by Ruth Snowden
4 Exploring the psyche
Jung emphasised that it was important to study both the personal unconscious and the collective unconscious in order to understand the human psyche. Freud saw the unconscious as being a repressed part of the mind where we shut away unacceptable ideas and thoughts. Jung saw it very differently – for him it was the true basis of the human psyche, from which consciousness arose.
Jung said that balance is vitally important in the psyche. For example the ego (who we think we are) and the shadow (unacknowledged aspects of ourselves that we deny) work together in the psyche as a balancing pair. He did not find it helpful to identify separate driving instincts within the psyche as others had done. He preferred instead to use the term libido to describe a general psychic energy.
5 The journey of the psyche
The individual psyche is always changing as it seeks growth and wholeness on its journey towards the true Self. Jung proposed several basic principles at work, all based on natural laws.
The principle of opposites – every aspect of the psyche naturally has an opposite aspect.
The principle of equivalence – equal amounts of energy are given to each of the opposites. If we deny certain aspects, energy may become blocked.
The principle of entropy – this describes the tendency for all systems to ‘run down’ as energy is evenly distributed. This means that opposites tend eventually to blend together.
The journey of the psyche follows archetypal patterns, such as birth, marriage and death. These are reflected in rites of passage. In order to achieve individuation (conscious realization and fulfilment of the Self), it is important always to move forward with the flow of our lives.
6 Dreams and symbols
Dreams take a central place in analytical psychology. Jung suggested various functions of dreams:
to act as compensation for areas of the conscious mind which are deficient or distorted in some way;
to bring back archetypal memories from the collective unconscious;
to draw attention to aspects of our lives of which we are not consciously aware.
A dream always has personal meaning that is relevant to the dreamer, and so it can help with the individuation process. Dreams can reflect many different aspects of the individual psyche and dream symbols may also have relevance to society as a whole. Therefore the analyst needs to have a good grasp of mythological ideas so that dreams can be looked at in a collective context. It is often helpful to look at dreams with a connecting theme, because this may lead to fresh insights.
7 The personality and relationships
Jung identified two opposite and balanced attitudes in human personalities:
introversion, where the psychic energy is turned inwards, towards the inner world;
extroversion, where the psychic energy is turned outwards, towards the external world.
He then established four different functions:
thinking – this type of person relates to the world via logic and the intellect;
feeling – this type makes value judgements about the world;
sensation – this type relies mainly on sensory impressions;
intuition – this type perceives the world mainly through the unconscious.
A person’s conscious orientation will usually be towards one principal function.
Jung then combined the two attitudes and the four functions to produce eight different psychological types. A person’s psychological type influences their relationships and behaviour. Most people are a mixture of two or more types.
8 The esoteric and the paranormal
Jung studied the esoteric and the paranormal in his search for universal truths within human psychology that validated his theories about the collective unconscious. He studied Gnosticism and alchemy, which combined aspects of mysticism, magic, science and religion. In both he discovered archetypal symbolism and mythology that supported his theories.
His astrological studies and playful experimentation with the I Ching, (an ancient Chinese system of divination), led him to suggest the existence of a second natural law, that of synchronicity, that worked alongside the law of causality.
Jung believed that events in the outer world of material things were often reflected in the inner world of the psyche and vice-versa. This view is currently supported by aspects of theories in quantum physics.
9 Religion and spirituality
Jung emphasised the importance of individual experience in spiritual growth, and found the more dogmatic, fundamentalist religions unhelpful because they lead to disagreement and spiritual stagnation. All his life he grappled with the problem of evil. For example he thought the idea of a sinless God was unbalanced, because it represented a total denial of the shadow aspect. He predicted an inevitable swing-back in human society to counteract this trend.
Jung studied many religions in order to gain insight into archetypal patterns. He decided that eastern religions were mainly introverted, looking for meaning within. Western religions were more extraverted, searching for meaning in the ‘real world’. Jung thought that truth lay somewhere between, and that religions need to grow and evolve in order to answer the deep spiritual needs of ordinary people.
10 Jung the visionary
Jung’s influence has extended worldwide, making him one of the greatest thinkers of the 20 th century:
His ideas about the collective unconscious and archetypes have given us new insights into the human psyche.
His interest in dreams has expanded our understanding of the unconscious.
Many of his ideas about personality have become part of everyday thinking.
His fascination with mythology, religion and the paranormal has opened up new thinking about spiritual psychology.
Jung used various therapeutic approaches, particularly:
Exploring symbolism in dreams and fantasies.
