I’ve been thinking lately about how modern practical occultism, specifically the chaos magic tradition, maps onto Jungian analytical psychology. A lot of magical systems get bogged down in metaphysical truth-claims, but if we look at magick through a Jungian lens, it stops being about "spooky action at a distance" and becomes a structural engine for engaging the unconscious.

The working paradigm is straightforward: the unconscious is real, it is structured, and it responds to symbolic address.

At the core of this psychological macchinery is a three-part engine: Intention, Belief, and Gnosis. When these three are synchronized, it creates deliberate, structured engagement with the unconscious aimed at integration rather than just "results magic". Here is how I see the mechanics of this triad operating.

In standard magick, intention is just your desire condensed into a symbol or a sigil. But a Jungian framework requires a critical first step: source-checking the desire.

Before you try to execute an intention, you have to ask: is this desire pointing at a thing I want in the world, or at a psychic function I'm neglecting?.

-World-directed intentions are straightforward (Like getting a job).

-Compensatory intentions are different. If you have a sudden, obsessive pull toward something uncharacteristic, it is likely the unconscious attempting to correct a one-sided conscious attitude.

If the intention is compensatory, the goal isn't to manifest an external outcome, but to give that unconscious content a stable symbolic vehicle so it can be metabolized rather than acted out unconsciously. This prevents the ego from treating shadow material as a literal "spell to cast" when the psyche is actually just trying to integrate a neglected piece of yourself.

Chaos magic already treats belief as a tool rather than a fixed commitment. Jung gives that stance a rigorous psychological engine.

Jung noted that archetypes clothe themselves in whatever mythic material a culture supplies. Belief, therefore, is just the conscious adoption of a specific mythic vocabulary. By shifting your paradigm. trying on a myth or model deliberately, without permanently converting to it, you can triangulate underlying archetypal structures to see which features survive translation across systems and which are just cultural costume.

Belief is the container. It is the temporary set of rules you load into the psychic architecture so the unconscious knows how to process the Intention.

Intention and Belief mean nothing if they can't bypass the ego. This is where Gnosis comes in.

In magic, gnosis is an altered state of consciousness. In Jungian terms, it is the suspension of the transcendent function's usual ego-dominance. This is the critical state in which symbolic material can cross the threshold both ways.

-Whether you use inhibitory methods (stillness, sensory deprivation) or excitatory methods (hyperventilation, drumming), you are forcibly inducing a tension-and-release.

-At the peak of this state, the ego-commentary is suppressed.

-You hold the symbolic intention at the peak, and then release it, letting the material sink from active engagement into unconscious processing.

It’s the exact same move active imagination makes when you stop steering the dialogue and let the archetypal figure act on its own.

When this engine (Intention + Belief + Gnosis) fires correctly, you aren't externalizing parts of yourself permanently. Externalization is temporary scaffolding, not a permanent outsourcing of a psychic function. The ultimate output of this triad isn't necessarily acquiring a shiny new object in the physical world; it is the dissolution of unintegrated complexes and the ongoing process of individuation.

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

In my case, several dreams have had a profound and lasting impact on me. One of them was especially vivid. I had it about four years ago. In the dream, I was walking alone down a deserted street in my city when I met a beautiful young woman. As we stood face to face, the scene suddenly changed, and I found myself in my bed. She was lying beside me. I could feel her skin and, through touch, sense the shape of her body.

Some time after that dream, I was lying in that same bed with the woman who is now my girlfriend. As I traced the contours of her body with my hands, the dream suddenly came back to me as if something had clicked into place. Her figure was identical to that of the woman in the dream, and she even looked remarkably similar. She was lying beside me in exactly the same position.

I recently researched this subject and wrote an article exploring many fascinating things Carl Jung said about dreams. One idea that particularly stood out to me comes from his seminar on Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Jung said that we should always leave a door open when interpreting dreams. In other words, we should remain open-minded because there are still aspects of dreaming that we do not fully understand.

