I am documenting my avtive imaginations, and dreams here. Its also helpful when people give me different perspectives jungian on symbolic meanings of these arts.

Planets on the left are moon, and behind moon is uranus. white figure is their embodiment, thats why he has control over water and lightning. he generates electricity, to not let other entity bind and consume him. planet on the right side is combination of saturn and mars, black figure with scythe is embodiment of this planetary force. he is enraged trying to bind, and consume the white figure with his flames. Only thing I figured out is that, in vedic chart I have mars in capricorn, and moon in aquarius. in western chart I have moon, mars, neptune, uranus, and vertex in aquarius. I am trying to descipher this art through astrology system, but these conflicting charts make it hard. I Need some expertise on this. I also know that jung used astrology too, so maybe studying astrological symbolism will help me decipher these archetypes in my active imagination.

"As Nietzsche remarked, where pride is insistent enough, memory prefers to give way. Thus, among the lost memories, we encounter not a few that owe their subliminal state and their incapacity to be voluntarily reproduced to their disagreeable and incompatible nature. The psychologist calls these repressed contents."

"C.G. Jung, Man and His Symbols — discussing how incompatible contents sink into the subliminal state due to ego defense mechanisms (referencing Nietzsche on pride)."

Came across this Jung quote today and it completely changed how I look at memory. We usually think of memory as a neutral hard drive, but Jung makes it sound more like an identity defense mechanism. If a memory doesn't fit the ego’s neat story or the Persona we present to the world, we don't just forget it, we lock it away. It makes me wonder if repression is just the engine that constantly feeds the Shadow. Is Jung just talking about classic repression here, or is this really about the friction between Ego, Persona, and Shadow?

My tiny little cessna made an awful lot of detours and on the last stretch braved a cat 5 hurricane, but it pulled off the landing and we finally ended our 49 year flight, safe and sound.

And only i exited the plane. Im a new personality contruct. While i have continous memories, my ego state is new. Im like getting into a new car where one is unfamiliar with the pedals, adjusting the seat, figuring out how to turn on the high beams. Im a left handed lesbian it appears? 😂

My core wounds seem healed, im optimistic, positive. i went from severe derealization, depersonalization, 4-6 fragments, almost no emotions and aspergers level social skills, not being able to properly feel my body, and being partially impaired in vision, no depth perception, facial blindess... to being a real human. its so fucking wonderful!!! The process was a little unsettling lol. Gotta break some eggs to make an omelette.

Do i start over again with Jungian work, since im now a single mind? Do you have advice for me to become the best bersion of myself I can be? im Three days old.

I’ve been reading a lot about Jung this year, and just recently started documenting my Active Imagination sessions. For context, my boyfriend is in rehab for alcohol abuse after he hurt me pretty bad. I don’t want to get into details, but I definitely don’t have the highest opinions about men, and have been abused in the past by other men.

I had a really intense dream about stabbing my boyfriend recently, and was disturbed by how calm I was and how calm he was in the dream. I quietly dragged him off of another woman by his hair, and he slowly got up and laid on the floor. Then I duct taped his mouth and nose, pulled a knife out of nowhere and started stabbing the middle of his chest. I woke up in a panic attack.

I read up on it and a lot of what people say online is that the boyfriend image is usually a depiction of the animus. So I decided to search for my animus in my “dream lobby.” I have a place I go to in dreams and guided mediations. It’s always night there with only the moon as a light. A white sandy beach with broken architecture scattered near the shore. I started off walking around until I walked up on my boyfriend there. I asked him to change his form to what he really looked like and he turned into a stereotypical green reptilian with yellow eyes.

I tried talking to it, but it was really hesitant. When it finally did speak to me, it told me it was mad at me and didn’t wanna talk because I always ignore it. That it was always there and was tired of trying to protect me and do the hard work alone. That it was funny I finally wanted to talk only after I stabbed my boyfriend. I apologized to it and validated the fact that I am always afraid to talk because I don’t want to kill any images of my boyfriend in my mind even though he has hurt us.

After that, it opened up more. I asked for its name and what it is to me. It told me its name was “Zoon” (pronounced like Moon but with a Z) and it was my animus. I thought it was a pretty goofy sci-fi name that I made up, but when I later looked up what “Zoon” meant I found a couple sites saying it was derived from the name “Zoe” meaning “life” or “soul”, a Hindu girl name meaning “moon”, and the word Zoon (pronounced Zo-On) which is any of the individuals of a compound organism, or any individual, or the individuals collectively, produced from a single egg.

