Jung’s personality

The total personality or psyche, as it is called by Carl Gustav Jung, consists of several isolated systems, but which act on each other in a dynamic way.

The Jungian view of personality is often compared with Freud’s psychoanalytic theory, due to the emphasis that Jungian psychology gives to the unconscious. However, the differences seem to outweigh the similarities.

The main systems correspond, in Jung’s analytical psychology, to the ego, the individual unconscious and the collective unconscious, the persona, the anima or animus, and the shadow. Such elements, as a whole, form the total personality or Self (in German Selbst, and in English Self).

The ego or self is responsible for identity and continuity and is seen, from the person’s point of view, as being the center of the personality. It is also called the conscious mind or consciousness and is made up of conscious perceptions, memories, thoughts and feelings.

Opposed to consciousness is the unconscious, which is divided into two regions: the individual unconscious and the collective unconscious.

In the book Aion, studies on the symbolism of the Self, Jung writes: “the contents of the personal unconscious are acquisitions of individual existence, while the contents of the collective unconscious are archetypes that always exist and a priori”.

The individual unconscious is a region adjacent to the ego, and consists of experiences that have been repressed, suppressed, forgotten or ignored. Such contents are accessible to consciousness, and there are many exchanges of contents between consciousness and the ego.

The contents of the collective unconscious are archetypal, that is, they are innate, of a universal nature and are the same everywhere and in all individuals. The term archetype is not intended to denote an inherited idea, but rather an inherited mode of psychic functioning.

The archetypes that are most sharply characterized are those that most frequently and intensely affect the self. They are: the persona, the shadow, the anima and the animus.

The persona is the mask worn by the individual in response to the demands of social convention and tradition and to his own inner archetypal needs. The concept refers to the masks (persona) used by actors in ancient Greek times in solemn ritualistic plays. It corresponds to the representational image of the archetype of adaptation, because only through the persona can the individual adapt to the world.

An ill-formed persona is just as limiting as an overly rigid one. In the latter case, the ego is confused with the persona, therefore, the person in question identifies with the social position he represents and only with this one.

And on the other opposite, when the individual’s training is inadequate due to unsatisfactory social training or the rejection of social forms, he is unable or refuses to represent the social roles that are destined for him.

There is an oppositional relationship between the persona and the shadow.

“The shadow – writes Jung, in the aforementioned book – constitutes a moral problem that challenges the personality of the self as a whole”, because the shadow presents “obscure aspects of the personality”.

Therefore, the lighter the persona, the darker the shadow will be. The more identification there is between what is represented in the world, the more repression there will be in relation to elements that are not consistent with such representation.

Regarding the anima and animus archetypes, Jung writes that they will appear personified in dreams, visions or fantasies, that is, they will represent unconscious personalities with which the ego will have to deal.

The anima and animus are archetypes of that which, in each sex, is the complete opposite. The anima constitutes the feminine qualities in the male, and the animus, in the female psyche, the male qualities.

The anima, as a numinous image, that is, as an affective image spontaneously produced by the psyche, represents the eternal feminine. She is the mother, sister, beloved, destroyer, maiden, witch… In short, the anima is, for a man, everything a woman can be.

The woman is compensated by the masculine nature, the animus, which means reason or spirit.

“As the anima corresponds to the maternal Eros, the animus corresponds to the paternal Logos” – writes Jung in the book Aion.

In order to reach totality, it is necessary, as an indispensable prerequisite, to face the anima or the animus, in order to achieve a union, a “coniunctio oppositorum”, a unification of opposites.

“Although totality, at first glance, appears to be nothing more than an abstract notion (like the anima and the animus), nevertheless it is an empirical notion, anticipated in the psyche by spontaneous or autonomous symbols. Among these symbols, we can mention in particular the symbols of quaternity, circularity and those that form mandalas (geometric circular shapes).

The process of individuation links all systems (or parts) of the psyche so far defined.

In the book The Self and the Unconscious, Jung circumscribes the process as follows: “there is a destination, a possible goal beyond the phases (or systems). Individuation means becoming a unique being, insofar as by individuality we understand our most intimate, ultimate and incomparable uniqueness, also meaning that we become our own Self. It is the realization of the Self”.

Jung’s analytical psychology, which is often compared with psychoanalytic theory, both for its similarities and for its differences, can only be linked to the latter insofar as, despite the mutual influence between Jung and Freud, with their initial collaboration and later separation.

Regarding Freud’s influence, we can think of the method of dream analysis, which Jung also modifies, but which in essence owes much to the creator of psychoanalysis – which Jung recognizes.

This example is just to mention an influence and at the same time a divergence. Of course, we could cite many other examples.

Although Jung is often considered a mystic – for studying the symbols of many religions – he considered himself an empiricist, a scientist who worked with produced psychic material that could be seen, described and compared.

Despite this, he was critical of the abstract scientific language in psychology, which “too often courts the opinion that its intuitions could be replaced by algebraic equations”.

As we have seen, the objective of a therapy, in the approach of analytical or Jungian psychology, is the individuation process, in which the patient, “confronting” himself with his own unconscious, both the collective and the personal, will become the his own totality, he will reach fullness, that is to say, his total personality.

Therefore, we can conclude that the concept of personality for Jung cannot be reduced to the term persona (personality), because the persona is only one of the elements that constitute the total personality, which, in analytical psychology, can only be considered if so in its entirety.

For that, we have to study all the concepts and the Jungian “psychic geography”.

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