http://jungiancenter.org/blog/ This is a supplemental site to jungiancenter.org. If you have found this site through blogging, check out our Web site. Here you will find a full description of the Jungian Center, who we are, what we do and what we offer. en Copyright 2004-2005 jungian@jazvt.com jungian@jazvt.com Ublog Reload 1.0.5 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=50 Materialism, Scientism and Jung’s Empiricism

“What most people overlook or seem unable to understand is the fact that I regard the psyche as real…”
“The ‘reality of the psyche’ is my working hypothesis, and my principal activity consists in collecting factual material to describe and explain it. I have set up neither a system nor a general theory, but have merely formulated auxiliary concepts to serve me as tools, as is customary in every branch of science.”
“You seem to forget that I am first and foremost an empiricist,…”

Jung struggled throughout his life to be understood for what he was—a true scientist—and for what his empirical method told him was true—that the psyche is real. Why was this? Why such a struggle? And why is this? Why is it that many people (especially in academia and science) still regard Jung as a “mystic,” not a scientist? Why do so many still fail to understand Jung when he spoke of the psyche as real? Even at the Jungian Center, where one might expect to find people open to and interested in Jung’s ideas, I frequently find blank expressions on students’ faces when I speak about the reality of the psyche.
This blog essay considers Jung’s dilemma in trying to get people to understand how he worked and what he found in his explorations of the inner life. We will begin by examining the dominant philosophy of our culture (materialism) and the “knowledge base” of our society (scientism) and then we’ll consider Jung’s form of science (empiricism) and how it differs from scientism. Finally we will examine Jung’s concept of the psyche, its features and centrality to Jung’s psychology.

Materialism: Why Few People Regard the Psyche as Real

The etymology or origins of the word “materialism” go way back thousands of years to the Indo-European root ma. “Matter,” “material,” “money” and “mother” all come from this root, all of these words referring to that which has physical form or substance. We got our word “materialism” from Latin materia, the “-ism” coming along in the 18th century as part of the Enlightenment’s quest to escape the ideological clutches of the Church.
Dictionaries amplify the root meaning of “materialism,” defining it as:
“the belief that all action, thought and feeling can be explained by the movements and changes of matter;…”
“the tendency to care too much for the things of this world and neglect spiritual needs;…”
“the ethical doctrine that material self-interest should and does determine conduct.”
“the doctrine that nothing exists except matter and its movements and modifications…”
“the doctrine that consciousness and will are wholly due to the operation of material agencies…”
“a tendency to prefer material possessions and physical comfort to spiritual values; …”
“a way of life based on material interests.”
The astrophysicist Bernard Haisch defines “materialism” as “… the belief that reality consists solely of matter and energy, the things that can be measured in the laboratory or observed by a telescope. Everything else is illusion or imagination….” The underlying assumption here is that “… everything will eventually be explainable in terms of electrical currents, chemical reactions, or yet-to-be-discovered physical laws—mind and spirit are mere epiphenomena.”
I think the most overarching definition—the one most closely related to our purposes here—is the description of “materialism” as “the present-day physical model of reality that matter is all there is and all there can be.” Intangibles like ideas, love, beauty, spirit, aren’t real. This denigration of intangibles has some serious implications, which we will consider below. Before discussing them, let’s examine some of the components of materialism.
Two of the most important elements of materialism are reductionism and randomness. Reductionism is the belief that a complex system (like a living being) can be understood by reducing it to its constituent parts. You want to understand an ecosystem? Just identify all the various parts of it and study each one and presto! You’ll have it figured out. The idea that a living thing might actually be more than the sum of its parts—that it might have “emergent properties” —is never considered in the reductionist’s mind-set.
Randomness is the belief that “… natural processes follow the laws of chance.” The Universe and everything in it (including you and me!) are here because of random happenstance. There is no meaning, no purpose and no destiny in life. There is also no free will, since we all are mere creatures of chance. From this it logically follows that there is no god, no Divine intention or higher power working in the world. Materialism as our culture’s current paradigm is atheistic.
It is also committed to rationalism, putting a premium on logic, the use of reason, the dismissal of superstition, and the denigration of what cannot be proven through the use of left-brain, linear mental processes (e.g. religion). This vaunting of reason leads to concoctions that warm the hearts of economists, like Rational Economic Man. Rational Economic Man (this means you and me, in the materialists’ theory) lives by utilitarian values. That is, when you and I go to the store to buy something, or when we invest our money or decide how to spend our time, we do what works for us, we determine right from wrong based on whether the action will get us what we want. We do what is in our best self-interest. The result? An ethics of expediency (if something gets us what we want, or makes piles of money, it’s right) and the greed of consumerism.
These are some of the implications of materialism. Others include the repression of meaning and true satisfaction in life (because “He who dies with the most toys, wins!” is a spiritually deadening philosophy). By killing the spiritual side of our humanity materialism fosters a sense of meaninglessness, ...]]> Wed, 01 Sep 2010 22:55:14 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=50 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=49 C.G. Jung, 1938
“For a long time I have advocated schools for the adult…”
C.G. Jung, 1960

A series of dreams in July 2005 led to the creation of the Jungian Center for the Spiritual Sciences. Dozens of dreams since then have supported it, added to its curriculum and widened its scope. I have always intuitively felt that Jung would approve of this endeavor but it is only recently, in reading Jung’s works to prepare a course on Jungian parenting that I came across his explicit statements—like those quoted above—in support of the Center’s type of educational organization.
In this essay we will consider Jung’s thoughts and preferences about how education should be conducted, and the distinction between “instruction” and “education.” Then we will examine what Jung regarded as the two halves of life and their different concerns, followed by discussions of the tasks, components and goals of adult education in a Jungian framework, and what the consequences or results of such an education might be. Lastly, we’ll discuss some of the ways the Jungian Center serves the adult learner and his/her needs.

“Instruction,” “Education” and Jung’s Thoughts on the Proper Form of Education

It is common in American society to use “instruction” and “education” interchangeably to refer to what goes on in those buildings we identify as “schools.” But in etymology, practice and their image of the learner, the two terms could not be more different. “Instruction” comes from the Latin verb instruere, meaning “to pile on.” When we “instruct” students we “pile on” them the facts, figures, techniques, and information that we feel they need to have to cope with the demands of modern life. This is essentially a one-way, teacher- or subject-centered process. It is, to some degree at least, unavoidable, since no one is born able to do sums, parse sentences, read, write, or find France on a map.
Jung recognized the necessity of instruction when he wrote that “youth… must find outside” those things it needs to acquire in order to function and flourish in contemporary society. While he admitted that modern life demanded some technical training (a trend that has intensified in a major way in the 50 years since his death), he preferred a school system oriented more to the historical and humanistic subjects, rather than the “scientific worldview, with its statistical truths….” In general, he was quite critical of most forms of education, because teachers lacked self-knowledge, the children sensed this and the result was that they came away from their studies lacking “a sense of authority, robbed of their individual nature and halted in the development of their personality.” So, while Jung knew instruction had its place, he also knew it must not be the sole form of learning, and this is especially true for the adult learner. For adults—persons at or after mid-life—a much more suitable form of learning is education.
Our English word “education” derives from the Latin exducere, meaning “to draw forth.” When we “educate” we draw out of the student what is within. This is a student-centered, dialectical process, requiring one-on-one dialog and interaction between student and teacher. It is student motivated and self-directed and reflects the shift in focus that Jung felt was a key feature of mid-life—a shift away from a preoccupation with outer reality toward a focus on one’s inner life. Jung described it in these words: “What youth found and must find outside, the man of life’s afternoon must find within himself.” As a process of recognizing and then drawing forth that which is within, education can do this; instruction cannot. So when we speak of “adult education” we are speaking about education, rather than instruction.

The Two Halves of Life and Their Different Concerns

As we noted above, Jung felt that people in the first half of life were concerned with externals: training for work and parenthood, making a living, raising a family, acquiring the material wherewithal that would support a decent life. Jung termed all these things of the “biological sphere.”
By contrast, Jung felt people in mid-life (c. age 40, usually timed when transiting Uranus comes to oppose one’s natal Uranus) and beyond were to shift their focus away from the biological to the “cultural sphere.” This shift came with a host of different concerns from earlier life: the biological instincts were subordinated to cultural goals; mental and emotional energies had to be expended to making a successful mid-life transition (a transition that is not always an easy passage); and the adult had to navigate a reorientation from regarding life as a series of ascents to recognizing the reality of descending and diminishing energies and capacities.
Jung recognized that a variety of questions commonly characterized the mid-life passage. These include such queries as:
“Where am I standing today?”
“Have my dreams come true?”
“Have I fulfilled my expectations of a happy and successful life as I imagined them 20 years ago?”
“Have I been … intelligent, reliable and enduring enough to seize my opportunities or to make the right choice at the crossroads and produce the proper answer to the problems which fate or fortune put before me?”
“What is the chance that I shall fail again in fulfilling that which I obviously have been unable to accomplish in the first 40 years?”
Some people who spend their first 4 decades striving for material success find mid-life full of confusion, disillusionment or loss of meaning. They wonder “Is this all there is?” “With all that I’ve got, why don’t ...]]> Sun, 01 Aug 2010 10:06:38 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=49 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=48
Earlier essays on this blog site described some of the components of individuation and defined it as
… a developmental process which begins in the adult individual, usually after the age of thirty-five, and if successful leads to the discovery of the Self and its replacing of the ego as the personality center. Individuation is the discovery of and the extended dialogue with the objective psyche of which the Self is the comprehensive expression.
Perhaps because it seems similar to “individualism,” or perhaps because American society is so biased toward that philosophy of “each for himself,” many people assume that individuation implies a preoccupation with oneself, selfishness and social isolation. But this is not true at all. Far from fostering selfishness and self-absorption, individuation promotes a greater sense of social concern and responsibility in the person who has taken the spiritual journey. This essay seeks to clarify Jung’s attitudes in this regard, beginning with his warnings about the dangers of immersion in the “mass psychology” of groups.

Jung on the Dangers of Groups

In the essay “Jung’s Timeliness and Thoughts on Our Current Reality,” we noted Jung’s concern about how easily individuals could become identified with groups and thus loose their individuality, as well as their personal moral stance. Over and over Jung decried the tendency for the psyche of the group—the collective psyche—to overwhelm or submerge the individual’s psyche, especially if the group is large. Jung felt that the larger the group, the more readily the individual would get lost in it, and the lower the level of morality that would manifest. So Jung concluded that
…every man is, in a certain sense, unconsciously a worse man when he is in society than when acting alone; for he is carried by society and to that extent relieved of his individual responsibility.
Jung felt that, even when a large group was composed of “wholly admirable persons,” it would still have the “morality and intelligence of an unwieldy, stupid, and violent animal.” Clearly, Jung had little use for large groups!
Not just large groups were at issue: Jung also recognized that the person undertaking the path of individuation would have to “differentiate” him/herself from smaller groups—the family, circles of friends, ethnic and other collectives. This is because individuation requires giving up persona stuff—the host of social expectations and inauthentic roles that the individual has acquired unconsciously over time.
Does this mean that Jung expected individuated people to live in some sort of social isolation? Not at all.

