home Diagnosis and diseases The main archetypes according to Jung and their characteristics. The theory of archetypes by C. G. Jung and its significance for understanding the mechanisms of perception of the objective world

The main archetypes according to Jung and their characteristics. The theory of archetypes by C. G. Jung and its significance for understanding the mechanisms of perception of the objective world

During eight hours of sleep, we see at least five dreams. Pleasant, disturbing, colorful, colorless, nightmare and prophetic dreams - all these are messages from our unconscious. Sometimes you want to forget them, but more often you want to decipher them. We talk about the Jungian interpretation of dreams, the multi-layered nature of the unconscious, and what experience is packaged in the archetype of the Child, Mother, Father, Hero and Baba Yaga.

What is an archetype?

An archetype is a set of primitive images, concepts and ideals that do not have a specific prototype in a person’s memory or personal experience, but are generated by the collective unconscious. Archetypes are transmitted to a person from ancestors on a subconscious level through their experiences, plots of myths and fairy tales, peculiarities of upbringing, and memories.

They manifest themselves in dreams, daydreams, visions, and spontaneously determine a person’s thinking and behavior. To put it in other words: an archetype is an innate, basic “set”, which, along with instincts, is hardwired in its mysterious depths.

It is believed that the archetype is another variation on the theme. This is wrong. The ancient word “archetype” comes from the term “arche” - “primary foundation”, on which, according to ancient Greek thinkers, the whole world is built. This term is also widely represented in the history of culture, religion, philosophy, and literature. For example, derivative words are found in the words “monARCH”, “ARXangel”, “patriARCH”.

Archetypes today are those subconscious images that:

They are found among different peoples of the world and in all periods of history (Sage, Prophet, Cunning).
Endowed with a set of positive and negative qualities characteristic of most cultures.
They are found in painting, literature, and sculpture in the form of recognizable symbols (tamed fire, marriage of the male and female principles).
Displayed in myths, fairy tales, traditions, legends.
Affect emotional condition(Wizard - joyful anticipation of a miracle).
They evoke certain feelings and thoughts in relation to the corresponding object (Child - the joy of communication, Sage - trust).

Carl Gustav Jung: patriarch of analytical psychology.

Compared to other brilliant scientists, the Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung amazes with its productivity. Jung's merit is that he deepened and expanded Freud's theory about the influence of the unconscious on human actions, described the multi-layered psyche, introduced the concepts of archetype and psychological type into the field of medicine, and. Jung's main contribution to analytical psychology was that he endowed archetypes with psychological meaning and made them (patterns of) human perception.

In discussions about the “collective unconscious” and “personal unconscious,” Jung also refers to ancient philosophers: Plato, Aristotle, St. Augustine. But in his works he called the two types of the unconscious not conflicting, but complementary structures. According to Jung:

Personal unconscious- the unconscious content of the psyche, which draws knowledge from a person’s individual experience.
Collective unconscious– a deeper layer where primary archetype images that have existed since time immemorial are “stored”.

The archetype itself and the power contained in it cannot be clearly called positive or negative: it is important how to direct them. Especially in , where encrypted messages steadily increase the percentage of unconscious purchases.

Archetypes in branding.

Times may change, but the archetypes remain in the subcortex and evoke the same associations: Creator, Ruler, Rebel, Romantic. Companies consciously or unconsciously exploit these images when building relationships with customers. Moreover, brands that consistently exploit a successful archetype increase their market share.

Archetypes, as a universal way of communicating with the subconscious, help to recognize the goals of popular brands:

Coca-Cola (Child + Nice Guy): conveys a feeling of celebration, involvement in sincere and warm relationships.
Nestle baby food (Child+Mother): care for the baby’s health, selfless love, harmony and peace are conveyed.
Lancome cosmetics (Persona + Diva): involvement in high fashion and the image of a queen are conveyed.
Gillette (Macho+Hero): the image of Superman is broadcast, capable glance to impress a woman, a brave hero accompanied by a beautiful companion.

The theory of usefulness of archetypes is exploited not only in advertising. It is used to create a personal brand: in the selection of clothes, makeup, hairstyle.

Jung's basic archetypes.

Jung said that there are an infinite number of archetypes. But Anima and Animus are considered central. Anima– manifestation of the inner feminine image in a man, his unconscious women's side. Animus– these are masculine tendencies in a woman’s psyche. The union of Anima and Animus symbolizes the unconscious, our Alter Ego, which is gradually integrated into the self.

Self according to Jung, this is a certain example inherent in a person of the person he is to become. The Self is a prototype of God, endowed with his qualities. This holistic archetype can appear in the images of a super-personality (King, Hero, Prophet) or in the form of a symbol closed along the contour (circle, square, Tao).

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Other archetypes according to Jung are always a universal collective image ideal man or the ideal woman in different incarnations:

1. Mother.

This is the beginning of all beginnings, which predetermines our interaction with the outside world. It gives a person vitality, resourcefulness, vitality. One of the most important and studied archetypes has a light and dark side:

Mistress-Mother(light side) - the keeper of the hearth, protecting family traditions and treasures obtained by a man. Loves harmony in everything: in home, relationships, work, thinking. She gives warmth, care, and does handicrafts. In general, he creates.
Mistress-Stepmother(dark side) is often described in literature. She seizes power, ignores the wishes of her family, and takes it out on her loved ones.

2. Father.

Not so developed, but the most dynamic image in the pantheon, which gives us active patterns of behavior and directs us to some kind of activity. Researchers distinguish three types of paternity and associate them with the Greek gods:

Father Zeus- This is the image of a patriarchal man. He is endowed with foresight and intelligence, power, authority and the right to rule. The father of the gods is a prototype of people who are strong and confident in their success in everything from career to love affairs.
Father Kronos- This is the image of a dictator, an enemy for his child. He prefers total control and intoxication with his aggression and victories to love. However, prolonged dictatorship leads to resistance and rebellion.
Father Uranus is an image full of mystery and timelessness. Such a man is endowed with powerful intellect, but often withdraws into himself. It creates a feeling of activity that has no end and thereby increases hopelessness.

3. Child.

One of the most important archetypes, which allows you to touch the childhood state, symbolizes the beginning of life and a qualitatively new stage of development. This is more than half-forgotten childhood memories. This is a combination of two opposites - male and female, weakness and a colossal reserve of strength. In almost every culture, the image of a child has a dual message:

Offended Child initially carries “divine value” (the image of the “baby Jesus”), needs the help of elders, but at the same time learns independence.
Coming Child. In fairy tales, there is often a plot where the ruler is predicted to die from a recently born child. And then the basis for the plot becomes the child’s miraculous survival in difficult conditions. This symbolizes readiness for possible challenges, the will to live.

In Jung's model, the collective unconscious has several layers and each is filled with its own archetypes. Eat:

Basic incarnations of the Hero, Sage, Romantic, Jester, Ruler.
Mythological prototypes of Artemis, Athena, Aphrodite.
Fairy-tale characters Baba Yaga, Mermaid, Morozko, Rapunzel.
Numerical symbols of the Far Away Kingdom, the Thirtieth State.
Prototypes of animals (Antelope, Lion) or birds (Falcon, Firebird).
Mythical characters Dragons, Medusa Gorgons.
Images embodied in everyday things (Magic Shoes, Wonderful Ring).
Natural phenomena (Source, Thunder).
Incorporeal incarnations in Spirits, Ghosts.

How to understand and decipher archetypes in dreams?

Sigmund Freud called dreams “the royal road into the unconscious,” but saw them mainly as repressed sexual desires. C. G. Jung viewed images from dreams as clues from the unconscious that help reveal the content of mental life. Archetypes are endowed with enormous energy. Therefore, Jung considered them to be the deepest force and the main source of dreams.

Studying dreams allows you to decipher the messages of your unconscious. But, before joining this interesting and unpredictable game, it is worth remembering:

The unconscious always communicates in collective images. Archetypes in their pure form are not included in dreams - they are combined with individual experience, the personal unconscious and processed by consciousness. For example, Zeus or Artemis are rarely seen in classical images of gods. They are always endowed with the features or appearance of familiar people.
Regardless of the number of characters in a dream, they all relate to the personality of the owner of the dream. Message characters can be people, animals, objects, transport, nature. Even if familiar people come in a dream, the dream is not about them, but about the dreamer.
Dreams are always triggered by the events of the previous day. Before you start decoding, it’s worth rummaging through to remember this event.
The most informative are dreams with repeating plots, nightmares or dreams that cause strong
There are no random images. Each has its own meaning and its own strength.
Only its owner can decipher the message of a dream. If you wish, you can turn to, who will tell you the general principles of working with dreams.
The details of the dream are forgotten very quickly. You can keep a special notebook and write down your dreams in it immediately after waking up.

From the point of view of analytical psychology, dreams are a performance about ourselves, told in metaphorical language. The purpose of the dream is not to scare, entertain or calm the dreamer, but to draw his attention to “distortions” in consciousness and restore mental balance.

But Jungian analysis is not limited to dream interpretation. Analytical based on similarity psychological situations patient with stories from fairy tales, myths, and legends. For example, because he was stuck in the image of the Hero Lover. Or the girl suffers from because she sees herself in the image of the Frog Princess. Jungian analysis helps the patient see the history of his life, discover internal archetypes and build harmonious relationships with them. The metaphorical nature of this method helps to work with young children and people prone to...

conclusions:

An archetype is a mental structure that condenses the experience of humanity and influences people's behavior on an unconscious level.
Each universal symbol has its own deep meaning, but human consciousness supplements it with new elements.
Decoding dreams is a sacrament available only to the owner of the dream.

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Semira and V. Vetash “ASTROLINGUA”

SEMIRA

JUNG ARCHETYPES AND ASTROMYTHOLOGY

afterword to the translation of C. G. Jung’s book “The Alchemy of Dreams” St. Petersburg/Timothy, 1997

This article contains a brief overview of Jung's main archetypes, the description of which was not included in the translations of this book. In addition, here we will show that images of these archetypes can be found not only in dreams and alchemy, but also in a related field - astrology (which, like alchemy, the psychoanalyst treated with deep interest and reverence). The roots of astrology lie in the most ancient layers of mythological consciousness, and we will look at the components of Jung’s “collective unconscious” from the point of view of generalized mythological archetypes, universal prototypes that form part of the Zodiac system.

Jung relied on mythology and consciously used cultural images in his practice, as well as to describe psychological phenomena. "The psychological illumination of these images, which cannot be passed over in silence and blindly ignored, leads directly into the depths of religious phenomenology. The history of religion in the broad sense of the word (including mythology, folklore and ancient forms of psychology) is a treasury of archetypal forms from which the doctor can easily fish out suitable analogies and parallels to calm and clarify the ocean-swept mind. It is highly necessary to consider fantastic images, which in the light of reason appear so strange and menacing, in some context that makes them clearer." Such a context for Jung was artistic works of art and literature, as well as alchemy and mythology. He called the stable images found in all these areas archetypes .

Jung understood the archetype as the content of the unconscious, which always reveals itself to consciousness with some distortion introduced into direct perception by culture and individual inclinations of a person. He did not pose the question of how archetypes arose or whether their truest or primary form exists. For the European Jung, whose worldview absorbed classical German philosophy, the archetype is obviously present in the psyche, like the Kantian ideaa priori, as an image of the divine mind. Jung writes about it this way: " The soul is part of the inner mystery of life; it has its own special structure and shape, like any other organism. Where this psychic structure with its elements - archetypes - came from is a question of metaphysics, which, therefore, remains unanswered. It is something given, pre-established, which is present in all cases." This is how the thinkers of antiquity and the Middle Ages understood the archetype, and that said it all - however, for the science of the third millennium, such an answer about the nature of the archetype will probably no longer be sufficient.

Jung's writings clarify and debunk religious myths in celebration of human individuality; but the psychological approach does not provide sufficient grounds to proclaim the historical and largely atheistic view that it was human consciousness in the process of its development that created the world of the soul and those archetypal images that make it up. Based on the opposition between consciousness and the unconscious, the founder of analytical psychology preserves the dualism of perception of the world, which he himself strives to overcome. He preserves it in order to prevent the primitive-empirical, flat-materialistic approach that modern science is guilty of, which tends to view man as a biological machine and deprives him of his divine purpose. But the greatness of man lies precisely in the fact that he is able to set himself divine goals and achieve them. And the history of mythology allows us to see the unity of the human mind (consciousness) and the divine soul (unconscious).

Mythological images, if we consider their essential features, are strikingly similar in different parts of the Earth, despite the striking external differences in the history and culture of different peoples. This allows us to identify universal prototypes common to all humanity - the most ancient archetypes that confirm the unity of the divine noosa, like the human psyche. Among them there are more ancient and newer ones, and each of them reflected a special, but directly integral and new bright attitude of people to the world. These images are usually associated with the ancient pantheon of gods, although ancient mythology alone gives only a very superficial idea of what the original completeness and how deep the evolutionary meaning lies behind each of the motley wealth of its characters. An analysis of world mythology as a whole makes it possible to trace how gods of one type replaced others, recording the achievements of people in the creation of culture. Parallel to it, the evolution of consciousness went on, creating the inner world of man from the vital and most relevant external forms for him. The history of mythology allows us to see how, developing images of new gods and forgetting the old ones, the mind gradually created a sphere of its forms, which today has gone into the depths of the unconscious, leaving only abstract ideas on the surface.

Turning to the unwritten history that myths convey to us, we will see that the soul is only the patrimony of consciousness, its second, other, otherworldly reality, the area of its long-term memory, from where it retrieves, when necessary, its most ancient images. The soul is part of consciousness, but this should not be understood primitively: consciousness in ancient times was inseparable from feeling, and therefore, remembering the ancient prototypes as the first and most universal archetypes, it evokes directly fresh, pristinely bright and divinely heavenly sensations , before which the mind, which has forgotten about them and is limited by the stereotypes of civilization, often gives in.

Astrology here provides the help that allows you to clearly separate one archetype from another based on its system. Jung was helped to identify archetypes by his personal psychiatric experience. Astrology has formed its psychological images for thousands of years, based on the experience of many generations of people. Moreover, it is a metaphysical system that answers the philosophical question about the origin of the soul and its forms, a question left unanswered by Jung. Astrology is the only natural system - based on the cosmic, annual cycle of the sun - which describes the forms reasonable human life: forms predetermined by the general rhythms of the solar system. The global all-embracing nature and mind that this system presupposes allows us to identify the natural history of the development of consciousness and show what the archetypes that we see today in many images of the soul and culture originally were.

