 The term projection is derived from classical psychoanalysis and is regarded as a primitive ego-defense mechanism. I'm going to use three references in discussing this issue. The first is a very good dictionary of psychoanalysis written in 1973 by Laplace and Ponterlis called the Language of Psychoanalysis. Even though this is clearly not a Jungian text, I have found it extremely useful over the years in making sense of the scope of Jung's analytical psychology, which, as many of you already know, is based on core Freudian ideas. Jung, however, transformed the classical psychoanalytic theory of Freud into a more dynamic field called analytical psychology. Remember that Jung began his psychoanalytic career as an ardent psychoanalyst and was a colleague and student of Freud until their ideological break in 1913-1914. The second source is Jung himself, and the third source is another important text that I have heartily recommended and continue to do so, being Andrew Samuels, a critical dictionary of analytical psychology. I will repeat these titles of these books at the end of the podcast. So, back to the idea of projection. Let's start with a classical definition from Laplace and Ponterlis, and they say that projection is, and I quote, an operation whereby qualities, feelings, wishes, or even objects, which the subject refuses to recognize or rejects in himself, are expelled from the self and located in another person or thing, end quote. Now, let's contrast that with Jung's definition, which reads as follows, and I quote, projection means the expulsion of a subjective content into an object. It is the opposite of interjection. It is a process of dissimilation by which a subject of content becomes alienated from the subject and is, so to speak, embodied in the object. Both definitions are structured in a similar manner. Projection is a process or an operation in which subjective content, such as qualities, feelings, wishes, or even objects, which an individual cannot recognize in him or herself, are expelled and then located in another person or thing. A key term needs to be added to our definition, and that is that whatever is expelled or projected is unconscious. We don't know we're doing this, and we seldom know what it is that is being projected. Important here to note is that projection is a very normal, very natural process in the psyche. We project all the time, especially when dealing with other people. Do you remember meeting someone for the first time, and they felt familiar, as though you had known them from before? And as your conversation went on, you started to see that they spoke or behaved just like someone you already know, say a sibling or an acquaintance. Then you began to realize that you expected them to hold certain attitudes or beliefs, or that you found yourself distancing yourself from the other person, because you already know what they held in terms of beliefs, and you don't like these beliefs. You found some of their attitudes unattractive. This was projection. Very little of the real information about this new person was actually present in the interaction, as most of it came from within you. An excellent summary of our definition is offered by Andrew Samuels in his Critical Dictionary of Analytical Psychology, and I quote, Jung's approach to projection builds upon a psychoanalytic base. Projection may be seen as normal or pathological, and as a defense against anxiety. Difficult emotions and unacceptable parts of the personality may be located in a person or object external to the subject. The problematic content is thereby controlled, and the individual feels a release and a sense of well-being. In analytical psychology, stress has also been laid on projection as the means by which the contents of the inner world are made available to ego consciousness. The assumption is that an encounter between the ego and such unconscious contents is of value. The external world of persons and things serves the internal world by providing the raw material to be activated by projection. This can be seen most clearly when what is projected is also representative of a part of the psyche. Anima and animus projections are carried by real men and women. Without the carrier they would be no meeting. Similarly, the shadow is frequently encountered in projection. By definition, the shadow is the repository of what is unacceptable to consciousness. It is therefore ripe for projection. For anything of value to be gained, though, it is necessary for some reintegration or recollection of that which is projected to take place. So we can see how Samuel's enlarges our idea of projection, but critically uses as his prime examples the archetypes of the shadow, the anima, and the animus. We can also understand that there are definite series or stages that we engage in when we project. When we become aware of the discrepancy between the real person and the projections we make onto that real person, we are starting to withdraw our projections. This means that we are seeing the person for whom he or she really is, and not using them as a movie theater screen to project our movies onto. This is a way to understand projection, that of a movie screen. It is almost as if when we meet someone and start to project we are treating them like a movie screen, a blank canvas, that we then fill with images from a movie that the unconscious generates about that person. Although none of the projections are based on hardcore facts, they are psychically real.