When we talk about relationships we often look for simple signals: the phrase to avoid, the behavior that announces a crisis, the gesture that demonstrates how solid a couple is. Carl Gustav Jung followed a different path. For the Swiss psychiatrist, founder of analytical psychology, a relationship represents one of the places in which our psyche shows itself most clearly. Love tells us who we have next to us and, at the same time, reveals who we become when the other touches fears, desires and parts of us that have remained hidden.
Jung never developed a questionnaire to establish whether a couple is healthy or destined to last. His reflections concerned the unconscious, projections, the Shadow, the Person and the process of identification, that is, the path through which a person tries to fully become himself.
One of his sentences, contained in Modern Man in Search of a Soulsummarizes this vision well:
The meeting of two personalities is like the contact between two chemical substances: if a reaction occurs, both are transformed.
An important relationship leaves a mark. No one comes out the same as before.
Love and the images we build
According to Jungian psychology, in the early stages of falling in love we often also see something in the other person that belongs to our inner world. It is the mechanism of projection: desires, needs, fears and little-recognized qualities are attributed to the partner.
A reserved person may seem mysterious to us. A constant presence can transform into the promise that we will no longer be abandoned. A decisive character can seem like the perfect answer to our insecurity. That image contains real elements, along with a lot of material that comes to us.
Over time, however, the projection loses consistency. The other shows limits, contradictions and autonomous desires. Some relationships break just when the real person stops coinciding with the imagined character. Others really start at that moment.
Jung also paid great attention to the Shadow, the set of aspects of us that we struggle to recognise. Anger, need for control, jealousy, fear of abandonment and desire for approval can remain outside the image we have built of ourselves for a long time. A deep relationship can often bring them to the surface.
Among the central concepts of his thought there is the process of identification. A person grows when he stops living only through external roles and expectations and builds a more authentic relationship with himself. The couple also enters this path. It can leave room for the evolution of both or become rigid around fixed roles: those who save and those who are saved, those who decide and those who adapt, those who protect and those who depend.
The following questions were not formulated by Jung and do not constitute a psychological test. They arise from the main concepts of his work and serve as a guide to look at a relationship beyond the simple question: “Do we still love each other?”.
Who are you when your partner isn’t around?
Life as a couple creates habits, private languages and a common memory. Over time it can become difficult to distinguish what belongs to the relationship from what belongs to the individual. When your partner leaves the scene, are there any interests, friendships, desires and independent direction left? Or does every choice acquire value only through the gaze of the other?
In the Jungian perspective, a relationship can accompany individuation only when both retain their own consistency. Emotional autonomy allows us to love someone without giving them the entire task of determining who we are and what we are worth. When identity rests entirely on the couple, any distance can seem like a threat. The partner stops being just a loved one and becomes the involuntary guardian of our stability.
When your partner stops resembling the image you had of him, do you correct your gaze or try to correct the person?
At the beginning of a relationship we always know a limited part of the other. The empty spaces are filled with expectations and fantasies. The difficulty comes when reality shatters that image. The person present can ask for more space. Those who appear strong can show fragility. Someone who seemed mysterious may simply turn out to be distant.
At that point we can change our gaze and really know who we have in front of us. Or we can try to bring it back into its original role, correcting its tastes, behaviors and even emotions. A relationship becomes trapped in projection when one of the two loves above all the function performed by the other: refuge, guide, savior, confirmation. The real person ends up disturbing the character.
What part of yourself does your partner force you to see, even when you would like to avoid it?
Significant relationships bring out sides of the character that elsewhere remain silent. A balanced person at work can become anxious in a couple. Those who consider themselves generous may discover a strong need for control. Those who say they don’t need anyone can react with pain at any distance. Jungian psychology would call the Shadow into question. The term also includes vulnerabilities and needs that do not coincide with the image we want to give of ourselves.
The partner thus becomes an unaccommodating mirror. It can show us the fear of being replaced, the difficulty of asking for affection or the tendency to withdraw when a conversation becomes too intense. Recognizing this part means taking responsibility for what belongs to us, avoiding attributing any reaction to the behavior of the other.
Are you choosing each other for who you are today or for the idea of who you could become together?
Many bonds live projected into the future. The relationship will improve when a difficult period ends, when one of the two changes jobs, learns to communicate or finally becomes the person glimpsed at the beginning. The future may offer direction. It can also turn into a long waiting room. We remain tied to the potential version of the other, while the present person continues to show different choices and needs.
The question concerns the willingness to inhabit the current reality of the relationship. Is the partner chosen for what it shows today or for the promise of a transformation that may not come? Even the idea of ”growing together” can become a projection. The growth of two people rarely proceeds in parallel. Compatibility must also be observed in the present.
What are you asking of your partner that you should learn to give to yourself?
Being loved means receiving attention, listening and comfort. However, there is a difference between entrusting some emotional needs to another and giving them exclusive responsibility for our balance. The partner can reassure us without erasing all insecurities. It can recognize our value without replacing the relationship we have with ourselves. It can support us during a difficulty without becoming the only reason to feel good.
The question asks you to identify the invisible task assigned to your loved one. Should it make us feel desirable? Must it protect us from loneliness? Must he repair what other relationships have hurt? Individuation requires taking back some of this responsibility. Support can come from the other. Building your own value remains an internal job.
If one of the two stopped recognizing each other in the role they have always had in the couple, would you be able to meet again as people?
Each couple develops more or less visible roles. One organizes, the other follows. One consoles, the other brings problems. One appears strong, the other can afford to be fragile. These balances initially help the relationship function. Over time they can become cages. Those who have always cared for may want support. Those who have adapted can begin to say no. The person considered fragile can develop a new autonomy.
Change is often experienced as a betrayal of the original pact. Phrases like “you weren’t like this before” describe the confusion of those who no longer recognize the previous balance. A living relationship must be able to separate the person from the role he or she has held. The previous couple may no longer exist. It remains to be seen whether the people who have become friends in the meantime still want to meet.
A relationship leaves space or tightens
Contemporary psychology studies couple relationships through data, observations and experimental research. Jung followed a different path, based on clinical experience and exploration of the psyche. His reflections do not allow us to scientifically measure the health of a relationship. However, they offer a useful lens to observe what love brings to the surface: projections, roles, denied parts and fear of change.
A relationship can offer comfort and stability. It can also become the place where we gradually stop recognizing ourselves. The six questions serve to distinguish these two directions, without scores and without automatic results. A healthy couple does not resolve every fragility and does not protect against every pain. However, it leaves enough space for two people to change, look at each other again and decide whether to continue walking together. Without forcing yourself to remain the characters met on the first day.
