Puella represents the young feminine on the brink of becoming and at a crossroads. She is described through archetypal images, the etymology of this word itself, and as aligned with the maiden of mythology. She is a figure in the life cycle.

Jungian analyst Susan Schwartz posits that we learn about ourselves by examining the puella’s roles and enactments, unconscious assumptions, and perceptions, acquired consciously and unconsciously.

Artwork by Barbara Aliza.

This article serves as a teaser for Susan Schwartz’s book A Jungian Exploration of the Puella Archetype; Girl Unfolding.

Archetypal girl/woman

What does the puella part of the personality and femininity look like? What happens when we decouple femininity from female bodies? We are led to puella with imagination and hope, enchanted and curious about her elusive elements. As Jungian analyst Toni Wolff said years ago:

« What is of practical importance is the awareness of the existence of the problem, and the attempt to resolve the state of inner confusion by attaining greater consciousness. » (Wolff 1956, p 2)

Although the puella character can form within the psyche in various ways, this perspective focuses on the prominent effect of the absent father and the absorption in the mother who is emotionally missing without sufficient connection to her being.

Puella is noticeable with a certain style, a freshness and interest. She can be of any age, energetic with ideas and hope. However, she can also be bogged down with a secret numbness, like carrying a dead weight. The zest is compromised; the strength is as well.

She is smart, quick, and the development of personality has yet to unfold. She needs time as something became stunted. It can come from parental lack, neglectful family systems and structures and culturally limiting and prescribed aspects. She is withheld, living behind a wall, taken with destructive complexes and unable to access a more complete self.

This exploration is to free her from the shackles and projections into her more natural movement. She is the girl becoming and emerging from what has been into what she can be.

Puella is described through archetypal images and the etymology of the word itself. She is aligned with the maiden of mythology. She is a figure in the life cycle, as Jungian analyst Murray Stein noted:

« The imagos people realize in their individual development are based on archetypal forms which are relatively timeless and unchanging, are shaped by history and culture. » (Stein 1998, p 120)

We learn about ourselves by examining the puella’s roles and enactments, unconscious assumptions and perceptions, acquired consciously and unconsciously. Puella represents the young feminine on the brink of becoming and at a crossroads. She exists between her individual nature, energy, youth and the innovative, yet can be drawn back to traditional ways.

Puella is the creative, unusual, desirous, and different. Even so, often infirm in her position, she can become waylaid.

Whether we are women or men, heterosexual, lesbian, gay or nonbinary, puella remains a concept and personality aspect to be understood and made conscious in all people.

Puella stands on a historical, mythological, cultural, and personal continuum, symbolizing one form of the category called feminine. She works the female voice out of its conformity and repression into creative spaces with her rebellious nature. Her challenging of traditional patterns takes courage, dedication, and devotion. This emerges through the process of individuation and by exploring the many facets of the psyche to find what it means to be true to herself.

For example, at the core of Jungian psychology is an understanding that we are a mixture of male and female, masculine and feminine. Notions of woman, man, and the feminine are altering dramatically and more shifts are on the horizon. This presents challenges, not for pathologizing but for psyche transforming. The Jungian perspective presents ways of understanding what this means in our current era. Thinking about the feminine has changed with cultural attitudes and awareness of the varieties of conscious and unconscious identifications.

These variations enlarge our understanding while also creating misperceptions. Gender stereotypes indicate the need to rethink gender assumptions influenced by traditional hegemonic codes shaping many of the current adaptations. The fundamental tensions for navigating gender represent radical and widespread changes in the sociocultural environment. As Jung commented:

« It has always seemed to me that I had to answer questions which fate had posed to my forefathers, and which had not yet been answered . . . things which previous ages had left unfinished. » (Jung, MDR, p 233)

The portrayal here is the unfolding of puella through addressing some of these questions, difficulties, challenges, and promises.

Puella is fluid; she is the feminine emerging in ways different from previous generations when denied and repressed.

This puella exploration marks an era of gender fluidity with open-ended descriptions of feminine aspects. It puts us in an unprecedented land, with self-definitions changing, a moving kaleidoscope of the imaginal, the unknown.