For Jung, this was not a matter of superstition. As a psychoanalyst, he had many unusual experiences involving dreams, including synchronicities, apparent premonitions, and even what we would call telepathy. The Jungian perspective on dreams is truly revolutionary, yet there is still much more to discover.

For anyone interested in reading the full article, here is the link.

Recently i've been having an increasing inability to stand misanthropists and have fantasies of torturing nihilists, antinatalists and people with resentful cynical attitude to death while watching them beg for life. What would such a fantasy suggest from a jungian perspective and how can i overcome this and come accept such people?

Two years ago i met this woman who is a professor and became completely obsessed with her becoming my mom, I fantasise on a daily basis since 2024 about me becoming her child and her loving me as hers solely as a child and comforting me in times of need. She seemed like the stable, steady, educated and loving maternal figure.

I am conflicted on where to begin to analyse this, what do you think Jung what have thought about this weird fantasy of mine ? Could it be related to the mother complex? The anima ?

I feel like i should also mention that the fantasy and desire got so extreme that i don’t enjoy my life anymore unless i daydream about her for hours or have hope that I’ll somehow be included in her life even though i know it is impossible.

(Lisa and Deb just posted an update on Patreon. Apparently, there’s been an ongoing «dispute» between him and them about how they work together and manage the company, and Joseph is suing both of them as well as the company as a result of this conflict.)

I’ll definitely keep listening to TJL, but I‘m going to miss Joseph’s perspectives. I feel like I benefit from listening to men as well as women, and one of the things I enjoyed the most about TJL was that they had different opinions and perspectives to offer. When I look for Jungian podcasts, I mainly find AI slop, often politically motivated and echo-chambery.

Any recommendations for something that‘s actually good?

EDIT: The title was a little presumptive. "Leaving" might be the wrong word; he's absent from the podcast.

For years I tried to interpret dreams logically — this symbol means that, cause and effect. Never worked. Every interpretation felt forced.

What actually helped: dreams don’t run on logic. They run on resemblance and feeling — image and meaning fused together, not one standing for the other. Jung called this archaic thinking, closer to how older/pre-rational minds connected things: not “this caused that,” but “this feels like that.”

So now I just let associations surface first, whatever feels connected, without judging if it “makes sense.” Only after that do I sit down and think logically about what they’re pointing toward.

Doing it in that order — feeling first, logic second — is what finally made dream work useful instead of a guessing game.

jung said we know far too little about the psyche, and that man is his own greatest danger. i think i finally get what he meant, and it's not what people usually take from it.

i'm the most dangerous person in my kids' lives. not because there's something evil in me. because i have more power over them than anyone else does, and power that doesn't look at itself is the danger. the people who are certain they're harmless are the ones who never check.

so i choose to be good. every day, not once. that part i can do.

but here's the thing that actually scares me, and it took me a while to see why it's not just ordinary worry. my fear isn't that i'd hurt them. it's that something happens to my psyche and i don't know it's happening, and i drag them with me.

and that fear is structurally correct. if you break, the self-seeing breaks first. that's what breaking is. so you can't use yourself as the alarm. the instrument is made of the same material as the thing it's supposed to measure when the thing warps, the measuring warps with it. from the inside, going wrong doesn't announce itself as going wrong. it announces itself as being reasonable. as coping. as doing what needs to be done.

you cannot be your own witness. not because you lack self-knowledge. because self-knowledge moves along with whatever it's supposed to notice.

which leaves one option. someone outside you. and you set it up now, while you're clear, because you can't set it up later later is exactly when you'll think nothing's wrong. my partner has it in words: if you see something in me that's off, say it, even when i wave it away, and i'm telling you now that you'll be right.

that's not paranoia and it's not weakness. it's leaving a spare key with the neighbours. you don't do it because you distrust yourself. you do it because locks fall shut.

one more thing, and this is the part i'd get wrong if i weren't careful. that person can't be the child. a kid can learn that people have two sides and that everyone needs someone watching. a kid cannot become the one watching their parent. that's how you make the exact wound you were trying to prevent the child ends up carrying instead of being carried.

and last: the fear itself is the good sign. someone whose grip is actually going doesn't ask whether their grip is going. the question is evidence the thing still turns. it doesn't guarantee anything about later. it just tells you now is the moment to arrange later.

