journeys, go to the blog category titled, “Paranormal and Carl Jung.”