Jung on the Consequences of Individuation

Jung recognized that human beings are social creatures and society is a “necessary condition” for us. Each of us is part of the whole web of life and the process of individuating makes one aware of this wholeness and the unity of all. The process also makes us aware of the unconscious, which—in Jung’s concept of the “collective unconscious”—is common to all humankind. The individuated person is “at-one-ment” with him/herself and also with humanity. Working toward individuation leads us to a deeper sense of connection with others and fosters a desire to serve others.
But because the process of individuating entails being “born out” of identity with family, tribe, ethnic group etc., the individuated person does not fall back into his or her original social network. Time and again as I work with students at the Jungian Center I hear them note how they have found themselves creating new friendships and new social networks. Their old friends seem not to have similar interests or outlook. “As within, so without:” having changed inwardly, individuating people discover that outer life also changes, including their social contacts and friendships.

The “Leading Minority” and the Need for Community

“Leading minority” was Jung’s term for those awake, those persons who had undertaken to look within and become conscious of the unconscious. Both then and now, there aren’t a lot of people who have done this. Western society, and especially American society with its strong ESTJ bias, is not inclined toward introspection or introversion. People stepping out of the mainstream to discover the unconscious and develop their individual uniqueness are few and far between, and they often wind up feeling “different” or isolated, until they link up with like-minded individuals.
Toni Wolff, Jung’s “friend and collaborator” saw this need to link up with other individuating people and got Jung to agree to the formation of the Psychology Club of Zurich. Funded with a gift of 360,000 Swiss francs from Edith Rockefeller McCormack in 1916, the Club provided Jung with the opportunity to do a “silent experiment” in group psychology. Jung also saw it as the antidote to the “onesidedness” of the analytic process.
Jung noted that “Human personality is certainly not individual only, it is also collective,…” and we need contact with others. Years later, as Jung Institutes were created in various cities around the world, there has been the “spontaneous phenomenon” of similar clubs being formed by analysands and others interested in Jung and his ideas.
One such club recently formed at The Jungian Center for the Spiritual Sciences. The shared experience of Jung and his deep effect on individuals committed to their growth has brought people together to share fun, fellowship (and food!), as well as stimulating intellectual exchange of Jung-related ideas. Such clubs become for their members what Edward Edinger called an ecclesia spiritualis, a spiritual gathering of those “called out” from the crowd.
If you are reading this essay in some place far from Vermont, and you need the fellowship of others on the path of individuation, here are some ways you might go about finding others who share your interests:
1. Google “Jung Institutes” and you will bring up over 1 million ...]]> Sat, 03 Jul 2010 09:20:39 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=48 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=47 A Jungian Approach to Choosing

Those readers of this blog who are on the mailing list of The Jungian Center were informed of the voiceover dream I had on September 22, 2009. The voice said:
October 2010 will be an especially important month, when key choices are made that lay down energy patterns the consequences of which we will reap in the next 2 years.
Given my 26+ year track record with such dreams, I always take them seriously. So very shortly I found myself researching what Jung might have said about choice and choosing. Did he leave us any advice about how to make good choices? And what might constitute a “good” choice, to Jung?
My research revealed that Jung never wrote an essay directly on this topic. There are only references scattered throughout his voluminous writing on the subject. But these references allow us to answer the questions above. Before doing so, let’s address the title: What was “Buridan’s ass” and how does it relate to choosing?

Buridan’s Ass

Jung was very learned and well-read and, as such, was familiar with the paradox in philosophy that goes back well into antiquity, to the time of Aristotle, which was discussed centuries later by the 14th century French philosopher, Jean Buridan. Buridan satirized this paradox, in which a man (in Aristotle) or an ass (in later versions) is positioned exactly between two necessities, food and drink (in Aristotle), two bales of hay (in later versions). Buridan felt that if one got stuck pondering the possible outcomes, one could starve. That is, one’s will could so delay making a choice that, in the extreme, one could die before the choice was made. Jung mentions Buridan’s ass three times in his writings, in contexts that give us insights into his views on choosing.

Jung on Choosing

As Jung saw the paradox of Buridan’s ass, the problem was due either to the ass not being hungry so he didn’t take the problem seriously, or to the creature’s externalizing the task. When we externalize a decision we look to the object to make the choice. Jung recognized that good choices—choices that are aligned with our true being—require us to look within, to the depths of our nature and then, to ask ourselves what we feel drawn toward. We must ask ourselves “What is the natural urge of life, at this moment, for me?”
While for most of us the situation of Buridan’s ass may seem extreme, Jung’s identification of the core issue is right on the mark: When people (especially those who are strong Perceivers) have trouble coming to closure, they do just what Jung described. They look to others or turn over the decision-making to others. Or they leave the decision up to life, Fate, Destiny. Jung regarded this tactic as abdicating responsibility for one’s own life and forfeit the opportunity to learn, grow and live more authentically. So one key component of good choices, for Jung, is looking within and being aware of what we are naturally drawn toward.
Jung also recognized that our sense of “free will”—being able to choose freely—is, to a degree, an illusion. The possible range of choices we face when making a decision is dependent upon (and limited by) the amount of libido (psychic energy) disposable by the ego. The Self is really in charge of our lives, a fact most of us usually forget or prefer to ignore. The ego does not like to face its inferiority. It wants to think it is running the show.
The reality of the ego’s dependence on the Self is usually brought home to us only after years of inner work in which the ego experiences the “defeat” that comes with its experience of the Self. This repeated fixatio experience is never pleasant, but eventually it fosters the ego relinquishing its desire for control.
Free choice Jung defined as a “subjective feeling of freedom,” which is not totally free. Our will comes up constantly against the limits of the outside world and also comes into “conflict with the facts of the self.” As the Self acts on the ego it circumscribes our will.
Then there are the inevitable times in life when we experience what Jung calls “conflicts of duty.” These are those situations where we face a choice between two evils or two unpalatable options. In such times Jung saw 3 possible courses of action:
We might look to some outside authority, thus externalizing our locus of authority, something Jung never encouraged.
We might look to an “act of God,” in the form of a fait accompli, which Jung felt most people regard as the will of God. An example here is that of a woman unable to decide whether to have a child, so she stops using birth control, thinking that if she gets pregnant it will be the will of God.
Neither of these did Jung see as desirable. Rather he suggested that we view such situations as opportunities to discover the power inherent in “holding the tension of opposites” and wait for the resolution of the conflict in the form of the emergence of the “transcendent function.” This is not something the ego figures out; it is done by the Self. So this waiting and holding at various (difficult) times of life provide us with opportunities to experience the Self.
Such times also provide the opportunity for us to recognize our “two-ness,” i.e. how we contain both good and evil, different, often opposite impulses or inclinations, as Saint Paul lamented in his letter to the church in Rome. If we can hold the tension of the “two-ness” Jung felt we would achieve a new attitude.
Jung reminds us that the major problems in life—those times when we face major decisions—are never things ...]]> Fri, 28 May 2010 09:47:10 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=47 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=46 An Examination of America’s Potential Future in Light of Its Astrological Chart



In previous essays I have made references to possible forms of the future for America and American society. Those essays make it clear that I am not a fan of our current culture, government or society, nor am I very optimistic about the future. In part, this stems from a series of dreams I had back in 2007 and 2008 which suggest some of the challenges we are likely to face in the coming years. In part, my attitude stems from my reading of Native American sources about the actions of the United States government over the last 400 years, and Native predictions about the karmic consequences of those actions. And in part, my attitude stems from my reading of Jung, and his conviction that our collective future will see some sort of “impending world catastrophe.” As people have read the previous essays posted to The Jungian Center’s blog, they have asked me for specifics: what’s coming down? What are we, as a society, looking at in the next few years? And when might we expect the challenging times to arrive?
There are several ways one might address these questions: One way is with the use of Intuitive Imagery, which I have used with several friends who are adept in it. Another way is by consulting the variety of mantic arts, the results of which, on the collective level, often are hard to decipher or interpret. A third way is by watching one’s dream guidance, and beyond just watching, actively seeking the guidance of the psyche through an interactive dream practice. I have done all of these. There is also another source of information, which Jung used on occasion to better understand his patients, and also to study the relationship of married couples. This source is astrology.
Many Americans, nearly all academics, and some of you readers of this blog might at this point start rolling your eyes. Astrology? Astrology!***??? Yes, I know. Years ago I too had a very low opinion of this ancient branch of knowledge—until I was forcibly, shockingly disabused of my prejudice in this regard. It happened like this:
I was a very logical, rational Cartesian college professor, locked into the world of theory and abstraction like only an Eastern Ivy League intellectual can be, when, in November 1983, my world began to come unraveled. It began with the first of what I have come to call my “voice-over dreams.” No action, no figures, just a voice that said: “Friends will die. Relatives will die. You will give up everything and your life will be transformed.” I was married at the time and I woke up and told my husband, thinking that he must have heard this loud voice. But no, he had heard nothing. I then dismissed the whole experience, given my academic prejudices, but my husband remembered what I had told him. Five days later I learned that my friend Hazel Crafts had dropped dead. When I told Ed, he reminded me of the words I had heard. But I dismissed it as “just a coincidence.” Over the next six months, however, I lost another friend, two aunts and an uncle and everything in my life began to fall away. I came to feel like I was losing my toehold on reality and various friends tried to help, some sending me to ministers, others to counselors, others to psychiatrists and psychologists. So it was, in the Spring of 1984, that I thought my student Miranda was taking me to another therapist of some kind when I went with her to a home in downtown Bar Harbor. It was only on the sidewalk going into the house, just minutes before my appointment, that she told me the person I was about to meet was not a therapist but an astrologer. I recall freezing on the spot, turning to Miranda in shocked disbelief, and yelling at her that that sort of stuff was bunk, nonsense, that she should know better, that astrologers were full of—Well, you get the idea: I was not open to astrology at all! Miranda then said that if I didn’t go in she was still going to have to pay for the session and all the work the astrologer had done to prepare for it. That made me feel guilty: here was one of my students being willing to ante up her own limited funds to help me out. So I hung my head and went into the house. The session lasted the better part of 5 hours—5 hours during which I was transformed. First I sat there, arms folded across my chest in stern disbelief and disdain. Then I began to hear things that rang true—about my nature, my personality, and, even more intriguing, about what I was experiencing at the time. But it was when the astrologer began to tell me when all of it would be over, when life would get better, that I really sat up, took notice and then, lacking any other inner resources with which to explain what I had just experienced, I accused the woman of being a psychic. “No,” she replied, “anyone could do this, if he or she were prepared to study and learn how to interpret the symbols.” Astrology was just a powerful symbol system, open to anyone willing to invest the time and energy to learn. I could do just what she did. Presented with such an intellectual challenge, some part of me took the bait, and I became a student of Frances Sakoian on the spot. Over time, as I faced similar experiences, I came to realize that the Universe was taking each of my prejudices, each of my paradigms about how reality is, and “popping” ...]]> Sat, 01 May 2010 01:32:45 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=46 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=45
In the previous essay I noted how Jung anticipated a new development in the evolution of religion. Some of his followers call this the “new dispensation.” Just what this means, and the role the individual will play in it, is the subject of this essay.
We must begin with some definitions, since “dispensation” is not a household word for most readers of this blog. Nor would Jung’s definitions of “God” be familiar to most readers. After defining terms, we will consider the role of the individual in the emerging spiritual landscape, and we’ll conclude by setting the subject in the broader context of the evolution of Western civilization.