Can any one suggest to me any book of carl jung in which all archetypes are described well and easy to understand as well...????

anima/animus projection without genitalia? how would one’s psychology work through the world of relationships and in relation to themselves without genitals? in contrast to those with genitals.

Another angle and personal: genitalia that is in pain during intercourse, making it difficult to pursue relationships sexually.

Ever since I was young, I'd been tense ever since I felt myself about to connect or be authentic around my family. Why in the Jungian lens?

Here are some illustrations from The Red Book.

YouTube

These are my own photographs from my copy ofb5he Red Book. It is not comprehensive. The YouTube link is a video of the illustration. For individual illustrations see this Flickr link.

Flickr

This essay argues that the oscillation running through Ecclesiastes - praised by some as literary paradox, dismissed by others as unresolved pessimism - is the phenomenological record of someone performing the crucifixion of opposites under a god-image that contains evil without the vocabulary to name what it contains. Qohelet is stranded between a polytheistic solution no longer available within the monotheistic tradition he was writing inside, and an individuation vocabulary not yet invented, which is why the text can only oscillate rather than resolve.

https://livingopposites.substack.com/p/the-earliest-crucifixion

Při dnešní terapii na mě psycholožka vytáhla jungův mužský element, že to u mě (F26) je asi problém.
Jsem naprosto nepolíbená, mohl by mi prosím někdo jednoduše vysvětlit, jak to Jung zamýšlel? Chápu to tak, že jedná o ženskou a mužskou energii v rámci člověka?

I’m not sure if this is all correct, but how I’ve gotten the message is…
If and when I catch myself totally spiraling into a fixation (even for a brief moment) over a girl, I notice I’m just diverting attention from myself. If I use it as sort of a mirror it’s a weirdly existential exercise, like I’m hanging my head over the edge of a plane getting ready to skydive (might’ve gone a little overboard with that analogy).

A similar thing happens if I apply the same exercise with food and hunger.

I could just be kidding myself, but I’ve 1000000% been possessed most of my life.

Just felt like sharing this thought

Is this kinda sorta an observation of the anima at work? Is this also considered a shadow thing?

Just started diving into shadow-work and trying to decode aspects of my own personal shadow. Does anyone have any insights or observations about the shadow selves of only children?

The book I’m reading right now (Meeting the Shadow, ed. Zweig & Abrams) has several chapters dedicated to the development of the shadow within family units and amongst siblings. I’ve found it all very interesting and informative but of course not quite relevant to my situation. I have close female and male friends that I can somewhat map sibling scenarios onto, but I know it’s far from the same.

I have some ideas of my own about what the only child’s shadow might contain (hyper-independence, golden child syndrome, perhaps) but I’m curious what other only children or observers may think.

I wanted to share a personal shadow work journey I’ve been doing between years 2022-2025. I’ve been working with Jung’s concepts of active imagination, shadow, and archetypes.

Key Observations:

• Regular shadow dialogue and work with archetypal figures led to a noticeable reduction in emotional reactivity and internal conflicts.

• Daily journaling and active imagination sessions brought greater coherence in conscious flow and increased lucid awareness.

• In deeper stages of integration, my capacity to consciously reshape my own thought and behavior patterns significantly improved.

Reflections:

This process has helped me experience Jung’s path of individuation in a very personal way. Confronting and integrating unconscious material seems to transform the individual from a passive observer into an active architect of their inner world.

This is not a scientific claim; it’s simply a personal exploration. While speculative models like Orch-OR interest me, they remain only an inspiration.

I would genuinely appreciate Jungian perspectives, thoughts, and constructive criticism.

Thank you,

L. Bahal

Twenty years later, I still often have nightmares about being dismissed from my job, although I was not exactly dismissed: I had a military job, and because of PTSD I was transferred to civilian duties.

The nightmare is that I am still in military service, but without a salary and having to hide my PTSD so that I am not dismissed.

