Abstract
The paper discusses the centrality of experience to the creation of meaning and the implications of this for analytic therapies, especially Jungian psychotherapy. Analytical Psychology includes a significant focus on the influence of image—through dreams, symbols and archetypal material such as myth, fairytales, religions and alchemy. In this paper, I focus on the areas of somatic experience, primary affects and metaphor as the underlying foundational contributors to experience. Supported by phenomenology, neuro-affective research and clinical vignettes, my primary proposal is that meaning emerges from experience. Contemporary critiques of archetypal theory are briefly reviewed which call into question a priori elements of experience embedded in archetypal patterns and images. The paper proposes modifications of analytic training suggested by an emphasis on the creation of meaning as emerging from experience.