Transpersonal Pioneers: Carl Jung

Carl Jung is one of the most important, most complex, and most controversial psychological theorists.
Jungian psychology focuses on establishing and fostering the relationship between conscious and
unconscious processes. Dialogue between the conscious and the unconscious aspects of the psyche
enriches the person, and Jung believed that without this dialogue, unconscious processes can weaken
and even jeopardize the personality.

One of Jung's central concepts is individuation, his term for a process of personal development that
involves establishing a connection between the ego and the self. The ego is the center of
consciousness; the self is the center of the total psyche, including both the conscious and the
unconscious. For Jung, there is constant interplay between the two. They are not separate but are two
aspects of a single system. Individuation is the process of developing wholeness by integrating all the
various parts of the psyche.

Jung's analysis of human nature includes investigations of Eastern and Western religions, alchemy,
parapsychology, and mythology. His initial impact was greater on philosophers, folklorists, and writers
than on psychologists or psychiatrists. Today, however, growing concern with human consciousness
and human potential has caused a resurgence of interest in Jung's ideas.

The Attitudes: Introversion and Extraversion

Among all of Jung's concepts, introversion and extraversion have probably gained the widest
general use. Jung found that individuals can be characterized as either primarily inward-oriented or
primarily outward-oriented. The introvert is more comfortable with the inner world of thoughts and
feelings. The extravert feels more at home with the world of objects and other people.

No one is a pure introvert or a pure extravert. Jung compared the two processes to the heartbeat-
there is a rhythmic alternation between the cycle of contraction (introversion) and the cycle of
expansion (extraversion). However, each individual tends to favor one or the other attitude and
operates more often in terms of the favored attitude. Introverts see the world in terms of how it
affects them, and extroverts are more concerned with their impact upon the world.

There is also a balance between conscious and unconscious emphases on these qualities:

If you take an extravert you will find his unconscious has an introverted quality, because all the
extraverted qualities are played out in his consciousness and the introverted are left in the
unconscious. (Jung in McGuire & Hull, 1977, p. 342)

At times, introversion is more appropriate; at other times extraversion is more suitable. The two are
mutually exclusive; you cannot hold both an introverted and an extraverted attitude concurrently.
Neither one is better than the other. The ideal is to be flexible and to adopt whichever attitude is more
appropriate in a given situation-to operate in terms of a dynamic balance between the two and not
develop a fixed, rigid way of responding to the world.

Introverts are interested primarily in their own thoughts and feelings, in their inner world; they tend
to be introspective. One danger for such people is that as they become immersed in their inner world,
they may lose touch with the world around them. The absent-minded professor is a clear, if
stereotypical, example.

Extroverts are actively involved in the world of people and things; they tend to be more social and
more aware of what is going on around them. They need to guard against becoming dominated by
external events and alienated from their inner selves. The hard-driving business executive who has no
understanding of feelings or relationships is a classic stereotype of unbalanced extraversion.

The Functions: Thinking, Feeling, Sensation, Intuition

One of Jung's greatest contributions to psychology is his theory of type. Jung found that different
people think, feel, and experience the world in fundamentally different ways. His type theory is a
powerful tool to help us understand how people function.

Jung identified four fundamental psychological functions: thinking, feeling, sensation, and intuition.
Each function may be experienced in an introverted or an extraverted fashion. Generally, one of the
functions is more conscious, developed, and dominant. Jung called this the superior function. It
operates out of the dominant attitude (either extraversion or introversion). One of the other three
remaining functions is generally deep in the unconscious and less developed. Jung called this the
inferior function.

Thinking and feeling are alternative ways of forming judgments and making decisions.Thinking is
concerned with objective truth, judgment, and impersonal analysis. Thinking asks the question "What
does this mean?" Consistency and abstract principles are highly valued. Thinking types (those
individuals in whom the thinking function predominates) are the greatest planners; however, they
tend to hold on to their plans and abstract theories even when confronted by new and contradictory
evidence.

Feeling is focused on value. It may include judgments of good vs. bad and right vs. wrong (as
opposed to decision making according to the criteria of logic or efficiency, as in thinking). Feeling asks
the question "What value does this have?"

