FINDING
ONE'S WAY....August 4, 2024
At
age 38 in 1913, Carl Gustav Jung* was a successful world-renowned
Switzerland psychiatrist and university researcher/professor.
Sigmund Freud, already credited with scientifically proving the
reality of the Unconscious, which unknowingly is working in our words
and behaviors, had named Jung heir to carry on his work.
But
at this juncture Jung realized that his view of the Unconscious was
much broader and potentially more promising than Freud's. He, partly
consciously and partly unconsciously, forced a permanent separation
of the two men.
This
resulted in Jung finding himself in a no-man's land without patterns
or guidelines to follow for his personal and professional life. This
has, and undoubtedly will, happen to others. It must, at the time, be
an experience of stumbling into a meaningless abyss amid one's
orderly life.
He
knew he must go his own way however lonely and separated. He resigned
from his prestigious positions while continuing to see his patients.
He would seek answers for the questions his abyss experience had
assigned to him. He knew now he would search within himself, his
natural dreams and focused fantasies, as well as outer resources
which came and seemed relevant to his fatefully assigned task.
As
long as a person's life continues the well-worn and socially
acceptable paths of family and religious/cultural expectations, one
avoids the situation described above. And life with its normal
troubles, ups and downs goes in rather typical and generally expected
ways to its physical end.
This
collective type of path usually provides an adult with some
reasonable sense of meaning, purpose and hope in life. Thus, one does
not experience the more extreme trauma
of a more individually unique and dangerous journey. This would be in
the long run, I suspect Jung would agree, a fuller experience of both
a person's human and divine nature.
Such
an unexpected turn in life can be understood more hopefully as a
person 'falling' into their genuine human uniqueness. And being
significantly torn away from the general collective, more comfortable
and predictable patterns of life. It can be a time of severe
meaninglessness and hopelessness for an individual. A person
could live only so long in that state without tragically losing their
healthy mind.
There
are many examples of other persons having similar experiences. Some
have found themselves making needed and noble contributions to
humanity. We may become aware of such persons in our education but
may know little about how they found their way out of the
life-threatening personal abyss.
So,
it may still be uncommon knowledge to describe how such persons
stumbled onto a 'path less traveled' and of the costs and ecstasies
they then encountered. Ones which only indirectly led to their
much-needed contributions to culture.
With
no examples in his early 19th century culture to guide him, how did
Jung find his way into a creative meaning for his personal existence
and a unique sense of a purpose for his life?
A
primary path out of his abyss was stumbling onto some previous
historical examples of persons and communities which had recorded
similar inner experiences and images which Jung was having. Inner
experiences of the Collective Unconscious he was faithfully recording
along with some from his modern patients.
Two
important resources which arrived to him were writings from the
ancient Christian communities of Alchemists, mystics and Gnostics. Another was an ancient
Chinese document titled The Secret Of the Golden Flower. As he
saw connections between himself and these ancient writings, he
enthusiastically plunged into a laborious study of them for what his
contemporaries would have seen as mostly non-sense.
But
to Jung they became ever-more-clear answers to questions which his
personal 'fall into the abyss' of the Unconscious had posed to him.
All
this mushrooming discovery over four plus decades was very much
anchored in what had previously been to him and his culture, and I
suspect to Sigmund Freud, Unconscious.
He
found this to be a living stream of material which potentially lies
within reach of every human being. It could result in great leaps in
the psychological and spiritual evolution of individuals and of our
species. It might foster the arrival of a desperately needed
transformation of human values for emerging times. And it could lead
to important strides in understanding and compassion among humans
worldwide. This, in turn, may curtail our present collective path
toward destruction of ourselves and our Earth home.
A
reason I'm moved to write this is that some of our human peers may
'fall' into the abyss of their own human/divine uniqueness. They may
find Jung's path, and the ideas and processes he rediscovered, a
rich resource. This might help some escape despair and bring back to
culture much-needed treasures. Treasures from the cosmic expanse of
the Collective Unconscious, which connects us all, for the creative
evolution of a safer and higher quality of human life on earth.
*
Historical references are accurate to my best knowledge.
