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Video Description
Once you know what anxiety is trying to say, what do you actually do about it? This second lecture from Academy of Ideas on Jung’s theory of neurosis turns from diagnosis to recovery. The cure, Jung insisted, is not reliving childhood but constructing a new attitude toward life: honest self-acceptance, freedom from conformity, and bold action in the presence of fear. Avoidance only narrows life until it becomes a prison of our own making. His closing truth is a challenge: only boldness can deliver you from fear.
Full Video Transcript
The perpetual hesitation of the neurotic to launch out into life is readily explained by his desire to stand aside so as not to get involved in the dangerous struggle for existence.
But anyone who refuses to experience life must stifle his desire to live. In other words, he must commit partial suicide.
In the first video of this two-part series, we discussed what Carl Jung believed the existence
of anxiety disorders and other forms of neurotic suffering can teach us about our way of life.
The cause of the neurosis, according to Jung, is always to be found in the present,
in a conflicted way of life in the here and now. The outbreak of the neurosis functions in a
prospective manner. It signals to us that the life path we are on is inconducive to our well-being.
Or as Jung wrote,
the neurosis is not just a matter of chance. As a rule, it is most critical. It is usually the
moment when a new psychological adjustment, a new adaptation, is demanded. The road to recovery,
according to Jung, does not require reliving childhood memories or working through old family
conflicts. For unless we were the victim of some sort of trauma, of which we have yet to process,
our childhood memories will not free us from our present suffering. What is needed is a new
attitude, one which entails a wholehearted dedication to life and which makes the powerful
urge to develop our own personality an imperative duty.
We must step off the sidelines of life and establish a uniform direction to our existence
in which we, and not others, are the final authority.
All the energy that was tied up in family bonds must be withdrawn from the narrower
circle into the larger one, because the psychic health of the adult individual, who in childhood
was a mere particle revolving in a rotary system, demands that he should himself become
the center of a new system.
The first step in recovery is simple in theory but difficult in practice.
We need a clearer picture of who we are and where we are heading.
We can no longer afford to falsify reality.
Instead of fleeing from our difficulties, denying our flaws, or blaming our lot in life
found forces independent of our control, self-acceptance must become the rule.
For as Jung wrote,
A neurosis is not a disgrace.
It is not a fatal disease, but it does grow worse to the degree that one is determined
to ignore it.
While many people fear what they may see if they take an honest look at themselves, in
actual fact the practice of self-acceptance is liberating.
No longer do we need to expend so much energy denying our flaws and hiding them from our
self and others. Instead, this energy can be used for its proper purpose of contributing
to personal growth and promoting our recovery. For the bold among us, Jung suggested that
one way to gain a better picture of who we are is to turn to someone we trust for an
honest assessment of our character. One of the most important therapeutically effective
factors, Jung wrote, is subjecting yourself to the objective judgment of others. In addition
to becoming more aware and accepting of our current situation, we also need to recognize
where we are heading if we remain neurotic. For often those afflicted by anxiety disorders,
especially in the initial stages of the illness, believe that if they can avoid the things
which trigger their symptoms, then a relatively comfortable life is still possible. Symptom
management, not recovery, becomes their primary goal. But this path often leads to a hell
of one’s own making. For while avoiding the situations, activities, and life tasks
that trigger our symptoms may be of minimal inconvenience at first, over time, as many
neurotics will attest, the practice of avoidance snowballs until life becomes restricted in
the worst of ways. For this reason, Jung believed it was crucial for the neurotic to recognize
that while recovery is certainly not easy, it will in the long run prove far less arduous
than remaining in the grips of a neurosis.
Rez Jung wrote,
Flight from life does not exempt us from the law of age and death.
The neurotic who tries to wriggle out of the necessity of living wins nothing and only
burdens himself with a constant foretaste of aging and dying, which must appear especially
cruel on account of the total emptiness and meaninglessness of his life.
Jung compared the task of recovery to climbing a steep mountain pass, while he suggested
those who never make the attempt are like individuals who sit on the pleasant valley
road below, not realizing that a raging bull is heading directly for them. But so as to not
be overcome by despair in the recognition that no easy escape remains, we should remember that
a neurosis offers us the chance to discover a path in life that is far more fulfilling than
the one we currently tread. In fact, recovering from a neurosis can result in a level of psychological
health and a degree of resilience not found in those who never endure such suffering.
