Adler’s & Jung’s Insights for Artistically Creating Your Life: Part 1

Alfred Adler (1917) postulated that inferiorities themselves, including their manifestation within our bodies as organ inferiority, abnormal size, looks, or even traumas during our development, are less relevant to living fulfilling lives, than how we respond to our inferiorities (Adler, 1917). For Adler, our volition, our striving and our goal-orientation are paramount. His position sharply contrasted with that of Sigmund Freud, who posited that instinctual drives are the primary motivational determinants of human behavior. Adlerian authors Oberst and Stewart (2003) write:

The superiority complex, as I have described it, appears usually clearly characterized in the bearing, the character traits, and the opinion of one’s own superhuman gifts and capacities. It can also become visible in the exaggerated demands one makes on oneself and on other persons (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956, p. 261).

Adlerian psychology contends that our deepest need as humans is to belong and to be significant (Oberst & Stewart, 2003). Adler describes our healthy impetus of moving towards superiority, infused with “Social Interest” and “Community Feeling,” which are “Common Sense” ways of contributing. Unlike socially recognized common sense, “Private Sense,” or “Private Logic” along with “Mistaken Beliefs, consists of disempowering ways of viewing ourselves, of viewing others, and of reconciling our place in the world, which might result in procrastination or “Safeguarding” behavior. This can occur should we become discouraged in our striving towards goals in the arenas of work, close relationships or community relationships, placing us instead at risk to strive in less common sense ways, choosing to embrace “side-show” goals, also known as a private logic ways of striving towards superiority (Oberst & Stewart, 2003).

One antidote to perfectionism is to externalize it. This author suggests calling it: “The voice of perfectionism, who speaks in the dialect of mistaken beliefs.” This voice tries to convince us that we should not even try to artistically create our lives, as we don’t have what it takes to do it perfectly. This statement is an example of a mistaken belief, because we know that even if we do not achieve some unattainable perfection, we still will create our lives in more optimal ways than would be the case if we had heeded this voice and not even tried. Adlerians like to tell themselves and others that they will just “take a whack at it.” When concerned over whether or not their creation, or their performance, was stellar in every way, Adlerians tell themselves that it was “good enough.” We would do well to recall humorist and politician Al Franken’s fictitious character, Stuart Smalley, who self-soothed by saying: “I’m good enough. I’m smart enough. And doggone it, people like me.” (Franken, 1991)

An Adlerian construct that is particularly helpful for performance artists, as well as anyone who feels exposed when in front of others, is the “Vertical Plane of Striving vs. the Horizontal Plane of Social Interest and Community Feeling.” When people strive vertically, it is as if they live their lives on a skyscraper’s elevator, and are constantly monitoring who is living a higher floor and who they have risen above. When their performance goes well, it is if as if they have ascended several floors and can look down on even more people; but when their performance isn’t as good, their elevator descends to a lower floor of diminished status.

• Comparing, judging and criticizing.
• Occupying ourselves by deciding who we are better than, or not as good as.
• Believing that others are judging us, because after all, we are judging ourselves.

Horizontal striving, in contrast, confirms that we are all in this together, audience and presenter or performers alike. We believe that the audience is cheering on the presenter or performers, due to inherent human empathy. Because the audience, presenter or performer, and even behind-the-scenes stage people, all are co-creators of an event, everyone present desires the best possible experience and outcome for the performance. Therefore, if we are in the role of performer or presenter, we can afford to relax and let go; positive support is ever present.

In illuminating Carl Jung’s understanding of the relationship between the personal and collective unconscious, author Sonu Shamadasani (2009) writes:

[Jung] … differentiated two layers of the unconscious. The first, the personal unconscious, consisted in elements acquired during one’s lifetime, together with elements that could equally well be conscious. The second was the impersonal unconscious or collective psyche. While consciousness and the personal unconscious were developed and acquired in the course of one’s lifetime, the collective psyche was inherited. … [Jung] discussed the curious phenomena that resulted from assimilating the unconscious. He noted that when an individual annexed the contents of the collective psyche and regarded them as personal attributes, they experienced extreme states of superiority and inferiority. He borrowed the term godliness from Goethe and Alfred Adler to characterize the state, which arose from fusing the personal and collective psyche, and was one of the dangers of analysis. (S. Shamadasani, 2009, p. 208)

