The Philosophical and Psychological Approach to Life

More notes and quotes from Jung's "The Undiscovered Self". Chapter 5 The Philosophical and Psychological Approach to Life.

Our ideas/philosophy of life only change when conditions are radically altered. New ideas cannot simply be dictated by the external situation they must also take into account man's biological needs and his inner situation.

Most of the religions express a world view appropriate to the Middle Ages and take no account of the mental developments since then. As a result there is a gulf between faith and knowledge - a symptom of split consciousness. As the individual so the society of which he is a member.

The legacy of the Christian epoch is the "supremacy of the word".

"People think you only have to "tell" a person that he "ought" to do something in order to put him on the right track. But whether he can or will do is another matter. The psychologist has come to see that nothing is achieved by telling, persuading, admonishing, giving good advice." (page 55)

Preservation of the species and preservation of the self are two fundamental instincts which often come into conflict. According to Jung it is probable that all man's psychic functions have an instinctual foundation. It is the learning capacity of man that causes modifications to instinct. Jung proposes that learning capacity is based on an instinct for imitation the nature of which is to disturb other instinctive activities and modify them. The learning capacity takes man away from his instinctual foundation. He then identifies with his conscious knowledge of himself resulting in disturbances and difficulties.

Separation creates conflict between conscious and unconscious, spirit and nature, knowledge and faith.

"There is an unconscious as a counterbalance to consciousness." (page 59)

"Conscious deliberations, uncontrolled by any inner opponent, can be indulged in all too easily." (page 60)

"The religious person, so far as one can judge, stands directly under the influence of the reaction from the unconscious. As a rule, he calls this the operation of conscience. But since the same psychic background produces reactions other than moral ones, the believer is measuring his conscience by the traditional ethical standard and thus by a collective value." (page 62)

"Here we must ask: Have I any religious experience and immediate relation to God, and hence that certainty which will keep me, as an individual, from dissolving in the crowd?" (page 62)