Across the depth-psychology corpus, ‘instinctive nature’ names the stratum of psychic and somatic life that precedes and exceeds conscious volition — the biological substrate from which symbolic, emotional, and spiritual expression emerge. Jung establishes the foundational tension: instinct both underlies rational behaviour and continually subverts it, producing the ‘all-or-none’ exaggerations that betray unconscious process. He insists that human behaviour is influenced by instinct ‘to a far higher degree than is generally supposed,’ and he grounds this claim in the archetype’s role as instinct’s own self-perception. Neumann carries this further, arguing that in primordial consciousness ‘perception and instinctive reaction were one,’ a fusion only dissolved by the progressive differentiation of ego. Hillman, writing from the archetypal perspective, frames the suppression of instinctive nature as a civilisational pathology: when Pan is dead, the connection between personified nature and personified instinct is severed, and the image of the devil fills the vacancy. Levine and Ogden, working from somatic and trauma-oriented positions, restore the body as the primary locus of instinctive life, insisting that the denial of animal nature produces dissociation and impedes healing. Panksepp and McGilchrist bring neuroscientific warrant to these claims, describing instincts as ‘deeply embedded drives’ that organise the dance of life across species. The shared concern is the fate of instinctive nature under the pressure of rationalisation, socialisation, and spiritual inflation.
no one in this situation likes to admit the instinctive nature of his behaviour. I am therefore inclined to believe that human behaviour is influenced by instinct to a far higher degree than is generally supposed
Jung argues that the systematic denial of instinctive motivation is itself an instinctively driven falsification of judgment, establishing the foundational paradox of the concept.
, The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche, 1960thesis
As the human loses personal connection with personified nature and personified instinct, the image of Pan and the image of the Devil merge
Hillman diagnoses the cultural suppression of instinctive nature — personified by Pan — as the source of the demonisation of the body and of nature itself.
, Pan and the Nightmare, 1972thesis
perception and instinctive reaction were one. The emergence of an image — the material component — and the instinctive reaction which affected the whole psychophysical organism — the emotional-dynamic component — were coupled in the manner of a reflex arc.
Neumann locates the primordial unity of instinctive nature in the undifferentiated psychophysical state of early consciousness, where image and instinctive response are inseparable.
, The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton, 2019thesis
Trap #4: Injury to Basic Instinct, the Consequence of Capture. Instinct is a difficult thing to define, for its configurations are invisible, and though we sense they have been part of human nature since the beginning of time, no one know
Estés identifies ‘injury to basic instinct’ as a central wound inflicted by captivity and famine, framing the rehabilitation of instinctive nature as essential to feminine psychological wholeness.
, Women Who Run With the Wolves Myths and Stories of the Wild, 2017thesis
This denial of the instinctual life is also shared by strange bedfellows, many modern behavioral scientists. The rejection of our animal nature is understandable as we have become (overly) socialized.
Levine diagnoses the civilisational rejection of instinctive animal nature as a shared pathology of both religious moralism and reductive behaviourism, with dehumanising consequences.
, In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness, 2010thesis
Instincts are usually taken to mean deeply embedded drives that do not have to be learnt, are not pursued as conscious aims, and find their fulfilment directly in their expression.
McGilchrist offers a rigorous phenomenological baseline definition of instinctive nature as pre-conscious, species-wide organisational patterning that underlies and exceeds learned behaviour.
, The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World, 2021thesis
Many of the patterns that organise and make sense of the dance of life in animals — and importantly in humans — come from somewhere, we have little or no idea where or how: instincts.
This parallel passage reinforces the ontological mystery at the heart of instinctive nature: its organisational power is empirically undeniable yet its origin remains philosophically opaque.
, The Matter With Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions and the Unmaking of the World, 2021supporting
In the unconscious, spirit and instinct are not opposites. On the contrary, new spiritual germs often manifest themselves first in an uprush of sexual libido or instinctive impulses and only later develop their other aspect.
Von Franz dissolves the conventional spirit/instinct dualism, arguing that instinctive nature is the very vehicle through which new spiritual potential first announces itself in the psyche.
, The Interpretation of Fairy Tales, 1970supporting
the yucca moth must carry within it an image, as it were, of the situation that ‘triggers off’ its instinct. This image enables it to ‘recognise’ the yucca flower and its structure.
Samuels, citing Jung, establishes the archetype-instinct nexus: instinctive nature is not blind mechanism but image-guided apprehension, linking biology to the theory of the collective unconscious.
