14 Enlightening Quotes From Carl Jung To Delve Deep Into Your Psyche

By Mayukh Saha / Truth Theory

Carl Gustav Jung was a Swiss psychoanalyst and psychiatrist who founded analytical psychology. His work was influential in the fields of psychiatry, anthropology, archaeology, literature, philosophy, and religious studies. While he was working at the Burghölzli hospital, under the guidance of Eugen Bleuler, he came to the attention of Sigmund Freud, the founding father of psychoanalysis. 

“Analytical psychology” is the name given by Jung to the “empirical science” of the psyche, to distinguish it from Freud’s psychoanalytic theory.  This marked the end of their seven-year collaboration on psychoanalysis. The evolution of Jung’s scientific discourse is recorded in his monumental opus, the Collected Works, written through the course of his life. Some of the key concepts in Analytical psychology are the Anima and Animus, the Archetype, the Collective unconscious, the Complex, Extraversion and Introversion, Individuation, the Self, the Shadow, and Synchronicity. Here are some of his insights on human life that may inspire you:

“Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or from holding certain views which others find inadmissible.”

If you do not know who you are and what you desire, how will someone else know?

“The pendulum of the mind oscillates between sense and nonsense, not between right and wrong.”

The eternal “To be, or not to be” tussle has no end, even Jung agrees.

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“Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol, morphine or idealism.”

A little of everything can be healthy, but according to Jung, an overdose of any kind is bad.

“As a child I felt myself to be alone, and I am still, because I know things and must hint at things which others apparently know nothing of, and for the most part do not want to know.”

Solitude can be a blessing if you wish to learn more and more each day.

“The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.”

Once you know your true potential, you can achieve anything. You will be invincible.

“There’s no coming to consciousness without pain.”

Wondered why the wisdom tooth is a constant source of pain? Jung answers it simply – wisdom comes from pain. 

“In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order.”

We are too caught up in the apparent meaning to delve deep into the situation. Order lies in the heart of chaos.

“Mistakes are, after all, the foundations of truth, and if a man does not know what a thing is, it is at least an increase in knowledge if he knows what it is not. ”

Mistakes surely are the pillars of success according to this saying by Jung.

“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves”

You cannot understand yourself without finding out what you are not. Often times you become exactly what you thought you’d never be – Jung nudges you to introspect and learn to embrace your authentic self.

“How can I be substantial if I do not cast a shadow? I must have a dark side also If I am to be whole.”

There is no black and white in life according to Jung. Every man has both light and darkness within him.

“Where love rules, there is no will to power, and where power predominates, love is lacking. The one is the shadow of the other.”

Jung keeps repeating in his works the essential duality of the human predicament, how a feeling can be the shadow of the other. 

“The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no recipe for living that suits all cases.”

There’s no shortcut to success, no hard and fast rule to live life to the fullest. It is you who needs to find a way of life that is best suited to you.

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“Nobody, as long as he moves about among the chaotic currents of life, is without trouble.”

When you feel low and think why the Universe has turned its back on you, remember this quote by Jung. Everyone has to face problems and strive to solve them.

“The debt we owe to the play of imagination is incalculable.”

Imagination is what makes us human beings and it has the power to change the world. Jung believed in the power of thoughts.

These quotes by Jung will inspire you to introspect!