Amplification of symbols, by exploring archetypal connections.
Association – following trains of spontaneous connected thoughts.
Active imagination using methods like drawing, painting, drama or writing.
Balancing of opposites in order to achieve greater integration in the psyche.
Jungian analysts are now trained worldwide and there are many institutions devoted to expanding his ideas.
Introduction
Carl Jung was a Swiss psychologist and psychiatrist. He lived from 1875–1961 and he is famous because he founded a new system of psychology that he called ‘analytical psychology.’
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The Greek word psyche, meaning breath, life or soul, has given us three commonly confused words:
psychology is the scientific study of the mind and behaviour
psychiatry is the study and treatment of mental illnesses
psychoanalysis is a system of psychology and method of treating mental disorders, originally developed by Sigmund Freud.
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Jung is now a well-known figure worldwide and many books have been written about him and his work. Some of his ideas and the terms that he coined have found their way into everyday use today, for example the words ‘archetype’ and ‘introvert’.
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An archetype is a universally recognizable image, or pattern of thinking, which represents a typical human concept or experience (for more about archetypes, see Chapter 3). For example, the idea of ‘Mother Earth’ often appears in mythology as a nurturing woman figure.
An introvert directs his or her interest mainly towards the inner world of thoughts and feelings (see Chapter 7).
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Jung was a prolific writer – his work stretches to over 20 volumes – and much of what we know about his life and work can be found in his autobiography, which was recorded and edited by his friend and long-term assistant Aniela Jaffé. The short quotes from Jung in this book have been taken from a translation of this title (see Further reading on page 191), unless otherwise stated.
Jung was born towards
the end of the nineteenth century, at a time when great changes were taking place in society, particularly in the field of science. Charles Darwin’s (1809–82) theory of evolution had challenged religious thinking, causing people to question the truth of what was written in the Bible. Freud (1856–1939) was expanding people’s awareness of the importance of the unconscious in human psychology. Even the structure of society was changing, and people were searching for new truths and becoming more interested in self-knowledge.
The conscious mind is the part of the mind that is aware of its actions and emotions. The unconscious is made up of the parts of the mind and personality that a person is not aware of.
Jung was a great scholar and his interests were wide ranging, covering such areas as astrology, alchemy, Gnosticism, archaeology and world religions, as well as psychology, psychiatry and medicine, in which he had originally trained. He was adept at languages – he mastered Latin, Greek, French and English in addition to his native German. His thinking and his work sprang not only from these interests, but also from his practical experience working with people who came to see him professionally.
Alchemy is an esoteric practice combining aspects of mysticism, magic, science and religion. Gnosticism is an ancient esoteric practice concerned with occult mystical knowledge (see Chapter 8).
Jung’s research covered many spiritual traditions, because he was trying to search for truths that were common to all mankind. Frequently, he turned to the mystical and spiritual teachings of the East, as well as looking at Western traditions. This was not done as a rejection of his own culture, but rather in order to seek wholeness, and fill in the gaps he saw in both ways of thinking. As a result, his writing is of interest to people from both Eastern and Western cultures, helping them to understand one another better.
Jung found many symbols in Eastern philosophy and religion that reflected his own dreams and visions, often in startling ways. He became fascinated by the way these common themes ran through the myths and cultures of so many different people. For him they reflected the underlying inner knowledge, like a vast invisible sea, that he believed linked all human thinking. This led him to the idea of the collective unconscious, which is one of the central themes in Jungian teaching.
The collective unconscious is the deepest layer of the unconscious which extends beyond the individual psyche (see Chapter 4).
The idea evolved partly from discussions with Freud, who was a friend and mentor to Jung and had a huge influence on him early in his career, until irreconcilable differences in their thinking eventually drove them apart. Freud had suggested that the developmental process in a child also reflected the entire history of the human race. Each individual has their own private life history, which emerges during dream work and analysis, but there is also a bigger picture, common to all of us, which manifests itself as built-in symbolic connections that the individual has not acquired by learning. Jung took Freud’s idea a lot further and gave this deepest layer of the unconscious its name.
His inner world, in particular his dreams, were of great interest to Jung throughout his life and he recounts dreams that were deeply significant to him from a very early age. I too have been fascinated by dreams since I was about five years old, when I had a terrifying, recurring dream. In my dream the whole world was covered by a gigantic factory, apart from one small remaining field which contained a solitary flower. This was 1950’s rural England, wildflowers abounded, and as far as I am aware people around me were not yet talking about global ecological disasters. My family had no television and the only radio I listened to was children’s hour. Where did this dream come from? Did it somehow arise from the collective unconscious? I’m sure that Jung would have been very interested in it and I would love to have been able to discuss it with him.
