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Sisyphus: A Jungian Approach to Midlife Crisis
Verena Kast refers to Sisyphus as the myth of the forty-year-olds, who often experience their lot in life to be a Sisyphus task. Are our human efforts all in vain, or is there some meaning to be found? In the end, it is a struggle with death itself. Dr. Kast interprets everyday events, fairy tales and psychotherapy issues in light of the Sisyphus theme, rendering it a kaleidoscope through which we can look deeply into ourselves. Verena Kast deals with a problem that also fascinated Nietzsche and Freud. This book is packed with down-to-earth experience, clinical anecdotes, wit and insight. - Murray Stein
- GenresPsychology
117 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
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November 2, 2018
Contemplating the myth of Sisyphus is very worthy in my opinion. It’s a huge part of our coping process and life’s struggles. Unfortunately, this book did not do too much with it. I am grateful that it brought it to my focus and allowed me to contemplate concepts around struggling in the face of hopelessness. It’s a very potent topic and worthy of more contemplation.
Here are some of my favorite excerpts:
“But hoping is not just timidly waiting for an “opportunity” to present itself or building castles in the air. Hoping is ultimately trusting that there is a solid foundation in our lives, and that our own intentions can be brought into a coherent relationship with the entirety of life. In hope there is ultimately a form of security. Hope transcends the here and now and the conscious will. Hope generally gives us the strength to take on a task in the confidence that sooner or later something will change or that at least there is some sense in persevering. - Pg. 42
Sisyphus is a model for the person who engages himself again in spite of disappointment. He takes up the stone again and starts over as if the loss has never happened. In Sisyphus’s situation a person who is less resilient would come to a halt on the top of the mountain and complain, even if he had been forewarned that he would be disappointed. It would be hard for him to risk the new beginning. After all, he could be disappointed all over again. But Sisyphus can defiantly work through the disappointment and the accompanying emotional hurt. He does not let disappointment hinder him from coping with life. To this extent he wrests a bit of life away from death. Sisyphus is not just a hero who is not easily hurt; he is a hero of great strength, a hero with great energy.
…If we contemplate this myth not in terms of hope and hopelessness, but in terms of expectation and disappointment which comes with it, then the heroic deed of Sisyphus remains undiminished, but he is no longer an absurd hero. To repeatedly take risks in life, though we know that a disappointment is always possible, means to adopt a larger frame of reference and accept that we must continue to say good-bye to certain conceptions and expectations without giving up. All of us know how much strength and how much courage that can take. – Pgs. 44-45
Senseless Expectation
A man has married a very deeply depressed woman. He made it his life task to relieve her depression. At the same time he could transfer his own depressive elements to her and do battle with them in her. He spoiled her, did everything for her, massaged her, inspired her. Sometimes he suffered greatly, because his own needs were no longer taken into account. Every once in a while his wife told him she simply couldn’t go on any more, and every time that happened, he was gravely disappointed. He didn’t let his disappointment show, however, and continued to set up new programs, torturing himself even further and believing that this time he was bound to succeed. But of course he didn’t succeed. In his care she had no opportunity to test and strengthen herself, to develop the ability to shoulder her own stone.
I have included this example here to illustrate that Sisyphean behavior is really not appropriate for all occasions. It must be applied in the right life situation. The courage to begin anew, which is also courage to bear our losses, can be simply a compulsion to repeat. It can be a blind urge to prove our own will superior, a mere expression of the fact that we are both unable and unwilling to give up. – Pgs. 47-48
Change is only possible when we can let go and accept our losses. Ultimately we must recognize that winning and losing are equally important aspects of life. In terms of the myth we need to recognize that we must be not only “master thieves” but “master loser.”
Letting go demands more courage than holding on. After all, we never know how life will change when we let go. The myth only tells us what happens when we hold on beyond the time allotted to us. Letting go, however, can lead to the possibility of transformation. – Pg. 71
[From] Roscher’s dictionary: The rolling of the stone by Sisyphus can be interpreted as the hopeless striving of human intellect: Just when it believes it is about to reach its goal and soar over the pinnacle which will reveal the ultimate panorama, it sinks back down, exhausted by its futile struggle. – Pg. 95
At the time I was extremely active and convinced that I could intervene positively in fate. That was particularly true in the case of my suicidal patient – incidentally, she’s still alive. Then suddenly this dream confronted me with my human limitation, or more accurately, with the extremism of my situation. My entire superhuman protest at the time was revealed, and with one blow a limit was set.
