Psychotherapy in the aesthetic attitude

Abstract: Drawing upon the writings of Jungian analyst Joseph Henderson on unconscious attitudes toward culture that patients and analysts may bring to therapy, the author defines the aesthetic attitude as one of the basic ways that cultural experience is instinctively accessed and processed so that it can become part of an individual's self experience. In analytic treatment, the aesthetic attitude emerges as part of what Jung called the transcendent function to create new symbolic possibilities for the growth of consciousness. It can provide creative opportunities for new adaptation where individuation has become stuck in unconscious complexes, both personal and cultural. In contrast to formulations that have compared depth psychotherapy to religious ritual, philosophic discourse, and renewal of socialization, this paper focuses upon the considerations of beauty that make psychotherapy also an art. In psychotherapeutic work, the aesthetic attitude confronts both analyst and patient with the problem of taste, affects how the treatment is shaped and ‘framed’, and can grant a dimension of grace to the analyst's mirroring of the struggles that attend the patient's effort to be a more smoothly functioning human being. The patient may learn to extend the same grace to the analyst's fumbling attempts to be helpful. The author suggests that the aesthetic attitude is thus a help in the resolution of both countertransference and transference en route to psychological healing.     

The Primary Self and Related Concepts in Jung, Klein, and Isaacs

In this paper, I have tried to re-examine my understanding of early psychic processes and contents. This has involved comparing and contrasting the ideas of Jung, Klein, Isaacs, and Fordham, with an emphasis on the contributions of Fordham. Fordham's postulate of a primary self that deintegrates and reintegrates is a model of the mind that combines structure and dynamics, and which, moreover, helps to describe what is observed in infant observations and infant research. Infant observation has been used to illustrate these concepts, and clinical material used to show how the same concepts can be used to describe impairments to psychic development. To pursue this study I have had to construct for myself models that describe and explain. I am aware that they are just as inaccurate as they might be accurate, because they imply that there is an answer to the questions I am asking, and that there is a way of describing and explaining what 'the answer' is. 'Nature is always too strong for principle', wrote Hume (Hume 1751, p. 121), and this is particularly true of the ultimately unknowable self.     

荣格心理学与中国文化

荣格及其分析心理学,对于我们国内的心理学和人文科学都曾产生了重要影响。但是,荣格心理学本身,却与我们的中国文化,有着内在的联系。或者说,在荣格正是在充分吸收了中国文化的基础上,才完善与发展民其分析心理学的体系。在本文中,作者通过对汉学字维尔海姆,以及通过《易经》和“道”,分析与论述了荣格分析心理学与中国传统 关系,阐述了中国文化心理学的意义 。     

Repatriating a Mind at Sea: Contribution to a Panel Discussion on the Seismic Shifts in Ruling Principles

Neither the analytic container nor the analyst is immune to the currents of cultural and societal change, in particular when those changes feel seismic in nature. In addressing the cultural anxiety that surrounded the 2016 presidential election, psychic splintering and social schisms seemed ubiquitous, in and out of the analytic container. How does the analyst anchor her- or himself, both as conscious clinician and conscientious citizen, amidst such shifting cultural and political currents? When the analyst experiences either internal displacement from fundamental well-being or severing from her or his own capacity to think, might ancient myth shed light on what one must navigate to find terra firma once again?     

Freud’s Legacy and Modern Theories of Ineffable Trauma

Notions of ineffability, what cannot be put into words, vary depending on the historical and cultural context and, in particular, on shifting linguistic ideologies about the capabilities and limits of language. In recent decades psychoanalysts have embraced a modern notion of ineffability centered around traumatic bodily experiences that are thought to be inexpressible. However, these ideas break with Freudian ideas about language and, most importantly, with his understanding of the processes of interpretation that give meaning to both psychic pain and attempts to heal it. Contra Freud, current theories of ineffable trauma re-inscribe a dominance of the body over the psyche and over-simplify Freud’s ideas about the retro-determination of trauma.