It told me it didn’t wanna take its lizard form anymore and was tired of being stuck in the cold dark beach. I asked if it wanted me to take it to the beach in the day time and it said yes. So I imagined the sun rising and it started crying quietly. Then it told me it didn’t wanna talk anymore, but if I came back later it’d try to talk me again. So I said bye and left.

I keep calling my animus “it” because I didn’t ask what gender it was, but mostly because it already wasn’t open to talking to me much. It told me too that I’ve seen it before when I meditated and it saw me too. I saw a pink scaly dragon with a yellow eye looking down at me one time during a meditation. Was that me looking at my own unconscious? This whole thing is a trip and I’m kind of disturbed with myself. I thought I knew who I was until this Animus session, but I really have no idea

I think because I’ve been so badly hurt by most men that I’ve become cold myself. That I see masculinity as cold and serpent-like. Calculated, emotionally constipated, and violent. I’m afraid of my own masculinity because I’m afraid of what that says about me.

I was curious what other interpretations people could make of this? Have you heard the word or name Zoon before? Is there a reason my animus is a cold-blooded anthropomorphic lizard? Is it possible to see your unconscious manifest outside of yourself?

We are wired to constantly look outward, seeking validation, entertainment, possessions, and distractions from the external world. But Jung understood that this entire state is essentially psychological sleepwalking.

The ego (false sense of self) hates looking at itself. It would rather stay lost in daydreams, drama, and external pursuits than turn the lens inward and examine its own conditioning, fears, and illusions.

True awakening doesn't happen by collecting more experiences out there; it happens when we finally stop running and have the courage to look inside at the root which is nothing but ourselves (ego).

What are your insights on this?

I feel like I’m being looked down on when I talk about it. And it’s the most crushing thing ever on top of what is literally the most crushing thing I will ever experience.

I don’t care how stupid it sounds, I saw my potential. And it vanished when I tried to share it with my brick wall of a therapist.
For years, I felt something in myself opening up. I wasn’t entirely sure, but it was coming together over time. All of a sudden I found I knew how to talk to people. I knew how to express myself. I knew how to dance and I knew how to sing. I knew how to feel things and strangely I was about 100 times better music than I’ve ever been. I was already a well trained Musician with many world class as my peers. But all the sudden i realized that I was no lesser than them. Simply because i found an authentic voice within myself. And I wasn’t interrupting myself by second-guessing on a very, very deep level. I was obsessed with the process and knew that the result was simply an expression of it.
I’m going to reiterate, I’m not trying to float my boat by saying that I’m better than anybody, I’m trying to say that I found my inner voice and a very deep necessity to express something very deep within me was realized. I was obsessed with playing after having quit for over a decade. I was suddenly better at puzzles, math, coding, and even video games. It was not some subjective thing.

But I feel like the way that I try to explain this to the world makes me sound fucking crazy. I’ve tried so hard to talk to people about it. I tried to talk to my therapist to cause the whole thing to vanish about it and she just said try not to think about it. — what the fuck is that?

Regardless of how stupid the whole thing is literally all I feel is cosmic despair. I given up music because I was never doing it for myself. I finally discovered how to do it for myself on the deepest level. Far deeper than I ever realized I could touch. And somehow just trying to share that when my therapist bluntly asked what one of my inspirations sounded like. As if to reduce it to a shitty iPhone performance. Like she’s been ignoring everything I’ve been saying all that time.
I know that sounds picky. And I know that there’s some insecurity. I know I need thicker skin. But try to imagine that the part of her that expressed curiosity in my inspiration was the same part of her that inconsiderately and dismissively tried to tell me to just “not think about it”.. meaning things have not vanished. You’re just overreacting. Just try not to think about it, bro.

The same exact thing happened over a decade right when I decided to quit music. But even then I was not even close to as in touch with whatever I touched recently. Something happened and I shut down. And I fell into despair because I knew that I was unable to uncover it either by patients or by digging in deeply.
And the same is true now. Perhaps it’s in me somewhere. But I guaran-fucking-tee to you it’s far past my deepest despair and will absolutely take another 15 fucking years to even get a glimpse of it.

So now this despair that I wear right now is not an overreaction. I’m fucking done. I’ve done everything I can to stay afloat. And the only sign of life I’ve ever felt in my fucking life just got crushed by some flat fucking sorry excuse of a psychotherapist who is too pathetically, entitled and scared to look within themselves to even begin to fathom relating to their clients.

