Through a Jungian Lens

Curious thing for me, numbers.  I have posted 230 times since I began this site on November 27, 2008.  So far I have received just over 5800 visits to the site, about 25 per post or 22 per day.  On average, there have been about two comments per post over the whole period.  Of course, trying to find even one post that falls within this set of stats would likely find no such individual posts.  So why does one even bother with statistics since they point to something that is anything other than objective reality?  I know why I look to the numbers.  I don’t expect them to point to a particular thing.  All I expect to see is a generalized canvas, I get to see the forest rather than the trees as I look at the global picture.

So what does this global picture tell me?  Well, first, it tells me that I am not writing words that disappear into the ether unread.  Somewhere in the numinous space of cyberwaves, others have paused to glimpse, if only briefly at the words and the images.  I learn that a few have spent more than just a passing moment with my images and thoughts.  A smaller group have spent enough time to offer comment or to ask questions.  In some amazing way, connections have been established and a curious set of relationships have taken shape, cyber relationship.

All of this serves to cause me to rethink some of my words and thoughts.  In a way, this is like walking into a hall of mirrors in which “others” serve to resonate/reflect/mediate the words that have found their way to this space.  In the end, I become hopefully, more conscious of my “self.”

In Jungian psychology, water is symbolic of the unconscious.  If one thinks of the depths of the ocean, depths to which no man or machine has yet been able to penetrate in order to discover what contents are to be found, one begins to get to understand the nature of one’s personal unconscious contents.  Our unconscious is buried under layer after layer of repressed, denied and still born aspects of self.  If one were able to go within this personal unconsciousness, one would discover that they have simply encountered a flimsy and porous layer that leads to yet greater depths and shadows, the collective unconscious.

This photo which I took in India of the Indian Ocean, hints at depth by its sheer immensity.  As one approaches the land, waves form to break on the shore.  Think of the shore as consciousness.  The waves breaking upon the shore are aspects of the shadow that are close to the surface, aspects that attempt to inform consciousness, aspects that transform imperceptiably, the outer self.  Dreams are the waves that act upon the self in a transformative manner.  Whether one is aware of these dreams or not, the waves continue to flow from the depths, working on the psyche.  And in the process, we evolve.  We change subtly, often blind to the changes.  Yet change we do, more often than not, changing in ways that surprise those around us, especially those closest to us.

We hear them say, “You’ve changed.”  And we search inward and respond in confusion, “No I haven’t!”  Yet over time, a sense of confusion about who we are grows.  We have been changing.  Unless we work to enlarge our awareness of who we are, we become victimized by our loss of the old version of who we thought we were.  There is work to do in order to become conscious of our own depths.  Listen to the waves break and learn.