Carl Gustav Jung was a Swiss psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and the founder of analytical psychology. For years, Jung worked closely with Sigmund Freud, who even called him “his adopted eldest son”, but significant differences in the content of their work led to a separation. Due to the split, Jung developed his own version of psychoanalytic theory.
Even though Jung’s work isn’t as popular as Freud’s, it influenced various of study, including psychiatry, anthropology, literature, and philosophy.
And if you’re open to expanding your mind, there’s a lot you can learn from his teachings. The following lessons, in particular, could help improve your ability to think outside the box, and change your life for the better.
“The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no universal recipe for living.”
The world is full of people who try to convince you that their way of living life is the best or only acceptable way of doing it. And they’re so wrong.
Life is rich and colorful and every single day, you have millions of opportunities to chose from. While some decisions might be smarter than others, there is no universal right or wrong.
Each of us is different; we all have different goals, aspirations, fears, and hopes. There is no way of saying this is the best way to live your life. The only rule worth keeping in mind is staying true to yourself and living life on your own terms.
How to apply it:
Don’t let anyone dictate how you live your life. Nobody’s walking your path and no one knows what’s best for you.
Your entire life is a daring adventure and you’ll only find out what you can achieve if you’re brave enough to explore it yourself.
“I’m not what happened to me, I’m what I choose to become.”
Your life is not defined by what happens to you, but by how you deal with it.
A great story to visualize this powerful lesson is the parable of the egg, potato, and coffee beans:
If you put each of them in boiling water for long enough, the potato will become soft and weak, the egg will become hard, and the coffee beans will change the water to something entirely new.
You can view the boiling water as the challenges you face in your day to day life. No matter how big or small these challenges might seem, you can always choose how you react to them.
You can be a soft potato or an egg that becomes even stronger through storms. Or you choose to be adaptable just like the coffee beans and make the most out of the challenges you face.
How to apply it:
Life can be tough, but so can you.
Even if you face challenging situations, it’s always up to you to choose your reaction and who you become through these challenges.
Don’t try to fight obstacles. Embrace them and be adaptable, just like the coffee beans. Change is inevitable anyway, so it’s better to make the most out of it instead of fighting through it.
The greatest gift you have in life is your freedom to choose who you want to be. Choose wisely.
“That which you most need will be found where you least want to look.”
This quote is rooted in a branch of Ancient Philosophy called “Alchemy,” and is quoted as “In filth, it will be found.”, but Jung used this phrase frequently, particularly referring to filth as our unconscious.
Depending on your path, there might be many things in life that will be easy to achieve. You might play to your strengths and use the advantages you have over others. You might even be able to use resources that are exclusively available to you.
But if you want to dig deeper, you’ll always find a place where you don’t want to go. And if you feel stuck, that’s probably the place where you most need to go.
Whenever we start something new, we feel small and helpless. Being a pro is always more fun than being a beginner. But the former isn’t possible without the latter.
How to apply it:
If what you’re doing isn’t working, you probably need to go where you didn’t go yet. Sometimes, the solution to our problems is to go where we feel most uncomfortable and to do what feels most painful.
Life is a constant battle between using your strengths wisely and working on your flaws.
Sometimes, you just need to get out there and confront the unknown, no matter how fearful you feel. If something doesn’t push you to your limits, you probably won’t gain much from it.
“You are what you do, not what you say you’ll do.”
Most people spend more time talking about what they’ll one day do than actually doing it. Procrastination is easy; taking action and producing actual results is the hard part.
Yet, life is so much more fun if you achieve your goals instead of just talking about them.
While visualizing your goals can be a great way to increase your motivation, studies show that there’s also a downside. Researchers at the New York University found that visualizing the achievement of your goals creates an emotion that is similar to having it achieved.
While this might be motivating, it can also lead to the contrary: If you already feel as if you’ve reached your goal, you might feel less pressure to take action.
Long story short: Knowing what you want and having a vision are essential, but if you spend more time visualizing and talking about your goals than taking action, you might lose motivation.
