Collective Unconscious

The rainmaker and the dream of drought

Jung was fond of telling a story of a drought being broken in a village in China by a Taoist rainmaker.[1] I share the story and some further thoughts on it in the light of the current drought and impending day zero in the Cape. There was a great drought where [Richard] Wilhelm lived; for months there had not been a drop of rain and the situation became catastrophic. The Catholics made processions, the Protestants made prayers, and the Chinese...

The “Collective Unconscious” and its value for psychotherapy

This article locates, defines, and evaluates Jung’s contribution to psychoanalysis of the Collective Unconscious or “Objective Psyche” and its use a tool in psychotherapy. This is a copy of a lecture given by Stephen Anthony Farah at the University of Pretoria on the 9th of September 2015.   Introduction Carl Gustav Jung, (1875 – 1961), the Swiss psychiatrist and academic, was an early and key collaborator of Freud’s; and at one time the heir apparent to the psychoanalytic legacy. He made a big...