Jung classified sensation and intuition together as ways of gathering information, as distinct from
ways of making decisions. Sensation refers to a focus on direct sense experience, perception of
details, and concrete facts: what one can see, touch, and smell. Tangible, immediate experience is
given priority over discussion or analysis of experience. Sensation asks the question "What exactly am
I perceiving?" Sensing types tend to respond to the immediate situation and deal effectively and
efficiently with all sorts of crises and emergencies. They generally work better with tools and materials
than do any of the other types.

Intuition is a way of comprehending perceptions in terms of possibilities, past experience, future

goals, and unconscious processes Intuition asks the question "What might happen, what is possible?"
The implications of experience are more important to intuitives than the actual experience itself.
Strongly intuitive people add meaning to their perceptions so rapidly that they often cannot separate
their interpretations from the raw sensory data. Intuitives integrate new information quickly,
automatically relating past experience and relevant information to immediate experience. Because it
often includeds unconscious material, intuitive thinking appears to proceed by leaps and bounds.

Jung has called the least-developed function in each individual the inferior function. It is the least
conscious and the most primitive, or undifferentiated. For some people it can represent a seemingly
demonic influence because they have so little understanding of or control over it. For example,
strongly intuitive types, who are not in touch with their sensation function, may experience sexual
impulses as mysterious or even dangerous. Since it is less consciously developed, the inferior function
may also serve as a way into the unconscious. Jung has said that it is through our inferior function
that which is least developed in us, that we see God. By struggling with and confronting inner
obstacles, we can come closer to the Divine.

For the individual, a combination of all four functions results in a well-rounded approach to the world:

In order to orient ourselves, we must have a function which ascertains that something is there
(sensation); a second function which establishes what is (thinking); a third function which states
whether it suits us or not, whether we wish to accept it or not (feeling); and a fourth function which
indicates where it came from and where it is going (intuition). (Jung, 1942, p. 167)

Unfortunately, no one develops all four functions equally well. Each individual has one dominant
function and one partially developed auxiliary function. The other two functions are generally
unconscious and operate with considerably less effectiveness. The more developed and conscious the
dominant auxiliary functions, the more deeply unconscious are their opposites.

One's function type indicates the relative strengths and weaknesses and the style of activity one tends
to prefer. Jung's typology is especially useful in helping us understand social relationships; it describes
how people perceive in alternate ways and use different criteria in acting and making judgments. For
example, intuitive-feeling speakers will not have the same logical, tightly organized, and detailed
lecture style as thinking-sensation lecturers. The talks of the former are more likely to ramble, to
include stories, and to give the sense of a subject by approaching it from many different angles, rather
than by developing it systematically.

The Unconscious
Jung emphasizes that, because of its very nature, the unconscious cannot be known and thus must be
described in relationship to consciousness. Consciousness, he believes, theoretically has no limit.
Further, Jung divides the unconscious into the personal unconscious and the collective unconscious.

Personal Unconscious. The material in the personal unconscious comes from the
individual's past. This formulation corresponds to Freud's concept of the unconscious. The personal
unconscious is composed of memories that are painful and have been repressed, as well as memories
that are unimportant and have simply been dropped from conscious awareness. The personal
unconscious also holds parts of the personality that have never come to consciousness.

Collective Unconscious. The collective unconscious is Jung's boldest and most controversial
concept. Jung identifies the collective, or transpersonal, unconscious as the center of all psychic
material that does not come from personal experience. Its contents and images appear to be shared
with people of all time periods and all cultures. Some psychologists, such as Skinner, implicitly assume
that each individual is born as a blank slate, a tabula rasa; consequently, psychological development
can come only from personal experience. Jung postulates that the mind of the infant already
possesses a structure that molds and channels all further development and interaction with the
environment. This basic structure is essentially the same in all infants. Although we develop differently
and become unique individuals, the collective unconscious is common to all people and is therefore
one (Jung, 1951a).

