Definition
An archetype is a recurring character in your inner cast — the Troublemaker, the Rescuer, the Invisible Expert — that shows up with its own rules before you choose a move.
Origin
Jung (analytical psychology). Archetypes are shared symbolic patterns in the collective unconscious; individuals enact them in dreams, myths, and daily roles. Later work (Pearson, Moore, Hill) maps them to leadership and development stages.
Performance literature. The Power of the Alter Ego (Todd Herman and related coaching tradition) treats a designed alter ego as a deliberate archetype you invoke for a context — not fraud, but borrowed permission.
Mechanism
Archetypes compress complexity:
- They pre-load behaviour (“experts don’t apologise for existing”).
- They trade with each other under stress (Rescuer eats the meeting; Expert hides).
- They need conscious casting — otherwise the loudest archetype wins the week.
Player is the stance that treats life as a trainable game with roles you can swap; archetype is which role is active now.
Sources
Cite
- Jung, C. G. (1968). The archetypes and the collective unconscious (2nd ed., R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). Princeton University Press
- Herman, T. (2019). The alter ego effect: The power of secret identities to transform your life. HarperCollins
Adjacent
Applications
When you say “that’s not me,” ask which archetype would have acted and whether that archetype still serves your declared Identity Gap.