Human Development
Jung’s theory rests on his concept of the psyche. Jung viewed people’s lives as divided into two periods. The first half is made up of accomplishing basic tasks of developing values and interests, finding a partner, and making career choices. During the second half of life, we progress towards individuation and as a part of that process, the whole personality develops. We gain greater access to the unconscious and our latent potentials; we move toward a state of greater balance, harmony, and equilibrium; and we clarify who we are in relation to others. The Self evolves in the second half of life, the persona is weakened, the shadow is better integrated and understood, and archetypes emerge that empower us. Our values shift from materialism, sexuality, and procreation to spiritual, social, and cultural values (Seligman & Reichenberg, 2014).
Balance and Polarities
To Jung, life consists of opposites with their balance determining the psychological health and development of the person. He viewed extremes as harmful because they prevent the opposite construct from being realized and gaining satisfactory expression. A consequence of imbalance is the tendency of any extreme to turn into its opposite over time.
Dimensions of Personality
Jung attributed individual differences in personality to two dimensions: 1) the typical ways in which people take in and understand internal and external stimuli and 2) the characteristic directions of their libidos.
The four functions:
1. Thinking - people whose thinking function is dominant react cognitively and intellectually, seeking to interpret and understand a stimulus.
2. Feeling - the feeling function is the opposite of the thinking function. People whose feeling function is primary react emotionally, focusing on pleasure, dislike, anger, and other emotions raised by a stimulus.
3. Sensation - sensation involves receiving and identifying physical stimuli through the sense and relaying them to consciousness. People who have sensation as their dominant function look at facts and the substance of a stimulus, seeing concrete evidence of its meaning and value.
4. Intuition - the opposite of sensation. People whose intuition is their dominant function rely on hunches about where a stimulus has come from, where it is going, and what the possibilities are to determine their reactions and decisions related to the stimulus.
The four functions:
1. Thinking - people whose thinking function is dominant react cognitively and intellectually, seeking to interpret and understand a stimulus.
2. Feeling - the feeling function is the opposite of the thinking function. People whose feeling function is primary react emotionally, focusing on pleasure, dislike, anger, and other emotions raised by a stimulus.
3. Sensation - sensation involves receiving and identifying physical stimuli through the sense and relaying them to consciousness. People who have sensation as their dominant function look at facts and the substance of a stimulus, seeing concrete evidence of its meaning and value.
4. Intuition - the opposite of sensation. People whose intuition is their dominant function rely on hunches about where a stimulus has come from, where it is going, and what the possibilities are to determine their reactions and decisions related to the stimulus.
The two attitudes:
- Extraversion - people in whom this attitude dominates direct their energy toward the outside world; they tend to be outgoing and adapt easily to external change. They are energized by social and interpersonal situations rather than by solitude.
- Introversion - this is the opposite of extraversion. People in whom introversion dominates are most comfortable channeling their libido inward. Although they may have good social skills, they tend to be introspective and replenish their energy by being alone. Crowds of people exhaust them.
Treatment
Jungian treatment has four stages:
- Catharsis and emotional cleansing - strong emotions are discharged while the therapeutic alliance forms. People begin to understand their pasts but do not need to relieve them - Jung saw that as being undesirable.
- Elucidation - The meaning of symptoms, the anima and animus, the shadow, and the person's current life situation are all explained in this stage. People also work through the childhood origins of their difficulties. Transference and countertransference are explored and analyzed.
- Education - can help fix any gaps in development or maturation that have resulted from maladjustment or imbalances. In this stage, the clinician is supportive and encouraging, helping people take risks to improve their lives.
- Transformation - this occurs when individuals have achieved an in-depth access to the collective unconscious and archetypes. Transformation facilitates an ego-Self dialogue, leading to further emergence of the Self and greater balance. (Seligman & Reichenberg, 2014).
Therapeutic Alliance - Jungian therapists take an active role in the treatment process. Through interventions, clinicians promote awareness and analysis of the unconscious. With awareness, these elements of the personality can become integrated and their impact on the person better understood and modified, leading to greater social awareness and personal transformation. Jung believed that both the clinician and the client have an unconscious influence on each other as they progress through treatment (Seligman & Reichenberg, 2014).
Interventions - Analytical therapy begins by focusing on the conscious, building a therapeutic alliance, and laying the groundwork for safe and productive exploration of the unconscious.
- Use of Symbols - stresses the capacity to think symbolically and see the underlying dynamics and patterns driving clients' thoughts, feelings, and actions. These patterns may appear in clients dreams, fantasies, symptoms, and other material.
- Dream Interpretation - Jung saw dreams as the easiest access to the unconscious and viewed them as reflecting people's inner lives as well as their unconscious responses. Jung took Freud's ideas a bit further and thought that dreams also represented fantasies, memories, experiences, visions, truths, and more.
- Word Association Tests - the clinician reads single words, one at a time, to the client who replies with the first word that comes into mind. Unusual responses provide clues to the presence of complexes and other unconscious material.
- Rituals - Jung sometimes incorporated rituals and rites into therapy and which has led to some modern Jungian theorists to embrace this method. Jung realized the important of religious rituals and rites in facilitating people's growth and passage from one phase of life to another. Incorporating rich and meaningful rituals into interventions can enhance that process and increase its individual and cultural relevance and impact (Seligman & Reichenberg, 2014).