Graduate Research Library: A Library Guide to Jung's Collected Works: Self

Reference publications: Self

"Self, The (Analytical Psychology)" In International dictionary of psychoanalysis by Joseph L. Henderson; de Mijolla; Alain de Mijolla (Ed.)
Call Number: Ladera: REF RC501.4.D4313
ISBN: 9780028659947
Publication Date: 2005

"Jung originally defined his concept, "the Self," (Selbst), as follows:
"As an empirical concept, the Self designates the whole range of psychic phenomena in man. It expresses the unity of the personality as a whole. But insofar as the total personality, because of its unconscious component, can only be partly conscious, the concept of the Self is, in part, only potentially empirical and is to that extent a postulate. In other words, it encompasses both the experienceable and the unexperienceable (or the not-yet experienced). From an intellectual point of view it is only a working hypothesis. Its empirical symbols, on the other hand, very often possess a distinct numinosity, that is, an emotional value. It thus proves to be an archetypal idea . . . which differs from other ideas of the kind in that it occupies a central position befitting the significance of its content and numinosity." [“Definitions: Self” CW 6, para. 789.] [Read more]
"Self" In A critical dictionary of Jungian analysis by Samuels, A., Shorter, B., & Plaut, F.
Call Number: BF173.J85 S275 1986
Publication Date: 1986
Self: "An archetypal image of man's fullest potential and the unity of the personality as a whole. The self as a unifying principle within the human psyche occupies the central position of authority in relation to psychological life and, therefore, the destiny of the individual. At times lung speaks of the self as initiatory of psychic life; at other times he refers to its realisation as the goal. He stressed this was an empirical concept and not a philosophical or theological formulation but the similarity of his views and a religious hypothesis have needed clarification. One cannot consider the concept of the self apart from its similarity to a God-image and, consequently, analytical psychology has been confronted both by those who welcome acceptance of it as an acknowledgment of man's religious nature and others, whether doctors, scientists or religious dogmatists, who find such a psychological formulation unacceptable." [Read more]
"Self" In Jung lexicon: A primer of terms & concepts by Sharp, D. (Ed.).
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Call Number: BF109.J8S53 1991
ISBN: 0919123481
Publication Date: 1991
Available as a free download from the publisher
Self: "The archetype of wholeness and the regulating center of the psyche; a transpersonal power that transcends the ego. [...] Like any archetype, the essential nature of the self is unknowable, but its manifestations are the content of myth and legend." (Sharp, 1991)
"The self appears in dreams, myths, and fairytales in the figure of the “supraordinate personality,” such as a king, hero, prophet, saviour, etc., or in the form of a totality symbol, such as the circle, square, quadratura circuli, cross, etc. When it represents a complexio oppositorum, a union of opposites, it can also appear as a united duality, in the form, for instance, of tao as the interplay of yang and yin, or of the hostile brothers, or of the hero and his adversary (arch-enemy, dragon), Faust and Mephistopheles, etc. Empirically, therefore, the self appears as a play of light and shadow, although conceived as a totality and unity in which the opposites are united." [“On the Nature of the Psyche,” CW 8, p. 223, para. 430.] [Read more]

"Jungian Self" In Encyclopedia of psychology and religion (3rd ed.) by J. Pittman McGehee; David A. Leeming (Ed.)
ISBN: 9783030243470
Publication Date: 2020
"The Self for Jung was the archetype of wholeness and the organizing principle of the psyche. In volume 12, paragraph 44 of his Collected Works, he writes: 'The self is not only the centre, but also the whole circumference which embraces both conscious and unconscious; it is the centre of this totality, just as the ego is the centre of consciousness'" (1953/1970).
"Self" In Encyclopedia of psychology and religion (3rd ed.) by Ann Casement
ISBN: 9780387718026
Publication Date: 2020
Self: "Self lies at the heart of Jung’s conceptualizing on the structure and dynamics of the psyche. He first encountered the Self in mid-life during the turbulent years of 1916–1918 while undergoing his “creative illness” following the difficult breakdown of his relationship with Freud. As a result, Jung took mid-life to be universal for experiences of the Self to come into being, a view that has been contested by later analytical psychologists. Jung’s definition of the Self is that it is the totality of the psyche as well as being the prime archetype that keeps the psyche from disintegrating at times of stress. Furthermore, it transcends and goes beyond psyche.” (p. 827) [Read more]

