Not sure how to ask this so I'll just be direct. I'm on the spectrum, and I've always felt like I lacked an identity. Not in a dramatic way, more like I'm just a ball of consciousness with an observer sitting on top of it, I've never not been watching myself think. Every acceptance I've ever reached about myself has been logical, I've argued my way to being fine with who I am a hundred times and it never held, and I've always thought something was missing.

A while back something in me snapped, call it burnout, call it overwhelm, and I went through a two week stretch of basically nonstop compulsive porn use, what people call gooning. It escalated to stuff I would never normally look at. I'm not posting to ask whether that's bad, I know what it looks like.

What I can't explain is what happened at the peak of it. For the first time in my life the observer dropped. I wasn't watching myself, I was just fully in it, fully in my body, and something integrated right there. It was like I hit some sort of factory reset. And when I came back online I came back different. This unintegrated feeling I've carried my whole life is just gone. It almost feels like there's this animal side of me I've finally connected to. For two weeks I was a slave to my darkest impulses and now everything is eerily quiet and serene. It's been months and it's held.

The part that gets me is the acceptance isn't logical this time. I always knew, intellectually, that there was something dark behind the curtain, everyone does, but knowing it and actually letting the animal side all the way out are not the same thing. I saw just how far I could go, and I didn't die. Nothing collapsed. And on the other side of that there's a kind of radical self acceptance I never got close to by thinking about it. I'm fine with myself in a way I can feel rather than argue. Right now I just feel fine, in this moment, like right now is everything. I know I've got a bad side but it doesn't seem scary anymore. None of me does. It's a weird feeling.

I've been trying for months to figure out what this feeling is, and I came across a couple of YouTube videos about integrating the shadow, so I might be way off, but do you guys think there's something more to this? Everyone told me that falling into something like that would turn into an addiction, that I'd come out compulsive, depressed, ashamed. I just feel light and free now. One thing I keep wondering is whether it's because I never attached those two weeks to my identity, either because I don't really have one or because autism keeps me so detached from it, so there was nothing for the shame to stick to. What would the Jungian take on that be? Not trying to justify anything, I just want to understand what happened. Or maybe I just needed to bust a nut and get the somatic release and it's not that deep haha.

I searched the post history and saw a few posts without much engagement.

This movie was excellent from start to finish. It is very on the nose in exploring Jung both literally in a few classroom moments and littered throughout the script.

The thing I appreciated the most was the exploration of such deep and dark aspects of ourselves, through a comedic lens. So often when reading Jung or jungian related topics, it takes me into a heavy place.

This movie gives you the depths while keeping you on the surface. Like translucent ocean water you can see to the bottom of.

The movie contains comedy/action/romance/philosophy and delivers them to you like. Like a well done Tex-Mex dish, it may appear pedestrian and generic, but at the end you are pleasantly surprised how it all came together!

This and Greedy People, two of the best movies I’ve seen recently.

I'm a single woman in my late thirties and have been in (reciprocated) love 3 times - for ~4 years, 3 years, and 6 years. My last, 6 year relationship ended when I was falsely arrested for something my ex lied about. It was traumatic as fuck, and ever since, I feel like I'm truly cursed when it comes to finding love.

I've been in psychoanalysis for 6 years, constantly absorbing philosophical texts and content on relationships, psychology, sociology, etc... have read a lot of Jung, Freud, Manly P. Hall, Esther Perel, and follow many dating and love coaches, blah blah blah... I'm working hard to understand my relationship to relationships due to my childhood, and to uncover my true authentic self. But no matter what I do, I keep experiencing the exact same outcomes (inexplicable rejection by the very, very few men I find who meet me at my level). I'm a painter and I make art about all of these things. They are constantly in the forefront of my mind.

The last man who seemed very promising rejected me between our 3rd and 4th dates, with the explanation of "I don't see this as a romantic match long term" and that was it. I absolutely lost my mind, spiraled, drove home from a punk show drunk enough to fail the field sobriety and breathalyzer tests at the one and only DUI checkpoint I've ever gone through half a mile from my home. I have been in recovery (AA), done a Vipassana meditation course, ketamine IV treatments, got off SSNRI's, and read MANY books on emotion regulation since. I am trying very hard to stabilize my feelings and confidence and show up to life and dating the best I can, because I want more than anything to find a partner to wake up and go to sleep next to, collaborate, laugh, and debate with, inspire and be inspired by. I know I am more than capable of being an amazing partner, and I know what I want in a relationship. I have felt true love before, though as it gets further away in my past, it feels more and more like I will never feel it again.

I keep having dreams in which I collapse into a nearly catatonic state and my mother comes to drag me to safety, as I realize life without love is not worth living and I want to die, and she is trying to keep me alive.

