Showing posts with label Jung. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jung. Show all posts

Monday 25 February 2013

The Freud / Jung Letters - a window into the worlds of two great innovators.

I'm in the middle of reading The Freud / Jung Letters; and  I'm finding it fascinating. It's the personal correspondence between Freud and Jung starting in 1906 and going on for around seven years until their final break with each other - over 300 letters!


Stepping stones across the water.Looking back from 2013, it strikes me that we now live in a such different world from theirs. Things have moved on. Yet would we be where we are now without them?

Both men were pioneers - innovative thinkers exploring new territory. As they clarified their ideas, their differences came more to the fore; and ultimately they found no way to reconcile them with each other. However despite this, (or maybe because of it), they have both contributed a great deal to our understanding of the human psyche.
Reading their letters, you can see how their ideas develop and crystallise, as they explain themselves to each other. Interesting stuff!..
 
Freud also met Salador Dali. I'd love to have been a fly on the wall at that meeting...
 

Friday 5 October 2012

Dreams - are they worth investigating?

Dreams have always fascinated me. Sigmund Freud saw them as the 'royal road to the unconscious'. How interesting is that? The unconscious, a part of us that we cannot know directly, is there to be explored by looking at our dreams. Freud saw the unconscious as being populated by repressed parts of ourselves, bits we have found difficult to face.

Stepping stones across the waterCarl Jung on the other hand has had a broader view of the unconscious. For him, the unconscious contains a 'shadow' side; but is also the source of our spirituality and creativity. The unconscious in this view is a vital and creative part of our selves and our personalities. Doesn't that make our dreams worth investigating?

There are books where you can look up dream objects and find out what they mean. This may be interesting and a starting point; yet it may tell you little about yourself. The objects in our dreams are our own creations and so may have meanings particular to ourselves. These individual, idiosyncratic, particular meanings can give clues to previously undiscovered, unexplored parts of ourselves.

This view of dreams seems to me to open a door to not so much another world as to another side of ourselves, another perspective that can be useful for us in our everyday lives. Therefore, while fascinating in itself, looking at our dreams can broaden our perspective, unblock our creativity and help us out there in the everyday world.

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