"The Self" In The handbook of Jungian psychology by Warren Colman; R. Papadopoulos (Ed.)
Call Number: BF173 .H333 2006
Publication Date: 2012
The Self: "Since Jung viewed the self as both the centre and the totality of the psyche, it has a strong claim to be regarded as the central concept of his entire psychology. The self is the goal towards which the process of individuation strives. It represents psychic wholeness and the process by which self division may be healed. The psychology of the self is also the psychology of religious experience. Jung's work on the self is at the heart of his investigations into the religious function of the psyche and the varying ways that this has manifested in the historical consciousness of the West. From the early 1920s onwards, he drew frequent comparisons between the self and the divine and, especially in his later work, emphasised that `the spontaneous symbols of the self, or of wholeness, cannot in practice be distinguished from a God-image' (Jung 1951: p. 40, para. 73). Jung thus regards God-images as symbolic representations of the self." (p. 827) [Read more]
"Self" in A guided tour of the Collected Works of C. G. Jung by Robert H. Hopcke
Call Number: REF BF173 .J85 H66
ISBN: 9781570624056
Publication Date: 1999
"For Jung, the individual ego complex not only exists in relationship to other complexes of the psyche but draws its stability and growth from larger, more complete sense of human wholeness, which Jung saw as archetypically based. This archetype of wholeness he termed the self. While the editors of the Collected Works do not capitalize self, whether referring to the archetype or simply to one's individual ego -leaving it to the context of the passage to indicate which meaning was intended - in English the convention has since developed of referring to the individual ego as the self, with a lowercases, and the archetype as the Self, with a capital S. The capitalization of Self in its archetypal denotation is as much for clarity of terminology as for psychological reasons, since the Self is just that, in Jung's view: the archetype of a supraordinate, organizing principle of psychic selfhood." [Read more]
"Self" in C. G. Jung's Collected Works: The basics by Ann Yeoman and Kevin Lu
ISBN: 9781317213093
Publication Date: 2024
"As Jung was emerging from his creative illness towards the end of the First World War, he started every morning to sketch a mandala corresponding to his “inner situation at the time. With the help of these drawings I could observe my psychic transformations from day to day” (1961/63, p. 195). Jung drew countless mandalas between 1918 and 1920, asking himself what might be the goal of this process that he felt compelled to continue. He began to realise that what the mandala symbolised “corresponds to the microcosmic nature of the psyche,” and, evoking Goethe’s Faust, Jung characterised the dynamic process of the psyche as continuous “Formation, Transformation, Eternal Mind’s eternal recreation. And that is the [S]elf, the wholeness of the personality […] It is the exponent of all paths. It is the path to the center, to individuation. […] There is no linear evolution; there is only a circumambulation of the [S]elf ”." (p. 146-147)." [Read more]

Self [index term]. In General Index to the Collected Works of C. G. Jung (Vol. 20).
Publication Date: 1979
An exceptionally comprehensive index by paragraph numbers. Certain subjects are treated in separate sub-indexes within the General Index. These include alchemy, animals, the Bible, colors, Freud, Jung, and numbers.

Jung on the Self

Jung's essays on the Self from the Collected Works:

The Self (pp. 23-35)

Jung, C. G. (1968). The Self (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 09ii. Aion (2nd ed., pp. 23-35). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1951) https://doi.org/10.1515/978140085094
Christ, a Symbol of the Self

Jung, C. G. (1968). Christ, a Symbol of the Self (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 09ii. Aion (2nd ed., pp. 36-71). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1951) https://doi.org/10.1515/978140085094
A study in the process of individuation (pp. 290-354)
Jung, C. G. (1968). A study in the process of individuation (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 9 pt. 1. Archetypes and the collective unconscious (2nd ed., pp. 290-354). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1950) https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400850969.290
Concerning mandala symbolism (pp. 355-384)
Jung, C. G. (1968). Concerning mandala symbolism (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 9 pt. 1. Archetypes and the collective unconscious (2nd ed., pp. 355-384). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1950) https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400850969.355
The undiscovered self (pp. 245-305)
Jung, C. G. (1970). The undiscovered self (present and future) (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 10. Civilization in transition (2nd ed., pp. 247-305). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1957) https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400850976.247
Depth psychology and self knowledge

Jung, C. G. (1976). Depth psychology and self knowledge (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 18. The Symbolic Life (pp. 1811-1819). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1943)
Definitions: Self

Jung, C. G. (1971). Definitions: Self (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 6. Psychological Types (pp. 463–470). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1921)

Suggested readings adapted from Hopcke's (1999) A guided tour of the collected works of C. G. Jung, pp. 96-99.

