The Water of Life: Cultivating Our Connection with the Eternal

The person “who lives only in the outer world. . . has no other ground under his feet except the pavement,” wrote Jung. Throughout history, religions and wisdom traditions have encouraged us to cultivate a relationship with the transcendent realm, but in these modern times, most of us spend our lives focused outward and become cut off from inner, eternal reality. The Grimm’s fairy tale “The Water of Life” provides a map we can use to explore the suffering we experience when we become alienated from the inner world–and to restore our connection with source. In it, three sons go off in search of the elixir that will heal their father’s illness. The water of life is a timeless symbol for a relationship with what Jung called the Self–the transpersonal center of the psyche. While we spend most of our waking time concerned with the external material world of our senses, what undergirds our ground of being is a deeper reality that is the realm of the Self.

In The Red Book, Jung wrote about the spirit of the times and contrasted it with the spirit of the depths. The theme of two aspects of reality has appeared repeatedly in myths and religions from around the world, underscoring the universal quality of our dual nature. The goal of psychological development is to have access to both orders of existence and to be able to move freely between them.

Jung’s intuitions are being back up by the findings of modern neuroscience, which suggests that the more recently evolved self-reflective ego consciousness can become dissociated from the ancient brain which gives rise to core emotions. This split can result in symptoms of mental distress, which can be healed by techniques which offer the opportunity for reconnection. The restorative water of life in the fairy tale is a powerful metaphor for this experience of integration.