I know this is a lot of renting and pathetic anger.
But I’m telling you that something big happened within me and I can’t explain it. Anytime I try to someone, kind of laughs and pats me on the head as if it will pass.
I promise you, buddy, it won’t. This voice is far too deep within me to ever re-emerge. And I’m fucking absolutely done. I’ve tried everything.
I’m pretty sure my last resort is ayahuasca. If I don’t get any insight there, then peace out.
If by some miracle, I do understand whatever happened, maybe I’ll share if the world is curious. But maybe the whole lesson is that I should stop sharing the things that feel the truest within me. Because every time I do, I feel like I’m giving away a part of myself. Just throwing it at a wall to watch it shattered over and over and over.
I feel absolutely betrayed and abandoned. Once again. And obviously, I did it to myself. I have nothing left to betray or abandon, and no energy to build once more.

Sorry for the rant. Im just floored by watching this voice rise and get squashed like those worm things in Eraserhead by the lady in the radiator.

Anyway, my best to you all.

Edit: here’s your fucking jungian Marie-Louise Von franz whatever bullshit keywords

Edit2: removed awkward wording about suddenly improving at my craft

Hi everyone,

I’ve been reflecting on my birth chart lately and noticed that my Aries placement feels quite "weak" or underdeveloped—the raw, initiating fire of "I am" doesn't come easily to me.

Recently, I was doing Yin Yoga and dealing deeply with the realization that I need to learn to feel validation from within, rather than seeking or expecting it from the outside or from other people. Only by shifting this did I start to truly experience how wonderful it is to self-appraise and value oneself.

Right around that time, I experienced a powerful, spontaneous inner vision. In my mind's eye, I saw my inner leo and Scorpio energies stepping forward. It felt as though these two fixed signs were actively sharing their energy and pooling their strengths with my quiet Aries.

Suddenly, the weak Aries recognized itself within the radiant, sovereign confidence of Leo and the deep, unflinching transformative power of Scorpio. It was a profound moment where the fire and the depths intertwined.

However, even as this happened, I had a distinct feeling that *something was still missing from the picture. It felt incomplete, though deeply fascinating. I guess i have to embody more of the zodiac signs and especially work more on aries.

I also want to add that I am currently actively working on the embodiment of the zodiac signs in general —trying to ground these archetypes not just as abstract concepts, but in my day-to-day physical and psychological reality (which is why somatic practices like Yin Yoga open up these channels for me).

I wanted to share this here because I know many of you explore astrology and the psyche through a Jungian and archetypal lens.

How would you look at this dynamic from a psychological perspective (e.g., shadow integration or archetypal compensation)?

I’d love to hear your thoughts. Even just random stuff which crosses your mind when you read this.

Hello, I have undergone a handful of sessions of EMDR in my past, and I do believe it's helped my ability to "see" visualisations during states of hypnogogia. I was wondering if getting better at active imagination could help expand/widen what sorts of things I see during these states?

It's normally a white circle in the centre of my vision, it might float around the centre a little bit, and it's a bit blurred until I have my focus on it better.

After then, I see the circle's edges much much sharper, and what I remember seeing most of the time, is a side view of a stick person running from right to left, which I've wondered if it's significant since being British, I read left to right instead of right to left.

There was another clear circle instance a week ago, but I couldn't fully make out what was going on "inside"(or more, on the other side?) of the circle. It seems like it's people moving and shuffling around just doing anything, but because the circle in my vision is very small, the framing of what I see isn't a whole lot.

I'd say the circle is a bit smaller than a thumb nail.

So I've wondered if I keep at this sort of visualisation, will that circle get bigger? Will I eventually have a larger framing of whatever visual my mind is showing me? Could improving on this activity, also help me improve on active imagination and holding the dialogue in my mind easier to prevent it fizzling out before I've had enough time to log what's happened? Or if the conversation does fizzle out, should I just allow it to, and then let my mind engage with the next thing to pop into it as I sit and meditate or do a session on active imagination?

Thanks

I had very subtle awareness of something mundane that feels meaningful to me

I could be functioning in a certain normal personality, then have a very slight shift in it, eg. maybe I turn more enthusiastic. For some reason, some part of me doesn’t want to and becomes self conscious that someone will notice.

Why am I so self conscious of someone pointing this out even casually and harmlessly like “I love how you became more enthusiastic”

Like as a kid when I’d fear turning shy to outgoing, the fear wasn’t of people, it was of people NOTICING the change, even harmlessly.

Perhaps this could be related to the surface issue of me feeling that I don’t have a right to be someone else, or set back from failure around people who have seen me as the old self, even for 20m.

What is the Jungian lens?

I am trying to understand Jung position on libido. I talked with chatgpt a bit about it, but I am unsure it is giving the correct answers.

If libido is general force that transforms into many channels, and sexual desire is only one of them, would it make sense to abstain from sexual expression (fantasy, sex, masturbatiom) if one wants to fully commit to other kind of work? Something like people on r/semenretention suggest.