Some Definitions
Dispensation
“Dispensation” comes from the Latin verb dispensare, “to manage, distribute, allot, arrange, dispense.” Given our materialistic ethos most Americans would immediately think of the dispensing of resources, stuff, food or money. But our focus here is more on intangibles. What intangible is being dispensed? Jungians would say the stuff of the psyche. “Dispensation” defined in psychic terms is “the specific arrangement or system by which our perception of the world is ordered.”
This system is not something a group of people decide to create: It is the work of the objective psyche or Collective Unconscious, and it evolves over time. Thousands of years ago the psyches of the ancestors of Western people operated within a participation mystique with Nature. In time, this changed, as the ancient Hebrews took up monotheism, and their perception became ordered around the worship of Jahweh, the God of the Torah. The fact that we now speak of an “Old Testament” and a New bespeaks the later evolution of another form of ordering, what Jung’s followers call the “Christian dispensation,” centered around the life and teachings of Jesus Christ.
Jung felt that the key difference between the Judaic and Christian religions was the “transformation of the God-image” that occurred over hundreds of years from the time of Job (c. 600-400 B.C.) to the time of Christ. As he anticipated the shift from the Age of the Fishes (Pisces) to the Age of the Water-Bearer (Aquarius), Jung recognized the outlines of a new form of religious expression.
Jung’s follower, analyst Lawrence Jaffe, coined a term for this new form: the “psychological dispensation.” The first dispensation was the Judaic, the second, the Christian. What Jaffe and other Jungians now see is the emergence of a new religion of consciousness, a “religion of experience” that will reconcile the first and second dispensations.
This “psychological dispensation” is a form of religious expression in which
experience supplants faith: Jung articulated this key feature of the new dispensation in the interview he had with John Freeman of the BBC late in his life. Freeman asked Jung if he believed in God. Jung paused and then said, “… I know. I don’t need to believe, I know.” This was not the only time Jung spoke about his knowing the Divine. In an earlier interview Jung said “I only believe in what I know. And that eliminates believing. Therefore I do not take his existence on belief—I know that he exists.”
In the psychological dispensation, the role of the individual becomes central, as Jungian analyst Edward Edinger noted, when he said that by becoming “…aware of the transpersonal center of the psyche, the Self,” and by living “… out of that awareness, [the individual] can be said to be the incarnation of the God-image.” This quote begs further definition. What is meant by “God”? by “God-image”? by “Self”?
Jung’s Definitions of God
Since “God” is a word most Western people have heard often, the reader of this blog essay is likely to assume he/she knows what Jung meant. Not so! First, note the plural in the sub-heading: Jung used many terms to define the Divine in his voluminous writings.
Second, ever the empiricist, Jung was not about to indulge in vagueness with his terms. He recognized that “god,” as a concept, is unknowable, “because no one can get outside his/her own psyche.” Jung reminds us that “… everything men assert about God is twaddle, for no man can know God.” Jung makes a distinction, therefore, between “God,” the unknowable, and the “God-image,” that sense or image we have in our minds. Jung said: “… I speak of the God-image and not of God because it is quite beyond me to say anything about God at all.” And Jung was quite critical of theologians who did claim to speak of God and describe God, without making any distinction between the unknowable and the mental image.
Third, Jung’s “God” was not absolute, but “relative to man.” Regarding the Divine as absolute would place God “outside all connection to mankind.” Jung recognized that “Such a God would be of no consequence at all.” And God was of great consequence in Jung’s psychology, as seen in the 498+ citations listed in the Index to his Collected Works alone (not considering his Letters, or the other books, essays and articles he wrote).
Jung spoke much of God, but his uses of the term vary greatly. Here are some statements likely to resonate:
“God is Reality itself.”
God is “… a factor unknown in itself.”
God is “… an inner experience, not discussable as such but impressive.”
“God is a universal experience which is obfuscated only by silly rationalism and an equally silly theology.”
“… God is ev to pan.” (in all things)
“God is an immediate experience of a very primordial nature, one of the most natural products of our mental life,…”
“… I do know of a power of a very personal nature and an irresistible influence. I call it ‘God’.”
“I only know Him as a personal, ...]]> Thu, 01 Apr 2010 08:36:06 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=45 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=44
“Phoberon to empesein eis cheiras theou zontos.”
“It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”
Hebrews 10:31
“… the experience of the self is always a defeat for the ego.”
[italics in the original] Jung, Collected Works, 14, ¶778


The first of the above quotes was cited in the previous blog essay and in a note in that essay I indicated that the following essay would provide further discussion of the “Hebrews” quote. In that essay I noted how fear can be used to keep people under control and how those in power would have us believe that internalizing a locus of security through personal experience of the Divine is something to be feared.
Jung had much to say on this point. Most explicitly he made it clear in his statement quoted above that confronting the Divine is never a pleasant experience for the ego. This is because of pride: the ego “does not like to think consciousness might lose its ascendancy.” The ego fancies it is in control and is forced to face its smallness and limitations when the Self appears.
More broadly, Jung addressed this issue in his discussions of the numen, the numinous, the numinosum and numinosity. In this essay we will define these terms, provide some features and qualities of the numinous, then consider the experience of the numinous and how it has been experienced by some noteworthy historical figures. We will then examine Jung’s experience of it, and Jung’s assessment of our current predicament, now that Western civilization has lost many of its numinosities.

Some Definitions

Numen is a Latin word, deriving from the verb nuere, meaning “to nod.” Its original meaning was “a nod.” You might well wonder how it comes to have anything to do with the Divine, the Self and Jung’s concerns. It came to mean “divine will or divine power of the gods” from the Greek and Roman practice of going to a temple to consult the will of the gods, at times when a person confronted a serious decision. In the temple the supplicant would stand before a statue of the god, state his problem, ask the god for guidance and then watch the statue. If it seemed to nod, the person knew the god approved the tack he planned to take. Over time numen came to be synonymous with “deity,” “Godhead,” divinity or “divine majesty.”
The other 3 words mentioned above—numinous, numinosum and numinosity—Jung used frequently and all of them derive from numen. “Numinous” was an invented word, coined in 1917 by a German professor of theology, Rudolf Otto, in his book Das Heilige (translated in 1923 as The Idea of the Holy). Why the invention? Otto felt the need for a specialized word to describe the concept of “holy” without the “moral factor” or rationality that we usually attach to “holy.” He sought to describe “… this ‘extra’ in the meaning of ‘holy’ above and beyond the meaning of goodness.” To create his neologism Otto started with numen and then looked for analogies. He found one in “omen,” the adjectival form of which is “ominous.” The adjective form of numen thus would be “numinous.” Otto used “numinous” to describe categories of value within the sense of “holy,” and also to refer to a state of mind.
Modern English dictionaries define “numinous” several ways. It can mean “spiritual, holy, divine” and also “ethereal, nebulous, intangible.” In Otto’s and Jung’s usage, “spiritual,” “holy,” “divine” and “intangible” capture most accurately the qualities they mean.
Numinosum is a word Jung used repeatedly. He may have borrowed it from Otto; perhaps the original German text had this Latinized version of “numinous.” I have not found it in the English translation. In his essay “Psychology and Religion” Jung provides a definition of numinosum:
“… a dynamic agency or effect not caused by an arbitrary act of will…. The numinosum—whatever its cause may be—is an experience of the subject independent of his will…. The numinosum is either a quality belonging to a visible object or the influence of an invisible presence that causes a peculiar alteration of consciousness….”
In Jung’s thinking the numinosum is both a quality inherent to an object or an experience that comes over a person, often inadvertently.

Qualities and Features of the Numinous

Otto and Jung provide a wealth of explicit qualities people are likely to feel when in the presence of the holy. First, it must be noted that the numinosum is a paradox, containing both positive and negative, both of which we may experience simultaneously in any encounter with the Divine.
Some of the positive qualities of the numinosum include: sublimity, awe, excitement, bliss, rapture, exaltation, entrancement, fascination, attraction, allure and what Otto called an “impelling motive power.” Not so pleasant are other qualities like: overwhelment, fear, trembling, weirdness, eeriness, humility (an acute sense of unworthiness), urgency, stupor (blank wonder), bewilderment, horror, mental agitation, repulsion, and haunting, daunting, monstrous feelings that “overbrim the heart.” Otto speaks at length of the mysterium tremendum et fascinans, the fascinating mystery that makes us tremble (in awe). Because it “grips or stirs the mind,” such an experience is not one we forget.
But, while it is memorable, the numinous is not easily put into words. “Ineffable” is another of its features. The numinous “eludes apprehension in terms of concepts.” Being bigger and beyond oneself, it induces speechlessness. Being a mystery, it bewilders the rational mind. Being divine, it links us to the “ground of the soul.” Being “unevolvable,” it is not to be derived from any other feeling.
More frequently found in Jung’s works is “numinosity.” He used this term to refer to a ...]]> Wed, 03 Mar 2010 10:26:41 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=44 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=41 Part III—Internalizing a Locus of Authority

