The language and the “people” of the unconscious are symbols, and the means of communications dreams.

“extravert,” “introvert,” and “archetype” are all Jungian concepts—borrowed and sometimes misused by others. But his overwhelming contribution to psychological understanding is his concept of the unconscious—not (like the “subconscious” of Freud) merely a sort of glory-hole of repressed desires, but a world that is just as much a vital and real part of the life of an individual as the conscious, “cogitating” world of the ego, and infinitely wider and richer. The language and the “people” of the unconscious are symbols, and the means of communications dreams.

examination of man’s relation to his own unconscious.

Thus an examination of Man and his Symbols is in effect an examination of man’s relation to his own unconscious.

Man becomes whole, integrated, calm, fertile, and happy when (and only when) the process of individuation is complete, when the conscious and the unconscious have learned to live at peace and to complement one another.

the ability to establish communication with the unconscious is a part of the whole man, and Jungians “teach” themselves (I can think of no better term) to be receptive to dreams.

Thus a word or an image is symbolic when it implies something more than its obvious and immediate meaning.

Because there are innumerable things beyond the range of human understanding, we constantly use symbolic terms to represent concepts that we cannot define or fully comprehend. This is one reason why all religions employ symbolic language or images. But this conscious use of symbols is only one aspect of a psychological fact of great importance: Man also produces symbols unconsciously and spontaneously, in the form of dreams.

There are, moreover, unconscious aspects of our perception of reality. The first is the fact that even when our senses react to real phenomena, sights, and sounds, they are somehow translated from the realm of reality into that of the mind.

Then there are certain events of which we have not consciously taken note; they have remained, so to speak, below the threshold of consciousness. They have happened, but they have been absorbed subliminally, without our conscious knowledge.

As a matter of history, it was the study of dreams that first enabled psychologists to investigate the unconscious aspect of conscious psychic events.

Our psyche is part of nature, and its enigma is as limitless.

Consciousness is a very recent acquisition of nature, and it is still in an “experimental” state. It is frail, menaced by specific dangers, and easily injured. As anthropologists have noted, one of the most common mental derangements that occur among primitive people is what they call “the loss of a soul”—which means, as the name indicates, a noticeable disruption (or, more technically, a dissociation) of consciousness.

In some tribes, it is assumed that a man has a number of souls; this belief expresses the feeling of some primitive individuals that they each consist of several linked but distinct units. This means that the individual’s psyche is far from being safely synthesized; on the contrary, it threatens to fragment only too easily under the onslaught of unchecked emotions.

Thus, even in our day the unity of consciousness is still a doubtful affair; it can too easily be disrupted.

dreams are the most frequent and universally accessible source for the investigation of man’s symbolizing faculty.

In the Middle Ages, long before the physiologists demonstrated that by reason of our glandular structure there are both male and female elements in all of us, it was said that “every man carries a woman within himself.” It is this female element in every male that I have called the “anima.”

The two fundamental points in dealing with dreams are these: First, the dream should be treated as a fact, about which one must make no previous assumption except that it somehow makes sense; and second, the dream is a specific expression of the unconscious.

if one assumes that they are normal events (which, as a matter of fact, they are), one is bound to consider that they are either causal—i.e., that there is a rational cause for their existence—or in a certain way purposive, or both.

But when something slips out of our consciousness it does not cease to exist, any more than a car that has disappeared round a corner has vanished into thin air. It is simply out of sight. Just as we may later see the car again, so we come across thoughts that were temporarily lost to us.

Thus, part of the unconscious consists of a multitude of temporarily obscured thoughts, impressions, and images that, in spite of being lost, continue to influence our conscious minds. A man who is distracted or “absent-minded” will walk across the room to fetch something. He stops, seemingly perplexed; he has forgotten what he was after. His hands grope about among the objects on the table as if he were sleepwalking; he is oblivious of his original purpose, yet he is unconsciously guided by it. Then he realizes what it is that he wants. His unconscious has prompted him.

If you observe the behavior of a neurotic person, you can see him doing many things that he appears to be doing consciously and purposefully. Yet if you ask him about them, you will discover that he is either unconscious of them or has something quite different in mind. He hears and does not hear; he sees, yet is blind; he knows and is ignorant. Such examples are so common that the specialist soon realizes that unconscious contents of the mind behave as if they were conscious and that you can never be sure, in such cases, whether thought, speech, or action is conscious or not.

All these details could be verified. She was even able to tell the time at which she had been admitted, because she had seen a clock in the entrance hall. Under hypnosis, her memory was as clear as if she had been completely conscious all the time.

But the forgotten ideas have not ceased to exist. Although they cannot be reproduced at will, they are present in a subliminal state—just beyond the threshold of recall—from which they can rise again spontaneously at any time, often after many years of apparently total oblivion.

we all see, hear, smell, and taste many things without noticing them at the time, either because our attention is deflected or because the stimulus to our senses is too slight to leave a conscious impression. The unconscious, however, has taken note of them, and such subliminal sense perceptions play a significant part in our everyday lives. Without our realizing it, they influence the way in which we react to both events and people.

A girl, for instance, may be busy in her office, apparently in good health and spirits. A moment later she develops a blinding headache and shows other signs of distress. Without consciously noticing it, she has heard the foghorn of a distant ship, and this has unconsciously reminded her of an unhappy parting with a lover whom she has been doing her best to forget.

The toy cars forming the Volkswagen trade-mark in this advertisement may have a “trigger” effect on a reader’s mind, stirring unconscious memories of childhood. If these memories are pleasant, the pleasure may be associated (unconsciously) with the product and brand name.

But just as conscious contents can vanish into the unconscious, new contents, which have never yet been conscious, can arise from it. One may have an inkling, for instance, that something is on the point of breaking into consciousness—that “something is in the air,” or that one “smells a rat.”

But it is a fact that, in addition to memories from a long-distant conscious past, completely new thoughts and creative ideas can also present themselves from the unconscious—thoughts and ideas that have never been conscious before. They grow up from the dark depths of the mind like a lotus and form a most important part of the subliminal psyche.

dilemmas are sometimes solved by the most surprising new propositions; many artists, philosophers, and even scientists owe some of their best ideas to inspirations that appear suddenly from the unconscious. The ability to reach a rich vein of such material and to translate it effectively into philosophy, literature, music, or scientific discovery is one of the hallmarks of what is commonly called genius.

I have found again and again in my professional work that the images and ideas that dreams contain cannot possibly be explained solely in terms of memory. They express new thoughts that have never yet reached the threshold of consciousness.

Each word means something slightly different to each person, even among those who share the same cultural background. The reason for this variation is that a general notion is received into an individual context and is therefore understood and applied in a slightly individual way. And the difference of meaning is naturally greatest when people have widely different social, political, religious, or psychological experiences.

These subliminal aspects of everything that happens to us may seem to play very little part in our daily lives. But in dream analysis, where the psychologist is dealing with expressions of the unconscious, they are very relevant, for they are the almost invisible roots of our conscious thoughts.

Every concept in our conscious mind, in short, has its own psychic associations. While such associations may vary in intensity (according to the relative importance of the concept to our whole personality, or according to the other ideas and even complexes to which it is associated in our unconscious), they are capable of changing the “normal” character of that concept. It may even become something quite different as it drifts below the level of consciousness. These subliminal aspects of everything that happens to us may seem to play very little part in our daily lives. But in dream analysis, where the psychologist is dealing with expressions of the unconscious, they are very relevant, for they are the almost invisible roots of our conscious thoughts.

for this is that, in a dream, such concepts can express their unconscious meaning. In our conscious thoughts, we restrain ourselves within the limits of rational statements—

The images produced in dreams are much more picturesque and vivid than the concepts and experiences that are their waking counterparts. One of the reasons for this is that, in a dream, such concepts can express their unconscious meaning. In our conscious thoughts, we restrain ourselves within the limits of rational statements—statements that are much less colorful because we have stripped them of most of their psychic associations.

