Category: Carl Jung

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The Meaning of Consciousness

Man’s task is . . . to become conscious of the contents that press upward from the unconscious . . . As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being. It may even be assumed that just as the unconscious affects us, so the increase in our consciousness affects the unconscious.”

Carl Jung, Memories, Dreams and Reflections, p. 326

– Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan, MD

The purpose of human existence is the creation of more and more consciousness. This is such a profound statement on the part of the great analyst, Dr. Carl Jung, and one with which I am in complete agreement. We are coming into a new age, one which is bringing together the twin elements of our being: our religious nature and our intellectual (scientific) nature. To quote the wonderful author and Jungian analyst, Edward F. Edinger, from The Creation of Consciousness – Jung’s Myth for Modern Man, p. 57:

If religion is Self-oriented, science is ego-oriented. Religion is based on Eros, science of Logos. The age now dawning will provide a synthesis for this thesis and antithesis. Religion sought linkage, science sought knowledge. The new world view will seek linked knowledge.

. . . A genuinely new goal and purpose for human existence is required. That new goal has been found and articulated by Jung. In his words, ‘Man is the mirror which God holds up before him, or the sense organ with which he apprehends his being.’  “

We are entering a new age of synthesis, a new era of individuation in which we will begin to see with the eyes of the soul. It is both a tremendously fraught and exciting time, and I look ahead with great anticipation as we work to evolve into the spiritual selves we have all been born to be!

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The Evolution of Consciousness from the Trinitarian to the Quaternarian

By Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan, MD

The chaos befalling the American Presidential election process, is, I think, reflective of the process of the evolution of consciousness we as a species are presently undergoing. We are well into a process that can best be described, in my view, through the application of Jungian Analysis and the study of our great mythologies.

The seminal work by Robert A. Johnson, "He: Understanding Masculine Psychology"
The seminal work by Robert A. Johnson, “He: Understanding Masculine Psychology”

The author and Jungian analyst, Robert A. Johnson, has done a superb job in describing this process in his seminal work, “He: Understanding Masculine Psychology.” I offer below an extended passage of his work that describes this evolution of consciousness particularly well:

We are apparently in an age where the consciousness of man is advancing from a trinitarian to a quaternarian view. This is one possible and profound way of appraising the extreme chaos of our world is now in. One hears many dreams of modern people, who know nothing consciously of this number symbolism, dreaming of three turning into four. This suggests we are going through an evolution of consciousness from the nice orderly all-masculine concept of reality, the trinitarian view of God, toward a quaternarian view that includes the feminine as well as other elements that are difficult to include if one insists on the old value.

It seems that it is the purpose of evolution now to replace an image of perfection with the concept of completeness or wholeness. Perfection suggests something all pure, with no blemishes, dark spots or questionable areas. Wholeness includes the darkness but combines it with the light elements into a totality more real and whole than any ideal. This is an awesome task, and the question before us is whether mankind is capable of this effort and growth. Ready or not, we are in that process.”

We are moving from the psychology of Hamlet – individuals hopeless divided and unsure – into the psychology of wholeness and unification. We must endeavor to see what we have unconsciously hidden or had repressed into our collective shadows and reintegrate that into our complete selves. Only then will we be able to emerge from the presently climate of dissension, violence and conflict that is the hallmark of humanity today.

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The Feeling and Thinking Functions

A feeling is as indisputable a reality as the existence of an idea.”

– Dr. Carl Jung, “The Psychology of the Transference,” CW 16, par. 531

– Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan, MD, FACS

In my book “Beyond Bedside Manner: Preserving the Vessel For Your Soul’s Journey,” one of the key points I touch on is the need for a balance between the Feeling and Thinking Functions in our everyday life. What do I mean by Feeling and Thinking Functions?

Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan's book, Beyond Bedside Manner
Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan’s book, Beyond Bedside Manner

These two functions refer to what the great psychoanalyst, Dr. Carl Jung, described as part of the four ways we humans perceive and interpret everything in reality: The Feeling Function / The Thinking Function / and / The Intuitive Function / The Sensory Function. They are arranged in a cross shape (Feeling on the Left, its opposite, Thinking, on the right; Intuition on the top and its opposite, Sensation, on the bottom).

The psychological role of feeling is to give us value and direction, to evaluate or judge the worth of something or someone. The function of thought is to rationally analyze whatever we encounter, to apply the tools of the intellect independently of any valuation we may have or feel.

Both functions (and all four, of course, although we are focusing on feeling and thinking here only) are crucial for us to navigate our way through life. We have, in the West however, tended to place far greater focus upon the Thinking Function and, as such, have repressed or ignored much of our Feeling Lives. This has had serious repercussions and has led to generations of people living their lives with a wound they may not even realize they have.