Jung's approach to the Collective unconscious can be seen in the following passage from a letter to
one of his patients:

You trust your unconscious as if it were a loving father. But it is nature and cannot be made use of as
if it were a reliable human being. it is inhuman and it needs the human mind to function usefully for
man's purposes.... It always seeks its collective purposes and never your individual destiny. Your
destiny is the result of the collaboration between the conscious and the unconscious. (Jung, 1973, p.
283)

We are born with a psychological heritage as well as a biological heritage, according to Jung. Both are
important determinants of behavior and experience: "just as the human body represents a whole
museum of organs, each with a long evolutionary period behind it, so we should expect to find that
the mind is organized in a similar way. It can no more be a product without history than is the body in
which it exists" (1964, p. 67).

The collective unconscious, which results from experiences that are common to all people, also
includes material from our prehuman and animal ancestry. It is the source of our most powerful ideas
and experiences.

Archetype
The archetype is probably Jung's most difficult concept. Archetypes are inherited predispositions to
respond to the world in certain ways. They are primordial images, representations of the instinctual
energies of the collective unconscious.

Jung postulated the idea of archetypes from the experiences his patients reported. A number of Jung's
patients described dreams and fantasies that included remarkable ideas and images whose content
could not be traced to the individual's past experience. Jung suggested that there is a level of imagery
in the unconscious common to everyone. Jung also discovered a close correspondence between
patients' dream contents and the mythical and religious themes found in many widely scattered
cultures.

According to Jung, the archetypes are structure-forming elements within the unconscious. These
elements give rise to the archetypal images that dominate both individual fantasy life and the
mythologies of an entire culture. The archetypes exhibit "a kind of readiness to produce over and over
again the same or similar mythical ideas" (1917, p. 69). They tend to appear as certain patterns-as
recurring situations and figures. Archetypal situations include the hero's quest, the night-sea journey,
and the battle for deliverance from the mother. Archetypal figures include the divine child, the double,
the old sage, and the primordial mother.

Each of the major structures of the personality is also an archetype. These structures include the ego,
the persona, the shadow, the anima (in men), the animus (in women), and the self.

The archetypes themselves are forms, without content of their own, that serve to organize or channel
psychological material. They are somewhat like dry stream beds whose shape determines the
characteristics of a river once water begins flowing through them. The archetypes are carriers of
energy. When an archetype is activated, it generally unlocks a tremendous amount of energy. All
creativity has an archetypal element.

In his Hero with a Thousand Faces ( 1949), Joseph Campbell, a Jungian scholar, outlines the basic
archetypal themes and patterns in the stories and legends of heroes found in cultures throughout
history. Several excellent studies have articulated aspects of the heroic archetype into orphan,
warrior, sage, fool (Pearson, 1989, 1991) and also into king, warrior, magician, and lover (Moore &
Gillette, 1990). The story of Oedipus is a good illustration of an archetypal situation that deals with a
son's deep love for his mother and conflict with his father. The same basic structure can be found as a
theme in many myths and legends and also as a psychological pattern in many individuals. There are
numerous other related situations, such as a daughter's relationship to her parents, parents'
relationship to children, relationships between men and women, brothers and sisters, and so forth.

It is important to remember that only the contents of an archetype can enter consciousness. The
archetype itself is a pattern that channels our psychic energies. We can never become fully conscious
of this underlying pattern, just as we can study thousands of snowflake crystals but can never actually
see the underlying pattern that generates their common crystalline structure.
The Ego

The ego is the center of consciousness and one of the major archetypes of the personality. The ego
provides a sense of consistency and direction in our conscious lives. It tends to oppose whatever
might threaten this fragile consistency of consciousness and tries to convince us that we must always
consciously plan and analyze our experiences.

According to Jung, the psyche at first consists only of the unconscious. Similar to Freud's view, Jung's
ego arises from the unconscious and brings together various experiences and memories, developing
the division between unconscious and conscious. There are no unconscious elements in the ego, only
conscious contents derived from personal experience. We are led to believe that the ego is the central
element of the psyche, and we come to ignore the other half of the psyche, the unconscious.

