MEMORIES, DREAMS, REFLECTIONS

C.G. Jung (1875-1961)

[This is a revised and updated post from 2018.]

During the spring of 2018, the C. G. Jung Society of St. Louis offered a study group, seminar format, during which two dozen of us read and discussed Jung's MEMORIES, DREAMS, REFLECTIONS in two small groups over eight weeks.

It was a pleasure reading through MDR at a leisurely pace with the benefit of others’ reflections and impressions.  Many memories of my own early life came flooding back as I read the first chapters.  Many of those memories I’ve revisited before in my journals, in conversations with my siblings and friends, in discussion groups like this one, and in many analytic sessions.  This time with our text, from an even more distant perspective, yielded new insights and depth of understanding of my own journey.  I came away with a firmer understanding of the role of my mother in my life and the impact of the death of my father when I was three years old, two areas of intense inner focus now for decades.

Jung’s discussion of his No. 1 and No. 2 personalities was particularly helpful.  I know I, too, suffered a similar split early on.  I, too, left behind my No. 1 to take up the tasks of adaptation—over-adaptation in my case—as a young adult.  Only with the complete failure of my No. 2 to deal with tragedy was I thrown back on myself in a way I came to see as essential, having purpose, and fraught with meaning.  But, oh, was it ever painful!

At age 30 I had a numinous experience in which my No. 1 personality broke through though I didn’t recognize what was happening.  I only registered something foreign but vaguely familiar from very early experiences.  I went to the Louvre and, turning a corner, I saw the Venus de Milo down a long corridor before me.  Suddenly I knew something new, and understood why all the emphasis on and study of art.  I didn’t know the word numinous then, but it was a numinous experience.  Later I learned language that gave this encounter meaning.  It was a moment of in-breaking.  Something from the collective unconscious penetrated my conscious reality.  

In my early 40’s, in the middle of a life crisis, I happened to go with a friend to a week-long program about dreams led by a Jungian Analyst.  The week left me extremely interested in dreams, but mostly I saw something in the analyst, undefinable to be sure, that I wanted for myself.  That week I began a pursuit that is still on-going.  I am somewhat clearer about what it was I glimpsed in that person and can now say that it is a way of being in process—a way of being and becoming that is life giving.  It is a process where the goal paradoxically is death.  It is an arduous path that leads to an understanding that each of us is called to develop ourselves ever further.  To do so is a sacred responsibility, and the reward is an intoxicating wonder in a world of wonder--release from a life of drudgery and inanity, and purposelessness. 

There are many, many ideas and specific sentences in the MDR that grabbed me, particularly the paragraph on p. 325 where Jung talks about embodying the essential “or life is wasted.”  A harsh judgement! 

Jung’s discussion about stumbling onto alchemy and its contributions to his psychological theories was enriching.  I liked, once again, reading about his discovery of a myth that gave meaning to his existence.  The search for meaning may be every bit as critical to one's existence as the discovery of that meaning.  Meaning has provided me dignity and purpose and has made all the difference in my life.

My main takeaway from these weeks of reading and discussion is the vital importance Jung assigned to his inner life.  His emphasis on the interior process put me, more than ever, in touch with my own.  Reading about his experiences, his insights, his reflections made me more keenly appreciative of my own. 

Somewhere Jung argues that one must fall in love with one’s own life.  How does one do that in a world increasingly fraught with anxiety and woe?  I like to remember that Jung found a way in spite of living through two horrific world wars.  His lasting legacy is his roadmap for that way.

July 12, 2025

 

TEILHARD DE CHARDIN QUOTE

"If one is to come up to his/her full measure, he/she must become conscious of his/her infinite capacity for carrying him/herself still further; he/she must realize the duties it involves, and he/she must feel its intoxicating wonder. " 

Text sourced from https://www.organism.earth/library/document/cosmic-life

 

Consciousness, Projections, and the Unconscious 

Jung speaks often of a consciousness "contaminated with unconscious contents."  I think he means that we have unconscious scripts, ideas, images, that affect our vision. What we see is often distorted by what we are looking through. It is as if we all wear eyeglasses that alter our perceptions—for better or worse. Is there something like an objective reality? Is it possible to view people and events with a measure of clarity? Who can say that his/her vision is the correct one? Often, it is in this realm that might does indeed make right. The ones who write the history books tell us how it was, but do they know how it was?

I think there is a way that every dream takes some piece of heretofore contamination out of our field of consciousness and shows it to us. Before the dream, the contamination was simply part of our way of perceiving the world. After the dream, has something changed? 

In the myth retold in the slender volume, DESCENT TO THE GODDESS, Inanna has to abandon her queenly garments and descend to the underworld for the funeral of Ereshkigal’s husband. I think we can do a translation of that drama into some Jungian theory. Jung’s notion is that as long as the ego is identified with the persona (Inanna in her finery), then the shadow and the animus are bound together in the unconscious (Ereshkigal married to Gugalanna). Being unconscious, shadow and animus are then seen only in projection. The shadow is some hated, envied, or otherwise powerful person who draws the ego’s projection. The animus is a male figure who carries the projections of a woman's unrealized masculine potentiality. Often the animus is an idealized figure, but he can just as easily be seen as demonic or oppressive. The common denominator for both shadow and animus projections is energy; the projection carriers for each carry a lot of energy for the ego. Often, once the projections are withdrawn, the ego is left in wonderment when she relates with the real human being who was previously the projection carrier. What was the big deal?

I think it is often the case that when shadow and animus get together (as, say, might be dramatized in a dream), the ego is left in a bereft feeling place. The parental complexes play a huge role in the overall psychic setup because the way the budding ego develops a really fine persona (and often identifies with it) is by pleasing the parents, the primary authorities for consciousness. Of course, the finer the persona, the more outer worldly success is guaranteed. At midlife when the inner world makes itself felt, as it often does, the battle is engaged. You can see how devastating it is for one to have to sacrifice one's identity with the persona (and often how costly!). 

You can also see how difficult it is to own for oneself the qualities one has projected. The distasteful, hateful ones that we have to accept with the attendant humbling. And the positive, attractive ones that we have to accept and take responsibility for. I am the one who does these terrible things that I find so unacceptable. I am the one with these potentialities that I have to work like crazy to develop and put to use. Much easier that I let someone be my bad guy and someone do all those marvelous things I so admire.

 LECTURE

Why is Alchemy so Important to Jungian Psychology and to us Today?

Rose F. Holt, M.A., Jungian Analyst

The video of this lecture is available for purchase on the Jung Society of St. Louis website, jungstlouis.org

Date:  March 28, 2025    Time:  7:00 - 9:00 pm CDT

Place:  In person at First Congregational Church, 6501 Wydown Blvd, St. Louis, MO 63105

            Also available on Zoom            CEU's available

For additional information or to register visit Jung Society of St. Louis