My focus in Beyond Bedside Manner – through the language of optimal health and the medical profession, which is my professional background – is to move to a new perspective in order to participate in the grand evolution of consciousness we are presently undergoing.

In order to experience a higher quality of life, we must restore to its rightful place the value and role of the Feeling Function in our daily lives; we must re-balance it with its opposite, the Thinking Function. In doing so, we will cultivate a tremendous respect for all life; we will live the full experience of life.

You can conceive of the Thinking Function as a map – it has all of the landmarks and details we need to see where we’re going. What it can’t tell you, however, is which way you want to go. For that, you need a compass – the perfect metaphor for the Feeling Function.

So, a balance between the map and the compass, Thinking and Feeling, is key to living the life you were born to live!

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Dr. Jung’s First Sermon to the Dead

– Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan, MD, FACS

The following is an extended excerpt of the First Sermon to the Dead by Dr. Carl Jung.

The First Sermon

The dead came back from Jerusalem, where they did not find what they were seeking. They asked admittance to me and demanded to be taught by me, and thus I taught them:

Hear Ye: I begin with nothing. Nothing is the same as fullness. In the endless state fullness is the same as emptiness. The Nothing is both empty and full. One may just as well state some other thing about the Nothing, namely that it is white or that it is black or that it exists or that it exists not. That which is endless and eternal has no qualities, because it has all qualities.

The Nothing, or fullness, is called by us the PLEROMA. In it thinking and being cease, because the eternal is without qualities. In it there is no one, for if anyone were, he would be differentiated from the Pleroma and would possess qualities which would distinguish him from the Pleroma.

In the Pleroma there is nothing and everything: it is not profitable to think about the Pleroma, for to do that would mean one’s dissolution.

The CREATED WORLD is not in the Pleroma, but in itself. The Pleroma is the beginning and end of the created world.

The Pleroma penetrates the created world as the sunlight penetrates the air everywhere. Although the Pleroma penetrates it completely, the created world has no part of it, just as an utterly transparent body does not become either dark or light in color as the result of the passage of light through it. We ourselves, however, are the Pleroma, so it is that the Pleroma is present within us. Even in the smallest point the Pleroma is present without any bounds, eternally and completely, for small and great are the qualities which are alien to the Pleroma.

The Pleroma is the nothingness which is everywhere complete and without end. It is because of this that I speak of the created world as a portion of the Pleroma, but only in an allegorical sense; for the Pleroma is not divided into portions, for it is nothingness. We, also, are the total Pleroma; for figuratively the Pleroma is an exceedingly small, hypothetical, even non-existent point within us, and also it is the limitless firmament of the cosmos about us. Why, however, do we discourse about the Pleroma, if it is the all, and also nothing?

I speak of it in order to begin somewhere, and also to remove from you the delusion that somewhere within or without there is something absolutely firm and definite. All things which are called definite and solid are but relative, for only that which is subject to change appears definite and solid.

The created world is subject to change. It is the only thing that is solid and definite, since it has qualities. In fact, the created world is itself but a quality.

We ask the question:

How did creation originate? Creatures indeed originated but not the created world itself, for the created world is a quality of the Pleroma, in the same way as the uncreated; eternal death is also a quality of the Pleroma. Creation is always and everywhere, and death is always and everywhere. The Pleroma possesses all: differentiation and non-differentiation.

Differentiation is creation.

The created world is indeed differentiated. Differentiation is the essence of the created world and for this reason the created also causes further differentiation. That is why man himself is a divider, inasmuch as his essence is also differentiation. That is why he distinguishes the qualities of the Pleroma, yea, those qualities which do not exist.

You say to me: What good is it then to talk about this, since it has been said that it is useless to think about the Pleroma?

I say these things to you in order to free you from the illusion that it is possible to think about the Pleroma. When you speak about the divisions of the Pleroma, we are speaking from the position of our own divisions, and we speak about our own differentiated state; but while we do this, we have in reality said nothing about the Pleroma.
However, it is necessary to talk about our own differentiation, for this enables us to discriminate sufficiently.
Our essence is differentiation. For this reason we must distinguish individual qualities.

You say: What harm does it not do to discriminate, for then we reach beyond the limits of our own being; we extend ourselves beyond the created world, and we fall into the undifferentiated state which is another quality of the Pleroma. We submerge into the Pleroma itself, and we cease to be created beings. This we become subject to dissolution and nothingness.