Yet, this is not a list of traits and clear markings. We are not one way or another; we are a spectrum, a changing combination, a synthesis creating new forms, the self made of disparate parts based on unconscious energies and forms (Stein 2022, p 33). This self is a plurality of new forms, contradictions, and challenges without cookie-cutter application.

Puella grapples with various limitations as this aspect also represents the scared and confused, seeking to erase an internal misery.

In the series of personal composite vignettes an intriguing and poignant portrait emerges. New attitudes usher in new times, revealing the truths and struggles about what it means to be human. Puella is tender, perceptive and intelligent, yet can resist embracing the shadow with its unknown qualities and the possibility of seeing herself in a new expanded light. As Jung said:

« The shadow is a tight passage, a narrow door, whose painful constriction no one is spared who goes down to the deep well. But one must learn to know oneself to know who one is. For what comes after the door is, surprisingly enough, a boundless expanse of unprecedented uncertainty. » (Jung, CW9i, para 45)

The archetypal defined

The archetype’s relevance alters with the times and ideology. There is currently debate and many disputations about what the Jungian concept of the archetype means. I reference Jung’s description of the archetypes as general pathways to be filled differently by each of us:

« representations that vary a great deal without losing their basic pattern » (Jung, CW18, para 523)

This is a term generally used to denote something well known and recognized, and it is even part of the general vernacular.

The archetype unfolds in its metaphorical nature. Ambivalence and ambiguity lay within the notion of the archetype with its differentiation and complexity oscillating in a dynamic continuum. The archetype and its psychological implications along with the writings of Jung and other Jungian analysts support this viewpoint.

About this controversial subject Jung himself noted in General Aspects of Dream Psychology:

« Archetypes, so far as we can observe and explain them at all, manifest themselves only through their ability to organize images and ideas, and this is always an unconscious process which cannot be detected until afterwards. By assimilating material whose provenance in the phenomenal world is not to be contested they become visible and psychic. » (Jung, CW8, para 440)

I use the archetype:

« not as reified but what it means to be human and what the psyche needs for healing and wholeness . . . with a collectively shared sphere which is unconscious and can impact groups and processes » (Roesler 2024, p 245)

The archetype appears through symbols, motifs, and themes portraying universal human experiences, punctuated with an emotional range from ecstasy to melancholy.

« We could characterize analytical psychology as a poetic science—concerned with finding, and even creating, meaning. » (Roesler 2024, p 244)

Contained within the archetype are the paradoxes of opposites, a spectrum of possibilities connected through feelings, thoughts, emotions, ideas. In Psychology of the Child Archetype Jung said in one of his numerous descriptions of the archetype:

« Not for a moment dare we succumb to the illusion that an archetype can be finally explained and disposed of . . . The most we can do is to dream the myth onwards and give it a modern dress. » (Jung, CW9i, para 271)

To add to the classical approach of the archetype, its definition and controversy, Jung called the anima an archetype. Therefore, in classical Jungian thought, puella is a form of the anima archetype, or the feminine within us all.

Moreover, Jung called the anima soul. He commented:

« In a man the soul, i.e. anima, or inner attitude, is represented in the unconscious by definite persons with the corresponding qualities. Such an image is called a soul image. Sometimes these images are of quite unknown or mythological figures. » (Jung, CW6, para 808)

Here the anima is attributed to the male psyche, but updating this concept leads to a fuller definition. As Jung said in a letter dated 8 June 1959:

« The androgyny of the anima may appear in the anima herself. » (Jung 1976; Hillman 1985, p 65)

The anima has also been described as:

« inward . . . virginal, closed, generative yet reserved . . . an interiority of movement deepening downward . . . She is also a reflective factor with soul-stirring emotions. » (Hillman 1985, p 23).

The anima is described as providing a sense of being, and when absent and inaccessible, a person feels the void and emptiness, as the relationship to an essential part of themself is unavailable. Without relationship to the anima they feel depersonalized, as Hillman noted (1985, p 105), due to the loss of personal involvement, a certain interior reflection and introspection, not caring and not believing in their value or purpose. Meaning has disappeared.

Jung suggested meaning can be restored by accessing the image and imagination (Jung, CW13, para 75). Reviving the images leads to accessing a form of self-definition and aliveness. Hillman reminds us of Jung’s dream of the girl and the dove, and in this, how Jung became himself through imagination (1985, p 113).

