Huh...

What do you think?

For me, I have challenged myself to fight, waging everything I possess, all my wisdom and strength to fight for all I desire. I fought and lost my fear of losing. For me, that was a win.

Sometimes,this process moves along quite smoothly and other times my journey has been on a long and winding uphill narrow, mucky path or moving so quickly downhill everything is blurred and I can't focus.

In the end...well, I'm waiting on that.

Ken, any victory seems worth keeping. As for things moving so quickly downhill that they blur, you're a downhill skier, aren't you? Find the nearest chair-lift, or t-bar at least. :-) The end? That waits for all of us; it seems to me that it's the approach to it that counts.

Seddy, your point is one of the illogical aspects that I noted (so question away, that's why I opened it up for discussion): how would you get more than you started with? Yet, there's some sort of statement (in the part of me that generated this, whatever you want to call it) that feels like you would benefit in some way. And maybe there is, in the fact that at the end, you've survived the fight with yourself. It has made you stronger (or something) just to strive.

Jung talks about a process where, when the "conscious dominant", one's current organizing image of consciousness, starts to wear out, as they always do, you have to dip back down into the unconscious, yielding the usual command of the ego. Then there can be a fight, internally, "unto the death" at least of the old idea, and then you're reborn as a new person, presumably because a new dominant has become conscious. He stresses that this process is definitely not under conscious control, however.

"When the way comes to an end ..." :-)

Which side? You could say both; you could say neither. Depends on which you believe to start with, is my guess. "Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're probably right."

The gain to be had in having such a "frank and open discussion" with oneself is that, at the end, you know yourself better. It's easy to judge, from the conscious viewpoint, that anything you don't already know about yourself is something you don't want to know, but that assumes that consciousness is always right.

The only thing that might be at risk of "dying" is the old conscious idea. And if it isn't prepared to hear a little constructive criticism, maybe it's time the old idea moved on, anyway ...

It's kind of backwards: you keep trying to repress, that is forget, events that you can't really forget, and that process could be blocking you from retrieving things from your unconscious that could turn out to be strengths.

The only thing that comes to me is someone who has taken too much Antabuse, which obviously isn't it.

There probably are more than two sides. Heck, for some people, it's a free-for-all, and then maybe it's not as advisable. You do what you can, otherwise you overwhelm yourself.

The unconscious is definitely uncomfortable. But it's worse when you think you know what's in there (and you can't really, because then you'd already be conscious of it.) Really, it's only the unknown, which is in fact neutral on average.

I like your unwillingness to let go of a part of yourself, whether we're talking about you or not. :-P Remembering it is the worst part, so far. Who knows what that will give you later?

The only thing that comes to me is someone who has taken too much Antabuse, which obviously isn't it.

LOL so corny but made me laugh