Who looks outside, dreams, who looks inside, awakes. -Carl Jung
The most famous idea of Jung’s is his recognition of the psychological value of spiritual experience, particularly in an era where traditional religious belief was waning and church attendance across Europe was declining.
Jung proposed and developed the concepts of the extraverted and the introverted personality, archetypes, and the collective unconscious. His work has been influential in psychiatry and in the study of religion, literature, and related fields.
An older woman said to me one afternoon, “I feel so much better after I went to church.”
“What happens when you skip the church?” I asked.
She tried to tell me of this long explanation that sounded more like fear rather than love.
I asked what she learned today
to which she replied with a vague response. I realized that that’s the religiosity, not a relationship with GOD. O my goodness! That’s addiction.
Eldredge calls that type as Churchianity. I’m known to be controversial so l’m not surprise when people react negatively.
A.W. Tozer writes, “That our idea of God corresponds as nearly as possible to the true being of God is of immense importance to us. Compared with our actual thoughts about Him, our creedal statements are of little consequence. Our real idea of God may lie buried under the rubbish of conventional religious notions and may require an intelligent and vigorous search before it is finally unearthed and exposed for what it is.”
In other words, if you want to know what a person (or an organization) really believes, their creeds may not tell you nearly as much as how they live. Or perhaps, how they pray.
When I began to look within I was awakened to see the pain, the fear and shame I knew I needed to deal with and to acknowledge the painful feeling of unworthiness. I realized I’ve been working so hard to be approved by the critics. The truth is they don’t care for your hard work. They will find something wrong and make sure you heard it. Or they’re so insecure, consumed with jealousy they will sabotage you in every way possible. I learned to look up instead of looking across the field.
To trust God is the only way to go. Keep on keeping on looking up and look within to see what needs to be forgiven to be healed and grow.