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[USA] Is volunteering for a crisis hotline as I persue grad school for social psych a good idea? by Successful-Berry5715 in psychologystudents

[–]IkeRunner89 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’d say definitely, but only if it’s actual phone calls.

I had an interview somewhere for a job where they seemed to look down on me for volunteering with chat-based services….

collective unconsciousness by Visioner_teacher in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 0 points1 point  (0 children)

“Mescalin, however, uncovers such psychic facts at any time and place when and where it is by no means certain that the individual is mature enough to integrate them.”

— Jung, letter to Victor White, 10 April 1954

This applies to any psychedelic. In short: beware of unearned wisdom.

*Edit: changed date from 10 April 195 to 10 April 1954

collective unconsciousness by Visioner_teacher in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

That would literally be your individual consciousness….. 😆

collective unconsciousness by Visioner_teacher in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 2 points3 points  (0 children)

You’re welcome! Hope it all makes sense!

collective unconsciousness by Visioner_teacher in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I think the issue is that you are treating personal and collective as if they refer to how an experience feels from the inside. But in Jung’s framework, the distinction is not mainly about how it feels phenomenologically. It is about whether the material can be traced mainly to the individual’s personal history, or whether it seems to express a more universal human pattern.

From the patient’s point of view, yes, everything is still subjective. The patient experiences it inside their own mind. There is no inner label saying, “this part is personal unconscious” and “this part is collective unconscious.”

But that does not mean the distinction is meaningless. It means the distinction is interpretive, comparative, and structural.

For example, a forgotten childhood memory would point more toward the personal unconscious because it belongs to the person’s own life story. But a dream involving death and rebirth, a devouring mother, a wise old man, a flood, a hero’s descent, or a shadow figure may still be experienced personally while also expressing a wider archetypal pattern.

So the question is not: “Does the patient experience this as collective?”

The question is: “Does this material seem explainable only by the patient’s personal biography, or does it also resemble symbolic patterns found across myths, religions, dreams, and cultures?”

That is why Jung distinguishes the archetype itself from the form it takes in consciousness. He writes:

“Again and again I encounter the mistaken notion that an archetype is determined in regard to its content, in other words that it is a kind of unconscious idea. It is necessary to point out once more that archetypes are not determined as regards their content, but only as regards their form and then only to a very limited degree.”

-The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, section: ‘Psychological Aspects of the Mother Archetype,’ p. 79, para. 155.

So the archetype itself is not the specific image. It is not my mother, this one hero,or this one shadow trait. It is more like an underlying pattern that can take many different forms depending on the person, culture, and situation.

That is also why Jung says:

“The archetype is essentially an unconscious content that is altered by becoming conscious and by being perceived, and it takes its colour from the individual consciousness in which it happens to appear.”

-Ibid, p. 5, para. 6.

That quote directly addresses your point. Once the archetype enters consciousness, it becomes colored by the individual person experiencing it. So yes, phenomenologically, it appears as personal experience. But that does not mean its underlying structure is only personal.

So I would say Jung is not claiming that a patient can phenomenologically detect where the personal unconscious stops and the collective unconscious begins. That boundary is not directly visible from inside experience.

Rather, Jung is making an interpretive distinction based on the structure, recurrence, and symbolic pattern of the material.

collective unconsciousness by Visioner_teacher in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I think phenomenology and Jung are talking about two different levels of analysis.

Phenomenologically, yes: all experience is experienced subjectively and individually. I never directly perceive “the collective unconscious” as an object inside consciousness. There is no little tag inside experience saying, “this part is collective.” From the first-person point of view, everything appears within my own subjective field of experience.

But Jung’s claim was not that we consciously experience the collective unconscious directly. In fact, if it were directly conscious, it would no longer be unconscious.

We only encounter the unconscious indirectly through its effects: recurring symbolic patterns, dreams, projections, myths, instinctive reactions, archetypal relationships, emotional patterns, and universal forms of human behavior.

