About Jungian Analysis | Kathleen Moreau, M.A. - Fort Wayne, Indiana Jungian Analyst and Counselor

What is Jungian Analysis?
Who might benefit from Jungian Analysis?
Who was C.G. Jung?

WHAT IS JUNGIAN ANALYSIS?

The intent of Jungian Analysis is to discover a healing link between the CONSCIOUS and the UNCONSCIOUS - to encounter one’s creativity and to understand more fully what is most meaningful in one’s life.

In analysis, one is brought into a new RELATIONSHIP with the UNCONSCIOUS.

This occurs when dreams, images, even behaviors and symptoms, are understood as SYMBOLIC expressions of deeper needs of the human soul or psyche.

Analysis helps us discern what the SOUL requires of us as we seek WHOLENESS rather than perfection.

Jungian approaches are particularly valuable to those in the second half of life, seeking to access aspects of their personalities that have been neglected or misunderstood.

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WHO MIGHT BENEFIT FROM JUNGIAN ANALYSIS?

Jungian analysis can be helpful to those who experience a lack of meaning in their daily lives.

Jungian analysis does not promise to eliminate the emotional pain; rather, it is more likely to give the pain a context where understanding and healing may occur.

If you wish to know more, Kathleen offers practical explanations and applications of concepts in her INTRODUCTION TO JUNG classes and LUNCH WITH JUNG small group experiences. For instance, participants gain greater insight into how their personality may influence personal or professional relationships; how to identify emotional complexes which influence ineffective behavior patterns; why SYMBOLS we are drawn toward may reflect longings of our deepest selves; and how to answer such questions as "What myth am I living?"

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WHO WAS C. G. JUNG?

When C. G. Jung, at age 81, wrote his autobiography, it was titled Memories, Dreams, Reflections. This title was indicative of Jung’s approach to what is most significant in evaluating one’s life; namely that, "In the end, the only events in my life worth telling are those when the imperishable world irrupted into this transitory one. That is why I speak chiefly on inner experiences, amongst which I include my dreams and visions. I can understand myself only in the light of inner happenings. It is these that make up the singularity of my life..." (MDR. pp.4, 5)

Additional indicators, in Jung’s own words, of his very personal and experiential approach to psychology and to the analytical process:

"I am a doctor involved with the illness of the people of his time, mindful of remedies that correspond to the reality of the ailment. Psychopathological research has brought me to awaken historical symbols and figures out of the dust of their tombs. I have seen that it is not enough to make the symptoms of my patients go away...We are not so much in need of ideals as of a little wisdom and introspection, careful religious consideration of experiences from the unconscious."

Jung as cited by G. Gerster. Frankfurt, 1956

As an old man writing his memoirs, Jung states: "Still today, I am lonely, because I know, and must speak of, things that others do not know and for the most part by no means wish to know."

"...The years at Burgholzli (hospital) were my years of apprenticeship. Dominating my interests and research was the burning question: ‘What actually takes place inside the mentally ill?’ That was something which I did not understand then, nor had any of my colleagues concerned themselves with such problems. Psychiatry teachers were not interested in what the patient had to say, but rather in how to make a diagnosis or how to describe symptoms and to compile statistics. From the clinical point of view which then prevailed, the human personality of the patient, his individuality, did not matter at all. Rather, the doctor was confronted with Patient X, with a long list of cut-and-dried diagnoses and a detailing of symptoms. Patients, were labeled, rubber-stamped with a diagnosis." (Memories, Dreams, Reflections, 113-4)

Brief Biography of C. G. Jung

Born in Kesswil, Switzerland, in 1875, Jung studied medicine at the University of Basel, and in 1900 received his medical license. In 1902 he moved to Zurich, marrying Emma Rauschenbach in 1903. His residence remained near Lake Zurich the rest of his life, either at his home in Kusnacht or his retreat at Bollingen. Highly influential travels were to North Africa and East Africa, and to the United States; most notably a visit with the Pueblo Indians in New Mexico in 1924.

A time of deep personal crisis from 1910-1914 led Jung into his own "journey into the unconscious", which was to energize and inform his theoretical and clinical work throughout his life. The literary product of this became Symbols of Transformation, perhaps his most influential work. His attempts to understand the relationship between the ego and the unconscious led him to study ancient ALCHEMICAL TEXTS. He wrote extensively on this subject, believing that alchemy reflected the human psyche’s attempt to reveal and come to terms with its unconscious contents. Alchemy also becomes critical in understanding Jung’s emphasis on the importance of the analytical RELATIONSHIP, perhaps best expressed in the following quote attributed to Jung:

The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances; if there is any reaction, both are transformed.

This is also why the analysts’ exploration of her/her own unconscious is a crucial and extensive part of Jungian analytical training.

Other highly significant concepts which either originated or were developed extensively by Jung include:

Psychological typology, particularly as it relates to the functions of the INTROVERTED or EXTRAVERTED PERSONALITY
The WORD ASSOCIATION experiment, particularly as a means of identifying feeling-toned reactions or experiences referred to as COMPLEXES
The psyche as a SELF-REGULATING SYSTEM, with a goal of WHOLENESS
SYMBOLS, especially as spontaneously produced in dream images or artistic images, as TRANSFORMERS OF ENERGY, as the psyche attempts to emotionally integrate aspects of experience otherwise consciously unknown.
Distinctions between the CONSCIOUS mind, the PERSONAL UNCONSCIOUS (containing information repressed or otherwise unavailable to the conscious mind), and the COLLECTIVE UNCONSCIOUS, which he conceived as containing universal human experiences deeply integrated into the brain structure. These contents are expressed only in symbolic form, which is why MYTHOLOGY and FAIRY TALES are so frequently examined by those studying and understanding Jungian concepts.

Kathleen was drawn to Jung’s thought, work, and method when, upon exposure to this unique approach, she found it so refreshingly compatible with her own life experience and development and with the psychological and spiritual experiences and developmental needs of her clientele.

Kathleen offers practical explanations and applications of concepts such as those above in her INTRODUCTION TO JUNG classes and LUNCH WITH JUNG small group experiences. For instance, participants gain greater insight into how their personality may influence personal or professional relationships; how to identify emotional complexes which influence ineffective behavior patterns; why SYMBOLS we are drawn toward may reflect longings of our deepest selves; and how to answer such questions as "What myth am I living?"

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