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121 CHAPTER SEVEN VIVIFYING THE TRANSCENDENT FUNCTION IN EVERYDAY LIFE This final chapter focuses on synthesis and application. Having explored the transcendent function as a Jungian concept, as a root metaphor, and as an archetypal, mediatory phenomenon, we conclude by turning to more practical concerns. How can we better recognize and apply the transcendent function in our lives? How does the notion that Jung first described in 1916 manifest itself outside of the consulting room? Do we find it, for example, in relationships, in culture, and in our institutions? Are there ways in which we can increase its presence or at least increase our awareness of it? Is the expansive view of the transcendent function helpful in this regard? These questions require us to weave together the strands we teased out earlier. Here we attempt to blend the concepts to bring the material to bear in a tangible way. Depth psychology serves only a limited purpose by remaining confined to the boundaries of the consulting room and the pages of scholarly works. Increasing awareness of and integration of the unconscious in individual psychotherapy is all well and good. But depth psychology needs to do more. The unconscious erupts into relationships, the culture, and the world in ways that require as much, if not more, attention by our field. Depth psychologists are conspicuously absent from the discussion of crucial issues of our time. Beneath each and every divisive split in our cultural, societal, and political lives lies unacknowledged material that needs to be identified, discussed, and brought to the surface. An expansive view and discussion of the transcendent function can assist us in addressing these issues. This chapter seeks to usher the transcendent function out of the relative quiet of the analytic situation and the academic world into the hustle and bustle of everyday life. 122 The Transcendent Function THE METAPHORICAL VIEW OF THE TRANSCENDENT FUNCTION Notwithstanding Jung’s effort to simply define and describe it in his 1916 paper, the transcendent function thwarts our efforts to give it clear outlines. Chapter 4 identified two distinct images of the transcendent function: the “narrow” transcendent function, a process within Jung’s psychology pursuant to which opposites are united, and an “expansive” transcendent function, a much broader root metaphor for becoming psychological through an interaction with the unconscious, unknown, or other. Then in chapter 6, working explicitly with the transcendent function as a root metaphor, we explored the deeper archetypal patterns it implicates and enunciated the neither/nor and autochthonous urges of the psyche to find connections where none seemed possible and to move deeper. Here we seek to further explore the expansive transcendent function as a metaphor for becoming psychological, a conversation between that which is known, conscious, or acknowledged and that which is unknown, unconscious, or hidden through which something new emerges. Though this metaphoric view of the transcendent function conjures up a core image that may best be described as “developing deeper awareness,” it appears in various forms such as those discussed in chapter 6. Indeed, post-Jungian writers variously conceptualize the transcendent function in ways that are consistent with each of the archetypal patterns we discussed: the role of the transcendent function in overcoming the binary opposition inherent in consciousness;1 its initiatory and transformative aspects;2 its bridging or liminal qualities;3 the rhythm of consciousness between differentiation and unity;4 and the way it implicates divinity. Implicit in these references is the thrust of the second half of this book: beyond its delineated role in Jungian psychology (the “narrow” transcendent function), the transcendent function is a metaphor for psyche’s yearning to create connections rather than separating, to savor the unknown rather than asserting knowledge as a way to order things. As one writer summarized it, “The transcendent function is realized synchronistically when there is a shift away from a desire to know and control toward a desire to relate and understand” (Beebe, 1992, p. 118). The broader, metaphorical vision of the transcendent function is crucial to gaining greater insight into its appearance and use in interpersonal, cultural , and everyday contexts. Jung’s description in his original essay, though helpful in understanding the abstract concepts implicated in a dialogue between consciousness and the unconscious, is not very useful in animating the transcendent function. His discussions in his other works are also interesting but they are devoid of how to bring the transcendent function more to life. In order to understand how the transcendent...

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