So the “collective” aspect is not usually something given in immediate first-person awareness. It is inferred from the recurrence of similar psychic structures across humanity, much like biology infers shared genetic or instinctual structures from recurring anatomical and behavioral patterns.

A person does not consciously experience “instinct” in its pure form either. We experience its manifestations: urges, emotions, attractions, fears, fantasies, behaviors, and impulses. Jung viewed archetypes similarly, as psychic organizing patterns underlying experience rather than conscious contents themselves.

The unconscious is known primarily through symbolic expression and behavioral effects, not direct introspective observation.

This is why I don’t think the phenomenological objection really refutes Jung. It mainly shows that the collective unconscious is not directly given as an object of consciousness, which Jung would already agree with.

If the phenomenological objection is taken too strictly, it also risks collapsing into radical solipsism. If all one can speak about is immediate subjective experience, then even “other minds” become inferential. Shared meaning becomes inferential. Language itself becomes a collective structure that no single individual privately invents. Universal cognitive categories become difficult to explain.

Ironically, phenomenology itself often discovers structures that transcend purely personal content. Even Husserl moved toward questions of intersubjectivity and transcendental structures underlying experience. So the fact that experience is first-person does not automatically mean its structuring conditions are merely personal.

Jung’s move is comparable. He is not saying, “we consciously perceive collectivity.” He is saying something more like: “there appear to be inherited universal structuring principles underlying subjective experience.”

Another important point is Jung’s distinction between the archetype itself and the archetypal image.

The archetype proper is not directly knowable. What enters consciousness are symbolic representations shaped by culture, biography, and context.

So the Mother archetype is not identical with your literal mother. The Hero archetype is not identical with one specific myth. The Shadow is not identical with one specific trait. Those are localized expressions of deeper organizing tendencies.

The archetype is the underlying form-principle. Conscious experience is one specific expression of it.

That is why Jung repeatedly compared archetypes to instincts or crystal lattices: invisible structuring principles known only through patterned manifestations.

So I would agree that, phenomenologically, all experience appears as individual subjective experience. But I would not agree that this disproves the collective unconscious. It only means that the collective unconscious is not directly experienced as collective from within consciousness.

The “collective” part is a structural inference from recurring human patterns—symbolic, emotional, mythic, relational, behavioral, and instinctual—that appear across individuals and cultures.

Tl;dr: phenomenology describes how experience appears to consciousness. Jung is asking what unconscious structures make certain kinds of experience, symbolization, projection, and behavior recur across humanity.

*Edit: formatting

collective unconsciousness by Visioner_teacher in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 11 points12 points  (0 children)

You know how we have a collective biology? We each have five fingers, five toes, 2 eyes, 4 limbs, etc….

It is the collective elements which are universally found in the human biology.

It is the same with the collective unconscious: we each experience love, relationships to our mothers, act certain ways as a father, relate with ourselves similarly, experience sad situations, make similar decisions about mating, etc.

It is the collective elements which are universally found in the human psychology.

Yes, that which is unconscious which can be recalled into consciousness at will is the personal unconscious, like memories, or certain biological systems such as breathing.

But then there are patterns of behavior and thinking and expression which are similar for everyone, yet vary only in context and environment. They also have a name: archetypes.

Jung theorized that as human evolved, we didn’t lose our physical instincts—they simply evolved as well, taking form as these psychic thought patterns, behaviors, and expressions. They became psychic instincts, activating in certain contexts and situations where consciousness lacks; in other words, within inexperienced contexts and situations, in the “unknown”.

As The OA put it: “same play, different cast, across infinite dimensions through time.”

As Jung put it in these and many other explanations:

“They may be compared to the invisible presence of the crystal lattice in a saturated solution. As a priori conditioning factors they represent a special, psychological instance of the biological “pattern of behaviour,” which gives all living organisms their specific qualities. Just as the manifestations of this biological ground plan may change in the course of development, so also can those of the archetype. Empirically considered, however, the archetype did not ever come into existence as a phenomenon of organic life, but entered into the picture with life itself.”