How to apply it:
Reduce the time you spend talking about the stuff you will do and spend more time doing it. Instead of wasting your time and energy by talking about ideas, invest it in planning and executing.
“Your visions will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.”
Too often, we suppress our most profound desires because we’re afraid to share them openly. Yet, a fulfilled and happy life is only possible if we can dig deep and open up our darkest sides.
So many young people are afraid to follow their dreams and instead choose careers and life decisions their parents suggest. However, by looking at the outside, you can only satisfy others, not yourself.
One of the five biggest regrets of dying people is: I wish I dared to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
You only have one life. And you don’t even know whether you’ll wake up tomorrow. Instead of wasting your time by scratching the surface and living up to others’ expectations, start following your heart and nurturing your soul.
How to apply it:
As Paulo Coelho once said:
“You have to take risks. We will only understand the miracle of life fully when we allow the unexpected to happen.”
Listening to your heart and following your inner desires is always a risk. But to live an extraordinary life, you need to be courageous and take that risk.
By focusing on your inside, you can live the life of your dreams. By following the expectations of others, however, you might end up with a life and career you don’t even enjoy.
“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darkness of other people.”
Too often, we run away from our darkest sides and try to hide them. Yet, what we deeply need is getting to know these parts of ourselves and embracing them just like the bright sides.
Knowing your fears, regrets, and deepest desires can help you to create a life you truly enjoy. Not only will it help you to deal better with the shadow of others, but also with new challenges that might come up in your own life.
How to apply it:
Spend more time with yourself.
The better you know yourself, the stronger you’ll be when facing challenges and supporting your fellows.
While there are many exercises and tools that help you be more aware of your strengths, it’s even more powerful to know your darkest sides.
“The greatest and most important problems of life are all fundamentally insoluble. They can never be solved but only outgrown.”
How often did you feel helpless because you couldn’t solve a challenge that probably was insoluble at all?
Accepting our struggles isn’t comfortable, but quite often, it’s the best way to deal with difficult problems.
You don’t need to find a solution to every challenge you face. Sometimes, you need to be adaptable and some other times, you just need to accept the situation as it is.
How to apply it:
With every challenge you face, you have at least three opportunities:
- You can try to solve the problem.
- You can adapt yourself, your goals, or your mindset.
- Or you can just accept the fact that shit happens and move on.
“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves. “
Whenever you find yourself being angry or disappointed by the behavior of someone else, ask yourself why you feel those emotions.
Quite often, the mistakes we see in others represent our own flaws.
While judging others is easy, it’s hard to look at the mirror and accept our own mistakes.
How to apply it:
Be more aware of how you react to the behaviors of your fellows: If you’re not comfortable because of their words or actions, ask yourself why that’s the case.
In most cases, we’re irritated not because of the action itself but because we got reminded of our own fears or weaknesses. Being aware of these triggers is the first step to solving them and being more carefree.
Bottom Line
While Carl Jung’s teachings aren’t as popular as Freud’s, there’s a lot we can learn from his fundamental lessons. Even though archetypes, the unconscious mind, and analytical psychology, in general, are complex fields, these quotes can be simple yet powerful guides to living richer, more honest lives.
- There’s no universal recipe for living: What might be the best way to live life for someone else might be a disaster for you. Don’t trust anyone who’s trying to convince you of their view of the world. Build your own rules.
- Sometimes, you need to go where you least wanna go: The solutions to your most profound problems might be hidden in the darkest places. Don’t be afraid of digging deeper and exploring the unknown.
- You can be a potato, an egg, or a coffee bean: You’re not what happens to you but what you choose to become.
- Stop talking, start doing: You’re not what you say you’ll do but what you actually do. Or, as Nike states: Just do it.
- Looking at the outside won’t ever lead to a satisfying life: Instead, look inside your own heart — what is it that you really want?
- Knowing your own darkness will help you to deal with the darkness of others: Spending more time with yourself is the best exercise to better understand others.
- You don’t need to solve every problem: Sometimes, you can outgrow or just accept them.
- If someone irritates you, it might be because of your own flaws: Ask yourself why you feel triggered by other’s misbehavior.