A neurosis, in other words, is only a curse if we remain forever caught in it,
but it will prove a blessing if we can find an escape. But the attitude change which is
engendered by self-acceptance and the recognition of where we are heading if we remain neurotic
is only the preparatory step on the road to recovery. The real solution lies in action.
We must stop being mere observers of life and venture into the strange world with all its unforeseen possibilities.
At this stage, there is a tendency for those suffering from a neurosis to want to know exactly what tasks they should be fulfilling
and what path in life they should follow, but according to Jung, caution must be exercised in this regard, for as he wrote,
What direction the patient’s life should take in the future is not ours to judge.
We must not imagine that we know better than his own nature,
or we would prove ourselves educators of the worst kind.
It is better to renounce any attempt to give direction,
and simply to try to throw into relief everything that the analysis brings to light,
so that the patient can see it clearly and be able to draw suitable conclusions.
Anything he has not acquired himself, he will not believe in the long run.
And what he takes over from authority merely keeps him infantile.
He should rather be put in the position to take his own life in hand.
With that said, Jung does offer some general advice to help us avoid dead-end paths.
Firstly, he warned that the neurotic should be cautious of conformity.
Some people are neurotic because of an acute sensitiveness
to the inadequacies of the dominant way of life in their society,
and hence, so long as they strive for conformity, they will remain trapped in their suffering.
So it comes about that there are many neurotics, wrote Jung, whose inner decency prevents them
from being at one with present-day morality and who cannot adapt themselves so long as the moral
code has gaps in it which it is of the crying need of our age to fill. These individuals,
according to Jung, are not ill because they lack the ability to live like everyone else.
They are ill because they have not found a new form for their finest aspirations.
Instead of following the well-worn path of conformity, such people are born and destined, rather, to be the bearers of new cultural ideals.
They are neurotic as long as they bow down before authority and refuse the freedom to which they are destined.
But not all who are neurotic fall into the class of the bearers of new cultural ideals.
Many people are neurotic simply because they are unwilling to face up to one of those tasks of life which all of us, because of our shared human nature, naturally gravitate toward,
be it the need to pass on our genes, to cultivate a social life, to participate in some form of productive work, or eventually to face up to our death.
The young neurotic, wrote Jung, shrinks back in terror from the expansion of life’s duties, the old one from the dwindling of the treasures he has attained.
In these cases, the question of conformity or non-conformity does not apply.
Recovery is simply a matter of facing up to the life tasks we have for too long avoided.
Or as Jung put it,
Previously, because of his illness, the patient stood partly or wholly outside life.
Consequently, he neglected many of his duties,
either in regard to social achievement or in regard to his purely human tasks.
He must get back to fulfilling these duties if he wants to become well again.
For those whose neurosis has led to a dramatic restriction in activity, the specific task
which is chosen is not too important.
We just need to find something to aim at which can help effectuate a transition from the
inner realm of our doubts, worries and intrusive thoughts, to the external world of people,
places and things.
A useful practice in this regard was recommended by Jung’s colleague Alfred Adler.
We should imagine ourselves free of the neurosis and also free of the fear of social ridicule.
In such a situation, what would we choose to do?
Who would we want to become?
We can even turn to our dreams and fantasies for clues as to the direction our life should
take.
For as Jung wrote,
It would, in general, be a great mistake to deny any teleological value to the apparently
pathological fantasies of a neurotic.
They are, as a matter of fact, the first beginnings of spiritualization, the first groping attempts
to find new ways of adapting.
As we begin effectuating the extroversion that accompanies recovery, focusing our energy
on living in the world instead of primarily in our heads, our symptoms are likely to flare
up.
But as Jung points out, whereas the neurosis and the troubles that attend it are never
followed by the pleasant feeling of good work well done, of duty fearlessly performed, the
suffering that comes from useful work and from victory over real difficulties brings
with it those moments of peace and satisfaction which give the human being the priceless feeling
that he has really lived his life.
Many people, however, never heed the call of their neurosis urging them towards a more
fulfilling life, maintaining that before they can begin down this path they must first conquer
their symptoms.
But if we agree with Jung’s analysis that our symptoms are primarily the result of our
choice to stand on the sidelines of life, then such an approach will likely fail.
We have to accept that recovery will only be achieved if we are willing to move forward
in the presence of our fear and anxiety.
And in this regard, there is no formula for our deliverance, no advice that will turn
the meek into the brave.
Rather, as Jung wisely noted, only boldness can deliver from fear, and if the risk is
not taken, the meaning of life is somehow violated and the whole future is condemned
to hopeless staleness.
Source: Academy of Ideas