Introduction Analytical psychology, founded by Swiss psychologist Carl Jung, is based on the idea that the key to psychological adjustment and growth lies in making unconscious material conscious through hypnosis, active imagination (free association and guided imagery), and dream interpretation. For Jung, such psychological maturation is defined as individuation, “the process by which a person becomes a psychological 'individual,’ that is, a separate, indivisible unity or 'whole.’” For the developing individual, this involves the emergence of ego from a pre-egoic state of being. Children, for example, develop a growing sense of themselves as separate from their mothers as they move from childhood into adulthood. Erik H. Erikson, in Identity and the Life Cycle (1959), refers to this as the achievement of ego-identity. It represents the “comprehensive gains which the individual, at the end of adolescence, must have derived from all of his preadult experiences in order to be ready for the task of adulthood.” According to Jung, however, ego-identity is not a final stage in the individuation process but simply a step along the way. Full adult maturity implies a movement beyond ego-identity toward awareness of the collective, undivided nature of being and people’s unity with all things. Achievement of psychological maturity, or individuation, requires an integration of both conscious and unconscious energy.
Dreams Jung believed that dreams provide a window into the individual’s unconscious and thus are central to the process of individuation. According to Jung, there are, however, two types of dreams, personal and archetypal dreams, just are there are two types of unconscious, the personal and the collective unconscious. The personal dream arises from the personal unconscious, which consists of repressed personal memories and experiences, including the Shadow (which represents everything that the individual refuses to acknowledge about himself or herself, specifically negative character traits or tendencies).
The archetypal dream, by contrast, arises from the collective unconscious, which is made up of archaic or “primordial” types, “universal images that have existed since the remotest times” and that are shared by all. Thus, although the personal unconscious is specific to the individual and involves a personal inventory of material that may have been forgotten (memories of birth, for example) or repressed from consciousness (child abuse, for example), the collective unconscious represents a vast reservoir of elemental configurations or archetypes that are outside space and time (the Rebirth archetype, for example). The collective unconscious, in other words, is inherited. It is, as Jung explains, identical and present in all individuals and represents “a common psychic substrate of a suprapersonal nature.” Jung’s support for the existence of the collective unconscious is based, in part, on his assertion that the realm of consciousness does not account for the totality of the psyche, a claim supported through many years of clinical observations of patients’ dreams and visions, particularly those of schizophrenics. Thus, achieving individuation through the “therapeutic method of complex psychology,” according to Jung, requires rendering conscious the energy of both the personal and collective unconscious, to reconcile the conflict between conscious and unconscious content. Jung refers to this union of opposites as the “transcendent function.”
Archetypes Unconscious energy is made manifest through archetypes, the “language” of the collective unconsciousness, or the way in which unconscious material is articulated. Archetypes not only represent unconscious content rendered into consciousness, as prototypes or patterns of instinctual behavior, but also exist outside space and time and thus speak to the universal nature of human experience. The Mother archetype, for example, is a preexistent form that is above and yet subsumes individual experiences of one’s own mother. Archetypes may emerge in picture form (such as the universal mandala symbol, a squared circle) or in mythic narratives (such as a story of rebirth). Whether as pictures or stories, however, archetypes emerge during states of reduced intensity of consciousness, such as daydreams, visions, dreams, or delirium. In these states, according to Jung, “the check put upon unconscious contents by the concentration of the conscious mind ceases, so that the hitherto unconscious material streams, as through from opened side-sluices, into the field of consciousness.” They can also emerge during strong emotional states brought on by, for example, intense anger, love, hate, confusion, or pain. Archetypes are spontaneous products of the psyche that seem to have a life of their own; as such, they can be neither permanently suppressed nor ordered to emerge. They are, as Jung says, in potentia, waiting to be revealed. Some examples of archetypes include the Child, the Hero, the Old Man, the Mother, and the Trickster.