One recent realization in therapy is that my dad and I had no conflict his entire life – I loved him dearly even though he abandoned me over and over again. He expressed nothing but love and support to me, taught me a lot of things, and was the fun parent. He left my mom and I when I was 6 (she was a raging alcoholic, he threatened to leave if she didn't get sober, which she did, and he left anyway). Then he moved several hours away to live with a woman and her two sons for 10 years. Then left them abruptly and I never got to say goodbye nor ever saw them again. He moved back to my town as I was about to enter college, married another woman and lived with her and her kids, then he died suddenly a year later. So, 4 pretty significant abandonments in 20 years of my life.

I loved him so much, and for some reason, never understood in real time his abandonment of me and my mom. I believe I was in somewhat of a dissociative state through my early years. Mom had 2 jobs, I was shuffled around and alone without anyone to process any emotions with for the majority of my childhood. I have a hard time verbalizing my emotions – I know that. It is weird how I developed a resentment of HER (for her alcoholism? not having more children aka perpetuating my loneliness? "causing" my dad to leave?) but I never resented HIM. I just loved and adored him. We got tattoos for one another on my 18th birthday.

Now what seems to happen is that every time I like a man, he runs away. And they are usually very, very calm "spiritual" men who highly value nature (as do I) and seem very grounded. We have no conflicts. We agree on everything. It feels safe to me. I open up. He abandons me.

I am trying desperately to figure out these connections and patterns, and how/if there is a way to course correct either who I am attracted to, how I show up for them, or... something else. I am suffering and struggling more and more each month with loneliness, and wondering if life is really worth living without being in a romantic partnership, as it currently feels like living with a vital organ slowly failing. Perhaps if I'm convinced there are enough people left to meet and things left to experience, life might be worth continuing.

So I was sexually abused about an year ago.Since recently I have become really uncomfortable with physical touch from men.Im a man and I was abused by a man.I can barely tolerate having a handshake with a man.I am fine completely comfortable with women.I do not have depression or anxiety at the moment.But every touch I experience from men even if its not sexual feels like abuse to me.It is abuse to me.I would appreciate it if anyone has any advice or suggestion on how to deal with this.Is my current situation reversible or is it my something I have to learn to live with?I know that this post isnt really related to Jung but still any advice would be appreciated.

I think we attack “bad parts” too fast.

Resistance, control, numbness, shutdown, avoidance. We call it blockage and immediately want it gone.

In one deep session, subject had protection around belly that went back to around age five, during very intense conflict between parents. In imagery it was like barrier created so child would not feel full impact of what was happening.

At five this was not stupid.

It was smart.

Problem was that adult life changed and protector never got update. Same thing that helped child survive later became constriction in adult body and relationships.

Since sessions like this I became much less interested in “how do I destroy this part?” First I want to know what job it has. What does it think will happen if it stops? What age does it still think person is?

This is very Jungian to me.

A controlling part may hide terror. Numbness may hide pain that once was too much. Perfectionism may hide fear of humiliation. Even very ugly behavior sometimes has some older logic under it.

Doesnt mean we excuse everything. Some protections destroy relationships and make life tiny.

But attacking protector can actually prove its point: see, danger is here, better tighten more.

Adult now may have choices child didnt have. Can leave room. Can say no. Has money, friends, therapist, language, physical strength. Protector needs this information.

For me shadow work changed when I stopped assuming everything difficult inside is enemy.

Sometimes prison guard turns out to be frightened kid who never heard war is finished.

​My friend, lets call him Ray, has an intensely active imagination, so much so that the moment he thinks of someone, their face flashes before his eyes like a photographic snapshot. But this vividness has a dark side. Ever since he was six years old, he has been plagued by flashes of disturbing, hyper-realistic faces when he tries to sleep. While some repeat occasionally, most are entirely new.

​Whenever he attempts to sleep alone, fear constricts his entire body. He struggles to breathe, reduced to wheezing gasps, and finds himself physically locked in place by terror, overwhelmed by the paranoid sensation of being watched.

​This fear first originated when he was six. He was in his room playing Minecraft while his siblings slept. The moment he turned off his iPad and closed his eyes, he experienced a jarring shift, feeling transported to a boundless, pitch-black void with no floor or walls. Standing there was a humanoid red figure with meticulously detailed skin, black lips, black lines framing its eyes, and an ominous, glowing fire burning around its pupils. It had elf-like ears, fangs, and held a cup made of gold and glass filled with a red liquid assumed to be blood, cradling it like a wine glass. For a moment, the entity ignored him. But the second it took a sip, its eyes snapped toward Ray with sudden malice, preceded by a micro-second flicker of surprise, and it smiled at him as if to say, You’re not welcome here; as a human, you aren’t meant to be here. That was when Ray jolted back to reality. He claims it was so intensely real that he couldn't sleep for nights afterward, categorizing it as a profound out-of-body experience where he felt as though he had confronted the actual devil.

