The 8 archetypes of Extroverted Sensation (Se)

This article will explore extroverted sensation in all 8 of the different roles it plays in the personality. This is per Jungian analyst John Beebe’s 8 function personality type model.

First let’s take a look at the sensation function in general.

Jung wrote that sensation, just like intuition, is an irrational function, because it is a perceiving function. All of us experience a constant influx of new information and sensation types perceive it primarily through sensation. He said that sensation (and intuition) by itself “lack all rational direction.” It is thinking and feeling that are the rational functions and “find fulfillment only when they are in complete harmony with the laws of reason.”

Many Jungian analysts have attached names to the four functions and describe sensation as Matter. Thinking is Logos, feeling is Soul, and intuition is Spirit.

The element associated with sensation is Earth. Air is thinking, Water is feeling, and Fire is intuition.

Each function has an “attitude” of either extroversion or introversion. Jung defined “attitude as “a readiness of the psyche to act or react in a certain way.” Extroversion is outwardness and assertiveness towards people or events

Putting the two together, sensation and extroversion, the traits can include a preference for experiencing rather than reflection, an orientation to the present, creative power, and an awareness of the body and sensuality.

Here is how Jung defined extroverted sensation:

No function ever acts separately from the other functions. Jung said we almost never see a pure form of a function. We consider a function only in order to better understand the whole of the personality.

With that in mind, here is an infographic I made that describes the 8 archetypal roles of Se. All personality types have Se. Half of the 16 personalities have it in the top four functions where it is more conscious. The other half have it in shadow:

Click here for more details about the needs and behaviors of the 8 archetypal roles if you aren’t already familiar with them. The archetypes free us to use our imagination when considering personality rather than reduce personality to a set of traits. They also can help us claim our own inner authority and power.

This is part 1 of 8 in the series.Here are the other articles in the series:

The 8 archetypes of Introverted Sensation (Si)

The 8 archetypes of Extroverted Intuition (Ne)

Continue ReadingThe 8 archetypes of Extroverted Sensation (Se)

The archetypes of the roles of the 8 cognitive functions of the personality per John Beebe, M.D.

Your personality is like an inner stage where the eight “characters” of the functions interact.

Jungian Analyst John Beebe created an 8 function model that assigns archetypes to each of these eight functions.

Understanding the underlying archetype of the cognitive functions in your personality type will make it easier to improve your relationship with your self and with others.

The first four functions constitute a person’s conscious psychology, per Carl Jung. Even if some of the mental processes are still unconscious, they have the potential to become conscious over time.

Functions 5-8 are the shadow functions and are the same functions as the first four, but the opposite attitude, and are mostly unconscious. These functions carry the repressed aspects of the first four functions.

Jung believed that both attitudes were implicit in each function because a function works in a cycle, starting from and returning to the preferred attitude. So the 8 function model is consistent with what Jung taught.

Here is an infographic I made of how Beebe describes the eight archetypes. Note how the shadow functions also have positive qualities:

Continue ReadingThe archetypes of the roles of the 8 cognitive functions of the personality per John Beebe, M.D.

An archetypal universe

It’s so magical to tap into the differential as well as collective energy of the archetypes that we are able to interact with in a moment’s notice, as well as throughout the course of a lifetime.

I have always wanted to find some encyclopedic list of all the possible symbols and archetypes that exist in our universe. It probably is a fantasy that it could even be encapsulated within some 1000 page book or even within a library of such books.

Just to know and encapsulate the infinite variety of what is out there symbolically just blows my mind.

What also blows my mind is that it doesn’t even take this encyclopedic knowledge to understand the power of an archetype. All that it takes is one that feels so synchronistic and so Divine, that you can feel touched by a Being larger than anything that we can wrap our brains around.

All it takes is just one archetype that hits us so hard in any given moment, and we can truly be touched and transformed!

So it just shows that both breadth and depth of archetypal contact can really alter our lives and mindset in such profound ways!

Such a gift to be alive!

Continue ReadingAn archetypal universe