Marie-Louise von Franz, Creation Myths. Boston: Shambhala, 1995, pp. 11-12.
One of Jung’s students asked him, “I am now seventy and you are eighty years old. Won’t you tell me what your thoughts are on life after death?” Jung’s answer was, “It won’t help you when you are lying on your deathbed to recall, ‘Jung said this or that.’ You must have your own ideas about it. You have to have your own myth. To have your own myth means to have suffered and struggled with a question until an answer has come to you from the depths of your soul. That does not imply that this is the definitive truth, but rather that this truth which has come is relevant for oneself as one now is, and believing in this truth helps one to feel well.”
3 comments:
This is a good description of our task on our faith journeys as we struggle to come up with the personal beliefs that give our lives meaning. The answers of others can inspire and guide us, but they are no substitute for the struggle that yields answers from the depths.
Loving God, give us the courage to travel down into the depths to find the answers that will give our lives meaning.
Synchronistically, I have been looking at the recently released The Red Book , Jung's own dream and fantasy images, which descry great struggle, some torment, yet an underlying openness and a hint of victory. Personally I feel afraid to delve so deeply into my own psyche for answers of how to feel well, although I turn more willingly to the Divine, asking for mercy, gentleness and loving guidance that does not hurt. Always I have wished and prayed to ease the pain, unrealistically even to erase its existence.
Jeanne refers to the Red Book by Carl Jung, currently on exhibit at the Rubin Museum of Art. For more on this subject go to the forum at
http://lindsayboyer.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=331
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