Jungian Parenting and the Sacred Archetypes
We finished off last week’s article with the realization that individuals are ultimately responsible for parenting. If you haven’t read part one we recommend you do so, as this article directly builds upon it. Parenting is made up of individuals, and if those individuals are not mature, the child will suffer consequences.
Today we will be digging into the specific pieces that make up a mature individual. Parenting, and Jungian Parenting especially, can be somewhat successful with the right knowledge. But knowledge is less than half the battle, and knowledge can severely backfire when the other half is not present. What is the other half? The development of parent themselves.
As discussed in part one, the key to successful Jungian Parenting is accomplished when you 1) Target your child’s Inferior function before adolescence, and 2) Target their Critic function after adolescence. But, even if you successfully do this for your children, and otherwise do everything else right according to Jungian Parenting, you may still fail. Why? Children learn primarily by the example of who the parent is, and not by what their parent says. “Do as I say, not as I do” unfortunately does not work very well in parenting.
If who the parent is — their actions and identity — and what the parent says do not line up, then there will be a splintering effect on their influence on the child. The child may obey, but the lesson ingrained in them will be based on what you do. Over time, the child will see the hypocrisy and undermine the “rules” spoken to them in favor of embracing the example impressed on them by their parents. Ultimately, actions do speak louder than words.
However, if the parent can be consistent with their identity and their actions — i.e., holding themselves to the same standard they hold their children to — then the effect compounds, and the child will seek to live with the same continuity of self that their parent(s) did. This is integrity.
Last week was focused on what the parent should say and do to help their child optimally grow. This week we are focusing on who the parent is — individual identity, maturity, and development. This journey represents the first layer of the foundation — the psychological layer.
Second, is the sociological layer, where the proving grounds of intersexual dynamics take place and acts as a magnified representation of the individual archetypes. These are what are symbolically labeled as the Cult of the Mature Masculine, and the Cartel of the Mature Feminine. More on that in a minute.
The First Layer: Psychological Maturity
First, layer one: personal psychology and igniting the sacred archetypes within you. What is “psychological maturity”? It is when the four sacred archetypes within you are developed (or developing) and you are on the path to becoming a complete individual. Maturity is not perfection — but it is the constant journey toward growing, improving, and building yourself up.
Maturity is finding out more about who you are and working toward becoming who you could be.
What are the archetypes that exist within you and me?
For the Masculine: King, Warrior, Magician, Lover
For the Feminine: Queen, Mother, Matron, Lover
Chase has dedicated the entirety of season 13 to thoroughly explaining these archetypes for each role. His articulation of the feminine archetypes is a rare sight, as few books or lectures cover female development to this depth and offer a higher standard for feminine maturity. His discussion of the masculine archetypes is inspired by this classic, King Warrior Magician Lover, which discusses the path to masculine maturity.
Apart from season 13, season 6 demonstrates how to develop personal maturity and self-intimacy with straightforward, practical insight that can help you develop your archetypes starting right now.
In some ways, Chase feels seasons 6 and 13 are the most important lectures he has ever done because they are the only ones of their kind. If you haven’t watched or listened to them, you are potentially harming your own development by not applying what is in them. Once you have watched those, consider advancing to season 19, where you will learn how to become the version of yourself for each type.
You and I have four specific archetypes within us. Through gradually developing each one, we reach further into ourselves — physically, mentally, socially, and spiritually — to access a richer and deeper expression of ourselves that we obtained through our genes, personality, ancestral history, and whatever divine forces might be at work in the world.
The Masculine Archetypes
Developing the King archetype will be focused on growing a “kingdom” and keeping it in order. This means developing the ability to make money, provide for transportation, living, food, and all other necessities to become a socially integrated individual. The telltale sign of the King, as Chase says, is that he “produces more than he consumes.”
Different cultures may have different standards for different aspects of the archetypes. An easy example to point to for King is how transportation might mean public transit in some places but require your own vehicle in another. Either way, the underlying principle here would be a King having transportation needs covered is not beholden to others for it. The King is his own man.
The Warrior protects the kingdom. The physical aspects of the Warrior include building up the body, becoming skilled in self-defense, and taking care of one’s health. The mental aspects of the Warrior include discipline, survival skills, contingency planning, and preparation from unexpected disasters — personal, financial, and natural. The Warrior is built when a man is in tune with his own source of primal ferocity, but harnesses that energy to become stronger, more competent, and able to protect himself and those around him.
