The Life Beneath The Surface.

On the invisible foundations that sustain us through the changing seasons of life.

Image source: source unverified. Quote attributed to Carl Gustav Jung, from Memories, Dreams, Reflections (1961).

There is something beautiful about the way Carl Jung understood life. Perhaps we spend too much time worrying about what is visible, forgetting that the most meaningful things often exist beneath the surface.

A flower blooms, brightens the world for a little while and eventually withers. We witness its beauty and mourn its passing, rarely thinking about the roots that remain beneath the soil, quietly sustaining the possibility of another bloom.

Human life is much the same. Our appearances change, our circumstances shift, our identities evolve and the things we once considered permanent eventually become memories. The person we were yesterday slowly gives way to the person we become tomorrow. Yet somewhere beneath all these transformations, something continues to endure.

Perhaps our lives should not be measured entirely by what we achieve, accumulate or leave behind in plain sight. There is also the invisible life we cultivate within ourselves, the values we hold, the lessons we carry, the love we give and the parts of our character that survive even when everything around us changes.

Not everything meaningful needs to be seen to be real. Not everything that disappears is entirely lost.

The blossom passes, but the rhizome remains.

Inspired by Carl Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections (1961), Prologue.

An interpretation of Jung’s reflection on the enduring, invisible foundations of life.