The archetype is divine, unconscious and invisible in the sense that it represents a certain stable mental vibration - which is a reflection of the cosmic vibration (and this is another, more direct connection between psychology and astrology). This vibration seems to have no image, since it can be manifested in countless varieties. different forms, adjusted by the current moment in time. But still, there is a global natural prototype that once allowed humanity to create its own idea of this vibration - and to lay in the psyche the emotional foundation with which we unconsciously operate today. Using the astrological system and the evolutionary-historical criterion for distinguishing archetypes, we can clearly describe this prototype as the unity of external and internal, form and idea (more clearly than Jung, who, without having a complete system of archetypes, brought together diverse mythological features and images). In this sense, the universal mythological archetype is not only an actual idea, but also obvious, outwardly visible and tangible in life image consciousness. These are the images of the Sea, Sky or Earth, behind which stretches a stable trail of subconscious ideas and psychological concepts associated with them.

Comparison of Jung's archetypes with the most ancient mythological prototypes can help to present the processes of the inner world with greater completeness. An astromythological commentary expands the view of the basic images of the psyche and makes it possible for those who are somewhat familiar with astrology to trace the functioning of archetypes in a person’s personal horoscope.

IN modern life Astrology so far usually plays only the role of a psychological commentary, a description of a person’s personal orientation. But the astrology of archetypes, behind which there are universal human mysteries, allows us to touch upon the most dramatic problems of people and find informal ways to solve them. Therefore, the astrology of archetypes could provide real help in serious pathological cases of disintegration of the soul - in psychiatry. Perhaps in the future the horoscope will be of interest to psychiatrists, and not only at the level of diagnosing probable pathologies, but also as a method of practical work.

Jung started from the psychological practice of the functioning of archetypes in order to form their images. Astromythology comes from the other end: from an image to a practical conclusion. Let's see what the image system of astrology can provide for understanding Jung's concept. When reviewing Jung's archetypes, we partially relied on the work of F. Fordham "Introduction to Jung's Psychology" , and mythological archetypes are described in our book "Astrology and Mythology" .

JUNG AND THE PROCESS OF INDIVIDUATION

Any theory bears the character of its creator, and in order to better understand Jung's ideas, we can first of all pay attention to the archetypal features of his own personality. Carl Gustav Jung was born on July 26, 1875 - at the beginning of the sign of Leo, which is characterized by the greatest interest in the problem of human individuality. This is the central sign of the Zodiac, personifying the comprehensiveness of the world and the fullness of the individual’s life. The Sun, the main ruler of Leo, in astrology symbolizes the revelation of human creative potential - which is served by the process of creating a crystal of oneself, called individuation by Jung.

The lion is a symbol of human maturity, and here you can pay attention to the fact that individuation is not a youthful ideal and not only the maturation of the individual. This is the goal of a fully grown person, especially if he had to face an illness, neurosis or test that prompted him to leave his previous life and seek new way. As Jung notes in his work “Integration of the Personality,” often middle-aged people who are quite successful in external life are overcome by a feeling of emptiness and a sense of lack of meaning in life.

Modern society is based on scientific knowledge and technical skills, to achieve which he must inevitably develop the one-sided, rational side of his personality and suppress his instincts. Most young people can pay this price, although among them there are those who, neglecting their true nature, relapse and fall ill. But in the second half of life, many are faced with the need to understand those aspects of their personality that were suppressed in the struggle for existence and the pursuit of personal ambitions or pleasures. This is expressed in mental disorders or nervous breakdowns, which often occur around the age of 40, when previous aspirations are no longer satisfying, and ideals and values no longer attract as much as in youth.

Let us note that at this age (about 41 years old) the most significant ideological crisis occurs, in astrology associated with the planet Uranus (the opposition of Uranus in the sky to Uranus in the birth chart). Uranus is responsible for new perspectives and the nervous system (neuroses). This planet is weak in the sign of Leo, and the psychoanalyst, as a characteristic representative of his sign, places special emphasis on the development of its qualities.

The central archetypal problem of the sign of Leo, and especially its first decade, is in the conflict between the traditional-collective and the emerging individual: by and large, in the conflict between society and the individual. It is reflected in the mythological plot of the struggle between the Sun God or the heroes whom he often patronizes with the Thunderer, the king over gods and people. The king of the gods, corresponding in astrology to the planet Jupiter, personifies collective traditions. The solar archetype claims its independence and independence from the head of the pantheon, but is not yet able to take his place. The conflict between the traditionally given (Jupiterian) and the new truth of the emerging personality (solar principle) is the driving factor in Jung's theory.

The archetype of the Thunderer, the patron of the pantheon of gods and society as such, is a more ancient image in relation to the Sun God, symbolizing the strength of the individual. Individual qualities begin to be valued only in a society that has reached a certain stage of development of civilization (which in ancient culture is reflected, for example, in the image of the solar god Apollo, the patron saint of the muses). The personal must be reckoned with the collective on the basis of which it arose. And Jung begins his theory of archetypes with the compromise between the individual and society to which the development of civilization leads.

A PERSON

The first archetype, which most openly dominates a person’s consciousness and at the same time the most superficial and accessible to reasonable assessment, relates to the social image of a person. Society expects a person to comply with certain norms of cultural behavior - but over time, they become outdated, lose their former vitality and turn into cliches. This leads to the formation of a mask behind which most people live. Jung calls this social mask a person - this is what ancient actors called masks that denoted the nature of the role:

"Society expects and must expect from the individual that he plays the role assigned to him as well as possible: thus, if a person is a priest, he must play the role of a priest flawlessly all the time. Society, out of a sense of security, requires that everyone stand at his post: one is a shoemaker, the other is a poet. A person is not expected to be both... that would be strange. Such a person would be distinguished from other people as being quite unreliable. In academic circles he would be an amateur, in politics an "unpredictable" candidate, in religion a "freethinker" - in short, he would be suspected everywhere of irresponsibility and incompetence, because society is convinced that only a shoemaker who is not a poet can make decent boots."

A person- a collective image, and we will be mistaken if we perceive individuality through it. So an actor with long hair and unusual clothes looks like something unique (as a person), while he simply dressed and looks like the other artists in the group. Or, the kindness of Mrs. So-and-So, the priest's wife, seems to speak of her kind nature - but in reality she simply believes that the priest's wife should be a good friend to everyone who needs her. Of course, people choose roles that are close to them, and in this sense, a person is a person, but never the whole person. Human nature is fickle, which manifests itself in the performance of a role, and then falsehood is inevitable.

A persona is necessary: it simplifies contacts, indicating what we can expect from people and generally making them more pleasant, just as good clothes hide ugly bodies. It is difficult for someone who neglects personal development to settle in the world, and he often offends others with defiant behavior. However, there always remains a danger of identifying oneself with the role being played, although it is not obvious when the mask is good and suits the person. Often a person, being too rigid, denies the rest of the personality: aspects of the personal and collective unconscious, and isolation in one’s role leads to a lack of natural emotional response. Another danger is that when changing the mask and adopting a new way of responding to the external, a crisis of loss of familiar supports may occur, which a person perceives as the destruction of the personality.

Psychoanalysis and astrology are close in that they solve the same problem - determining the unchangeable internal data of the individual. They are designed to be identified by psychological tests designed for a sincere conversation with the unconscious, and reveals a personal horoscope drawn up for the day and hour of birth. Taking the problem more broadly, the description of the typical leads us to archetypes that reveal the roots of timeless problems. Using Jung's terminology, today they relate to luck and prestige (Persona), personal complexes (Shadow), love and marriage partners (Anima and Animus), fate (Spirit) and protection (Great Mother), but they go much deeper than these formulations, which and encourages us to turn to ancient mythology for their essential description. Jung started from the psychological practice of the functioning of archetypes in order to form their images. Astromythology comes from the other end: from an image to a practical conclusion. Let's see what place the Persona occupies in the system of its images and what this can give for understanding this archetype.

The persona reflects the social face of a person: the image of the individual from the point of view of society, which compares it to the astrological archetype Jupiter . The Jupiterian self, in the personal horoscope associated with social functions, is what we are, as opposed to what we essentially are and what we could become. But this performance should not be underestimated. The archetype of Jupiter in mythology is the image of the king of the gods, preserving the world and curbing the dark forces of Chaos. This is not the most ancient image of the creator, who only repeats creation: this is how a reasonable idea organizes the already created world for us. And yet, the gods of this archetype surpass the previous and subsequent gods in breadth of vision: and Zeus, bringing his brothers and sisters out into the white light from the dark womb of Kronos - the physical world, controls all visible reality from the top of Olympus and coordinates all the functions of the gods. In accordance with this, the planet Jupiter is the organizing principle of the personality: that which keeps it “in shape” and therefore contributes not only to social success, but even to physical health and happiness.

Here it must be emphasized that the image of the Person belongs to the collective, and not the personal “I” of a person. The idea of the ego has not always been what it is today: it has a long history. We now understand our "I" through the image of personal consciousness or the image of conscious will (astrologically Mercury or Mars), the latter concept being newer and therefore more progressive. Jupiter is an already outdated awareness of oneself that has not reached us in its pure form through its function within a certain integrity of people: “I”, which contains the component “we” and presupposes its correlation with the general will or general worldview. It is a broader and less personal “I” awakening in love for an idea or homeland and sometimes forcing one to sacrifice one’s life: the narrower life of one’s “I” to the broader concept of the life of social thought. But this is not yet the most ancient concept of oneself: it was preceded by the idea of oneself as an impersonal part of the family, from which the idea of transmigrating the soul of a deceased relative into the body of a born baby originates. This ancient idea of oneself through the image of an ancestor is linked to genetic memory and is practically inaccessible to us.

We are preserved and coordinated by our activities, preventing the personality from sinking and falling apart, primarily by the principles learned from childhood, developed by thousands of years of history and unique to their time - our collective “I”. To the extent that it is not explicit, but subconscious, Jung refers to it as an “auxiliary” function that stands on the border between consciousness and the subconscious - the Animus. He thinks of the image of the Person as the most external, so we cannot fully compare it with the mythological archetype of the King of the Gods: Jupiter is only the base, the foundation of the Person.

As the most external image of a person, a person corresponds to the most manifested personality traits. In a personal horoscope, these are the strongest qualities in the aggregate, especially the qualities of one’s own zodiac sign, as well as those pointed to harmonious aspects strong planets (connections and trines) - and ascendant: characteristics of the hour of birth (Ith andXth house). The Ascendant is how a person tends to relate to himself. Western astrology, which places emphasis on the Ascendant and the associated house system, often does not go beyond the Persona, but this is enough to correct the personality. However, it is known that self-esteem does not always reveal the true qualities and abilities of an individual: if this were so, there would not be many problems, the simplest of which is choosing a profession. We often perceive a person by profession, and it confirms the strongest qualities of the horoscope listed above.

But the essence of the prototype of the Persona is not only this. People around him want in Persona an image that is ideal not only from a social but also from a moral point of view. Astrologically, this aspect corresponds to the archetype of the forward-oriented warrior Mars , personifying the ideals of humanity. The Mars archetype is the last archetype, the development of which is emphasized in the history of mythology. Possessing natural magic and at the same time the potential of the mind, the gods of this archetype often unite under their leadership the deities of various territories and sometimes replace the former lord of thunder (as the frantic Odin removed the mighty Thor from the throne). Thus, the archetype of Mars leads us to the image of a single god and symbolizes a new, more universal principle of unifying personal qualities. The images of this archetype - the invincible warrior and the wise shepherd - contain a solution social conflict Leo, but they imply the individual going beyond the boundaries of society and turning to the magic of nature, which pours the life-giving forces of nature into a rational form (according to Jung - to the unconscious). Having acquired a new truth, the individual returns to society, being able not only to never lose himself again, but also to lead others.

Speaking about the need to turn to the element of the unconscious, Jung implies this path. However, for the analytical psychologist it remains purely internal, not affecting the surface level of the Persona. Jung does not consider the transformation of the mask by the internal forces of the personality, and his image of the Persona remains formal, not reaching the sincerity of the Mars archetype. The Martian archetype of warrior and shepherd is what will appear when the mask becomes a face. But the inferiority of Jung's image of the Person has a basis: the Mars archetype is the last archetype to emerge in history. Its completion means the acquisition of that immortal center of personality, the formation of which Jung’s works are dedicated to.

The astrological archetype of Mars, bearing the features of a universal human ideal, stands out at the end of the development of mythology from the general archetype of the gods of war and death. As having a connection with death, these deities often act as rulers of the invisible other world, which becomes the basis of a person’s second reality - his invisible spiritual life. But close to the image of the Persona in its emphasis on external manifestation, on self-disclosure, the Mars archetype symbolizes only those elemental forces that a person has mastered. What remains beyond what is accessible belongs to the Pluto archetype as a necessary evil, which provides a counterbalance to good and helps to realize it.

This other side of oneself, which relates to the unconscious, Jung calls " Shadow ".

SHADOW

In the sense of the collective unconscious Shadow- this is a natural instinctive person, and it has hardly changed since the times when man first walked the earth. The shadow cannot be completely transformed by education, and in many ways it remains from childhood, when our actions were purely impulsive. That which is common to all in the Shadow expresses itself in such images(!) of the collective unconscious as the ruler of the hidden, invisible, underworld - of which modern man is best acquainted with the Devil. To illustrate the image of the Shadow, Jung also found a mythological image of a deceiver-trickster (trickster), who in fairy tales does not appear to be who he really is, exposing to everyone his worst qualities, corresponding to a lower level of development of the consciousness of mankind. We will turn to this image later, but for now we will consider the Shadow as hidden, and therefore the most sinister and dangerous in a person.

The shadow is subconscious desires that are incompatible with social standards. This is a kind of lower level of consciousness in relation to modern society, and this is someone who wants to do what we no longer allow ourselves, Mr. Hyde of our Dr. Jerkyl. A person suspects this alien personality in himself when he goes into a rage and then justifies himself: “It’s not me, it’s like something came over me.” What “came over” him was the primitive, uncontrollable, animal part of his personality - the Shadow. The shadow has its personifications: and when we especially hate someone, we really do not love our own qualities that we find in the other.