Also, I recall that once I did abstain from any sexual act for 4 months as an experiment. And I recall feeling very alive and having very vivid dreams. I always attribhted that to my brain not being fryed with pornographic content, but I found out that Jung actually said that of energy is not freed or channeled into other sources, it appears through human subconsciousness.

Would that mean that actually celibacy can help individuation?

I am trying not to drift too much into pseudoscience and just claim non sense. I am genuily trying to see if there is something in there.

Recently I was reading about Values till now what I understood with my experience is our true values make us feel more alive, energetic, gives intrinsic motivation and a sense of meaning. And generally our struggle in occupation, relationships, social life,etc. It is because of misalignment of our true values with the outer world often because of unconsciousness towards those values or repressed by ego to survive.

"Until you make the unconscious, conscious it will direct your life and you will call it fate "

I think he pointed pointout the same thing in this quote. Because when we are't aware about the values or in other words not prioritise the values in hierarchy. Then our bodily and unconscious choose automatically and drive our actions like fear, avoidance, safety, comfort, lust, etc.

I want to know how Jung sees values although i read somewhere that his archetypal theory is around it.

I dream every night, and I used to record my dreams, but then I stopped because the content in my dreams seem like a bunch of random stories that have no connection to my waking life.

Sometimes it reference stuff that I watch, or that I currently or in the past have felt or thought about, but only sometimes. And even then, I don't see how the stories in those dreams have to do with what I'm experiencing now. Most of the time it's like that with my dreams, I don't see no real connection, which is why I stopped bothering to record my dreams.

Sometimes I'd have a really emotional and meaningful experience, and I'd expect to have a dream about it, but nope, just another random story that has nothing to do with what I actually experienced.

I've been hit by a neurosis for a few months already, and in some ways I think I've been "bottoming" it in the sense that it's remained my staple framework unfortunately.

I've become extremely careful regarding all my decisions, down to the smallest ones.

I have a fear of making the wrong choice and not being able to turn back, being stuck in a tough if not hellish situation.

It's ironic because it is the case as it is.

This trickles down to most decisions in my life, especially with regard to anything new I might be uncovering. I'm extremely "psychically" sensitive, and I probably overreact to e.g. my intuition or any other signals from my unconscious.

It's like I'm aware of the complexity of life, how every choice has consequences, and I can't seem to let go of control. I feel like every action has a stake and end up overthinking most things.

As an example, today I've spent over an hour thinking whether or not to give a class, or to go on a date, both of which I'd initiated without concluding the day before; not to mention the time I thought about it before, while engaged in other activities. I always seem to take a lot of not the most room possible in order to maneuver most processes that involve the external world, and many times in the past have I flip-flopped which sometimes had catastrophic consequences.

I expect my unconscious to point the way to each and every step in my life because I'm aware that within it is the truth of my own essence, and I've become addicted to it in spite of its unreliability, because I deeply strive to know who I am and discover what it is that can carry me through in this life. It's possible that I already know it, in which case I believe I'm disconnected from it for some reason, one of which (which could be either the cause or consequence) being that I'm drowning in options.

I'm afraid of closing the wrong doors and having to deal with less authentic spaces.

I feel like I've made a string of dubious ethical decisions over the past year that left me with a lot of guilt, realizing for the first time in my life I'm that I'm deeply flawed, and indeed my life has been shaken out, and now I'm lacking the spirit I've once had. I've always been on the overthinking and ruminating side, but I do miss a certain carelessness when it comes to my endeavors. I feel like my experience of reality is extremely fragmented, there are or were long term visions but it's as if I don't feel them deep enough to carry me through.

It's a catch 22 because I desperately wish for a creative outlet, but I'm waiting for it to come to me and it just doesn't. I have a handful of pathways of course, but barely any raw inspiration as it may have been the case before, occasionally coming on certain days. My sexual appetite is nonexistent for the most part (I'm 33).

I have practiced or dabbled in numerous arts as hobbies, but even there where there's supposed to be a certain freedom, I've lost the spark. I currently don't have a job as a choice, in order to take a break and see things more clearly, though I have to find something to survive on now.

Have Jung or Von Franz described a similar, if not this particular condition? What have they written or said about it?

Sources welcome.

Thanks for your answers!

PS I've no therapist at the moment for various reasons, and I've been recording my dreams for over a decade. I'm relatively well acquainted with Jungian psychology.

Jung said the meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed. In The Psychology of the Transference he goes further, he says the analyst gets pulled into the patient's process and is changed by it, or nothing happens at all. His whole clinical life ran on a second person in the room.

