Glacial Grieving: Melting the Ice Within to See the World Renewed

Abstract

Later in his life, Carl Gustav Jung became increasingly interested in the alchemical process as a symbolic representation of the individuation journey. By focusing on the stages of the nigredo and the albedo, this paper expands upon the importance of these steps in the psychological process of individuation. Jung (1970a) wrote that individuation “gathers the world to oneself” rather than shutting one out from the world (p. 136). This is an aspect of the journey toward wholeness that is especially relevant in our current era of climate crisis.

By exploring the nigredo and the albedo deeply, we can begin to see the many shades of blue that lie underneath. These blues, and the idea of feeling blue, offer a pathway to empathy and understanding through our shared grief. With a careful examination of The Red Book: Liber Novus (Jung, 2009), after a time of traumatic ambiguous loss, and amplified with the images of ice in our warming world, this paper takes a paradoxical journey. From the blues of the Arctic ice to the bright red of Liber Novus, this black and white path becomes illuminated with a variety of colors. This expanded, empathetic view of the complex image of ice brings with it the gift of the rubedo, a renewed hope born out of death, grief, and chaos.

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Notes on contributors

Sarah D. Norton

Sarah D. Norton, PhD, is an independent scholar, writer, and editor. She received her doctoral degree from Pacifica Graduate Institute in 2020 after completing her dissertation, Arctic Imaginings: Chasing Ice through C. G. Jung’s Liber Novus into the 21st Century. Her focus on our chaotic and changing environment, in relation to the individual and the collective unconscious, comes from a time of trauma and ambiguous loss. During that time, she developed a deep connection to the image of melting polar icecaps.