From time to time, we would like to pass along information about events or programs in which we think you might have an interest. 

On May 23, 2010 The Ninth Annual Community Mental Health Conference on Overcoming the Stigma of Mental Illness will be held on the topic of Discovering Hope: Understanding Addictions, Perspectives and Approaches or Individuals and Families.  For more information please click here.

The June Singer Clinic for Depth Psychotherapy is now accepting applications for new clients.  For more information on our sliding scale clinic please click here or call Pat Cochran at 847-475-4848 x 243.

This is our space for reflections on quotes from Jung.  We invite you to share a favorite quote along with your thoughts by e-mailing us at jung@cgjungcenter.org

This is our space for reflections on quotes from Jung.  We invite you to share a favorite quote along with your thoughts (you can email us via the link below).

"Psychology therefore culminates of necessity in a developmental process which. . . consists in integrating the unconscious contents into consciousness. . . . In that event, there is an alteration of the ego as well as of the unconscious contents. . . . [T]he ego is ousted from its central and dominating position and thus finds itself in the role of a passive observer who lacks the power to assert his will under all circumstances, not because it has been weakened in any way as because certain considerations give it pause. That is, the ego cannot help discovering that the afflux of unconscious contents has vitalized the personality, enriched it and created a figure that somehow dwarfs the ego in scope and intensity. . . . In this way the will, as disposable energy, gradually subordinates itself to the stronger factor, namely to the new totality-figure I call the self."  [Jung, CW8, para. 430; ital. in original]

In this excerpt from his essay, "On the Nature of the Psyche," Jung is writing about what is known (in Jungian jargon!) as the "relativization of the ego."  This is the process by which the ego begins to engage with and assimilate material from the unconscious, and in so doing, it discovers that the unconscious, and in particular, the self, "dwarfs the ego in scope and intensity."  The ego recognizes its power is relative to that of the self.  In this process, however, the ego is not diminished-even as it is "ousted from its central and dominating position." As the ego resolves to surrender its will, it becomes more vital and enriched through its connection to the transcendent nature of the self.