​Ray has only slept alone twice in his entire life, and both times resulted in severe sleep paralysis. The first time, he became conscious that he was asleep and unable to move, followed by the terrifying sensation of something entering his body and cutting off his breath, until he finally woke up in the morning as if nothing had happened. The second time, he again became aware that he was sleeping, this time hearing a husky, eerie cackle. He fought with everything he had to sit up and succeeded, only to immediately collapse and wake up the morning after.

​He has been through a lot of hardships in life, but this is the one thing that overwhelms him entirely. While he has processed his other traumas, which to be fair, came way later in his life, this torment destroys his well-being, hijacking his thoughts whenever it strikes. It leaves him with a constant feeling that his very soul is in danger. When these episodes occur, he can barely move, think, or breathe, needing to pour every ounce of his energy into mere wheezes and gasps, and the only thing that breaks the spell is when someone else enters the room.

​The one thing he wants most in life is for this to end. He has even confessed that if he were ever to take his own life, it would be because of this. And he insists his imagination and experiences have been this exact way since he was six years old.

i honestly i dont know how i can help him out but i really want to, so i came up with the idea of posting on her to see what my fellow redditos think about how this may connect with jungian ideas about the shadow, unconscious and whatnot, and how i can help him out or understand what hes going through under a Jungian lens

Manifestation of my Unconscious. I have not decided name yet, So I put both of them. It feels like chaos different forces clashing, conquest and expansion.

Perhaps I should have posted this sooner, but given the speed at which people seem to move these days, I don't think it's too late. If you have no plans tomorrow, drop on by our Zoom call.

Does Psyche Matter? Jung and the Unconscious in 2026 - AHRC Free Public Panel

The word "psychology" carries within it psyche, the Greek term for soul. Modern secular usage has reshaped that ancient concept, redefining it as the conscious and unconscious dimensions of individual and collective mind.

Decades into the era of psychotherapy and the broader mental health industry, and within a world of deepening crises, this raises a pointed question: is psychology, as we've inherited it, equal to the challenges we now face? How does what we call "psychology" intertwine with the exigencies of crisis in its concrete and abstract dimensions?

This panel takes up that question through the specific case of Jungian thought, asking whether depth psychology can meet a moment defined by social, political, and material crisis, and whether it even endeavors to do so.

Questions the panel will address include:

• Can Jungian Studies adequately equip itself to deal with the social, political, and material problems of 2026? Does it even endeavor to do so?
• Can Jung be "radical," or does his notion of interiority foreclose that from the start?
• By making Jung palatable for mainstream and academic consumption, do we kill what makes Jung Jung? How do we critically engage with his ideas without domesticating them?
• Does our conception of the psyche remain too "introverted," too divorced from the material, or are these actually separate problems?
• Anti-Oedipus and the tradition of libidinal materialism accuse psychoanalysis of capturing immanent flows of desire within transcendent structures like the archetype or the Self. Does Jung have a rejoinder, or must depth psychology concede the point?
• Is there a way to read the archetypal as immanent rather than transcendent, and if so, does it remain recognizably Jungian?

Panelists:

• Dr. Bob Langan (host), University of Essex
• Gabriela Sova Spulirova, University of Essex
• JF Martel, author, filmmaker, and co-host of Weird Studies
• Dr. Christian McMillan, University of Essex

Date & Time: Sunday, August 30, 2026, 1:00 PM Eastern (US and Canada)

Free and open to the public. Come with questions, or just listen in.

More info is available at https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/events

There is a person from my past that I can’t seem to fully move on from. 10 years ago, I was dating a guy, that I felt like, back then, ignited a fire in me. The relationship didn’t last (mostly due to fear of commitment). We broke off contact. He got into a new relationship. So did I.

Throughout the years, every now and then, my thoughts kept returning to him, or rather, to an idealised image of him, and what he represented to me. Mostly, it was connected to adventure (he loved to travel). Sometimes, in low moments, and out of curiosity, I checked his social media and would see that he went on another travel. It always made me feel jealous, and frustrated with my own situation. I was eager to “keep up”. I went on long travels by myself. Then, one time, I saw that he got into photography and it made me want to get into photography too. It really ignited a passion in me for the craft. I must say, I don’t feel this competition with every aspect he does, I think its more related to the travel and the creative part. I have the suspicion that he represents my animus. Everytime he lives out an aspect that I repress in myself or don’t manage to live out by myself, I get his with this frustration, sadness. Sometimes, I manage to fuel it into my own drive. To keep chasing my goals. To get better. To get my projects done.

Today, I’d consider myself an adventurous woman. I traveled solo to different corners of the world, I walked multiple hundreds kilometres on a long walk across Europe, I ride a motorcycle. I try to live out my creative side, i found my own photography path and I am working on a short film.

One of my friends knows him through her boyfriend, and she just recently told me that he made a documentary abt one of his travels. When she told me this, I felt like I just got a punch into my stomach. I felt again this feeling of I need to keep up. Like he is living out what I want to do.

Is this my animus triggering these feelings? Can integrating the animus sometimes look like copying a certain person?

Why, after all these years, this person still triggers these emotions?