I have treated many hundreds of patients. Among those in the second half of life – that is to say, over 35 – there has not been one whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding a religious outlook on life. It is safe to say that every one of them fell ill because he had lost that which the living religions of every age have given their followers, and none of them has really been healed who did not regain his religious outlook.
– CG Jung
I don’t know exactly how Jung understands the term “religious outlook” and I won’t speak for him.
For me, I understand it in the widest sense possible. I would perhaps say “meaning, purpose, and connection with the larger whole”.
We all seem to have a deep need for meaning, purpose, and a sense of connection.
Why? Because existence is already a seamless whole. If we don’t consciously notice that, we will have a sense that something is missing. What’s missing is our conscious recognition of the connections that are already here, and perhaps the conscious cultivation of connections that are especially meaningful and important to us.
That connection is with ourselves as who we are, as a human being with a body and psyche. The connections here are with our body, subpersonalities, deepest needs and wishes (which tend to be simple and universal), and so on.
The connection is with our nature, with what we are. With our fundamental nature as consciousness, and noticing that the word to us happens within and as this consciousness. (And oneness.)
The connection is also with others, social systems, ecosystems, Earth as a living and evolving whole, the universe as an evolving seamless system, and existence as a whole. (I would call existence as a whole God.)
All of this is already a seamless whole. We are already in a relationship with it all. And as what we are, it’s all already happening within and as what we are. And if we are not consciously noticing these connections – and how it’s happening within and as what we are, we’ll feel we are missing something.
INITIAL DRAFT
I don’t know exactly how Jung understood the term “religious outlook” but I wouldn’t be surprised if he meant it in the widest possible sense. I would perhaps say meaning, purpose, and connection with the larger whole.
We all seem to have a deep need for meaning, purpose, and a sense of connection.
And that connection is with ourselves and the larger whole. With the different parts of us (subpersonalities) and our nature (consciousness). And with others, the larger ecosystems, and existence as a whole.
We are part of it all, and it’s part of us, so if we don’t have a conscious connection with most or all of this, we’ll sense that something is missing. And something is really missing, which is the conscious noticing of the connections that already are here, and perhaps the conscious cultivation of connections that are especially meaningful and important to us.