The Persona

Our persona is the appearance we present to the world. It is the character we assume-through it, we
relate to others. The persona includes our social roles, the kind of clothes we choose to wear, and our
individual styles of expressing ourselves. The term persona comes from the Latin, meaning "mask," or
"false face," as in the mask worn by an actor on the Roman stage through which he spoke. In order to
function socially at all, we have to play a part in ways that define our roles. Even those who reject
such adaptive devices invariably employ other roles, roles that represent rejection.

The persona has both negative and positive aspects. A dominant persona can smother the individual,
and those who identify with their persona tend to see themselves only in terms of their superficial
social roles and facades. In fact, Jung called the persona the "conformity archetype." As part of its
positive function, it protects the ego and the psyche from the varied social forces and attitudes that
impinge on them. The persona is, in addition, a valuable tool for communication. In Roman drama the
actors' boldly drawn masks informed the entire audience clearly, if somewhat stereotypically, of the
personality and attitudes of the role each actor was playing. The persona can often be crucial to our
positive development. As we begin to play a certain role, our ego gradually comes to identify with it.
This process is central to personality development.

This process is not always positive, however. As the ego identifies with the persona, people start to
believe that they are what they pretend to be. According to Jung, we eventually have to withdraw this
identification and learn who we are in the process of individuation. Minority group members and other
social outsiders in particular are likely to have problems with their identities because of cultural
prejudice and social rejection of their personas (Hopcke, 1995).

The Shadow

The shadow is an archetypal form that serves as the focus for material that has been repressed from
consciousness; its contents include those tendencies desires and memories that are rejected by the
individual as incompatible with the persona and contrary to social standards and ideals. The shadow
contains all the negative tendencies the individual wishes to deny, including our animal instincts, as
well as undeveloped positive and negative qualities.

The stronger our persona is and the more we identify with it, the more we deny other parts of
ourselves. The shadow represents what we consider to be inferior in our personality and also that
which we have neglected and never developed in ourselves. In dreams, a shadow figure may appear
as an animal, a dwarf, a vagrant, or any other low-status figure.

The shadow is most dangerous when unrecognized. Then the individual tends to project his or her
unwanted qualities onto others or to become dominated by the shadow without realizing it. Images of
evil, the devil and the concept of original sin are all aspects of the shadow archetype. The more the
shadow material is made conscious, the less it can dominate. But the shadow is an integral part of our
nature, and it can never be simply eliminated. A person who claims to be without a shadow is not a
complete individual but a two-dimensional caricature, denying the mixture of good and evil that is
necessarily present in all of us.

The following passage from one of Jung's letters provides a clear illustration of Jung's concept of the
shadow and of the unconscious in general:

It is a very difficult and important question, what you call the technique of dealing with the shadow.
There is, as a matter of fact, no technique at all, inasmuch as technique means that there is a known
and perhaps even prescribable way to deal with a certain difficulty, or task. It is rather a dealing
comparable to diplomacy or statesmanship. There is, for instance, no particular technique that would
help us to reconcile two political parties opposing each other.... If one can speak of a technique at all,
it consists solely in an attitude. First of all, one has to accept and to take seriously into account the
existence of the shadow. Secondly, it is necessary to be informed about its qualities and intentions.
Thirdly, long and difficult negotiations will be unavoidable....

Nobody can know what the final outcome of such negotiations will be. One only knows that through
careful collaboration the problem itself becomes changed. Very often certain apparently impossible
intentions of the shadow are mere threats due to unwillingness on the part of the ego to enter upon a
serious consideration of the shadow. Such threats diminish usually when one meets them seriously.
(1973,p.234)

Just when we think we understand it, the shadow will appear in another form. Dealing with the
shadow is a lifelong process of looking within and honestly reflecting on what we see there (von Franz,
1995).

Anima and Animus

Jung postulated an unconscious structure that is the complement of the persona-the anima in man
and the animus in woman. This basic psychic structure serves as a focus for all the psychological
material that does not fit with an individual's conscious self-image as a man or as a woman. Thus to
the extent that a woman consciously defines herself in feminine terms, her animus will include those
unrecognized tendencies and experiences that she has defined as masculine.

For a woman the process of psychological development entails entering into a dialogue between her
ego and her animus. The animus may be pathologically dominated by identification with archetypal
images (for example, the bewitched prince, the romantic poet, the ghostly lover, or the marauding
pirate) and/or by an extreme father fixation.