By calling this aspect of the unconscious "shadow", Jung wanted not only to designate it as something dark and unsteady. There is no shadow without the Sun, and there is no Shadow of the unconscious without the light of consciousness. Shadow - “lower”, most internal function of a person is inevitable, and without it he is incomplete. Forming a counterweight to consciousness, it serves as an impetus for internal development. Superstitions say that a man without a shadow is the devil himself, which is why we are always suspicious of someone who seems “too good to be true.”

A person does not necessarily deny the Shadow: sometimes the shadow qualities of a person calmly coexist with it. If an individual is not too dominated by the social ideal of the Persona, he tends to allow himself to have shortcomings that fill his inner leisure and at the same time allow him to relax and escape from external life, which requires constant effort on himself. These internal tendencies can imperceptibly take precedence over external requirements, which can lead to the loss of a person, whose role is in the individual’s adaptation to the world, which leads to his inappropriate behavior among people, sometimes implicit to himself. Therefore, as Jung writes, a person who is possessed by the Shadow always stands on his own path. By casting a shadow of denial over his entire existence, he makes an unfavorable impression on others and himself rejects his real life prospects. Luck passes him by, forcing him to live below the level of his capabilities in eternal dissatisfaction and struggle for life.

As an analytical psychologist, Jung came to the conclusion that it is futile to deny the Shadow or try to suppress it. A person must find ways to live in the dark side of his personality, his mental and mental health often depends on this. Accepting the shadow requires considerable moral effort and often destroys dear ideals, but only because they are too exaggerated or based on illusion. The danger of completely suppressing the Shadow is that then it grows in the unconscious to monstrous proportions and is only waiting for an opportunity to manifest itself outward, prevailing over the rest of the personality, according to the proverb “there are devils in still waters.” But identifying the Shadow also takes a person inside himself, and the dangers of a purely internal life are associated with it (primarily social inadequacy and loss of interest in the world). Therefore, the Shadow for Jung is " a moral problem that affects the whole self", a problem of enormous importance that should not be underestimated.

Astrologically, the Shadow is undeniably a zodiac archetype Pluto , ruler of the Underworld and the eternal enemy of the head of the gods - the king of Heaven and Earth. Confrontation is its essential feature. The Roman god of the underworld is born as Vediyovis: non-Diovis, that is, anti-Jupiter in relation to Jupiter the God. The Person opposes the Shadow, like the archetype of Jupiter - the archetype of Pluto, which reflects the main mythological mystery of the struggle for goods between the earthly and underground worlds: this and the otherworldly, visible and invisible, and this corresponds to the main opposition of the conscious and unconscious in Jung.

The most characteristic mythological image of this struggle is the battle of the Thunderer with the Serpent, who stole the flocks of clouds from the heavenly ruler and fettered the energy of nature - just as our forces are held back by a mass of unconscious ideas and problems contained in the unconscious. To clearly imagine the opposition of these archetypes, one truly needs to imagine a thunderstorm - and not just as atmospheric phenomenon, still impressive to man, but like an animated thunderstorm, which announces itself with stunning thunder, rules dazzling lightning and, finally, marks the victory of the rain, feeding the parched earth with long-awaited moisture.

From this image it is clear how significant the concept of Shadow is: after all, it awakens the dormant energy in a person, without allowing the Person to turn into a frozen mask. In order to resist the one who owns all revealed reality, ensuring the development of the world and the natural dynamism of the individual, the ruler of the invisible world had to be equal to him in strength. That is why the Shadow is so strong (until its negative traits are transformed into the positive qualities of the Persona).

The planet Pluto symbolizes the passions and physical instincts of man that are most inaccessible to consciousness (which must also be no less strong than the human mind: in order for the human race to at least ensure its reproduction). Pluto is the necessary counterweight to the intelligence of material existence, testing and testing the vitality of everything that exists, and endowed with the power to transform that which is dead. Pluto is the potential of forces hidden from us, and our task is to take advantage of it. This is the role of the Shadow: a person deprived of the Shadow would lose the ability to transform himself and would soon cease to exist. He would remain an ideal, but ethereal mask, belonging to a certain lived, past stage of time, but unable to take a step into the future, which is doomed to be different.

True, in the horoscope the planet Pluto is colored by the qualities of the planets associated with it and in itself usually does not provide a sufficient counterbalance: only indicating the supposed image of the enemy and negative ideological guidelines. The Shadow as a truly repressed quality is indicated by the strongest disharmony horoscope (for example, tau square). This corresponds to Jung's thought that affects arise most often where adaptation is weakest, revealing the reason for its weakness. Also shadow qualities can be understood through the image the opposite Zodiac sign or sign opposite the Ascendant. A simple way to identify the Shadow is to ask to model the most unpleasant image that immediately comes to a person’s mind. He will not necessarily be a villain, a criminal or a vampire (that is, he will not necessarily have the traits of the Pluto archetype), but will indicate traits that have not yet been perceived by the personality and the most obvious imbalance of the forces of the horoscope.

This imbalance (more precisely, the desire to get rid of it) is a driving factor for the individual. The qualities also act as a hidden engine opposite sign, mastering which is the most universal and indisputable psychological task in the life of any person. Indicators can also play an additional role here.VIIIth house, corresponding to Pluto and determining the spiritual life of a person, as well as plunging into extreme circumstances (which in the end often turn out to be the most powerful factors of development).

The unconscious always appears to us in an extreme situation: even a dream, oddly enough, occurs at a time when the psyche is experiencing storms similar to ecstasy or severe stress. Why does the body subject itself to such a test several times a day? Obviously, there is no other way to get rid of the stresses of the day: after all, Spinoza already pointed out that any human experience can be eliminated only by a stronger affect. The role of such an affect is played by a dream, and in reality - religious revelations, initiations and rituals, and conscious spiritual work on oneself, releasing shadow problems and shadow qualities of the soul in order to include them in the orbit of a person’s rational life.

Pluto is the planet of suffering and passion, and therefore it leads us to an understanding of the essential contradiction between the world and nature, reflected in the animal world as the opposition of the sexes. In mythology, it later manifests itself in the Gemini archetype, the formation of which was influenced by the Pluto archetype, and in Jung - in the opposition of Anima and Animus.

ANIMA

By comprehending the shadow, we delve deeper into the unconscious, perceiving it as an additional principle to ourselves. But we are drawn into the sphere of unconscious passions not only by denial and enmity, but also by the attraction of love. These are also two poles of the world. Both sexes equally have a Persona and a Shadow, with a man's Shadow usually personified as another man, and a woman's as another woman. But the subconscious of a man contains a complementary feminine element, which is repressed from his external life, and the subconscious of a woman contains a masculine element. And a man perceives his unconscious addition primarily through female image, and the woman - through the man. These images, which act as intermediaries between the conscious and unconscious nature of man, Jung calls, respectively, " Anima " And " Animus ". "In this idea, he to some extent follows his teacher Freud: the unconscious ideas of the soul that are most accessible to a person (and therefore mental pathology) are often associated with the image of the other sex.

Anima- an archetypal phenomenon, and does not represent the character of any one woman, although it is realized through real women (and above all through the image of the mother). " In the male consciousness there is a collective image of a woman, with the help of which he comprehends feminine nature,"- writes Jung. "Every mother and every lover becomes the embodiment of this ever-present and ageless image that corresponds to the deepest reality of man.".

The image of a woman, since it is an archetype of the collective unconscious, may change somewhat in different eras, but retains the constant characteristic of timelessness: Anima usually looks young. She is wise, but not too wise, she rather possesses " hidden secret of wisdom". It is often associated with earth and water, and carries within itself " chaotic requirement of life"and can be endowed with great power. She also has two aspects - light and dark: she can be distinguished by purity and good behavior, or she can be a seductress and a traitor. Sometimes she looks like an elf or fairy, distracting a man from work and home, or a siren of antiquity , a mermaid or nymph, drawing him into her element of water so that he will love her forever or drown. The anima is fickle as the woman in whose image she incarnates, and to describe her, Jung usually turns to the mythological approach, which " traces the life process of the soul much more accurately than an abstract scientific formula".

Jung considers Anima to be the soul of a man - not in the Christian sense, where it acts as the immortal essence of the personality, but as the ancients understood it, simply as a part of the personality. To avoid confusion, Jung uses the word "anima" instead of the word "soul", psychologically interpreting it as " perception of a semi-conscious mental complex having partial autonomy of functions" / But the concept of anima has a spiritual meaning, and its image is projected not only onto pagan goddesses, but also onto the Virgin Mary, also an emotional image close to us.

Reflecting the feminine qualities of a man, Anima also expresses a person’s mood, his premonitions and emotional outbursts. We can find an analogy for this in ancient Chinese texts where it is said that when a person is in a bad mood, he is ruled by the female soul (yin). It destroys his attempts to concentrate, creates a feeling of unsteadiness and uncertainty about the correctness of his actions. A person possessed by Anima is subject to uncontrollable emotional swings.

From the point of view of astrolomythology, Anima corresponds to female archetypes Moon And Venus . The first is the more ancient archetype of the mother, personifying the continuity of the eternal river of life and the childlike receptivity of the soul. It is with the Moon and the lunar archetype that the instability of feelings and self-doubt, premonitions and overflows of emotions are associated. The second is a younger image of the goddess of love, revealing the power of earthly fertility, as well as the developed, stable and deep feelings of man. It is in the sense of this archetype that the Anima differs from the soul.

Jung says that the image of Anima can coincide in a person with the concept of the Shadow (an example of such a confusion is the male statement “all troubles come from a woman.”) And in astrology, the archetype of the Moon is associated with a deceptive desire back to childhood and the illusory immortality of an unconscious nature , and the Venus archetype carries within itself the power of sensual temptation, which correlates it with the invisible power of the ruler of another world. In mythology there are transitional images of the sorceress-Moon (Hecate) or the female vampire (Lilith or Lamia), and the goddess of love often opposes the thunderer, as does his otherworldly adversary. But the struggle of the goddess of love with the head of the pantheon is not eternal and often ends in the marriage of the strongest male and strongest female image. Jung assesses the situation negatively if the Anima (as semi-conscious) merges with the Shadow (completely unconscious): this indicates too much power of the unconscious over a person. And indeed, in this case, the more ancient archetype of the confrontation of natural forces, lying deep in the subconscious, does not allow the archetypes of a more developed consciousness to manifest themselves - and with them the feelings of devoted and fruitful love.

The power of the anima over a person, if we consider not pathological, but processes common to all people, corresponds to the unconscious attachment to the mother and the first crush, and then love. Attachment to the mother reveals the instinct of self-defense. But self-defense is his first awareness of himself, and therefore the first step from the unconscious to reason. Falling in love is an attraction to what one likes: but it also means the first determination of the inclinations of the soul, its formation. In this sense, Anima becomes the first bridge between consciousness and the unconscious.

In a personal horoscope, the image of Anima, in addition to the position of the Moon and Venus, is primarily associated with the most weak a planet whose qualities are difficult to manifest. It is also the planet that usually causes serious illness, which links the Anima image with the characteristicXIIth house. This definition of Anima confirms the fact that first (and maybe second and third) love often arises for a person who has these qualities strong. (That is, if Mars is weak and, accordingly, there is a tendency to pain in the head, the first strong unconscious attraction is caused by Aries, etc. The same is true for Cancer, where Mars is in its fall.) As something subconsciously attractive, the image of Anima can correlate with qualities a planet that is weak in its birth sign: the so-called falling planets (that is, for Aries, the image of Anima is Capricorn, since Saturn is in its fall in Aries). Partly the same applies to a woman’s animus.

ANIMUS

AnimusA woman shows in her, first of all, her masculine traits. In general, like the Anima of a man, this concept includes three multi-level components: the collective image of a man, a person’s individual ideas about masculine qualities, and the masculine principle hidden inside a woman. A woman often treats the external sphere of application of the male mind - commerce, politics, technology and science - semi-consciously, just as a man treats his feelings. Thus, a woman’s thinking and a man’s feelings belong to the sphere of the subconscious. If the Anima brings unconscious waves of mood, the Animus brings unconscious conviction, causing one to insist on perceived statements and generally accepted opinions instead of actually realizing them.

Just as the mother is the first bearer of the Anima image, so the father becomes the embodiment of the Animus, which is then projected onto many other male figures. The animus can be personified by any male figure, from the most primitive to the very spiritual, depending on the development of the mind: in a dream he can appear as a boy, or even just as a voice. He is also personified as a group of men, which is less typical for Anima, who is more often personified by one figure (obviously because the dominant feeling is one, and there are many dominant opinions):

"The animus is like a collection of fathers or worthy people, which utters indisputable “reasonable” judgments. On closer examination, these judgments turn out to be widespread statements or opinions, more or less unconsciously acquired from childhood and compressed into the dogma of truth and justice: a collection of axioms, which, if the consciousness cannot competently understand the situation (which often happens), instantly provides a ready-made opinion. Sometimes such opinions take the form of so-called common sense, sometimes they are like a parody of learning: “People always do it this way” or “Everyone says it is so.”."

The critical judgment of the animus can create a feeling of inferiority or fetter initiative. On the other hand, it encourages excessive criticality. An intelligent woman can be just as much a victim of the animus as her poorly educated friend. The second quotes the media, or its opinions are supported by some unsteady entity called “they”: “They say,” and the first refers to some authoritative source: a university, a church, a state, a book or a historical document. But in both cases, if you ask the question about the essence of her judgments, the answer will be controversial and dogmatic. The animus thirsts for power, and no matter how nice a woman is in ordinary life, she falls into tyranny and aggression and does not hear the arguments of reason if her animus is affected. The reason is that the activity of the animus creates a real difficulty for a woman to think without prejudice. She has to beware of her inner voice, which constantly tells her: “it should be this way,” preventing her from seeing reality as it is.

Nevertheless, the animus also plays a positive role, creating support in a critical situation and truly stimulating the search for knowledge and truth.

In its role as a generally accepted support, the Animus corresponds to the mythological archetype of the head of the pantheon of gods - Jupiter , which is responsible for the collective worldview and universal developments of religion, philosophy and culture. On the other hand, the opposition of Anima and Animus as feminine and masculine principles contrasts with them the mythological images of the ideal feminine and ideal masculine principles, expressed by the archetypes of Venus and Mars. Since these are the latest images developed by humanity, these are the most accessible and understandable matrices of the unconscious to us.

