Nietzsche and Jung: The Whole Self in the Union of Opposites..

[Lyfing]

Nietzsche and Jung: The Whole Self in the Union of Opposites..

I shall argue that, for Nietzsche and Jung, the goal or height of human health and potential is the realization of the whole self, which they refer to as the ‘Übermensch’ and ‘Self’ respectively.6 This achievement is marked by creativity, which is achieved by the cultivation and balance of all antithetical psychological impulses – both rational and irrational – within the personality, and it is in this sense that I shall refer to the whole self as a union of opposites. Specifically, the whole self comprises the dynamic syntheses of Apollinian and Dionysian impulses in the Nietzschean Übermensch, and consciousness and the unconscious in the Jungian Self. When the opposites fail to synthesize, or when only one opposite in the pair is present, Nietzsche and Jung warn of impending psychological damage.

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...Nietzsche consolidates Jungian theory, and he does so in a twofold way: in supporting its insistence on harnessing the creative energy of the unconscious, by seeking its affective communication through the symbol, and in reinforcing its warning of not impeding unconscious communication by addressing it through the reductive conscious terms of the sign.

Through our examination of Jung’s critique of Nietzsche’s model of the whole self, we have seen that Jung failed to listen to his own warning. Through the example of Nietzsche, we see that Jung must learn not to constrict the symbol – not to have preconceptions of what can and cannot count as a symbol. Jung’s misunderstanding of Nietzsche rests on the interpretation that Nietzsche’s notion of the Will to Power is merely a conscious invention, merely a sign, when in fact it functions as a symbol within Nietzsche’s model. Through Nietzsche, Jung is taught a lesson of his own: not to reduce the symbol to theoretical conception, but instead to consider it in its own terms and allow it to work itself out, so that its creative power can be fully – or wholly – experienced.

Later,
-Lyfing