Finding the Soul in the Career
How do we find an experience of the soul in our careers? The longing for a career with a soul is a profound desire which burns brightly in many people today. If this longing isn’t brought to realization in some measure, it creates increasing anguish as the working years go by. Above all, it’s the “job” of our conscious awareness to take account of matters of the soul and give them their place in our life.
This course will examine the ways in which Jung approaches the soul as an objective reality. We will draw conclusions for infusing the career with the qualities we associate with the soul: deeper meaningfulness, joy, and a sense of the importance of our work.
First Section
According to Jung, we can “define the soul on the one hand as the relation to the unconscious, and on the other as a personification of unconscious contents.”
In this short but powerful statement, Jung gives us a compressed understanding of the way the soul operates in the human system.
When, for example, we are caught up in the dramatic events of our careers, we fail to realize that we ourselves have imbued these same outer events with the qualities of our own psyche. Taking back the projections to the outer world will enrich our experiencing of it, and our understanding of it. Then a new process can begin: the experiencing of the ego’s relationship to the soul, and the ways in which this process can be brought into reality in the world and the career.
Second Section
Jung states that identification with the persona can lead to loss of soul. What does he mean by that and by the “negative soul” or negative anima or animus? How does the positive soul work in bringing the experience of meaning to our lives and careers?
Third Section
The soul has a profound significance in the religious practice of human beings all over the world. How does Jung understand the soul’s connection to religious experience and how can this be brought into careers which seemingly are “secular?”
Fourth Section
What are the common images and fantasies in the lives of working people which can lead to an experience of the soul? What is the role of what Jung called the “transcendent function” in realizing the contents of the soul?
Fifth Section
From a Jungian point of view, what does it mean to have a rebirth or renewal of the soul, or to experience healing of the soul? How is the soul renewed in our career?