For in our daily experience, we need to state things as accurately as possible, and we have learned to discard the trimmings of fantasy both in our language and in our thoughts—thus losing a quality that is still characteristic of the primitive mind. Most of us have consigned to the unconscious all the fantastic psychic associations that every object or idea possesses. The primitive, on the other hand, is still aware of these psychic properties; he endows animals, plants, or stones with powers that we find strange and unacceptable.

What psychologists call psychic identity, or “mystical participation,” has been stripped off our world of things. But it is exactly this halo of unconscious associations that gives a colorful and fantastic aspect to the primitive’s world. We have lost it to such a degree that we do not recognize it when we meet it again. With us such things are kept below the threshold; when they occasionally reappear, we even insist that something is wrong.

We are so accustomed to the apparently rational nature of our world that we can scarcely imagine anything happening that cannot be explained by common sense. The primitive man confronted by a shock of this kind would not doubt his sanity; he would think of fetishes, spirits, or gods.

It was far more difficult for this educated man to make an admission of this kind than it would have been for a primitive to say that he was plagued by a ghost. The malign influence of evil spirits is at least an admissible hypothesis in a primitive culture, but it is a shattering experience for a civilized person to admit that his troubles are nothing more than a foolish prank of the imagination. The primitive phenomenon of obsession has not vanished; it is the same as ever. It is only interpreted in a different and more obnoxious way.

For one finds that many dreams present images and associations that are analogous to primitive ideas, myths, and rites.

Because, in our civilized life, we have stripped so many ideas of their emotional energy, we do not really respond to them any more.

There was, for instance, a lady who was well known for her stupid prejudices and her stubborn resistance to reasoned argument. One could have argued with her all night to no effect; she would have taken not the slightest notice. Her dreams, however, took a different line of approach. One night, she dreamed she was attending an important social occasion. She was greeted by the hostess with the words: “How nice that you could come. All your friends are here, and they are waiting for you.” The hostess then led her to the door and opened it, and the dreamer stepped through—into a cowshed!

That is what “dream language” does; its symbolism has so much psychic energy that we are forced to pay attention to it. There was, for instance, a lady who was well known for her stupid prejudices and her stubborn resistance to reasoned argument. One could have argued with her all night to no effect; she would have taken not the slightest notice. Her dreams, however, took a different line of approach. One night, she dreamed she was attending an important social occasion. She was greeted by the hostess with the words: “How nice that you could come. All your friends are here, and they are waiting for you.” The hostess then led her to the door and opened it, and the dreamer stepped through—into a cowshed!

The more that consciousness is influenced by prejudices, errors, fantasies, and infantile wishes, the more the already existing gap will widen into a neurotic dissociation and lead to a more or less artificial life far removed from healthy instincts, nature, and truth.

The dream compensates for the deficiencies of their personalities, and at the same time it warns them of the dangers in their present course.

I remember the case of a man who was inextricably involved in a number of shady affairs. He developed an almost morbid passion for dangerous mountain climbing, as a sort of compensation. He was seeking “to get above himself.” In a dream one night, he saw himself stepping off the summit of a high mountain into empty space. When he told me his dream, I instantly saw his danger and tried to emphasize the warning and persuade him to restrain himself. I even told him that the dream foreshadowed his death in a mountain accident. It was in vain.

dreams may sometimes announce certain situations long before they actually happen.

In this respect, dream symbols are the essential message carriers from the instinctive to the rational parts of the human mind, and their interpretation enriches the poverty of consciousness so that it learns to understand again the forgotten language of the instincts.

“Learn as much as you can about symbolism; then forget it all when you are analyzing a dream.”

The individual is the only reality. The further we move away from the individual toward abstract ideas about Homo sapiens, the more likely we are to fall into error.

In this exchange with Freud, it dawned on me for the first time that before we construct general theories about man and his psyche we should learn a lot more about the real human being we have to deal with. The individual is the only reality. The further we move away from the individual toward abstract ideas about Homo sapiens, the more likely we are to fall into error.

If one studies extraverted individuals, for instance, one soon discovers that they differ in many ways from one another, and that being extraverted is therefore a superficial and too general criterion to be really characteristic. That is why, long ago, I tried to find some further basic peculiarities—peculiarities that might serve the purpose of giving some order to the apparently limitless variations in human individuality.

I had always been impressed by the fact that there are a surprising number of individuals who never use their minds if they can avoid it, and an equal number who do use their minds, but in an amazingly stupid way. I was also surprised to find many intelligent and wide-awake people who lived (as far as one could make out) as if they had never learned to use their sense organs: They did not see the things before their eyes, hear the words sounding in thir ears, or notice the things they touched or tasted. Some lived without being aware of the state of their own bodies.

These four functional types correspond to the obvious means by which consciousness obtains its orientation to experience. Sensation (i.e., sense perception) tells you that something exists; thinking tells you what it is; feeling tells you whether it is agreeable or not; and intuition tells you whence it comes and where it is going.

Thus, if you want to understand another person’s dream, you have to sacrifice your own predilections and suppress your prejudices. This is not easy or comfortable, because it means a moral effort that is not to everyone’s taste. But if the analyst does not make the effort to criticize his own standpoint and to admit its relativity, he will get neither the right information about, nor sufficient insight into, his patient’s mind. The analyst expects at least a certain willingness on the patient’s part to listen to his opinion and to take it seriously, and the patient must be granted the same right. Although such a relationship is indispensable for any understanding and is therefore of self-evident necessity, one must remind oneself again and again that it is more important in therapy for the patient to understand than for the analyst’s theoretical expectations to be satisfied. The patient’s resistance to the analyst’s interpretation is not necessarily wrong; it is rather a sure sign that something does not “click.” Either the patient has not yet reached the point where he understands, or the interpretation does not fit.

When I suggested earlier that the overall function of dreams seems to be to compensate for deficiencies or distortions in the conscious mind, I meant that this assumption opened up the most promising approach to the nature of particular dreams.

It will be clear from all I have said that we cannot lay down general rules for interpreting dreams. When I suggested earlier that the overall function of dreams seems to be to compensate for deficiencies or distortions in the conscious mind, I meant that this assumption opened up the most promising approach to the nature of particular dreams.

Hobnobbing with Napoleon and being on speaking terms with Alexander the Great are exactly the kind of fantasies produced by an inferiority complex. But why, one asks, could not the dream be open and direct about it and say what it had to say without ambiguity? I have frequently been asked this question, and I have asked it myself. I am often surprised at the tantalizing way dreams seem to evade definite information or omit the decisive point. Freud assumed the existence of a special function of the psyche, which he called the “censor.” This, he supposed, twisted the dream images and made them unrecognizable or misleading in order to deceive the dreaming consciousness about the real subject of the dream.

It rather looks as if the approach to consciousness has a “blotting-out” effect upon the subliminal contents of the psyche. The subliminal state retains ideas and images at a much lower level of tension than they possess in consciousness. In the subliminal condition they lose clarity of definition; the relations between them are less consequential and more vaguely analogous, less rational and therefore more “incomprehensible.”

If the dreamer overestimates his own value, it is easy to show (from the material produced by association of ideas) how inappropriate and childish the dreamer’s intentions are, and how much they emanate from childish wishes to be equal to or superior to his parents. But if it is a case of inferiority, where an all-pervading feeling of worthlessness has already overcome every positive aspect of the dreamer’s personality, it would be quite wrong to depress him still more by showing how infantile, ridiculous, or even perverse he is. That would cruelly increase his inferiority, as well as cause an unwelcome and quite unnecessary resistance to the treatment.

I remember a patient I once had to treat over a period of nine years. I saw him only for a few weeks each year, since he lived abroad. From the start I knew what his real trouble was, but I also saw that the least attempt to get close to the truth was met by a violent defensive reaction that threatened a complete rupture between us.

