Rebirth. A process experienced as a renewal or transformation of the personality. (See also individuation.)
Rebirth is not a process that we can in any way observe. We can neither measure nor weigh nor photograph it. It is entirely beyond sense perception. . . . One speaks of rebirth; one professes rebirth; one is filled with rebirth. . . . We have to be content with its psychic reality.[Concerning Rebirth,"CW9i, par. 206.]
Jung distinguished between five different forms of
rebirth:
metempsychosis (transmigration of souls),
reincarnation (in
a human body), resurrection, psychological
rebirth
(individuation) and indirect change that comes
about through
participation in the process of
transformation.
Psychological rebirth was
Jung's particular
focus. Induced by ritual or stimulated by immediate
personal experience,
it results in an enlargement of the personality. He
acknowledged that one
might feel transformed during certain group
experiences, but he cautioned
against confusing this with genuine rebirth.
jungian therapy jungian therapist new york carl jung therapy jungIf any considerable group of persons are united and identified with one another by a particular frame of mind, the resultant transformation experience bears only a very remote resemblance to the experience of individual transformation. A group experience takes place on a lower level of consciousness than the experience of an individual. This is due to the fact that, when many people gather together to share one common emotion, the total psyche emerging from the group is below the level of the individual psyche. If it is a very large group, the collective psyche will be more like the psyche of an animal . . . .
. . . The group experience goes no deeper than the level of one's own mind in that state. It does work a change in you, but the change does not last.[Ibid, pars. 225f.]