---
title: "Meaning & Key Takeaway of: Jung recognized that society advances…"
description: "\"“Jung recognized that society advances only slowly, through the gradual integration of new insights gleaned through the often unrecorded work of indivi..."
image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/adb/gary-valentine-lachman-14492_cold-war_jung-recognized-that-society-advances-on_174616.jpg"
---

#  Jung recognized that society advances only slowly, through…

![“Jung recognized that society advances only slowly, through the gradual integration of new insights gleaned through the often unrecorded work of individuals, whose attempts at self-transformation add incrementally to society’s own growth. This is a theme he returned to in his late work The…” quote by Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/adb/gary-valentine-lachman-14492_cold-war_jung-recognized-that-society-advances-on_174616.jpg)   [Download](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/adb/gary-valentine-lachman-14492_cold-war_jung-recognized-that-society-advances-on_174616.jpg) [Open image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/adb/gary-valentine-lachman-14492_cold-war_jung-recognized-that-society-advances-on_174616.jpg)

> ““Jung recognized that society advances only slowly, through the gradual integration of new insights gleaned through the often unrecorded work of individuals, whose attempts at self-transformation add incrementally to society’s own growth. This is a theme he returned to in his late work The Undiscovered Self, written in 1957, which applies the insights of analytical psychology to the H-bomb threatened world of the Cold War years.””

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

## About This Quote

This interpretation was drafted with AI assistance. It is one reading of the quote, not the author's own explanation.

Society progresses slowly as individuals integrate new insights, each personal transformation contributing incrementally to collective growth.

**In simple terms:** Individual growth adds up to societal change.

Key Takeaway

Cultivate personal insight to aid societal evolution.

Themes

psychology societal change incremental progress individual transformation collective growth

Mood

reflective optimistic thoughtful

Type

philosophical inspirational

When to use this quote

- personal development
- community initiatives
- education reform
- mental health advocacy

Key Concepts

analytical psychology cultural evolution self‑actualization

Questions to Reflect On

- How can personal insights be shared to accelerate societal growth?
- What barriers prevent individual transformation from influencing society?

A Different Perspective

Progress is limited by the pace of personal change and societal resistance to new ideas.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★   No ratings yet

[Cold war](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/cold-war/) [Identity](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/identity/) [Incrementally Society](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/incrementally-society-1883286/) [Jung](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/jung/) [Jung Recognized](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/jung-recognized-1883285/) [Psychology](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/psychology/) [Self transformation](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/self-transformation/) [Undiscovered Self](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/undiscovered-self-1543227/) [War](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/war/) [Wisdom](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/wisdom/)

## Related quotes

> [“There is something more dangerous than the death of one’s body. It is “the undiscovered self”; being alive without knowing why.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/israelmore-ayivor/there-is-something-more-dangerous-than-the-death-of-one-s-body-it-is/)

[Israelmore Ayivor](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/israelmore-ayivor/)