A few years ago my sister took to wearing a button on her shirt as she went through her days on the University of Vermont campus. The button said “Question Authority.” She didn’t wear the button for long, because she found people’s reaction to the button so dispiriting: Most people would see it, read it and then say, “What should I ask you?”
This sad story illustrates a fact about our culture: We are not encouraged to internalize a locus of authority. We grow up looking to our parents, our teachers, the clergy, the police, political leaders, doctors, lawyers, judges and others as authority figures, and we are taught to honor these authorities. Jung would not be pleased. While he was no revolutionary, he never encouraged people to give over ultimate authority for their lives to any external figure. He felt that doing so was essentially an alienation of the self, a sign of spiritual immaturity and an abdication of the personal task to search for the truth.
Not even analysts did Jung exempt on this point. Early in his essay “Principles of Practical Psychotherapy,” Jung admonished analysts:
When, as a psychotherapist, I set myself up as a medical authority over my patient and on that account claim to know something about his individuality, or to be able to make valid statements about it, I am only demonstrating my lack of criticism, for I am in no position to judge the whole of the personality before me.... If I wish to treat another individual psychologically at all, I must for better or worse give up all pretensions to superior knowledge, all authority and desire to influence.
My analyst describes the relationship of Jungian analyst to client as one where both parties are “in the soup together.” That is, both analyst and analysand are affected by the process and both must defer to the wisdom of the psyche.
Jung reserves some of his most sarcastic comments for those who externalize their locus of authority by becoming disciples of a guru. When discussing negative attempts to free the individuality in “The Relations between the Ego and the Unconscious,” Jung wrote:
... the joy of becoming a prophet’s disciple... for the vast majority of people, is an altogether ideal technique. Its advantages are: the odium dignitatis, the superhuman responsibility of the prophet, turns into the so much sweeter otium indignitatis. The disciple is unworthy; modestly he sits at the Master’s feet and guards against having ideas of his own. Mental laziness becomes a virtue; one can at least bask in the sun of a semidivine being. He can enjoy the archaism and infantilism of his unconscious fantasies without loss to himself, for all responsibility is laid at the Master’s door. Through his deification of the Master, the disciple, apparently without noticing it, waxes in stature; moreover, does he not possess the great truth—not his own discovery, of course, but received straight from the Master’s hands? Naturally the disciples always stick together, not out of love, but for the very understandable purpose of effortlessly confirming their own convictions by engendering an air of collective agreement.
The result? Both master and disciples get inflated (since both are identifying with an archetype). The disciple looses his/her spiritual freedom. His individuality is injured. Life for both prophet and disciple is “full of sorrows, disappointments and privations,...” Put on a pedestal by his followers, the master/prophet teeters precariously and almost inevitably eventually succumbs to the moral evils of power, lust and/or greed. The disciple is infantilized and sorely disillusioned when his guru turns out to have feet of clay.
At the Jungian Center for the Spiritual Sciences, we got a first-hand look at this whole process this past Spring and Summer 2009, when one of our students got involved with the work of Dr. Zhi Gang Sha. Interested in his system of soul healing, she went to several of his workshops, came back and urged us to look into Sha’s work, because Sha is quite explicit in his belief that the soul is real, powerful and should be the “boss” of one’s life.
Aware of Jung’s conviction that the psyche (soul) is real, we jumped at the chance to investigate the work of someone else (from a very different, Oriental, not Western background) who recognizes the reality of the soul. So we offered to the public two workshops led by two students of Master Sha. In these workshops it was clear that they had tremendous respect for their master, even to the point of venerating his books (which were not to be put on the floor). Some of us began to be skeptical—what one student called “spotting a red flag.”
Then we were told that the Master could remove karma from past lives, as long as you bought $1,000 worth of his books. Another red flag.
Then came the pitch to attend the Master’s enlightenment retreat, at which one’s level of “soul standing” would be raised—for the cost of attendance, of course. Another red flag.
Finally, a group of us went to a workshop led by the Master himself. We saw people seeking to kiss his feet, to kiss the ground he walked on, to prostrate themselves, to wait on him hand and foot. More red flags.
But it was when Master Sha announced to the group that he had elevated Jesus, Mary and Buddha to a higher level of Heaven that we had incontrovertible proof of the inflation that Jung describes as one of the features of the guru syndrome. Jung would have none of this. We left the workshop on the spot.

The Positive Authority Figure

Jung had no good words for those who set themselves up as authority figures and then take their followers’ authority from them. But he was not completely opposed to ...]]> Sat, 02 Jan 2010 10:00:23 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=41 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=40 Part II—Internalizing a Locus of Control

In Part I of this four-part essay we noted that a pre-requisite for achieving individuation was internalizing a locus of control. What does this mean?

Defining “Locus of Control”

I encountered the term “locus on control” in the works of Jungian analyst and astrologer Liz Greene. It refers to the placement (locus) of one’s sense of responsibility or power. In the normal course of child development, the locus of control gradually shifts over time from the parents to the adolescent until the mature adult recognizes and takes up his/her responsibility for living as a well-functioning adult in society.
Jung’s consulting room was full of people whose personal development from child to adult was not normal. Jung’s clients had parents who were negligent, slothful, neurotically anxious or soullessly conventional. Or their parents were clingy, and, as a result “... exercise an extremely bad influence over their children, since they deprive them of every opportunity for individual responsibility.” Others of Jung’s clients were scarred from years of carrying their parents’ unconscious complexes, and, lacking the wherewithal to assimilate that complex, they remained stuck in “infantilism.” Other clients had lived unconscious lives, “carried by society and to that extent [were] relieved of [their] responsibility.” Whatever the personal history, the core situation was the same: externalization of a locus of control, an abdication of personal responsibility.

Jung on Responsibility, the “Blame Game” and the “Search for the Magical Other”

Jung’s writings are replete with calls for individuals to recognize and take up personal responsibility:
... the maturing personality must assimilate the parental complex and achieve authority, responsibility, and independence.
… you could treat yourself if you don’t succumb to the prejudice that you receive healing through others. In the last resort every individual alone has to win his battle, nobody else can do it for him.
... every man is, in a certain sense, unconsciously a worse man when he is in society than when acting alone; for he is carried by society and to that extent relieved of his individual responsibility.
The bettering of a general ill begins with the individual, and then only when he makes himself and not others responsible.
Making others responsible is what some call playing the “blame game.” When we play the “blame game,” we blame others for our current situation, and these “others” are most often our parents or other adults who played a prominent role in our upbringing. Jung provides an example of the blame game in “Symbols of Transformation:”
Faced by the vast uncertainty of the future, the adolescent puts the blame for it on the past, saying to himself: “If only I were not the child of my very ordinary parents, but the child of a rich and elegant count... then one day a golden coach would come and... take... his long-lost child back with him to his wonderful castle,...
Clearly, Jung was familiar with this fruitless fantasy. He probably had many patients who were into playing the blame game. He recognized it as a morally lazy and ultimately frustrating endeavor, as he explained to a Swiss Fräulein in a letter of 23 January 1941:
There are a whole lot of facts in your letter which you’ll just have to face up to instead of tracing them back to the faulty behavior of other people…. There are countless people with an inferior extraversion or with too much introversion or with too little money who in God’s name must plod along through life under such conditions. These conditions are not diseases but normal difficulties of life. If you blame me for your psychological difficulties it won’t help you at all, for it is not my fault you have them. It’s nobody’s fault. I can’t take these difficulties away from you, but have merely tried to make you aware of what you need in order to cope with them. If you could stop blaming other people and external circumstances for your own inner difficulties you would have gained an infinite amount. But if you go on making others responsible, no one will have any desire to stand by you with advice.
As long as we see our problems as “out there,” caused by others, as long as we focus on assigning blame, we are refusing to face our own responsibility for dealing with the hand that Fate has dealt us.
This is not to say that Jung absolved parents of blame. He was quite blunt that most children who were brought to him with psychological problems were not the people he really needed to treat. Most of the time “problem children” were carrying their parents’ complexes and
In a case like this what would be the sense of talking to the child?... Such a procedure would ... burden her with a responsibility which is not hers at all, but really belongs to her parents....
Jung would then try to treat the parent or parents, but sometimes the parents didn’t want to hear that their unconsciousness was the real cause of their child’s problem. Rather than take up analysis with Jung themselves, they would leave.
It is not uncommon for people to have experienced poor parenting. Lots of us have come away from our youth scarred, warped or injured from all sorts of tragic events. Jung was explicit that, whatever our personal histories, the key to successful living is accepting that, as adults, we are responsible for the rest of our lives. If in some way or ways our life is not working, blaming others will only keep us stuck in our “stuff.”
Likewise, searching for the “magical other” who will transform our reality and bring us happiness is another trap that will keep us stuck. James Hollis, Jungian analyst and prolific author, wrote on this “search for the magical other” in his book ...]]> Tue, 01 Dec 2009 05:35:24 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=40 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=39 Part I—What is Individuation?

“Individuation” is a term often associated with Jung and his psychology. In this four-part essay we are going to define “individuation” and discuss some of the benefits, elements and requirements for achieving individuation (Part I). Then we’ll examine several components of it, specifically the locus of control (Part II), the locus of authority (Part III) and the locus of security (Part IV).

What is “Individuation”?

Our English word comes from the Latin individuus, meaning “undivided” or “individual.” The dictionary defines “individuation” as “the process leading to individual existence, as distinct from that of the species.” This definition applies the term to both animals and humans. Jung’s usage focused on humans and the concept became central to his approach to psychology.
Jung recognized the importance he placed on individuation in his 1921 definition of the term:
The concept of individuation plays a large role in our psychology. In general, it is the process by which individual beings are formed and differentiated; in particular, it is the development of the psychological individual... as a being distinct from the general, collective psychology. Individuation, therefore, is a process of differentiation... having for its goal the development of the individual personality.
In later years, Jung amplified his definition in a series of essays, describing “individuation” as
... the process by which a person becomes a psychological “in-dividual,” that is a separate, indivisible unity or “whole.”
...the better and more complete fulfillment of the collective qualities of the human being,...
... practically the same as the development of consciousness out of the original state of identity.... It is thus an extension of the sphere of consciousness, an enriching of conscious psychological life.
... becoming an “in-dividual,” and, in so far as “individuality” embraces our innermost, last, and incomparable uniqueness, it also implies becoming one’s own self. We could therefore translate individuation as “coming to selfhood,” or “self-realization.”
Jung felt this process of “self-realization” was a “natural transformation,” something that “the unconscious had in mind,” something meant to develop our individual personality.
Jung also regarded “individuation” as a solution to what he considered one of the major problems facing modern people: How to link up consciousness to the unconscious; how to bring our ego mind (consciousness) into a working relationship with our inner terra incognita, our unknown inner terrain. Concern about this problem was not unique to Jung: thousands of years ago Taoist and Buddhist practitioners had also seen its significance. Jung recognized this when he noted that “... the individuation process ... forms one of the main interests of Taoism and of Zen Buddhism.” Coming from a Christian background, as the son of a Protestant minister, Jung also recognized a Christian relevance to the concept, when he described individuation as “... the primitive Christian idea of the Kingdom of Heaven which ‘is within you’.”
Aware of Western culture’s vaunting of individualism, Jung took pains to stress the difference between “individualism” and “individuation.” The former concept is ego-driven and fosters selfishness and lack of concern for others. (Think of the bumper sticker that celebrates “Looking out for #1!”). Individuation is very much the opposite: Over the years of inner work the process requires, the person experiences repeated crucifixions of the ego as the ego confronts and assimilates contents of the unconscious. This long-term process
... brings to birth a consciousness of human community precisely because it makes us aware of the unconscious, which unites and is common to all mankind. Individuation is an at-one-ment with oneself and at the same time with humanity, since oneself is a part of humanity.
So, far from being selfish, an individuated person feels deeper responsibility to support and serve others and to foster peace, wholeness and integrity in the world.

