In Part Two of Wandlungen und Symbole der Libido (1912),[1] Jung observed that “Every psychological extreme secretly contains its own opposite or stands in some sort of intimate and essential relation to it.” Later in this same paragraph (¶581), he defines enantiodromia[2] as “a conversion of something into its opposite.” He cites the Chinese Yin/Yang as an example. While the general idea of “opposites” is understood, the phenomenology of enantiodromic change is complex. The first level of complexity is that enantiodromia is a process, not just a change from one state to another. For example, when a puer psychology reaches extremity, there is no sudden change to a senex psychology. There is, first of all, a period of breakdown of the puer structure which leads to its collapse. This is followed by a period of chaos, which in turn is followed by a period of the tentative and gradual emergence of senex “seeds” which in turn grow into senex structures. This sequence of extremity—breakdown, collapse, chaos, emergence, structure— is characteristic of all enantiodromic change. The second level of complexity is that changes resulting from extremity are not always best conceptualized as “opposites.” The quality of difference, for example, is not always an “opposite.” The quality of “something else,” is not necessarily an opposite. The quality of “otherness,” may be something else other than an opposite. All of these qualities may be thought of as “changing course” when extremity begins the breakdown cycle. For this reason, I use a more comprehensive, though invented word, ???????????? (allagiporeia), meaning “to change course.”

Jung also observed that the libido “wills its own descent, its own involution” and in a broader sense, its own demise (¶681). To illustrate this, Jung referred to Reubens’ Last Judgment, and pointed to the foregrounded image of a man being castrated by the serpent. He says of this image, “This motif illustrates the meaning of the end of the world.” Here Jung is thinking far beyond the psychology of the individual and speaking of mythology’s crystallization of the phenomenon of extremity. This highlights the third level of complexity regarding enantiodromia: “The grand plan on which the unconscious life of the psyche is constructed is so inaccessible to our understanding that we can never know what evil may not be necessary in order to produce good by enantiodromia, and what good may very possibly lead to evil.”[3] Thus, what develops following any change of course, any enantiodromia resulting from the breakdown caused by extremity, cannot be known in advance to be for good or ill, no matter how one might regard it. For example, excessive greed invariably leads to breakdown. The financial crisis of 2008, led to the near collapse of the global financial system. What has emerged is not something “better,” but something that is worse by far, though “masked” by the recovery of markets that most everyone feels is wonderful.[4]

The prospect of enantiodromia at any given time, the urge for a change of course, will always appear in dreams, visions, synchronicities, art and other manifestations of the unconscious. This is true both for individuals as well as groups and nations. The contents of these “irrational” messengers, will always be different from what is found laid out in conscious intentions, plans, and programs. If change does not come about through conscious intention, then as conditions become ever more extreme, change will come about through intentions birthed and growing in the unconscious of individuals and the collective, changes that no one is prepared for, and no one knows how to control.

The Google entry for “enantiodromia” refers to the German film, The Lives of Others, as a good example of the meaning of enantiodromia. This is one of my favorite films and I’d suggest you watch it. The film portrays an absolute state police power (the East German Stasi) intent on suppressing art. Even though we “know” the East German state fell 16 years before the film, the film dissolves this knowing and we are “there.” Such is the art of the film itself.

What does one “do,” then, in the face of an oppressive state (terror), or a looming catastrophe (climate change), or replacement by computer (machine intelligence)? We each must answer in our own way. My own answer lies first in trying to discern the wisdom of dreams. Second, I take the dream not as something to be interpreted, explained, or understood, but as an occasion for involving the deep imagination. When one is “exposed” to the deep imagination (and not just ego fantasies), one begins to engender the creative potential of the objective psyche. This is likewise, the ground from which true art is generated and, as I have noted before, it is art that Jung says will serve as the welcoming eros for the Coming Guest.

So, the dream pictures me and others celebrating a final Ragnarok with a toast of black vodka. In the next post, I’ll describe what engaging this compelling image in deep imagination has given birth to.

[1] Literally, “Transformations and Symbols of the Libido,” but published in English as Symbols of Transformation (CW Vol. 5)

[2] The Greek word was coined by Stobaeus in the 5^th century CE. There are numerous observations by Heraclitus of the same idea.

[3] C. G. Jung. "The Phenomenology of the Spirit in Fairytales." (CW Vol. 9, ¶397)

[4] The world’s central banks have created money out of thin air (called “quantitative easing,” a kind of alchemy) that has inflated the world’s markets from equities to housing. These bubbles are built on a mountain of debt never before seen. Such bubbles are always “attractive” in the short-run, but cannot be sustained and the subsequent enantiodromia comes as a shock to those who thought they were in control and a disastrous loss of wealth to most everyone.