This girl might be representative of puella; as such, by following the image, we find her associated with the spirit in the form of the dove. She seems a significant figure leading we do not know where, but embodying mystery, hope and possibility.

Both Jung and Hillman recognized the value of all forms of the feminine as not only residing in women and men but also in the psyche where she exists in myriad aspects expressed through each person’s individual path.

As puella comes alive within, the images she inhabits become more creative and fuller with meaning. Puella becomes a valuable part of what enlivens us, restores life balance, and supplies energy.

Puella, as an archetype humanly lived in each of us, represents movement in time, revealing patterns and tendencies of psychological development. Jung suggested this archetypal predisposition, this orientating structure, is filled out and given content by the external world. It is experienced and taken in, linked with the archetypal predispositions and rendered meaningful by them.

Jung also said:

« It [the archetype] persists throughout the ages and requires interpreting anew. The archetypes are imperishable elements of the unconscious, but they change their shape continually. » (Jung, CW9i, para 301)

The process of interpreting anew is what this expose aims to do. This includes the large and small incremental processes of rebirth, transformation, and renewal occurring through the developmental stages involving separation, differentiation, dismemberment, and unification.

The universe of the archetypes and their symbolic representations appear in world mythologies. They enact a continuum through history in a psychological and cultural way, widening our personal psyche and connecting us to others.

Jung said to Freud in a letter dated 1909:

« We shall not solve the ultimate secrets of neurosis and psychosis without mythology and the history of civilization. » (McGuire 1974, p 279)

We need myth in our lives to gain meaning because we easily think in story form. Stories are how we best remember the important events in our own lives and the lives of those around us, including world events. Myth outlines the natural and often challenging cycles depicting life’s rites of passage.

The mythology of puella

Myths in other cultures emphasize similar and different personality traits. Exploring the tradition of the Greek myths whose symbols and characters have influenced Western culture illustrates psychological and physical dynamics passed down through the ages concerning the feminine. Examining them helps us understand their influence as we evaluate whether they fit or not. This look back is part of comprehending the present while unfolding into the future.

The goddesses Artemis and Persephone (Kore) link to each other and are the maiden part of the triple goddess cycle. They are associated with the maiden, the girl energy; they represent freedom and learning within the stage prior to adulthood and are foundational to development throughout life.

By exploring these archetypal figures, we can understand in a broader way the joyful and the difficult aspects of puella.

Knowing these traits helps us better understand relationship patterns, strengthens our choices and decisions in life and aligns us with our essence. For example, the fluctuations of symbiosis and separation in the myth of Demeter and Persephone reflect the ever-changing relationship between mothers and daughters as a part of the movement toward maturation.

This myth also repeats historically intrusive actions by the male. These represent rough personal and societal treatment that aims to subdue the feminine, the young girl. Persephone is raped by Hades, forced without recourse until she decides to eat one pomegranate seed that he gives her. In this small but significant act, she establishes independence and choice and the return to earth and mother, separate from her life in the underworld and Hades.

Artemis

The mythology of all cultures is replete with jockeying for power relations and gender stereotypes. Too often women have been rendered passive and subservient, relegated to supporting the male protagonist. This leads us to the figure of Artemis who is aligned with puella as she is the guardian of young girls’ development.

Artemis resists patriarchal control, manipulation, and the oppression of women, firmly opposing male authority. She illustrates the emancipatory potential of female resilience, wisdom, and agency. She teaches feminine power, respect, and equality, authenticating, restoring, and empowering the physical strength and fortitude of girls.

Artemis protects and teaches as the goddess of the virginal psyche, the incubating, fresh, interior, and imaginal containment of energy (Hillman 1989, p 190). The virginal reference denotes the singular, wrapped within itself, gestating and not yet ready to open. As virgin she is self-directed, autonomous, enclosed with her attention focused inward. Virginity means obedience to what she was created to be and what will be awakened and revealed (Shorter 1987, p 128).

She is athletic, with a spirit of adventure and swiftness along with restlessness. She has the passion and persistence to go the distance and succeed.

The personification of Artemis represents an independent spirit—indomitable, untamed, unsubdued, an activist for new feminine growth in the personality.