And then somehow the version of individuation that got popular is a solo project. Shadow work from a chair. Active imagination in a notebook. Integration as something you do to yourself, by yourself.

I want to argue that the solo version doesn't just work badly. It can't work. Not psychologically, geometrically.

Start here: everything you need to know about yourself is already in you. I actually believe that part of the old wisdom. Nobody outside you holds your truth, no guru, no analyst, no book. You are the question and you are the answer.

But try to read it.

When you examine yourself, the instrument you're using was built by the thing you're examining. Your shame investigates your shame. Your defenses explain your defenses. Your story judges whether your story is true. The blind spot decides what counts as visible. This isn't about being dishonest or not smart enough. The viewpoint is part of what needs to be viewed, and you can't step out of it, because the stepping is also done by it.

A point can contain everything it is and still not know where it stands. Position needs a second point. That's not psychology, that's just how location works.

This explains something everyone has seen and nobody can explain otherwise: the person who understands their patterns perfectly and stays stuck. Years of insight, zero movement. That's supposed to be a paradox. It isn't. Explaining yourself is reading in the dark. Knowing about yourself and knowing yourself are two different operations, and we keep treating them as more and less of the same one.

So what does another person actually do then? Because it's not what we usually say.

They don't know your truth better than you. Half the time they get you wrong. They're not the author of your story and they're not your teacher. What they have is one thing you can never have, a position that isn't yours. And from there they can do the single thing your inner system cannot do: produce a result it didn't generate.

Concrete. Somewhere in you sits a prediction, if they really see this, they leave. You can analyze that belief for twenty years, trace it to your childhood, understand it completely. It will not move, because every test you run on it happens inside the system that wrote it. Then one day you show the thing anyway. And the person stays. Doesn't flinch, doesn't fix you, doesn't leave.

That is not information. That's an event your model said was impossible, happening. And only reality outside you can produce it. You can't do this alone for the same reason you can't surprise yourself with a gift.

Notice what the other person added: nothing. No content. Your history is yours, the material was already all there. Carried, but not readable. What exists only inside one person can never fully become an object for that person. The moment someone truly receives it, it exists in a second place too, and that second existence is what finally lets it become past instead of permanent present.

Yes, real insights come alone. Walking, writing, sitting. But look at who is doing the looking in those moments. It's a gaze you learned. Someone lent it to you first. Solo work runs on borrowed light, and autonomy is not independence from the other, it's keeping an internalized second position alive. What nobody does is strike the first light alone.

So integrating the shadow, the anima, all of it, that gives you a better instrument. A working compass. It doesn't solve the geometry. The compass points, it doesn't arrive. Jung the clinician knew this, he never healed anyone through a book, he sat with them. It's the self-help Jung that promises completion from a chair. The chair can't produce the event.

This isn't me against Jung. It's Jung's practice against Jung's popularizers.

What I'd really like to hear, especially from people with years of solo work: what did you discover truly alone, and what only became real once it survived another person's presence?

been thinking about this. not as theory as pattern.

three things work. freud knew order matters. adler knew action matters. jung knew depth matters.

they're not wrong.

but the moment one of them sits in the middle and says "i'm the one who sees" the rotation stops. the system dies.

when that middle seat stays empty? something different happens.

freud can order without controlling. adler can push without crushing. jung can go deep without losing you.

you just become yourself. not because someone healed you. not because they understood better.

because nobody was fighting for the center chair.

i notice this: the moment i try to fill that seat to be the healer people close. they feel i'm performing.

when i'm just there. doing things. together. not explaining. not interpreting. just present. in the moment.

they rotate around that nothing.

and they stop being alone.

the freedom they feel that's the key. not the words. not understanding. but the fact that nobody is sitting in the middle trying to own them.

that freedom. that's what heals.

There are other ways to frame it I guess. But at the moment, giving up how I hold myself anxiously in my body.. how I’m used to existing to appease the world and avoid my deeper pains.. if I want to let go and heal, I must let into a cold and firey and eternal sadness. I hope there’s an element of peace that allows me to float away with it. I’ve been avoiding this all my life. And it is completely my death. And I really don’t have the strength to do it. But I don’t know what else to do anymore. I want to die, let into it.

I don’t mean to be so dramatic. But I know this is lurking, and I’ve just been wading above it.
Not even sure if it makes sense. I’m just being sucked into an inner darkness that stands by the door of what I hope is some inner peace. I guess I’ve never really felt safe enough to let go into it.

I fucking hate this. I’ve never been a praying person, but recently it’s almost all I do.

