Glossary: Constellation

Activation of an archetype or complex. E.g. feelings of vulnerability or abandonment can activate the child complex. A time-bound grouping of events.

This term simply expresses the fact that the outward situation releases a psychic process in which certain contents gather together and prepare for action. When we say that a person is "constellated" we mean that he has taken up a position from which he can be expected to react in a quite definite way… The constellated contents are definite complexes possessing their own specific energy.

- "A Review of the Complex Theory," CW 8, par. 198