The idea of the Persona as the objective power of people over man (Jupiter), and of the Animus as an ideally masculine, that is, purely personal, and not an external, strong-willed, Martian principle (which, in fact, apparently, is the “voice”), would greatly simplify the overall system by directly mapping it to astrological archetypes, in an image simpler than Jung's psychic functions. But the image of the Animus as a “collection of husbands” does not allow this to be done. According to the past, now subconscious stage of consciousness and the image of authority, the father, the Animus is Jupiter. And here it must be pointed out that the father plays a slightly different role in the life of a child, be it a boy or a girl, than the mother. He always embodies the authority and general orientation of a person in the external world, while the mother transmits to the child more elusive abilities for the development of the inner world of feelings and dreams.

The mother protects the child from external life - similarly, the anima leads away from the reality of existence. The infantilism of a man in this sense is a departure from “adult” independent activity into the subjective spheres of his soul. The father reveals the objective external world to the child and, personifying the sphere of authority and morality, on the contrary, creates protection from subjective mental deviations. The child identifies himself with the mother, but the father remains alien to him. In this sense, the mother symbolizes subjective consciousness, the father - objective being; The anima for all people is a guide to the sphere of the personal unconscious, and the animus acts as a guide to the collective unconscious beyond itself.

This is the difference between Anima and Animus as personifications of love. If a man's feelings lead him away from conventional reality into the world created by Anima, a woman's love opens it up to external life. In love, its self-disclosure reaches perfection: astrologically manifesting the quality of Mars. At the same time, she sees reality from the position of her animus, that is, in a semi-conscious version - from the subjective position of the man she loves, and in the purely unconscious - from the position of society imposed on her by tradition: since public morality, reflecting the archetype of Jupiter, acts in relation to the people as father. Semi-consciously controlled by the Animus, the woman's worldview is more fanatical than the man's, which belongs to the entirely manifested sphere of the mind.

Here you can see another difference between Anima and Anumus. If the Anima, leading deeper into the soul, merges with the Shadow, the Animus sharply dissociates itself from it: the public mind creates the image of an enemy so as not to be absorbed by the unconscious processes of the collective soul. Social consciousness does this out of habit: it, like human consciousness, is afraid of hidden spheres of the unknown, from which one can expect the unpredictable. Jung points out that previously this fear was justified: consciousness could not arise without denying the unconscious. However, now it has moved too far away from living natural sources, and therefore the mind must consciously return to the unconscious movements of the soul. The clash between the Animus and the Shadow continues to illustrate the most dramatic plot of mythology, which we have already mentioned: the archetypal plot of the battle of the earthly and underground kings, the battle of the Thunderer with the serpent. This struggle always ends in the victory of the Jupiter archetype, although only temporarily: for the sake of the dynamics of development, the forces of the invisible world again raise their heads.

It is clear that the division into male and female is partly arbitrary, and the male part of a woman’s personality may temporarily become more conscious to her than the needs of her female soul. Modern followers of Jung believe that Anima and Animus exist in all people, helping a person to realize the various hidden qualities of his personality. The activation of these archetypes in the human soul is the first step towards creating one’s own individuality - unique and unlike any of the series of masks that we have unconsciously adopted since childhood.

Love plays the same role: it will mark the first milestone on the path to creating an immortal crystal of yourself. Animus is love in a higher sense than the sensual love of Anima: it is more adult love to the spouse, as well as to the homeland and idea, which in astrology is designated by the planet Jupiter. As you know, a woman values marriage more love: he develops her animus - her spirit - and brings it out of the sphere of the patriarchal-unconscious into the realm of consciousness (this is how a wife protects her husband’s ideas and contributes to their implementation). For a man, sensual love remains more developing and therefore more important, forcing him to experience the unconscious sensations of childhood with new strength and in a new quality: only the anima soul is capable of providing a harmonious complement to his personality, oriented towards formal adult life.

First love is rarely realized into a lasting marriage, and often the marriage is associated with a person of a completely different nature than the initial feeling of love. This is because love for both sexes is usually realized through the image of the Anima, and marriage requires the consent of the Animus. If some traits of the beloved do not satisfy the mind of a person - the “assembly of husbands” in his soul, which judges his actions - they form a Shadow. And the Animus - that semi-conscious part of the soul that strives to become conscious - is categorically opposed to the Shadow in all spheres of life. Therefore, the image of the spouse often does not coincide with the image of the beloved, although in the future the criterion of feeling and the criterion of reason should coincide: Anima and Animus should be one, differing from each other only in the image of gender (as Jung intended them, giving them the same names).

The convergence of the images of Anima and Animus means the implementation of the mythological plot of the marriage of the Thunderer with the goddess of love (zodiac archetypes Jupiter and Venus - the master of the worldview and the mistress of feelings), which symbolizes abundance, prosperity and stable well-being. The wedding of two such dissimilar rulers of the world becomes possible only at a late stage in the development of mythological consciousness, which sets the task of mastering the nature of feelings.

This happens after humanity realizes itself as intelligent and, based on this, imagines people equal to gods, which captures the mythological archetype of Gemini. It is clear that in one person the unity of the masculine and feminine principles does not occur immediately. Thus, we can identify the first three stages of the development of feelings, which everyone encounters in one way or another:

Involuntary sensual attraction that arose in the image of the memory of the soul (Anima, astrologically Moon);

Tendencies dictated by upbringing (Animus, Jupiter - which fights the Shadow, Pluto); And

A stable feeling that has overcome the phase “the mind is not in harmony with the heart” (Anima, different from the Shadow: that is, Venus; or the Animus, which has defeated the Shadow, that is, Mars).

The image of the Animus in a personal horoscope, as a subconscious social ideal, can be correlated with the qualities of the planet, according to astrological terminology, exalted in the sign of birth (that is, for Aries it will be Leo, since the Sun is exalted in the sign of Aries). It is also related to indicators social interaction - except for the Jupiter , the position of his wife plays a role here: the asteroid Juno , responsible for marriage, as well as with the planetoid Chiron . In addition, as the prototype of the father, the animus bears the characteristic Saturn , and how love for your husband is a characteristic Mars . In the combination of horoscopes, all these planets cement the marriage. Astrologically, understanding a person's animus is in many ways tantamount to calculating his potential marriage partner. And since the Animus is associated with the Saturnian characteristic of fate, it already somewhat goes beyond the individuality of the person himself and is determined by the circumstances of his life and the character of the people that influenced the development of the individual (to describe the Animus it is useful to take into account their horoscopes).

Just as the planet Jupiter strives to expand a person’s horizons as much as possible, the Animus takes him beyond the boundaries of the personal unconscious. It prepares a person for contact with the collective unconscious, developing in him the ability to emotionally interact with other people: friendly and hostile, and simply indifferent. After all, the collective unconscious potentially includes all souls, and therefore immediately traumatizes those who are subconsciously afraid of “strangers,” hiding behind the traditional statement that “another soul is darkness.” Like Mars, the animus shows the fearlessness of a person.

For Jung, Anima and Animus are primarily intermediaries between consciousness and the unconscious. Their main value lies in the semi-conscious, “auxiliary” nature of the mental functions of Anima and Animus, which takes us deep into our soul. Jung writes: " In an obsessive state, both figures lose their charm and their value; they retain them only when they are turned not to the world, but inward, when they are bridges to the unconscious. The Anima facing the world is fickle, capricious, gloomy, uncontrollable and purely emotional, sometimes endowed with demonic intuition, merciless, cunning, unfaithful, evil, two-faced and secretive. The animus is stubborn, clings to principles and formal law, is dogmatic, strives to transform the world, theorize, argue and dominate. Both Have Bad Taste: Anima surrounds herself with low people, and the Animus is led by second-rate ideas."

The influence of Animus and Anima is more difficult to understand than Shadows and Personas. Consciousness cannot fully identify them; they partially belong to the dark spheres of the collective unconscious. Thus, a man can develop his feelings and intuition, but he himself does not possess the qualities that he projects onto goddesses or the Virgin Mary. But arising in fantasies, dreams and visions, they make it possible to understand what is hidden inside the unconscious, since dreams, according to Jung, are " the voice of nature"Anima and Animus give man knowledge of himself and the forces acting on him, although never complete, since the collective unconscious is an inexhaustible ocean, and the images arising from it are countless.

ARCHETYPES OF THE SPIRIT AND THE GREAT MOTHER

Further development of feelings and deepening into the sphere of the unconscious reveals two more archetypes that have a noticeable impact on the life of the individual: this Old Sage And Great Mother .

Image wise old man, which often appears in dreams and appears even more often in fairy tales, Jung calls archetype of Spirit. He can appear in different forms: as an old wise man or an equally wise animal, as a king or a hermit, an evil sorcerer or good helper, healer or adviser - but he is always associated with some miraculous power that surpasses human abilities. This archetype forces a person to rise above his capabilities: to find solutions to insoluble problems, to seek unknown forces and to overcome insurmountable obstacles. The fascination of the Anima seems to pass over to this figure, and the Sage archetype can pose a serious threat to the personality, since when it awakens, the person often begins to believe that he owns " mana ": magical power, wisdom, the gift of healing or prophecy.

Such a person may actually acquire a certain gift, since, having cognized the unconscious to this point, he has advanced further than others. In addition, there is a power in this archetype that people intuitively feel and which they cannot easily resist. What he says captivates them, even if it seems incomprehensible. But this power can become destructive and motivate a person to actions that exceed his strengths and abilities: in reality he does not possess wisdom, which is actually the voice of the unconscious and needs criticism of reason and understanding in order for its real significance to become accessible. If a person believes that he is following his thoughts and his power, when in fact they originate from the unconscious, he may become obsessed with obsessions or delusions of grandeur (an extreme example of this is the madman who imagines himself to be a king). However, if a person “listens” to the voice of the unconscious and understands that he is only a conductor of hidden forces, then this is the path to the development of individuality.

Archetype Great Mother has a similar effect on a woman. She begins to believe that she is endowed with an infinite capacity for love, understanding and protection and devotes herself to serving others. She can also behave destructively, insisting (not necessarily openly) that everyone within her circle of influence is her children and therefore helpless and dependent on her. This subtle tyranny, if it takes extreme forms, can demoralize and destroy the personality of other people.

Jung defines these global thoughts of the individual, which are not characteristic of him, as " invasion from the collective unconscious" and gives an example from the work of fiction "Christina Alberta's Father": " Mr. Primby reveals that he is actually the incarnation of Sargon, the king of kings. Fortunately, the genius of the author saves poor old Sargon from pathological error, and even gives the reader the opportunity to notice the tragic and eternal sound in this pathetic pretension. Mr. Primby, a complete nonentity, recognizes himself as the intersection point of all centuries of the past and the future. This knowledge was bought at the not very dear price of a little madness, proving that Primby was not completely devoured by the monster of the primeval image - which he was close to."

In general, Jung tries to fit into the archetypes of the Ancient Sage and the Great Mother everything that goes beyond the personal and belongs to the area of the collective unconscious. Therefore, all of Jung’s mythology appears in the form of two global images: the pagan god-Spirit and the pagan goddess-Mother, who have the most diverse and multi-time features and functions. He makes an exception only for the archetype of the Trickster, in which he sees a cultural reflection of the Shadow (more on that below). Since the Trickster is characterized by both masculine and feminine traits, he naturally stands apart.

From the point of view of mythology, such a division of gods into men and women cannot be called absolutely correct, since the functional opposition of male and female images reveals itself only in the last stages of the development of mythology. In ancient myths, differentiation by gender does not yet imply differences in images, and often the same functions are performed by both male and female characters - these functions themselves and the corresponding figurative characteristics are more important. However, latently this binary opposition is present, and we, as a rule, tend to attribute the traits of gods of a certain type to one gender (which is manifested in the alternation of “male” and “female” signs in the circle of the Zodiac).

Continuing the idea of binary opposition, one could say that all “male” mythological archetypes (such as the Demiurge, the King of the gods, the divine Blacksmith, the intrepid Warrior, Trickster, etc.). And to the image of the Great Mother - everything is “female”: both the rebellious ancestor-water, raising sea storms, and the civilized nurse-earth, monitoring the order of the seasons; and the old woman-fate, and the ever-young dawn; and an assistant during childbirth, and an underground avenger. However, these archetypes are indeed too diverse to be worth reducing them into one single, truly incomprehensible and monstrous image: apparently, different functions occupy different places in the psychic structure. Therefore, speaking about the appearance of archetypes in the psyche, Jung considers the mythological images of the Spirit and the Great Mother more narrowly, correlating them only with the two most ancient archetypes, which bring us closest to the sphere of the unconscious.

At the same time, the images of Anima and Animus, as intermediaries between the unconscious and the mind, naturally correspond to the archetypes that took shape later. We can say that Jung's theory itself, based on the antithesis of male and female, reflects the stage of development of the last two mythological archetypes: the ideal female and ideal male images (Venus and Mars). The image of the Trickster, who has the features of a hermaphrodite, logically precedes their design, and in relation to newer archetypes undoubtedly acts as a Shadow.

But let's return to the archetypes of the Spirit and the Great Mother.

Mythology confirms that here we turn to the most ancient ideas of humanity about the world. The archetype of the old wise man corresponds in image to the mythological image first ancestor and the god of his people - the archetype Saturn . And in terms of the genius it bestows and its spiritual power, it corresponds to the characteristics of the archetype Uranus - even more ancient deification Sky . Saturnian traits include such qualities as concentration and focused effort, the urge to comprehend the past and the tendency to direct consciousness and warn. From the Uranus archetype he inherits the ability to bestow magical gifts and miraculous power.

In a positive sense, the Saturnian archetype signifies mastery of fate: the first ancestor does not yet depend on social conditions, he himself determines them. In the world of the dominion of the Wise Old Man, the opinion of the Animus does not yet exist, since the Jupiterian archetype is formed later. And for one who has come into contact with the archetype of the Spirit, it no longer dominates consciousness. The archetype of the wise old man turns a person to his roots and his own goal, organizing external life around himself. It takes a person out of subjection to those conventions that are not essential to his life, laying the foundations of his own principles of existence. And, organizing events into a single line of fate, he makes it possible to realize it, and then overcome the generic concept of “I” inherited from the ancestors and go beyond it: to the single consciousness of people - to the previous archetype.