The animus or anima initially seems to be a wholly separate personality. As the animus/anima and its
influence on the individual is recognized, it assumes the role of liaison between conscious and
unconscious until it gradually becomes integrated into the self. Jung views the quality of this union of
opposites (in this case, masculine and feminine) as the major step in individuation.

As long as our anima or animus is unconscious, not accepted as part of our self, we will tend to project
it outward onto people of the opposite sex:

Every man carries within him the eternal image of woman, not the image of this or that particular
woman, but a definitive feminine image. This image is ... all imprint or "archetype" of all the ancestral
experiences of the female, a deposit, as it were, of all the impressions ever made by woman.... Since
this image is unconscious, it is always unconsciously projected upon the person of the beloved, and is
one of the chief reasons for passionate attraction or aversion. (Jung, 1931b, P.198)

According to Jung, the child's opposite-sex parent is a major influence on the development of the
anima or animus. All relations with the opposite sex, including parents, are strongly affected by the
projection of anima or animus fantasies. This archetype is one of the most influential regulators of
behavior. It appears in dreams and fantasies as figures of the opposite sex, and it functions as the
primary mediator between unconscious and conscious processes. It is oriented primarily toward inner
processes, just as the persona is oriented to the outer. (For example, the creative influence of the
anima can be seen in male artists who have traditionally attributed their inspiration to the muses--
female demigoddesses.) Jung also called this archetype the "soul image." Because it has the capacity
to bring us in touch with our unconscious forces, it is often the key to unlocking our creativity.

The Self

The self is the most important personality archetype and also the most difficult to understand. Jung
has called the self the central archetype, the archetype of psychological order and the totality of the
personality. The self is the archetype of centeredness. It is the union of the conscious and the
unconscious that embodies the harmony and balance of the various opposing elements of the psyche.
The self directs the functioning of the whole psyche in an integrated way. According to Jung,
"[C]onscious and unconscious are not necessarily in opposition to one another, but complement one
another to form a totality, which is the self" (1928b, p. 175). Jung discovered the self archetype only
after his investigations of the other structures of the personality.

The self is depicted in dreams or images impersonally (as a circle, mandala, crystal, or stone) or
personally (as a royal couple, a divine child, or some other symbol of divinity). Great spiritual
teachers, such as Christ, Muhammed, and Buddha, are also symbols for the self. These are all symbols
of wholeness, unification, reconciliation of polarities, and dynamic equilibrium--the goals of the
individuation process (Edinger, 1996). Jung explains the function of the self:

The ego receives the light from the Self. Though we know of this Self, yet it is not known.... Although
we receive the light of consciousness from the Self and although we know it to be the source of our
illumination, we do not know whether it possesses anything we would call consciousness.... If the Self
could be wholly experienced, it would be a limited experience, whereas in reality its experience is
unlimited and endless.... If I were one with the Self I would have knowledge of everything, I would
speak Sanskrit, read cuneiform script, know the events that took place in pre-history be acquainted
with the life of other planets, etc. ( 1975, pp.194-195)

The self is a deep, inner, guiding factor, which can seem to be quite different, even alien, from the ego
and consciousness. "The self is not only the centre, but also the whole circumference which embraces
both conscious and unconscious; it is the centre of this totality, just as the ego is the centre of
consciousness" (1936b, p. 41). It may first appear in dreams as a tiny, insignificant image, because
the self is so unfamiliar mid undeveloped in most people. The development of the self does not mean
that the ego is dissolved. The ego remains the center of consciousness, an important structure within
the psyche. It becomes linked to the self as the result of the long, hard work of understanding and
accepting unconscious processes.

Symbols

According to Jung, the unconscious expresses itself primarily through symbols. Although no specific
symbol or image can ever fully represent an archetype (which is a form without specific content), the
more closely a symbol conforms to the unconscious material organized around an archetype, the more
it evokes a strong, emotionally charged response.

