Learning about the Jungian concept of psychological projection has helped me in my interactions with others and has also helped me to better understand myself. Projection can be defined as a process where the contents of a person’s unconscious are perceived to be in others. Because projection happens at an unconscious level, we don’t cause it to happen or control it. We can, however, try to notice when it occurs and learn from it.
Here’s an example from my life. When I was in my 20s, I worked as a secretary in a law firm. One of the lawyers, who was about 20 years older than I, was well known for his success in the field of law. He was an intelligent, personable man, and he would greet the other staff and me when he arrived each day. His intelligence and pleasant manner were evident from his conversation and behavior. However, I found myself attributing additional positive qualities to him even though I didn’t know him well enough to ascertain if those qualities were part of his personality. In a way, he became in my mind the model of an “ideal man.”
When I think back, I realize I was projecting positive aspects of myself onto the lawyer, aspects of myself of which I wasn’t consciously aware. At the time I did not know about the concept of projection and therefore had no idea this was happening. I just saw a man who I thought had so much going for him, and I also saw myself as having some positive qualities but not nearly as many as he had.
Projection works the other way also. Too often people see only negative in individuals who they don’t know, not aware that they are projecting negative aspects of themselves onto others. Carl Jung and many other writers attribute racial prejudice and injustice to negative projection, where some people fear or even hate people because of the color of their skin, their accent, clothing they wear that is different from that worn by the dominant culture, and so on.
One way we can discern whether projection might be occurring is to observe how strong our feelings are about another person or group of people. If we notice we’ve taken an immediate dislike to someone, it would be good to ask ourselves why that might be. Has that person said or done something that could be the basis for our feelings? Similarly, if we find ourselves intrigued by someone, it would be useful to ask ourselves what lies behind the attraction. In this way, we may discover aspects of ourselves that had previously been hidden from our consciousness and thereby become more integrated persons.