In the minds of people, the image of the old wise ancestor was preceded by the archetype of the Spirit as such: the image of the one clear Sky god for all. People stopped worshiping him even before they began to record their myths, but the collective memory preserved him as a faceless image of the universal creator, who once created and preserved the world under the arch of the bright sky. For humans, the archetype of the spirit-Uranus, symbolizing the creation of the world and the very emergence of consciousness, is associated with the primordial flow creative inspiration, which arises when all the obstacles of the past are removed from his path (including the previous certainties of his “I”). He teaches how to write on a white sheet of paper. And the flow of creative energy, which is given scope, endows a person with special abilities, eloquence and the power of an idea that attracts other people. Having arisen before the generic consciousness of “I” (and before the social consciousness of “we”), the archetype of Uranus is almost not personified in consciousness, and therefore Jung considers the divine powers of Uranus through the personification of the wise old man Saturn (as ancient people did at a certain stage of the development of consciousness).

Why are these ancient archetypes dangerous for modern consciousness? As Jung noted, the archetype Spirit equally contains both the highest, divine, and the lowest, demonic. Thus, the all-seeing Sky combines darkness and light in itself: it shines for both good and evil, allowing everything and for centuries looking indifferently at creation and destruction. Heaven is above good and evil, and so is the human spirit: there is nothing that it would not justify for the sake of its idea of moving forward, for its essence is in this very endless movement, in the endless transformation of life forms. The sky gives birth to monster clouds and allows them to melt into thin air. The Spirit relates to life and death in the same way, always remaining uninvolved in the sorrow and suffering that its heavenly creativity causes on Earth. This is the nature of thought in the highest sense of the word: it is outside life, and therefore there is no death for it. But does a person have the right to treat life this way, even if he is captured by the kindest, brightest, most neutral and even scientific idea?

The truth that even good can turn into evil, and even evil sometimes leads to good, is revealed in children's fairy tales, but is not always understood by adults, not realizing the nature of spirituality. The thought of Uranus is devoid of attachments and does not have the warmth of properly human, self-preserving and self-continuing earthly love. According to the mythological mystery of the creation of the world, Heaven separates and moves away from Earth: they are doomed to eternal separation. Kronos castrated Uranus, forever separating him from Gaia, the mother of the gods and the basis of life. He did this to ease the suffering of the Earth and put an end to the monstrous creatures of Uranus.

Possession by the archetype of Spirit opens up an abyss of self-destruction before man and humanity. This will become more obvious if we understand the antiquity of the Spirit archetype: it arose when there was no soul yet. That is, at that time there was no memory of the past from which the soul was later born. The spirit does not remember itself. Therefore, he does not preserve culture and does not value the past. Therefore, while raising man to the heaven of rational thought, he lowers him to the level of the beast in the sense of all other human qualities except his very first characteristic homo sapiens.

The spiritual is both above and below us, says Jung: it conceals within itself both the superhuman (superconscious) and the animal (unconscious). And indeed, to what area should telepathy be classified if people only strive to transmit information at a distance, and mindless animals possess it perfectly?

Let us now think about the Saturnian image Wise Elder: the first ancestor and god of memory of the past, acquired land and fate, and often death: the awareness of which came to people along with ideas about fate and their land, where their ancestors are buried. This archetype endows man with chthonic power over matter, which humanity once craved to possess as a necessary guarantee of the continuation of its existence. It took shape at a time when a society of people emerged from the tribe, who realized their mortality, but also their collective strength, and made the law of survival the first law. At that time, moral laws had not yet been developed: good was what brought good to me, that is, to my family, for these concepts then merged. Need I say that today the identification of one’s aspirations with the desires of all other people is in no way justified and only leads to cruel tyranny?

Personifying the consolidation of efforts, the first ancestor, like later the king and high priest, was endowed with all the abilities that the tribe possessed. It placed everything it owned at his disposal, for he was its embodiment: the strongest and the wisest, and if he ceased to be so, he was killed, and often sacrificed long before that. Just as a person was identified with his tribe, so he was identified with his priest-king - that is why the archetype of the wise old man allows him to sense the abilities of others in himself. But it is impossible for modern man to express the will of the entire society precisely because society is too huge, and this will is too diverse. Even a politician, who in some way is obliged to stand above society and correspond to the archetype of the “wise old man,” is, at best, doomed to be disliked by half of the thinking population.

Nevertheless, the refraction of this archetype in modern life represents perhaps the most pressing psychological problem. Today, an increasing number of people are able to feel their belonging to the collective “I” - the ancestral consciousness of Saturn, their power over fate and their historical mission, which reflects both personal and collective genetic predestination. And the collective field of consciousness of Uranus, designated by the ancient and new concept of the noosphere, bestows extrasensory abilities and intuition of foresight. At the same time, not all people who take on the role of savior-king or sage-teacher behave adequately to the norms XX century, being misled themselves and leading other people into it.

We must understand that access to the collective unconscious transforms the concept of one’s “I” literally beyond recognition. Firstly, when a person encounters a hitherto unfamiliar, collective part of his psyche, it may seem to him that he is following the orders of another, higher being. It seems to him more intelligent than he himself: after all, he feels the will of many people, which is undoubtedly more intelligent than him alone (perhaps hence the numerous stories about aliens). In this case, a person can renounce the acquired “I” of his destiny and give it up to the god-king Jupiter (it doesn’t matter, the wise god of his people, an overseas guru or a kind alien: in any case, this will be a regression to the Animus).

On the other hand, if a person is deeply imbued with the Saturn archetype, he does not recognize anyone’s power over himself and is forced to identify himself with the higher image that has arisen in his consciousness, and this sometimes turns out to be even worse. If he was unable or simply did not put in the effort to form this image on his own, to make it uniquely his own, but formally adopted it from the Jovian culture, we have a clinical case of megalomania. In the West, preoccupation with this archetype is viewed more simply: in America there was even a conference of “Jesus Christs”. The mental underdevelopment, the “infantility” of the feelings of our people, who do not go further than the Shadow and are ready to see everywhere, if not the devil, then the enemy, makes them more vulnerable. Jung's recommendation - to clearly distinguish between one's own and what is not one's - turns out to be impossible to implement when the concept of one's individuality is in the infant stage of formation.

Jung notes the pathological manifestation of the Sage archetype in men, and it is clear that a woman is more protected in relation to the ancient archetypes, since she is accustomed to recognizing the elusive power of higher sensations over herself. This subtle power does not impress her as a man, and in addition, the patriarchal male culture does not allow her to personify it as something of her own, leaving it in the sphere of the subconscious. She is protected by the power of the Animus, who, as the king of the gods, declares himself the true master of her soul and does this the more successfully, the more he himself belongs to her unconscious. In addition, the archetype of Saturn is an ancient archetype of earthly, essentially feminine properties: it captures the first stage of people’s mastery of the matter of the earth. This is connected with the fact that the image of a wise old man captivates a man like the Anima before, becoming a guide of the spirit into the hidden spheres of matter. A woman, by her nature, feels the material plane much better, her intuition here is much more conscious, and she is not so amazed by what for a man looks like magical power over the Earth.

But if a woman usually has no problems with practical earthly wisdom, and she can turn into a “wise old woman” without any particular pathology and quite consciously (albeit without great joy, that is, bypassing the unconscious sphere of emotions), then with the spiritual gifts of Heaven the situation is more complicated . The flow of inspiration of Uranus, as a bearer of new ideas, is alien to the conservatism of female nature, and unconscious resistance to it is a direct path to neurosis (the basis of which psychoanalysis sees in the repression of what consciousness should accept). At the same time, the Uranus archetype, as the highest creative function of the masculine property, attracts a woman more than Jupiter-Animus, and she unconsciously strives to develop new abilities in herself (in order to pass them on to the child). Since this desire has a basis, it can also develop to the point of pathology, and if men are striving for power, then women’s nerves are usually unsettled.

A man treats miracles more calmly, so he is not dominated by the unconscious goal of fixing them genetically. By and large, it doesn’t matter to him what their source is, and he usually does not seek to shape them into familiar images. A woman subconsciously cannot help but want to appropriate them for herself. Therefore, she perceives the unknown more subjectively and more distortedly than a man (although, of course, aliens also appear to the stronger sex, especially if he is inclined to see them as enemies, that is, his own still unmanifested, but already shadow qualities). In other words, it is relatively easy for a woman to be a witch in relation to the known world, but she is exposed to greater danger in the spiritual sphere than can be justified by the inequality of the sexes that still exists in the church.

The airy celestial flow of Uranus is light when it is divided among all people. But if the goal of his individual fixation into earthly matter is set (similar to the female goal of birth) and the personality possesses the magnetism of Saturn, which attracts parts of the collective soul, it becomes a funnel that distorts the movement of the collective flow. He can fall upon her with a stream of energy so overwhelming that it will knock the ground out from under the feet of not only the mind, but also the body. As already mentioned, Jung does not consider the archetype of the God of Heaven separately (apparently because in his time, the passion for extrasensory perception was not yet widespread and did not give visible pathologies). In general, a distorted perception of the collective unconscious, or, in relation to this archetype, it would be more correct to say: the foundations of collective consciousness, borders on hallucinations, which are the flip side of clairvoyance.

Along with the image of the Ancient Sage, Jung highlights another female image - the figure Great Mother. The archetype of the Progenitor of life, corresponding to it, is the most ancient image of mythological consciousness. It symbolizes the origin of life as such and is associated with the depths of the sea (archetypal image Mother Seas ) and corresponds to the astrological archetype Neptune . For Jung, this archetype originates from the real image of the mother - however, astrologically, this is not so: the lunar archetype of a specific, tender and loving mother of her child is formed much later than the blurred and foggy image of universal motherhood, not distinguishing between her own and other people’s children, nourishing everything living and animating even inanimate nature. Therefore, the archetype of the Great Mother does not in any way correlate with a person’s real mother, but is more connected with his ability to feel the single pulsation of the rhythms of life. This archetype is powerful because it is associated with the problem of the origin of life, and its influence on consciousness can be appreciated through the fact that in fusion with Jupiter-Animus, which replaces the sphere of the unconscious with cultural values, it symbolizes faith in God.

The Neptunian archetype of the Great Mother - the Mother of the world - personifies the collective unconscious in the fullest sense of the word. It took shape in consciousness even before the division of people into nations arose and they began to distinguish between dreams and reality, being and thought, their own and others. Before they began to remember their land and their tribe and recognize themselves as these certain people, having their own territory and family ties. And long before the first, initially collective, idea of one’s “I” arose. The Neptunian archetype of the Mother of the World does not presuppose any “I”: it dissolves in it like a doll made of salt in sea water (as it was defined by the Indian mystic Ramakrishna, who served the Great Mother Devi). The archetype of a single Mother does not even presuppose the separation of people from each other, not to mention the norms of their behavior and relationships (such as respect for the individual). That is why, conveying to us the feeling of the soul of the world and the ancient unconscious attitude towards another, which involves merging with it - today's image of the highest love - this archetype can have a demoralizing and destructive effect on the personality of other people: it simply makes them forget that it exists .

Jung notes the characteristic manifestation of this archetype in women: those women who always remain only wives and mothers, living only with the needs of children and husbands and dissolving their personality in the primordial feeling of love, which does not yet know about itself and which would be more correctly called pity. But in ancient and higher forms, this archetype is also inherent in a man as his Uranian-Neptunian desire to passively contemplate this world and to patronize the Universe with the instinct of spirit.

Merging with reality, the feeling of which this archetype brings, gives a person maximum comfort, similar to what a baby experiences in the womb, but at the same time brings a childish reluctance to strain himself beyond his unconscious needs and even just think. Such carelessness encourages people to live at the expense of those near and far, who, through real efforts, solve the problems that affect them. life problems, while the sympathizer gets only the role of a spectator of an interesting film: beautiful and tragic, but not entirely real. And although it seems that such a person lives for the sake of others, in fact, as Jung notes, speaking about the maternal complex, he lives at the expense of them, because without them his life is empty, since it is devoid of real internal content. To a more advanced person, life in this case may seem illusory: and from the point of view of eternity, this is completely fair, because without personal achievements that would affect the matter of a person’s life, his existence as an individual is indeed a pure illusion. And in general, we can say that the archetype of the Great Mother allows modern man to feel only the illusion of completeness, but not it itself.

Jung calls preoccupation with these archetypes " bloated, distended" (inflation), indicating that the personality increases to something greater than itself, which is not at all personal, but only collective. If a person does not draw a critical line of demarcation between the ego and the figures of the unconscious, the feeling of his likeness to God or the feeling of himself as a superman, caused by these archetypes, leads him into illusion. Jung points out that when the “I” comes under the control of the subconscious, it shares its archaic nature and falls into “the relativized space-time continuum characteristic of the unconscious as such.” . Simply put, a person falls out of his time and loses his place in life.

And if for a short time we can have phenomenal courage, or be infinitely wise and forgiving, still this is “above us,” and this is something that we cannot possess only at will. We must admit that we do not yet understand the forces that drive people in such a state. Therefore, a sense of humility in the face of them is absolutely necessary. But when the ego gives up part of its belief in omnipotence and the person finds a footing somewhere between the consciousness with its hard-to-define values and the unconscious with its vitality and power, this marks the emergence of a new center of personality, different in nature from the center of the ego. Jung calls this new center of personality " self" (self - "self,originality").

Trickster

Jung sharply contrasts consciousness, brought up in a person by society from childhood (the ability to think in words, traditional reason and common sense, which form ego- together with his egoism) and the personal mature that arises in him self-awareness (self). The ego can only be considered as the center of consciousness, and if it tries to add to itself the contents of the collective unconscious, it is in danger of destruction, like an overfilled glass from which the contents spill out. The self can include both the conscious and the unconscious. It acts like a magnet on disparate parts of the personality and unconscious processes, organizing them around itself and becoming the center of this integrity, just as the ego is the center of consciousness. The Self brings together the opposing elements of male and female, conscious and unconscious, good and bad, and transforms them along the way. But in order to reach it, it is necessary to accept what is lower, unconscious and chaotic in everyone.

At the first stage, unconscious aspirations are identified as personal complexes and problems. Traditional reason reigns here, projecting the prohibitions and taboos of the past onto the life of the soul. On the second - as intuitive revelations: Jung uses the religious term "enlightenment" for this stage. Here the leading role passes to the soul - so that the mind can change its attitude towards the world and begin to form a new center of its individuality. This is the process of manifestation of a new personality that was previously dormant in a person: he existed in the world as this individual personality only in potential. At the third stage, the integration of mind and soul is achieved, and the intellect again becomes a guide to the realm of the unknown. But he no longer occupies the dominant position, but official role in relation to the personality as a whole, without interfering with the transformations of the soul and allowing the personality to include more and more new spheres of collective consciousness in its “I”, in order to help with its synthesis the formation of its completeness.

