From Pantheon Intro:
THE CONCEPT OF ARCHETYPES
The work of Swiss psychologist Carl Jung (1875-1961)
has become of greater and greater interest to the
general public. His works or their summaries are part
of almost every seeker's list of books to read. The
growing interest in Jungian Psychology (or Depth
Psychology) stems from the fact that it answers the
needs of many people as a means for relating to
"internal" as well as "external" reality. These
people are seeking a fuller understanding of the
meaning of life in such areas as dreams, fantasy,
compulsive behaviors, and self-exploration or
spiritual enrichment.
The main focus of Jung's work stressed the search for
meaning and the development of individuation,
psychological wholeness, or integrity of the
personality. Jungian therapy opened the door to the
collective unconscious for many, not only to their
subconscious desires and motivations but also to their
higher spiritual aspirations and potentials.
Jungian psychology describes the meaning of symbols
and events on the spiritual quest for
self-actualization in non-religious terms. It is
extremely useful for self-analysis. By gaining a
working knowledge of the temperaments of our various
facets and how they interrelate, an integration or
synthesis of personality becomes possible. This
results in high well-being and increased creativity.
In practical terms, Jungian therapy includes
developing awareness of internal guiding principles,
or archetypes. You don't need a personal therapist to
discover these archetypes within. We can discover
them ourselves if we know what to look for during
periods of reflection or introspection. Knowing the
patterns, they can strike us directly when we catch
ourselves in the act of watching them act through us.
An archetype is an innate, or in-born pattern, part of
our hardwiring, which functions as the underlying
matrix behind any event. They are not necessarily
transmitted through our genes, but they are
fundamental to our method of perceiving nature, God,
and man. They are the very substance of our
experience of life. They act like filters or lenses
for our perception.
Archetypes may be seen as embodiments of specific
functions, and their characteristic patterns may be
personified by giving each a name. In this way, we
can learn to recognize archetypes when they appear in
our lives affecting styles of behavior, thought,
emotions, attitudes, and dress. By personification,
identifying and naming them, we can take up a
meaningful relationship with these characters of our
internal world. We gain the option of holding
imaginal discussions with them about their attitudes,
desires, and opinions.
The Jungian perspective sees the human perception of
"reality" as originating in a projection from an
internal motivating factor (or archetype) onto our
environment. Since we do not perceive the universe of
experience directly, but through the filters of our
senses, we experience archetypes through sight, touch,
taste, smell, and sounds, and the metaphorical
equivalent of these senses in our imaginal life.
They also appear in human typology, and the various
functions of feeling, sensation, intuition, and
thinking. Because of their nature's we are
introverted or extroverted, thinkers or feelers,
knowers or doers. They are constantly maneuvering our
human lives as if we were puppets. In the ancient
past, when these powers of the archetypes over the
human will were intensely dramatic, or negative, this
phenomenon was termed "possession," and it could be
demonic or spiritual in nature.
On a more common level, archetypes are constantly
affecting our value judgements, priorities, emotonal
relationships, work situations, and daily life
responses in the physical world in an unconscious way.
Sometimes these appearances of archetypal patterns
are appropriate, in tune with conscious goals; but
sometimes the archetypes seem to have a goal of their
own, independent of (and perhaps self-destructive to)
our personalistic ego desires. "They" don't seem to
know or care what we want. How can we be
self-directing when their influence is capricious and
subconscious?
Civilization is largely the result of mankind's
conscious understanding and taming of primitive
instinctual forces of the archetypes. With fewer and
fewer "taboos" to control our society, we need to
understand our own emotional upheavals so that we
aren't overwhelmed by them. We can evolve to an
understanding of our subtle and not-so-subtle inner
urges, in which case they cease to compel us and begin
to work on our behalf. Thus, we can grow out of
counterproductive behaviors into the ability to
actualize our higher goals.
It is these underlying matrix patterns within the
psyche which produce the outer behavior. When we can
see that archetypes are motivating factors, it is also
possible to intuit how a knowledge of their particular
characteristics cold be useful in understanding the
complexities of life.
But, are these gods and goddesses real in the
objective sense? Can they really manipulate our
behavior so subbtely without us noticing them?
According to Jung this is true, and we all share this
condition. Even those trained in these areas maintain
psychological "blind spots" where we fail to see the
archetypes moving us.
Jung saw man, not as an isolated individual, but as
being linked with the whole of mankind (and mankind's
abilities) through the collective unconscious. This
unconscious manifests in the multiple forms of gods
and goddesses. These figures take different, though
analogous forms in the various mythologies of the
world's cultures.
Thus the goddesses Isis (Egyptian), Artemis (Greek),
and Diana (Roman) all share a common essence and use
the same lunar symbolism. The same generic form is
also behind the Catholic's Blessed Virgin Mary, and
all are derived from the theme of Celestial Queen.
These forms, or archetypes, should not be thought of
as nouns (things), but rather as semantic metaphors.
They represent powers or qualities, but when we
personify them it is "as if" we take up a relationship
with another entity. They assume an anthropomorphic
form in imagination in order to make a dialogue
easier. This dialogical exchange is just a variation
of the I-Thou communications of mysticism.
