Awe is the only proper attitude

My second of Von Franz’s. She was the co-founder of the original Jung Institute in Zurich, Switzerland, perhaps Jung’s most famous student and colleague, and certainly the preeminent on interpretation of fairy tales among other topics. Touching the relationship with my own anima is guaranteed while reading her analysis of maybe any fairy tale but certainly more so when she’s focused on the subject.

According to Jung, the anima is the archetype of life itself. Most often men have an anima within and animus without in the unconscious and conscious, respectively. And the reverse for women. Although its best not to get trapped (probably by the anima/animus in some way, HA!) in identifying how this may be different for every individual. If you are a man in the outer world, this will be true for you 99% of the time. If you have another gender identify, you are likely some 2% of the population so it’s unlikely, but I would certainly therefore be happy to hear from you and discuss how this may differ for you. Hey, sometimes I think I am a lesbian since I often feel as a woman inside and even like women’s clothes too!

A relationship with the unconscious in all it’s aspects, including with anima/animus, is probably the most fascinating and magical things in life. Dive in and proceed with caution, simultaneously. Truly it may be beneficial just to have a resource in your periphery to discuss any out of the ordinary experiences with as they come. And if you are knocking on the door of the unconscious, you can be darn sure they will come in some form at some point. This can take the form of dreams, visions, radical and unexplainable shifts in energy or even life circumstances because the unconscious and the physical world are interlinked mysteriously. And Von Franz does an excellent job towards the end of this work describing just why/how that is.