The symbol has a very complex meaning because it defies reason; it always presupposes a lot of
meanings that can't be comprehended ill a single logical concept. The symbol has a future. The past
does not suffice to interpret it, because germs of the future are included in every actual situation
That's why, in elucidating a case, the symbolism is spontaneously applicable for it contains the future
(Jung in McGuire & Hull 1977, p. 143)

Jung is concerned with two kinds of symbols: individual and collective. By individual symbols Jung
means "natural" symbols that are spontaneous productions of the individual psyche, rather than
images or designs created deliberately by an artist. In addition to the personal symbols found in an
individual's dreams or fantasies, there are important collective symbols, which are often religious
images such as the cross, the six-pointed Star of David, and the Buddhist wheel of life.

Symbolic terms and images represent concepts that we cannot completely define or fully comprehend.
Symbols always have connotations that are unclear or hidden from LIS. For Jung, a sign stands for
something else, but a symbol, such as a tree, is something in itself-a dynamic, living thing. A symbol
may represent the individual's psychic situation, and it is that situation at a given moment.

Active Imagination. Jung valued the use of active imagination as a means of facilitating self-
understanding through work with symbols. He encouraged his patients to paint, sculpt, or employ
some other art form as a way to explore their inner depths. Active imagination is not passive fantasy
but an attempt to engage the unconscious in a dialogue with the ego, through symbols.

Active imagination refers to any conscious effort to produce material directly related to unconscious
processes, to relax our usual ego controls without allowing the Unconscious to take over completely.
The process of active imagination differs for each individual. Sonic People use drawing or painting
most profitably, whereas others prefer to use conscious imagery, or fantasy, or some other form of
expression.

Jung himself used a variety of outlets to explore his unconscious. He designed his retreat house in
Bollingen according to his inner needs, and, as he himself developed, he added wings to the house.
Jung also painted murals on the walls at Bollingen; he inscribed manuscripts in Latin and high German
script, illustrated his own manuscripts, and carved in stone.

Dreams. For Jung, dreams play an important complementary (or compensatory) role in the psyche.
The widely varied influences we are exposed to in our conscious life tend to distract us and to mold
our thinking in ways that are often unsuitable to Our personality and individuality. "The general
function of dreams," Jung wrote, "is to try to restore our psychological balance by producing dream
material that re-establishes, in a subtle way, the total psychic equilibrium." (1964, p. 50).

Jung approached dreams as living realities that must be experienced and observed carefully to be
understood. He tried to uncover the significance of dream symbols by paying close attention to the
form and content of the dream, and he gradually moved away from the psychoanalytic reliance on
free association in dream analysis. "Free association will bring out all my complexes, but hardly ever
the meaning of a dream. To understand the dream's meaning I must stick as close as possible to the
dream images" ( 1934, 1). 149). In analysis, Jung would continually bring his patients back to the
dream images and ask them, "What does the dream say?" (1964, p. 29).

Because the dream deals with symbols that have more than one meaning, there can be no simple,
mechanical system for dream interpretation. Any attempt at dream analysis must take into account
the attitudes, experiences, and background of the dreamer. It is a joint venture between analyst and
analyzed. The dreamer interprets the dream with the help and guidance of the analyst. The analyst
may be vitally helpful, but in the end only the dreamer can know what the dream means.

Jeremy Taylor, a well-known authority on Jungian dreamwork Postulates certain basic assumptions
about dreams (1992, p. I I ):

1. All dreams come in the service of health and wholeness.

2. No dream comes simply to tell the dreamer what he or she already knows.

3. Only the dreamer can say with certainty what meanings a dream may hold.

4. There is no such thing as a dream with only one meaning

5. All dreams speak a universal language, a language of metaphor and symbol.

More important than the cognitive understanding of dreams is the act of experiencing the dream
material and taking this material seriously. Jung encourages us to befriend our dreams and to treat
them not as isolated events but as communications from the unconscious. This process creates a
dialogue between conscious and unconscious and is, an important step in the integration of the two
(Singer, 1972, p. 283).

