Why C.G. Jung told you to go f%&$ yourself

In the revision of literature on organizational culture and leadership the absence of CG Jung is astounding. It’s as if his contribution towards culture, values, social relationships, meaning hasn’t even existed. In general Jung is now fairly marginalized from the mainstream, often ridiculed or his name also evokes association of obscurity and occultism. Now and then a leadership coach with a background in psychology and therapy will pride themselves of a “Jungian approach”, but that is about it. In fact, I would eye a “Jungian approach” with a certain degree of mistrust, simply because it seems to be dogmatic and hermetic. I would not even consider myself to be “a Jungian”, simply because I have no clue what that even means.

C.G. Jung contributed to our daily thinking in coining terms like introvert and extrovert, the persona for which there is more general acceptance, but others start to become more elusive starting with “the shadow”, “the self”, “individuation”, “anima and animus”. Within his body of work there are pieces which are indeed more pragmatic and to be used to explain certain psychological phenomena and how to deal with them, and how to offer patients relief from their neurosis and lack of meaning from their lives. His lectures display still the willingness to communicate to others his insights and to translate these into prescriptions how to help others. But then there is also a distinct break in his work, which shows an entirely different quality.

“Psychology and Alchemy” and “Mysterium Coniunctionis” are two of such works (“Aion” being another, but I will not dwell on that for now), which are still topped in their sheer obscurity by the “Red Book”. Just the other day I tried to recommend these books to a friend but how can recommend reading something when there is no way to understand it? It’s obvious when reading these books, that Jung was not even remotely interested making anyone understand what he was writing about. There is this distinct impression that he simply didn’t care anymore what anyone thought of him and his research. In his painful break from Freud, which is detailed in the exchange of their letters, it is tangible what despair Jung felt when his brilliant friend and mentor absolutely refused to acknowledge his discoveries. Over pages and pages Jung reasons with Freud and tries to make him see how important his ideas are in extension of those of Freud. But Freud stonewalls him and makes it clear, that he cannot and will not have any of it. This rational reasoning is one of the aspects which lack entirely in “Psychology and Alchemy” and “Mysterium Coniunctionis”, as if Jung new already one thing: If Freud could not stomach it, then most people also would not. Reason alone would not be enough.

And indeed, there is no way the reader can understand these works of Jung through reason and rational thinking. None whatsoever. But there is one key and that is experience. And perhaps the good news is that there are two types of experience which might help a reader dive into the material and benefit from it. One is of course that of a clinical practitioner, of a therapist — which I am not — who sees dozens and hundreds of clients in therapy and is able to discern similar patterns as described by Jung and then make sense of it. To find universal application and relevance. The other form of experience is to have overserved the metaphorical and symbolic meaning making capabilities of one’s own mind. Also, this is a process which requires dozens or hundreds of such observations to be able to be discover themes and patterns, and the relevancy of these. This is a lot of work, which at first appears to have little tangible benefit except if you would like to alleviate your own neurosis. But a neurotic view on the work of Jung just obscures it more.

To be able to accept certain universal principles which Jung describes one must strip oneself even of the contemporary view on Jung and just accept things “as they are” - which is even more difficult!

It’s the act of having an experience and realizing that your subjective experience is not that special, not an expression of trauma or personal history, or social pre-conditions, but rather an act of consciousness itself. And to experience consciousness itself means that Jung can then be understood.

In a nutshell:

Experience is the pre-condition for understanding Jung, it is not Jung who provides the experience of understanding.