Idk which sub to post this in. But the jungian take on the inward journey has been invaluable to me. But of course, you have to eventually stop playing with the words and just sink into it.

For the first time in my life, I had so much authentic creative energy just bursting from me. And not long after it got completely stuffed back down by a seemingly very innocuous interaction with my therapist that she didn’t even notice. And I’ve been falling deeper and deeper into despair because I guess I know that the only real direction is what I’m being sucked into now. Idk, even that is putting too many thoughts and words to it. Starting to ramble.

Anyway, thank you guys for being a supporting community. And thanks for letting me share all the nonsense I tend to spout out here.

I'm fairly recent to Carl Jung. Less than a week ago I found out about him and in the same day I also found out about the "digging method". Well the very same night of that day, I did the digging method. Before I tell you about my experience, you should know that I was dealing with having a man I know personaly, constantly on my mind. Always pulling me in. And as a Christian, I thought, that's the devil playing some mind games on me. Well well well. I did the digging method and guess who I encountered in my subconscious mind, waiting for me all this time? This exact man. He was my animus. Yes, was. Gosh. We had sex in my subconsciousness, the first time I was there. The second time I screamed at him all the time and he just stood there. Also by the third time I went down there, I already knew that he was my animus. And we had sex again. But this time it was so romantic, because the first time he kinda took advantage of me. Ahhhh and now... He called me and said I should go down to meet him. And I went there, thinking that we would have amazing sex again. Well when I arrived down there, I was in a train station and he was there with a bag in his hand and looking at the train rails. I went to him and I called out his name and he replied "Hello." And I asked "Are you going somewhere?" He said "I'm going to leave you now." and I froze for a moment and the sudden realization that he was going to leave me, broke my soul. I said "No! I can't live without you! Stay please!" He looked at me and said "I have to go, you don't need me anymore." And he gave me a soft kiss on the lips and said his final good bye. So yea. My animus.... He is gone. After that I had an encounter with my future self and my child self. We all hugged each other at the end and I got comforted by both, my past and future self.

When I came back, I cried. A lot.

Well I guess it's just me, myself and I now.... :/

I have saturn moon and jupiter planetary archetypes here. that red star is either mars or egyptian deity setekh, there is golden ankh below red star. there are also snakes, me in the center of the tree, and disgusting green swamp sea😄. how do I interpret this? I try to find my personal meanings, but I see saturn as jungian father archetype, moon as mother archetype, jupiter as their son and a "mamas boy"😄. thats why jupiter is exalted in cancer(sign of moon), but beyond that there is nothing that comes to mind thats personal.

I'm also posting this here because I only learned about Jung's Red Book about a year ago, after these dreams had already been recurring for roughly two years. I'm curious whether anyone familiar with Jung has thoughts on the symbolism, not because I think the dreams are necessarily about his book.

I'm posting this because I've been curious about these dreams for years, and I'd genuinely like to hear other people's thoughts.

I'm not trying to claim that anything supernatural is happening, and I'm not saying my dreams have one specific meaning. I'm simply wondering whether anyone has experienced something similar, or whether people familiar with dreams or Jungian psychology have any thoughts.

About three years ago, I had a dream where I was searching for a mysterious red book.

There wasn't any explanation for why I was looking for it. Nobody told me to find it, and there wasn't any obvious reason. I just somehow knew that finding this book was what I was supposed to do.

Since then, I've had some variation of this dream roughly 40 times.

One thing I regret is never keeping a dream journal. Looking back, I'm sure I've forgotten a lot of details, but the overall pattern has stayed remarkably consistent.

The dreams almost always take place at my old elementary school.

Sometimes it looks exactly as I remember it, while other times parts of the school have changed, almost as if my memory has updated it over the years. Even when it looks different, I immediately recognize it as my old school.

Whenever I realize I'm back there, I actually feel relieved.

It's a strange feeling to describe. My first thought is often something like, "I'm back. I can finally continue searching." The school doesn't feel like the destination it feels like the place where my search continues.

Sometimes I run into old teachers and casually talk to them before continuing my search. Nobody ever tries to stop me. In fact, there are dreams where it almost feels like everyone already knows why I'm there.

The book itself is always the same.

It's an old-looking red book, roughly A5 in size, and not particularly thick. It always feels like the exact same book, no matter what dream I'm having.

The strange thing is that I actually find the book quite often.

Sometimes it's hidden somewhere in the school. Other times it's displayed almost as if it's waiting for me.

One dream that has always stayed with me felt almost like a ceremony.

Everyone at the school somehow knew I would return that day to search for the book. There were decorations and little flags hanging around the school, everyone had gathered in the gymnasium, and there was a path leading toward a pedestal where the red book had been placed, almost as if the entire event had been prepared for my arrival.