Important Functions Jung claims that it is dangerous to suppress or ignore the collective unconscious, particularly in important matters, because he believes that the individual’s fate is predominantly determined by the unconscious. In extreme cases, suppression of the unconscious results in neurosis, a nervous disorder characterized by intense emotional instability. Indeed, Jung claims that “when an individual or social group deviates too far from their instinctual foundations, they then experience the full impact of unconscious forces.” It is as if, as Jung explains, the unconscious “were trying to restore the lost balance.” Although Jung asserts that archetypes are manifestations of instinctual behavior, such as the child’s need to suck or the innate attraction to warmth and light over cold and darkness, he also asserts that they may speak to people’s spiritual nature, and thus may be manifestations of the divine. He writes of archetypes, for example, that they “are meant to attract, to convince, to fascinate, and to overpower. They are created out of the primal stuff of revelation and reflect the ever-unique experience of divinity.” Jung goes so far as to assert that “our concern with the unconscious has become a vital question for us—a question of spiritual being and non being.”
Whether divine or instinctual, Jung makes a compelling argument for cultures’ need to continually explore the archetypes of the unconsciousness. Indeed, he even claims that the practice of psychology (by which he means analytical psychology) would be “superfluous in an age and a culture that possessed symbols.” Cultures, particularly Western cultures, according to Jung, have experienced a “growing impoverishment of symbols.” Despite the universal qualities of the unconscious, Jung explains that archetypes must constantly be reborn and reinterpreted for every generation or they will die. Jung, in fact, argues that the primary role of art is to “dream the myth outward,” to continually find new interpretations of the archetypes of the collective unconscious to live the fully human life.
Archetypes and archetypal stories, then, are continually produced and reproduced in all cultures in all ages. Manifest in dreams and delirium as well as in art (most notably in myths and fairy tales), they articulate human experiences, offer resources for psychological maturation, and provide a guide for living the fully human life. What, then, are some of these archetypes? How have they evolved? To what urgencies do they speak?
The Anima and Mother Archetypes According to Jung, hidden inside of the unconscious of every man is a “feminine personality”; likewise, hidden in the unconsciousness of every woman is a “masculine personality.” Jung labels these the anima and animus,
respectively. The anima-animus concept is best illustrated in the Chinese yin-yang symbol, where yang, representing “the light, war, dry, masculine principle” contains within it “the seed of yin (the dark, cold, moist, feminine principle).” Jung supports such an idea with biology, explaining that although a majority of male or female genes determines an individual’s sex, the minority of genes belonging to the other sex do not simply disappear once the sex has been determined in the developing fetus. The idea of the anima and animus is also reflected in “syzygies” or dually gendered deities, such as god the father and god the mother, and in god’s human counterparts, the “godmother” and “godfather,” and in the child’s own mother and father. Jung links the anima personality, in particular, with its “historical” archetypes of the sister, wife, mother, and daughter, with particular attention paid to the Mother archetype.
The Mother archetype, or the image of the mother-goddess or Great Mother, is an archetype that spans the world’s religions and cultures. In psychological practice, it is often associated with fertility, fruition, a garden, a cave, or a plowed field. It is connected with birth, the uterus, or any round cavernous place and, by extension, rebirth, or magical transformation and healing. These are positive connotations, but the archetype also has negative ones, as in the witch, the devouring dragon, the grave, deep water, or any suffocating or annihilating energy. Thus, the mother archetype represents both the nurturing-protecting mother, as in the Roman Catholic image of the Virgin Mary, and the punishing-devouring mother, as in Medea of classical Greek mythology. Sometimes she represents both the loving and the devouring mother, as in the dual-natured Indian goddess Kali.
In clinical practice, the Mother archetype is manifest in what Jung refers to as the mother-complex, which also has both positive and negatives aspects. For the daughter, the mother-complex can either unduly stimulate or inhibit her feminine instinct. The exaggeration of the feminine instinct, particularly the maternal instinct, is represented in the daughter whose only goal is childbirth, who views her husband primarily as an instrument of procreation, and who is self-defined as “living for others” while unable to make any true or meaningful sacrifices for others. A second manifestation of the mother-complex, according to Jung, is the daughter with an overdeveloped eros, or sexual instinct. In this case, the maternal instinct, potentially wiped out, is instead replaced with an overdeveloped sex drive, often leading to an unconscious incestuous relationship with the father driven by jealousy of the mother. By contrast, a third type of identification with the mother involves a complete paralysis of the daughter’s feminine will, such that “everything which reminds her of motherhood, responsibility, personal relationships, and erotic demands arouses feelings of inferiority and compels her to run away—to her mother, naturally, who lives to perfection everything that seems unattainable to her daughter.” Finally, the daughter who resists or rejects the mother and everything she represents exemplifies the extreme negative mother complex.