> [“The Seven Sermons, Jung tells us, is what Philemon would have written, but by this time, Jung had assimilated this personification of his unconscious,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/the-seven-sermons-jung-tells-us-is-what-philemon-would-have-written/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“In 1933 a German branch of the International Society was founded with Matthias Göring as president; needless to say it was gleichgeschaltet and Göring…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/in-1933-a-german-branch-of-the-international-society-was-founded-with/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Even more disturbing was a dream Jung says he had then, the earliest one he remembered. Standing before a dark hole, he peered into…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/even-more-disturbing-was-a-dream-jung-says-he-had-then-the-earliest/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Increasingly, Jung came to see that while his father and his uncles, six of whom were pastors, spoke to him about dogma and belief,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/increasingly-jung-came-to-see-that-while-his-father-and-his-uncles/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“the need to have a secret became a fundamental element in Jung’s philosophy. “Like the initiate of a secret society that has broken free…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/the-need-to-have-a-secret-became-a-fundamental-element-in-jung-s/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Jung famously said that about a third of his cases weren’t suffering from some clinically definable illness, but from a sense of meaninglessness and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-famously-said-that-about-a-third-of-his-cases-weren-t-suffering/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“That life could be ugly wasn’t news, and Jung found that the neurotics who were supposed to be cured by making their neurosis clear…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/that-life-could-be-ugly-wasn-t-news-and-jung-found-that-the-neurotics/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Jung came to understand that in this regard, we are all fragmented, and that the work of individuation is to fuse our disparate parts…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-came-to-understand-that-in-this-regard-we-are-all-fragmented-and/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Jung’s remarks about how in North Africa he “felt cast back many centuries to an infinitely more naïve world of adolescents who were preparing,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-s-remarks-about-how-in-north-africa-he-felt-cast-back-many/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Western man, Jung saw, always wants to do something, to “get somewhere”; this kind of restlessness is characteristic of us all. A few years…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/western-man-jung-saw-always-wants-to-do-something-to-get-somewhere/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Dulles knew of Jung through his wife, who had an interest in psychoanalysis and had trained as an analyst in Zürich before the war.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/dulles-knew-of-jung-through-his-wife-who-had-an-interest-in/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“But Jung did speak out against Hitler some years before he left the society. In 1936 he condemned the Fuehrer as a “raving berserker”…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/but-jung-did-speak-out-against-hitler-some-years-before-he-left-the/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Again Jung wanted to make contact with “archaic man” and he asked the Pueblo chief why he thought the whites were mad. Ochwiay told…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/again-jung-wanted-to-make-contact-with-archaic-man-and-he-asked-the/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“One result of active imagination, according to some reports, is an increase in synchronistic and paranormal phenomena. 32 This was certainly true of Jung.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/one-result-of-active-imagination-according-to-some-reports-is-an/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

## More by Gary Valentine Lachman

> [“What troubled Jung most was Freud’s tendency to reduce any expression of spirituality—in a cultural or philosophical sense—to something smaller. Freud sniffed out sex…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/what-troubled-jung-most-was-freud-s-tendency-to-reduce-any-expression/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“One result of active imagination, according to some reports, is an increase in synchronistic and paranormal phenomena. 32 This was certainly true of Jung.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/one-result-of-active-imagination-according-to-some-reports-is-an/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Again Jung wanted to make contact with “archaic man” and he asked the Pueblo chief why he thought the whites were mad. Ochwiay told…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/again-jung-wanted-to-make-contact-with-archaic-man-and-he-asked-the/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“But Jung did speak out against Hitler some years before he left the society. In 1936 he condemned the Fuehrer as a “raving berserker”…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/but-jung-did-speak-out-against-hitler-some-years-before-he-left-the/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Dulles knew of Jung through his wife, who had an interest in psychoanalysis and had trained as an analyst in Zürich before the war.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/dulles-knew-of-jung-through-his-wife-who-had-an-interest-in/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Western man, Jung saw, always wants to do something, to “get somewhere”; this kind of restlessness is characteristic of us all. A few years…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/western-man-jung-saw-always-wants-to-do-something-to-get-somewhere/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Jung’s remarks about how in North Africa he “felt cast back many centuries to an infinitely more naïve world of adolescents who were preparing,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-s-remarks-about-how-in-north-africa-he-felt-cast-back-many/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Anyone who does creative work is familiar with this problem, and in many ways active imagination is similar to writing, painting, and so on;…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/anyone-who-does-creative-work-is-familiar-with-this-problem-and-in/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Jung came to understand that in this regard, we are all fragmented, and that the work of individuation is to fuse our disparate parts…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-came-to-understand-that-in-this-regard-we-are-all-fragmented-and/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“As he argued in The Undiscovered Self, Jung told the “average” reader that any possibility of avoiding disaster “must begin with an individual.” “It…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/as-he-argued-in-the-undiscovered-self-jung-told-the-average-reader/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Jung had had enough, and in his reply he made clear his disgust with Freud’s infuriating practice of treating criticism of his ideas as…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-had-had-enough-and-in-his-reply-he-made-clear-his-disgust-with/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Gross was a habitué of the decadent bohemian café society of Munich’s Schwabing district—a kind of early-twentieth-century Haight-Ashbury—and embraced the radical social ideas prevalent…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/gross-was-a-habitu-of-the-decadent-bohemian-caf-society-of-munich-s/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“With practice one can follow the material as it develops and can actually speak with it, as Jung did, which means, of course, that…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/with-practice-one-can-follow-the-material-as-it-develops-and-can/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“That life could be ugly wasn’t news, and Jung found that the neurotics who were supposed to be cured by making their neurosis clear…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/that-life-could-be-ugly-wasn-t-news-and-jung-found-that-the-neurotics/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

