Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book provides Jung's data and views on the self and individuation and then introduces the self as a dynamic system. It describes the views especially in relation to psychoanalysis. The book examines the psychology of religion and alchemy. The childhood and adolescence periods in life were almost entirely ignored by analytical psychologists and that led them to an intensive comparative study of myths with the aim of creating a geography of the psyche. In so doing, however, their studies tended to become horizontal rather than vertical. The theoretical endeavour was supported by finding that Jungian analysis without that dimension was often lacking in depth.