Reorienting from the rigid attitudes of the consciousness of “I” to the flexible self-awareness of the inner center is as difficult as feeling that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and not vice versa, although external experience proves the opposite. This requires an internal struggle, since the Western mind, unlike the Eastern one, divides the world into black and white, denying one side of reality, and cannot easily come to terms with the paradox of the unity of opposites. For Indians, Brahman contains both the lower and the higher; in China, Tao also includes everything (both yang and yin), and the development of the Golden Flower, the immortal spiritual body (the highest goal of Chinese yoga), depends on the interaction of light and dark forces. But Jung did not believe that the West should imitate the East by wielding its own instrument of will and knowledge:

"Scientific knowledge is a tool of the Western mind with which we can open more doors than with our bare hands... it interferes with our intuition only when it claims that its method is the only possible way of understanding. The East teaches us a different, broader, deeper and higher understanding, understanding through life... The usual mistake of a Western person, when he is faced with the problem of understanding the ideas of the East, is to turn his back on science and, carried away by Eastern mysticism, become a formal imitator of practices yoga (Theosophy is best example this.)"

The mind plays a special role in the process of recreating the integrity of the personality: but it becomes its assistant only when it occupies a third - auxiliary, service role in relation to the personality, without pretending to be different. In dreams and visions, a person sees archetypal images of an assistant mind, a guide to unknown and forgotten spheres of personal and collective memory (such as the “man with a sharp beard” - Mephistopheles in the first series of dreams). Mythologically, these images relate to the archetype of the god of mind and speech Mercury-Hermes : a guide of people to the underworld and a messenger of the gods, who by its very essence is only their humble servant. Why did he deceive us, convincing us of his omnipotence? How else could he convince us to go there, who knows where - into the dark realms of the unconscious?

"Undoubtedly, intelligence is useful in its field, but outside of it it turns into a charlatan magician, especially when it tries to manipulate values"- writes Jung . And this archetype merges with mythological images Tricksters - tricksters and deceivers, which is the Greek Hermes. Their mythological traits are cunning and mischief, breaking old traditions in order to find new ways. From Jung's description one can see that he views the Trickster as one of the manifestations of the antinomic nature of the Spirit itself, finding in him features of similarity to this ancient archetype. The creative principle of the archetypes of Uranus and Mercury, astrologically belonging to the same air element, really makes them similar. But unlike the Spirit, which is characterized by an indefinite, superhuman and at the same time animal nature, Jung emphasizes human The traits of the Trickster are characteristic of the astrological archetype of Mercury, in contrast to the archetype of Heaven.

Cunning and intelligence make the images of the deceiver-Trickster sometimes look like Mephistopheles, which reflects modern ideas about the provocative role of the intellect in comparison with the purity of the soul. And in fact, the intellect only imitates the divine creativity of the life of the Universe like a monkey. But it is the development of the intellectual function of Mercury that allows us to correctly assess the situation when we fall into the sphere of the Old Sage or Great Mother archetypes. The mischievous mind, stepping over the boundaries of life established by tradition, makes it possible to attach images of the collective unconscious to the sphere of personality.

The Trickster archetype astrologically forms a single whole with the images of other violators of cultural and social taboos - the images of the first intelligent beings on Earth, the twin ancestors, who, by violating taboos, give birth to humanity, which also becomes the cause of death of people. But this main archetypal feature: violation of social attitudes - according to Jung, a characteristic feature Shadows, and he sees the image of the Trickster primarily as an illustration of the shadow sides of society. If in myths the Trickster demonstrates the intellectual achievements of humanity, then in fairy tales his tomfoolery and his cunning are more often perceived as manifestations of a lower mental level compared to that which society has already achieved. Embodying the primordial human mind, like memory and cunning, which animals do not possess, the Trickster deceiver plays the role of the Shadow of the past in relation to the new ideal personality to which humanity strives. Likewise, in an individual case, when a person changes, he is inclined to consider his former “I” - that is, his former consciousness, which deceived him for so long, as an interfering Shadow.

Astrology interprets the images of the Enemy and the Trickster as different archetypes, but they both have a dynamic moment of confrontation, and their merging is partly legitimate from the point of view of mythology. As already mentioned, the images of the archetype of Mercury and Gemini are often associated in origin with the gods of the underworld (thus, the Indo-European underground serpent Budh transfers his name to the sage Budha, the Indian personification of the planet Mercury; and vice versa, the Indian twin Yama, the first person to die, becomes king dead). We can say this: the image of the criminal Trickster is a more peaceful and reasonable modification of the archetype of the enemy of the head of the Gods, who embodies all the evil of the world. This is the most modern, non-fearful image of the Shadow, already largely integrated by consciousness, which has managed to comprehend its antinomic nature.

The first step to personality integration, according to Jung, is awareness of the Shadow: the negative sides of the personality, which also hide the natural development potential. This step simultaneously presupposes an understanding of the contradictory nature of the world and the antinomic side of reason, which allows one to accept its humble role as an assistant. If the image of a deceiver-Trickster reveals to us the previous stage of development of consciousness, his features indicate hidden shadow qualities that will inevitably appear in a person if his consciousness falls below the traditional attitudes of culture. Here it should be pointed out that a decrease in the mental level is an inevitable, albeit temporary, consequence of an invasion into the realms of the unconscious: a collision with the unknown deprives us of the usual dexterity of the mind, and sometimes the opportunity to use traditional knowledge. Turning off the Trickster mind is compensated by a return to the animal intuition of the Spirit. But awareness of one's complete incompetence and incompleteness is a necessary condition for moving towards a higher level of knowledge and completeness. This is why in fairy tales Ivan the Fool becomes king: deceiving himself and us with his complete inability to lead a traditional normal life - in order to make it more fulfilling.

THE WAY TO THE CENTER

We examined the manifestation of the root archetypes of the psyche, which is largely natural in nature. The instinct of self-preservation reveals itself in the formation of the Persona and Shadow, the desire for a partner - in the images of Anima and Animus, and past childhood dependence on parents evokes the archetypes of the Wise Old Man and the Great Mother. Now let's move on to the most human need to find oneself and define the space around oneself, which in Jung is expressed by the image of Self and the geometrical associated with it mandal symbolism.

Jung defines the concept of Self as eidos: that is, the primary and inexpressible idea, formulated by us as unity and integrity. Jung was inspired by this idea from the alchemists about a certain metaphysical substance hidden in the human body, " which does not need any medicine, but is itself an indestructible medicine." The sought-after substance can be located both inside a person (as the truth comprehended by him, an indivisible point and that “mustard seed” from which the “kingdom of God” grows) and outside him (as nature or God, common to all), but remains one and the same same. Jung's concept of originality (or in the accepted scientific translation - Self) consists, on the one hand, of knowledge of one's unique nature, and on the other hand, of a close relationship with all life: not only human, but plant and animal, and even with inorganic matter and the cosmos .

Ego and Self are distinguished as "who" and "what": Ego is a subjective and partial view of the world, Self is an objective and neutral fact of integrity. " The Self cannot be localized in the individual ego-consciousness; it behaves like the atmosphere surrounding it, for which it is impossible to establish certain boundaries either in time or in space." It brings a sense of reconciliation with life, which is perceived as it is, and not as it should be, according to one's pre-learned ideas: " It is as if the direction of life emanated from one invisible center... and this is the liberation from all compulsion and impossible responsibility that is the inevitable result of touching the mystical."

The perception of the center of the Self is archetypal, and is reflected in dreams and fantasies in many different images that can be called self-archetypes. The new Self-image may appear in a dream as an animal or from an egg, as a hermaphrodite figure (an obvious symbol of completeness), or as a “treasure that is difficult to achieve.” In the latter case it is often a jewel (diamond or pearl), flower or gold ball. A frequent symbol of identity is a child, sometimes divine, sometimes ordinary, and even ragamuffin. The motif of a child often appears in myths and folklore, and special emphasis is placed on this image in religions, especially Christianity.

Jung emphasizes that the elusive center of the Self, like any archetype, cannot be described purely rationally. " If the unconscious speaks of the Sun and identifies with it a lion, a king, a golden sword guarded by a dragon, or the energy that gives life and health to a person, this is neither one nor the other, but something unknown that finds a more or less adequate expression in all this, and - to the eternal chagrin of the intellect - remains unknown and does not fit into any formula."

The sought center of individuality is indeed astrologically related to the archetype Sun , the design of which is historically associated with the affirmation of human autonomy in relation to society, his independence, with which the very name of this center in Jung is connected - Self. The Sun, in astrology correlated with the human heart, symbolizes a different way of organizing personality than Jupiter (or Persona): not dependent on social upbringing, but on personal psychophysiological perception of reality.

The image of a child marks the transition to the Mercurian archetype, which historically denotes the further development of personality, when not only the individuality, but also its thought becomes original. Developing independence in himself and insisting on it, the child plays pranks, violating the prohibitions of adults in order to develop his own intellectual position - therefore, one of the last stages of the alchemical process is called play. Here the image of a child merges with the archetype of the Trickster in a perspective that denotes the achievements of human thought, and not its Shadow. The sign of Leo, as a sign of maturity, patronizes the image of a child and psychoanalysts picked up this idea of Jung: a person cherishes his future new individuality as a child - after all, it must gradually be born, grow and develop in him.

Independence of consciousness leads to the power of free will, which reflects the archetype of Mars - and the ideal image of man, the invincible warrior and wise shepherd. This includes the images of Buddha and Christ, which Jung calls the most developed expressions of the self-archetype manifested by humanity. The center of the Self, in a sense, can be called the center of an independent vision of the world, which refers to Mercury, but to an even greater extent it is the center of the will: the fiery principle of frantic action, symbolized by Mars. Understood in this way, the center of the Self includes in its orbit the secret magic of nature, which the solar archetype does not emphasize, being primarily an image of cultural development and the manifestation of its individuality.

Jung describes the process of individuation as a psychological journey (another archetypal image often found in fairy tales). It can be a painful and slippery road, and sometimes you have to go in circles, but experience shows that in reality the circle turns out to be a spiral. On this path, a person faces danger from collisions with the unconscious areas of the soul: and mental illness show that they are not imaginary, but real. "Everything that appears in the form of images, that is, symbolically, is not a matter of imaginary danger, but a very real risk on which the fate of a whole life may depend. The main danger is submission to the enchanting influence of archetypes. If we yield to this influence, we may come to a dead point of inaction or to identification with an archetypal personality" .

Ancient archetypes, filling with their completeness the incompleteness of the personality and thereby exerting a strong influence on it, seem to test the stability of the newly created center. Does a person remain himself in contact with the images of previous centuries - which he unconsciously accepted from culture and which are stored in his soul in the same primordial and foggy form as they were at the dawn of the development of consciousness? If the invasion of the elements of the unconscious is not terrible for the personal “I,” then we can say that a person has really found his philosopher’s stone. And maybe the crystal of his consciousness, returning after death to the collective unconscious, will not really disappear, but will remain in eternity. Nature undoubtedly cares about the life of its creations - that is why the frantic element of Mars is historically preceded by the game of Mercury: its awareness of the world keeps the will within limits as long as it can threaten the disintegration of the individual. With all possible tricks, the Trickster leads us away from the truth of Himself, preventing the intrusion of the unconscious, and continues his security game even when the secret becomes apparent.

In the journey of individuation, the soul has a defense mechanism, and Jung devotes a lot of space to it when talking about mandalas. A mandala represents the protective walls of a magic circle or square, the central point within which in religions reveals the nature of the deity. When a person's mind withstands the invasion of the unconscious, his psyche often creates something like this: a border around the edges and a central figure inside, which expresses the Mercurian desire for organization internal space. In a “safe,” “sacred,” central place, something is placed in which Jung sees the image of a new center of individuality, capable of organizing around itself both the previous and newly perceived reality. Geometric figures of more or less regular shape that appear in dreams, and everything containing the number four: from a cross with equal edges to four nuts lying on a plate - are, according to Jung, mandalas, constructions of Mercury and protective walls, sometimes storing an invisible symbol inside Myself.

"Experience shows that individual mandalas symbolize order and occur in patients mainly during periods of mental disorientation or reorientation. As magic circles they bind and subjugate unbridled forces, belonging to the world darkness, and create or outline order that transforms chaos into space." This definition and the four-part form of mandalas are reminiscent of the mythological role of the king of the gods, creating the cosmos out of chaos. The king of the gods - the archetype of Jupiter - is associated with the four cardinal directions: as the main principle of the organization of space, and patronizes cities, which in ancient times were also built according to the square principle, in an effort to embody in the earthly structure the heavenly idea of the harmony of the world, based on the 4 elements. Temples were also built in the same way. The archetype of Jupiter symbolizes religion and the unity of the organization of parts of the world.

Mandal symbolism occurs in dreams and visions, often accompanied by strong feeling harmony and peace. Mandal visions appear as an entry into the realm of "active imagination", as "intensive concentration on the other side of consciousness" in order to make it accessible to the mind. Here is an example of such a dream:

"I climbed the mountain and came to a place where I saw seven stones standing in front of me, seven on both sides and seven behind me. The stones were flat like steps, and I tried to climb the four steps closest to me. During this, I discovered that these stones were statues of four gods buried in the ground. I dug them out and placed them so that I myself was in the middle. Suddenly they began to lean towards one another until their heads touched, forming a kind of tent above me. I fell to the ground and said: “Fall on me if you want, but I’m tired.” Then I saw that a ring of flame was forming around the four gods. After a while I got up and threw the statues away. Where they fell, four trees rose up. And the blue flames that emerged from the ring of fire began to burn the crown of the trees. Looking at this, I decided: “This must be stopped. I must enter the fire myself so that the leaves do not burn.” And I entered the fire. The trees disappeared, and the ring of fire closed into a single blue flame, which lifted me above the ground."

In this vision, the idea of a middle point, which is achieved with difficulty and by overcoming dangers, is discernible, as well as the images of a square and a circle. Mandal symbolism can be simpler than this example: for example, a square with a fountain in the center and people walking around. And sometimes a mandala contains many geometric figures inscribed within each other, which indicates a consistent and complex organization of space. But it is no coincidence that it originates from the circle and the wheel, which throughout the world is associated with the archetype of the Sun, denoting the stage of isolation and formation in the consciousness of the concept of individuality. Seeing in Buddhist and Christian mandalas an analogue of the process of self-organization of the psyche around an invisible center, Jung found a surprisingly true and deepest symbol to denote the idea of the Self.