The Magician is developed by attaining knowledge and using that knowledge to gain wisdom. The Magician pours into other people, teaching, healing, and guiding them to develop themselves. The Magician is the archetype that directly develops the Mature Masculine in other men, using the wisdom that has been gathered through life experience and careful study. He holds the secrets and is willing to share them for the betterment of the world.
Finally, the Lover. The lover is developed as one’s ability to drink from the pleasures of life without becoming consumed by them, increases. Without the King, a lover will burn out and squander their resources on pleasures. But, beyond the sensual — which composes most of the Lover — the Lover is also associated with creativity, aesthetic appreciation, and the sensitivity to beauty, which borders on the line of the Magician as well.
The Feminine Archetypes
The Queen is developed by a woman developing her beauty and humility. She does this by taking care of herself — eating well, exercising, and otherwise ensuring that her body and her looks are as refined as possible. But the Queen is also humble, and it is through her humility that she strengthens her ability to influence those around her. Together, beauty and humility work hand in hand, as humility acts as the source of her beauty and makes her all the more beautiful. She will be desired if she can reach the development of her Queen.
The Mother is developed through a woman developing her nurturing tendency to care for others. This is obviously directly developed in motherhood, but it extends beyond the influence she has on her own children, so that she affects her family and her community with her renewing energy.
The Matron is the equivalent of the Magician in the Mature Masculine. A woman develops her Matron to share their knowledge and wisdom with other women to develop their own Queen and Mother archetypes. The Matron is developed as a lifetime of experience and skills are used to better her community and the people around her.
The Lover is developed as a woman develops her ability to delight in life. However, for women, it is even more important that they learn to take nothing for granted. The good and the bad must be appreciated for their own sake. It is through the balance of focusing on the pleasures of life, as well as not turning away from her pains, wounds, and traumas, that allows her to drink deeply from the well of the Lover.
Developing these archetypes is an essential task for anyone on the path to growth and integration. Our ability to sharpen others — through friendship, intimacy, mentorship, and especially parenting — is in direct proportion to our own development.
As we established in last week’s article, ideal parenting is defined as the ability to grow a child through consistent exposure to both the Mature Masculine and the Mature Feminine.
If the child is a dull sword, the pressure resulting from the dance of these two forces forges that child into maturity. Having access to neither of the mature archetypes, or only one, will cause a deep imbalance in the child’s development.
Poor parenting typically stems from the parent’s lack of archetypal development within themselves. How can an undeveloped parent produce developed children? But even with developed parents, exposure to more psyches and more of the sacred archetypes is another reason why it takes a village to raise a child properly.
You, the parent or adult present in a child’s life, are the source from where that child draws the fuel for their growth. Develop yourself, and they too will develop.
What effect would a world of men and women archetypically optimized within their psyches have on future generations? I would love to find out — and I know you would too.
The Second Layer: The Sociological Cult and Cartel
In a recent Confessions of an ENTP episode, Alpha Mania, Chase delivered one of the more controversial lectures in recent history. He gave a deep analysis of what the collective sacred masculine and feminine really are, and specifically how they relate to sexuality and the growing “Red Pill” community. But he also provided the necessary critiques to clarify what the “Red Pill” gets right, and what it lacks.
The sociological archetypes are two-fold — the Cult of the Mature Masculine and the Cartel of the Mature Feminine. Before proceeding, it is worth noting that the literal definition of a word often conflicts with the culturally accepted one — such as with these words, “cult” and “cartel”.
Let’s start with the Mature Masculine. What does “cult” mean?
From dictionary.com, a “cult” is:
1) A particular system of religious worship, especially with reference to its rites and ceremonies.
2) An instance of great veneration of a person, ideal, or thing, especially as manifested by a body of admirers
3) The object of such devotion
4) A group or sect bound together by veneration of the same thing, person, ideal, etc.
Taking “cult” to strictly mean that which is defined above, we can see how it relates to the Mature Masculine.
- According to the first definition, the “cult” of the Mature Masculine does have ceremonies and rites, or did, for the initiation of men.
- According to the second definition, the cult of the Mature Masculine relentlessly pursues the ideal of a mature man and embodies the characteristics of the Mature Masculine.