Artemis is one of the androgynous goddesses endowed with a seamless integration of masculine energy, and she does not need or want the male. Her self-sufficiency prefers solitude and avoids vulnerability by not expressing emotional needs to others. Artemis tends towards emotional distancing and does not trust or engage in intimate relationships. She rejects culturally prescribed behaviors and traditional portrayals of girls as helpless, charming and compliant pleasers.

She is the patroness of the youthful spirit, protects women in childbirth and mothering and the young. Artemis is not a mother but displays other means for nurturance as a goddess of nature, concerned with the outdoors, animals, environmental protection and women’s communities. She symbolizes the regenerative earth power. She promotes coming to be, representing the defenceless not as victims but in recognition of the tenderness and vulnerability of new developments needing careful attention, protection and guidance to grow.

Persephone the maiden

Puella exists as the maiden within the female triad of maiden-mother-crone aspects through the arc of life. Western cultural heritage aligns her with the Greek goddesses Artemis and Persephone (Kore).

Persephone and Artemis both represent the virginal, unwed, and are close to nature. However, in the myth Persephone is violently wrenched from childhood, raped, and radically changed. This act of violence by her father Zeus’s brother, Hades, brutally separates Persephone from the past life with her mother.

This harsh act represents the overpowering by the male dominant patriarchy. It can be likened to the susceptibility of puella to similar influences.

Persephone marries Hades and has a child from the rape. Her eating the pomegranate seed given to her by Hades allows her to return to the earth and her mother a portion of every year. Her role as queen of the lower world of the dead combines with the vegetation goddess or Kore in the actions of both shooting forth and withdrawing into the earth like the seasonal changes.

Kore represents youthful demeanor, the still standard judging of the feminine by outer beauty ideals. However, there are dangerous consequences if this is all she is. Women can learn to restrain their forwards movement by becoming an ideal object and unconsciously subject to manipulation by male or patriarchal and traditional ways of being.

Being only Kore can indicate an undeveloped part of the personality, internalizing patriarchal ideals in the absence of other modelling. It can lead to disappointments in the second half of life, such as inhibition of interior growth, an inability to continue a full life, frustration, psychological crises and loss of meaning.

In cultural traditions addressing puella and the treatment of the feminine, I discovered the following:

« The African /Xam, Swahili, Sudanese, Senegalese and Zulu folktales illustrate the emancipatory and disruptive potential of female power, resilience, wisdom and agency. These contradict, challenge, or satirize androcentric authority. Some folklore also resists or subverts patriarchal control, manipulation, exclusion, and the oppression of women. Their goal-directed events are empowering and liberating for females. » (Sheik 2018, p 47)

For example, in a story referencing education for girls in Togolo, the chief ordered girls to attend school, and thus they were forbidden from the arduous task of drawing water from far-off boreholes. The wisdom of folklore, myth, fantasy and social history instigates social change and egalitarian relations while celebrating the women of Africa as key protagonists, appearing profound in their power and their humanity (Sheik 2018, p 53).

This reinforces feminine power and respect, justice, and equality. Such narratives authenticate female agency and are restorative and empowering to the African woman’s psyche.

However, without the guidance of female models and cultural sanctions, an unstructured girlhood leaves a young woman emotionally and physically vulnerable.

Insights from a case study

Grounding the archetypal in the present-day personal is the example of Petra. She had a father who spied on her when she was younger, setting up emotional unease, lack of basic confidence, trust, or safety. No one believed how betrayed and insecure she felt. She held the disappointments and apprehensions within and eagerly responded at an early age to any overtures from males to be physically intimate.

She was seeking love but fell into the Hades energy. Petra had no model of an Artemis mother, only one who could hardly protect herself. She used Petra as a confidant, a partner but not a girl child. Petra took on a radical look, signaling she was not fitting in: an independent-appearing person but actually highly dependent and needing the foundation of safe love.

As an adult Petra was bewildered, looking to be saved and feeling small and needy. A series of partners were possessive and turned violent, raging, abusive emotionally. She left one after the other, each time feeling more defeated and depressed. Her vibrant energy diminished. She tried various medications to compensate the despair. Finally, she began searching in-depth psychologically, commenting she now realized what it was to reflect and value her thoughts and reactions.