Some Requirements of the Process of Individuation

Mention of crucifying the ego brings up the subject of what individuation entails. It’s challenging, a task for heroes, not for the faint of heart or for those who can’t stand against the crowd and be different. Divisio (being divided not only from others but also within oneself), separatio (being separated not only from family, friends and collective society, but also from the person you used to be), solutio (watching the structures of your life dissolve), discrimination, self-knowledge, “a positive torture” —these are just a few of the hardships likely to be faced in this work. Jung was being honest about the task when he warned “...as always every step forward along the path of individuation is achieved only at the cost of suffering.”
Why such difficulty? Jung gives several reasons. First, we grow up under parents and society, striving to become what is expected of us and the result is what Jung called the development of the “persona,” or mask. In many cases, the persona is not our true self. We have had to compromise, adapt, even, in extreme cases, betray our authentic nature. The process of individuation requires getting wise to this mask, that is, we have to face the fact that for years (if not decades) we have been living a lie. And then we have to give up this lie, put down the mask and begin to change our life so as to live more aligned with our authentic being. Such change almost inevitably elicits remarks (maybe even protests) from those who know us best, those most deeply invested in how we used to be, those likely to be most affected by our shifting the parameters of daily life, i.e. our family and closest friends.
Second, individuation requires heroism because it is hard to be different, to step out of the mainstream conventional reality and march to one’s own drummer. The work is not a herd phenomenon. You aren’t going to find many people doing it. For this reason Extraverts, who tend to ...]]> Tue, 03 Nov 2009 09:28:32 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=39 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=38 Seizing the Opportunity in the Archetype of the Apocalypse

“Apocatastasis.” It’s a five-dollar Greek word that Jung used repeatedly in his writings, drawing on earlier usage in the New Testament and the Gnostic gospels. It means a “re-establishment,” “restoration” or “reconstitution,” and, as we noted in the previous essay, it is part of the intentionality of the archetype of the apocalypse. No person goes through the apocalyptic process simply to experience the destruction of what he or she holds dear: the whole point is to clear away the detritus of a life that he or she has outgrown. In a similar way our collective global society is now being challenged to open up to radically new ways of thinking, so as to replace a civilization that has grown stale and inappropriate with a world that works for everyone.
The initial reaction of most people to this challenge is “Duh? Radically new ways of thinking? Replacing a civilization? A stale civilization? A Rip Van Winkle act sounds appealing right about now; let’s go to sleep for the next 40 years and wake up when all this is over!” Jung would not be amused; he would also not be surprised.
Jung recognized that most people will take the Rip Van Winkle approach, only they won’t need to go to sleep: they already are asleep, and they won’t want to hear any of the following. Jung was a realist: only a “leading minority” will have the maturity, the consciousness and the courage to transform the world. Fortunately, since Jung’s time, as the world has gotten more and more “stale,” more and more people have been taking up his challenge and have responded to the apocalypse archetype to restore and revitalize their own lives. As they have done so they have also taken up the task of envisioning a similar restoration for the collective. They have shared their insights and suggestions in a wealth of books and articles that inform the portrait of a civilization more supportive of the fullness of our human potential.
In this essay we consider what such a civilization would look like, its features, activities and paradigms (basic patterns that structure underlying beliefs and assumptions). Because this new “restored” civilization is growing out of the old, we must begin with a review of the basic features of the world we know. Then we can examine how that world is no longer appropriate, what might replace it and the form a global restoration might take.

Some Basic Features of Western Civilization

When we speak of “civilization” these days invariably we mean the life ways of the peoples of Europe, America and other “progressive” countries. Superficially this “Western” civilization means “high technologies” like television, cell phones and computers, and cultural artifacts like movies, pop stars, video games and the Internet. This civilization offers to the people of the world sophisticated forms of medical care—hospitals with their CAT scans and MRIs; germ theory, vaccines and the promise of the eradication of disease; “spare-parts” medicine, the evolution of super-bugs, and the prospect of global pandemics--pandemics made more likely because of growing urbanization, as more and more people flock to cities, turning them into megalopolises. It also has enmeshed the entire planet in corporate capitalism, with its credit default swaps, collateralized debt obligations and other types of derivatives, etherealized money and massive economic inequality. Some other features of our current civilization include literacy, numeracy, digeracy, indoor plumbing, electricity, cars, trains, planes and supertankers.
All these are “superficial” because they are consequences of much deeper aspects of our Western civilization. These deeper aspects are so deep as to touch into what German-speaking societies mean when they speak of “culture” as distinct from “civilization.” The German tradition recognizes a difference between the artificial constructs of city living (“civilization” deriving from the Latin civitas, “city”) and the more organic growth of collective ways of living. The archetype of the apocalypse is asking us to address themes that have evolved organically over millennia—paradigms that are much deeper than our technological gadgets and ways of running our economic and political systems. To deal with such deep themes we must get to unconscious levels, to address and change things so basic that they seem “normal” or inevitable.
What are some of these deep themes that have grown organically over the last 6,000 years in the development of Western civilization? We will consider 6 of them, all closely interrelated, and we will do so by drawing on the insights of contemporary authors but also on the ideas of an enlightened human being who was 2,000 years ahead of his time.

How Our Current World is No Longer Appropriate

The six themes we will examine are: power relations, social relations, gender relations, racial and ethnic prejudice, economic injustice and our beliefs and attitudes around violence.
Power Relations. For many millennia the world has operated with a flawed notion of power. We think of power as “domination,” the ability to control, to force other people to do our will. The lust for control is very strong in our Western mindset, leading us to develop our left brain’s logic, reasoning ability and objectivity. Over many centuries this has grown into what we now term “science.” Francis Bacon (one of the fathers of modern science) was explicit about the desirability of gaining control over Nature, so we can bend her to our will.
Another feature of this power-driven mindset is dualistic thinking, which perceives reality in “either/or” terms. In this system power is a “zero-sum game:” If I have power then you don’t. This then creates competition and fear. Politically this evolved over many thousands of years into monarchies and tyrannies and, in our own day, into totalitarian regimes and “imperial Presidencies.” Power-as-domination also gave rise to colonialism and ...]]> Tue, 29 Sep 2009 10:58:36 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=38 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=37
As we have noted in earlier essays, Jung was very intuitive. Thanks to his keen intuition he was able to sense shifts in the collective consciousness long before outer changes made these shifts obvious to others. One of the shifts he noted was the approach of the end time and the activation of what he called the archetype of the apocalypse. As early as the 1950’s Jung foresaw the approach of the “end time.”
Jung felt it was important for people to know about this archetype because he recognized the power each individual has to change the future. He knew that if enough people become aware of the apocalypse, as an archetype, understand its intentions and internalize its meaning in their own lives, the fate of the world might be more positive. In this essay we are going to discuss briefly the meaning and features of archetypes, with particular attention to the archetype of the apocalypse, and then consider how it relates to the individual and to the collective. We conclude with identifying some of the signs of the approach of the archetype in our world at the moment and Jung’s attitude toward apocalypticists.

The Meaning of “Archetype”

In a paper presented at a London symposium in 1919 Jung used the term “archetype” for the first time, to refer to the
a priori, inborn forms of “intuition,”... which are the necessary a priori determinants of all psychic processes. Just as his instincts compel man to a specifically human mode of existence, so the archetypes force his ways of perception and apprehension into specifically human patterns. The instincts and the archetypes together form the “collective unconscious.”
Earlier in his publications Jung had used the terms “primordial image,” and “the inborn mode of psychic apprehension...”. None of these definitions is likely to illuminate the meaning and value of the notion for the contemporary layperson devoted to Jungiana. So, eager to convey the utility of the concept to their students, later Jungian analysts have elaborated Jung’s definition.
One of the most thorough explications of the concept is found in Anthony Stevens’ Archetype Revisited: An Updated Natural History of the Self. In this revision of his earlier study of the concept, Stevens defines archetypes as
“innate neuropsychic centers possessing the capacity to initiate, control and mediate the common behavioral characteristics and typical experiences of all human beings, irrespective of race, culture or creed.”
What’s this mean? Let’s examine each of the components of this definition.
First of all, archetypes are “innate,” that is, they are part of our psychic makeup, much as our instincts are. We don’t have to learn them or do any sort of conscious work to make them part of our array of human traits: they already are within us, as a form of natural self-organization.
Next, Stevens describes archetypes as “neuropsychic centers.” They are part of our psyche and our nervous system. And they hold potential, i.e. they give rise to patterns of behavior. Archetypes help us to respond in the moment to experiences that arise in life.
One example that I use in my classes which helps students grasp the idea here is the situation where a person is walking along a sidewalk and comes upon a tiny infant all alone and crying. Virtually no one in such a situation would walk on by: It is part of our innate psychic makeup to stop, look around for the parents or caregivers and, if none seem to be present, to try to tend to the infant in some way. Such solicitude reflects the activation of our inner “mother” archetype, which predisposes all human beings to give nurturance, protection and comfort to infants in distress. The caregiving impulse is one pattern of behavior. As Stevens notes in his definition, the archetype “initiates” the behavior. In this case, it is the behavior associated with “mothering.”
A final feature of archetypes is their universal quality. As part of the “collective unconscious” they are common to all persons “regardless of race, culture or creed.” Every human collective has “mother,” “father,” “birth,” “death” etc. in its culture—these are universal features of human existence.
As “active living dispositions... that perform and continually influence our thoughts, feelings and actions,” archetypes are very significant in our lives. But they are not tangible: you cannot see the archetype itself but only the behaviors or patterns of feeling that the archetype gives rise to. Ultimately, Jung realized, archetypes cannot be defined (just as we cannot wrap our minds around the collective unconscious). We can best understand archetypes through our experiences as humans. We can grasp the archetype of “mother” from situations like the above example with the infant on the sidewalk.