The mandala is sometimes like a dancing vision and is based on the same principle as ritual or folk dances, where there is a circular movement around a central point, diverging to the four corners and returning to the center. Thus, the symbolism of the mandala incorporates another archetypal characteristic of the Sun - movement that distinguishes the luminary from a static landscape and symbolizes its independence (which correlates it with the idea of selfhood). The visible circle across the sky, which it describes day after day, is the most primordial and simple mandala and that natural magical circle of life repetitions that does not allow our consciousness - our understanding of the world and ourselves in it - to fall apart. And it is no coincidence that the most interesting vision among the dreams described by Jung in his book Psychology and Alchemy was the vision of a world clock. This “great vision,” as Jung calls it, of a four-dimensional world clock with three hands moving at different speeds, was accompanied by a feeling of “sublime harmony” in the patient and indicated a successful resolution of his problems. The vision of the world clock symbolized the original and universal type of movement: the movement of time, which for man from ancient times was personified by the Sun rolling across the sky.

Jung noted that the rotational dynamics of mandal symbolism are typical of people who can no longer project a divine image - that is, find God outside themselves - and are thus in danger of "dispersing" the self. It is typical for people under stress, but it also serves as an indicator of the formation of a new personality: an indicator of the dynamics of the life of the soul and spiritual movement. In various religions we find the statement that the self, with all its aspirations and desires, even intellectual and spiritual, must be lost (in Christianity this is the call to “be like children” and the often quoted statement “blessed are the poor in spirit”). But this is only the first step of internal transformation. In fact, neither personal consciousness nor the deeper-lying individual “I” is lost: the first would liken us to unthinking animals, the second to mechanical robots devoid of their uniqueness. Only the previous concept of one’s “I” disappears, so that it can be replaced by a new, broader one, harmoniously including into one’s orbit that which goes beyond the RAM of one’s brain and the individuality of one’s body.

Mandala rings of a circle or square protect the personality from explosion and splitting and protect the inner goal. They are like the fences of sacred places that protected the gods of ancient times, and Jung defines the mandala as the totality of the vision of God. But in a modern mandala, God is rarely placed in the center: we find many different symbols and even real people there. And Jung draws a natural conclusion: in the modern mandala - which is a psychic support in extreme circumstances and generally helps to reveal individuality - " there is no deity, submission to him and reconciliation with him. It seems that the place of the deity is taken by the entirety of man."

Jung wrote this half a century ago, but even today it still seems scary to part with the traditional idea of God and replace it with a “mere” image of one’s new personality. In order to realize his strong qualities, a person strives to see them in some external ideal image, just as there remains a need to project his shortcomings onto the villainous Shadow. It seems to us that without God we will lose that invisible protection that is actually given to man outside the church, regardless of other people and even culture, since the entire history of mankind is recorded in his personal and collective memory of the unconscious. It seems to us that, having come into contact with the element of the unconscious, we will certainly go crazy or destroy our soul in the abyss of falling into an uncontrollable chaos of emotions. But in fact, we will find ourselves not in the primeval Chaos, but in the primeval Cosmos, organized according to perfect laws, which, however, we have not yet comprehended.

Images of the unconscious - the wonders of fairy tales and dreams - frighten us, and they are indeed sometimes scary, but only to the extent that they convey a distorted and subjective vision of the world. The universal archetype hidden behind these images is beautiful, just as the images of myths are beautiful. The myth has integrity and completeness, and the archetype in the true sense of the word is not a cunning old man, but a wise progenitor; Not evil spirit, but creator and creator; not a seductive mermaid, but the power of beautiful nature herself. Astrology of archetypes reveals to us, first of all, the features of these sublime images. But if archetypes appear to us somehow differently, the matter is not in the machinations of the evil one and not in the low level of culture of society, but in ourselves.

Targeting the soul, psychology merges with religion, but today the old religious views are not enough for them to withstand the modern errors of reason, which in two thousand years has advanced far beyond the consciousness of the Roman slaves. Being a practitioner, Jung went deeper than Christian dogma and combined psychology with alchemy and mythology.

Expanding perception from personal ideas and images of modern culture to the archetypal, astrological universalism of myths is the path that makes knowledge safe.

Good day to all! I would like to briefly talk about Jung’s archetypes, which have gained interest in the community against the backdrop of “archetypes by color type.” The word “archetype” was introduced into science by C. G. Jung, so let’s start with it:

Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961) - Swiss psychiatrist, founder of one of the areas of depth psychology, analytical psychology.

Carl Gustav Jung graduated from the medical faculty of the University of Basel. From 1900 to 1906 he worked in a psychiatric clinic in Zurich as an assistant to the famous psychiatrist E. Bleuler. In 1907-1912 he collaborated with Sigmund Freud and played a leading role in the psychoanalytic movement. Despite this, in 1911 Jung resigned from the International Psychoanalytic Association and abandoned the technique of psychoanalysis in his practice. He developed his own theory and therapy, which he called “analytical psychology.” With his ideas, he had a significant influence not only on psychiatry and psychology, but also on anthropology, ethnology, cultural studies, comparative history of religion, pedagogy, and literature.

In his works, Jung covered a wide range of philosophical and psychological issues: from traditional issues of psychoanalysis in the treatment of neuropsychic disorders to global problems of human existence in society, which he considered through the prism of his own ideas about the individual and collective psyche and the doctrine of archetypes.
Jung suggested the existence of a deeper layer in the structure of personality, which he called the collective unconscious. The collective unconscious is a repository of latent memory traces of humanity and even of our anthropoid ancestors. It reflects thoughts and feelings common to all human beings and resulting from our common emotional past. As Jung himself said, “the collective unconscious contains the entire spiritual heritage of human evolution, reborn in the structure of the brain of each individual.” Thus, the content of the collective unconscious is formed due to heredity and is the same for all humanity. It is important to note that the concept of the collective unconscious was the main reason for the divergence between Jung and Freud.
Jung hypothesized that the collective unconscious consists of powerful primary mental images, the so-called archetypes (literally, “primary models”). An archetype is a stereotype, a stamp in human thinking, consecrated by cultural and historical tradition, a stable, often figurative, symbolic idea of something. In Jungian philosophy, A. is understood as peculiar ideas about the phenomena of life inherent in the collective consciousness of each people, ethnic group, for example, A. water, A. an old man, etc. These are a kind of “props” of consciousness, located in individuals in the sphere of the unconscious, in the hereditary genetic material inherited from ancestors. A. participate in the formation of fundamental ideas about the world. Further, Jung suggested that archetypal images and ideas are often reflected in dreams, and are also often found in culture in the form of symbols used in painting, literature, and religion. In particular, he emphasized that the symbols characteristic of different cultures, often show striking similarities because they go back to archetypes common to all humanity. For example, in many cultures he came across images of a mandala, which he considered to be the embodiment of the unity and integrity of the “I”:

Archetypes include people’s stable ideas about the “home,” “a man as a breadwinner and a warrior,” and “a woman as a mother.” Also included in A. are mythological and legendary fairy-tale plots and images characteristic of each national culture, taking into account the influence of the heritage of Ancient Greece and Rome: myths about Helen the Beautiful, Prometheus, Hercules, Russian Ivanushka the Fool, Emelya or Ilya Muromets, etc. There are a great many such A. cultural consciousness. This is Don Quixote among the Spaniards, Thumb or Puss-in-Boots among the French, and the legend of King Arthur among the English. Fiction often revives and rethinks architecture in new historical conditions and new images.
Among the many archetypes described by Jung are the mother, the child, the hero, the sage, the sun deity, the rogue, God and death.
The number of archetypes in the collective unconscious can be unlimited. I can say that Jung really has a lot of archetypes, for example, Child and Virgin, Mother and Rebirth, Spirit and Trickster, etc., their characteristics represent very deep philosophical and psychological aspects, so they will be more interesting and understandable especially to specialists who study Jung .

Particular attention in Jung's theoretical system is paid to persona, anime and animus, shadow and self as the main archetypes in the life of every person:

A person

Persona (from the Latin word “persona,” meaning “mask”) is our public face, that is, how we show ourselves in relationships with other people. Persona denotes many roles that we play in accordance with social requirements. In Jung's understanding, a persona serves the purpose of impressing others or concealing one's true identity from others. The persona as an archetype is necessary for us to get along with other people in everyday life. However, Jung warned that if this archetype becomes important, the person can become shallow, superficial, reduced to a role, and alienated from true emotional experience.

Shadow

In contrast to the role that the persona plays in our adaptation to the world around us, the shadow archetype represents the repressed dark, bad and animal side of the personality. The shadow contains our socially unacceptable sexual and aggressive impulses, immoral thoughts and passions. But the shadow also has positive sides. Jung viewed the shadow as the source of vitality, spontaneity and creativity in an individual's life. According to Jung, the function of this is to channel the energy of the shadow, to curb the harmful side of our nature to such an extent that we can live in harmony with others, but at the same time openly express our impulses and enjoy a healthy and creative life.

Anima and Animus

The anima and animus archetypes reveal the innate androgynous nature of people. Anima represents the inner image of a woman in a man, his unconscious feminine side; while animus is the inner image of a man in a woman, her unconscious masculine side. These archetypes are based, at least in part, on the biological fact that both male and female hormones are produced in the bodies of men and women. This archetype, Jung believed, had evolved over many centuries in the collective unconscious as a result of experiences with the opposite sex. Many men have been “feminized” to some degree by years of marriage to women, but the opposite is true for women. Jung insisted that anima and animus, like all other archetypes, must be expressed harmoniously, without disturbing the overall balance, so that the development of the individual in the direction of self-realization is not hampered. In other words, a man must express his feminine qualities along with his masculine ones, and a woman must express her masculine qualities as well as her feminine ones. If these required attributes remain undeveloped, the result will be one-sided growth and functioning of the individual.

Self

The Self is the most important archetype in Jung's theory. The self is the core of personality around which all other elements are organized.
When integration of all aspects of the soul is achieved, a person experiences unity, harmony and wholeness. Thus, in Jung's understanding, the development of the self is the main goal of human life. The main symbol of the archetype of the self is the mandala and its many varieties (abstract circle, halo of a saint, rose window). According to Jung, the integrity and unity of the “I”, symbolically expressed in the completeness of figures such as a mandala, can be found in dreams, fantasies, myths, religious and mystical experiences. Jung believed that religion is a great force that promotes man's desire for wholeness and completeness. At the same time, harmonizing all parts of the soul is a complex process. True balance of personal structures, as he believed, is impossible to achieve; at least, this can be achieved no earlier than middle age. Moreover, the archetype of the Self is not realized until there is integration and harmony of all aspects of the soul, conscious and unconscious. Therefore, achieving a mature “I” requires consistency, perseverance, intelligence and a lot of life experience.

In addition to the listed archetypes, Jung paid great attention to the Mother archetype in his works. The mother archetype has many manifestations. This could be a mother, grandmother or mother in the figurative sense of the word - a goddess. According to Jung, the symbol of the mother is also present in things that “express the goal of a passionate desire for salvation: heaven, the kingdom of God.” Things that arouse “reverence” in a person: church, university, country, sky, earth, forests, seas, moon. The mother archetype also symbolizes abundance and fertility. “It can be associated with a rock, a cave, a tree, a spring, a spring.” Due to its protective function, a mandala can be a symbol of the mother. “Hollow objects”, vessels, some animals are associated with it: “a cow, a hare, useful animals in general.”

The mother archetype, like many others, is characterized by duality of manifestations. “Evil symbols are the witch, the snake, the grave, the sarcophagus, deep waters, death, ghosts, brownies and others.”

Positive manifestation of the archetype: “care, sympathy, magical power of a woman; wisdom and spiritual exaltation that transcends the limits of reason; any useful instinct or impulse; anything that is kind, caring, or supportive, or that promotes growth and fertility.” The mother archetype is associated with resurrection and magical transformations. In a negative sense it can mean “something secret, mysterious, dark: an abyss, world of the dead, everything absorbing, tempting, i.e. something that inspires horror and that is inevitable like fate.”

Jung also believed that every woman goes through the Virgo archetype in her development. Literally the Virgin, Kore, is Persephone from Greek mythology, daughter of Demeter, forcibly married to Hades. Woman-child. Mother and girl. Its purity, innocence, flexibility, dependence, pliability remain in each of us throughout our lives. The Virgo archetype embodies feminine submissiveness.

There is also a huge number of archetypes that are used in NLP techniques, and it is their descriptions that are often found on the Internet. In such archetypes, Jung's idea is taken as a basis, reworked, rethought, simplified for a wider range of people (which is also good), they more fully describe the psychotypes and characters of real people. They may have something in common with Jungian ones, but some researchers do not consider such archetypes to be manifestations of the collective unconscious, but rather the result of acquired experience.

Carl Gustav Jung is the founder of analytical psychology. It is interesting that while developing his theories and ideas, he often turned to world religions, occultism, Holy Scripture, and visited “places of power.” It was Carl Jung who introduced such concepts as the “collective unconscious,” “animus/anima,” and “shadow” into modern psychology.

Many argue that analytical psychology has revealed to the general masses the underworld of the human soul. Sigmund Freud first described the unconscious, which is home to complexes, fears, secret desires and sexual pathologies. And Jung spoke about the “shadow” - the stronghold of a person’s demonic energy.

First of all, Jung noted that the individual’s psyche consists of several parts. Its center is consciousness. One can imagine that this is a whole galaxy with “planets” - archetypes and the “sun” - consciousness at the center.

When we talk about a person, we mean a holistic personality, but in reality we are dealing with several subpersonalities.

In his studies, Carl Jung described these parts of the human “I” in detail. First of all, this is ego complex. Among the less significant ones, one can observe a father or mother complex, many constellations and archetypal images. If we take a closer look at a person, he consists of multidirectional attitudes that conflict with each other and create the basis for internal conflict. The most significant subpersonalities are Shadow.

Archetypes according to Jung

Archetypes, according to the works of Carl Gustav Jung, are a kind of library of images that is located in the sphere of the collective unconscious. Its contents are passed down from generation to generation. These images generate patterned reactions for standard situations.

All archetypes come from instincts. Therefore, their main task is survival. For example, the “enemy” archetype helps the child in wildlife recognize a predator and take the right actions - lie low, hide, run away, etc.

