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December 29, 2021 - January 2, 2022
An archetype, he said, is not ‘an inherited idea’ but rather ‘an inherited mode of functioning, corresponding to the inborn way in which the chick emerges from the egg, the bird builds its nest, a certain kind of wasp stings the motor ganglion of the caterpillar, and eels find their way to the Bermudas. In other words, it is a “pattern of behaviour”.
sociobiology also holds that the psycho-social development in individual members of a species is dependent on what are termed epigenetic rules (epi = upon, genesis = development; i.e. rules upon which development proceeds);
Essentially, the theory can be stated as a psychological law: whenever a phenomenon is found to be characteristic of all human communities, it is an expression of an archetype of the collective unconscious.
unus mundus, or ‘unitary world’ – the eternal ground of all empirical being.
He conceived archetypes to be the mediators of the unus mundus, responsible for organizing ideas and images in the psyche as well as for governing the fundamental principles of matter and energy in the physical world.
synchronicity: ‘A coincidence in time of two or more causally unrelated events which have the same or similar meaning’
anything that happens is related to everything else that happens at the same time.
Our Western world-view teaches that time is a purely abstract measure, but, if we are honest, it never feels as if it is.
Each stage is mediated through a new set of archetypal imperatives which seek fulfilment in both our personality and our behaviour.
postulated archetypal components which play specific roles in the psychic development and social adjustment of everyone. These include the ego, persona, shadow, anima, and animus.
Jung considered these to be archetypal structures which are built into the personal psyche in the form of complexes during the course of development.
Jung’s ‘Self’ which transcends the ego and inheres the age-old capacities of the species. Its goal is wholeness, the complete realization of the blueprint for human existence within the context of the life of the individual.
Individuation is the raison d’être of the Self.
Though it has evident biological goals, the Self also seeks fulfilment in the spiritual achievements of art and religion and in the inner life of the soul. Hence we can experience it as a profound mystery, ...
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ego–Self axis, and it is on this axis that the stability of the personality depends.
The ego is itself the centre of consciousness and it is what we refer to when we use the terms ‘I’ or ‘me’.
ego can be identified with his ‘No. 1’ personality
Self with his ‘No. 2’.
the first half of life it is essential to develop a strong and effective ego if one is to deal competentl...
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Only in the second half of life does it become possible for the ego to recognize its subordinate status in relation to the Self – an indispensable stage in the progress of individuation.
Then the ego begins to confront the Self and the Self the ego, and through the mediation of the transcendent function (which we will examine later) bring about the attainment of personality integration and higher consciousness.
social archetype or the conformity archetype,
shadow as a complex – that is to say, a cluster of traits bound together by common affects
To defend ourselves from this threat, and to sustain our peace of mind, we make use of a variety of ego-defence mechanisms, particularly repression, denial, and projection.
Not only do we repress the shadow in the personal unconscious, but we deny its existence in ourselves, and project it out on to others. This is done quite unconsciously: we are not aware that we do it. It is an act of ego-preservation which enables
the animus in women and the anima in men. As the feminine aspect of man and the masculine aspect of woman, they function as a pair of opposites (the syzygy) in the unconscious of both, profoundly influencing the relations of all men and women with each other.
He therefore felt justified in viewing the psyche as a self-regulating system which strives perpetually to maintain a balance between opposing propensities, while, at the same time, seeking its own growth and development.
The psyche is a self-regulating system that maintains its equilibrium just as the body does. Every process that goes too far immediately and inevitably calls forth compensations, and without these there would be neither a normal metabolism nor a normal psyche. In this sense we can take the theory of compensation as a basic law of psychic behaviour. Too little on one side results in too much on the other. Similarly, the relation between conscious and unconscious is compensatory.
Jung learned that regression can act in the service of growth and that psychiatric illness may represent an effort on the part of the psyche to heal itself.
an enantiodromia occurs, carrying with it terse intimations of mortality. For many this is a time of crisis, of self-doubt, and inner questioning. ‘What exactly have I achieved with my life?’ ‘What am I to do with the rest of it?’ ‘What is there to look forward to but old age, infirmity, and death?’
he viewed individuation as a biological principle evident in all living organisms and not restricted to human beings.
‘Individuation’, he wrote, ‘is an expression of that biological process – simple or complicated as the ease may be – by which every living thing becomes what it was destined to become from the beginning’
To use these years to become as complete a human being as we can within the limitations of our culture is to contribute to the well-being of society as much as to the personal fulfilment of our lives.
To individuate is to realize one’s personal existence as a unique expression of humanity and, within the frail vessel of one’s little psychic world, to distil the essence of creation.
(1) that the equipment consists of four psychological functions, which he named sensation, thinking, feeling, and intuition, all of which are available a priori to everybody,
(2) that individuals differ in regard to which of the four functions they use for preference.
Jung considered thinking and feeling to be rational functions and sensation and intuition to be irrational functions.
Whereas the extravert is oriented primarily to events in the outer world, the introvert is primarily concerned with the inner world.
two attitude types and the four functional types it becomes theoretically possible to describe eight psychological types: the extraverted sensation type, the introverted sensation type, the extraverted thinking type, the introverted thinking type, and so on.
In all instances, he concluded, the distinctions represented a fundamental difference between extraverted and introverted attitudes.
Alfred Binet’s distinction (made in his L’Étude experimentale de l’intelligence, 1903) between two types of intellectual attitude, which he termed ‘introspection’ and ‘externospection’.
Jung’s theory of dreams can be summarized under four headings: 1. Dreams are natural, spontaneous events, which proceed independently of conscious will or intention; 2. Dreams are both purposive and compensatory, in that they serve to promote the balance and individuation of the personality; 3. The symbols of dreams are true symbols, not signs, and they possess a transcendent function; 4. The therapeutic power of dreams is better served by the techniques of amplification and active imagination than by interpretation based on ‘free association’.
Similarly, the relation between conscious and unconscious is compensatory. This is one of the best-proven rules of dream interpretation. When we set out to interpret a dream, it is always helpful to ask: What conscious attitude does it compensate?’
To Jung, symbols were natural growth factors which made possible the development of the personality, the resolution of conflict, and the transcendence of polar oppositions.
All opposites are intrinsically irreconcilable: but conflict between any pair of opposites generates tension which motivates the psyche to seek a third possibility that transcends them both.
In these a definite structure can be perceived, which Jung divided into four stages: (1) the exposition, which sets the place and often the time of the action, as well as the dramatis personae involved; (2) the development of the plot, in which the situation becomes complicated and ‘a definite tension develops because one does not know what will happen’; (3) the culmination or peripeteia, when ‘something decisive happens or something changes completely’; and (4) the lysis, the conclusion, the solution, or result of the dream-work
Put in its widest conceptual context, therefore, mental health and mental illness are both functions of homeostatic balance or imbalance between the needs of the individual and the demands of the collective.
psychiatric symptoms are persistent exaggerations of natural psychophysiological responses
Jung’s understanding of symptom formation as a creative act is of the highest value for the development of therapeutic optimism in both patient and therapist, for instead of regarding the symptoms as representing a form of futile suffering, it sees them as the growing pains of a soul struggling to escape fear and find fulfilment,
Neurosis, he said, in the nearest he came to a definitive definition, is the suffering of a soul that has not found its meaning.