He then made a devastatingly frank confession of his problem, which showed me the reasons for the peculiar course our treatment had had to follow. The original shock had been such that alone he had been unable to face it. He needed the help of another, and the therapeutic task was the slow establishment of confidence, rather than the demonstration of a clinical theory. From cases like this I learned to adapt my methods to the needs of the individual patient, rather than to commit myself to general theoretical considerations that might be inapplicable in any particular case.

I have already suggested that dreams serve the purpose of compensation. This assumption means that the dream is a normal psychic phenomenon that transmits unconscious reactions or spontaneous impulses to consciousness. Many dreams can be interpreted with the help of the dreamer, who provides both the associations to and the context of the dream image, by means of which one can look at all its aspects.

Just as the human body represents a whole museum of organs, each with a long evolutionary history behind it, so we should expect to find that the mind is organized in a similar way. It can no more be a product without history than is the body in which it exists. By “history” I do not mean the fact that the mind builds itself up by conscious reference to the past through language and other cultural traditions. I am referring to the biological, prehistoric, and unconscious development of the mind in archaic man, whose psyche was still close to that of the animal.

Just as the biologist needs the science of comparative anatomy, however, the psychologist cannot do without a “comparative anatomy of the psyche.” In practice, to put it differently, the psychologist must not only have a sufficient experience of dreams and other products of unconscious activity, but also of mythology in its widest sense. Without this equipment, nobody can spot the important analogies: it is not possible, for instance, to see the analogy between a case of compulsion neurosis and that of a classical demonic possession without a working knowledge of both.

must clarify the relation between instincts and archetypes: What we properly call instincts are physiological urges, and are perceived by the senses. But at the same time, they also manifest themselves in fantasies and often reveal their presence only by symbolic images.

Here I must clarify the relation between instincts and archetypes: What we properly call instincts are physiological urges, and are perceived by the senses. But at the same time, they also manifest themselves in fantasies and often reveal their presence only by symbolic images. These manifestations are what I call the archetypes. They are without known origin; and they reproduce themselves in any time or in any part of the world—even where transmission by direct descent or “cross fertilization” through migration must be ruled out.

We do not assume that each new-born animal creates its own instincts as an individual acquisition, and we must not suppose that human individuals invent their specific human ways with every new birth. Like the instincts, the collective thought patterns of the human mind are innate and inherited. They function, when the occasion arises, in more or less the same way in all of us.

You may ask many civilized people in vain for the real meaning of the Christmas tree or of the Easter egg. The fact is, they do things without knowing why they do them. I am inclined to the view that things were generally done first and that it was only a long time afterward that somebody asked why they were done. The medical psychologist is constantly confronted with otherwise intelligent patients who behave in a peculiar and unpredictable way and who have no inkling of what they say or do. They are suddenly caught by unreasonable moods for which they themselves cannot account.

There is the famous case of a 13th-century Spanish hidalgo, Raimon Lull, who finally (after a long chase) succeeded in meeting the lady he admired at a secret rendezvous. She silently opened her dress and showed him her breast, rotten with cancer. The shock changed Lull’s life; he eventually became an eminent theologian and one of the Church’s greatest missionaries. In the case of such a sudden change one can often prove that an archetype has been at work for a long time in the unconscious, skilfully arranging circumstances that will lead to the crisis.

Certain dreams, visions, or thoughts can suddenly appear; and however carefully one investigates, one cannot find out what causes them. This does not mean that they have no cause; they certainly have. But it is so remote or obscure that one cannot see what it is. In such a case, one must wait either until the dream and its meaning are sufficiently understood, or until some external event occurs that will explain the dream.

Logical analysis is the prerogative of consciousness; we select with reason and knowledge. The unconscious, however, seems to be guided chiefly by instinctive trends, represented by corresponding thought forms—that is, by the archetypes. A doctor who is asked to describe the course of an illness will use such rational concepts as “infection” or “fever.” The dream is more poetic. It presents the diseased body as a man’s earthly house, and the fever as the fire that is destroying it.

But as far as one can make out from dreams, the unconscious makes its deliberations instinctively. The distinction is important. Logical analysis is the prerogative of consciousness; we select with reason and knowledge. The unconscious, however, seems to be guided chiefly by instinctive trends, represented by corresponding thought forms—that is, by the archetypes. A doctor who is asked to describe the course of an illness will use such rational concepts as “infection” or “fever.” The dream is more poetic. It presents the diseased body as a man’s earthly house, and the fever as the fire that is destroying it.

Goethe’s Faust aptly says: “Im Anfang war die Tat [In the beginning was the deed].” “Deeds” were never invented, they were done; thoughts, on the other hand, are a relatively late discovery of man. First he was moved to deeds by unconscious factors; it was only a long time afterward that he began to reflect upon the causes that had moved him; and it took him a very long time indeed to arrive at the preposterous idea that he must have moved himself—his mind being unable to identify any other motivating force than his own.

Yet in order to sustain his creed, contemporary man pays the price in a remarkable lack of introspection. He is blind to the fact that, with all his rationality and efficiency, he is possessed by “powers” that are beyond his control. His gods and demons have not disappeared at all; they have merely got new names. They keep him on the run with restlessness, vague apprehensions, psychological complications, an insatiable need for pills, alcohol, tobacco, food—and, above all, a large array of neuroses.

The motto “Where there’s a will, there’s a way” is the superstition of modern man. Yet in order to sustain his creed, contemporary man pays the price in a remarkable lack of introspection. He is blind to the fact that, with all his rationality and efficiency, he is possessed by “powers” that are beyond his control. His gods and demons have not disappeared at all; they have merely got new names. They keep him on the run with restlessness, vague apprehensions, psychological complications, an insatiable need for pills, alcohol, tobacco, food—and, above all, a large array of neuroses.

A man likes to believe that he is the master of his soul. But as long as he is unable to control his moods and emotions, or to be conscious of the myriad secret ways in which unconscious factors insinuate themselves into his arrangements and decisions, he is certainly not his own master.

Western man, becoming aware of the aggressive will to power of the East, sees himself forced to take extraordinary measures of defense, at the same time as he prides himself on his virtue and good intentions.

We might argue that the use of salt is a mere illusion of taste or a superstition; but it would still contribute to our well-being. Why, then, should we deprive ourselves of views that would prove helpful in crises and would give a meaning to our existence?

To the scientific mind, such phenomena as symbolic ideas are a nuisance because they cannot be formulated in a way that is satisfactory to intellect and logic. They are by no means the only case of this kind in psychology. The trouble begins with the phenomenon of “affect” or emotion, which evades all the attempts of the psychologist to pin it down with a final definition. The cause of the difficulty is the same in both cases—the intervention of the unconscious.

The interpretation of dreams and symbols demands intelligence. It cannot be turned into a mechanical system and then crammed into unimaginative brains. It demands both an increasing knowledge of the dreamer’s individuality and an increasing self-awareness on the part of the interpreter.

When we attempt to understand symbols, we are not only confronted with the symbol itself, but we are brought up against the wholeness of the symbol-producing individual. This includes a study of his cultural background, and in the process one fills in many gaps in one’s own education. I have made it a rule myself to consider every case as an entirely new proposition about which I do not even know the ABC. Routine responses may be practical and useful while one is dealing with the surface, but as soon as one gets in touch with the vital problems, life itself takes over and even the most brilliant theoretical premises become ineffectual words.

Imagination and intuition are vital to our understanding. And though the usual popular opinion is that they are chiefly valuable to poets and artists (that in “sensible” matters one should mistrust them), they are in fact equally vital in all the higher grades of science.