Available from Ebook Central.

Jung's philosophy: Controversies, quantum mechanics, and the self by Lionel Corbett
ISBN: 9781003811756
Publication Date: 2024
"Jung's Philosophy' explores some of the controversial philosophical ideas that are both explicit and implicit within Jung's psychology, comparing the philosophical assumptions between this and other psychotherapeutic traditions. Within this book, Corbett provides a useful introduction to the philosophical issues relevant to the practice of analytical psychology, and how these are viewed by different psychotherapeutic traditions. Most of the disagreement between schools of psychotherapy, and much of the comparative literature, centers around differences in theory and technique. This book takes a different, more fundamental approach by comparing schools of thought based on their underlying philosophical commitments. The author discusses the philosophical basis of various worldviews such as idealism and realism, beliefs about the nature of the psyche and the unconscious, and the mind-brain relationship, and focuses on the way in which Jung's psychology addresses these and related issues, including the possible relevance of quantum mechanics to depth psychology."
See especially chapter four:
- The question of the Self: Jungian, Western, and Eastern approaches
Jungian and dialogical self perspectives by R. Jones & M. Morioka (Ed.)
ISBN: 9780230307490
Publication Date: 2011
"This collection of cutting-edge chapters contributes to the psychology of personhood especially (but not only) as applied in psychotherapy. The chapters are written from Jungian, dialogical-self, or both perspectives and give insights into the history of ideas, clinical and research applications of these perspectives in the East and West."
My self, my many selves by Joseph Redfearn
Call Number: BF697 .R393 1985
ISBN: 9781849401777
Publication Date: 1994
'The concept of the "self" has remained puzzling and controversial. Indeed, far from gaining clarity, it seems to become ever more complex; for many different people, starting from different premises and having different goals have come to "appropriate" this term.'Joe Redfearn has made what seems to me to be a most valuable contribution by sticking firmly to an experiential approach. He has thought hard and deeply about the different ways in which we experience the "I" and drawn on his own "I" experience as well as on those of his patients and Jung himself.'He tells us in his introduction that the main aim of his book is to illustrate the migratory nature of the feeling of "I" and that the goal of analysis is to "facilitate and open up interaction and intercommunication between our various selves".'The origin of these many and varied selves tends to be named differently according to the school of discipline involved as, for instance "archetype", "complex", "internal Object", "part object", "interjected environmental personage", "part of body-image", "part-brain function" etc. In order to facilitate true observation and intercommunication, Joe Redfearn has given these different selves a generic, descriptive name; thinking of them as actors in a play he calls them "sub-personalities". This name allows us to speak to one another and know what we mean whatever our school of discipline, and yet we are left free to continue our search or research for the possible origins or roots of these sub-personalities.'- From the Foreword by Rosemary Gordon
Transformation: Emergence of the self by Murray Stein
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Call Number: 0890967806
ISBN: 0890967806
Publication Date: 1998
