Symptoms & Soul in Archetypal Psychology

James Hillman (1975) re-framed the term “pathologizing” to describe a natural activity of soul to create psychological disorder and illness (p. 57). Pathologizing is one of four distinct movements of soul that Hillman articulated in seminal work, Re-Visioning Psychology (1975). The four movements of soul exist like currents in a river—pathologizing is an already-existing psychic current that we drop into, not one that is created from an egocentric perspective (G. Slater, personal communication, November 9, 2017). Pathologizing is the psyche’s illness-creating activity, which includes fantasy material as well as disease, and is a way of viewing life “through this deformed and afflicted perspective” (Hillman, 1975, p. 57).

Central to this concept is de-centering the ego to open into a polytheistic psyche while expanding Jung’s (1929/1967) statement,  “The gods have become diseases” (p. 37). The god in pathology is the way into soul and this is why Hillman (1975) stated, “Symptoms, not therapists, led this century to soul” (p. 71). Pathologizing is what soul does, not something to be cured. Hillman wanted to restore the understanding that pathology is a central activity of soul because it is how gods speak. By imagining into pathology and symptom, we can make soul and care for the gods in their differentiated aspects, rather than falling into monotheistic mythology that prioritizes integration and wholeness while forsaking psychic diversity.

Pathologizing and Archetypal Psychology

More than praxis of psychology, archetypal psychology is a way of seeing. It is a perspective that is a soul-making activity, which occurs through imagining. Hillman (1975) was concerned with restoring soul to psychology and archetypal psychology holds soul as “a viewpoint towards things rather than a thing itself” (p. xvi). Pathologizing is exactly this—it is a way of deepening into and seeing through a particular lens—the lens of illness, disease, and pathology. Hillman (1975) viewed psychopathology as a “central to the experience of soul” (p. 55). This is because it is in the extremes of psychological experience that the unfamiliar realm outside the ego’s perspective is encountered. These extremes of experience are necessary to psychological life and it is through the idea of pathologizing that this necessity might be imagined (Hillman, 1975, p. 57). Neurosis, anxiety, and depression, to name a few, are expressions of soul; and viewing life through the lens of these afflictions, what might be occurring in soul is explored.

Another primary tenet within archetypal psychology is the centrality of image since image is soul – images are not chosen or controlled by the human mind, they are spontaneous beings in their own right (Hillman, 1975, p. 50). Hillman (1975), following the footsteps of Jung, understood the priority of imagination, which is that through paying attention to images and engaging imagination, soul is fed and made (p. xvii). Soul is attended through attending to images. Pathology and its images are pieces of soul, “Every single feeling or observation occurs as a psychic event by first forming a fantasy-image” (Hillman, 1975, p. xvii). Through imagining into affliction, whether that is psychological symptom or dark fantasy, the impersonal nature of pathology is recognized and the myths and gods that move through human experience in their pathological states are opened.

A third way pathologizing connects to the wider aims of archetypal psychology is by giving gods their due in psychology, “By reverting the pathology to the God, we recognize the divinity of pathology and give the God his due” (Hillman, 1975, p. 104). Hillman saw pathologizing as a central activity of soul because it is how gods find expression. The gods are restored to psychology by engaging with symptoms and imagining into symptoms in their multivalent aspects rather than pushing for integration in an ego-dominated way (Hillman, 1975, p. 104). Hillman was critical of concepts of integration and wholeness and, instead, advocated for the existence of a polytheistic psyche; and pathologizing is intrinsic to his argument because it is through pathology that the gods are seen in their afflicted states, which are necessary to their complexity (Hillman, 1975, p. 108). Through imagining into the archetypal core of a complex and its attendant symptoms, human-centered issues are moved into the mythic realm and “it makes a difference both to our suffering and perhaps to the God who is there manifesting” (Hillman, 1975, p. 104). In other words, it matters to both the human and world’s soul how pathology is approached; through loving the images of psyche, gods are fed.

