When we consider hypnosis, we cannot ignore the theory of the conscious and unconscious mind, and thus it is worth considering what Carl Gustav Jung has contributed to perhaps understand the unfathomable interactions between the conscious and unconscious realm.
Jung developed five layers of psyche: The Persona, The Ego, The Shadow, The Anima/Animus, and The Self. The more I read about Jung’s view of the human psyche, the more intrigued I am with his philosophy of human psyche, because it is complex, fluid and alive. I have barely been able to grasp even the basic ideas of his philosophy, and I am determined to bring Jung to the front as a contributor to the world of hypnosis, so what I can present here are random Jungian ideas that I can relate with, to hypnosis in the context of psychotherapy.
Jung proposed that there are four psychological functions – thinking, feeling, sensing and intuiting (Walters, 2004). Thinking and feeling are considered rational and conscious function of the mind, whilst sensing and intuiting defies rationale. Sensing such as the five senses of sight, sound, smell, touch and taste, are just what occurs when we are exposed to those stimuli that can elicit the various responses from those senses. Intuition is the use of the unconscious in perceiving reality. In trance, hypnotherapist utilizes the rational inclinations of client to delve into the unconscious realm of the client’s mind, to gain perspective(s) regarding specific issue or event that bothers the client.
Jung’s idea of “The Shadow” as “the thing a person has no wish to be” (as cited in Samuels, Shorter & Plaut, 2012, pp.138-139), is a beneficial concept to consider in hypnotherapy. Every person has a part of us that we do not want to acknowledge or associate with, because we might consider them to be less than good traits to have. Thus, we either ignore or deny this part, and choose not to embody it, and eventually it becomes a part of our unconscious, repressed or forgotten. The twist though, just because it has been repressed or forgotten, does not mean that it is not there in the unconscious; in fact, the shadow might burst out in various forms sporadically and without any clear reasons or logic – when you do or say the things you do or say, and not knowing why that happened, and regretting what happened. The key, according to Jung, is to uncover and acknowledge the shadow, in order for insights to happen (Papadopoulos, 2012).
Furthermore, the idea of “collective unconsciousness” proposed by Jung, is validated by Maltz (2002), by referencing the belief and results from experiments of a few experts, “… people have access to knowledge, facts, and ideas other than their own individual memories or stored information from learning or experience” (pp. 35). Maltz (2002) stated that humans can achieve the desired goals, by visualization, to access this realm where the conscious cannot reach. And this visualization technique is very similar to hypnosis.
The next idea that I find closely related to hypnosis is Jung’s idea of archetypes. Metaphorical suggestions in hypnosis are offered in trance to bypass the rational and conscious mind, and Jung used “archetypes” to bridge the complexities of human experiences that are embodied in individuals, and the various roles that each individual act upon in different moments of his/her life, so that someone can identify him/herself with the different archetypes and gain insights to his/her identity. This is possible because each archetype has specific characteristics, and a specific identity, which a person can relate to, and yet can have some personal distance between the identity of the archetype and the person in a moral sense. This distance is helpful for the person to form a more objective and comprehensive view of who he/she is as a human without moral judgment of good or bad.
The following is a list of five unfavourable scientific results of Jung’s theory as noted by the Walters (2004): lack of parsimony, precision, internal consistency, empirical support and personal relevance. This is exciting, because the complexity of how to test the validity of the theory means to me that perhaps Jung’s attempt to understand the human psyche, has come closer to showing the complexity of a human and his/her life, than other defined theories of psychology.
There are many other ideas that Jung has proposed that are closely related to hypnosis, and this is an invitation for you to perhaps be curious about the works of Carl Gustav Jung, and be welcomed and magically surprised into a world of the unconscious, like never before.
Maltz, M., (2002). The New Psycho-Cybernetics . Ebb Vale, Wales: Creative Print Design Group.
Papadopoulos, R.K. (2012). The Handbook of Jungian Psychology. [ebook reader on iPad]. Available for purchase from www.ebooks.com
Samuels, A., Shorter, B., Plaut, F., (2012) . A Critical Dictionary of Jungian Analysis. [ebook reader on iPad]. Available for purchase from www.ebooks.com
Walters, G.D. (2004). Personality Theory in Context, p.59-90 [PDF document]. Retrieved from Lecture Notes Online Web site: http://www.psychology.sunysb.edu/ewaters/345/
Hypno Stuffs 
Pingback: Students from The School of Positive Psychology Assignment Blog | From The School Of Positive Psychology