     

A dynamic systems approach to the feeling toned complex

A review of Jung’s writing on the ‘feeling‐toned complex’ shows that he considered it to comprise independent, split‐off, psychic elements. Modern advances in scientific thinking and technology, namely Dynamic Systems Theory and neuro‐imaging, allow us to better define and explore this psychic phenomenon. Considering the constellation of the complex as a hierarchy of dynamic systems allows for a prediction of the timing of brain activity. This has been confirmed by two independent studies using fMRI and QEEG while administering the Word Association Experiment, the tool Jung used to investigate brain/psychic functioning over a century ago. Using as a framework the stages of the constellation of a complex viewed as a hierarchy of dynamic systems, I review the neuro‐imaging studies reported by Petchkovsky et al. (2013, 2017) and Escamilla et al. (2018), concluding that quantitative theoretical predictions and experimental results are in agreement within an order of magnitude. The change in attention caused by the constellation of the complex can also be conceived as the switching from a default neuro‐network, a startle response activating executive functioning in the frontal cortex of either the ego‐complex or an autonomous complex.     

The influence of complexes on implicit learning

A century ago, Jung looked into the unconscious through complexes by using word association tests. Jung wrote, 'modern psychology with its investigation of complexes has opened up a psychic taboo area riddled with hopes and fears', and complexes remain an unexplored taboo area of research. In the present study, we have investigated the influence of complexes on unconscious cognitive processing, in particular on implicit learning. We have found that complexes shown to disturb conscious cognitive processing in fact enhanced the attention of the subjects and their performance on an implicit learning task. These results suggest that complexes are not just abstractions, but have various actual influences on both conscious and unconscious processing.     

Hiding in plain sight: Jung,astrology, and the psychology of the unconscious

Astrology was a lifelong interest for C.G. Jung and an important aid in his formulation of psyche and psychic process. Archetypally configured, astrology provided Jung an objective means to a fuller understanding of the analysand's true nature and unique individuation journey. Jung credits astrology with helping to unlock the mystery of alchemy and in so doing providing the symbol language necessary for deciphering the historically remote cosmology of Gnosticism. Astrology also aided Jung's work on synchronicity. Despite astrology's worth to Jung's development of analytical psychology, its fundamental role in guiding his discoveries is all but absent from historical notice. The astrological natal chart seems rarely used clinically, and many clinicians seem unaware of its value as a dynamic diagram of the personality and the potentialities within which nature and nurture foster and/or discourage for individual growth and development over the lifespan. This paper charts Jung's interest in astrology and suggests why his great regard for it and other paranormal or occult practices remains largely neglected and unknown.     

Jung, the trickster writer, or what literary research can do for the clinician

This paper aims to show how literary scholarship can contribute to clinical debates by offering different methods of reading and interpreting works by Jung. Firstly, as texts form much of the means by which Jungian ideas are transmitted and worked upon, literary research offers methods of examining the way we read for authority and orthodoxy. Secondly, it is invaluable to look at the way in which Jung actually wrote. Jung portrays a dynamic psyche in action in his writings. His works are not only about a creative archetypal psyche, they enact and perform this creativity in the way in which he uses words. The rich playfulness demonstrated in The Collected Works is an example of a writer as a mythmaker of the psyche, one who absorbs unconscious creative energies into his writing in ways that dissolve modernity's cultural boundaries of science and art. In addition, the aesthetic component in Jung's writing is not a decoration of his ideas. Rather, his 'literary' qualities are themselves forms of argument about the fragile state of modern subjectivity. Using his essays on 'Synchronicity', and the 'Trickster', the paper will show these works to be responses to three related crises that still face clinicians and scholars today: the problematic role of the hero myth as an individuation narrative, the nature of 'science', and the crisis of western modernity itself in desperate need of psychic healing. The paper will show that where writing on synchronicity aims to individuate science by adding a 'feminine' Eros to its Logos biases, the Trickster essay is designed to ameliorate modernity by providing frameworks to make visible marginal or excluded material. In these works Jung tries to rejuvenate the modern world by re-connecting traditional symbolic systems with the psyche through myth as a language of psychic relating.     