Pathologizing and the Jungian Tradition

To Hillman, and depth psychologists before him, psychopathology is primary to psychological experience. Hillman (1975) stated, “Freud declared this succinctly, ‘We can catch the unconscious only in pathological material’” (p. 70). So in congruence with depth psychological tradition, pathology is central to encountering the unconscious. Taking a step past the human-centric sphere into the mythic, pathologizing is congruent with Jung’s (1929/1967) understanding of gods in diseases and archetypes in complexes (p. 67). Pathologizing situates human abnormality within a larger mythic context. Hillman (1975) explained, “Only in mythology does pathology receive an adequate mirror, since myths speak with the same distorted, fantastic language” (p. 99). By attending to the images of pathology, myths provide a sense of opening into, rather than closing down through superficial diagnosis. The phenomenal experience of affliction is a movement of the unconscious that can lead to soul through imagining into the symptom as it presents. Thus, imagination, image, and pathology are fundamental in restoring relationships to archetypal forces and to the unconscious.

However, several primary Jungian concepts shape shift in archetypal psychology including the centrality of ego, Self, and individuation. Hillman’s stance de-centered the ego and largely abandoned the Self from therapeutic focus, instead centering imagination and soul. To Hillman, pathologizing is a particular movement of soul, not in service to the Jungian concept of individuation, as it is traditionally accepted as a journey towards individual wholeness. Hillman did not privilege the ego complex or Self archetype, rather, he privileged psychic diversity. Individuation, then, is a radical differentiation, opening to the multiplicity of psychological life (Hillman, 1975, p. 88). Psychological pathology reveals something about soul and caring for the images in pathology is caring for soul, rather than specifically serving the ego complex.

Hillman also shifted from his Jungian lineage by being deeply in service to images, themselves. Symptoms are to be worked with as images, that is, in their phenomenological aspects rather than amplified out of their self-presentation. His dictate to “stick to the image” comes into play with pathologizing in regards to staying with the pathology imaginally rather than analyzing to the point that the image, itself, is lost (Glen Slater, personal communication, November 9, 2017). Jungian practices of amplification and dream analysis can lead away from the images of psyche so Hillman was concerned with staying close to imagination rather than assessing the purposefulness or telos of an image. Images are central because they, themselves, are soul.

Hillman’s concept brings the human and the world in close relationship, which is also a movement past Jungian tradition. Pathologizing is an aspect of the polytheistic psyche and is one way the plethora of gods expresses their existence. Therefore, pathologizing is an activity of anima mundi, the world’s soul, and by imagining into pathology, the human psyche finds its place within the world, not as separate or central, but as a piece of it. Human psychopathology is an experience of the world’s soul and by developing imaginal capacities the world’s soul is honored.

Pathologizing and The Soul’s Code

In The Soul’s Code, Hillman (1996) proposed his argument for the “acorn theory” which is that individuals have a guiding template to be lived into—this pattern has a guiding “daimon” who is credited with all of our life circumstances including choice of parents (p. 7-8). The daimon is responsible for us living into its image and the image to be lived into includes pains, challenges, and pathology (Hillman, 1996, p. 8).

In offering the acorn theory, Hillman moved past the nature/nurture debate and was able to re-imagine the role of pathology and pain in a human life. Pathology is not a signal of life gone awry; rather, pathology is central to life experience because it is part of living into the daimon. Pathologizing, then, is a central perspective to the acorn theory because symptoms are restored as part of destiny, “As accidental happenings, symptoms do not belong first to disease but to destiny” (Hillman, 1996, p. 34). Pathologizing allows for symptoms to be accepted as part of destiny—rather than dismissing symptoms, we might ask what the symptom is saying in terms of calling. Since there is an archetypal core at the center of complexes, the daimon might be found in the center of a child’s struggles. Hillman (1996) provided examples of children who did not succeed in school and attributed this lack of “success” to their calling, their invisible daimon, rather than merely an ADHD diagnosis, for example (p. 103). The importance of imagining into pathology here is that a person finds support in the more-than or other-than-human world, which is what Hillman (1996) called “the invisibles” (p. 112). People need more than human relationships and it is through imagining into problems, struggles, and issues that the support and guidance of daimons might be found.

REFERENCES

Hillman, J. (1975). Re-visioning psychology. New York, NY: Harper Collins.

Hillman, J. (1996). The soul’s code: In search of character and calling. New York, NY: Warner

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Jung, C. G. (1967). Commentary on The secret of the golden flower (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H.

Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung (Vol. 13). Retrieved from http://www.proquest.com (Original work published 1929)