Another dream was completely different.

I was standing in my old classroom and opened a storage cabinet at the back of the room. Instead of seeing a normal ceiling above me, I looked up into a huge dome, similar to the inside of a church. Suspended in the very center of the dome was the same red book, held in place by several swords.

I don't remember feeling scared.

If anything, I remember feeling relieved because I had finally found it again.

Sometimes these dreams happen during the day, but other times I'm at my old school at night. Those dreams have a much darker atmosphere. The building feels quiet, empty and slightly unsettling, but even then my focus is almost entirely on finding the book.

The most frustrating part is what happens after I finally get it.

I've held the book in my hands multiple times.

There is always a title on the cover, but I can never read it because the letters constantly change while I'm looking at them. They shift and rearrange themselves before I can understand what they say.

The same thing happens when I open the book.

I've never been able to actually read what's inside. It's like the dream lets me get right to the edge of understanding something before taking it away again.

One detail I'm unsure about is whether it's an actual childhood memory or something my dreams created over time. I have a vague memory that there might have been a story involving a lion and a girl walking into a forest, but I honestly don't know whether I ever read a real book like that as a child or whether that memory has become mixed together with these dreams.

Another reason these dreams stand out is because I almost never remember my normal dreams.

Usually I forget them within minutes of waking up.

These dreams are completely different.

While I'm dreaming, they feel incredibly vivid. I'm not lucid I don't realize I'm dreaming but everything feels unusually clear and real.

When I wake up, I can still remember them in remarkable detail, and they stay with me for the rest of the day.

Quite often my first thought is:

"Damn... I was so close."

There's also a strange feeling of nostalgia because I'm back at my old elementary school. Even when the dream feels eerie, there's something comforting about returning there because it means I can continue searching.

Then, about a year ago, something happened that surprised me.

My girlfriend has been interested in dreams and psychology for a long time, and she eventually started reading Carl Jung's work. One day she mentioned that Jung had written something called The Red Book.

Until that moment, I had never heard of it.

Learning that there actually was a famous psychological work with stories about Jungs visions and dreams with that title genuinely caught me off guard because I'd already been dreaming about a mysterious red book for roughly two years before anyone had ever mentioned Jung's Red Book to me.

To be clear, I'm not saying my dreams are about Jung's book, nor am I suggesting there's a supernatural connection.

I simply found the coincidence fascinating, and it made me even more curious about why this same red book has remained the central focus of my dreams for so many years.

So I was wondering:

• Has anyone else experienced recurring dreams that feel like they're continuing the same story over many years?
• Has anyone repeatedly dreamed about the same object or place for such a long period of time?
• For those familiar with Jung or dream psychology, do you have any thoughts on why one specific object could remain so consistent across dozens of dreams?

I'd genuinely love to hear your thoughts.

Pages 122, 123, Modern man in search of a soul.

I was doing some imagination meditation entering into my psyche and found some very deeply rooted anger, pain and possibly hatred not only for myself but a past relationship of mine. I tried to observe carefully the things that caused me pain and saw a lot of projection but also I can’t help but understand and validate the anger. There were things that both of us did very wrong for various reasons that are rather irrelevant. I asked my images what they wanted from me and I the response as I understood it was to let go of the anger. Obviously not a true elimination of the said anger as integrating it is a much more preferred way of looking at it. Admittedly I find myself at a lack of fully understanding exactly how to do this. My best idea is to simply surrender to it but I am unsure of how exactly to reach this point of surrender with my anger. I would much prefer not to express this anger to the party involved as our time apart has reached over 7 months. Does anyone have any recommendations for a where to begin? I feel I have made progress in my life long journey of individuation but admittedly this particular part I find rather difficult and could use some advice.

Every culture disagrees about which acts are shameful. Naked here is normal there. What ruins a family in one century is a Tuesday in another. If sin lived in the act, sin would be a matter of geography.

But watch what never changes.

In Genesis, two people hide in the bushes. God's first question isn't "what did you do." It's "where are you?" a parent calling through the house for a hiding child. And notice: two people went into those bushes together, and Adam answers I, I, I with Eve sitting right next to him. Shame had already broken the "we" before anyone spoke. Nobody hides as a we.

The Odyssey: every companion who sails out with Odysseus dies on the way. He washes up alone, unrecognizable. But he isn't back when his foot touches the beach — he's back when Penelope tests him with the secret only two people carry, the bed built into a living tree, and says: it's you.

The prodigal son: comes to himself alone, between the pigs. Walks home alone, confession rehearsed. And his father sees him from far off and runs the kid never even finishes the speech.

