The Collective Unconscious

Collective unconscious is a term of analytical psychology originally coined by Carl Jung. While Freud did not distinguish between an "individual psychology" and a "collective psychology", Jung distinguished the collective unconscious from the personal unconscious particular to each human being. The collective unconscious is also known as "a reservoir of the experiences of our species.

In his earlier writings, Jung called this aspect of the psyche the collective unconscious. He later changed the term to objective psyche. The objective psyche may be considered objective for two reasons: it is common to everyone; and it has a better sense of the self's ideal than the ego or conscious self does. It thus directs the self, via archetypes, dreams, and intuition, and drives the person to make mistakes on purpose. In this way, it moves the psyche toward individuation, or self-actualization.