Self

hodler_evening_silence

19 Mar: Vanishing Fingerprints

I suddenly noticed all the bright, beautiful one-inch tiles lining the pool. How had I not seen them before? Each of these little cobalt blue squares bore witness to my laps through the water. I decided, in the spirit of play, to imagine that every one of these tiny tiles represented $5000. For the time in which I swam, I engaged this unexpected image.

mualla_the_jazz_band

22 Jan: When the Music Plays the Band

The dynamics of creative process and psychological wellbeing are such that creative artists are often overcome by the demonic. From Nietzsche’s Zarathustra to Curt Cobain’s Nirvana, there is an artistic star swallowed by the unconscious every week. But the arts can also be a type of savior—a place for us to process our darkness and not become it.

swan

08 Sep: The Ugly Duckling

The image of the ugly duckling growing into a beautiful swan is a powerful and transformative symbol of hope and fulfillment for INFJs. As a metaphor for differentiation and the individuation process, the Ugly Duckling tale illuminates the struggle to separate from the demands of others in order to recognize the value and beauty of one’s essential self.

dragon

14 Jan: Seeing One’s Self

Just as Hiccup’s superior function, his Hero, has been wounded by his culture and his father, this dragon is wounded as well, a figure we will come to see as Hiccup’s inner truth. This is the story of an individual recognizing the wounding that has occurred, and claiming back his authentic power by developing his Heroic function.

picasso_three_figures

04 Jan: Ambiversion and Individuation

Type as a problem needs to be rediscovered. Although from Jung’s point of view moderate one-sidedness does not usually cause major difficulties and is a stage of development to go through, ultimately being a type is a problem whereas contemporary type theory generally views it as a virtue. This has resulted in the transcendent function being overlooked.

munch_friedrich_nietzsche

01 Jul: Nietzsche on “Self-Overcoming”

Rather than truly being able to move down to embrace the inferior function, to achieve “integrity in depth,” Nietzsche tries to “overcome” the problem of the personality. His fantastic intuitions are not wholly thought through, and so he is not able to deal with the real task of individuation, which asks us to ground consciousness in the reality of body and mind.

matisse_woman_aquarium

11 Dec: Getting Beyond ‘Inner’ and ‘Outer’

Introverted thinking is more concerned with satisfying a subtle, personally perceived standard of truth—like Barack Obama in his first debate with Mitt Romney. People saw Obama hesitating and looking away from his opponent. I read that as him double-checking to make sure that what he was about to say would meet a benchmark of critical thinking.