Jack Zaikos’s Reviews > Man and His Symbols > Status Update

The discussion of symbolism in the visual arts has been far more rewarding than I originally thought it would be.

The concept of no artist no matter his genius being able to transcend the capability of his era’s capacity for expression is fascinating.

This section has also opened up a new way of viewing art movements as a representation of humanity’s collective mental state and the evolution of consciousness

Found the discussion of what renaissance meant for human thought and its implications on man from then onwards super insightful. This event being labelled as the splitting point between conscious thought and symbolic, spiritual attainment.

Super keen to learn more about jungs idea of synchronicity

Franz’s discussion of the symbols that arise within the individual and the reluctance of modern religion to accept the events as legitimate was fascinating.

Loved the mention of my namesake “black elk”

The discussion of our active ability to manipulate the unconscious merits further discussion as were exposed to so many attempts to alter our views

The self symbols of totality

Loved the aspects of comparative culture and religion in the segment.

Also noticed that the four colours that Adam was supposedly created from in the four corners of the world coincide with the four fundamental colours of Sioux religion (red white black yellow) representing N, S, E and W which I learn from a medicine mans biography.

The discussion of the self is fascinating

The anima and the animus

Finally getting to the crux of jungs vision of human psychology. The descriptions of these aspects of men and women’s inner being are interesting. There are certain negative anima qualities I can see within myself as a man from reading these pages.

So far from reading this I feel like the concept deserves greater attention and I’m willing to read about it in depth in other books.

Love M. L. Von Franz’s style of writing.

Her explanations of the unconscious are clear and enjoyable.

Franz’ description of how children forget events that are impressive to adults and remember seemingly mundane scenes from childhood as a symbolic representation of key aspects of their psyche is super interesting.

Jim Morison’s run in with the Indians on dawns highway comes to mind.
Memories of my own to

I was a little bit uninterested in chapter two because I feel like the concept can not be sufficiently expressed in a beginner friendly format and could’ve been left out since it could not be done properly.

Chapter 3, however, has brought me right back into it Marie Louise Von franze communicates the concept clearly and succinctly with meaningful examples that enable understanding. The concept itself is profound.

End of chapter 2

The discussion of initiation was rewarding and the function of these rites can be fruitfully understood from a jungian perspective.
The aspects of comparative religion were fascinating like how Orpheus and Christ were shown as parallels in a way. Two versions of the same principle.
I was lost on a few of the examples of the ancient myths on current cases of dreams which suffer from little clarity

Wowwwwww

End of chapter 1 by Jung

As someone who is non religious I guess I’d most closely relate with the “rationalists” as jung describes them but I’ve never before in my life seen the position so swiftly and convincingly dismantled in the same breath as the dismantling of institutionalised religion.

Jungs position of modern man’s enormous achievements as coming at a great cost is felt in our lives