ABSTRACT
A symbolic approach to the unconscious is the crux of Carl Jung’s depth psychology. The unconscious produces archetypal images that have deep symbolic significance and need to be interpreted and brought to consciousness in the process of individuation. This essay explores the rarely taken road to individuation: creating the narrative by reading and interpreting Tarot images which, as Jung asserted, were distantly descended from the archetypes of transformation. The chapter focuses on Tarot readings as a form of self-knowledge that demands an intuitive, feminine way of knowing and bridges the gap between the cognitive and emotional dimensions in the course of personality development. Psychologically, Tarot readings partake of projective technique, and the psyche embodied in material pictures demonstrates the synchronicity principle developed by Jung in collaboration with physicist Wolfgang Pauli. The unconscious projected in images ‘speaks’ in universal, what Pauli called neutral, language. To conclude, the chapter presents a documented case study as an example of Jungian phenomenology of the Self in the context of the Tarot hermeneutic.