, Jung and the Post-Jungians, 1985supporting
‘the primordial image might suitably be described as the instinct’s perception of itself’
Hogenson foregrounds Jung’s most condensed formulation: instinctive nature achieves psychological representation through the primordial image, bridging somatic drive and symbolic cognition.
, The Baldwin Effect: A Neglected Influence on C. G. Jungs Evolutionary Thinking, 2001supporting
the religious impulse rests on an instinctive basis and is therefore a specifically human function. You can take away a man’s gods, but only to give him others in return.
Jung grounds the religious impulse in instinctive nature, arguing that its suppression by rationalist ideology does not eliminate it but merely displaces it into compulsive pseudo-religious formations.
, Civilization in Transition, 1964supporting
help them to better understand their dysregulated animal defense as instinctive protective actions that have become altered in ways that are not integrated or adaptive to current situations
Ogden reframes pathological trauma responses as distortions of instinctive nature rather than defects, positioning somatic reintegration as the therapeutic restoration of adaptive instinctive function.
, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Interventions for Trauma and, 2015supporting
anyone who has seen a well-executed rendering of a dance such as the tango or samba has witnessed an exquisitely instinct-rooted mating ritual. Seen simply as formalized movements, devoid of their primal sexual rooting, the steps lose their vitality and credibility.
Levine illustrates the generative tension between instinctive nature and cultural form, arguing that artistic vitality depends upon remaining rooted in instinctive substrate rather than abstracting away from it.
, In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness, 2010supporting
authority emanates from his horned head and fiery glance that knows nature from within the fire of his own nature. This Moses is impassioned by nature, is part of its instinctive unruly force
Hillman reads Michelangelo’s Moses as an emblem of authentic authority derived from embodied participation in instinctive nature rather than from its sublimation into law alone.
, Mythic Figures, 2007supporting
it is the uniformity of the phenomenon and the regularity of its recurrence which are the most characteristic qualities of instinctive action.
Jung distinguishes genuine instinctive action from neurotic compulsion by the criterion of universal recurrence, providing a structural definition that separates instinctive nature from mere unconscious reaction.
, The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche, 1960supporting
all that can be ascertained with any certainty is that the instincts have a physiological and a psychological aspect.
Jung and Pauli affirm the dual-aspect character of instinctive nature, resisting reductive physiologism while acknowledging that instinct bridges body and psyche in a manner not fully theorised.
, The Interpretation of Nature and the Psyche, 1955supporting
to play the anima role means to act, think and feel only as feminine being. It is a role which is entirely collective, representing a biological and instinctive reaction to the male.
Harding distinguishes the anima role — which reduces woman to collective instinctive reaction — from individuated feminine personality, positioning conscious development as the transcendence of purely instinctive determination.
, the way of all women, 1970supporting
the emotional systems of the brain create mixtures of innate and learned action tendencies in humans, as well as in the other creatures we must study in order to fully understand the neural substrates of affective processes.
Panksepp argues from affective neuroscience that instinctive nature is not a discrete layer but a dynamic mixture of innate and acquired tendencies, complicating strict nature/nurture accounts.
, Affective Neuroscience The Foundations of Human and Animal, 1998supporting
animals would often tend to revert to their instinctual behavioral tendencies. Likewise, it was gradually recognized that animals are ‘prepared’ to learn certain things more easily than others.
Panksepp’s account of prepared learning and instinctual reversion under stress provides a neuroscientific parallel to the Jungian claim that instinctive nature reasserts itself when higher functions are overwhelmed.
, Affective Neuroscience The Foundations of Human and Animal, 1998supporting
the lower reaches of the psyche begin where the function emancipates itself from the compulsive force of instinct and becomes amenable to the will
Jung maps instinctive nature as the lower boundary of the psyche, defined precisely by its resistance to voluntary control, against which the will and consciousness are differentiated.
, The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche, 1960aside
anxiety — fear itself — is a universal, instinctive response to a threat to one’s body or social status and is therefore critical for survival.
Kandel’s neuroscientific framing of fear as a universal instinctive response provides empirical grounding for the depth-psychological insistence on the species-wide character of instinctive nature.
, In search of memory the emergence of a new science of mind, 2006aside
In infrarational life harmony is secured by an instinctive oneness of nature and oneness of the action of the nature, an instinctive communication, an instinctive or direct vital-intuitional sense-unde
Aurobindo situates instinctive nature as the pre-rational substrate of collective harmony, which must be transcended but not abolished in the movement toward gnostic consciousness.
, The Life Divine, 1939aside