power-of-play

The Power of Play: 

A Jungian Exploration of Symbol, Imagination, and Healing

Anna Ziegler

10.06.2025

Introduction

In a world that prioritizes productivity, efficiency, and outcomes, the simple act of play can be deeply healing. Throughout my life, I internalized many of the values promoted by my education, upbringing, and the broader culture—values that emphasized doing, achieving, and making an impact. I worked hard to align myself with these expectations, and over time I began to feel increasingly disconnected from myself. I lost touch with what felt truly meaningful, spontaneous, and alive in me.

Returning to play has been an essential part of my personal healing journey. It has helped me reconnect with my inner self, with what I genuinely love, and with the freedom to explore without needing to justify or produce something useful. In play, I remember who I am when I am not trying to be who others expect me to be, and I am able to uncover the outcomes that would truly feel fulfilling to me.

In this essay, I explore the healing power of play through the lens of Jungian psychology. I focus on play as a modality for accessing the unconscious, generating insight, and restoring wholeness. To do so, I draw on my own experience of using art and imagination to gain understanding and to alchemize and heal my inner world. Specifically, I share my personal creative process of building a website (Ziegler, 2025) that functions for me as a non-linear journal—a symbolic landscape in which I collect my visual art, poetry, games, and ideas. 

Imagination, Symbol, and the Self: A Jungian Perspective

Carl Jung emphasized that the psyche speaks in symbols. For Jung, symbols are not decorative or abstract, but rather bridges between the conscious and unconscious mind. He defined a symbol as a "term, a name, or even a picture that may be familiar in daily life, yet possesses specific connotations in addition to its conventional and obvious meaning. It implies something vague, unknown, or hidden from us" (Jung, 1964, p. 20). Engaging with symbols in a conscious, feeling-centered way allows us to tap into deeper layers of the psyche.

Jung also developed the concept of active imagination—a process through which unconscious material is explored through images, fantasies, or creative expression. It involves entering into a relationship with inner symbols, allowing them to speak and evolve (Jung, 1969). Active imagination is not passive daydreaming; it is intentional play with the soul's language.

The Inner Galaxy: Playful Symbol-Making and my Journey to the Heart

I invite the reader to accompany me on this inner journey—one that takes place through the act of symbolic play through the digital realm of goodfairy.gift - the website I created. This website functions  as a personal, evolving landscape: an intuitive and nonlinear journal. It draws directly from my artistic practice and reflects my inner world through images, symbols, and experiential navigation.

We begin at the page titled “Galaxy Woman” (goodfairy.gift/galaxy-woman), which is based on a digital painting that emerged as a visual metaphor for the universe within me. Inspired by the chakra system described in Eastern philosophy, I began imagining the energy centers not as abstract concepts, but as places—planets in this symbolic galaxy. On the website, each chakra is represented by a planet-shaped symbol that the visitor can click, transporting them to that energetic space within my inner cosmos.

I was especially drawn to explore the heart chakra. I asked myself: If my heart were a landscape, what would it look like? Would it hold forests or rivers? What kind of beings would live there? To access this space, I entered into a meditation where I imagined myself shrinking down, walking a golden spiral staircase into my chest, and arriving at the heart space to see what would be revealed.

What emerged became the basis for a painting, which then formed the core of the heart energy page on the website (goodfairy.gift/heartenergy). In this image, I portrayed my heart space holding myself as a child, a tiger, a gate opening into a forest, and a raven flying overhead. Roses and sunflowers bloom beside a central chalice containing two koi fish circling each other in an eternal dance. The entire scene is rooted in a massive tree trunk, from which two great trees grow—one holding an owl, the other a blackbird. A luminous golden net offers protection around the space, and beneath it, a curtain of stars evokes a quiet cosmic presence at the foot of the chalice.

This symbolic landscape was not constructed intellectually. It emerged through the spontaneous, feeling-centered process of play—what Jung would call active imagination (Jung, 1969). Each element became both image and message: the child as my inner child; the koi fish as a representation of my twin brother and myself in the womb; the gate as a portal into deeper layers of my dreamscape. The symbol that stirred me the most was the child and the koi fish she was watching in the waters of the chalice.

About a year prior to this experience, I discovered through a family constellation workshop that I had a twin brother who died in the womb. I had carried unacknowledged grief, which had expressed itself in subtle but persistent ways throughout my life. After this revelation, I had processed the grief that emerged, but there were deeper layers to it that I was not able to unravel at the time.