- The third definition echoes the same idea — the “object” is the ideal of the Mature Masculine.
- And the fourth definition shows that the collective body of men should pursue the Mature Masculine in a unified effort to achieve the ideal.
And “cartel”?
The first definition will do:
1) An international syndicate, combine, or a trust formed especially to regulate prices and output in some field of business.
From the Alpha Mania lecture, we see that women’s role in society has been aggressively supplanted with the rise of technology. Our technology fulfills almost all our practical needs. The role that women had less than a century ago has been abolished. Without a distinct role to play, her power is lessened, especially when entering an intimate relationship. Where that’s leaving many women today is in a place where she must rely too heavily on the best leverage she has in her relationships — her sexuality.
If we take the above definition of “cartel” and plug it into the understanding that a woman’s sexuality has become her primary means to negotiate relationships, we find that there is a quasi-price effect associated with that sexuality.
This “price” is not in relation to an actual value. It is a currency, that, in this metaphor, represents what a woman is looking for in an intimate partner. Whatever the characteristics that attract a woman to an intimate relationship with a man are, those represent the collective “price” for her sexuality.
Books like The Rational Male, and others that address intersexual dynamics, show that women are drawn to strong men. Men capable of making a path for themselves in the world. They are drawn to men who have a spine and — perhaps more than anything — men who know their own value. It is a common understanding that a man who embodies many of these characteristics becomes desired by many women.
So, What’s the Problem?
The problem is this: as a result of men and women shirking the responsibility of developing the sacred archetypes within them, the world is rife with men and women who lack integration, personal respect, responsibility, and who have little to offer to each other.
This results in a tremendous amount of tension that threatens all intimate relationships and will inevitability contaminate any attempts at parenting. As we said earlier — how can an undeveloped parent raise a child to become integrated?
Let’s break down the problem a little further.
There are not a lot of integrated men out there. The same goes for women. But, since women are the ones who “select” mates, most of the men that enter into relationships with women are “low-hanging fruit”. Maybe they are the pure “alpha” that she wanted — fearless, self-interested, assertive — but those characteristics don’t necessarily make for good providers and fathers. They may not stick around before the child is born.
Or maybe a woman has that great provider who is nurturing, sensitive, and willing to do whatever it takes to make her happy. But she loses respect for him because those are not the characteristics she craves, and soon desires a man who embodies those characteristics instead.
Because she has settled for low-hanging fruit, she has devalued her own sexuality. The very man she “settles” for, also “settles” for her, and he is robbed of the impetus to go out and better himself. The cycle perpetuates itself and, just as a rising tide may raise all boats, a falling tide will lower them all.
The Solution?
We’ve talked already about how activating and integrating the sacred archetypes increases one’s value. Integrating your archetypes is the solution. Develop your King, develop your Queen. But let’s dive a level deeper.
If we go a layer deeper, we find a short season buried under years of content that offers the solution in more digestible terms. This is season 4, which is titled How Intimate Relationships Actually Work. While all its content is relevant to today’s discussion, there is one thing we need to bring to the table right now.
- What attracts a man and a woman to each other? A woman’s beauty is what draws a man to her. A man’s nobility draws her to him.
This leaves us a road map. It starts with women. By increasing their beauty — and developing the sacred archetypes within them — they increase their value exponentially. It is here that the vital decision takes place. Then, instead of settling for low-hanging men, a woman must reject a man who does not have nobility and who has not developed his archetypes. It is only by rejecting men do men get better.
Men will rise to the bar that women set for the “price” of an intimate relationship. Some men, the best men, will surpass it entirely. But the point remains, most men will only rise to the bar that gets him access to sexuality. AND NO FURTHER. Once a woman has validated a man’s worth with intimacy, it sends the message of acceptance and removes an impetus to improve. A woman, then, and women collectively — hence the cartel of ALL women — must both raise this price and stand by it.
The higher they raise the bar; the higher men will rise. If the price is not met, the man must be met with rejection. Rejection informs a man that he needs to grow and increase his value.
A man, on the other hand, must embody the two pieces that compose nobility. This is his strength and his provision. But the burden does not lie only on men. If a woman is not beautiful and does not possess some humility, she will not be desired by a man. As Chase has said on multiple occasions, beauty is primary for women, and the combination of strength and provision is primary for men.
Now What?
