Thread: Carl Gustav Jung - Videos, Books, Ruminations

Originally Posted by snoop

unfortunately I'm guilty of having been a proponent of the reductivist scientism perspective,

I'm guilty as well. I'm not proud of my time in here a few years ago arguing against Creationists when I myself had an equally reductive and extreme argument. I definitely got caught up in the New Atheist movement for a while. On the plus side though, Jung (and Jordan Peterson - often while quoting him) says that you do need to go through a strong period of complete separation from any form of belief. He uses the latin term Separatio, which means (obviously) separation. It's a dividing of the opposites, where you learn critical thinking and learn to apply it to everything in your worldview. At first people have a tendency to go heavy-handed with it. But this is like a symbolic death of your old childish worldview which clears the way for a new more mature one to take its place. Then you can transcend the opposites and learn that really they're all just false dichotomies. Night and day are opposite sides of the same coin, as are cold and hot, up and down etc. All opposites are like this - there's no need to choose one side and rail against the other (once you're through your Separatio period). In fact that keeps people immature and prevents them from reaching full development. Instead learn to embrace the opposites and see them as balancing factors like Yin and Yang, both being necessary but you must find the proper balance (which is dynamic - it shifts from time to time and you must shift with it).

Originally Posted by snoop

I myself mistook his meaning and failed to properly understand the idea he was proposing with the collective unconscious and how exactly archetypes come to exist and be pretty much the universal among humanity. The new age woo-woo sound of some of it (despite being thought up in the 20th century, but you get my meaning I hope) when first hearing it and the fact brushing aside most of Freud's theory is not only just socially acceptable but common practice, it's all too easy to dismiss as the ideas of crackpot from a less enlightened time.

Same here. Fortunately I was curious and fascinated enough to keep researching until I discovered what it was really about. And so glad I did!

Originally Posted by snoop

Out of curiosity, how much of Lacan's work have you read up on, DarkMatters?

Not much, honestly. I know the name, and I know Peterson has talked about him, but I don't remember what it was about.

Originally Posted by snoop

I think there's a lot that's iffy, but overall I feel like he, Freud, and Jung all provide separate pieces to a large puzzle, with Jung's theories making up more of it than the other two. It definitely introduced me to a perspective that made understanding my behavior and thoughts (along with other people's) easier, imo.

I'll look into Lacan - thanks for the suggestion!

I hope I'm not interupting this thread too much to say that I've been searching for knowledgeable writing about Jung all day, and Darkmatters, this thread is the best thing I've found. I've bookmarked your blog too.

I don't know a lot about Carl Jung, although I have a psychology degree (we weren't taught about him!). At the moment I've a fascination with creativity and creative 'flow' and the sense of connection to something greater, divine, or whatever people wish to call it, and just following threads of interest and it's brought me to Jung, and now here.

I have a specific question I've been stuck on all day, I wonder if you'd like me to post it here (it would be brief) or start a new thread for it?

Either way, just wanted to say that I'm so glad I've stumbled on this (and hope I haven't interrupted too much)! :-)