She had repeated dreams of her childhood home, each one a bit different, but the return there brought some peace inside, and then she remembered the discomfort, mother listening to her but preoccupied and always doing something else.

Father was playful when she was small, but upon puberty, like puella, she could not trust him and kept away. Whatever was in the house was haunting her through the dreams, calling her back into the recesses she tried to forget but needed now to recall for proceeding in her life.

As we journeyed through dream after dream Petra slowly began to emerge from the years of torment and depression held within her psyche. This was externally enacted with the partners she chose who further damaged her with possessive and rough treatment. She had formerly been helpless to protect herself, but was now beginning to recognize this was detrimental to the love and security she so desired. A previously unknown strength was blooming within her.

Etymology of puella

There are many nuances to puella and a mixture of seemingly contradictory aspects evident in the etymology of this word. It is a term describing the:

« emotional associations of a diminutive applied to female children and older girls viewed as erotic objects; it is also used to denote young married women in the sense of being virgin. » (Hallett 2013, p 203)

The Roman elegiac poet Catullus was credited with the use of puella, previously a noun for the female child. The term

« designated an affectionately regarded, erotically desired female who was not the wife or paid sexual partner of the male poet/speaker, implying that the women referred to by this term engaged in sexually transgressive conduct that at times involved payment for their favors » (Hallett 2013, p 206)

Puella denoted the young, attractive, and clever woman in poetry, music, and dance who was considered charming and accomplished through these achievements.

Moreover, the phrase docta puella referred to the learned girl aligned with the poet lover, sharing values and interests in disregard of the conventional (Sharrock 2003, p 324). Puella was beloved but not married due to her irregular lifestyle. She was idealized, considered to have sophistication and an exciting nature, but she was not part of the Roman noble class where women were without education and could hold no place in literature.

Puella was outside the standards of respectable Roman matron due to her artistic and cultural training; however, she still needed the man to propagate her writing due to the way society was then structured (Hallett 2013, p 336).

Modern girl/woman

Puella aeterna is the eternal child, but one who feels a fraud, shameful, small, vulnerable and fearful, often based on not being enough.

The hallmark of the puella aeterna is one who lives provisionally, hiding in the shadows of disconnection, self-loathing and disavowal of authentic self-expression, while refusing the unconscious parts in need of integration.

Such feelings may be recognized in persecutory internal figures, harsh self-assessments and critiques, and emotionally distant partnerships. Without an accurate inner mirror, she assesses herself with inferiority. She needs to be adored but nothing is enough to compensate for the inner emptiness.

Trapped in fantasy, she lives in a bubble, abdicating to the male mirror, submissive, her individuality halted. The narcissistic wounds coincide with an underdeveloped capacity for empathy and compassion for herself as well as others. She is tough on herself and relentlessly critical. There is a destructive and envious force behind the aggression, feeding a determination to win. An inability to satisfy the internal demands leads to depression and anxiety.

This aspect of puella in the personality reflects the destructive side of Eros who was the Greek god referring to relatedness and love.

The ancient Greek language distinguished four ways of love:

érōs: to be in love with, to desire passionately or sexually,
philía: to have affection for,
agápē: to have regard for, be contented with,
storgē: used especially to refer to the love of parents and children or a ruler and his subjects.

All these definitions involve passion and emotions. But these are the areas where puella feels the inadequate self-love fighting with self-hate. The sense of ease with others is often colored by worry about acceptability. Trust is not easily won or established. The virginal nature, inner isolation, and singularity are difficult to give up as they have been her retreat and safe space.

Plurality of psyche

The lens here focuses on the modern personality dealing with conflicts and obstacles that present difficulty in finding entry gates for development, initiative, hope and promise. British Jungian analyst Andrew Samuels has written extensively on recognizing the plurality of the psyche. He said:

« Pluralism is an approach to conflict that tries to reconcile differences without imposing a false synthesis on them . . . without sight of the truth of each element. » (Samuels 2016, p xii)

Puella is an aspect highlighting the multitudinous nature and truths of the psyche.

Puella is not simple, but complex and filled with paradoxes. As we explore through personal narratives, tales, myths, dreams, and analytical treatment, we begin to strip away what distracts from her evolution and discover what can promote her value.