"A thirty-five-year-old woman dreams of a butterfly and wonders where her own life is going. A wealthy American sees a picture of Albert Schweitzer and decides to become a physician and establish a clinic in Haiti. Most of us would say these people are experiencing midlife crises. More accurately, they have entered a deep psychological process called transformation.In Transformation: Emergence of the Self, noted analyst and author Murray Stein explains what this process is, and what it means for an individual to experience it. Transformation usually occurs at midlife but is much more complicated than what we colloquially call a midlife crisis. Consciously working through this life stage can lead people to become who they truly are and have always potentially been. Indeed, Stein suggests, transformation is the essential human task.Stein first details how transformation occurs and why it so often occurs in midlife, using the example of poet Rainer Maria Rilke. Looking at C. G. Jung's life, Stein then explains how transformative images stimulate the transformation process by suggesting new ways of thinking and living. Intimate relationships, like those between a husband and a wife or a doctor and a patient, can also play a very powerful role in transformation. Finally, Stein examines the process in the lives of three important people, Jung, Picasso, and Rembrandt, whose experiences of transformation led to even greater creativity and freedom.For those people who would like to learn what a meaningful second half of life could be like, Transformation: Emergence of the Self is an inspiring place to start."
The Self and the quintessence by Christine Driver
ISBN: 9781000020151
Publication Date: 2019
The Self and the Quintessence explores Jung's work on number symbolism and the alchemical journey and considers how they act as metaphors underpinning theories about the development of the self and individuation. It goes on to consider the implications of these dynamics in terms of the symbol of the quintessence and what this represents psychologically. Initially exploring number symbolism and the way numbers can express dimensionality and emergence, this book explores the theories which underpin Jung's ideas about the self and its complexity, including the dynamics of opposites, the transcendent function, and the symbol of the quaternity (fourness). The book then explores the symbol of the quintessence from a theoretical and clinical perspective and also in relation to its use in alchemy and physics. It goes on to consider the symbolic and psychological significance of the quintessence in relation to complexity, emergence, individuation, wholeness, truth and the spirit of matter. Extending Jungian ideas to explore the archetypal symbol of the quintessence and its psychological significance, The Self and the Quintessence will be of great interest to Jungian academics, researchers and clinicians, and anyone looking to expand their knowledge and understanding of Jungian psychology.
The two million-year-old Self by Anthony Stevens; David H. Rosen (Foreword by)
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ISBN: 0890965366
Publication Date: 1993
With the evolution of human consciousness, nature has finally become conscious of itself. It has taken eons of time, this lumbering progress through the minds of reptiles, mammals, and primates, and it is still working its purpose out in the archetypes of the collective unconscious encoded in the most ancient parts of the human brain. The recent evolutionary history of our species, which Jung personified as the two million-year-old human being in us all, is still active in our dreams, myths, psychiatric symptoms, traditional healing practices, and typical patterns of behavior. And it is still struggling to help us survive in the often alienating conditions of the modern world. Through a wide-ranging review of developments in anthropology, ethology, sociobiology, neuroscience, psycholinguistics, and Jungian psychology, Anthony Stevens explores the nature of the two million-year-old Self and examines ways in which the contemporary world both fulfills and frustrates its basic needs and intentions. Drawing on his experience as an analyst, Stevens evokes dreams and psychiatry to reveal a compelling and challenging view of the two million-yearold Self as embodying no less than the will of nature, providing ancient wisdom that we neglect at our collective peril. By granting close attention to nature's mind, Stevens argues, we not only further personal wholeness but help redress the gross imbalances of our culture, which are threatening the destruction of the earth. For the ecologically concerned, this book offers a dramatic new perspective on our future relations with our planet.

