Jung’s Model Of The Psyche

 Like Freud, Jung regarded the psyche as made up of a number of separate but interacting
systems. The three main ones were the ego, the personal unconscious, and the collective
unconscious.
 According to Jung, the ego represents the conscious mind as it comprises the thoughts,
memories, and emotions a person is aware of. The ego is largely responsible for feelings of
identity and continuity.
 He proposed that the unconscious consists of two layers.
1. The first layer called the Personal Unconscious is essentially the same as Freud’s version of
the unconscious.
 The personal unconscious, a concept developed by Carl Jung, refers to all the information
and experiences of an individual’s lifetime that have been forgotten or repressed but
continue to influence their behavior and attitudes on an unconscious level.
 For instance, a person might have a fear of dogs due to a forgotten childhood incident. This
fear, while not consciously remembered, is stored in the personal unconscious and could
cause an irrational response whenever the person encounters dogs.
2. Collective Unconscious
 Holds experiences shared by all human beings- experiences that in part are our biological
heritage. It reflect the experiences our species had since it originated on earth.
 The collective unconscious consists of pre-existent forms, or archetypes, which can surface
in consciousness in the form of dreams, visions, or feelings, and are expressed in our
culture, art, religion, and symbolic experiences.
 Fear of the dark, or of snakes and spiders might be examples, and it is interesting that this
idea has recently been revived in the theory of prepared conditioning.

Jungian Archetypes

 Jungian archetypes are defined as images and themes that derive from the collective
unconscious.
 For Jung, our primitive past becomes the basis of the human psyche, directing and
influencing present behavior.

 The Persona

 The persona (or mask) is the outward face we present to the world. It conceals our real
self and Jung describes it as the “conformity” archetype.

 This is the public face or role a person presents to others as someone different from who
we really are (like an actor).
 The term originates from the Greek word for the masks that ancient actors used,
symbolizing the roles we play in public.
 However, problems can arise when a person overly identifies with their Persona, unable
to differentiate between their professional role and their authentic self.
 An example would be a teacher who continuously treats everyone as if they were their
students
 The Persona is shaped during childhood, driven by the need to conform to the
expectations of parents, teachers, and peers.
  This usually results in the Persona encompassing the more socially acceptable traits, while the
less desirable ones become part of the Shadow’

 The Anima/Animus
 Another archetype is the anima/animus. The “anima/animus” is the mirror image of our
biological sex, that is, the unconscious feminine side in males and the masculine tendencies in
women.
 For men, there exists an Anima (a feminine inner personality), and for women, an Animus (a
masculine inner personality).
 Like the Shadow, the Anima and Animus are often first encountered through projection. For
example, the phenomenon of “love at first sight” can be explained as a man projecting his Anima
onto a woman (or vice versa), which leads to an immediate and intense attraction.

 The Shadow
 encapsulates the parts of ourselves that we may reject, disown, or simply don’t recognize.
 This is the animal side of our personality
 The Shadow isn’t merely negative; it provides depth and balance to our personality.
 Overemphasis on the Persona, while neglecting the Shadow, can result in a superficial
personality, preoccupied with others’ perceptions.
 This interplay of the Persona and the Shadow is often explored in literature, such as in “Dr. Jekyll
and Mr. Hyde”
 The Self

 However, in modern Western civilization men are discouraged from living their feminine side and
women from expressing masculine tendencies. For Jung, the result was that the full
psychological development both sexes was undermined.

Psychological Types

Carl Jung’s psychological types theory suggests that people experience the world using four principal
psychological functions – sensation, intuition, feeling, and thinking – and that one of these four
function’

1. Thinking (T) vs. Feeling (F): This dichotomy is about how people make decisions. ‘

Thinking’ individuals make decisions based on logic and objective considerations, while ‘Feeling’
individuals make decisions based on subjective and personal values.

2. Sensing (S) vs. Intuition (N): This dichotomy concerns how people perceive or gather
information. ‘Sensing’ individuals focus on present realities, tangible facts, and details.

They are practical and literal thinkers. ‘Intuitive’ individuals focus on possibilities, interconnections,
and future potential. They are often abstract and theoretical thinkers.

3. Extroversion (E) vs. Introversion (I): This pair concerns where people derive their energy from.
Extroverts are oriented towards the outer world; they tend to be more outgoing and sociable,
deriving energy from interaction with others and the external environment.

Introverts are oriented towards the inner world; they tend to be quiet and reserved, deriving energy
from reflection, inner feelings, ideas, and experiences.

 In the context of these pairs, everyone has a ‘dominant’ function that tends to predominate in
their personality and behavior, along with an ‘auxiliary’ function that serves to support and
balance the dominant.
 The other two functions are less prominent and constitute the ‘tertiary’ and ‘inferior’ or ‘fourth’
functions.
 The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a personality inventory based on these ideas of Jung.
 The MBTI uses a questionnaire to measure psychological preferences in how people perceive the
world and make decisions, assigning a type composed of four letters, like ‘INFJ‘ or ‘ESTP‘, based
on their answers.
 Each letter corresponds to one preference in each of the dichotomous pairs.

Individuation

 Jung proposed that the goal of a person’s psychological development is individuation – a process
of becoming aware of oneself, integrating different aspects of personality, and realizing our
inherent potential.
 It involves integrating the conscious and unconscious parts of our mind and reconciling our many
inner contradictions.
 It’s about becoming the person that you are innately meant to be, realizing and fulfilling your
unique potential.
 The concept also involves acknowledging and integrating the anima (the unconscious feminine
aspect in men) and the animus (the unconscious masculine aspect in women), and incorporating
the wisdom of the self archetype (the unifying center of the psyche). Through this process, a
person seeks to achieve a state of wholeness and harmony.
 In practical terms, the process of individuation might involve self-reflection, dream analysis,
exploration of personal symbols and themes, and conscious engagement with the unconscious
parts of the self.