The Algorithm As a Complex

Reflections on the Feed

There’s a subtle but constant ritual we perform every day, maybe every hour. We tap. Scroll. Linger. Like. Swipe away.

Each of these gestures seems small, almost mechanical. But these micro-movements are more than digital reflexes. They are symbolic acts. Rituals of unconscious reinforcement.

They are mirrors.

What if I told you that every time you interact with your feed, you are engaging in a dialogue, not just with technology, but with your own psyche?

Every click and pause is a vote cast from the unconscious, not necessarily for what you want, but for what lives below your awareness. The algorithm doesn’t just know your behavior. It knows your shadow.

The Algorithm as Complex

In Jungian psychology, a complex is a semi-autonomous cluster of psychic energy. It acts “as if” it were you, pulling your thoughts, emotions, and behaviors in ways you don’t fully control. A complex carries a specific emotional tone, often rooted in early life experience, and when activated, it can possess the personality. We speak through the complex rather than from our center.

This is what the algorithm has become: a living complex made of collective psychic material. It is an autonomous psychic structure, built not of code alone, but of our projections, our compulsions, our longings.

It reflects not just what we like, but what we lack. It draws from the emotional residue we leave behind the hunger for validation, the ache of comparison, the fear of irrelevance, the secret shame we try to avoid.

In that sense, the algorithm has become the unconscious mirror of culture. And like any mirror, it can show us either distortion or truth, depending on our willingness to look with awareness.

This Is Not a Punishment. It’s a Call.

It’s easy to frame the algorithm as the enemy. To declare a dopamine war, to flee into digital minimalism, or to shame ourselves for being “distracted.”

But this isn’t just about addiction or attention spans. It’s deeper.

What you’re encountering on the feed is not punishment, it’s a psychic echo. A trail of breadcrumbs, laid out by the unconscious, leading you toward integration.

We often think of tech as artificial and soulless. But what if, from a symbolic perspective, it is participating in the individuation process? What if the algorithm is simply reflecting what Jung called the shadow, the parts of ourselves we’ve disowned?

What if it’s calling you inward, not outward?

“The gold is in the dark,” Robert A. Johnson wrote.
“We must go down into our own darkness to find our gold.”

Scrolling is often where that darkness shows itself.

Persona vs. Self: Who Is Scrolling?

To understand the significance of this mirror, we need to distinguish between two key Jungian concepts: the Persona and the Self.

The Persona is the mask we wear. It’s the version of ourselves we’ve curated for public life, acceptable, polished, strategically constructed to fit into society. It’s not bad or false. We need it. But it’s not the whole story.

The algorithm reflects the Persona because the Persona is what we show. But it also reflects the shadow of the Persona, everything we’ve hidden to maintain that mask. Envy. Shame. Grandiosity. Fear. The hunger to be seen as someone we’re not.

This is why your feed knows how to hook you. It knows who you’re trying to be and who you’re afraid you might be instead.

But beyond both Persona and shadow lies the Self, the archetypal core of wholeness in the psyche. The Self is what you’re here to become. It’s not curated. It’s not performative. It’s ancient. It’s real.

When you begin to observe the algorithm with awareness, you begin the process of withdrawing projections. You separate what you’re unconsciously reacting to from what you actually are. You step out of the grip of the complex. You begin to differentiate.

This is the essence of individuation, Jung’s term for the lifelong journey toward wholeness.

Scroll as Shadow Work

So what do we do with this?

We learn to scroll differently.

Instead of fleeing or numbing, we turn our awareness inward. Each post becomes an opportunity. A reflection. A clue. An invitation to ask:

• What part of me is drawn to this?

• What feeling arises in my body when I see this image or message?

• Who am I training the algorithm to believe I am?

This is not doomscrolling. This is active imagination in the age of tech. This is shadow work through interface. The key isn’t to stop scrolling, it’s to become conscious within it.

“Who looks outside, dreams,” Jung wrote.
“Who looks inside, awakes.”

The feed may begin with dreams, fantasies, projections, or illusions. But if you meet it with depth, it becomes a portal to awakening.

Somatic Awareness: Reclaiming the Body

This work doesn’t just happen in the mind. The body is always involved.

The next time you’re scrolling and feel yourself pulled into comparison, outrage, or craving, pause. Check in with your body:

• Is your breath shallow?

• Is your jaw tight?

• Are your shoulders tense?

• Is your gut constricted?

These cues matter. They’re your nervous system trying to tell you what the algorithm cannot: You’re being pulled into an old pattern. A familiar complex.

When you notice the pattern somatically, you have the chance to stay inside your own experience rather than outsourcing your attention to the screen.

This is the first step to reclaiming agency, not as control, but as consciousness.

From Feed to Feedback Loop

What you engage with, engages back. That’s the sacred loop.

The algorithm is a feedback mechanism, yes, but it’s also a feedback metaphor. It gives form to the formless. It takes your unconscious and gives it an interface.

When you begin to interact with it consciously, it becomes a mirror you can work with instead of react to. You stop feeding the Persona and begin feeding the Self.

That’s a subtle but radical pivot.

It’s the shift from collective noise toward symbolic depth. From algorithmic hijack to archetypal intelligence. From blind consumption to conscious witnessing.

And that, truly, is the essence of initiation in the digital age.

Invocation

So the work now is this:

Stop blaming the mirror.
Start listening to it.

Withdraw the projection.
Reclaim the energy.
Stay conscious in the trance.

Your attention is not just a commodity. It’s a compass. A ritual. A key.

And the feed?
It’s not fate.
It’s a reflection.

Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and today, your algorithm, and you will call it content.

But you are not content.

You are consciousness.

And you are waking up.

From My Scroll to Yours

This reflection didn’t come from theory; it came from practice.

I wrote this after catching myself in yet another loop. Doomscrolling, yes, but also subtly craving something. Not information. Not entertainment. Something deeper. Something like recognition. Or resonance. Or relief.

That’s when I saw it: the feed wasn’t just distracting me. It was talking to me.

And if I stayed long enough, consciously enough, I could start to talk back.

This isn’t about demonizing the algorithm or fleeing from tech. It’s about engaging it as a mirror. A ritual. A practice space for becoming more fully ourselves.

So if you’ve ever felt hijacked by your screen, know this:
You’re not broken.
You’re being invited.

Next time you open your feed, try this:
Slow your scroll.
Feel your body.
Notice the pull

and follow it inward.

You might just find that what you’ve been chasing… is already waiting for you on the other side of the mirror.

Thanks for reading,
—Dustin