|
Remo F. Roth
Dr. oec. publ., Ph.D.
dipl. analyt. Psychologe (M.-L. v. Franz)
|
|
email
HomePage
Remo Roth
WebSite
Psychovision
©
copyright 2002 by Pro Litteris, Zuerich (Switzerland).
Urheberrechtsverletzungen
werden international verfolgt. Genehmigungen zur Publikation von
Zitaten durch den Autor über email
Introduction
to Carl G. Jung's Principle of Synchronicity
by Remo F. Roth, PhD, CH-8810
Horgen-Zuerich, Switzerland
Thanks to Phyllis Luthi
(jobshop@pacbell.net) for the help with the translation
In today's world we reduce all events to the
Principle of Cause and Effect (causality) and ask, which cause
belongs to which effect. Carl G. Jung, toward the end of his life,
realized that there is another type of events. Such events are
directed toward a goal, that is, they lead into an event which has no
cause. Therefore, they correspond to a new creation. In religious
language such "effects" without "cause" were considered as miracles.
The Catholic Church calls the underlying principle the providence of
God.
When one observes one's dreams over a longer
period of time, one becomes aware that often outward events occur
that are very similar to the content of one's dreams. It would seem
that the inner world and the outer world coincide. Carl G. Jung had
suggested that one should - instead of looking for a magical
relationship, as they did in medieval times - try to find the common
meaning of such relatively simultaneous inner and outer events. The
principle that underlies this nexus he called
synchronicity.
Jung cites in his letters [vol. 1, 1973, p.
395] an occurrence that is an impressive example of
synchronicity: "For instance, I walk with a woman patient in a wood.
She tells me about the first dream in her life that had made an
everlasting impression upon her. She had seen a spectral fox coming
down the stairs in her parental home. At this moment a real fox comes
out of the trees not 40 yards away and walks quietly on the path
ahead of us for several minutes. The animal behaves as if it were a
partner in the human situation."
According to Jung it would be wrong and
extremely dangerous, to see a causal relationship between the two
occurrences and to say that one event was the cause of the other.
That would be nothing other than a relapse to the magical-causal
thinking of the middle ages. Instead of this we must accept that the
two occurrences are not causally connected, but rather by a common
meaning. This means that we have to extract the meaning of the symbol
"fox" for the interpretation of this synchronicity. This would
somehow purport, that the dreamer herself - symbolically speaking -
should be lead much more by her "inner fox", meaning that she must
recover the instinctive cleverness she had lost with her intellectual
point of view.
When one has experienced a number of such
synchroncitities (see also Carl
G. Jungs Scarab Synchronicity),
one gains over time the impression that there is a wisdom within
them, far beyond that of our conscious knowledge. Furthermore, they
would indicate that the inner world, for example dreams out of the
so-called unconscious, know something about the outward, but also
that the outer, the animate or even the inanimate material world
knows something about the inner. Carl G. Jung had therefore put forth
the postulate that there has to be a world in which inner and outer
world, psyche and matter are connected in an undifferentiated unity.
This world was called the unus mundus in the Middle Ages [see also
the UNUS MUNDUS forum]. Carl G. Jung and Wolfgang Pauli looked for this world and
called it the unified
psychophysical reality ("die
psychophysische Einheitswirklichkeit") beyond the split in matter and
psyche. One must consider this a potential world out of which
causeless new creations can occur. Synchronistic events show the
moment that this potential world will incarnate into the
concrete.
In the above example it was in the moment of
that the fox emerged in the forest that this moment came in which the
stricken woman came out of her intellectualism and was able to
recover her instinctive cleverness. Jung would probably have said
something like the following to her: "You see, now the fox is also
outside. Invite the symbol of instinctive cleverness into your world
and you will be lead by it in your later life. Forget all of your ifs
or buts, conquer all your intellectual blocks in this way and begin
to trust your instinctive wisdom which will show you the right way."
Through the experience and the interpretation of this synchronicity
would the consciousness of the client abruptly transform and this
impressive occurrence would lead to a new meaning to her future
life.
Physically seen the principle of cause and
effect leads finally into so-called Entropy, in other words the so
called "heat death" of the universe. The differences in energy
between various parts decrease until there is no more difference,
energy no longer can flow, and life is extinguished.
Similar events one can observe in the psychic
realm. People who have been bound too long to the causal paradigma
begin to die in this life. Unconsciously they will become "living
deads". Thus the Sufis, the mystics of Islam - say these words of
wisdom: "Die before you die!" By this they mean that in such people a
new conscious orientation should take place which
effects so that the consciousness then would much more be connected
to the principle of synchronicity instead to causality. This letting
go of old tried and true, this giving up of the power principle, of
"Where there's a will there's a way!" works like an elixier
vitae. Such people begin a second life which falls under the
principle of synchronicity. I call it Synchronicity
Quest, which means that they
begin to let theirselves be lead by coincidences and to take
assistance from their dreams in order to learn to understand wherein
the way of life further leads. In greatly critical moments
synchronicities come to pass which show the real goal of life, which
can not be found by will and causalistic thinking.
Experience shows that such synchronicities
work negentropically, meaning that they build new psychic energy
fields out of which further new life possibilities emerge. People
grow in this manner and those who take their dreams and
synchronicities seriously have a chance to lead a life filled with a
new and deeper meaning. Thereby they have simultaneously overcome the
paradigma of causality while entering into a new age of synchronicity
which appears on the horizon of the new millennium.
see also
English Homepage of Remo F.
Roth (further articles in
English)
http://www.psychovision.ch/rfr/roth_e_synchronicity.htm
(articles about Synchronicity, Wolfgang Pauli and Carl G. Jung)
Wolfgang
Pauli and Parapsychology
Wolfgang Pauli und die
Wiederkehr der Weltseele (in German)
Back
5.5.2002
|