Book chapters:

"Making room for divinity" in Minding the Self by Murray Stein
Publication Date: 2014
"The centerpiece in this psychological theory rests in the meaning of what Jung called the self. It is generally recognized by anyone even a little familiar with Jung’s writings that he drew a critically important distinction between the meaning of the terms ego and self. On this point he was exceptionally clear and consistent. The term self refers to a hypothetical psychic domain that encompasses all aspects of the ego complex and the surrounding penumbra of actual and potential consciousness. It includes conscious and unconscious aspects of the ego complex, including its defenses, as well as forgotten or momentarily absent psychic contents that could be brought up into consciousness with some effort or assistance. Moreover, the self surpasses even this large complex of psychic material in several respects: its range and scope of reference is far greater in extension, in that it subsumes all conscious and unconscious levels and aspects of the psyche under its aegis. In theoretical range, it is therefore also more complex, because it embraces all the polarities and tensions within the psyche as a whole and not only those within consciousness and the ego complex; and it transcends the conscious/unconscious divide. The self is responsible for the underlying unity of the psyche as a whole, whereas the ego complex provides some measure of unity only for consciousness. The relation of the terms ego and self is that of a part to the whole." [Read more]
"The psyche's transcendent center and wholeness: The Self " In Jung's map of the soul by Murray Stein
Call Number: BF173 .S674 1998
Publication Date: 1998
"I was tempted to begin this book with a chapter on the self, because it is the most fundamental feature of Jung’s entire vision. It is the key to his psychological theory, and in some respects it is the piece that most sets him apart from all other figures in depth psychology and psychoanalysis. It is instructive to note that psychoanalytic theory has moved significantly in Jung’s direction over the past half century, and yet few if any other psychoanalytic theorists have ventured as far as his conception of the self in their theorizing. While many other writers today use the term self in their clinical studies and theoretical statements, none has in mind the same domain that Jung was trying to encompass with his concept. To begin with Jung’s theory of the self would have been misleading, however, historically and conceptually. It is not only the most fundamental feature of his theory, it is also the capstone. It therefore needs preparation in order to grasp its full range and importance." (p. 151) [Read more]
"The self in Jung's works" In Explorations into the Self by Michael Fordham
Call Number: BF697.F67 1985
ISBN: 9781849400299
Publication Date: 1985
"This first chapter is lengthy and somewhat heavy going - not perhaps the one to start interesting a reader anxious to obtain a concise understanding of what Jung meant by the self. However, I consider it vital to go into his method, his use of observational data and his abstraction of them. As will be seen, his discovery of the self grew out of his opening-up of a new dimension of the psyche: an inner world of almost unlimited dimensions. It was from there that the self emerged. At the time Jung was pioneering the field almost alone, but since then the self has come to occupy the interests of many others and especially psychoanalysts to whose publications I shall frequently refer. They differ from Jung’s radical understanding and so special attention needs to be given not only to Jung’s conceptions but also to the empirical foundations on which they rest." (p. 5) [Read more]
"On Jung’s view of the Self—An investigation" in Anthology of contemporary theoretical classics in analytical psychology by Murray Stein; Stefano Carpani (Ed.)
ISBN: 9781000554229
Publication Date: 2022
"The author discusses that the self is more than conscious identity (i.e., the ego) because it includes and expresses the full range of the psyche. Beyond this, the self-concept links analytical psychology and religious doctrines of transcendence. This chapter explores the complex relation of the self to the transcendent (Divinity), as Jung understood these terms and employed them, focusing especially on a critical passage from his last major work, Mysterium Coniunctionis. The notion of self as Imago Dei grasps the paradoxical nature of the self, a coincidentia oppositorum that is at once personal and impersonal. Jung posits, moreover, a dynamic interactive relation between the self and the transcendence it mirrors. Altogether, this combination of features regarding the self sets Jung’s psychology apart from humanistic and personalistic psychologies and secular depth psychologies, on the one hand, and from pre-Enlightenment dogmatic psychologies such as those of religious fundamentalisms on the other. This chapter argues that Jung’s depth psychology represents a post-Enlightenment, post-secular, post-humanistic vision of the human being, whose psyche links earth and heaven, the here and the beyond, and the finite and the infinite. It is a radical attempt to break out of modernity without regressing to medievalism."

Brooke, R. (2009). The self, the psyche and the world: A phenomenological interpretation. The Journal of Analytical Psychology, 54(5), 601–618. https://doi-org.pgi.idm.oclc.org/10.1111/j.1468-5922.2009.01809.x

PsycINFO

Beyerle, T. J., & Beyerle, S. L. (2018). The birth of the higher self in anthroposophic and analytical thought. Jung Journal: Culture & Psyche, 12(2), 68–90. https://doi-org.pgi.idm.oclc.org/10.1080/19342039.2018.1442106

PsycINFO

Corbett, L., & Whitney, L. (2016). Jung and non-duality: Some clinical and theoretical implications of the self as totality of the psyche. International Journal of Jungian Studies, 8(1), 15–27.

Brill Journals

Dobson, M. D.-S. (2015). Transcendent dimensions of the self: A spiritual home for self psychology? International Journal of Psychoanalytic Self Psychology, 10(1), 1–13.

PsycINFO

Edinger, E. F. (1960). The Ego-Self paradox. The Journal of Analytical Psychology, 5(1), 3.

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Redfearn, J. W. (1983). Ego and self: Terminology. The Journal of Analytical Psychology, 28(2), 91–106.

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Redfearn, J. W. (1977). The self and individuation. The Journal of Analytical Psychology, 22(2), 125–141.

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Urban, E. (2005). Fordham, Jung and the self: A re-examination of Fordham’s contribution to Jung’s conceptualization of the self. The Journal of Analytical Psychology, 50(5), 571–594.

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Weisstub, E. (1997). Self as the feminine principle. The Journal of Analytical Psychology, 42(3), 425–452.

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