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Dr. Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961) was a Swiss psychologist, occultist and an pioneer of exploration of mystic symbolism. Jung was born on July 26, 1875 in Kesswil, Switzerland, the only son of a Protestant clergyman. At the age of four his family moved to Basel. There were numerous relatives on either side of his family that were clergymen. It was expected of Jung to continue in the family tradition. Jung did not decide to follow, choosing instead to attend the University of Basel from 1895-1900. Before deciding to pursue medicine Jung studied biology, zoology, paleontology, and archaeology. His explorations did not stop with that; he looked at philosophy, mythology, early Christian literature as well as religion.

His mother, an eccentric woman, spent much of the time in her own separate bedroom, enthralled by the spirits that she said visited her at night. Although during the day he also saw her as predictable, at night he felt some frightening influences from her room. At night his mother became strange and mysterious. Jung claimed that one night he saw a faintly luminous and indefinite figure coming from her room, with a head detached from the neck and floating in the air like a little Moon.

After leaving Basel, Jung became an assistant physician at Burgholzli Psychiatric Clinic under Eugen Bleuler. In 1902 he obtained his M.D. from the University of Zurich. His dissertation was entitled "On the Psychology and Pathology of So-Called Occult Phenomena". Through this work one of his basic concepts is outlined, the underlying wholeness of the psyche. Jung's first research was conducted in 1904. He studied word association in patients. He found groups of repressed psychic content for which he invented the now famous word "complex". This study brought him close to the work of Sigmund Freud. Jung's work confirmed many of Freud's ideas. Between 1907 and 1912 he and Freud worked very close. Many believed that Jung would continue Freud's psychoanalysis, but this did not occur. Over temperamental and differences concerning the significance of sexuality in human life, the two split. Jung contested Freud's analytic principles, which he claimed were one-sided. Their relationship was finished forever when Jung published "Psychology and the Unconscious" which argued against some of Freud's ideas. In 1912 "Symbols and Transformations of the Libido" was published. Jung wanted to understand the symbolic meaning of the contents of the unconscious. In order to distinguish between individual psychology and psychoanalysis Jung gave his discipline the name "analytical psychology."

The unconscious is not just evil by nature, it is the source of the highest good: not only dark but also light, not only bestial, semi-human, and demonic but superhuman, spiritual and, in the classical sense of the word, “divine”. -Carl Jung. 

After his break with Freud, Jung began a deepened self-analysis in order to gain all the honesty and firmness for his own journey into discovering the mysteries of the unconscious psyche. During the years from 1913 to 1921 Jung published his important paper: "Two Essays on Analytical Psychology". The "Two Essays" provided the basic ideas from which his later work was developed. He described his research on psychological typology —that there are two basic classifications, or "two types of personalities," in the way they relate to the world: introversion and extroversion. Introversion, in which one has the characteristic of being self-involved, withdrawn, occupied with one's "inner world." Extroversion, in which one relates to the world through social involvement and has interests outside of oneself and is "outgoing." He expressed the idea that it is the "personal equation" which, often unconsciously but in agreement with one's own typology, influences how an individual observes and interacts with their world. 

Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes. - Carl Jung.  

Next to Jung's typology, his main contribution was his discovery that man's fantasy life has a certain structure. There must be subtle active centers in the unconscious, which control natural behavior and free imagination. These combine to form Jung's concept of archetypes. In order to study archetypal patterns and processes, Jung visited so-called primitive tribes. He lived among the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico and Arizona in 1924 and 1925 and among the inhabitants of Mt. Elgon in Kenya during 1925 and 1926. He later visited Egypt and India. To Jung, the religious symbols and phenomenology of Buddhism and Hinduism and the teachings of Zen Buddhism and Confucianism all expressed differentiated experiences on the way to man's inner world, a world which was badly neglected by Western civilization. He provided commentaries for the Tibetan Book of Dead as well as for Richard Wilhelm’s translations of the I Ching and the Secret of the Golden Flower. Jung also searched for traditions in Western culture, which made up for its one-sided outgoing development toward reason and technology. He found these traditions in Gnosticism, Christian mysticism and, above all, occultism. Some of his major works are deep and clear psychological interpretations of alchemical writings, showing their living significance for understanding dreams and the hidden theme of mental disorders. Jung's interest in philosophy and the occult led many to view Jung as a mystic, although Jung's ambition was to be seen as a man of science. His influence on popular psychology, spirituality and the New Age movement has been immense. 

Jung was a prolific writer; his collected works fill 19 volumes. Among his most important books are: Aion, Symbols of Transformation, The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, Analytical Psychology, Psychology and Alchemy. Mysterium Coniunctionis was Jung's last book and focused on the "Mysterium Conjunctionis" archetype, known as the sacred marriage between sun and moon.