Intuition is almost indispensable in the interpretation of symbols, and it can often ensure that they are immediately understood by the dreamer

When the medical psychologist takes an interest in symbols, he is primarily concerned with “natural” symbols, as distinct from “cultural” symbols. The former are derived from the unconscious contents of the psyche, and they therefore represent an enormous number of variations on the essential archetypal images. In many cases they can still be traced back to their archaic roots—i.e., to ideas and images that we meet in the most ancient records and in primitive societies.

disgorged its terrible primitivity, but Russia is also ruled by it, and

Modern man does not understand how much his “rationalism” (which has destroyed his capacity to respond to numinous symbols and ideas) has put him at the mercy of the psychic “underworld.” He has freed himself from “superstition” (or so he believes), but in the process he has lost his spiritual values to a positively dangerous degree. His moral and spiritual tradition has disintegrated, and he is now paying the price for this break-up in worldwide disorientation and dissociation.

In earlier ages, as instinctive concepts welled up in the mind of man, his conscious mind could no doubt integrate them into a coherent psychic pattern. But the “civilized” man is no longer able to do this. His “advanced” consciousness has deprived itself of the means by which the auxiliary contributions of the instincts and the unconscious can be assimilated.

Today, for instance, we talk of “matter.” We describe its physical properties. We conduct laboratory experiments to demonstrate some of its aspects. But the word “matter” remains a dry, inhuman, and purely intellectual concept, without any psychic significance for us.

As scientific understanding has grown, so our world has become dehumanized. Man feels himself isolated in the cosmos, because he is no longer involved in nature and has lost his emotional “unconscious identity” with natural phenomena.

This enormous loss is compensated for by the symbols of our dreams. They bring up our original nature—its instincts and peculiar thinking. Unfortunately, however, they express their contents in the language of nature, which is strange and incomprehensible to us.

To be more accurate, the surface of our world seems to be cleansed of all superstitious and irrational elements. Whether, however, the real inner human world (not our wish-fulfilling fiction about it) is also freed from primitivity is another question

Such are the contemporary human beings who produce the symbols we psychologists investigate. In order to explain these symbols and their meaning, it is vital to learn whether their representations are related to purely personal experience, or whether they have been chosen by a dream for its particular purpose from a store of general conscious knowledge.

This argument illustrates the way in which archetypes appear in practical experience: They are, at the same time, both images and emotions. One can speak of an archetype only when these two aspects are simultaneous.

Archetypes come to life only when one patiently tries to discover why and in what fashion they are meaningful to a living individual.

This is what explains the resistance, even fear, that people often experience in approaching unconscious matters. These relict contents are not merely neutral or indifferent. On the contrary, they are so highly charged that they are often more than merely uncomfortable. They can cause real fear. The more they are repressed, the more they spread through the whole personality in the form of a neurosis.

The main task of dreams is to bring back a sort of “recollection” of the prehistoric, as well as the infantile world, right down to the level of the most primitive instincts. Such recollections can have a remarkably healing effect in certain cases, as Freud saw long ago. This observation confirms the view that an infantile memory gap (a so-called amnesia) represents a positive loss and its recovery can bring a positive increase in life and wellbeing.

This emotional value must be kept in mind and allowed for throughout the whole intellectual process of dream interpretation. It is only too easy to lose this value, because thinking and feeling are so diametrically opposed that thinking almost automatically throws out feeling values and vice versa. Psychology is the only science that has to take the factor of value (i.e., feeling) into account, because it is the link between physical events and life. Psychology is often accused of not being scientific on this account; but its critics fail to understand the scientific and practical necessity of giving due consideration to feeling.

The great religions of the world suffer from increasing anemia, because the helpful numina have fled from the woods, rivers, and mountains, and from animals, and the god-men have disappeared underground into the unconscious. There we fool ourselves that they lead an ignominious existence among the relics of our past. Our present lives are dominated by the goddess Reason, who is our greatest and most tragic illusion. By the aid of reason, so we assure ourselves, we have “conquered nature.”

I know what the Buddhists would say: Things would go right if people would only follow the “noble eightfold path” of the Dharma (doctrine, law) and had true insight into the Self. The Christian tells us that if only people had faith in God, we should have a better world. The rationalist insists that if people were intelligent and reasonable, all our problems would be manageable. The trouble is that none of them manages to solve these problems himself.

Whatever the unconscious may be, it is a natural phenomenon producing symbols that prove to be meaningful. We cannot expect someone who has never looked through a microscope to be an authority on microbes; in the same way, no one who has not made a serious study of natural symbols can be considered a competent judge in this matter.

many researches are made into its conscious functions. But the really complex and unfamiliar part of the mind, from which symbols are produced, is still virtually unexplored. It seems almost incredible that though we receive signals from it every night, deciphering these communications seems too tedious for any but a very few people to be bothered with it. Man’s greatest instrument, his psyche, is little thought of, and it is often directly mistrusted and despised. “It’s only psychological” too often means: It is nothing.

The individual may feel that his dreams are spontaneous and disconnected. But over a long period of time the analyst can observe a series of dream images and note that they have a meaningful pattern; and by understanding this his patient may eventually acquire a new attitude to life. Some of the symbols in such dreams derive from what Dr. Jung has called “the collective unconscious”—that is, that part of the psyche which retains and transmits the common psychological inheritance of mankind. These symbols are so ancient and unfamiliar to modern man that he cannot directly understand or assimilate them.

The more closely one looks at the history of symbolism, and at the role that symbols have played in the life of many different cultures, the more one understands that there is also a re-creative meaning in these symbols.

Some symbols relate to childhood and the transition to adolescence, others to maturity, and others again to the experience of old age, when man is preparing for his inevitable death.

Ego and shadow, indeed, although separate, are inextricably linked together in much the same way that thought and feeling are related to each other. The ego, nevertheless, is in conflict with the shadow, in what Dr. Jung once called “the battle for deliverance.” In the struggle of primitive man to achieve consciousness, this conflict is expressed by the contest between the archetypal hero and the cosmic powers of evil, personified by dragons and other monsters.

In the developing consciousness of the individual the hero figure is the symbolic means by which the emerging ego overcomes the inertia of the unconscious mind, and liberates the mature man from a regressive longing to return to the blissful state of infancy in a world dominated by his mother.

The hero, on the contrary, must realize that the shadow exists and that he can draw strength from it. He must come to terms with its desructive powers if he is to become sufficiently terrible to overcome the dragon. I.e., before the ego can triumph, it must master and assimilate the shadow.

The idealism of youth, which drives one so hard, is bound to lead to over-confidence: The human ego can be exalted to experience godlike attributes, but only at the cost of over-reaching itself and falling to disaster. (This is the meaning of the story of Icarus, the youth who is carried up to heaven on his fragile, humanly contrived wings, but who flies too close to the sun and plunges to his doom.) All the same, the youthful ego must always run this risk, for if a young man does not strive for a higher goal than he can safely reach, he cannot surmount the obstacles between adolescence and maturity.

As a general rule it can be said that the need for hero symbols arises when the ego needs strengthening—when, that is to say, the conscious mind needs assistance in some task that it cannot accomplish unaided or without drawing on the sources of strength that lie in the unconscious mind.

the childish or adolescent ego frees itself from the oppression of parental expectations and becomes individual. As part of this rise to consciousness the hero-dragon battle may have to be fought and refought to liberate energy for the multitude of human tasks that can form a culture pattern out of chaos. When this is successful, we see the full hero image emerging as a kind of ego strength (or, if we are speaking in collective terms, a tribal identity) that has no further need to overcome the monsters and the giants. It has reached the point where these deep forces can be personalized. The “feminine element” no longer appears in dreams as a dragon, but as a woman; similarly, the “shadow” side of the personality takes on a less menacing form.

each human being has originally a feeling of wholeness, a powerful and complete sense of the Self. And from the Self—the totality of the psyche—the individualized ego-consciousness emerges as the individual grows up.