Some Features of Archetypes

Several features we have mentioned above: Archetypes are universal and impersonal, as part of the collective unconscious which links us to all of humanity. They are also intangible--non-material--being part of our psychic makeup. We cannot see archetypes with our physical senses unless or until they spark some outer behavior or feeling. And this is another feature: Archetypes are generative, i.e. they spark actions on our part, as we noted in the example above of the “mothering” behavior that arises when we see a vulnerable infant exposed to danger. We don’t have to learn this behavior: It is innately part of our being human.
Archetypes get actualized through our personal experiences in life. In our example, the “mother” archetype gets actualized when we stop and seek help for the infant. The puer archetype is actualized when we spend time at play. The senex archetype shows up when we balance our checkbook and plan our budget for the months ahead. We will discuss how the archetype of the apocalypse shows up later in this essay.
Other features of archetypes are more ...]]> Tue, 01 Sep 2009 12:08:30 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=37 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=36 “Holding the Tension of the Opposites”

The last fifteen years of Carl Jung’s life were lived against the backdrop of the Cold War—that time in our global history when most of the nations of the world were aligned either with the “West” or with the “Communist bloc.” Intermittently throughout this time the people of the world held their breath as they watched confrontations between the United States and the Soviet Union heat up. During one such tense time members of the Psychological Club in Zurich asked Jung if he thought there would be an atomic war. Barbara Hannah recalled his reply:
“I think it depends on how many people can stand the tension of the opposites in themselves. If enough can do so, I think the situation will just hold, and we shall be able to creep around innumerable threats and thus avoid the worst catastrophe of all: the final clash of opposites in an atomic war. But if there are not enough and such a war should break out, I am afraid it would inevitably mean the end of our civilization as so many civilizations have ended in the past but on a smaller scale.”
In the 1950’s the “opposites” globally were the capitalist West and the communist East, the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. The latter collapsed in 1989, seemingly leaving the United States as the undisputed leader of the world. But a nation as unconscious as the U.S. cannot exist for long without some external threat carrying its shadow, and it didn’t take more than a few years before another “opposite” emerged. What replaced Communism as our “opposite”?
Consider the major features of American society: We are a liberal, secular, ethnically diverse and pluralistic culture. We espouse democratic ideals and are progressive in the sense that we expect the future to be better than the past. We cherish free-market capitalism, an economic orientation well-suited to our materialistic bent. Many of our citizens enjoy high-tech forms of entertainment and urbane activities in a cultural milieu of moral debauchery.
The opposite of our society would be a culture that is illiberal, intolerant of diversity, theocratic and tribal. It would reject democracy and be oriented to the past, to traditions and history, rather than to the future. Such a culture would regard “progress” as a threat to its heritage, and would reject both capitalism and the materialism on which capitalism is built. It would be regressive, fanatically religious, dogmatic in its beliefs and rural in its orientation. Its citizens would live under a moral code that seems (to the “modern” West) almost medieval.
Do we see such an opposite in our world today? Clearly, the Islamic jihadists and, in particular, the Taliban, are just such a society. And, given their commitment to a bogus interpretation of jihad, they are eager to confront the United States. Since 1993 the world has witnessed increasingly destructive examples of the “clash of opposites” that Jung feared: the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center; the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Africa; the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon; the 2002 bombing of the nightclub in Bali; the 2004 railroad bombing in Madrid; and the 2005 bombing of the tube and buses in London.
In multiple messages the late Ayatollah Khomeini made it clear that he viewed the United States as the “Great Satan” and Osama bin Laden has demanded that we convert to Islam, give up our military bases in the Middle East, and change our way of life to conform to Islamic values. In this he is reflecting a deeper “opposite,” that is, a more fundamental clash of opposites, in what has been called the “clash of fundamentalisms.” Both Christianity and Islam lay claim to having the Truth. Each insists only its way is the right way. In an earlier essay I defined “cosmic vanity.” This idea that one religion is the sole proponent of truth is cosmic vanity. This way of thinking was the ideological basis for the crusades back in the Middle Ages. It comes as a shock to most Western people to learn that Osama and the jihadists are still operating with this medieval mindset and in their minds they have taken up the efforts to conquer the “infidel” that went on for over a thousand years.
In the essay on America’s shadow I noted how the United States is so strongly an ESTJ culture, Extraverted (oriented to the outer world), Sensate (focused on tangible, material things), Thinking (preferring rational argument and objective facts to feelings and subjective values), and Judging (liking closure, decisive leadership and rapid decision-making). Such a strong bias does not conduce toward introspection and reflection, so it is not surprising that we have to see our inner opposite “out there,” in outer reality, rather than recognizing it within ourselves. We are now facing our unconscious in our current confrontation with the Islamic jihadists, who are carrying the projection of our societal shadow. Failing to hold Jung’s “tension of opposites” within ourselves, we are forced to experience it in outer reality.
Given the fanaticism of the jihadists and the profundity of our Western unconsciousness, this projection presents us with the gravest of problems. Jung offers us some advice in this impasse:
“...I had learned that all the greatest and most important problems of life are fundamentally insoluble.... They can never be solved, but only outgrown.”
Our current situation globally is not a problem to be “solved” with logic, reason, computer programs and other forms of left-brained processing. We are here dealing with a situation we must outgrow. The ego mind does not have the answers here. We can’t use our conscious mind to figure out what to do. Neither the predominance of our Thinking function, nor our Extraverted bias will be useful in dealing with our current challenges. “Outgrowing” ...]]> Mon, 03 Aug 2009 09:43:57 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=36 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=35
Sometimes, in reading Jung, I encounter a passage that makes me think Jung wrote it just yesterday. Recently, while preparing a presentation for the Jung Society for Scholarly Studies symposium at Cornell University, I came across the following quote from “Civilization in Transition:”
Thanks to industrialization, large portions of the population were uprooted and were herded together in large centers. This new form of existence—with its mass psychology and social dependence on the fluctuation of markets and wages—produced an individual who was unstable, insecure, and suggestible. He was aware that his life depended on boards of directors and captains of industry, and he supposed, rightly or wrongly, that they were chiefly motivated by financial interests. He knew that, no matter how conscientiously he worked, he could still fall a victim at any moment to economic changes which were utterly beyond his control. And there was nothing else for him to rely on....
Jung wrote these words for a BBC broadcast he gave in 1946, but, given our recent history, they seem as relevant in 2009 as they were 63 years ago. How prescient Jung was! He could see the fragility of the industrial system and how vulnerable it has left the vast majority of people in the modern world.
Ever the clinician concerned to relieve suffering in the world, Jung was not content simply to diagnose problems; he offered suggestions as to what we might do to improve our situation. Some of these suggestions include wising up to the dangerous features of our current reality, addressing the problem of “mass-mindedness,” and achieving a metanoia, or fundamental mind change.

Wising Up to the Dangerous Features of Our Current Reality

Jung summarized many of what he felt were dangerous features of Western civilization in the above passage. In the manner of the French explication de texte, let’s draw out Jung’s wisdom phrase by phrase.
“Large portions of the population were uprooted...”: Jung regarded the rootlessness of modern people as “one of the greatest psychic dangers... a disaster not only for primitive tribes but for civilized man as well.” Why a disaster? Jung felt rootlessness would lead to “... a hybris of the conscious mind which manifests itself in the form of exaggerated self-esteem or an inferiority complex. At all events a loss of balance ensues, and this is the most fruitful soil for psychic injury.”
“herded together in large centers.”: Jung refers here to big cities, the megalopolises of the modern world, and he felt such “herding” of people caused all sorts of social and mental pathologies, a tendency to “thinking in large numbers” and the rise of “mass psychology” —all regrettable and dangerous features of modern life.
“...dependence on the fluctuation of markets and wages”: Jung recognized that we have become so dependent because of the “externalization of culture” —the result of the Extraverted bias of Western culture (most especially in America). Our “materialistic technology and commercial acquisitiveness” has led to “a loss of spiritual culture.” Jung was quite explicit about the dangers in such dependence on externals:
The man whose interests are all outside is never satisfied with what is necessary, but is perpetually hankering after something more and better which, true to his bias, he always seeks outside himself. He forgets completely that, for all his outward successes, he himself remains the same inwardly, and he therefore laments his poverty if he possesses only one automobile when the majority have two. Obviously the outward lives of men could do with a lot more bettering and beautifying, but these things lose their meaning when the inner man does not keep pace with them. To be satisfied with “necessities” is no doubt an inestimable source of happiness, yet the inner man continues to raise his claim, and this can be satisfied by no outward possession. And the less this voice is heard in the chase after the brilliant things of this world, the more the inner man becomes the source of inexplicable misfortune and uncomprehended unhappiness in the midst of living conditions whose outcome was expected to be entirely different. The externalization of life turns to incurable suffering, because no one can understand why he should suffer from himself. No one wonders at his insatiability, but regards it as his lawful right, never thinking that the one-sidedness of this psychic diet leads in the end to the gravest disturbances of equilibrium. That is the sickness of Western man, and he will not rest until he has infected the whole world with his own greedy restlessness.
The economic meltdown of 2008 brought home the truth of Jung’s insight: the “captains of industry” (most of them in the United States), “chiefly motivated by financial interests” did indeed “infect” the entire planet with their greedy materialism.
One concomitant of such materialism is “... the spiritual confusion of our modern world.” Another has been “the hollowing out of money, which in the near future will make all savings illusory...” . A third is the emptiness of Western materialistic values, which has led to the degeneration of the individual personality. Jung speaks to this in his reference to
“... an individual who was unstable, insecure and suggestible.”: Our Western over-valuation of logic, reason and science is both a result of and a further cause for our lack of self-knowledge and valuation of the inner man. We put great store on being “with it,” following fads and fashions with increasing susceptibility to the omnipresent influence of the media. Lacking inner anchors, we become more and more suggestible, especially as our cities get larger and larger: “The majority of normal people (quite apart from the 10 per cent or so who are inferior) are ridiculously unconscious and naive and are open to any passing suggestion.... The more people live together in heaps, the stupider and more suggestible the individual becomes.”
Mon, 06 Jul 2009 09:50:00 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=35 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=34
This is the final of three essays that focus on America and its current situation from a Jungian perspective. In this last in the series the subject is, as noted in the final sentence of the previous essay, “the size, cause, nature and deep background of the coming American catastrophe.” Since the “deep background” requires more explanation and elaboration we’ll consider that first.