It happens that we meet people who are unpleasant to us without good reason. We feel uncomfortable around them and want to run away. Perhaps this person fits our “enemy” archetype, and this is the reason for the reaction.

Jung identified three areas in the personality structure:

personal unconscious;
collective unconscious;
consciousness.

Personal unconscious- everything that was previously conscious, but has moved to the level of the unconscious. Collective unconscious passed down by inheritance, like a package of documents with ready-made images and examples of reactions.

Personality development is based on the interaction between five main archetypal figures: self, persona, shadow, animus and anima, ego.

Self- the unification of consciousness and the unconscious in a person. The self is formed through the process of individuation, when certain aspects of the personality must be integrated. Jung often depicted the self as a mandala, circle, or square.
Shadow relies on the instinct of reproduction and the thirst for life and freedom. There is a shadow as an invisible part of the unconscious, consisting of suppressed ideas, desires, actions, shortcomings and instincts of a person.

Jung wrote that the shadow can come into dreams and take on a wide variety of forms - in the form of a monster, a snake, a monster, Baba Yaga, a dragon, etc.

– the unconscious feminine side of the personality, and animus– male. This true “I” serves as the main source of connection with the collective unconscious. The combination of these archetypes is called the “divine couple” or syzygy. These images embody integrity, harmony and perfection.
– our ideal image of ourselves and appearance before the world. In Latin the word a person means "mask". The Persona archetype is a set of social masks that we use in different everyday situations.

The Persona's task is to protect the Ego from showing its negative side. Jung believed that a person can also manifest himself in dreams, incarnating himself in positive images.

Carl Jung argued that in reality there are more than five main archetypes. Some of them can overlap or combine with each other. Additionally, Jung described the following archetypes:

Mother - consolation, calmness;
Father - power, strength, authority, power;
Child - innocence, longing for childhood and carefreeness, salvation, rebirth;
Sage – knowledge, wisdom, experience;
Hero – rescuer, protector, support;
The enemy is danger, anxiety.

What is Shadow?

Jung considered the shadow to be an archetype that was passed down to man from the animal world. This is a collection of passionate desires and actions, immoral and violent instincts that are condemned by society and often do not correspond to the ideals of the person himself.

During the period of personality formation, the child learns to understand what “good” and “bad” are. Over time, we create a certain ideal image, according to Jung - it is called Persona. This "an ideal person" fits well into the norms and standards of public life: he is tolerant, successful, eloquent, has endurance and patience, decent and responsible. At the same time, internal content that can destroy the Persona is carefully ignored.

Most often, the shadow side of the personality is suppressed and repressed to such an extent that a person simply does not notice his negative sides. At the same time, a storm is brewing in the unconscious, which sooner or later will cover and deprive a person of self-control.

According to Jung's works, the Shadow is not considered the stronghold of evil in man. Rather, it is what creates it that is to blame: high expectations, denial of one’s own “I,” abstract ideals, living “someone else’s life,” lack of love and respect for oneself.

Archetype Shadow- this is the totality of any personality attributes that we deny and suppress, and sincerely hate in ourselves.

Interaction of Shadow and Ego

Every person's ego casts a Shadow. This is fine. During the period of adaptation to the world, the Shadow absorbs emotions and desires that lead to moral conflicts. Without Ego control, these processes are hidden in the darkness of consciousness. The work of the Shadow is comparable to the activities of spy intelligence, when the head of state knows nothing about the dirty and immoral work of spies. At the same time, he enjoys the results of their activities, living in a safe country.

Analytical work with the Ego can reveal shadow processes and helps to realize them, but the Ego’s defense mechanisms work effectively, and only a few manage to overcome them.

The shadow never comes under the control of the Ego, it is an unconscious factor. Our Ego sometimes does not suspect that it is casting a Shadow. In describing this archetype, Jung sought to point out the shocking lack of consciousness that most people exhibit.

If we delve into the root of human intentions, desires and choices, we find ourselves in a dark area. We will see that our Ego in the dark part is self-confident, insensitive, selfish, prone to manipulation and perverted desires. What appears before us is a 100% egoist who strives at any cost to achieve pleasure and power over others. This negativity inside the Ego is the embodiment of world evil in fairy tales, myths and classical literature. For example, the character Iago in Shakespeare's Othello is a prominent representative of the Shadow.

The most interesting thing is that the Ego does not experience its Shadow in any way. It is projected onto other people, being unconscious. For example, if you are annoyed by a notorious egoist, the unconscious content of your shadow is projected onto him. No doubt other people provide "hooks" for shadow projection. Indeed, in strong emotional reactions there is real perception and projection.

The defensive ego always insists on being right and often acts as a victim or observer. While one's Ego makes a person a "saint", another person turns into a "monster". When working psychologically with your own Ego, you can learn to recognize projections and not create scapegoats.

How is the Shadow born?

At the beginning of civilization, people lived following their own instincts, impulses, and laws of nature. Today, emotions and desires control the norms of behavior in society, morality, and etiquette. A person is subject to many categorical restrictions and prohibitions. The Shadow helps to live with all this.

A shadow begins to form in early childhood when adults diligently manipulate children, demonstrating all the imperfection and one-sidedness of the adult world. For example, if parents suppress a child or show injustice to him, the child reacts with indignation and healthy, natural aggression. But instead of apologizing and accepting that he was wrong, the adult humiliates him even more, yells at the child, punishes him or beats him. After all, you need to “respect your elders” and “shut your mouth.”

After some time, the baby will learn the lesson. He will stop showing aggression, although it will still arise. The child will begin to suppress it. All negative experiences will be pushed into the unconscious, which will be the beginning of the formation of the second “I”. Unfulfilled dreams and desires will also go there for storage: “this won’t bring you money,” “men don’t dance,” “do a normal job,” “you won’t make a living from this,” etc.

The Shadow takes on those character traits that are incompatible with the Persona and the Ego-consciousness of the individual. Both the Shadow and the Persona are actually alien to consciousness. According to Jung, Persona is a “public personality” that helps a person form a psychosocial identity. The Persona, like the Shadow, is invisible to the Ego. But the Ego accepts the Persona more loyally, since it does not contradict the moral standards of behavior in society.

How does the Shadow manifest itself?

The Shadow patiently waits for the moment when we are irritated, exhausted, or under the influence of alcohol/drugs, etc. It is she who pushes us to actions that we would never allow ourselves to carry out in a sober state.

Human under the influence of the Shadow offends loved ones, waves his fists, betrays his principles, speaks rudely, starts a fight or steals something. After what happened, he becomes very ashamed, and this state is described as “something was found”, “a fly bitten”, “like something was replaced”.

Despite the fact that for some actions you need to stand in the corner of 3-4 lives, you cannot blame a person’s consciousness for everything. After all, he actually acts as if in a dream when The shadow clouds the mind and breaks out of the “dungeon” of the unconscious.

Jung described that the Shadow tends to possess power over something, behave obsessively, and persistently oppose moral standards. So in this case there are several culprits - weakened consciousness, people who mistreated the child in childhood, the unconscious that broke out.

It is the Shadow that makes a person doubt his abilities, reminds him of helplessness, clumsiness, etc. On the one hand, the childhood scenario is triggered, and on the other, in such conditions it is easier for the Shadow to fight for power.

Following the example of Animus and Anima, the Shadow projects itself onto the people around it. Therefore, our hatred and anger towards someone is a failure to accept these qualities in ourselves.

The Shadow Archetype in Literature and Film

The most striking example of the Shadow is Mephistopheles in "Fauste" Goethe. According to the plot, Faust has become a boring and overeducated man. He read many books, studied everything that interested him, and lost interest in life. Faust thought about suicide, and on that day a black poodle crossed his path, which turned into Mephistopheles.

Then Mephistopheles seduces Faust to give up science and go with him to discover another world full of carnal pleasures and pleasures. It introduces the intellectual to his feelings, passion and thrill of dormant sexuality.

What happened in the novel was what Jung called enantiodromia. This is the transition of a personality to its opposite type. Faust accepted the Shadow and temporarily lived, feeding on its qualities and energy. As a result, Faust's soul was saved from the devil and hell only thanks to the mercy of God.

You can often see the Shadow and Persona archetypes in movies:

Often in works of art they show a symbolic meeting with the Shadow, like a reflection of oneself in a mirror.

Basic course analytical psychology, or Jungian Breviary Zelensky Valery Vsevolodovich

Self

Self

According to Jung, the individual ego complex does not exist only in connection with other psychic complexes, it gains its stability, continuous growth and constancy from a larger, more complete sense of human wholeness, at the basis of which lies the archetype that Jung called the self. This is one of the central concepts of Jungian psychology, the archetype of unity and integrity, “the image and principle of God in man” (Kakabadse, 1982, p. 109).

In turn, the ego complex resides between the internal and external worlds, and its task is to adapt to both of these worlds. With an extraverted orientation, the ego connects itself with external reality. Through introversion, the Ego comprehends the internal subjective reality and adapts to it. In Jungian publications, editors usually adhere to the following rule: in relation to the individual Ego, write “self” with a lowercase letter (“c”), and when referring to the archetype of the Self, use a capital letter (“C”).

Jung discovered symbols of the archetypal Self in many of the world's religious systems. His writings contain abundant evidence of his constant fascination with these symbols of completeness and complete union with all things, be it the paradise past symbolized by the Garden of Eden or the golden age of the Olympians. The undisturbed unity of man and the world is expressed both in the symbol of the mythological golden egg, from which the world is said to have been created, and in the image-symbol of the original man - a hermaphrodite or anthropos, personifying humanity before its “fall and degradation.” This can also include human existence in its most ancient (original) state, expressed in the images of Adam, Christ or Buddha. More as a psychologist than as a philosopher or theologian, Jung saw that the organizing archetype of wholeness was especially clearly represented in religious imagery - iconography, architecture, sculpture. Thus he came to understand that the psychological manifestation of the Self was actually the experience of God or the “God-Image within the human soul.” Naturally, Jung did not at all intend to reduce the omnipotent, transcendental divine being to a psychological experience, to a simple archetype of the collective unconscious. Most likely, he wanted to show how the image of God exists in the psyche and operates regardless of whether belief in God is a conscious feeling, idea or action or not.

In addition, Jung noted that if the psyche is a natural and purposeful (purposive) phenomenon, then much of this purposefulness is focused on action within the archetypal Self. The significance of events that happen to a person, the extraordinary mental intrusions and solutions that arise when faced with problematic situations, synchronistic phenomena in which strange coincidences lead to the transformation of previous attitudes - Jung defined all these mental phenomena as manifestations of the Self (in the sense that they contribute to the emergence of a more holistic sense and idea of individual existence). After all, “consciousness is a condition of the possibility of being” (Odaynik, 1996, p. 229). A natural consequence of this observation is that psychological analysis helps to highlight the individual's greater connection with the Self, mitigating the inflation or alienation that occurs when the individual Ego is too identified or, on the contrary, too removed from contact with the Self and its integrative force.

Geometrically, the Self is represented by Jung as a center and a circle at the same time. An example of a visual representation of the Self is mandola.

In the field of religious rituals and in the field of psychology, this (Sanskrit) word denotes pictures of a circle, which are designed in the form of a drawing, pictorially, plastically or in the form of a dance... As psychological phenomena, they (mandalas) occur spontaneously in people’s dreams in certain conflict situations and when schizophrenia. Very often they contain a quaternary or a multiplication of the same quaternary in the form of a cross, or a star, or a square, or an octagon, etc. (Jung, 1996, p. 220).

Within its paradoxical union, the self unites all the opposites embodied in the male and female archetypes. So the product of such a union is often symbolically described as a hermaphrodite. Other numerous examples of the central archetype as a unity of opposites are given to us by alchemical symbolism. For example, the philosopher's stone - one of the main goals of the alchemical process - was depicted in the symbolism of the marriage of the red king and white queen or the unity of the sun and moon, fire and water. In alchemy, the tireless curiosity of the Middle Ages sought not only to obtain gold from base metals, but also to improve their own nature (which should not be forgotten) (see Morozov, 1909). Therefore, the “action” of alchemists to improve matter was at the same time a psychological process, the purpose of which was the improvement of man.

Jung's excellent work on Christian symbolism - AION - is subtitled: "On the Phenomenology of the Self" - and contains the most complete treatment of his ideas regarding the archetype of the Self, but requires some effort in reading. Therefore, it is better to start with the definition of the Self, given in Chapter 11 of “Psychological Types.” Then one can become familiar with other works of Jung - for example, with the work "On Flying Objects Visible in the Sky", where the emphasis is not on the Self itself, but rather on approaching it through a detailed study of symbolism, based on clinical practice, religion and other sources. Unidentified flying objects (UFOs) can be seen as possible symbols of wholeness beyond our immediate experience. Such works on the Self are excellent examples of what Jung called circumambulation, or circumambulation, moving around a concept until its various aspects are identified and understood. So learning the archetype of transcendental wholeness, understanding the Self in the sense defined by Jung, requires patience, time and persistence.

Among the first post-Jungian works, one should name the book by E. Edinger “Ego and the Archetype”, where the relationship between the Ego and the Self is considered at a theoretical level, and his other work - “Meeting with the Self”, exploring the same relationship Ego - Self using the example of analysis William Blake's illustrations for the book of Job.

Literature

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Man and his symbols / K. G. Jung et al. - St. Petersburg, 1996. P. 312 ff.

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Stock lectures. - M.; Kyiv, 1998. pp. 211–269. Jung K. G. Flying Saucers: The Modern Myth of Things Seen

in the sky // Jung K. G. One modern myth. - M., 1993. P. 105–150. Jung K. G. Mana-personality// Jung K. G. Psychology of the unconscious.-

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Kyiv, 2002. § 627–712.

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The main archetypes according to Jung and their characteristics. The theory of archetypes by C. G. Jung and its significance for understanding the mechanisms of perception of the objective world

What is an archetype?

Carl Gustav Jung: patriarch of analytical psychology.

Archetypes in branding.

Jung's basic archetypes.

1. Mother.

2. Father.

3. Child.

How to understand and decipher archetypes in dreams?

SEMIRA

A PERSON

SHADOW

ANIMA

ANIMUS

Archetypes according to Jung

What is Shadow?

Interaction of Shadow and Ego

How is the Shadow born?

How does the Shadow manifest itself?

The Shadow Archetype in Literature and Film

Self