Article: What Would C.G. Jung Say about Donald Trump

I'm just gonna put this right here:

Deeply wanting to take advantage of my good fortune, I try to connect by asking him if he can believe the insanity that is happening in the United States today. As if he recognizes what is playing out, Jung says, with the utmost assurance, that what is taking place is “brought about by an upheaval of forces lying dormant in the unconscious.” It is as if darker subterranean powers that have been brewing in the cauldron of the collective unconscious for centuries have been unleashed into our world.

I remember that in Jung’s view what distinguishes our age from all others is that we are being forced to recognize and come to terms with the active world-shaping powers of the psyche. As if hearing my thoughts, Jung comments that the psyche is “the World Power that vastly exceeds all other powers on earth.” Jung adds, “We can no longer deny that the dark stirrings of the unconscious are active powers.” This immediately makes me think of Jung’s well-known insight that if we don’t bring consciousness to the shadow forces within the psyche, we will then most assuredly dream up our inner unconscious situation to play out – destructively – on the world stage as our fate.
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Jung continues, “If ever there was a time when self-reflection was the absolutely necessary and only right thing, it is now, in our present catastrophic epoch.” Self-reflection, a privilege born of and intrinsic to human freedom, is a genuinely spiritual act – essentially the act of becoming conscious. He continues, “The true leaders of mankind are always those who are capable of self-reflection.” In self-reflection we recognize ourselves in the mirror of the world. As if amplifying my thoughts, Jung exclaims, “Yet, whoever reflects upon himself is bound to strike upon the frontiers of the unconscious, which contains what above all else he needs to know.” I love Jung’s idea that the unconscious, instead of simply being a repository of what we repress, contains what we need to know. My unconscious apparently contains the living figure of Jung.

As if reflecting upon my own self-reflection, Jung says, “Individual self-reflection, return of the individual to the ground of human nature, to his own deepest being with its individual and social destiny – here is the beginning of a cure for that blindness which reigns at the present hour.” Connecting with the innermost foundations of our being is like finding a safe refuge during these crazy times we are living through. “If things go wrong in the world,” Jung says, and then waits to make sure I am listening, “I shall put myself right first.” I certainly can’t argue with that.

- Paul Levy, "What Would C.G. Jung Say about Donald Trump" (Reality Sandwich)