> [“Jung told the Society that apparitions (ghosts) and materializations were “unconscious projections” or, as he spoke of them to Freud, “exteriorisations.” “I have repeatedly…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-told-the-society-that-apparitions-ghosts-and-materializations/)

[Gary Valentine Lachman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

[Explore all 46 Gary Valentine Lachman quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/)

## More Cold war quotes

> [“A clear look back on the Cold War's battlegrounds, along with a sense of relief that the world survived forty-five years of confrontation, evokes…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/anonymous/a-clear-look-back-on-the-cold-war-s-battlegrounds-along-with-a-sense/)

[Anonymous](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/anonymous/)

> [We have Internet now and people are not stupid. But it seems that some people are trying to push the same agenda of the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bassem-youssef/we-have-internet-now-and-people-are-not-stupid-but-it-seems-that-some/)

[Bassem Youssef](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bassem-youssef/)

> [“The low point occurred in July, during Romney’s junior week abroad, in which the press became increasingly frustrated over Romney’s refusal to talk to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/mark-leibovich/the-low-point-occurred-in-july-during-romney-s-junior-week-abroad-in/)

[Mark Leibovich](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/mark-leibovich/)

> [We have won an armistice on a single battlefield, not peace in our world. We may not now relax our guard nor cease our…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/dwight-d-eisenhower/we-have-won-an-armistice-on-a-single-battlefield-not-peace-in-our/)

[Dwight D. Eisenhower](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/dwight-d-eisenhower/)

> [We do not have the right to forget that reactionary imperialism exists and its forces actively operate in the world, that they encourage the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/andrei-grechko/we-do-not-have-the-right-to-forget-that-reactionary-imperialism/)

[Andrei Grechko](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/andrei-grechko/)

> [If you don't like us, don't accept our invitations and don't invite us to come to see you. Whether you like it or not,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/nikita-khrushchev/if-you-don-t-like-us-don-t-accept-our-invitations-and-don-t-invite-us/)

[Nikita Khrushchev](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/nikita-khrushchev/)

> [Ever since the end of the Cold War, it has been our paramount interest in Europe to strengthen NATO and to extend it -…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/tom-malinowski/ever-since-the-end-of-the-cold-war-it-has-been-our-paramount-interest/)

[Tom Malinowski](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/tom-malinowski/)

> [“And so this is where the post Cold War has brought us: to the recognition that the very totalitarism that we fought against in…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/robert-d-kaplan/and-so-this-is-where-the-post-cold-war-has-brought-us-to-the/)

[Robert D. Kaplan](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/robert-d-kaplan/)

> [And so the greatest of American triumphs... became a peculiarly joyless victory. We had won the Cold War, but there would be no parades.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/robert-m-gates/and-so-the-greatest-of-american-triumphs-became-a-peculiarly-joyless/)

[Robert M. Gates](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/robert-m-gates/)

> [Socialism would gather all power to the supreme party and party leaders, rising like stately pinnacles above their vast bureaucracies of civil servants no…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/winston-churchill/socialism-would-gather-all-power-to-the-supreme-party-and-party/)

[Winston Churchill](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/winston-churchill/)

