The term 'diagram' occupies a revealing liminal position in the depth-psychology corpus: it functions simultaneously as pedagogical instrument, symbolic object, and ritual artifact. Within Jungian typology, the diagram serves as a schematic notation of psychic structure — most explicitly in Jung's own lectures, where concentric-circle representations of the ego-complex and its functions are deployed to spatialize what is otherwise invisible. Beebe extends this tradition, using numbered diagrams of function-positions and their archetypal correlates to propose that the architecture of the psyche can be mapped as a set of hierarchically organized, archetypally governed positions. Siegel, working from neuropsychological premises, introduces the 'three-P diagram' as a probability model of consciousness, bringing a computational vocabulary to bear on domains depth psychology long treated symbolically. The ACA recovery literature mobilizes the family-of-origin diagram as a clinical-therapeutic tool for uncovering generational dysfunction — a use that is phenomenologically close to the Jungian genealogy of complexes, though procedurally distinct. Daoist sacral diagrams (talismans, cosmic maps) represented in Kohn's scholarship constitute a separate but resonant tradition: the ritual diagram is not merely illustrative but operative, a vehicle for projecting the practitioner into cosmic process. Edinger's scholarly apparatus — producing his own diagrams of the Sefirotic Tree, the tetractys, and alchemical stages — demonstrates the persistent Jungian conviction that psychic processes can and must be schematized to become communicable. Across traditions, the diagram names both a limit and an aspiration of psychological representation.
In the library
10 passages
Figure 8.1 is a diagram that shows the archetypes that preside over the expression of the first four function-attitudes, in function positions from superior to inferior.
Beebe presents the diagram as the primary vehicle for expressing his theoretical claim that each of the eight function-positions is governed by a distinct archetype, making the diagram constitutive of his model rather than merely illustrative of it.
Beebe, John, Energies and Patterns in Psychological Type: The Reservoir of Consciousness, 2017thesis
In the diagram, sensation is given as the peripheral function. By it man gets information from the world of external objects. In the second circle, thinking, he gets what his senses have told him.
Jung employs a concentric-circle diagram to spatialize the hierarchy of psychic functions, presenting the diagram as a structural map of the ecto- and endopsychic systems.
Jung, C.G., Collected Works Volume 18: The Symbolic Life, 1976thesis
We cannot overstate the need for creating an extensive family diagram, which reveals with greater clarity the effects of family dysfunction in our lives today.
The ACA workbook frames the family-of-origin diagram as an indispensable therapeutic instrument for rendering visible the generational transmission of dysfunction, positioning it as foundational to Step One recovery work.
Organization, Adult Children of Alcoholics World Service, The twelve steps of adult children steps workbook, 2007thesis
Because of these three 'p's on the figure, it is referred to as the three-P diagram, and this overall proposal can be referred to as the three-P framework.
Siegel introduces the three-P diagram as a formal probability model mapping the movement of mental states from open possibility through plateau to actualized peak, applying quantitative logic to the topology of consciousness.
Siegel, Daniel J., The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are, 2020thesis
20-1. The Sefirotic Tree as a series of ten concentric circles. Author's diagram; after a drawing in A.E. Waite, The Secret Doctrine in Israel.
Edinger's practice of producing his own diagrams of alchemical and Kabbalistic structures — the tetractys, the coniunctio stages, the four elements — demonstrates that the Jungian scholarly tradition treats diagrammatic representation as an essential means of transmitting psychological-symbolic content.
Edinger, Edward F., The Mysterium Lectures: A Journey Through C.G. Jung's Mysterium Coniunctionis, 1995supporting
The talisman ensures total protection against the demonic forces assembled in the deep wells of death, while diagrammatic map of Mount Fengdu helps to project himself into the processes of cosmic involution.
Kohn documents the operative dimension of the Daoist ritual diagram: unlike a merely descriptive schema, the diagrammatic map actively enables the priest's inner journey and cosmic participation.
Diagrams of an Inquiry into the Secret Numbers of the rying, CT 159), where the Great Ultimate is depicted as an ellipsis with ten stations on its periphery.
Kohn surveys competing diagrammatic representations of the Great Ultimate in Daoist cosmology, establishing that sacred diagrams are contested sites of cosmological interpretation rather than neutral illustrations.
The numbering of the positions is a bit of an anachronism, left over from the early days of Jungian psychology and of Isabel Briggs Myers's adaptation of that psychology to the analysis of the MBTI findings.
Beebe critically reflects on the diagrammatic numbering of function-positions as a historically contingent convention, signaling that diagrams of psychic structure carry theoretical assumptions that must be interrogated.
Beebe, John, Energies and Patterns in Psychological Type: The Reservoir of Consciousness, 2017supporting
The dreamer noted that the curious curve of the shooting star corresponded exactly to the line he drew when sketching the picture of the eightfold flower.
Jung records that the dreamer's own spontaneous schematic sketching produced a correspondence to cosmic imagery, suggesting that the impulse to diagram psychic experience is itself a symptom of individuation.
Jung, Carl Gustav, Psychology and Alchemy, 1944supporting
Many people are circulating round a large central oblong with four smaller oblongs on its sides. The circulation in the large oblong goes to the left and in the smaller oblongs to the right.
Jung's transcription of this dream presents a spontaneous diagrammatic mandala structure — oblongs, circulation directions, a central star — as unconscious self-representation requiring psychological interpretation.
Jung, Carl Gustav, Psychology and Alchemy, 1944aside