Mandalas : A Symbol of the Self

A mandala is a 'geometric configuration of symbols' usually involving circular motifs often within a fourfold pattern. A mandala generally represents a 'spiritual journey' starting from the outside to the 'inner' core'

Mandalas are used as a spiritual 'tool' in eastern religions of Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Shinto. They are also found in the Americas where the Aztecs used them in their calendar designs. Christianity also employs Mandala designs in the huge stained glass windows we can see in Cathedrals like Notre Dame. It seems that Mandalas are used worldwide to interpret and meditate on a universal process of transformation and individuation.

Buddhist Mandala

Notre Dame

Carl Jung the famous Swiss psychiatrist who founded analytical psychology has been a massive influence on my life. His journeys into the depths of consciousness produced concepts such as the Archetypes (universal symbols and themes) the Collective Unconscious (Universal Mind),  Synchronicity (meaning from seemingly random events) and perhaps most profoundly the Self, the overarching concept governing the individuation process, as symbolised by the union of male and female principles and figuratively by the 'Mandala'

"In the course of my investigations of the collective unconscious, I discovered the presence of an apparently universal symbol of a similar type—the mandala symbol. The mandala is an archetypal image whose occurrence is attested throughout the ages. It signifies the wholeness of the self. This circular image represents the wholeness of the psychic ground or, to put it in mythic terms, the divinity incarnate in man"

Carl Jung

Jung believed that creating mandalas offered a “safe refuge of inner reconciliation and wholeness”, providing a sacred space into which we can invite the Self. 

"Most mandalas have an intuitive, irrational character and, through their symbolical content, exert a retroactive influence on the unconscious. They therefore possess a “magical” significance..."

Jung encouraged everyone who was seeking transformation to spontaneously draw mandalas. He believed that the construction of a central point to which everything is related invites conflicting parts of our nature to appear and allows for the unification of opposites to represent the sum of who we are.

We always carry a large range of mandala earrings and jewellery. Metamorphosis and transformation are the most profound of all the acts.