Jung’s Theory of Personality #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone and welcome to my letter J post in the #AtoZChallenge. On Monday, I discussed Freud, so it follows almost naturally that I’d be talking about Jung as well.

Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), like Freud, postulated that the human psyche consists of both an unconscious and a conscious part. He, however, believed that the unconscious consists of two parts: the personal unconscious (which is similar to Freud’s unconscious) and the collective unconscious, which includes archetypes universal to all humans.

The personal unconscious includes all of an individual’s acquired information that influences a person’s behavior but that has been forgotten or repressed. For clarity’s sake, it is not always negative. I think of this as the fact that positive triggers (also known as glimmers) are a thing too.

Jung says that the personal unconscious includes “complexes”, that is, associated collections of information that influence a person’s behavior.

The collective unconscious is mainly expressed in art, religion and other symbolic representations. It also shows up in dreams. The collective unconscious is universal. This is apparent from the fact that, as Jung observed in his interactions with psychotic patients in a mental hospital, there are certain underlying themes common to their dreams. According to Jung, the archetypes present in the collective unconscious, are the same for everyone across cultures and time periods. These archetypes, for example, include the Mother, the Hero, the Child, the Trickster, etc. I can’t help but notice how some of these are traditionally gendered.

Jung also believed people have a dominant attitude towards life: introversion or extraversion. They also have a dominant function, be it feeling, thinking, intuition or sensing. As such, Jung believed there are eight different personality types. As I’ve shared a few times, current thinking says that most people are not one type, but exist somewhere along a continuum.

Introversion: How to Know If You’re an Introvert #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. Today in my contribution to the #AtoZChallenge, I want to talk about introversion. This, like being a highly sensitive person, is another trait that’s often described in a positive, special-sounding way by those who identify with it and as a negative trait by those who don’t. Of course, as with most traits, introversion vs. extraversion is a continuum with most people not being at either extreme.

So what is introversion? The concept was originally brought into the public’s awareness by Carl Jung. According to Jung, introverts’ main source of energy comes from within rather than from the external world. For example, introverts get energized when alone and get overloaded when having to interact in a group.

It is not, as such, the same as shyness or social anxiety. Introverts, after all, do not necessarily fear interacting with others; it simply drains their energy.

Introversion is also not the same as loneliness. In fact, introverts need considerable time alone in order to recharge. I think many introverts actually feel more alone when surrounded by a large group of people than when they’re spending time in solitude.

Like I said, most people are neither explicitly introverted nor explicitly extraverted. For example, I for one get overstimulated in a group, but also don’t do well when alone for a long time. Like I said when discussing the Enneagram, my instinctual variant is one-to-one. That being said, preferring one-to-one interactions over group chatter is also a sign of introversion.

In other respects, I’m not really an introvert. This, once again, however relates to the positive traits of being an introvert. For example, introverts prefer to have one or two truly close friends rather than a large circle of acquaintances. While this is true for me, it’s not like I form deep connections easily.

Most societies in the developed world tend to value their more extraverted members. In this sense, it is understandable that introverts want to know how to deal with the world around them, a world that doesn’t primarily cater to them. For this reason, as with HSPs, there are many self-help books focused on introverts. There is also some overlap between being an introvert and being a highly sensitive person.