Existential–Jungian Analysis: Reconciling the Personal and Archetypal Realms in the Consulting Room

Abstract

C. G. Jung’s openness to the transcendent nature of the psyche has appealed to those seeking an alternative to the more ego-centered approach promoted by traditional Freudian psychoanalysis. Yet despite the significant philosophical implications of Jung’s ideas, he always emphasized their pragmatic and clinical nature: helping grapple with neuroses/psychoses and sundry symptoms borne of mental conflict. While abstract concepts from analytical psychology provide a useful schema to make sense of suffering, such theoretical conceptualizations can, when dogmatically misapplied in the consulting room, permit both analyst and patient to by-pass the concrete existential reality of the analytic relationship. The ability and willingness to be fully present to the angst of both patient and “self-as-therapist” is perhaps the most essential aspect of existential psychotherapy. In this article, the authors propose a concordance between existentialist and Jungian approaches that positions the work of analysis as a creative engagement with patients’ subjective experiences without avoiding or diminishing the here-and-now experience of the therapeutic encounter, arguing that such cross-fertilization could offer an integrative form of treatment more faithful to the unique existence of each individual and analytic pair than either approach on its own.