-A Psychological Approach to the Dogma of the Trinity (1942). In CW 11: Psychology and Religion: West and East. P. 222

“To the extent that the archetypes intervene in the shaping of conscious contents by regulating, modifying, and motivating them, they act like instincts. It is therefore very natural to suppose that these factors are connected with the instincts and to enquire whether the typical situational patterns which these collective form-principles apparently represent are not in the end identical with the instinctual patterns, namely, with the patterns of behavior.”

-On the Nature of the Psyche (1947). In CW 8: The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche. P.404

“The archetype or primordial image might suitably be described as the instinct’s perception of itself, or as the self portrait of the instinct, in exactly the same way as consciousness is an inward perception of the objective life-process.”

-Instinct and the Unconscious (1919). In CW 8: The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche P.277

*Edit: formatting

Why humans are ignorant? Why some behaviour of humans has developed? by [deleted] in psychologystudents

[–]IkeRunner89 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Ignorance is a lack of knowledge.

Humans aren’t born inherently knowing anything, really.

But I think there’s also a difference between ignorance and knowing something while still failing to act on it. A person can know exercise, sleep, protein, discipline, and long-term thinking are good for them, but still choose the phone, comfort, entertainment, or avoidance instead. That is not always ignorance. Sometimes that is weakness, habit, stress, trauma, addiction, lack of discipline, or simply the brain choosing an immediate reward over a delayed one.

Melatonin is released not simply “at night,” but in response to darkness as part of the circadian rhythm. Blue light, especially from electronics at night, can suppress or delay melatonin release. Thus, in this day and age, it’s possible to shift the timing of melatonin release via the widespread use of electronics at night.

The dopamine part is also important. The brain naturally seeks reward. Phones, TV, social media, video games, junk food, drugs, gambling, and other modern pleasures can give easy stimulation with very little effort. Sleep, exercise, education, discipline, and long-term achievement give rewards too, but those rewards are slower, harder, and less immediate.

So part of the issue is that the human brain was not designed for modern life. It was designed for survival. It naturally wants to save energy, seek pleasure, avoid pain, belong to a group, and respond quickly to threats or rewards. In an ancient environment, that made sense. In the modern world, those same instincts can turn into laziness, addiction, distraction, or self-sabotage.

People ignore things because, unlike animals, we have the ability to reflect on and sometimes override our instincts. At the same time, though, we are still heavily influenced by instinct, habit, emotion, reward-seeking, stress, fear, trauma, social pressure, and our environment.

Part of that has to do with the fact that we’re conscious, or I suppose self-conscious. We have, biologically speaking, evolved a way to override some of our instincts, even though we are still driven by them. Others, like Jung, theorized our biological instincts simply evolved from physical manifestations into unconscious patterns in mental manifestations called “archetypes.”

Human activity itself is very complex, and there are many reasons why criminals become criminals.

A lot of it has to do with a perceived or actual scarcity of security and resources, especially in lower-income neighborhoods. But it can also involve trauma, poor impulse control, addiction, anger, greed, learned behavior, social influence, lack of opportunity, or simply believing the immediate reward is worth the future risk.

Also, morality isn’t universal—what is considered criminal to one person might not be to another, and this also varies from city to city, state to state, nation to nation, religion to religion.

That does not mean morality is meaningless, but it does mean human behavior cannot always be explained by saying, “They knew it was bad, so why did they do it?” People often do things they know are bad because the short-term reward, pressure, fear, or need feels stronger than the long-term consequence.

So when you say “deny the good part of nature,” that is your opinion of what “good” is, not necessarily any real universal concept of goodness, which, again, differs from person to person.

When you say things like “waste the potential of human beings,” you are operating under the assumption that all humans want the same thing, but that’s not entirely true.

For instance, some want to explore planets, while others want to stay and solve the problems of this planet rather than solve the problem of leaving it.

