Alchemy: Holding the dynamic tension of opposites

“In [this alchemical] text the conflicting attitudes are characterized as one sun which directs two rays towards the opposite — the dark thing — and one sun which directs one ray, and it is said that the one ray is the sun without justice. What principle of collective consciousness is without justice towards the world below while the other sun has justice? What would that mean?

[We see here] two possibilities of consciousness, namely a rigid one and one which has a paradoxical attitude and therefore does justice to the paradoxical factor of the unconscious. The latter would be what you call a consciously open system, an open Weltanschauug [aka world view] which is always ready to accept its opposite, or meet the opposite and accept its contradictions. If you have a conscious attitude which is ready to accept the opposite, to accept the conflict and the contradiction, then you can connect with the unconscious. That is what we try to achieve. We try to bring about a conscious attitude with which the person can keep the door to the unconscious open, which means we must never be too sure of oneself, never be too sure that what one says is the only possibility…”

- Marie-Louise von Franz, Alchemy