'All of my work,
everything that I have achieved with my mind and spirit,
evolved out of those initial dreams and fantasies.'
About Carl Gustav Jung
Carl Gustav Jung was born on July 26, 1875, in Kesswil, Switzerland. He grew up in a religious family (his father was a Protestant minister).
From an early age he decided on a career in medicine and he attended the University of Bashel.
In 1900, when he was 25 years old, he became an assistant at the Burghölzli, Zürich's mental hospital.
His doctoral thesis was a report of séances (psychic contact with deceased people, usually done in a group) that he had observed during a two-year period. He soon turned to psychiatry and, in 1902, published a case history about a hysterical individual.
Five years after from earning his medical degree, Jung was made a senior staff member and director of a research laboratory. He also held an academic appointment at a university. During the next five years, he was awarded an honorary degree from a foreign university (Clark) and was elected the first president of the International Psychoanalytic Association.
Carl Jung in 1910, at the age of 35
In 1907, Jung's interest in dymentia (madness) and the interpretation of dreams brought him to the attention of Sigmund Freud. At this time, Freud's work was not accepted in academic circles, but Jung defended him vigorously, although he never accepted the strong sexual implications of Freud's teaching.
In 1912, Jung realized that he had to break with Freud and strike out on his own. His separations from Freud, the Burghölzli, and the university, gave him more free time, and he used this to write several important works. He called this period a 'confrontation with the unconscious,' (Jung, 973, p. 170). From his highly personal experiences, he developed what he called analytical psychology.
In 1944, at the age of 69, Jung suffered a massive heart attack. He struggled for life for several weeks. After his recovery, he decided to follow his inner convictions no matter what the consequences. The results were a flood of important manuscripts on the psychological aspects of alchemy, Gnosticism, and religion. He died in 1961, just as his work was becoming accepted throughout the world.
Much of Jung's discoveries and ideas came from his own experiences, through his personal dreams and visions.These are detailed in his autobiography (Jung, 1973).
Jung's Epitaph
'The first man comes fom the earth and is of the earth.'
'Invoked or not invoked, the god is present.'
'The second man comes from heaven and is of heaven.'
Analytical Psychology
Individuation, Archetype, Complex, Extraversion, Introversion - these terms have become part of common language and are familiar to most of us. The fact that these terms come from the work of the Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung is not as well known. Jung's Analytical Psychotherapy is based on a depth psychological model of the relations between conscious and unconscious minds. Adding to the idea of an individual unconscious that of a collective unconscious, Jung described archaic characteristics and patterns of perception, typical in human life, which he called archetypes. Jung's thought is based on the idea of a self-regulating psyche. Emotional processes are understood as feeling-toned dynamic events that can manifest themselves emotionally as well as somatically. Given a favourable environment, these emotional processes allow life to unfold in a productive manner. Under adverse conditions, they can cause a large variety of emotional disturbances, from minor to major forms of suffering.
The Jungian concept of Analytical Psychology is more than just a psychological theory; it is also a psychoanalytical psychotherapy, and thus a method for treating behavioural and emotional disturbances and psychosomatic illnesses. Moreover, it is an approach promoting self-realization and the development of the personality (individuation).
Jung's Analytical Psychology has had a major impact on the intellectual history of the 20th century, concerning itself as it does with the archetypal foundations of myths and folktales, their motifs, images, and symbols. In the practice of psychotherapy, the interpretation of dreams and fantasies as expressions of unconscious processes is central to its method. The method also requires understanding psychological processes that take place between conscious and unconscious minds. Finally, the relationship between therapist and patient is of decisive importance.
Videos with Carl Jung
Carl Jung's Most Important Works
The Collected Works of C. G. Jung consist of the following volumes:
1. Psychiatric Studies (1957)
2. Experimental Researches
3. The Psychogenesis of Mental Disease (1960)
4. Freud and Psychoanalysis (1961)
5. Symbols of Transformation (1956, a revision of Psychology of the Unconscious, 1912)
6. Psychological Types (1921)
7. Two Essays on Analytical Psychology (1953)
8. The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche
9i. Part 1 - The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious
9ii. Part 2 - Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self (1959)
10. Civilization in Transition (1964)
11. Psychology and Religion: West and East
12. Psychology and Alchemy (1953)
13. Alchemical Studies (1967)
14. Mysterium Coniunctionis, an Inquiry Into the Separation and Synthesis of Psychic Opposites in Alchemy (1963)
15. The Spirit in Man, Art, and Literature (1966)
16. The Practice of Psychotherapy (1954)
17. The Development of Personality (1954)
18. The Symbolic Life. Miscellaneous Writings
19. General Bibliography of C.G. Jung's Writings
20. General Index to The Collected Works of C.G. Jung
Other Important Works
The Red Book (1914-1930)
Seven Sermons to the Dead (1916)
Answer to Job (1952)
Man and His Symbols (1961)
Memories, Dreams, Reflections (published posthumously)
