ABOUT US

Phoenix Friends of C.G. Jung is an educational non-profit organization founded in 1984.

ABOUT C.G. JUNG

Carl Gustav Jung (1875 - 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst. He was one of the founders of analytical psychology, which seeks to create a conversation and relationship with the unconscious. Jung found that working with symbols – in patients’ dreams, artwork or other life experiences – was a gateway to uncovering the unconscious material and energies.  By integrating these symbols over a lifetime, one can aim for individuation, or “wholeness.” 

Although perhaps most known for his partnership and eventual break from Sigmund Freud, Jung was the creator of many of our commonly-known psychological concepts: the extraverted and introverted personality types, projection and complexes, the shadow, archetypes and the collective unconscious, active imagination, the powerful transformation of religious and spiritual experiences and synchronicity.

Jung’s ideas and theories have influenced many scholars and creatives. Among them are Joseph Campbell, Wolfgang Pauli, Katherine Cook Briggs, Isabel Briggs Myers, Robert Bly, Jordan Peterson, Herman Hessee and the Korean Pop band BTS. A variety of today’s psychological and therapeutic practices and structures stem from Jung’s work, such as dream analysis and interpretation, the principles of Alcoholics Anonymous, art and dance therapy, career and vocational counseling, personality tests and archetypal tarot. 

In Jung’s study of the human psyche, he drew from his medical training, as well as archaeology, mythology, literature, art, philosophy, astrology and alchemy. His theories encourage holding the tension of opposites and recognizing the transpersonal nature of the world. In sum, he said, “For in all chaos, there is a cosmos, in all disorder, a secret order.”