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Carl Gustav Jung Essay

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Carl Gustav Jung

Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961) was born on July 26, in the small village of Kesswil on Lake Constance. He was named after his grandfather, a professor of medicine at the University of Basel. He was the oldest child and only surviving son of a Swiss Reform pastor. Carl attended the University of Basel and decided to go into the field of psychiatry after reading a book that caught his interest.

Jung became an assistant at the Burgholzli Mental hospital, a famous medical hospital in Zurich. He studied under, and was influenced by Eugen Bleuler, a famous psychiatrist who defined schizophrenia. Jung was also influenced by Freud, with whom he later became good friends. Their relationship ended when Jung wrote a book …show more content…

Usually, one of the two classes usually dominates, and rarely does one see an individual with perfectly balanced classes of behavior (Nehr, 1996).

Jung said that an ego is a filter from the senses to the conscious mind. All ego rejections go to the personal unconscious. The ego is highly selective. Every day we are subjected to a vast number of experiences, most of which do not become conscious because the ego eliminates them before they reach consciousness. "The personal unconscious acts like a filing cabinet for those ego rejections" (Jurkevich, 1991,p. 58). Clusters of related thoughts in the personal subconscious form complexes. Complexes are really suppressed feelings. Complexes are often highly visible to people, but unfelt by the individual who has the complex. Complexes can be revealed by word association, which will cause hang-ups if a certain word is mentioned. A strong or total complex will dominate the life of a person, and a weak or partial complex will drive a person in a direction of it, but not too strongly. A complex, as Jung discovered, need not be a hindrance to a person's adjustment. "They can be and often are sources of inspiration and drive that are essential for outstanding achievement" (Aurelio, 1995, p.351).

"The collective unconscious is hereditary. It sets up the pattern of one's psyche"(Kremer, 1990, p.2). An inherited collection of primordial images are stored here. They

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