The Mother archetype in a man’s psychology is entirely different in character from that of a woman. Jung claims that while the mother-complex exemplifies the daughter’s own gendered conscious life, for the son, it typifies the alien, unknown, or yet-to-be-experienced, since it exists only as unconscious imagery. The mother-complex for sons, in other words, is connected with the man’s sexual counterpart, the anima. Jung’s discussion of the mother-complex in sons is some of his most controversial work, primarily because he argues that it produces homosexuality, Don Juanism, or impotence. In the case of homosexuality or impotence, he argues that the man’s heterosexuality is unconsciously tied to his mother, and thus is dormant. By contrast, in Don Juanism, which is marked by an overly developed sexual instinct, the “unconscious seeks his mother in every woman he meets.” Jung supports the idea of the strong influence of the mother on the son’s sexuality by explaining she is the first female with whom the man comes in contact. The man becomes increasingly aware of her femininity and responds to it instinctually or unconsciously.
The Child and Rebirth Archetypes Another significant archetype of the collective unconscious, according to Jung, is the Rebirth archetype. Stories and images of rebirth, or about being twice born, abound in all cultures across time. Underlying all rebirth stories, according to Jung, is “dual descent,” the idea of both human and divine parents. For example, just as Jesus Christ is twice born, from his mother Mary and by his baptism by John the Baptist in the river Jordan, he also has a dual descent from a heavenly father and an earthly mother. Rebirth, then, is about acknowledging and experiencing the divine through the corporeal. Jung explains that there are five forms in which the rebirth archetype manifests itself and there are two central ways to experience it. The five forms are reincarnation (the continuity of a personality, accessible to memory, that is successively reborn in various human bodies), metempsychosis (the transmigration of souls into successive bodies, possibly without the continuity of personality or memory, as in karma, or soul debt), resurrection (the reestablishing of human existence after death, usually in a resurrected body rather than a corporeal one), participation in the process of transformation (an indirect rebirth through involvement in a ritual of transformation, such as taking part in the Catholic Mass), and rebirth (rebirth within an individual’s life span involving a renewal or transformation of personality). The two central ways of experiencing rebirth are through ritual, as in the aforementioned Catholic Mass, or through immediate experience, as in a divine revelation or a significant insight gained through hypnosis or dream therapy.
The Rebirth archetype may manifest itself in numerous ways, such as the diminution of personality, or “soul loss”; the enlargement of personality, through, for example, a divine revelation; a change in internal structure, a transformation brought about, for example, by possession, whether possession by the persona (the public self), the Shadow (the dark self), the anima or animus (the opposite-sex self), or even the “ancestral soul”; identification with a group, such that the individual identity is subsumed or transformed into that of the group (for example, mob psychology); identification with a cult hero, as in the Christian idea of rebirth and salvation through Jesus Christ; technical transformation, achieved through certain meditative practices such as yoga; and finally natural transformation, whereby the individual undergoes the death of the old personality and the birth of a new or greater personality (individuation). This last manifestation of rebirth, individuation, is the most important from the perspective of analytical psychology.
The Child archetype represents the potential for such a rebirth, since the child, according to Jung, is an individuation archetype. It signifies the preconscious (the childhood aspect of the collective psyche) and the past, while also representing future possibilities. The child, in other words, represents the idea of an “a priori existence of potential wholeness” while also anticipating future developments for the individual and the culture. In Jung’s words, it “paves the way for future change of personality,” and, in the largest sense, is a “symbol which unites opposites,” as a “mediator, a bringer of healing, that is, one who makes whole.” Analytical psychology, and the work of Jung, is primarily responsible for drawing attention to this and other archetypes of the collective unconscious and their role in the process of psychological maturity, or individuation.
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