our general well-being as well as helping to continue our own personal growth and development. When a hidden personality emerges it's also called being 'in the grip'. This refers to the times when the inferior function is being showcased. This happens when we are low on energy and under great stress. Stress is defined as any external or internal event that lessens or depletes one's mental and physical well being. Stress is a necessary and sufficient stimulus for bringing out our hidden personality. Unconscious contents are charged with energy that must be discharged in order for a person to function comfortably and with minimal tension and distress. One of the most powerful and universal ways human beings deal with being unacknowledged, unconscious thoughts and feelings is through projection. Because the inferior function is appropriately understood as an unconscious process that is subject to the mechanism of projection. Projection involves attributing to others an unacknowledged, unconscious part of ourselves- something that lies outside our conscious awareness. What we project onto others can be negative or it can be positive. In Jung's psychology, projection often accounts for our initial attraction to or rejection of others. A person may be a ready "host" for one or more aspects of our own unconscious, and it's a way our psyche regulates itself. Equilibrium is maintained when people eliminate their contradictory ideas or feelings (Quenk 2002). We are all capable of using our tertiary and inferior functions when a particular task requires them. Jung suggested that we all have instincts that pushes us to grow toward completion, or to become the best possible version of ourselves. This goal is called individualization, a state of self-awareness or self-actualization we strive for and hardly ever achieve. Jung saw the lifelong quest of individualism as more important than focusing on an unattainable end point. References Further reading Psychoanalytic theory