> [During the Cold War, we lived in coded times when it wasn't easy and there were shades of grey and ambiguity.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/john-le-carre/during-the-cold-war-we-lived-in-coded-times-when-it-wasn-t-easy-and/)

[John le Carre](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/john-le-carre/)

> [“Stellar Wind resurrected Cold War tactics with twenty-first-century technology. It let the FBI work with the NSA outside of the limits of the law.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/tim-weiner/stellar-wind-resurrected-cold-war-tactics-with-twenty-first-century/)

[Tim Weiner](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/tim-weiner/)

> [TICAD is a conference Japan launched in 1993 to assist self-supporting development in Africa against the backdrop of the declining international interest in the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/fumio-kishida/ticad-is-a-conference-japan-launched-in-1993-to-assist-self/)

[Fumio Kishida](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/fumio-kishida/)

> [I have seen the rise and fall of Nazi tyranny, the subsequent cold war and the nuclear nightmare that for fifty years haunted the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/ronald-reagan/i-have-seen-the-rise-and-fall-of-nazi-tyranny-the-subsequent-cold-war/)

[Ronald Reagan](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/ronald-reagan/)

> [The Cold War philosophy of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD), which prevented the former Soviet Union and the United States from using the nuclear weapons…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bernard-lewis/the-cold-war-philosophy-of-mutual-assured-destruction-mad-which/)

[Bernard Lewis](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bernard-lewis/)

[Browse all 906 Cold war quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/cold-war/)

```json
{
    "@context": "https://schema.org",
    "@graph": [
        {
            "@type": "Quotation",
            "text": "“Jung recognized that society advances only slowly, through the gradual integration of new insights gleaned through the often unrecorded work of individuals, whose attempts at self-transformation add incrementally to society’s own growth. This is a theme he returned to in his late work The Undiscovered Self, written in 1957, which applies the insights of analytical psychology to the H-bomb threatened world of the Cold War years.”",
            "creator": {
                "@type": "Person",
                "name": "Gary Valentine Lachman"
            },
            "isPartOf": {
                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website"
            },
            "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-recognized-that-society-advances-only-slowly-through-the-gradual/",
            "about": {
                "@type": "Thing",
                "name": "Cold war"
            },
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-recognized-that-society-advances-only-slowly-through-the-gradual/#quotation",
            "image": {
                "@type": "ImageObject",
                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/adb/gary-valentine-lachman-14492_cold-war_jung-recognized-that-society-advances-on_174616.jpg",
                "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/adb/gary-valentine-lachman-14492_cold-war_jung-recognized-that-society-advances-on_174616.jpg",
                "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/adb/gary-valentine-lachman-14492_cold-war_jung-recognized-that-society-advances-on_174616.jpg",
                "width": 1080,
                "height": 1080,
                "caption": "“Jung recognized that society advances only slowly, through the gradual integration of new insights gleaned…” — Gary Valentine Lachman",
                "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes",
                "creator": {
                    "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization"
                }
            }
        },
        {
            "@type": "BreadcrumbList",
            "itemListElement": [
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 1,
                    "name": "Home",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/"
                },
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 2,
                    "name": "Quotes",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/"
                },
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 3,
                    "name": "Gary Valentine Lachman",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gary-valentine-lachman/"
                },
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 4,
                    "name": "“Jung recognized that society advances only...",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-recognized-that-society-advances-only-slowly-through-the-gradual/"
                }
            ],
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gary-valentine-lachman/jung-recognized-that-society-advances-only-slowly-through-the-gradual/#breadcrumb"
        },
        {
            "@type": "WebSite",
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website",
            "name": "SMS4Smile Quotes",
            "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/",
            "publisher": {
                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization"
            }
        },
        {
            "@type": "Organization",
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization",
            "name": "SMS4Smile Quotes",
            "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/",
            "logo": {
                "@type": "ImageObject",
                "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/themes/sq/assets/icons/icon-512.png",
                "width": 512,
                "height": 512
            }
        }
    ]
}
```