Within the past few years, the works of certain followers of Jung have begun to document the series of events by which the individual ego emerges during the transition from infancy through childhood. This separation can never become final without severe injury to the original sense of wholeness. And the ego must continually return to re-establish its relation to the Self in order to maintain a condition of psychic health.

the hero myth is the first stage in the differentiation of the psyche. I have suggested that it seems to go through a fourfold cycle by which the ego seeks to achieve its relative autonomy from the original condition of wholeness. Unless some degree of autonomy is achieved, the individual is unable to relate himself to his adult environment. But the hero myth does not ensure that this liberation will occur. It only shows how it is possible for it to occur, so that the ego may achieve consciousness. There remains the problem of maintaining and developing that consciousness in a meaningful way, so that the individual can live a useful life and can achieve the necessary sense of self-distinction in society.

It would appear from my studies that the hero myth is the first stage in the differentiation of the psyche. I have suggested that it seems to go through a fourfold cycle by which the ego seeks to achieve its relative autonomy from the original condition of wholeness. Unless some degree of autonomy is achieved, the individual is unable to relate himself to his adult environment. But the hero myth does not ensure that this liberation will occur. It only shows how it is possible for it to occur, so that the ego may achieve consciousness. There remains the problem of maintaining and developing that consciousness in a meaningful way, so that the individual can live a useful life and can achieve the necessary sense of self-distinction in society.

Initiatory events are not, of course, confined to the psychology of youth. Every new phase of development throughout an individual’s life is accompanied by a repetition of the original conflict between the claims of the Self and the claims of the ego. In fact, this conflict may be expressed more powerfully at the period of transition from early maturity to middle age (between 35 to 40 in our society) than at any other time in life. And the transition from middle age to old age creates again the need for affirmation of the difference between the ego and the total psyche; the hero receives his last call to action in defense of ego-consciousness against the approaching dissolution of life in death.

The theme of submission as an essential attitude toward promotion of the successful initiation rite can be clearly seen in the case of girls or women. Their rite of passage initially emphasizes their essential passivity, and this is reinforced by the physiological limitation on their autonomy imposed by the menstrual cycle. It has been suggested that the menstrual cycle may actually be the major part of initiation from a woman’s point of view, since it has the power to awaken the deepest sense of obedience to life’s creative power over her. Thus she willingly gives herself to her womanly function, much as a man gives himself to his assigned role in the community life of his group. On the other hand, the woman, no less than the man, has her initial trials of strength that lead to a final sacrifice for the sake of experiencing the new birth. This sacrifice enables a woman to free herself from the entanglement of personal relations and fits her for a more conscious role as an individual in her own right. In contrast, a man’s sacrifice is a surrender of his sacred independence: He becomes more consciously related to woman.

He needed a challenge to his manhood in order to see that unless he sacrificed his childish state of mind he would be left isolated and ashamed.

The dream expressed this as the need to make a drastic change; she had to sacrifice the “masculine” hero role. As one might expect, this educated woman had no difficulty in accepting this interpretation at an intellectual level, and she set about trying to change herself into a more submissive kind of woman. She did then improve her love-life and became the mother of two very satisfactory children. As she grew to know herself better, she began to see that for a man (or the masculine-trained mind in women) life is something that has to be taken by storm, as an act of the heroic will; but for a woman to feel right about herself, life is best realized by a process of awakening.

Those who have to learn to face death may have to relearn the old message that tells us that death is a mystery for which we must prepare ourselves in the same spirit of submission and humility as we once learned to prepare ourselves for life.

But it is quite certain that the fundamental goal of initiation lies in taming the original Trickster-like wildness of the juvenile nature. It therefore has a civilizing or spiritualizing purpose, in spite of the violence of the rites that are required to set this process in motion.

A child, as I have said, possesses a sense of completeness, but only before the initial emergence of his ego-consciousness. In the case of an adult, a sense of completeness is achieved through a union of the consciousness with the unconscious contents of the mind. Out of this union arises what Jung called “the transcendent function of the psyche,” by which a man can achieve his highest goal: the full realization of the potential of his individual Self. Thus, what we call “symbols of transcendence” are the symbols that represent man’s striving to attain this goal. They provide the means by which the contents of the unconscious can enter the conscious mind, and they also are themselves an active expression of those contents.

Many people may want some change from a containing pattern of life; but the freedom gained by travel (urged by the “run away to sea” poster), is no substitute for a true inner liberation.

In the first part of life, when one is still attached to the original family and social group, this may be experienced as that moment of initiation at which one must learn to take the decisive steps into life alone. It is the moment that T. S. Eliot describes in “The Waste Land,” when one faces The awful daring of a moment’s surrender, which an age of prudence can never retract. At a later period of life one may not need to break all ties with the symbols of meaningful containment. But nonetheless one can be filled with that spirit of divine discontent which forces all free men to face some new discovery or to live their lives in a new way. This change may become especially important in the period between middle age and old age, which is the time in life when so many people are considering what to do in their retirement—whether to work or to play, whether to stay at home or to travel. If their lives have been adventurous, insecure, or full of change, they may long for a settled life and the consolations of religious certainty. But if they have lived chiefly within the social pattern in which they were born, they may desperately need a liberating change. This need may be filled, temporarily, by a trip around the world, or by nothing more than a move to a smaller house. But none of these external changes will serve unless there has been some inner transcendence of old values in creating, not just inventing, a new pattern of life.

The organizing center from which the regulatory effect stems seems to be a sort of “nuclear atom” in our psychic system. One could also call it the inventor, organizer, and source of dream images. Jung called this center the “Self” and described it as the totality of the whole psyche, in order to distinguish it from the “ego,” which constitutes only a small part of the total psyche. Throughout the ages men have been intuitively aware of the existence of such an inner center. The Greeks called it man’s inner daimon; in Egypt it was expressed by the concept of the Ba-soul; and the Romans worshiped it as the “genius” native to each individual. In more primitive societies it was often thought of as a protective spirit embodied within an animal or a fetish.

Those Naskapi who pay attention to their dreams and who try to find their meaning and test their truth can enter into a deeper connection with the Great Man. He favors such people and sends them more and better dreams. Thus the major obligation of an individual Naskapi is to follow the instructions given by his dreams, and then to give permanent form to their contents in art. Lies and dishonesty drive the Great Man away from one’s inner realm, whereas generosity and love of one’s neighbors and of animals attract him and give him life. Dreams give the Naskapi complete ability to find his way in life, not only in the inner world but also in the outer world of nature. They help him to foretell the weather and give him invaluable guidance in his hunting, upon which his life depends. I mention these very primitive people because they are uncontaminated by our civilized ideas and still have natural insight into the essence of what Jung calls the Self.

How far it develops depends on whether or not the ego is willing to listen to the messages of the Self. Just as the Naskapi have noticed that a person who is receptive to the hints of the Great Man gets better and more helpful dreams, we could add that the inborn Great Man becomes more real within the receptive person than in those who neglect him. Such a person also becomes a more complete human being.

From one point of view this process takes place in man (as well as in every other living being) by itself and in the unconscious; it is a process by which man lives out his innate human nature. Strictly speaking, however, the process of individuation is real only if the individual is aware of it and consciously makes a living connection with it.

But this creatively active aspect of the psychic nucleus can come into play only when the ego gets rid of all purposive and wishful aims and tries to get to a deeper, more basic form of existence. The ego must be able to listen attentively and to give itself, without any further design or purpose, to that inner urge toward growth.

People living in cultures more securely rooted than our own have less trouble in understanding that it is necessary to give up the utilitarian attitude of conscious planning in order to make way for the inner growth of the personality.

to bring the individuation process into reality, one must surrender consciously to the power of the unconscious, instead of thinking in terms of what one should do, or of what is generally thought right, or of what usually happens. One must simply listen, in order to learn what the inner totality—the Self—wants one to do here and now in a particular situation.

The guiding hints or impulses come, not from the ego, but from the totality of the psyche: the Self.

If the development of consciousness is disturbed in its normal unfolding, children frequently retire from outer or inner difficulties into an inner “fortress”; and when that happens, their dreams and symbolic drawings of unconscious material often reveal to an unusual degree a type of circular, quadrangular, and “nuclear” motif (which I will explain later). This refers to the previously mentioned psychic nucleus, the vital center of the personality from which the whole structural development of consciousness stems.

