Carl Jung - How to Find Your Soul (written by Eternalised)

This after-school presentation was written and narrated by Eternalized. [Music] Swiss psychologist Carl Jung saw how the modern materialistic world of money, pleasure, fame, and power did not lead to happiness, but rather an increasing sense of meaninglessness, anxiety, suffering, and loneliness. He sought to bring our attention back to the search of our soul and to restore our connection with ourselves, our innermost sanctuary.

Life is a journey of discovering ourself, which is our true and complete personality, consisting of both our conscious and unconscious lives. This is what Jung calls the individuation process—our journey of psychological maturation. It is the indestructible foundation that supports us when we can no longer support ourselves, like a rock that the waves keep crashing over, standing unmoved despite the raging of the sea.

To be in contact with this deeper part of ourselves is to be in a state of tranquility, undisturbed by wild emotional fluctuations. The goal in life is not perfection, but wholeness. For Jung, there are two stages of life that are part of individuation.

The first half of life is oriented towards the outer world: work, education, relationships, etc. We must throw ourselves into the fire of life and expose ourselves to daily life and hard work, which solidifies our personality. Natural life is the nourishing soul of the soil, which provides a rich source of nutrients that heals us.

This is why contact with nature is important; we mustn't get lost in abstract thinking to the detriment of practical life. It is the body, the feeling, the instinct that connects us with the soil. In his old age, Jung continued to value this way of life.

He wrote, "I have done without electricity and tend the fireplace and stove myself. Evenings, I light the old lamps. There's no running water, and I pump the water from the well.

I chop the wood and cook the food. These simple acts make life simple, and how difficult it is to be simple. " This anchoring in reality is a prerequisite for the second half of life, where our focus shifts to our inner world—our quest for individuation.

This is the phase of life Jung is mostly concerned with: the realm of the unconscious. The world of the inner life is as infinite as the world of the outer life. Man lives in two worlds.

Many people, however, have neglected this part of themselves and only remain half alive. They are unprepared for the natural transition into the second half of life and fall into a mid-life crisis because they have not learned to align both worlds. When we are confronted with the real and crushing problems of life, we desperately search for our soul.

We realize that the values we have learned from society provide no help to us. Conformity is the great destroyer of self; the opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice; it is conformity. We are often persuaded to take the apparently easier road of merging with the crowd and forgetting ourselves.

It requires courage to stand against the crowd. A person can be surrounded by a crowd of people and yet feel completely alone because he is alienated from himself. The search for the soul is a solitary task, and when we avoid the soul, it keeps on stirring; it disturbs us, makes us restless, and gives us no peace.

However, these problems are important; they are incentives for us to undertake soul work. Without the trials and tribulations of life, we aren't likely to summon the determination to overcome the indifference of daily life. People will do anything, no matter how absurd, to avoid facing their own soul.

The gate that leads to destruction is broad, and many enter through it, but the gateway to peace is narrow, and few enter through affliction of the soul. It is wise to nourish the soul; otherwise, you'll breed dragons and devils in your heart. Every psychic advance of man arises from the suffering of the soul.

Embrace your grief, for there your soul will grow. Like the primitive indigenous tribesmen, Jung recognized that the loss of soul leads to a sense of meaninglessness in life. When a tribe of people loses their feeling that their way of life is worthwhile, they may stop reproducing or, in large numbers, simply lie down and die.

Besides streams full of fish, food is not the primary nourishment of man. In place of our current banal life, Jung would ask us to embark on a great adventure of self-knowledge, which comes upon investigating once in a world—the unconscious realm. And for Jung, this is the true journey of life.

Without the soul, the body is dead; and without the body, the soul is unreal. The soul is the home of our supreme values. Drams are the guiding words of the soul; we must carry them in our heart and go back and forth over them in our mind like the words of the person dearest to us.

The dream is a little hidden door in the innermost and most secret recesses of the soul, opening into that cosmic night which was psyche long before there was any ego consciousness. Apart from dreams, Jung developed the technique of active imagination, where you have a dialogue with different parts of yourself that live in the unconscious. It is similar to dreaming, except that you are fully awake and conscious during the experience.

He discovered this technique when he experienced the dark night of the soul, or what he calls his confrontation with the unconscious—a midlife existential catastrophe in which he was overwhelmed with visions and plunged into unknown depths. It was as though he experienced a psychological death, and he decided that outer death is better than inner death. For that reason, he turned away and sought the place of the inner life, and thus began his search for his soul.

This led to one of the greatest contributions to mankind: The Red Book. Jung wrote, "My soul, my soul, where are you? Do you hear me?

I speak; I call you. Are you there? I have returned.

I am here again. I've shaken the dust of all the land from my feet, and I've come to you. I am with you after long years of.

. . " Long wandering, I've come to you again.

There is only one way to the soul, and that is your way. There is only one salvation, and that is your salvation. If the path before you is clear, you're probably on someone else's.

Each one must go his own way; hence, look into yourself, for you must fulfill the way that is in you. When we are in contact with our inner self, we are more likely to experience synchronicities—that is, meaningful patterns in life where the inner world is seen to have a correspondence in external reality. The first step towards individuation is the integration of the Shadow.

This is not our enemy, but our Ally. It contains pure gold waiting to be integrated into our personality; it becomes dark only when it is ignored. We must learn to watch our emotional impulses and be aware of projecting our own problems onto other innocent people.

It is only after the encounter with a shadow that we can move on to the deepest part of the soul, which Jung calls the Anima—the female psychological tendencies in man—and the Animus, the male psychological tendencies in women. These are the contrasexual soul images in our psyche. While the integration of the Shadow is the Apprentice piece, the soul image is the Masterpiece.

The integration of the Anima is done through taking seriously the feelings, moods, and fantasies of the unconscious and bringing them into reality through creative work, such as painting, writing, sculpture, or musical composition. The Anima is the source of life, and when it is not integrated, we feel lifeless and depressed. It enriches our life by making the unconscious contents conscious.

The Animus, on the other hand, is the source of meaning; it gives our unconscious content meaning in the outer world. It endows a woman with qualities of initiative, courage, objectivity, and spiritual wisdom, avoiding cold and destructive reflections or hidden convictions about how life ought to be, as if stuck in a cocoon of dreamy thoughts, which cuts a woman off from the reality of life. The integration of the soul image is what causes a path to the most fundamental figure, the self.

Wholeness can only be achieved through a union of opposites in which our light and dark sides are united. Jung's individuation process is analogous to the great work of the Alchemists, where the Philosopher's Stone is a symbol of the self, which is found within oneself. For Jung, the task of alchemy is psychological; it is the art of expanding consciousness of self-realization.

When we have lost our way or do not know what to do with our life, we can only surrender to the higher wisdom of the self—our constant inner companion through life. Jung did not see himself as a Healer, but as someone who could guide you to heal yourself. The cure ought to grow naturally out of the wounded individual.

This search for herself allows for empathy, mutual understanding, and the desire to become an ally in other people's journeys towards psychological maturation. Thus, we improve our relationship with ourselves, with others, and with nature. Life is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be experienced.

We do not require any esoteric knowledge to be in contact with ourself; anyone can take the time to look within, to reflect on life's meaning, to give time and attention to values, interests, and activities that bring joy and fulfillment to one's personal life. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes. If you are interested in learning more about the works of Jung, head over to my channel, Eternalized, where I have explained these concepts more in depth.

Thank you for watching.