Although I never wanted to be shipwrecked or forced to choose a few books, if that day came one of the books that would accompany me would undoubtedly be the beautiful Memories, dreams and reflections, by Carl Jung, a vital reflection on the human psyche, the meaning of life and self-knowledge.
The legendary Swiss psychiatrist, one of the founders of modern analytical psychology, was a disciple, and later a critic, of Freud. He was eighty-four years old when he undertook his living will from his tower, the house of Bolligen where he died in 1961 in fertile solitude, without electricity and in close communion with his dreams, which he continued to analyze, and with the nature that surrounded him, in the that he perceived a rich and mysterious life.
We owe to Jung such important concepts as the unconscious, the hidden part of the mind, understood not only as a source of low repressed instincts as Freud proposed, but also as a well of wisdom full of accumulated knowledge. In this hidden well, Jung affirmed, the necessary keys are hidden to achieve what he called the "process of individuation", that is, to bring out and integrate the conscious and unconscious, spiritual and philosophical dimensions of the human being. The individual who achieves this integration, Jung tells us, accesses the hidden treasures he carries, learns to better understand and manage his individual and collective conflicts, and frees himself from many of the seemingly incomprehensible tensions and urges that haunt us throughout our life.
This process of individuation, of understanding, maturity and acceptance of one's psyche, never ends: it is a task that requires the entire life. If it is not carried out, Jung tells us, we will be prisoners of our own ignorance, of our hidden fears and traumas, and we will continue to be trapped in repetitive mechanisms without unblocking: «When an internal situation does not become conscious, it appears in your external life as if it were destiny ", Jung tells us, and also:" When we only live in the conscious and evident part of the mind and life, we take refuge in a limited and frustrating place and turn our backs on a human dimension essential for a good mental and mental health. That is our life mission »:
"EVERYTHING POINTS THAT THE ONLY REASON FOR BEING OF HUMAN LIFE IS TO LIGHT A LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS OF SIMPLE EXISTENCE."
However, Jung is very aware of the pain involved in people learning to know and evolve: “We cannot access greater awareness without pain. People do anything, absurd as it is, to avoid facing their own soul.
For Jung, the drama of people in modern times is that we live in an exclusively materialistic dimension and turn our backs on images and longings until recently present through art and religions, and that represent other mysterious dimensions of lifetime. «The decisive question for each person is: Am I related to something infinite or not? While the person who despairs walks towards nothing, the one who has put his faith in the archetypes follows the path of life ... Both, of course, live without certainties, but the first one lives against his instincts; the second with them.