Whatever it is, the thing that can drive away the evil is always unique and hard to find. It is exactly the same in the initial crisis in the life of an individual. One is seeking something that is impossible to find or about which nothing is known. In such moments all well-meant, sensible advice is completely useless—advice that urges one to try to be responsible, to take a holiday, not to work so hard (or to work harder), to have more (or less) human contact, or to take up a hobby. None of that helps, or at best only rarely. There is only one thing that seems to work; and that is to turn directly toward the approaching darkness without prejudice and totally naively, and to try to find out what its secret aim is and what it wants from you. The hidden purpose of the oncoming darkness is generally something so unusual, so unique and unexpected, that as a rule one can find out what it is only by means of dreams and fantasies welling up from the unconscious. If one focuses attention on the unconscious without rash assumptions or emotional rejection, it often breaks through in a flow of helpful symbolic images. But not always. Sometimes it first offers a series of painful realizations of what is wrong with oneself and one’s conscious attitudes. Then one must begin the process by swallowing all sorts of bitter truths.

Whether the unconscious comes up at first in a helpful or a negative form, after a time the need usually arises to re-adapt the conscious attitude in a better way to the unconscious factors—therefore to accept what seems to be “criticism” from the unconscious. Through dreams one becomes acquainted with aspects of one’s own personality that for various reasons one has preferred not to look at too closely. This is what Jung called “the realization of the shadow.” (He used the term “shadow” for this unconscious part of the personality because it actually often appears in dreams in a personified form.)

When an individual makes an attempt to see his shadow, he becomes aware of (and often ashamed of) those qualities and impulses he denies in himself but can plainly see in other people—such things as egotism, mental laziness, and sloppiness; unreal fantasies, schemes, and plots; carelessness and cowardice; inordinate love of money and possessions—in short, all the little sins about which he might previously have told himself: “That doesn’t matter; nobody will notice it, and in any case other people do it too.”

If you feel an overwhelming rage coming up in you when a friend reproaches you about a fault, you can be fairly sure that at this point you will find a part of your shadow, of which you are unconscious. It is, of course, natural to become annoyed when others who are “no better” criticize you because of shadow faults. But what can you say if your own dreams—an inner judge in your own being—reproach you? That is the moment when the ego gets caught, and the result is usually embarrassed silence.

the shadow is not necessarily always an opponent. In fact, he is exactly like any human being with whom one has to get along, sometimes by giving in, sometimes by resisting, sometimes by giving love—whatever the situation requires. The shadow becomes hostile only when he is ignored or misunderstood.

Sometimes, though not often, an individual feels impelled to live out the worse side of his nature and to repress his better side. In such cases the shadow appears as a positive figure in his dreams. But to a person who lives out his natural emotions and feelings, the shadow may appear as a cold and negative intellectual; it then personifies poisonous judgments and negative thoughts that have been held back. So, whatever form it takes, the function of the shadow is to represent the opposite side of the ego and to embody just those qualities that one dislikes most in other people.

It would be relatively easy if one could integrate the shadow into the conscious personality just by attempting to be honest and to use one’s insight. But, unfortunately, such an attempt does not always work. There is such a passionate drive within the shadowy part of oneself that reason may not prevail against it. A bitter experience coming from the outside may occasionally help; a brick, so to speak, has to drop on one’s head to put a stop to shadow drives and impulses. At times a heroic decision may serve to halt them, but such a superhuman effort is usually possible only if the Great Man within (the Self) helps the individual to carry it through. The fact that the shadow contains the overwhelming power of irresistible impulse does not mean, however, that the drive should always be heroically repressed. Sometimes the shadow is powerful because the urge of the Self is pointing in the same direction, and so one does not know whether it is the Self or the shadow that is behind the inner pressure. In the unconscious, one is unfortunately in the same situation as in a moonlit landscape. All the contents are blurred and merge into one another, and one never knows exactly what or where anything is, or where one thing begins and ends. (This is known as the “contamination” of unconscious contents.)

When dark figures turn up in our dreams and seem to want something, we cannot be sure whether they personify merely a shadowy part of ourselves, or the Self, or both at the same time. Divining in advance whether our dark partner symbolizes a shortcoming that we should overcome or a meaningful bit of life that we should accept—this is one of the most difficult problems that we encounter on the way to individuation. Moreover, the dream symbols are often so subtle and complicated that one cannot be sure of their interpretation. In such a situation all one can do is accept the discomfort of ethical doubt—making no final decisions or commitments and continuing to watch the dreams.

Sometimes all attempts to understand the hints of the unconscious fail, and in such a difficulty one can only have the courage to do what seems to be right, while being ready to change course if the suggestions of the unconscious should suddenly point in another direction. It may also happen (although this is unusual) that a person will find it better to resist the urge of the unconscious, even at the price of feeling warped by doing so, rather than depart too far from the state of being human. (This would be the situation of people who have to live out a criminal disposition in order to be completely themselves.)

The discovery of the unconscious is one of the most far-reaching discoveries of recent times. But the fact that recognition of its unconscious reality involves honest self-examination and reorganization of one’s life causes many people to continue to behave as if nothing at all has happened.

Difficult and subtle ethical problems are not invariably brought up by the appearance of the shadow itself. Often another “inner figure” emerges. If the dreamer is a man, he will discover a female personification of his unconscious; and it will be a male figure in the case of a woman. Often this second symbolic figure turns up behind the shadow, bringing up new and different problems. Jung called its male and female forms “animus” and “anima.” The anima is a personification of all feminine psychological tendencies in a man’s psyche, such as vague feelings and moods, prophetic hunches, receptiveness to the irrational, capacity for personal love, feeling for nature, and—last but not least—his relation to the unconscious. It is no mere chance that in olden times priestesses (like the Greek Sibyl) were used to fathom the divine will and to make connection with the gods.

In its individual manifestation the character of a man’s anima is as a rule shaped by his mother. If he feels that his mother had a negative influence on him, his anima will often express itself in irritable, depressed moods, uncertainty, insecurity, and touchiness. (If, however he is able to overcome the negative assaults on himself, they can serve to reinforce his masculinity.) Within the soul of such a man the negative mother-anima figure will endlessly repeat this theme: “I am nothing. Nothing makes any sense. With others it’s different, but for me … I enjoy nothing.” These “anima moods” cause a sort of dullness, a fear of disease, of impotence, or of accidents. The whole of life takes on a sad and oppressive aspect. Such dark moods can even lure a man to suicide, in which case the anima becomes a death demon. She appears in this role in Cocteau’s film Orphée.

The projection of the anima in such a sudden and passionate form as a love affair can greatly disturb a man’s marriage and can lead to the so-called “human triangle,” with its accompanying difficulties. A bearable solution to such a drama can be found only if the anima is recognized as an inner power. The secret aim of the unconscious in bringing about such an entanglement is to force a man to develop and to bring his own being to maturity by integrating more of his unconscious personality and bringing it into his real life.

But what does the role of the anima as guide to the inner world mean in practical terms? This positive function occurs when a man takes seriously the feelings, moods, expectations, and fantasies sent by his anima and when he fixes them in some form—for example, in writing, painting, sculpture, musical composition, or dancing.

Just as the character of a man’s anima is shaped by his mother, so the animus is basically influenced by a woman’s father. The father endows his daughter’s animus with the special coloring of unarguable, incontestably “true” convictions—convictions that never include the personal reality of the woman herself as she actually is.