The Law of Cause and Effect: The Deep Background to America’s Current Situation

If we want to understand the deep background of what is going on now in America, we have to consider several key concepts. The first of these is the principle of karma. Theosophy and Eastern religions like Buddhism consider karma to be part of the Law of Cause and Effect. The Dalai Lama has provided a good definition of this Law and the principle of karma:
The fundamental precept of Buddhism is Interdependence or the Law of Cause and Effect. This simply states that... cause gives rise to effect which in turn becomes the cause of further effect,... consciousness... flows on and on, gathering experiences and impressions from one moment to the next... a being’s consciousness contains an imprint of all these past experiences and impressions, and the actions which precede them. This is known as karma, which means ‘action.’
Karma comes from all of one’s acts, words and thoughts, which “determine a person’s fate in his next stage of existence;...” The dictionary offers “fate,” “destiny” and “kismet” as synonyms for karma, and relates the term to Buddhism and Theosophy.
But the concept of karma and the Law of Cause and Effect is not unique to Buddhism. The Bible is full of references to this law and the concept of karma:
Job noted that “... those who plow evil and those who sow trouble reap it.”
Many years later the prophet Hosea expressed the same idea: “But you have planted wickedness, you have reaped evil,...”
Jesus advised his followers: “Do not judge, or you too will be judged.”
And the apostle Paul reminded the church in Galatia that “A man reaps what he sows.”
Jung wrote about karma in several places. In “Aion” he defined karma as “the fate earned through works in previous existences,” and he associated the term with Theosophy. He also recognized the importance of the concept in understanding the nature of archetypes:
When... psychic energy regresses, going beyond even the period of early infancy, and breaks into the legacy of ancestral life, the mythological images are awakened: these are the archetypes. [Here he appends an informative footnote:] This... is... a deliberate extension of the archetype by means of the karmic factor, which is so very important in Indian philosophy. The karma aspect is essential to a deeper understanding of the nature of an archetype...
Ever the man of science, Jung was quick to admit that concepts like karma cannot be proven:
...karmic illusion—that is to say, illusions which result from the psychic residue of previous existences...karma implies a sort of psychic theory of heredity...we cannot even conceive how anyone could prove anything at all in this respect... Hence we may cautiously accept the idea of karma only if we understand it as psychic heredity in the very widest sense of the word. Psychic heredity does exist--...
Jung offered a “Western version of a prenatal karma” in the “very ancient idea of what we might call an inborn bill of debt to fate...” . Our contemporary American culture has this idea, but we put it in a modern vernacular: “What goes around, comes around.” What you put out eventually comes back to you.
All the above remarks relate karma to the individual, but it has collective application as well. The Dalai Lama noted this in his autobiography, when he discussed the Tibetan invasion of China in the 8th century. Back then Tibet was a war-like place and the aggressive Tibetans actually seized the Chinese capital in 763 A.D. The killing, looting and destruction created a karmic debt, even though Tibet soon fell under the influence of Buddhism and became a very pacific and non-aggressive society. No matter. The karmic debt still had to be paid, and the process of doing so began in 1950, when China invaded Tibet. In 1951, just as the Tibetans did 1,188 years earlier to China, the Chinese took over the capital of Lhasa.
At this point you might be wondering what all this has to do with America, its current situation and the “catastrophe” mentioned above. We’ll get to that shortly. First, we must define another key concept: “cosmic vanity” or “ontological arrogance.”

The Concept of Cosmic Vanity

The terms “cosmic vanity” and “ontological arrogance” are not mine. I got the first from theologian Charles Davis, the second from business consultant Fred Kofman. They mean essentially the same thing: “... the claim to a privileged knowledge of the origin, structure and workings of the cosmos... a temptation that dogs all religion ... [is] cosmic vanity.” “Ontological arrogance is the belief that your perspective is privileged, that yours is the only true way to interpret a situation....” “Ontological arrogance [is] when I assume that my truth is the truth.”
We can define cosmic vanity situationally:
The vain man assumes that the world is as he sees it and also takes for granted that others should see things the way he does... Cosmic vanity occurs when men impose their social structure upon the cosmos as a whole, falling into the conceit of interpreting the entire cosmos in terms of the limited preoccupations and organization of a particular society and culture.
and we are reminded, by Kofman, that cosmic vanity has consequences:
Our history informs our understanding of the present and the decisions and actions through which we shape ...]]> Mon, 01 Jun 2009 08:01:53 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=34 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=32 As I have done with other essays I will begin by defining the “shadow,” in Jungians terms; then I will consider the link between the shadow and the typological functions. After that I will consider the specific elements of America’s shadow and how our collective shadow manifests pathologically. Finally I will examine how it relates to American exceptionalism.

What does “shadow” mean?

As used in Jungian thought, the term “shadow” refers to the “hidden or unconscious aspects of oneself,” which the ego has either repressed or simply not recognized. It is “shadow” because we are “in the dark” about these parts of ourselves.
While we will focus primarily in this essay on the negative aspects of the shadow (which are more problematic than the positive) we should note that the shadow contains all the parts of ourselves that we don’t recognize as “us.” That is, there can be positive or good qualities, like creative impulses, realistic insights, and qualities that are not developed in our consciousness: things or activities we are not good at, or aspects of living where we are awkward or unadapted. So, for example, gross motor coordination (fine athleticism) is part of my shadow (I can’t walk and chew gum at the same time!). Athleticism is a good thing, to be sure, but it is not something I do well and it would be very difficult for me to develop my gross motor skills to a high degree. So we might say that athleticism is part of my shadow.
More difficult—what Jung called “a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality” —is to work with the negative forms of the shadow. We will focus on this form in the rest of this essay.
In its dark guise, the negative guise, the shadow includes all the things we are not proud of or would not want to see as part of us: repressed desires, uncivilized impulses, resentments, childish fantasies, morally inferior motives, behaviors that are anti-social or illegal. Because we don’t want to think poorly of ourselves, we very rarely actively seek to discover our shadow. Jung felt the shadow showed up, or confronted a person, at the outbreak of a neurosis. At such a time, we are confronted with both embarrassing insights into ourselves and also new possibilities (because the shadow offers the opportunity to enlarge our sense of self).
At this point we face a choice: We can take up the task of working with the shadow material OR we can willfully repress the shadow. But note this: repression does not make the shadow go away. It continues to exist in the unconscious and begins to express itself indirectly (e.g. in outer life) in situations that are not pleasant. Often in these situations we “project” the shadow out (unconsciously, of course) and then find ourselves having to deal with people who carry the projection. Life gets more difficult. Jung even uses the word “dangerous” at this point. The shadow wants to be reckoned with. Doing so produces change.
If we take the more prudent (but less palatable) course and confront the shadow, what happens next? Jung describes the process: We come to feel stuck. Many of the certainties in life come to seem doubtful. We find it hard to make moral decisions. We may feel ineffective or begin to question our convictions. In short, life does not get better immediately because the process of assimilating the shadow takes time.
Much as we might wish for a guaranteed “cookbook” approach to resolving the shadow problem, there isn’t any. Each person grapples with it in his/her unique way. It is always an individual process. But certain steps have been identified by Jungian analysts.
First, we must accept the shadow as part of us and take it seriously. Second, we must become aware of the shadow’s qualities and intentions. How to do this? By paying conscious attention to our moods, fantasies, impulses and dreams. Dreamwork is one of the most effective ways to get to know and monitor the shadow. Third, we hunker down for a long “process of negotiation,” what Jungians call (using the technical term in the German original) “Auseinandersetzung,” or “having it out with oneself.” In this process we metaphorically “wrestle” with ourselves inwardly, engaging the shadow material, then backing off, coming in again, withdrawing again and again. This phase of inner work can take months, but there is no set timetable and, as I remind my dream students, this is not a race: the work will take as long as it takes.
In discussing the shadow, we must mention a key point which relates to the quality of the shadow. By “quality” I refer to how dark or light the shadow is. This degree of darkness “depends on how much we consciously identify with a bright persona.” By this Jungians mean how highly we think of ourselves. If we think we are wonderful, superior to others, special, or gifted, our shadow is likely to be very dark and full of all sorts of stuff we are not likely to want to see or face. Why is this? Because the shadow stands in a compensatory relationship to our conscious sense of ourselves. This is important to remember when we examine America’s shadow in a later section of this essay. ...]]> Thu, 30 Apr 2009 12:56:34 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=32 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=31
“America is an exceptional country.”
Sarah Palin
“I do believe in American exceptionalism”
John McCain

The topic of this essay—American exceptionalism—may not be familiar to many readers of this blog as it is not something taught in schools, but in the last Presidential election both Sarah Palin and John McCain mentioned it. As we look ahead to the future, and particularly the future of the United States, the concept of American exceptionalism is important to understand, and we will mention it in the two essays that follow this one. In this essay we will define “American exceptionalism,” then examine how it has shown up in American history, consider some of its implications and then offer a Jungian “take” on it.

What does “American exceptionalism” mean?

A concise, as well as easily accessible definition is provided by Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
American exceptionalism ... refers to the belief that the United States differs qualitatively from other developed nations, because of its national credo, historical evolution, distinctive political and religious institutions, ethnic origins and composition, or national ideals.
To understand what “differs qualitatively” means, we’ll consider each part of the definition:
“historical evolution” refers to the founding myth of the Puritan colonists, who felt they were charged with a special spiritual and political destiny to create in the New World a church and society that would be a model for the rest of the world. John Winthrop expressed this in his statement that he and his fellow colonists were creating a “city on a hill” that others in the future would be able to look to for inspiration on how to live an exemplary life. Believing they were chosen by God to be moral exemplars, the Puritans felt they were “blessed by Providence.” Later generations developed and extended this idea, as we shall see later, when we consider how American exceptionalism has manifested in our history.
“national credo” has been embodied or expressed in several ways: It appears in documents, particularly the Declaration of Independence (“...We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal...”), the Constitution (“We, the people of the United States... do ordain and establish this Constitution...”) and Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address (“... this nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal....”). It frequently shows up in Presidential speeches (The United States is “mankind’s last, best hope,” a “beacon on a hill,” “God’s own country,” “the indispensable nation” and a “shining city on a hill.”). Finally, American exceptionalism as a national credo got carved in stone—on the Statue of Liberty, in a stirring poem by Emma Lazarus: “Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free/The wretched refuse of your teeming shore/Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:/I lift my lamp beside the golden door.” Written, spoken or carved, words like these reflect the United States’ unique nature.
“ethnic origin and composition:” Mention of the Statue of Liberty and the message carved on its base reflects another component of the definition of American exceptionalism. More perhaps than any other country in the world, the United States draws its population from everywhere. There is no single predominant cultural origin here, and America for centuries has provided “upward mobility” without rigid castes or an official noble class. Its open social structure makes it unique.
“distinctive political and religious institutions and practices:” The official documents that established the United States separated church and state. There is no state religion in this country and such secularism is not the norm elsewhere. The absence of socialism and the failure of labor unions to organize into labor parties are also unusual. The most remarkable form of American exceptionalism is found in our diplomatic and foreign policies, in our isolationism, with our mistrust of entangling foreign commitments and the refusal of our federal judges to submit to the rulings of other jurisdictions; in our tradition of deprecating power politics and old-fashioned diplomacy; in the assumption we make that American values and practices are universally valid and appropriate for the rest of the world; and in our “exemptionalism,” in which U.S. courts exempt America from adherence to international treaties.
“national ideals:” We express our ideals in such statements as “America, land of liberty,” “The United States is the land of opportunity,” and “America, beacon of freedom.”
Clearly, American exceptionalism is a complex concept, including many aspects of our history and culture, with many facets and components. Some of these facets are positive, others negative. On the positive side, scholars of American history point to the following statements or claims:
The United States has a special role in the world.
The U.S. has a special destiny and mission.
The U.S. is the only nation founded on an ideal.
The U.S. is different from other nations in its underlying values.
The U.S. sees diversity as a strength.
The United States is distinctive.
The U.S. stands outside of history.
The U.S. is more patriotic than other lands.
American conservatives go farther in their claims, to offer a form of American exceptionalism that exalts the United States as superior to other nations, being richer, more democratic, more religious, and with the best values and institutions yet devised.
In reaction to this “triumphalism” other scholars remind us of the negative face, in such statements as:
The United States believes the rest of the world should adapt to American ways.
The U.S. thinks it can, and should, force its version of democracy on to others (e.g. Iraq).
The United States is ethnocentric.
The U.S. is hyper-nationalistic.
The U.S. is an arrogant bully.
The U.S. fails to listen to other countries.
The U.S. falls into a “double standard:” criticizing others while ignoring its critics.
The United States suffers from a “disease of conceit.”
The U.S. is blind to the misery its ...]]> Thu, 02 Apr 2009 09:53:01 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=31 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=30
Part III: Our Current Situation in an Alchemical Context