Isn’t this about parenting? Ultimately, yes. But hopefully, you can see that many of the issues our society faces can be traced back to this exact process laid out above. If immature and undeveloped men and women have children together, what are the chances that they will have a mature and developed family? The cycle of brokenness continues if nothing gets fixed.
It starts with you and it starts with me — today. It starts with us getting to know ourselves. Once we know ourselves, we will grow, develop, become strong, and mature. We will become beautiful and we will become noble.
Our children and our children’s children will not suffer for our lack of development. Our strength will make them strong. Collectively, we will save the world.
Want to Find Out More?
If you want access to more of the secrets surrounding Jungian Parenting, intimate relationships, and personal development check out our Journeyman Membership here at CSJ.
I like the core structure of “how to be mature”, but some of the guts, are controversial because in my belief, they fall short of being able to actually reach maturity. Hear me out, because I don’t think what is presented is wrong, but incomplete. The ideas are a tease to the aching soul seeking refinement, as all the right parts are listed but not the way to bring forth the change in people ultimately, at least in this area of becoming mature to be an effective “parent” of children or a mentor to adults.
In both male and female, there is something deeper that drives beauty/humility and strength/provision. Character. No matter what belief system one comes from, one cannot improve if character development isn’t at the top of the hierarchy, of course my opinion. This gets very close, but leaves me wanting more for children and adults alike, and covertly was the reason driving the discord from the community over this teaching, not just feminists with their pantsuits in a bunch.
I do like this part 2, showing that all teaching and mentoring and bringing others to maturity begins with ourselves as individuals taking responsibility. I would say above beauty, humility, strength, and provision, is learning how to love one another practically, which includes these four traits in male and female respectively. Going beyond these aims is the missing explanation. Only love can empower us to want to be humble as women when we can be equally competent, but are often seen as lesser. Only love can help us endeavor to be beautiful when we are complacent to keep taking the effort. Only love can have a man work tireless hours to leave a legacy when he is not appreciated often enough for his consistent contributions. Only love motivates a man to provide when the work is hard and gets harder.
I actually think the teaching is getting to this, but how can “learn how to love” be said in practical terms of depth psychology without missing the point and having men and women feel they are again being driven by aims of achievement and status?
A cult and cartel driving at nobility and beauty goes back to “muh status”. If the commerce of woman is based in rating men for provision and strength, isn’t that what led us here? If the commerce of men is based in rating women for sexual beauty, isn’t that also what led us here? Where is the change? I think character development explains what actually broke down in the first place. The practical development becoming a “loving person” best matches the mission statement of “And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers.” We are presented with the challenge to go for the full turn of becoming a loving people, to achieve this desired change.
Where does character come from? The argument that “King Warrior Magician Lover” makes is that when the archetypes are developed properly, it actually results in virtue. For example, with the King archetype, it is developing the perfect tension between the tyrant king and the weakling king, using for the forces of strength and grace, one’s King becomes developed.
The argument I would posit would be that maturity and character are so inter-related they are practically indistinguishable. Now you may disagree with the model of how that maturity develops, but the model of archetypal development demonstrates an innate connection between maturity and character. My question for you is do you agree that character and maturity are the same, or do you feel that character comes from somewhere/thing else? And if it does, where?
Now for love. First, the best question we can ask is what we mean by “love”? The problem with the “love” argument is that love is not a primary driver for us biologically. Women are not attracted to men because they are nice, kind, and thoughtful. That can be a small part of it, but they are primarily attracted based on what the man brings to the relationship — his strength and provision primarily. And a man is not attracted to a woman’s “love” primarily, but her sexuality. Religion and society have done a poor job of accounting for the biological drives of man in a way that helps us lead healthier lives. That being said, perhaps your definition of love can clear up some of these issues.
You made a point about status which seemed to imply a certain superfluousness to being “beautiful” or “strong” . . . and perhaps that’s correct. But to answer your question: “Isn’t that what lead us here?” . . . No, I can’t say it is. The argument that this article posits is that what led us here was the erosion of the Mature Masculine and the Mature Feminine.
Our society, for one reason or another, has moved so far away from our biological and psychological roots, we no longer recognize who we are as individuals. So yes, love is important — but love and respect for oneself are equally important to love and respect for another — which is why our own archetypal development is so important. As the article hinted at, how can we help or love others well if we have no maturity to speak of? We can’t develop our archetypes completely without love.