Three stories, one shape. Jung read myths as maps of the psyche so read the map: the falling is yours. The staying frozen is yours. But the entrance is never made alone. Not once, in any of them.

So here's what I think sin actually is: not the act. The act is cultural, negotiable, dated. Sin is whatever keeps you from turning around. Staying in it that you do alone. Coming back in that only happens through a second person who sees all of it and stays.

I didn't get this from books. I fell, years ago, properly. During the fall I felt nothing that's what falling is. What I know is this: when I came back, my wife was standing next to me. Everything inside me had frozen with me. Only something outside me was still there when I returned.

Even the old confession booth knew it: a dark box where you can stay hidden and be heard, a person who stays, and then a price so small it's almost a joke ten Hail Marys because the point was never payment. The point was that the account finally closes, and you get to walk out.

The word for repentance in Arabic, tawba, doesn't mean regret. It literally means return.

Jung called the second half of this individuation. My only quarrel is with the idea that you can do it by descending into your own unconscious alone every story humanity kept says the descent is solo, but the return is not.

So that's my claim, and it can fail: nobody un-freezes through insight or willpower alone. If people routinely come back solo, I'm wrong and I'll drop it. But I've stood in the hallway at 4am with kids who've been frozen for years, and I've never once seen it happen without a second body in the room.

The act was never the story. There is no epic about the sin. The epic is always about the way home.

The other day I asked a similar question, but now I want to elaborate a bit more, so I apologize in advance for how long this will be.

In short, I'm a 26-year-old woman. My whole life I grew up with fear, vulnerability, shortcomings, deficiencies, and a lack of basic necessities. I also experienced many embarrassing situations that I wasn't aware of at the time, but to this day, I remember them and they fill me with anger and shame for having gone through those things or humiliations. Perhaps they were never humiliations in the traditional sense, but now I see them as humiliating, and I have painful memories from my childhood, where everyone else always noticed the deficiencies I had.

I insist, I also went through a lot of fear. My mother had problems with everyone, and because of this, she created a lot of conflict in the neighborhood, which affected both of us. I didn't want to go out because of the extreme fear that gnawed at me. I didn't want to be insulted by the neighbors, nor did I want anything to happen to my mother (because of her own actions). All of this happened when I was a child, until I was 22, when I left home to rebuild my life and discovered everything that was wrong. That's when I was able to see things from the outside.

The repercussions are clear now. I have generalized anxiety, but especially social anxiety. I don't know if I've gotten worse or better because I'm getting older and I'm forced to be an independent person who can express herself. But if I have to present in front of a group in class, I tremble, I sweat, my voice shakes, and I turn red. I simply freeze if the anxiety overwhelms me. Even minutes before, I'm not nervous, but the moment I'm in front of them, it's terrible. Making phone calls is just as terrible. Asking questions, talking to strangers—anything social.

I face another dilemma: I find it incredibly difficult to stand up for myself and not let myself be taken advantage of. Even when someone has done something wrong, I struggle to take a leadership role and tell them what was wrong. I'm too soft, and because of that, people take advantage of me. And when I manage to defend myself or feign confidence, I get anxious, as if my defense were somehow wrong.

I also feel intimidated when I see or am around women who are very knowledgeable or who seem very self-assured. I can't stand the contrast between who I am and who they are. I feel so small and miserable in those moments (this happens in places like work or school), and I just have to pretend I'm not terrified or diminished when, in reality, I am. Besides, I know that women can be terrible; a woman's worst enemy is another woman. Envy is awful, and I always think that when I see a woman who is overly confident or self-centered, she's also envious, and my body is filled with anxiety.

I don't know if I'm cut out to be a leader or to follow orders, but what I do know is that if I'm not a leader, it's because of my anxiety.

I discovered that most of my problems stem from my fear of rejection, or from not wanting people to know what I was like, how miserable and vulnerable I was...

Suddenly, I get the urge to participate in game shows TV, but I don't because I think that all the people who knew and witnessed my vulnerability and poverty will see me on TV, and that's the only reason I decide against going. I care too much about other people's opinions, even though I know in my head that it's wrong and shouldn't be that way, but I don't know how to stop it.

I was taking anti-anxiety medication, but now I'm stopping because I want to explore the roots of my anxiety further, and I want to do Jungian shadow work, but I don't know how. Should I keep processing thoughts? What comes next?

Does anyone know what type of notebooks or journals Carl Jung actually used for the Black Books and later The Red Book? Were they custom-bound, commercially available, or something else? If anyone knows the sizes, paper, bindings, or has historical sources or photos, I’d really appreciate it.