As I continued to explore the symbolic imagery of my heart space, I began listening to music that resonated with the emotional atmosphere of that inner landscape. I created a playlist of songs that felt attuned to the images and feelings that had emerged. Among them, I discovered a powerful live performance of “Little Blue” by Jacob Collier (2023). The emotion in the music stirred something deep within me — a resonance with the soft sorrow I had sensed as a child but not been able to name. The melody and lyrics awakened what I came to understand as “the little blue”: a gentle, melancholic tenderness carried by my inner child, expressing grief and deep love for my unborn twin brother.

Inspired by the song, I created a guided meditation — a form of active imagination — in which I entered the heart space and asked my inner child to reveal the sorrow she carried (Ziegler, 2025). Through this symbolic dialogue, I was able to access the emotional truth of that loss, not as a problem to be fixed, but as a presence to be felt. Jung described active imagination as a process in which the conscious mind enters into a living relationship with figures and symbols from the unconscious (Jung, 1969). The meditation allowed me to receive the image, feel the grief, and hold it with compassion — transforming what had been hidden into something consciously integrated.

The symbol of the “little blue” soon began to appear outside of imagination as well. One day, during a walk, I found a small blue stone on the ground. I picked it up and wrapped it in white angel wings — a spontaneous act of symbolic creation. In Jungian terms, this moment represents the emergence of a living symbol: one that bridges the conscious and unconscious mind, carrying transformative potential (Jung, 1964). The blue stone became an embodiment of the healing I had accessed through play — a tangible expression of the faith, beauty, and softness that arise when sorrow is given space to be fully felt.

The Healing Power of Play: Reflection and Integration

Engaging with the symbolic landscape of my heart—through the creation of the painting and the imaginative process that followed—became a deeply healing experience. As a child, I had sensed the presence of this sorrow within me but did not know how to approach it. I had processed parts of it after discovering its source, seen the patterns it created in my life, but had not yet fully felt it. What gave me access to this grief was not analysis, but play.

Through playing with these inner images, I met my pain not with the pressure to resolve it, but with curiosity and compassion. In this space of symbolic imagination, the sorrow became an invitation. As I interacted with the symbols—the inner child, the raven, the circling koi fish—I was able to feel the grief rather than merely think about it. This emotional shift allowed a deep emotional release. In the weeks that followed, I noticed more joy and lightness emerge from within me.

Jungian psychology offers language and structure for this process. Emotional healing, according to Jung, is not about eliminating suffering, but about integrating what has been exiled into the unconscious. "One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious" (Jung, 1969, p. 265).

Symbols serve as bridges between conscious and unconscious material, guiding us toward deeper self-understanding. Jung noted that "a symbol always stands for something more than its obvious and immediate meaning" (Jung, 1964, p. 4). The symbolic images that emerged in my painting functioned in this way: not as decoration, but as living expressions of my inner truth.

The process also aligns with D.W. Winnicott's concept of play as a "transitional space"—a psychological space between inner and outer reality where emotional truths can emerge gently (Winnicott, 1971). I found this to be true: play allowed me to explore difficult feelings without judgment, without urgency. It felt as if the unconscious trusted me more once it knew I would listen softly.

I continue to explore the symbols that appeared in that original painting. New ones keep emerging. Each image, each movement, each color becomes a conversation. This journey is not linear but spiral—deepening with each cycle. I now see play not only as a healing tool but as a sacred path to self-knowledge. 

Today I am deeply greatful for my brother and his role in my life, for in search of him, I embarked on a journey to find myself.

Conclusion

What began as a digital experiment became a living practice of emotional healing, self-discovery, and meaning-making. Through the lens of Jungian psychology, I now understand that I was not merely creating; I was engaging the unconscious, inviting it to speak through image, symbol, and metaphor. And in doing so, I discovered how safe and transformative symbolic play can be. It allows grief to be felt without being forced, sorrow to be held without needing to be solved, and joy to emerge where judgment once lived.

Play, for me, has become sacred. It is a quiet return to innocence—not in naivety, but in openness. A softness toward what lives inside. A way of letting the Self become known, not by pushing, but by listening. It is my hope that this essay invites others to consider how they, too, might listen more closely—through symbol, through imagination, through play—to what is asking to be felt.

References

Ziegler, A. (2025). GoodfairyGift [Personal website] www.goodfairy.gift

Jung, C. G. (1964). Man and his symbols. New York: Doubleday.

Jung, C. G. (1969). The structure and dynamics of the psyche (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung (Vol. 8, 2nd ed.). Princeton University Press.

Winnicott, D. W. (1971). Playing and reality. London: Tavistock.

Collier, J. (05.10.2023) Jacob Collier - Little Blue | @MahoganySessions| [video] YouTube. www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQvzX0Z3HE4&list=RDIQvzX0Z3HE4&start_radio=1

Ziegler, A. (10.06.2025) Little Blue Meditation // connect to your inner child [video] YouTube. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hzxy1IPZdE4