She represents the chance to be conscious, to resolve and ameliorate the personal pain, conflicts, and symptoms compromising her life. She heeds, repels and bargains with her discomfort with incompleteness.

Puella as active and accessible throughout life represents the desire, enthusiasm and joy needed, perhaps even more so in the elder years.

People of older ages want to understand what has shaped them, especially when the puella aspect has gone unexamined until later life. This is not uncommon, although cultural and Jungian thought on this figure and her influence on the life cycle has been scanty.

In an example, puella is an aspect motivating a woman in her seventies who is coping with the news of Parkinson’s disease. Aging becomes difficult as more courage is needed, and the threat of breaking down increases. She could fall into unfathomable despair, yet the developmental task is to accept her shock, agency and power consciously and use it creatively and openly.

Even as her hope has shaded into sadness, discouragement has also shifted into determination. She realizes the psychical and emotional demands looming ahead and faces this with resolve to amass the energy to continue and use her interests as valuable sources for sustenance.

Portrayals of puella have tended to reduce her to a cliche, noncommittal in love life as a mere waiting room.

Jung called the child image:

« a symbol which unites the opposites . . . capable of the numerous transformations . . . it can be expressed by roundness, the circle or sphere, or else by the quaternary as another form of wholeness. I have called this wholeness that transcends consciousness the self. » (Jung, CW9i, para 278)

Here, puella is a key figure in psychological development, but she often has been a mystery to herself as well as to others, elusive, desiring to be seen but shying from the intimacy of being known.

In popular usage the archetype is identified as a recognized idea, a pattern we each fill differently. The puella is a psychological descriptor unfolding and exemplifying how to develop and give birth to oneself.

French author Simone de Beauvoir quite famously said:

« One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman. » (de Beauvoir 1949, The Second Sex)

Puella becoming and expanding means recognizing the unconscious, bringing rewards, joy and hope.

« In a nutshell, the archetypal may also be seen as a gradation of affect, something in the eye and heart of the beholder, not in what he or she beholds or experiences. We can think of the quality of a perception or collection of perception, qualities of preoccupation, fascination, autonomy, awe. » (Samuels 2016, p 25)

These descriptors combine with examples from Jungian analytical treatment to integrate the puella figure as she emerges, shaped through the complex interactions between individual and culture. This writing paradoxically occurs amid fraught times of cultural and social upheaval, disasters, and experiences that daily accentuate the need for self and other awareness.

Especially during so much upheaval, we need the puella of youth, the daring unattached to tradition, the playful and the creative.

Puella is one of our many guides through life, composed of various images and symbols and creating a kaleidoscope of increasing consciousness. She represents a creative spark yet needs intent, focus, and shaping to unfold the potential contained within her.

When easily drawn to each new and innovative thing, she can represent floundering and lack as youth itself does not have enough ballast. Or she might dwell in the shadows, entrapped by complexes into narrow roles, stripping individuality and preventing self-acceptance. This part can be burdened by childhood developmental residues, psychological pitfalls, ponderous cultural dictates, and transgenerational heritage.

Puella faces challenges and psychological limitations within herself, relationally and culturally. Her attempts at consciousness can become a hall of mirrors, the frames constructed from early childhood resulting in her being painfully awake or seemingly and irrevocably dead.

On the shadow side, many puella types find themselves caught in a restrictive life, impersonating but not being real. Admittedly there is a harrowing nature to transformation as it does not come easily. It takes awareness to the ways we are programmed and collude in our diminishment.

Although the puella, or the eternal girl, has strength, savvy, pleasure and creativity, there are many traumas and emotional terrors to comprehend for psychological integration and conscious awareness of this young, pervasive and influential feminine figure.

The ignored characteristics of puella represent the disregarded and wounded feminine and highlight the cultural influences perpetuating these wounds.

Society’s patriarchal, normative standards and stereotypes have tended to entangle and derail her mind, body and soul. These structures and predominant psychological assumptions perpetuate and unconsciously govern social, professional, and interpersonal spheres.

As Toni Morrison commented:

« How can a woman be viewed and respected as a human being without becoming male-like or a male-dominated citizen? » (Morrison 2019, p 86)

My book A Jungian Exploration of the Puella Archetype; Girl Unfolding, ranging from the personal and relational to the collective in conscious and unconscious aspects, involves shifts and complexities while offering ways to disrupt the negative narratives surrounding the images and symbols of puella.