One Thousand Dreams

The dreams in Psychology and Alchemy were important to Jung because they portray a natural process in the unconscious in which the mandala symbolism gradually takes form, with emphasis on a centre. The dreamer is led through a labyrinth of archetypal symbolism which lays in evidence the dynamic structure of the psyche.
Jung was obviously not permitted to reveal the identity of the man behind the dreams. This paper introduces the historical dreamer, Wolfgang Pauli (1900-1958), together with a sample of his significant dreams as discussed by Jung. The intent is to bear witness to the suffering which hides behind the archetypal imagery, as well as the transformative power of the archetype, lending support to Jung's statement that 'behind every neurosis there is a religious problem'.
Pauli was a genius, who as a Nobel laureate ranked with the top physicists of this century. As a one-sided intellectual atheist alienated from his feelings, in his early thirties he met with an emotional crisis, which led him to Jung for treatment. The dreams that Pauli experienced at that time carried him through a depth experience, a nekyia, that transformed his attitude toward life. They were also a precursor to a dream life that stimulated his investigation of non-causal influences common to quantum physics and (analytical) psychology, i.e. the 'psychophysical problem', including synchronicity.
A legacy of Pauli's life was to show that the non-rational unconscious can give meaningful expression to the functioning of a scientific mind.     

Case History, Case Story: An Enquiry Into the Hermeneutics of C. G. Jung

The case histories written by C. G. Jung, from his 1902 Doctoral Dissertation to his 1950 case of Miss X, are evaluated as pieces of evidence in support of his theories. Evidence is shown to rely for its validity on an 'evidential context' which has altered over time. Jung's case histories change over the course of his writings and become more like stories. The reason for this difference is his move from an interpretative schema based on the natural sciences when a psychiatrist, through that of psychoanalysis, to one based on the human sciences, and in particular to one based on hermeneutics - the study of interpretation and meaning - when he developed his theory of analytical psychology. Jung moves from a form of hermeneutics based on what constitutes a 'valid' interpretation to one that concentrates on meaning and understanding. In writing his later case histories like stories, Jung is using them as merely part of the wider cultural context of evidence required by analytical psychology rather than as privileged pieces of evidence in themselves.     

基于大数据的文化心理分析

随着大数据技术与文化心理学的融合发展, 计算文化心理学作为一门新兴交叉学科逐渐兴起, 大尺度、近乎全样本的文化心理分析真正得以实现。计算文化心理学关注的文化变量主要围绕个人主义/集体主义这一文化心理学使用最为广泛的维度展开, 分析方法包括特征词典、机器学习、社会网络分析、仿真模拟等, 分析思路包括时间维度上的文化变迁效应以及空间维度上的文化地理效应。当然, 计算文化心理学在为传统文化心理研究提供新方法、新范式的同时, 也存在解码失真、样本偏差、词语多义性、隐私风险等局限, 未来研究应重视变量理论解释、文化动态演化分析、学科深度整合、生态效度等问题。     

The glow of Telesphoros: a brief enquiry into the sense of the term ‘mana personality’ and the dynamic of experiences behind it

In this article, I begin by outlining the qualities and attributes associated with experiences of mana, focusing particularly on the way the term ‘mana’ was used by C.G. Jung in his published work. I note that Jung associated mana with the accumulation and transfer of psychic energy (libido), with the appearance and appropriation of elemental fire, and by extension, with the metamorphic experience of constellating consciousness. In this context, informed by Jung’s accounts and modes of expression, the term mana personality becomes a provisional designation for a recurrent dynamic of archetypal experiential configurations whose telos appears to be the reorientation of consciousness to its origin.     

The Individuation Process in Post-Modernity

C. G. Jung defined individuation as the process of differentiation from the general collective psychology—from the norms and the values of the society in which the individual is immersed. Accordingly, individuation occurs in relation to the culture of the time and the zeitgeist. During the second half of life, the process, according to Jung, takes the shape of a lifetime dynamic dialogue between the ego and the unconscious contents, aiming to reach psychic completeness. One of the participants in this dialogue is the ego, and since the ego necessarily develops inside a culture, this part of the individuation process also occurs in relation to the culture of the time. We are now fully immersed in post-modernity, and the zeitgeist is represented by the society of technology. In relation to this totally new scenario, do we still deal with the same individuation process described by Jung? How many of our patients confront themselves with the Self and its symbols, stepping toward some kind of psychic totality? This article hints at different forms of individuation reflective of our post-modern technologically dominated times, and it touches upon the concept of the end of meaning and the “death of God.” Considering this epochal passage, we might be compelled to outline a further form of individuation: that of a conscious revolt of the ego toward its basic ingredients (will to power, primary narcissism, and need of identity) and toward the old image of the Self, so similar to that God that should be dead.     