In this part we will examine the 4 alchemical phases with reference to specific events in the daily newspapers that provide us with insights into the phases underway in this transitional time. Then we will consider what the next few years might hold for us, using alchemy as a guide to the future.

Pick up the daily newspaper and what do we read about? Major forest fires burning thousands of acres and leaving hundreds of people homeless. Massive hurricanes dissolving beaches, breaking down structures, flooding whole cities. Tens of thousands dying in large earthquakes and terrorist attacks. Currencies losing their value. The revelations of corruption at all levels of business and government, as Governors and Senators are forced from office for malfeasance, bribery, or other “high crimes and misdemeanors;” heads of state castigating other heads of state as “the axis of evil” and refusing to engage them on the world stage; Wall Street tycoons getting huge paychecks, CEOs claiming big bonuses, “golden parachutes” and salaries hundreds of times larger than those of ordinary workers; hot shot “dealmakers” fancying themselves “Masters of the Universe;” confusion, bewilderment, disorientation and melancholy as tens of thousands of people lose their homes in the mortgage crisis; hundreds of young people becoming addicted to drugs or alcohol each year; major banks collapsing, ratcheting up the anxiety level throughout our society.

Do we need to wonder what is going on? Clearly we are now in the nigredo stage as a society, experiencing the calcinatio (fires), solutio (floods), mortificatio (dying), inflation (both economic and personal), the putrefactio (corruption), confrontation with the shadow (which George Bush projected out in seeing others as “evil”), greed, confusion, sickness of spirit, and anxiety. This is not a good time in our collective reality! Some elements of our society would have us believe it is the beginning of the end, that we will soon witness Armageddon or the Apocalypse.

But Jung reminds us that the nigredo is not meant to be the end. It is only a phase, the hardest phase, admittedly, but one that we are meant to grow through. Using alchemy as our road map, we can also see signs of the albedo, the phase after the nigredo.

We see the strong passions and bitter hostilities that are characteristic of the albedo phase in the Obama-Clinton exchanges during the Presidential primaries. Other examples of this are: the hostilities between Sunnis and Shi’ites in Iraq, between Tibetans and Chinese in Tibet, and between the Islamic jihadists and the U.S. military in Afghanistan. There is growing awareness of the need to balance opposites like home and work, work and play, in, for example, the studies of Anne Wilson Schaef and others on the dangers of addictions (e.g. workaholism). In the rise of feminism, gender studies on college campuses, and the women’s rights movement internationally we see growing attempts, on the collective level, to integrate animus and anima. In the rising awareness of holistic health, eating disorders and the value of diet in health maintenance we see the redemption of body and matter. The popularity of the books by Marion Woodman speaks to the growing concern with the body and its connection to soul. Finally, the environmental movement is the modern form of Hildegard’s benedicta viriditas, the blessedness of “greenness” and life on this planet.

Signs of the rubedo phase are just emerging in our collective experience. Renewal seems to be showing up in the growing number of people who are now working on healing themselves, including becoming conscious of the unconscious. New attitudes are appearing: there is more respect now being given to indigenous peoples and what they can offer us; more people are waking up to how global capitalism is destroying the planet; reverence is being given to Mother Earth in more places and more ways; the push for peace is growing as more people wake up to the reality that violence never solves anything; we are seeing a more conscious holding of the tension of opposites, as more people recognize the “clash of universalisms” and realize that gravity—and the Source of gravity—truly does work for everyone (even those who profess a different religious belief). As more people “authorize their own lives” they look within for direction and recognize the wisdom that their inner Divinity offers. Finally, we are hearing messages (even in media like television that usually pander to the lowest common denominator) reminding us “we’re all in this together,” and in such venues we are seeing nascent visions of unity. “Nascent” because this phase is just beginning to emerge on the collective level.

The nigredo, by contrast, is well underway. What does it suggest the next few years are likely to hold for us?

Our Possible Future in an Alchemical Context

The years ahead are likely to see widespread confusion—times when people really aren’t clear as to what’s happening. Disintegration—where things fall apart—is also likely, in what George Land called the “breakdown” time (which makes possible the “breakthrough” later on). Another likely part of our future is aggression: anger against oneself, as well as with other people. All sorts of base passions are likely to rise up: rage and jealousy, resentment and frustration.

There is likely to be lots of death. In the mortificatio people experience the death of various aspects of themselves or the death of some important people in their lives, or the death of a phase of life, or the death of a job. Given the current round of layoffs reported daily in the news, we are witnessing lots of mortificatio now. Deaths from fires, ...]]> Mon, 23 Feb 2009 12:45:04 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=30 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=29
Part II: Alchemy and Its Phases—A Road Map for Individuals and Cultures

“Alchemy.” The word conjures up medieval men hunched over flasks and fires trying to turn lead into gold. Historians of science regard alchemy as the precursor of modern chemistry. The dictionary defines it as “a combination of chemistry and magic studied in the Middle Ages, especially the search for a process by which cheaper metals could be turned into gold and silver...” It was part of Jung’s genius, born out of his respect for ancient ways and wisdom traditions, to recognize that the medieval alchemists were about something much more profound than making gold out of lead.

Rather than metallurgical transformation, alchemy is about the process of personal transformation. Lead is symbolic of the basic unconscious state that we’re in when we come into the world, and the gold is the achievement we reach when we have developed in ourselves what Jung called “individuation,” that is, when we have become fully and truly who we are meant to be. This process of change takes many forms, involves many processes and takes us through many phases as we work to individuate.

Jung and his followers (especially Marie-Louise von Franz) describe the phases of alchemical change using the terms developed by the early alchemists. These medieval researchers were fluent in the scholarly language of the day, Latin, hence the terms show up in forms that are foreign to the ears of most contemporary Americans.

The alchemical change process occurs in four major phases: the nigredo, the albedo, the rubedo and the citrinitas. In this Part II we will define and describe each phase in terms of an individual’s experiences. Then we will apply the phase on the collective level, in a general way. In Part III we will relate the phases to our current reality, with reference to specific events and phenomena we are witnessing now, and then look into the future.

The Nigredo

The first of the phases is dark, dismal, a very black time, well-labeled the nigredo, which comes from a Latin word (niger) meaning “black” or “dark.” For the person in this phase, life is not pleasant, as it is full of confusion and bewilderment, disorientation, sickness of spirit and confrontations with the shadow. Jealousy, envy, irritability, anxiety, self-righteousness, greed, melancholy and inflation are just some of the panoply of feelings that show up during this most difficult of the phases.

A variety of alchemical processes are part of this time, including:

the putrefactio, when we come to recognize some component of our existence is putrid, or rotten, with little or no energy left to feed our life.

the mortificatio, “death”—of people, things, parts of ourselves, in a metaphorical or (more rarely) literal sense—which leaves us with a sense of loss and grieving.
the calcinatio, “burning” or the “refiner’s fire” spoken of in the Old Testament, the process in which we experience the frustration of our desire nature, with the purpose of purifying or “refining” our will.

the solutio, or dissolution of one or more of the elements of our existence that give our life structure, a process during which we are flooded with affect.

These are just a few of the more than dozen processes that alchemists recognized and described. Since each alchemist wrote from his/her own experience, each alchemical text describes the order, sequence and processes differently, making close comparison difficult. But Jung saw the close correlation between their varied descriptions and what he himself experienced in his own development and in that of his patients.

The nigredo is the phase when we are still operating mostly unconsciously. Our complexes are mostly autonomous in this beginning phase. As a result, we suffer more acutely than in the later phases.

The Albedo

The term albedo comes from the Latin albus, meaning “white” or “bright.” Things begin to feel lighter, “brighter” in this phase, compared to the previous misery of the nigredo. The work of this phase is to become aware of our “contrasexual side” and make the acquaintance of our “inner partner.”

As we wrestle with our complexes and strive to domesticate them, we experience strong passions and bitter hostilities, within and without, in dealings with others (often those closest to us). The challenge is to balance the opposites and achieve an integration of the animus/anima. In the process of the sublimatio, we become more objective, able to rise above situations to see them from a transcendent perspective. In developing a conscious relation to the inner man (for a woman) or woman (for a man), we redeem the body and matter, and come to experience what the great 13th century abbess, Hildegard of Bingen, called benedicta viriditas, the blessedness of being alive.

In the albedo phase we work to bring up from the unconscious (that is, we “redeem”) attitudes and feelings about ourselves, our bodies, our sexuality, the opposite sex and the host of feelings we have around embodiment itself. The purpose here? To come ultimately to a deeper level of wholeness and a greater appreciation of life on the physical plane.

The Rubedo

The third phase means “reddening” in Latin and just as our face reddens in the process of blushing, so we experience a surge of renewal in the rubedo phase. After confronting the shadow in the nigredo and wrestling with our inner opposite sex in the albedo, we come to the third phase more able to hold the tension of opposites (good and bad, male and female). The process of the sublimatio has led to the development ...]]> Fri, 06 Feb 2009 10:43:33 -0500 http://jungiancenter.org/blog/blog_comment.asp?bi=29