Journal Entry # 10: MY STRONGEST ARCHETYPE

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The dog in the story "The Dog and its Reflection"

This may sound funny but indeed I have related myself to the dog in the story “The Dog and its Reflection.” This short story is among many short stories I’ve heard of back in my childhood days. I find it quite memorable for it taught me a valuable lesson in life – to avoid being greedy. This can be seen on how the greediness of the dog had led him to his death since he fell into the stream in pursuit of the larger bone of the dog in that stream which is his own reflection (the version of the story that I know is that the dog died in the end because he drowned; a child-friendly version of this is that the dog managed to swim up the stream but still, he lost his bone).

Clearly, the shadow archetype reflects this character and I can relate myself to this character and the archetype itself at some point in my life. Sometimes I am being overrun by my selfish needs and desires or the “dark side” of my psyche. And just like the dog, if I let my shadow archetype manifest in me, then terrible consequences happen to me. On the contrary, if the dog had been aware of his greediness just like how I should acknowledge the so-called “dark side” of my self, then we would be able to control our acts. Carl Jung’s quote “One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious” is indeed related to this matter.

With regards to the concept of individuation, by recognizing my limitations/failures just like the one mentioned above, it would help me to appreciate my humanity in general.

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