Unfortunately, puella learns early to fit into a box susceptible to parental and cultural conceptions, expectations, and limitations. Personal and cultural history, including covert and overt influences, cause many to denigrate their mind and body shape, stifle desires and make themself less than. Especially when subtle, this continues the destructive norms and warped ideals projected onto the feminine.

Although representing enchantment, glitter, wanderlust and curiosity, puella has been downplayed as inadequate and unaware.

The qualities of energy, courage and brilliance as well as development and insight are often minimized. Awareness of her as an aspect of the personality—psychologically, physically, emotionally—offers a different dimension.

It means we reconsider the circumferences unconsciously placed on the stories we continue to tell ourselves. Postmodern fluidity brings the opportunities of other realities, rethinking and reenacting how we express ourselves and live true to who we are.

Puella, representing new beginnings, also means to listen and value her way of being. The task is to transform the wounds and scars from prior experiences into personality expansion.

We reside in an era with much alienation and destruction to self and others. Within this magnitude of change, uncertainties and transitions, humanity is undergoing another particularly challenging time.

Hiding from the terror of falling into a black hole, or the void of nonexistence, exacerbates the threat to psychic survival in the air. It is also disturbingly overlaid with narcissism as a means of turning away in defense against feeling the disappointments and the immensity of the losses. Warren Colman, British Jungian analyst (2006, p 35), wrote about narcissists tending to assert their imagination of the world as the world. Reality testing then disappears.

Concluding remarks

Puella as portrayed here is confronted with what is difficult, torn, the shadows and the psyche in conflict. Puella’s tragedy takes various forms in an inability to love or feel, affecting mind, body, and soul. The ego is fragile, the persona rigid, functioning as façade, with the self abandoned and enthusiasm dulled.

Because the psyche also forms from what has been absent, development is possible.

A woman cries out that she does not have the right image due to her skin color, her eyes, her body shape and she is depressed. She is creative, talented, striking, intelligent, but struggles to manifest confidence and sustain energy.

She wonders how to cope with the noise of social media bombarding her, the pieces of herself she cannot bear and seeks to live beyond dominant cultural limitations. This puella woman has the chance to emerge from the mire into herself as she explores the meaning of her suffering in Jungian analytical treatment.

We want to know about puella. The more we recognize the ongoing issues, the more definitive she becomes with personal and collective ramifications.

Being conscious of puella, she ceases to be an object and she unfolds into being creative and potent, confident as she discovers her agency, connecting to self and others.

Jung wrote:

« It is to be hoped that experience in the years to come will sink deeper shafts into this obscure territory, on which I have been able to shed but a fleeting light. » (Jung 1926, CW4, foreword to the 2nd edition of The significance of the father in the destiny of the individual)

She then untangles from the rhetoric of stereotypes, recognizes and accesses the freedom to wander in her mind, releasing herself into the full imaginativeness of her being.

« Such a [wo]man knows that whatever is wrong in the world is in [herself]himself, and if [s]he only learns to deal with [her]his own shadow [s]he has done something real for the world. [S]he has succeeded in shouldering at least an infinitesimal part of the gigantic, unsolved social problems of our day. » (Jung, 1938, para 74)

January 2025

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Susan E. Schwartz, PhD

Susan E. Schwartz, PhD trained in Zurich, Switzerland as a Jungian analyst. She appears on many podcasts and presents at numerous Jungian analytical conferences and teaching programs in the USA and worldwide.

Susan E. Schwartz has numerous articles in journals and book chapters on Jungian analytical psychology. Her books, all published by Routledge, are:

The Absent Father Effect on Daughters: Father Desire, Father Wounds (2020), translated into several languages
Imposter Syndrome and the ‘As-If’ Personality: The Fragility of Self (2023)
A Jungian Exploration of the Puella Archetype; Girl Unfolding (2024)
An Analytical Exploration of Love and Narcissism; The Tragedy of Isolation and Intimacy (2025)

Her website is www.susanschwartzphd.com.

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Exploring the Puella archetype: Girl unfolding

Exploring the Puella archetype: Girl unfolding

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