Feist−Feist: Theories of
Personality, Seventh
EditionII. Psychodynamic
Theories- Jung: Analytical
Psychology
© The McGraw−Hill^109
Companies, 2009Both underwent a period of loneliness and isolation and both were deeply changed
by the experience.
Although Jung’s journey into the unconscious was dangerous and painful, it
was also necessary and fruitful. By using dream interpretation and active imagina-
tion to force himself through his underground journey, Jung eventually was able to
create his unique theory of personality.
During this period he wrote down his dreams, drew pictures of them, told him-
self stories, and then followed these stories wherever they moved. Through these pro-
cedures he became acquainted with his personalunconscious. (See Jung, 1979, and
Dunne, 2000, for a collection of many of his paintings during this period.) Prolong-
ing the method and going more deeply, he came upon the contents of the collective
unconscious—the archetypes. He heard his anima speak to him in a clear feminine
voice; he discovered his shadow, the evil side of his personality; he spoke with the
wise old man and the great mother archetypes; and finally, near the end of his jour-
ney, he achieved a kind of psychological rebirth called individuation(Jung, 1961).
Although Jung traveled widely in his study of personality, he remained a citi-
zen of Switzerland, residing in Küsnacht, near Zürich. He and his wife, who was also
an analyst, had five children, four girls and a boy. Jung was a Christian, but did not
attend church. His hobbies included wood carving, stone cutting, and sailing his boat
on Lake Constance. He also maintained an active interest in alchemy, archeology,
gnosticism, Eastern philosophies, history, religion, mythology, and ethnology.
In 1944, he became professor of medical psychology at the University of
Basel, but poor health forced him to resign his position the following year. After his
wife died in 1955, he was mostly alone, the “wise old man of Küsnacht.” He died
June 6, 1961, in Zürich, a few weeks short of his 86th birthday. At the time of his
death, Jung’s reputation was worldwide, extending beyond psychology to include
philosophy, religion, and popular culture (Brome, 1978).
Levels of the Psyche
Jung, like Freud, based his personality theory on the assumption that the mind, or
psyche, has both a conscious and an unconscious level. Unlike Freud, however, Jung
strongly asserted that the most important portion of the unconscious springs not
from personal experiences of the individual but from the distant past of human exis-
tence, a concept Jung called the collective unconscious.Of lesser importance to Jun-
gian theory are the consciousand the personal unconscious.
Conscious
According to Jung, consciousimages are those that are sensed by the ego, whereas
unconscious elements have no relationship with the ego. Jung’s notion of the egois
more restrictive than Freud’s. Jung saw the ego as the center of consciousness, but
not the core of personality. Ego is not the whole personality, but must be completed
by the more comprehensive self,the center of personality that is largely unconscious.
In a psychologically healthy person, the ego takes a secondary position to the un-
conscious self (Jung, 1951/1959a). Thus, consciousness plays a relatively minor role
in analytical psychology, and an overemphasis on expanding one’s conscious psyche
Chapter 4 Jung: Analytical Psychology 103