The negative animus does not appear only as a death-demon. In myths and fairy tales he plays the role of robber and murderer. One example is Bluebeard, who secretly kills all his wives in a hidden chamber. In this form the animus personifies all those semiconscious, cold, destructive reflections that invade a woman in the small hours, especially when she has failed to realize some obligation of feeling. It is then that she begins to think about the family heritage and matters of that kind—a sort of web of calculating thoughts, filled with malice and intrigue, which get her into a state where she even wishes death to others. (“When one of us dies, I’ll move to the Riviera,” said a woman to her husband when she saw the beautiful Mediterranean coast—a thought that was rendered relatively harmless by reason of the fact that she said it!) By nursing secret destructive attitudes, a wife can drive her husband, and a mother her children, into illness, accident, or even death. Or she may decide to keep the children from marrying—a deeply hidden form of evil that rarely comes to the surface of the mother’s conscious mind. (A naïve old woman once said to me, while showing me a picture of her son, who was drowned when he was 27: “I prefer it this way; it’s better than giving him away to another woman.”)

A strange passivity and paralysis of all feeling, or a deep insecurity that can lead almost to a sense of nullity, may sometimes be the result of an unconscious animus opinion. In the depths of the woman’s being, the animus whispers: “You are hopeless. What’s the use of trying? There is no point in doing anything. Life will never change for the better.” Unfortunately, whenever one of these personifications of the unconscious takes possession of our mind, it seems as if we ourselves are having such thoughts and feelings. The ego identifies with them to the point where it is unable to detach them and see them for what they are. One is really “possessed” by the figure from the unconscious. Only after the possession has fallen away does one realize with horror that one has said and done things diametrically opposed to one’s real thoughts and feelings—that one has been the prey of an alien psychic factor.

destructive intellectual game. We can notice the effect

In the East, and in some gnostic circles in the West, people soon recognized that the Cosmic Man was more an inner psychic image than a concrete outer reality. According to Hindu tradition, for instance, he is something that lives within the individual human being and is the only part that is immortal. This inner Great Man redeems the individual by leading him out of creation and its sufferings, back into his original eternal sphere. But he can do this only if man recognizes him and rises from his sleep in order to be led. In the symbolic myths of old India, this figure is known as the Purusha, a name that simply means “man” or “person.” The Purusha lives within the heart of every individual, and yet at the same time he fills the entire cosmos.

Our conscious mind continually creates the illusion of a clearly shaped, “rear” outer world that blocks off many other perceptions. Yet through our unconscious nature we are inexplicably connected to our psychic and physical environment.

Jung stressed that the only real adventure remaining for each individual is the exploration of his own unconscious. The ultimate goal of such a search is the forming of a harmonious and balanced relationship with the Self. The circular mandala images this perfect balance—embodied in the structure of the modern cathedral (above) of the city of Brasilia.

All activities and obligations that belong exclusively to the outer world do definite harm to the secret activities of the unconscious. Through these unconscious ties those who belong together come together. That is one reason why attempts to influence people by advertisements and political propaganda are destructive, even when inspired by idealistic motives.

This raises the important question of whether the unconscious part of the human psyche can be influenced at all. Practical experience and accurate observation show that one cannot influence one’s own dreams. There are people, it is true, who assert that they can influence them. But if you look into their dream material, you find that they do only what I do with my disobedient dog: I order him to do those things I notice he wants to do anyhow, so that I can preserve my illusion of authority. Only a long process of interpreting one’s dreams and confronting himself with what they have to say can gradually transform the unconscious. And conscious attitudes also must change in this process.

We know from studying the social behavior of the higher animals that small groups (from approximately 10 to 50 individuals) create the best possible living conditions for the single animal as well as for the group, and man seems to be no exception in this respect. His physical well-being, his spiritual psychic health, and, beyond the animal realm, his cultural efficiency seem to flourish best in such a social formation. As far as we at present understand the process of individuation, the Self apparently tends to produce such small groups by creating at the same time sharply defined ties of feeling between certain individuals and feelings of relatedness to all people. Only if these connections are created by the Self can one feel any assurance that envy, jealousy, fighting, and all manner of negative projections will not break up the group. Thus an unconditional devotion to one’s own process of individuation also brings about the best possible social adaptation.

if a single individual devotes himself to individuation, he frequently has a positive contagious effect on the people around him. It is as if a spark leaps from one to another. And this usually occurs when one has no intention of influencing others and often when one uses no words.

what restores the old order simultaneously involves some element of new creation. In the new order the older pattern returns on a higher level. The process is that of the ascending spiral, which grows upward while simultaneously returning again and again to the same point.

the symbols of the stone, the animal, and the circle—each of which has had enduring psychological significance from the earliest expressions of human consciousness to the most sophisticated forms of 20th-century art.

The underlying psychological fact is a strong identification between a living being and its image, which is considered to be the being’s soul. (This is one reason why a great many primitive people today will shrink from being photographed.)

The symbolic function of the mask is the same as that of the original animal disguise. Individual human expression is submerged, but in its place the wearer assumes the dignity and the beauty (and also the horrifying expression) of an animal demon. In psychological terms, the mask transforms its wearer into an archetypal image.

The animal motif is usually symbolic of man’s primitive and instinctual nature. Even civilized men must realize the violence of their instinctual drives and their powerlessness in face of the autonomous emotions erupting from the unconscious.

The animal demon is a highly expressive symbol for such an impulse. The vividness and concreteness of the image enables man to establish a relationship with it as a representative of the overwhelming power in himself. He fears it and seeks to propitiate it by sacrifice and ritual.

Greek mythology is full of animal symbolism. Zeus, the father of the gods, often approaches a girl whom he desires in the shape of a swan, a bull, or an eagle.

The boundless profusion of animal symbolism in the religion and art of all times does not merely emphasize the importance of the symbol; it shows how vital it is for men to integrate into their lives the symbol’s psychic content—instinct. In itself, an animal is neither good nor evil; it is a piece of nature. It cannot desire anything that is not in its nature. To put this another way, it obeys its instincts. These instincts often seem mysterious to us, but they have their parallel in human life: The foundation of human nature is instinct. But in man, the “animal being” (which lives in him as his instinctual psyche) may become dangerous if it is not recognized and integrated in life. Man is the only creature with the power to control instinct by his own will, but he is also able to suppress, distort, and wound it—and an animal, to speak metaphorically, is never so wild and dangerous as when it is wounded. Suppressed instincts can gain control of a man; they can even destroy him.

Suppressed and wounded instincts are the dangers threatening civilized man; uninhibited drives are the dangers threatening primitive man. In both cases the “animal” is alienated from its true nature; and for both, the acceptance of the animal soul is the condition for wholeness and a fully lived life. Primitive man must tame the animal in himself and make it his helpful companion; civilized man must heal the animal in himself and make it his friend.

The circle is a symbol of the psyche (even Plato described the psyche as a sphere). The square (and often the rectangle) is a symbol of earthbound matter, of the body and reality.

And, as far back as 1911. Kandinsky wrote in his famous essay “Concerning the Spiritual in Art”: “Every epoch is given its own measure of artistic freedom, and even the most creative genius may not leap over the boundary of that freedom.”

Fascination arises when the unconscious has been moved.

And the fantastic prices that are paid for works of modern art are a measure of the status conferred upon them by society. Fascination arises when the unconscious has been moved. The effect produced by works of modern art cannot be explained entirely by their visible form.

“Every object,” he wrote, “has two aspects: The common aspect, which is the one we generally see and which is seen by everyone, and the ghostly and metaphysical aspect, which only rare individuals see at moments of clairvoyance and metaphysical meditation. A work of art must relate something that does not appear in its visible form.”

Franz Marc wrote: “Have we not learned from a thousand years of experience that things cease to speak the more we hold up to them the visual mirror of their appearance? Appearance is eternally flat.…” For Marc, the goal of art was “to reveal unearthly life dwelling behind everything, to break the mirror of life so that we may look being in the face.”

