12/05/2024
This is the so-called Classical Jungian school approach. That means it is pretty close to the approach Jung himself set out. There are other approaches which are also Jungian, e.g. the Developmental school.
1. We all have a sense-of-self. In the Jungian model, this is called the “ego.” (It is conceptually different to the Freudian idea of ego, but it’s not helpful to go into that here.) The ego is also the centre of consciousness, sometimes thought of as the complex of consciousness. The ego has “ego functions” which support it. I see these like the metal and claws of a diamond ring supporting the diamond.
2. The ego has a habitual way of doing things, feeling, thinking, intuiting, sensing, etc. This is called the “ego attitude.” The ego attitude will change over the course of our lives. We end up with a series of ego attitudes.
3. There are at least two layers to the unconscious: the “personal unconscious” and the “collective unconscious.”
a. The personal unconscious consists mostly of things that we have, at least briefly, been conscious of and which, because they challenge our ego attitude and cause shame, anxiety and guilt, are defended against and made unconscious.
b. The collective unconscious is deeper in unconsciousness and it consists of psychological material, such as archetypes, that have never been conscious before.
c. Defendedness against either or both of these unconsciousness leads to neurosis.
4. When an ego attitude has come to the end of its “lifetime,” it loses meaning. Life becomes dull, uninspired, meaningless, etc. Then the unconscious tries to “compensate” the ego attitude by providing unconscious material.
5. This encounter by the ego with the unconscious can feel threatening. The ego will have to change. For example, perhaps somebody who has been over principled will need to be more flexible in their morality. Of course, it could be the other way round. Anyway, some people would rather literally die (su***de) than let their ego attitude change or metaphorically die (egocide). It’s very strange.
6. Anyway, there is then a period of tussle between the old ego attitude and the compensating unconscious material. The ego needs to integrate this material.
7. Usually, that happens through the process of “symbol” formation. Jung describes a symbol as the best possible representation of a relatively unknown fact. That means it is both conscious and unconscious at the same time. It is a curious thing, a symbol, but it resolves the tension between the ego attitude and the complementing unconscious material.
8. In this way, the ego attitude changes. A new, or adapted ego attitude forms.
9. All of this is growing the relationship between the ego and the unconscious (both personal and collective). However, there is more:
10. A relationship of the ego to the unconscious ultimately means a relationship to the centre of the unconscious. Just as there is a centre to consciousness, so there is a centre to the unconscious. Jung called this centre the “Self.”
11. The Self presents in different ways, typically as a God image and things like mandalas. Simply put, it generally comes as ordered circles. (It can be other things.)
12. The Self can be in a very mundane image, such as a clock or a hat.
13. The building relationship between the ego (and its attitude) and the Self is called “individuation.” In states of individuation, we feel the flow, meaning, the touch of the spiritual. We have a clear sense of our autonomy, we act with authenticity, and we have author-ity. We are the authors of our own lives, but our lives are not a reaction to how someone else wants us to be or not be.
14. There are different and complicated things that can happen with this process, but that is probably not relevant at this point.
