Psychology and Religion: West and East (The Collected Works of C. G. Jung, Volume 11)
“I have often met with the objection that the thoughts which the voice represents are no more than the thoughts of the individual himself.
That may be; but I would call a thought my own only when I have thought it, just as I would call money my own only when I have earned or acquired it in a conscious and legitimate manner.
If somebody gives me the money as a present, then I shall certainly not say to my benefactor, “Thank you for my money,” although to a third person I might say afterwards: “This is my own money.”
With the voice I am in a similar situation.
The voice gives me certain contents, exactly as if a friend were informing me of his ideas.
It would be neither decent nor truthful to suggest that what he says are my own ideas. ~Carl Jung; Psychology and Religion; Page 46.
This is the reason why I differentiate between what I have produced or acquired by my own conscious effort and what is clearly and unmistakably a product of the unconscious.
Someone may object that the so-called unconscious mind is merely my own mind and that, therefore, such a differentiation is superfluous.
But I am not at all convinced that the unconscious mind is merely my mind, because the term “unconscious” means that I am not even conscious of it.
As a matter of fact, the concept of the unconscious is an assumption for the sake of convenience.
In reality I am totally unconscious of-or, in other words, I do not know at all-where the voice comes from.
Not only am I incapable of producing the phenomenon at will, I am unable to anticipate what the voice will say.
Under such conditions it would be presumptuous to refer to the factor that produces the voice as my unconscious or my mind.
This would not be accurate, to say the least.
The fact that you perceive the voice in your dream proves nothing at all, for you can also hear the noises in the street, which you would never think of calling your own. ~Carl Jung; Psychology and Religion; Pages 46-47.
To put it simply one could say: Since we do not know everything, practically every experience, fact, or object contains something unknown.
Hence, if we speak of the totality of an experience, the word “totality” can refer only to the conscious part of it.
As we cannot assume that our experience covers the totality of the object, it is clear that its absolute totality must necessarily contain the part that has not been experienced.
The same holds true, as I have mentioned, of every experience and also of the psyche, whose absolute totality covers a greater area than consciousness.”~Carl Jung; Psychology and Religion; Page 49.
