Possession and Inflation

Excerpt-Dark Religion: Fundamentalism from the Perspective of Jungian Psychology-Vlado Šolc and George J. Didier

It is an axiom of psychology that when a part of the psyche is split off from consciousness it is only apparently inactivated; in actual fact it brings about a possession of the personality, with the result that the individual’s aims are falsified in the interest of the split-off part (Jung 1951, [CW 9i, para. 277])

Possession can be defined as the mastery of certain unconscious contents, complexes, or archetypes over the ego. The ego’s reaction that ensues, as a result of possession, becomes principally identical with the forces. The personality of the individual is changed, and he or she acts and thinks under strong and mostly unshakable convictions. Typically, individuals who are possessed by unconscious contents are not open to correction by normal means. Only very strong emotionally corrective experiences can produce change. A change of attitude can come about as a result of experiencing powerful emotions. Typically experiencing the opposite pole of the numinosum has the potential to compensate one-sided affect. 140 If the change is progressive and results in the enlargement of consciousness, it generates new, and more-integrated psychological positions. A thesis and antithesis is embraced so that a new synthesis emerges. This is the gold of analysis. As Jung states:

…the main interest of my work is not concerned with the treatment of neuroses but rather with the approach to the numinous. But the fact is that the approach to the numinous is the real therapy and inasmuch as you attain to the numinous experiences you are released from the curse of pathology...