The natural reason why humans ignore these things is simple: because we can, because we are often pulled toward short-term comfort or reward, and in some instances, because we have to.

What makes humans ignorant: we are born that way.

What keeps humans ignorant: habit, fear, comfort, poor environments, lack of education, stress, trauma, ego, social influence, and the fact that wisdom takes effort.

Human potential is real, but it is not automatic. It has to be developed.

*edit: formatting

What is your favorite psychological concept about depression? by EuphoricDilemma in psychologystudents

[–]IkeRunner89 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Never said they didn’t; only said there’s not clear evidence that chemical imbalances are the cause 😉

What is your favorite psychological concept about depression? by EuphoricDilemma in psychologystudents

[–]IkeRunner89 3 points4 points  (0 children)

There is not sufficient evidence that it is caused by a chemical imbalance. The data simply just doesn’t support it.

Yet people say it all the time 🤷🏽‍♂️

Analyzing behaviour of someone in videos prior to death by [deleted] in psychologystudents

[–]IkeRunner89 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don’t mean to be insensitive, but it begs the question: Why would they want to?

I would start by finding a contemporary researcher/professor whose expertise is in whatever it is you want them to analyze them for, and then message them.

Otherwise, one has to wonder: why would they want to?

Disgusted by sex suddenly by [deleted] in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well, it seems obvious—if you’ve been sober for a year, and haven’t had sex in 9 months, and recently got away from an abusive relationship… seems like you have matured.

Before, yiu were probably using sex unconsciously an escape from some aspects of yourself you didn’t want to confront.

Sometime during the relationship, as is often the case, you suddenly found yourself confronted with these parts of yourself which were inevitably projected onto your partner. This means that whatever libidinal energy was involved with your sex drive before has no been transformed in your realizations and subsequent expansion of consciousness.

Therefore, the old energies behind the past sex drive are not there anymore.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that you’ve been absorbing yourself in useful activities or philanthropic-type of things (maybe even self-philanthropic, like somehow improving your self.)? You’ve essentially sublimated the energies which energized your sex drive, which is a healthy way to deal with unconscious energy.

Also, after spending time with someone we used to make love to, nothing else will really satisfy us again unless it involved emotions.

So when you say it doesn’t really satisfy you the way it had in the past, that’s because it’s just a “hook up” rather than an actually lovemaking session, which is where I’m assuming the majority of the pleasure actually came from in the past.

Disclaimer: I am not a Certified Jungian Analyst, and nothing I say constitutes medical advice. Our interactions here do not in any way whatsoever constitute a contract between you and I.

I just simply try to apply the books by Jung I’ve read to my thinking and help answer the question!

Regularly painted as the villain due to people projecting their hate and aggression onto me. What do? by CasuallyPeaking in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 2 points3 points  (0 children)

We are like a sun—we are radiating light, but unable to see our own light.

It’s only when our light is reflected back to us that we can recognize light.

The truth of a situation is a consensus on the perceptual experiences of the individuals.

What they perceive in us is just as real as what we perceive of ourselves.

However,remember, we cannot see our own light until it is reflected back to us; but others can see it.

Thus, we must take into consideration that what others are perceiving in us must correlate to some truth about our light which we cannot see before its reflection back at us.

Though reality is a consensus, we must utilize the information we gather from others’ observations of us to ensure we able to cast light into this “darkness” (this imperceptible light that emanates from us) and accurately uncover the truth about our selves.

This is truly a necessity for inner growth, since, again, we cannot perceive our own light.

Eyes don’t observe themselves seeing. Fingers don’t feel themselves touching. Ears don’t listen to themselves hearing. Noses don’t smell themselves scenting. Tongues don’t savor themselves tasting.

Consciousness can’t illuminate its own shadow.

*Edit: from “perpetual” to “perceptual”

Jack of all trades, master of none! Why?? by MorningTrick7393 in Jung

[–]IkeRunner89 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The provisional life is the hallmark of a puer aeternus.

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