情绪表达抑制功能的文化差异

表达抑制是指当情绪被唤醒的时候, 有意识抑制自己的情绪表达行为。诸多研究表明表达抑制并不是一个有用且有效的策略。但不可忽视的是, 文化因素是表达抑制与结果变量关系间的一个重要调节因素。即, 在个人主义文化中, 表达抑制通常发挥着较负面的作用。但在集体主义文化中, 表达抑制并非完全是一种不恰当的调节策略。这可能与文化价值观、对“面子”观点的态度以及父母的应对方式有关。未来的研究方向主要在于表达抑制在集体主义文化及不同亚文化中的作用、学业背景下表达抑制的作用及其功能的文化差异以及被试取样的多样化等方面。     

Group process in Jungian analytic training and institute life

Group process experience for analytic candidates is a neglected dimension of training, and receives little attention in the analytic literature. Jung observed group dynamics, but he never studied them closely, attending instead to the psychology of the individual. Unconscious currents in small groups have been studied by others, most notably by Wilfred Bion, and there are similarities between his theories of the group unconscious and Jung's theories of complexes. Experiential and didactic seminars in group process were added to the analytic curriculum at the C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco in the early 1990s, leading to changes in the group dynamic of trainees and analysts alike. A discussion of the theories of Bion and Jung are followed by a report on our experiences of facilitating group process for analytic candidates. We give quotes from candidates and analyst members to illustrate the group process and its effects. The need for further study to develop a uniquely Jungian perspective on the unconscious structure and dynamics of the group is suggested.     

How to read The Red Book and why

The Red Book can be, and is, read in a variety of ways and used for different purposes. Here I propose to view it from the perspectives of three contexts: the personal and biographical one, a literary one and a cultural and religious one. Each of these viewpoints exposes different, but (in each case) important, features and meanings. Composing Liber Novus clearly had great significance for Jung's own personal individuation process. In studying this work, the reader must keep in mind that Jung had a great many predecessors in view and looking over his shoulder as he composed it. The text reveals that he was in dialogue with a vast number of cultural figures from the near and the far past. It is also a foundational text for Jung's later works in psychology. And it addresses large cultural and historical issues, looking back at traditions from the standpoint of modernity and forward toward what is to come collectively in the near and distant future. His creation was a work for himself, but also for the culture and for the ages. I try to understand what the title Liber Novus means and suggest that it represents an intention of attaining to a rank beyond being a 'new book' for only one man, Carl Gustav Jung, to being a work relevant to humanity as a totality.     

From horror to ethical responsibility: Carl Gustav Jung and Stephen King encounter the dark half within us,between us and in the world

This paper explores the experience of horror. The term is usually understood collectively to refer to experiences of terrorism, racism and other conflicts; however, the paper explores the equal horror for the individual of facing deep and painful psychic contents and traumatic experiences. The paper explores the way that both C.G. Jung, through analysis of the psyche, and the author Stephen King, through his horror novels, have accepted and explored the experience of encountering ‘the dark half’ or ‘It’ that is the other within themselves, forming images and symbols capable of linking their personal experience to that of the collective. This encounter is transformed, as far as Jung is concerned by analytical psychology and for King by fiction, through an attitude of active imagination. This led both men to developing an ethical responsibility towards the images of the unconscious, as well as the personal and collective contents of human life. The paper depicts how encountering the ‘dark half’, through Jung and King can provide a Jungian analyst with a special attitude with which to deeply explore and ethically process the experience of horror in different fields, including therapeutic practice, analytical training and in the traumatic and conflictual facing of the other, with which, today as always, the world presents us.