After my dream, I changed quite a bit. I began to accept the submissiveness of others towards fate more easily. Before the dream I had this arrogant attitude that something could be done with these lost souls if I could just get to work on them. If one could only overcome their inertia, one could pull them away from death. Today I am much more patient in these situations. I accompany my patients, but if someone really wants to or has to go through death’s door, I accept it. Naturally, I still try to lead them away from death’s undertow, but I no longer do so with force. – Pg. 100
Here are some of my favorite excerpts:
“But hoping is not just timidly waiting for an “opportunity” to present itself or building castles in the air. Hoping is ultimately trusting that there is a solid foundation in our lives, and that our own intentions can be brought into a coherent relationship with the entirety of life. In hope there is ultimately a form of security. Hope transcends the here and now and the conscious will. Hope generally gives us the strength to take on a task in the confidence that sooner or later something will change or that at least there is some sense in persevering. - Pg. 42
Sisyphus is a model for the person who engages himself again in spite of disappointment. He takes up the stone again and starts over as if the loss has never happened. In Sisyphus’s situation a person who is less resilient would come to a halt on the top of the mountain and complain, even if he had been forewarned that he would be disappointed. It would be hard for him to risk the new beginning. After all, he could be disappointed all over again. But Sisyphus can defiantly work through the disappointment and the accompanying emotional hurt. He does not let disappointment hinder him from coping with life. To this extent he wrests a bit of life away from death. Sisyphus is not just a hero who is not easily hurt; he is a hero of great strength, a hero with great energy.
…If we contemplate this myth not in terms of hope and hopelessness, but in terms of expectation and disappointment which comes with it, then the heroic deed of Sisyphus remains undiminished, but he is no longer an absurd hero. To repeatedly take risks in life, though we know that a disappointment is always possible, means to adopt a larger frame of reference and accept that we must continue to say good-bye to certain conceptions and expectations without giving up. All of us know how much strength and how much courage that can take. – Pgs. 44-45
Senseless Expectation
A man has married a very deeply depressed woman. He made it his life task to relieve her depression. At the same time he could transfer his own depressive elements to her and do battle with them in her. He spoiled her, did everything for her, massaged her, inspired her. Sometimes he suffered greatly, because his own needs were no longer taken into account. Every once in a while his wife told him she simply couldn’t go on any more, and every time that happened, he was gravely disappointed. He didn’t let his disappointment show, however, and continued to set up new programs, torturing himself even further and believing that this time he was bound to succeed. But of course he didn’t succeed. In his care she had no opportunity to test and strengthen herself, to develop the ability to shoulder her own stone.
I have included this example here to illustrate that Sisyphean behavior is really not appropriate for all occasions. It must be applied in the right life situation. The courage to begin anew, which is also courage to bear our losses, can be simply a compulsion to repeat. It can be a blind urge to prove our own will superior, a mere expression of the fact that we are both unable and unwilling to give up. – Pgs. 47-48
Change is only possible when we can let go and accept our losses. Ultimately we must recognize that winning and losing are equally important aspects of life. In terms of the myth we need to recognize that we must be not only “master thieves” but “master loser.”
Letting go demands more courage than holding on. After all, we never know how life will change when we let go. The myth only tells us what happens when we hold on beyond the time allotted to us. Letting go, however, can lead to the possibility of transformation. – Pg. 71
[From] Roscher’s dictionary: The rolling of the stone by Sisyphus can be interpreted as the hopeless striving of human intellect: Just when it believes it is about to reach its goal and soar over the pinnacle which will reveal the ultimate panorama, it sinks back down, exhausted by its futile struggle. – Pg. 95
At the time I was extremely active and convinced that I could intervene positively in fate. That was particularly true in the case of my suicidal patient – incidentally, she’s still alive. Then suddenly this dream confronted me with my human limitation, or more accurately, with the extremism of my situation. My entire superhuman protest at the time was revealed, and with one blow a limit was set.
After my dream, I changed quite a bit. I began to accept the submissiveness of others towards fate more easily. Before the dream I had this arrogant attitude that something could be done with these lost souls if I could just get to work on them. If one could only overcome their inertia, one could pull them away from death. Today I am much more patient in these situations. I accompany my patients, but if someone really wants to or has to go through death’s door, I accept it. Naturally, I still try to lead them away from death’s undertow, but I no longer do so with force. – Pg. 100
September 1, 2021
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