Research library

Carl Jung: a life on the edge of reality with hypnagogia, hyperphantasia, and hallucinations

Incekara and Blom · Frontiers in Psychology

Reading Carl Jung's journals and other self-reports, the authors argue that many of his unusual experiences, such as a mental image of a dead friend so vivid that he considered getting up to follow it, reflected extremely vivid imagery (hyperphantasia) rather than a psychotic illness. They suggest he was probably born with this vividness and developed it through a practice he called active imagination. They accept that some daytime hallucinations were psychotic symptoms, which are fairly common in people without a disorder, and call for research on hyperphantasia in psychotic experiences.