Adler on Active Imagination From The Living Symbol, pp 49 51)

Active imagination is a process in which the gap between conscious and unconscious is narrowed deliberately until the new and constructive contents of the latter can flow over into the former. The positive attitude of the conscious mind to the unconscious and the positive response of the latter bringing about their co-ordination and co-operation expresses itself in the "transcendent function," so called "because it makes the transition from one attitude to another organically possible." 2 In this way a consciousness which has taken up voluntarily a passive attitude can contact the archetypal images and open itself up to the "unconscious influences." 3 People who either have a natural gift for meditation such as our patient apparently possessed or have acquired a technique for it, a positive "expectant" concentration on the unconscious background (accompanied by a voluntary "dimming down" of consciousness), can perceive unconscious contents of often high emotional intensity, be they "images," words, dramatic processes, etc. Once this has happened, "consciousness puts its media of expression at the disposal of the unconscious content." 4 According to their specific preferences some people express the observed unconscious contents in verbal form, in paintings, in clay, etc. 5 It is of course not enough to observe, or even to express, the unconscious contents. Once they have been formulated in one way or another, the work of integrating them into consciousness has to be done; without adequate understanding they remain mere unused raw material. This work calls for a degree of insight which can only be achieved with considerable effort,6 and in most cases prolonged analysis is needed to provide the necessary premises. 1 Active imagination can be either a spontaneous "natural" event or a method of selfrecognition communicated to the patient by the analyst (cf. Jung, Mysterium, II, p. 267). 2 Jung, "The Transcendent Function," p. 73. 3 Jung, "Psyche," p. 204. 4 Jung, "The Transcendent Function," p. 85. 5 Dance is another though less frequent medium of expression. Here we are near the origin and significance of dance among primitives. Music would be still another medium of expression (cf. Valangin, "Das musikalische Mandala"). 6 One way to arrive at an understanding of the unconscious contents is by an "inner dialogue" between consciousness and unconscious, leading to the "transcendent function of opposites" (Jung, "The Transcendent Function," p. 90). 7 Henderson ("Resolution of the Transference in the Light of C. G. Jung's Psychology") and Fordham (The Objective Psyche) seem to hold the opinion that true active imagination is only possible after successful termination of analysis. Fordham makes a distinction between "imaginative activity" and "active imagination": "In any analysis there is plenty of imaginative activity, but this, in contrast to active imagination, can seldom be treated as if it had nothing to do with the transference. . , ." (p. 78). In my experience what he would call "imaginative activity" during analysis is frequently a genuine and constructive manifestation of the objective autonomous psyche and has to be taken as such, i.e., as active imagination. This is so despite possible transference contents which, of course, have to be differentiated from the archetypal contents and analyzed accordingly. Even an "incomplete" ego can have

active imaginations. Given a modicum of ego coherence (which is not identical with ego integration) by which the ego is capable of a deliberate contemplation of the unconscious background, the emerging contents can have an integrative effect. There exists a creative interaction between ego and non-ego in which the rudimentary ego is strengthened and completed. There is a constant relatedness between the developing (incomplete) ego and the non-ego contents; otherwise there could be no ego development at all (cf. above, p. 39, n. 4).