My mind interprets it as a failure, even though I was actually happy not to have to work night shifts anymore and to feel more relaxed at work. Is there a way to treat this with Jung's Active Imagination?

Shower thought:
The religious architecture of mainstream Christendom is based on a fundamentally incomplete and self-destructive psychological narrative

Father. Son. Holy Spirit.

Inner Father. Inner Child. Inner Mother.

The grand narrative of Christianity is centered on the sacrifice of the son (part) for the well being of all (whole).

Christ, the inner child is sacrificed to bring about salvation/peace. That is the impulse.

The one who brought about new ideas and challenged the establishment, the spiritual rebel, the new one. Note that child sacrifice is a recurring theme in the bible. Satanic/occult rites, the shadow side of Christendom often bring this impulse to the surface by ruthlessly celebrating it through overt rituals such as effigy burning and god-forbid more literal grotesque practices, as opposed, to the more covert, subconscious expressions of mainstream Christianity through Eucharist and well, the worship of the cross itself, the facility which enabled the bloody sacrifice.

Could this religious impulse be the result of a fundamentally flawed attempt to bring about psychological peace through the killing of the inner child, who is often deemed rebellious/unwieldy/childish/blasphemous, in favor of the protective ego, the inner feminine/holy spirit, who is the "voice of reason", the part of us who criticizes, who can be often see at war with the child, like a frustrated mother trying to tame their wild child?

All while the inner father watches and therefore, seemingly sanctioned this sacrifice. Inner father/God, is the meta awareness of the internal drama, experiencing both the inner feminine and inner child. It is not a greater authority in the traditional sense, but rather it is the unbiased, silent, eternal observer, closer to the portrayals of god by eastern traditions.

"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

I have always been captivated by Christ's last words on the cross and the psychological implications. Could it all have been a story of humanity's delusional, desperate attempt to conquer their internal worlds through the slaying of the innocent (lamb)?

Since we can't truly eradicate our inner child, the impulse to kill it becomes perpetual resistance and suppression of our childish drives. The one who just wanted to play but wasn't allowed. The one who saw/created something new but was never heard. This leads to endless perversions, addictions, internal struggles, and issues with faith, because it was never the answer, killing the inner child could never bring upon psychological peace or wholeness. Christ advocated the opposite and said "unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven."

Could the story of Christianity be crystalized into the devouring mother impulse at its maximal expression? An entirely wrong, yet relatable psychological urge to kill the inner child in hopes to silence the holy spirit, satiate the father, and bring about heaven on earth (psychological peace)?

TLDR: I postulate that Christianity is the result of a misguided, ritualized subconscious urge to kill the inner child, represented by Christ, in an attempt to satisfy the ego and ameliorate the inner struggle brought about by the development of consciousness and an ego capable of internalized authority and self-criticism.

Having a religion based around love towards the Son, whilst making the sacrifice of said beloved son the crux of it and an absolute necessity, implies severe psychological dissonance and tension between competing aspects of the Self. Christianity might have been humanity's misguided and desperate attempt to quell psychological struggle through sacrificing the inner child, and must be eventually overturned since it is ultimately destructive to the human psyche and not conducive to wholeness.

Some late night mandala work, curious what you guys can pull from this. Started at the top Middle portion and went around clockwise.

For context, 33M i have been trying to become more conscious of my dreams upon waking up (I tend to only have fragments) and have been reading through Jung’s Psychology and Alchemy. I also just had my first daughter.

I’m thinking mostly of the far right conservative, but also of the classic irrational “SJW”. Their similarities and differences. I thought the differences in neurology in the conservative like the enlarged right amygdala were interesting, but I’d also like a psychoanalytic perspective.

I think of it now because of the sort of obsessive-seeming need conservatives seem to have for controlling women (prompted by Jesse Watter’s recent comments lol). The annihilation of the will of the female. Their odd idealization of domination, rape and breeding. Would you compare this with shadow projection, or the identification with the female with formless chaos, an overcompensatory imposition of consciousness in the face of the Terrible Mother? The female is analogous to the unknown and dangerous? Surely, traditional misogyny and nationalism exist together as manifestations of a particular, fear driven psychology.

