Personality: Carl Jung and Myra
1. Which personality type does Myra display, according to Freudian theory? Provide evidence for your answer. What caused it? Myra must have experienced neurotic anxiety in the presence of her husband’s “authority” as she previously must have experienced unconscious feelings of destruction against her parents because of fear of punishment, so she exaggerates her cleanings and frequently portrays herself as a martyr who does so much for others and asks so little for herself, when in reality she usually over sees the cleaning and tells others what to do, and her husband or children help her. This same neurotic anxiety makes her aggressive towards her neighbor as once grass went flying into her garden from her neighbor’s while mowing; and as a result Myra threw a fit and did not talk to the neighbor for two years. Myra displays a disturbing pattern of establishing relationships and then ending them by being rude. She sometimes criticizes people to their faces, or she just stops calling them. Moreover, this neurotic anxiety makes her concerned about spending money and she refrains from expending it despite being middle class and really not poor. As a defense mechanism, Myra has developed an anal fixation, which manifests in her obsession with neatness and orderliness.
2. Why does Myra feel that cleaning the house is her responsibility? How would Jungian theory explain Myra adopting this traditional role?
According to Jung the mind or psyche has two levels; conscious and unconscious. Unlike Freud, Jung believes that collective unconscious refers to humans’ “innate tendency to react in a particular way whenever their experiences stimulate a biological inherited response tendency.” This explains why Myra unexpectedly reacts with love and persistence to the house cleanliness, tidiness and orderliness although she had negative or at least neutral feelings toward the job, especially when we know that her mother always took care of their house and thought that it was
2. Why does Myra feel that cleaning the house is her responsibility? How would Jungian theory explain Myra adopting this traditional role?
According to Jung the mind or psyche has two levels; conscious and unconscious. Unlike Freud, Jung believes that collective unconscious refers to humans’ “innate tendency to react in a particular way whenever their experiences stimulate a biological inherited response tendency.” This explains why Myra unexpectedly reacts with love and persistence to the house cleanliness, tidiness and orderliness although she had negative or at least neutral feelings toward the job, especially when we know that her mother always took care of their house and thought that it was