All of these polarities may be measured by taking the Myers-Briggs® assessments, which are based in large part upon Jung’s constructs. It is this writer’s belief that people may gain advantageous insights into themselves and others, by taking and receiving an interpretation from an experienced Myers-Briggs practitioner of the MBTI® Step II psychometric instrument, which subdivides each of the above polarities into five sub-processes (K. D. Myers & P. B. Meyers, 2001, 2003). Although the simplistic Myers-Briggs instrument is helpful, the additional precision and clarity gained through the MBTI® Step II instrument and interpretation is superior for understanding how to artistically create the life that we aspire to.

Like Alfred Adler, who talked about the role of gender guiding-lines as an aspect of our “Style of Life,” Carl Jung wrote about the influence of masculine and feminine energies within the totality of our self, which he identified as the “Anima” and the “Animus.” Artistically creating our lives may be informed by considering the ways in which “Yin” or female energies, and “Yang,” or male energies, consciously and unconsciously influence us. Artistic creation may be enhanced by choosing to include more yin energy, so our creations may be fluid and flowing. In contrast we might find greater benefit by incorporating more yang energy, instead emphasizing structure and more defined boundaries, in order to achieve the life that we want. Men may particularly find balance by consciously embracing the female energy of the anima, while women often achieve greater balance by embracing their inner animus, their masculine energy (Millner, 2004).

Through insights gained from his lifelong interest in stories, fairytales, myths and the metaphysical beliefs of other cultures, as well as from his own personal journey into the collective unconscious, Carl Jung wrote about archetypal life patterns (Jung, 1964). Those that most directly apply to artistically creating our lives revolve around archetypes of personal power, wisdom and the act of creating itself. Creation-oriented archetypes include:

• The “Hero”
• The “Warrior”
• The “Wizard” or “Sorcerer”
• The “Shaman”
• The “Wise Man” or “Wise Woman”
• The “Artist”
• The “Muse”
• The “Musician”

Our shadow self contains thoughts, feelings, desires and biases that may be embarrassing, shameful or even abhorrent to us, and also perhaps to others. It may also contain latent aptitudes and artistic sensibilities that yet remain unexplored (Jung, 1964).

Our dreams may also inform us of those latent, unexplored parts of ourselves. While interviewing Jungian Analyst Galen Martini, I asked: “If people simply wanted to more artistically create their lives, how might you proceed in a Jungian way?” She responded: “What I would be exploring with them is what they are getting from their dreams that show a side of themselves that needs to be heard. What is clamoring upward and asking to be integrated into their lives” (G. Martini, personal communication, August 28, 2014). This is the key to working with our shadow selves; reintegration of our shadow into conscious awareness brings wholeness to our lives, allowing us to transcend and overcome the paralysis of a fragmented self. Instead of vilifying our shadow, we out it!

Carl Jung addressed the cyclic nature of our lives, from the early acquisition of knowledge and experience, to our rising competence in our 20s and 30s, to the disruptive falling apart that so often occurs in midlife and through a reintegration towards a more holistic expression that may best describe our later years. Artistic creation frequently requires that something die in order for something new to be born (Millner, 2004).

As people have the courage to allow many aspects of their earlier adult life to die, there seems to be a kind of rebirth that occurs, a re-animation of their life by a self that had been largely ignored, a self that might remind a person more of how they were in their teenage years, in terms of being more optimistic and confident about life’s possibilities, their possibilities. (Chandler, 2013, p. 4)

• First clear your mind, or alternatively, ask yourself a compelling question.
• With pencil in hand, let your hand float lightly across your paper, letting go of preconceptions.
• Without interference from your conscious awareness, simply allow your hand to draw what it will, noticing what is being drawn.
• Let your intuition guide the completion of the drawing, which may now be done, if you choose, with your dominant hand.
• Fill the pencil drawing in with paint, or any other color medium that the drawing seems to call for.

During the process of making the drawing, or upon reflection after its completion, your creation is likely to have a specific insight for you. This technique may be especially useful when facing some uncertainty about how best to proceed forward in your life. (Martini, personal communication, September 5, 2014)

Part 2: https://mncounselingtherapy.com/adlers-jungs-insights-for-artistically-creating-your-life-part-2/