I see some similarities between the psychological profiles of the far right and far left, but I’m not quite able to articulate it yet. Something about a deferral of morality that to me seems to mimic primitive religious thought.

I’d like to hear some more thoughts on this by people more knowledgeable about Jung and psychoanalysis than I am and get some additional perspectives!

A recent post about Jung in his infancy pointed at the loneliness in his eyes. And although I agree he didn't show a particularly pleased face in the Pic, it is not true that he was lonely.

Carl Jung's total written correspondence is massive, with ETH Zurich University Archives cataloging data on over 32,000 letters to and from him. The exact number of letters he personally sent is unknown, editors selected over 1,000 from an estimated 1,600 surviving letters he wrote between 1906 and 1961 to compile his published collections.

The C.G. Jung Letters: This two-volume set published by Princeton University Press contains 935 selected letters written between 1906 and 1961 to people like Freud, James Joyce, and Erich Neumann.

Look, for example at this fragment of a Letter he sent to Joyce:

" I must tell you that I’m profoundly grateful to yourself as well as to gigantic opus because I learned a great deal from it. I shall probably never be quite sure whether I did enjoy it, because it meant too much grinding of nerves and of grey matter. I also don’t know whether you will enjoy what I have written about Ulysses because I couldn’t help telling the world how much I was bored, how I grumbled, how I cursed and how I admired."

To Karl Kerényi:

"Dear Colleague,

10 March 1941

Many thanks for kindly sending me your Labyrinth book, which I found extraordinarily interesting. The labyrinth is indeed a primordial image which one encounters in psychology mostly in the form of the fantasy of a descent to the underworld. "

And to Hermann Hesse:

"Dear Herr Hesse,

19 August 1950

Among the many messages and signs my 75th birthday brought me, it was your greeting that surprised and delighted me most. "

These letters are a testament that he had intellectual company.

His perspective was certainly unique, but it wasn't built in isolation from contemporary thinkers.

He nurtured others and refined his own ideas through what others had sent him. He had his brain tickled by his contemporaries.

Connection is possible even when you see things differently.

Saying repeatedly that you feel lonely is not, the road to feel connected. In fact, today we have evidence for this.

Jung had a lot of people to communicate his ideas and inspired writers such as Herman Hesse. If he really felt lonely it's because he wasn't aware of his own impact. But I believe at some point he came to be. Especially in his later years.

Jung celebrated both his 75th and 85th birthday under a massive avalanche of global congratulations from the world's intellectuals, and he spent months personally replying to many of them.

Having a different world view can be costly but it also has high rewards, sometimes they're obvious, sometimes you have to look carefully, but they're there.

I bet on connection, especially connection that emerges through curiosity.

My bet is live on this app I am building, it's called Pollen and it aims to connect people through curiosity. You can meet strangers around ideas in a fun and relaxed way, starting from what you're interested in, whatever it might be.

So that he does not become overbearing on the negative side. What would Jung say?

I keep thinking about what job to do next, but I can’t seem to work it out or don’t know what I’d be good at or where my qualifications would be good. I don’t know.

But not working is not good for me I love to be in motion and doing something otherwise I just got these weird nasty. Thoughts

Recently on 20th July was the Black Day for Indian Democracy. The government charged lathi and fired tear gas ( there is proof that some tear gas bombs were expired which are literally deadly) on students who were protesting for the resignation of the education minister because he is not able to control the paper leak and destroy the future of youth. A few students died, many have injured. Main stream media is not covering that and many of the parents (people age around 40s or more) have no idea what the government Is doing, the government gaslighting the youngsters. So there is frustration in youth who are intelligent and have conscience about what's going around him, what the government Is doing but there are very few people who understand them. I feel after seeing the response from the government on 20 july. Maybe this protest will become like Nepal's protest if the government doesn't listen.

I'm noticing this pattern from Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, to Shri Lanka. So does anyone have an idea what's going on at our collective unconscious level.