Samadhi as Union with Archetypal Wholeness

Samadhi in Patanjali's system is the state of unified consciousness where the observer and observed merge. In Jung's terms, this parallels the Self—the transcendent center that contains and harmonizes all archetypes. Individual archetypes (Hero, Shadow, Wise Old Man, Divine Child) appear as separate forces in ego consciousness, but samadhi reveals their underlying unity. The Hero and the Sage seem opposite until you reach samadhi where both express the same fundamental wholeness. Jung called this the transcendent function—the psyche's capacity to synthesize opposites. Patanjali's samadhi is experiential knowledge of this synthesis. Through meditation on archetypal polarities (masculine/feminine, light/shadow, order/chaos), the practitioner approaches samadhi where all archetypal contrasts dissolve into unified consciousness. This is not intellectual understanding but direct perception of the Self as the archetypal ground of all being. Samadhi becomes the goal of both paths: realization of consciousness beyond fragmentation.