For Jung, a person’s spiritual life was of paramount importance in the healing process. An individual’s personal history was what mattered – Jung listened carefully to what his patients had to say on this subject. He regarded clinical diagnoses as being useful only to the doctor, for the purpose of giving him or her a frame of reference. He did not regard them as being helpful to the patient.
The emphasis on the importance of the individual, coupled with the underlying collective unconscious, meant that the system of analytical psychology that Jung developed was very much a spiritual psychology. This set it apart from the mainstream, which tended to be rigidly mechanistic in outlook. The mechanistic approach meant that doctors and scientists tended to see people as machines, whose behaviour was strictly determined by physical or chemical processes. Jung did not conform to this way of thinking: he had a lifelong fascination with the spiritual and the numinous (experiences that are awe-inspiring and uplifting, suggesting that there is a divine force at work in the universe). Jung said that such experiences formed the most important aspect of his work. This is the main reason why I find his work so interesting, because even nowadays not very many scientists are willing to admit to being involved in a search for spiritual truths.
Jung coined the phrase ‘analytical psychology’ around 1913 in order to describe his work and to distinguish it from the system of psychoanalysis, originally developed by Freud. Analytical psychology is a whole system of psychology, which Jung developed gradually throughout his life. His ideas came from various sources:
nearly 60 years worth of experience as a practising psychiatrist, studying the experiences of his patients
the painstaking study of his own inner world and its dreams, visions and symbols
from reading widely and travelling in order to explore the myths and religious beliefs of many cultures.
Myths are traditional stories that try to explain natural, social, or religious ideas and phenomena (see Chapter 3).
The main aspects of analytical psychology are that it:
is a method of therapy, aimed not only at treating mental and nervous disorders, but also at helping ordinary people to become more balanced and self-aware
attempts to provide a map of the human psyche in order to understand more fully how it works
explores the deeper aspects of human psychology through the study of religious beliefs, dreams, myths, symbols and the paranormal.
Paranormal things and events are ones that cannot be explained by normal, objective means within the framework of current understanding. Consider this – in the Middle Ages anyone seen using a telephone would have been thought to be using dangerous paranormal powers (and would most likely have been burned at the stake!).
Jung was always willing to learn from his patients, the majority of whom were women, and he found the dreams and images with which they presented him endlessly fascinating. He said that they constantly gave him insights into his own nature. He was the first modern psychiatrist to recognize that the human psyche is ‘religious’ by nature, meaning that it is natural for us to seek that which is above and beyond our own sphere of existence. He referred to himself as a ‘healer of the soul’, exploring deep within his own psyche and those of his patients.
Jung based his psychology on explorations of his own inner world, as well his as work with people ranging from ‘normal’ to those with neurotic problems and even those who were suffering from psychosis (more extreme forms of mental illness). Jung was one of the first psychiatrists to attempt psychoanalysis with patients suffering from psychosis. Freud, the ‘father of psychoanalysis’, had warned against this, saying that such people were not suitable for analysis.
A neurosis is a minor nervous or mental disorder, whereas a psychosis is a severe mental disorder.
Freud and his followers were mainly concerned with early childhood trauma and the ways in which this affected a person’s adult psyche. This meant that they focused mainly on the patient’s past, stating that the first five years of life were all-important. Jung recognized that this was partly true, but he was more concerned with adult psychology, working with people who had largely moved on from this stage and were willing to take the perso
nal development process further.
Many of Jung’s patients seemed to him to be stuck because their thinking was too one-sided. He was very interested in the idea that the personality contains opposite and conflicting aspects – finding a balance between these is very important for individual progress. Jung said that it was essential for a person to understand their own psyche, and work with it in this way to achieve a sense of individuality, before they can achieve satisfactory relationships with others.
Jung always encouraged people to experience things for themselves and, where possible, to develop their own insights. So important was the inner world of the psyche to Jung that he regarded what he called the process of individuation as the central concept of his psychology. By this he means the lifelong journey that each of us must take in our gradual quest to become whole – a process of the conscious realization and fulfilment of the self. One of Jung’s great strengths was his willingness to work on himself, and he never asked people to explore areas that he had not explored in his own psyche. He knew he had failings and was prepared to acknowledge them – he could be irritable, bad tempered and very demanding. When he was nearly 60, he said that his whole life had been a struggle to overcome childish traits, of which, regrettably, many still remained.