Made clear the expansive and flexible nature of the human ego
Highlighted the supportive nature of subconscious portions of the psyche
Explained the importance of the Self in the inner spiritual life of the individual
Clarified the role of symbols in psychic processes
Elucidated the influence of shadow-like elements of the psyche
Described the psychology and pathology of so-called “occult” phenomena
Developing methods for investigating the spiritual life of the mind.
1. Opening spiritual reality of the psyche to scientific inquiry.
Most transpersonal theorists regard C. G. Jung to be one of the first depth psychologists to open the subject of the spiritual reality of the psyche to scientific inquiry (Jung, 1953, 1960, 1964a, 1965, 1978). Of all psychodynamically oriented psychologies, Jung’s Analytical Psychology addressed what he called “the life of the spirit” most consistently.
Whereas in its development up to the present, psychology has dealt chiefly with psychic processes in the light of physical causation, the future task of psychology will be the investigation of their spiritual determinants. We have only begun to take scientific note of our spiritual experiences. (Jung, 1964, p. 63)
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For Jung, life was a sacred quest and journey whose goal was the conscious ego’s discovery of and integration with the center of our being, the core inner Self (Crowley, 1998). The Jungian core inner Self is another one of psychology’s nearest corollary to the soul. Jung used the word “soul” frequently in his writings and criticized mainstream psychology for becoming a “psychology without a soul” (Jung, 1960).
2. The objective nature of the human psyche.
The objective side of the human psyche. For Jung, the psyche is not simply something subjective, but has an objective side. Anything that acts and has real effects upon us to which we are compelled to react and respond is itself real. The objective nature of the psyche is revealed when psychological events occur that resist our conscious control. For example, when emotions overwhelm us, thoughts run on without stopping, memory of events evade us, fantasies and daydreams obsess us, and flashes of insight and inspiration emerge unbidden.
There are many psychological activities that take place independently of our subjective consciousness. The objective side of the human psyche is also revealed in the many psychological and biological activities that occur spontaneously without normally conscious attention and are guided by activities that are largely “unconscious” at least as far as our conscious ego is concerned, ranging from the exotic (e.g., ideomotor movements, post-hypnotic suggestions, “multiple personalities” alternating with the everyday personality) to the commonplace (e.g., thinking, speaking, writing, walking, breathing, body self-repair, sleeping and dreaming). Sensations are conscious, but the mechanisms involved in the process of sensing are not. Thoughts and emotions are conscious, but the underlying processes of thinking and feeling are not. Words are conscious, but the production processes of writing and speaking are not. Dreams are conscious, but the process of dreaming is not. “It is indeed as if some inner spontaneous part of the personality is far more knowledgeable than the conscious portion of which we are so rightfully proud” (Butts, 1997a, p. 251).
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