I emphatically agree that we have moved away from nurturing and providing for biological drives, to our own detriment. I am suggesting that the definition of love, “the realized power of truth”, is actually what allows individuals to submit to serve these needs in a mutual exchange between the sexes.
I do not think humans possess the desire to fully love and submit to this exchange naturally. As you say men and women have a price which is not based on loving one another. I am suggesting that that lack of nurturing and providing for the wiring of one another is exactly what the problem IS, because we have lost love and respect for one another. If we would realize that nurturing and providing for this mutual exchange for one another IS loving and respecting one another, then we could fix the brokenness.
In the mission statement, it states, “to return hearts”. In an exchange between leader and follower, between parents and children, or between spouses, or even partners in business, we need to teach people how to love each other and respect each other.
All this boils down to is that I want the connection to be made that really what is broken is the love and respect between people. Love and respect can be natural but it often is a fleeting emotion that does not go deep enough when it comes to what we want without regard for the other. all of these good teachings are teaching people how to love and respect one another in a pragmatic way.
so why am I quibbling? Since I agree that maturity and character are ultimately equivalent, if it was natural to reach this point everyone would just reach it and we wouldn’t be in the trouble we are in. Definitions alone and identification alone are not transformative, If the process is not connected end to end, and these gaps can confuse people and drive people to the wrong focus.
So I’m asking can we connect the process fully because leaving it disconnected as if we can just will ourselves to maturity with an incomplete definition will not get us there. Instead this awesome teaching about returning the hearts of people to one another, to love and respect each other is the driver of character and maturity. The model is teaching love and respect. I just want to see that fully connected without the guesswork, otherwise it’s just re-creating a new system that people will take advantage of to be consumers of selfishness, Instead of focusing on the mutual exchange driven by love and respect.
I want to honor the suffering it took for this work to surface, by giving it the best potential for a return on the investment. thank you also for considering 🙂
Let me see if I understand you completely. What I think you’re saying is that love (big L love) is a contingent force alongside maturity that, together, fix whatever mire we are. Further, that it was a lack of love that was at least part of the onset of the problem, to begin with.
I will address some of the things you said.
About reaching our archetypal maturity you said: “if it was natural to reach this point everyone would just reach it and we wouldn’t be in the trouble we are in.” This is a piece I disagree with because it IS natural for us to achieve the realization of our archetypes, but that drive can be repressed when there are enough counter-forces to do so. In this case, the highest of these “counter-forces” is simply the dulled-out versions of the mature masculine and feminine. No one is teaching us how to be the best man or woman we can be. You could lay the “counter-forces” at the feet of society and ideology as well, both of which fight against our deepest natures. . .
Here is where the tricky part comes in. “Love”. You referenced the mission of returning hearts . . . I think “love” is too big a concept as is to address directly, so I will try to break it down.
We generally associate the idea of love with sacrifice — I sacrifice something of my own, possibly even my life, because I love you. But I prefer Confucious’s idea of love: “To love a thing means wanting it to live.” What does that mean? The Christian Saint, Irenaeus, said that “The glory of God is man fully alive.” If we combine these two then to show love for something then we want it to be as “alive” — or developed — as possible. On the archetypal scale, this is captured by the Magician and Matron archetypes — both of which are focused on helping people become as alive as possible. These archetypes are explicitly focused on giving and caring for others.
What I am saying then is that there is an implicit love that is required to properly develop the archetypes. I am not saying that the archetypes are equivalent to love itself, but to appropriately develop them requires some love.
What I see you saying is that developing ourselves through this “model” is not enough. I agree with you. A model, like a robot, cannot teach us to love. But I think it can lead us to it. You mentioned that the model will only teach us how to love and respect in “a practical way.” But developing ourselves requires a measure of self-respect and compassion that we might show for a close friend. Peterson’s rule, “Treat yourself like someone you are responsible for helping,” and the scripture that states “Love your neighbor as yourself” both play into this idea. I don’t think you can reduce it to merely a “practical” thing. The model is a model, I get that, but it’s not the model itself, but where the model leads us to that demonstrates what is life-giving about it.
The last place we could look for “love” is in the divine sphere. This would be based on the question how “Where does our capacity to love come from?” Because I am not sure, and I get the sense that you feel this way too, that all humans are capable of love in their current state. But that is a discussion for a different time.