Such is the very death of the created being. We die to the extent that we fail to discriminate. For this reason the natural impulse of the created being is directed toward differentiation and toward the struggle against the ancient, pernicious state of sameness.
The natural tendency is called Principium Individuationis (Principle of Individuation).
This principle is indeed the essence of every created being.
From these things you may readily recognize why the undifferentiated principle and lack of discrimination are all a great danger to created beings.
For this reason we must be able to distinguish the qualities of the Pleroma.
Its qualities are the PAIRS OF OPPOSITES, such as:

the effective and the ineffective
fullness and emptiness
the living and the dead
light and dark
hot and cold
energy and matter
time and space
good and evil
the beautiful and the ugly
the one and the many
and so forth.

The pairs of opposites are the qualities of the Pleroma: they are also in reality non-existent because they cancel each other out.

Since we ourselves are the Pleroma, we also have these qualities present within us; inasmuch as the foundation of our being is differentiation, we possess these qualities in the name and under the sign of differentiation, which means:

First—that the qualities are in us differentiated from each other, and they are separated from each other, and thus they do not cancel each other out, rather they are in action. It is thus that we are the victims of the pairs of opposites. For in us the Pleroma is rent in two.

Second—the qualities belong to the Pleroma, and we can and should partake of them only in the name and under the sign of differentiation. We must separate ourselves from these qualities. In the Pleroma they cancel each other out; in us they do not. But if we know how to know ourselves as being apart from the pairs of opposites, then we have attained to salvation.

When we strive for the good and the beautiful, we thereby forget about our essential being, which is differentiation, and we are victimized by the qualities of the Pleroma which are the pairs of opposites. We strive to attain to the good and beautiful, but at the same time we also to the evil and the ugly, because in the Pleroma these are identical with the good and the beautiful. However, if we remain faithful to our nature, which is differentiation, we then differentiate ourselves from the good and the beautiful, and thus we have immediately differentiated ourselves from the evil and the ugly. It is only thus that we do not merge into the Pleroma, that is, into nothingness and dissolution.

You will object and say to me: Thou hast said that differentiation and sameness are also qualities of the Pleroma. How is it then that we strive for differentiation? Are we not then true to our natures and must we then also eventually be in the state of sameness, while we strive for differentiation?

What you should never forget is that the Pleroma has no qualities.

We are the ones who create these qualities through our thinking.

When you strive after differentiation or sameness or after other qualities, you strive after thoughts which flow to you from the Pleroma, namely thoughts about the non-existent qualities of the Pleroma.
While you run after these thoughts, you fall again into the Pleroma and arrive at differentiation and sameness at the same time. Not your thinking but your being is differentiation.
That is why you should not strive after differentiation and discrimination as you know these, but strive after your true nature.

If you would thus truly strive, you would not need to know anything about the Pleroma and its qualities, and still you would arrive at the true goal because of your nature.

However, because thinking alienates us from our true nature, therefore I must teach knowledge to you, with which you can keep your thinking under control.

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Dr. Jung’s Seven Sermons to the Dead

– Dr. Jaime G. Corvalan, MD, FACS

A page from Dr. Carl Jung's private printing of the Seven Sermons to the Dead
A page from Dr. Carl Jung’s private printing of the Seven Sermons to the Dead

The “Seven Sermons to the Dead,” by the renowned psychologist Dr. Carl Jung, are a collection of mystical, Gnostic texts self-published by the doctor during his lifetime (1916) and distributed only to a select few individuals. The Seven Sermons were initially published as an appendix to his biographical work, “Memories, Dreams and Reflections” in 1962, but have since become identified as a summary of his master work, The Red Book, published only recently in 2009.

The Seven Sermons to the Dead refer, essentially, to the spiritually dead, those who lack the self-knowledge of Gnosis. As such, this collection serves as an excellent primer into Jungian psychology and Gnosticism. In essence, the Seven Sermons to the Dead may be summarized as follows:

  • The “dead” are the spiritually dead, those who have stopped growing into their authentic, higher selves.
  • The spiritually dead no longer question their illusory existence as egos, the facades they project for everyone to see, but instead remain bereft of their true, transcendent identities
  • As the spiritually dead no longer pursue the true calling of their souls, they have become, for all intents and purposes, the living dead

The Seven Sermons to the Dead serve as a reminder of the great truths and maxims one will miss if one continues to plod blindly along in this life, avoiding the inner journey we must take if we wish to connect with our transcendent selves.

Because thinking alienates us from our true nature, therefore I must teach knowledge to you, with which you can keep your thinking under control.

  • That which is endless and eternal has no qualities, because it has all qualities.
  • What you should never forget is that the Pleroma has no qualities.
  • We are the ones who create these qualities through our thinking.
  • The pairs of opposites are the qualities of the Pleroma: they are also in reality non-existent because they cancel each other out.

– Unknown

We will undertake an exploration of each of the Sermons hereafter.