I have concluded that the auxiliary function is carried by a stable parental figure (usually a father in a man and a mother in a woman) and the tertiary function by an unstable child figure, given to cycles of inflation and deflation (puer aeternus in a man, puella aeterna in a woman). Although von Franz spoke broadly of the fourth, inferior function as ‘the door through which all the figures of the unconscious come’ (1971/1998: 67), I have identified the fourth function, experienced by the ego as a problematic aspect of itself, not with the shadow, but with the anima and animus.