Read quotes Klee, who wrote in his Diary at the beginning of 1915: “The more horrifying this world becomes (as it is in these days) the more art becomes abstract; while a world at peace produces realistic art.” To Franz Marc, abstraction offered a refuge from the evil and ugliness in this world. “Very early in life I felt that man was ugly. The animals seemed to be more lovely and pure, yet even among them I discovered so much that was revolting and hideous that my painting became more and more schematic and abstract.”

Marini said: “If you look at my equestrian statues of the last 12 years in order of time, you will notice that the animal’s panic steadily increases, but that it is frozen with terror and stands paralyzed rather than rearing or taking flight. That is all because I believe that we are approaching the end of the world. In every figure, I strove to express a deepening fear and despair. In this way I am attempting to symbolize the last stage of a dying myth, the myth of the individual, victorious hero, of the humanist’s man of virtue.”

Consciousness is not only indispensable as a counterpoise to the unconscious, and not only gives the possibility of meaning to life. It has also an eminently practical function. The evil witnessed in the world outside, in neighbors or neighboring peoples, can be made conscious as evil contents of our own psyche as well, and this insight would be the first step to a radical change in our attitude to our neighbors.

The artist can often express many things, unconsciously and without awakening hostility, which are resented when they are expressed by a psychologist (a fact that could be demonstrated even more conclusively in literature than in the visual arts). Confronted by the statements of the psychologist, the individual feels directly challenged; but what the artist has to say, particularly in our century, usually remains in an impersonal sphere.

Attending the theatre (which is an imitation of real life) is a popular way of evading an active part in life’s drama. The spectator can identify with the play, yet continue to pander to his fantasies. This kind of identification permitted the Greeks to experience catharsis, much as the psycho-drama initiated by the American psychiatrist J. L. Moreno is now used as a therapeutic aid.

(When the dreamer himself appears in a dream, he usually represents only his conscious ego; the other figures stand for his more or less unknown, unconscious qualities.)

This failure shows that while Henry’s ego decides on activity, his other psychic entities (represented by the other members of the party) remain in the old state of passivity and refuse to accompany the ego. (When the dreamer himself appears in a dream, he usually represents only his conscious ego; the other figures stand for his more or less unknown, unconscious qualities.)

The rationalist Henry hesitates to accept her help because such acceptance requires a sacrificium intellectus—a sacrifice, or discarding, of a rational way of thought. (This demand will often be made of Henry in later dreams.) Such a sacrifice is unavoidable; it applies to his relationship with the analysis as well as with everyday life.

The helpful “old woman” is a well-known symbol in myths and fairy tales for the wisdom of the eternal female nature. The rationalist Henry hesitates to accept her help because such acceptance requires a sacrificium intellectus—a sacrifice, or discarding, of a rational way of thought. (This demand will often be made of Henry in later dreams.) Such a sacrifice is unavoidable; it applies to his relationship with the analysis as well as with everyday life.

At this moment he meets an old woman who indicates the right way to him. He can do nothing but accept her advice. The helpful “old woman” is a well-known symbol in myths and fairy tales for the wisdom of the eternal female nature. The rationalist Henry hesitates to accept her help because such acceptance requires a sacrificium intellectus—a sacrifice, or discarding, of a rational way of thought. (This demand will often be made of Henry in later dreams.) Such a sacrifice is unavoidable; it applies to his relationship with the analysis as well as with everyday life.

(In the history of symbolism, the right side generally represents the realm of consciousness; the left, the unconscious.)

A comment on these men is made in the dream: “It is said they are dead.” But Henry is alone. Who makes the statement? It is a voice—and when a voice is heard in a dream it is a most meaningful occurrence. Dr. Jung identified the appearance of a voice in dreams with an intervention of the Self. It stands for a knowledge that has its roots in the collective fundamentals of the psyche. What the voice says cannot be disputed.

Since his ego has surmounted the dangers it confronted alone (an accomplishment that could make him more mature and stable), he can rejoin the group or “collective” and get shelter and food.

Then comes the rain, a cloudburst that relaxes tension and makes the earth fertile. In mythology, rain was often thought to be a “love-union” between heaven and earth. In the Eleusinian mysteries, for instance, after everything had been purified by water, the call went up to heaven: “Let it rain!” and down to earth: “Be fruitful!” This was understood as a sacred marriage of the gods. In this way rain can be said to represent a “solution” in the literal sense of the word.

Coming down, Henry again meets the collective values symbolized by the rucksack and motorcycle. He has passed through a phase in which he has strengthened his ego-consciousness by proving he can hold his own, and he has a renewed need for social contact. However, he accepts the suggestion of his friends that he should wait and fetch his things the next morning. Thus he submits for the second time to advice that comes from elsewhere: the first time, to the advice of the old woman, to a subjective power, an archetypal figure; the second time, to a collective pattern. With this step Henry has passed a milestone on the road to maturity.

In the minds of many people, the pig is closely associated to dirty sexuality. (Circe, for example, changed the men who desired her into swine.) The dog may stand for loyalty, but also for promiscuity, because it shows no discrimination in its choice of partners. The kangaroo, however, is often a symbol for motherliness and tender carrying capacity.

In alchemy, the “prime material” was often represented by such monstrous and fabulous creatures—mixed forms of animals. In psychological terms, they would probably symbolize the original total unconsciousness, out of which the individual ego can rise and begin to develop toward maturity.

If dreams are not wish-fulfillments (as Freud taught) but rather, as Jung assumed, “self-representations of the unconscious,” then we must admit that Henry’s phychic condition could hardly be better represented than in the description given in the “saint” dream.

But repression (as well as sexual uncertainty) may have caused the confusion about the sex of the prostitute. The female figure that has both attracted and repelled the dreamer is transformed—first of all into a man and then into a saint. The second transformation eliminates everything sexual from the image, and implies that the only means of escape from the reality of sex lies in the adoption of an ascetic and holy life, denying the flesh. Such dramatic reversals are common in dreams: Something turns into its opposite (as the prostitute becomes a saint) as if to demonstrate that by transmutation even extreme opposites can change into each other.

Henry also saw something significant in the saint’s coat. A coat is often a symbol of the protective cover or mask (which Jung called the persona) that an individual presents to the world. It has two purposes: first, to make a specific impression on other people: second, to conceal the individual’s inner self from their prying eyes.

Henry could no longer disregard the message of this dream. He realized that one needs something more than reason as a helpful compass in the entanglements of life; it is necessary to seek the guidance of the unconscious powers that emerge as symbols out of the depths of the psyche. With this recognition, the goal of this part of his analysis was reached. He now knew that he was finally expelled from the paradise of an uncommitted life and that he could never return to it.

The Negro is for some people the archetypal image of “the dark primal creature” and thus a personification of certain contents of the unconscious. Perhaps this is one reason why the Negro is so often rejected and feared by people of the white race. In him the white man sees his living counterpart, his hidden, dark side brought before his eyes. (This is just what most people try to avoid; they want to cut it off and repress it.) White men project onto the Negro the primitive drives, the archaic powers, the uncontrolled instincts that they do not want to admit in themselves, of which they are unconscious, and that they therefore designate as the corresponding qualities of other people.

We are still far from understanding the unconscious or the archetypes—those dynamic nuclei of the psyche—in all their implications. All we can see now is that the archetypes have an enormous impact on the individual, forming his emotions and his ethical and mental outlook, influencing his relationships with others, and thus affecting his whole destiny. We can also see that the arrangement of archetypal symbols follows a pattern of wholeness in the individual, and that an appropriate understanding of the symbols can have a healing effect. And we can see that the archetypes can act as creative or destructive forces in our mind: creative when they inspire new ideas, destructive when these same ideas stiffen into conscious prejudices that inhibit further discoveries.

The powerful forces of the unconscious most certainly appear not only in clinical material but also in the mythological, religious, artistic, and all the other cultural activities by which man expresses himself. Obviously, if all men have common inherited patterns of emotional and mental behavior (which Jung called the archetypes), it is only to be expected that we shall find their products (symbolic fantasies, thoughts, and actions) in practically every field of human activity.