Psychological Growth: Individuation

According to Jung, every individual naturally seeks individuation or self-development. Jung believed
that the psyche has an innate urge toward wholeness. This idea is similar to Maslow's concept of self-
actualization but it is based on a more complex theory of the psyche than Maslow's. "Individuation
means becoming a single, homogeneous being, and, insofar as 'individuality' embraces our innermost,
last, and incomparable uniqueness, it also implies becoming one's own self we could therefore
translate individuation as 'coming to selfhood' or 'self-realization' " (Jung, 1928b, p. 171).

Individuation is a natural, organic process. It is the unfolding of our basic nature, and is a
fundamental drive in each of us. As Jung has written, "it is what makes a tree turn into a tree" (in
McGuire & Hull, 1977, p. 210).

Evaluation

Jung has often been criticized for his lack of a coherent, clearly structured system of thought. His
writing sometimes seems to go off on tangents, rather than present ideas in a formal, logical, or even
systematic fashion. Also, at different times Jung may use varying definitions for the same term. He
was aware of this difficulty in his writing but did not see it as a drawback. Jung believed that life rarely
follows the logical, coherent pattern that has become the standard for scientific and academic writing,
and felt that his own style may be closer to the rich complexity of psychological reality.

Jung deliberately developed a loose, open system, one that could admit new information without
distorting it to fit a closed theoretical framework. He never believed that he knew all the answers or
that new information would merely confirm his theories. Consequently his theorizing lacks a tight,
logical structure that categorizes all life in terms of a small number of theoretical constructs.

It has been argued that Jung's work is still extremely relevant today and that his writings are in line
with the postmodern critiques of contemporary culture (Hauke, 2000). Also, Jung's no objectivist yet
empirically based epistemology puts him in the psychological traditional of William James (Kotsch,
2000).

Recent Developments: Jung's Influence

Jung's ideas have been growing steadily in popularity and influence. The Jung Institute in Zurich still
trains analysts from around the world. Jungian institutes in various countries and in major U.S. cities
provide extensive research materials, lecture series, weekend workshops, and long-term training in
Jungian analysis. The practice of Jungian analysis has continued to develop since Jung's death (see
Stein, 1995, 1998).

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, based on Jung's theory of types, has become one of the most
popular psychological tests in the world (Myers, 1980). Widely used today in business and in
education, it has been taken by millions of people. Each individual is scored on introversion versus
extraversion, thinking versus feeling, intuition versus sensation, and also perception versus judgment.
This final category was added to Jung's basic scheme. Perception refers to an openness to new
evidence and new experience. Judgment refers to the shutting out of new perceptions and coming to a
quick decision. In one study, the MBTI has been used to increase the effectiveness of diversity
training. (Sheill, 1999).

Among the many prominent writers and scholars who have elaborated on Jung's ideas, Joseph
Campbell applied Jungian concepts to topics including myth (1985, 1988) and the hero archetype
(1949). James Hillman (1975, 1989), strongly influenced by Jung, developed an approach he calls
archetypal psychology. Jean Shinoda Bolen (1984, 1989) has written two best-selling books on the
archetypes of the goddesses in women and the gods in men. In their book King, Warrior, Magician
Lover Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette (1990) describe the "archetypes of mature masculinity." One
of the founders of the men's movement, Robert Bly (1990), has been strongly influenced by Jung's
ideas.

There is a whole literature relating Jungian psychology and spirituality, primarily from a Christian
perspective. This literature includes writings by Kelsey(1974,1982) and by Sanford (1968, 1981).
Caprio and Hedberg's (1986) Coming Home: A Handbook for Exploring the Sanctuary Within is a
practical guide for spiritual work in the Christian tradition. It contains striking personal stories,
excellent illustrations, and useful exercises.

For a fine look at the relationship between Jungian psychology and Buddhism, see Spiegelman and
Miyuki (1985). Spiegelman (1982) has also written on the links between Jungian psychology and
Jewish mysticism, as well as on the relationship between Jungian psychology and Hinduism
(Spiegelman & Vasavacla, 1987). Others have related Jungian psychology to the Kabbalah (Drob,
1999) and to a wide variety of topics in phenomenology (Brooke, 2000).

Jung's rich, complex, and sophisticated ideas are gradually gaining the widespread acceptance they so
well deserve.