Mythos

What is your favourite myth?

A Myth is a story of the gods, a religious account of the beginning of the world, the creation, fundamental events, or exemplary deeds of the gods. The Swiss psychologist Carl Jung saw the ancient gods as archetypes of human behaviour, and mythology as the personification of subconscious forces at work in the human psyche, mixed with real events. As such it is cultural.

Persephone

I have always felt empathy with the myth of Persephone, the maiden forced to live for a period in the underworld, separated from her mother, Demeter. See the post on this blog for more information.

Narcissus

Another favourite is Narcissus, because of its relatedness to current recognisable personality types, even within my own family! Narcissus was the son of a river god and a nymph, but he rejected those who loved him, causing some to die for love of him. Nemesis noticed his arrogance and attracted Narcissus to a pool, where he saw his own reflection in the water and fell deeply in love with it. Having developed an unrequited love that could never be reciprocated, Narcissus lost his will to live and committed suicide. In some versions of the myth, Narcissus stared into his reflection until he withered away. In all versions, his body disappears and all that is left is a narcissus flower.

Narcissus is the origin of the term narcissism, a fixation with oneself and one’s physical appearance or public perception. With the increasing importance of psychology as a discipline, Narcissism is today recognised as one of the main Personality Disorders by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. This is just one example of how ancient myths often relate on a deep level to problems that persist today.

October 14, 2018 4 comments

Mythos

Persephone and Demeter

The Meaning of the Myth

Kristina Dryza is recognised as one of the world’s top female futurists, that is, scientists and social scientists whose specialty is futurology or the attempt to systematically explore predictions and possibilities about the future and how they can emerge from the present. She is also an archetypal consultant and published author. In defining a myth, she referred to James Hillman, Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung, experts on mythology. For the purposes of Kristina’s workshop, myths represent the human search for what is true, significant, and meaningful from our cultural past.

Her talk on Persephone and Demeter at the Sydney Jung Society recently, opened me up to some of the more meaningful concepts to do with this archetypal pair. Together, they represent the idea and experience of despair (Demeter) and shock (Persephone), when something untoward happens to you, for example a betrayal, a sickness, or a broken leg. It often comes like a jolt out of the blue.

In my case, it was a descent into hell at the end of a psychoanalytical journey, one which I’d felt impelled to take.

July 14, 2018 1 comment

Mythos Nature

Symbolism of Twins

Some Definitions

Twins can be either monozygotic (“identical”), meaning that they develop from one zygote, which splits and forms two embryos, or dizygotic (“fraternal”), meaning that they develop from two different eggs. In fraternal twins, each twin is fertilized by its own sperm cell.

Spontaneous division of the zygote into two embryos is not considered to be a hereditary trait, but rather a spontaneous and random event. Identical twins are not dependent on race, country or ethnicity. The odds of having identical twins are the same for every couple, in every pregnancy, wherever they live in the world.

As yet, the reason for the occurrence of identical births is unknown. There is, therefore, something mysterious about the occurrence of identical twins. Monozygotic twinning occurs in birthing at a rate of about 3 in every 1000 deliveries worldwide, that is about 0.3 percent of the world population, and is uniformly distributed in all populations around the world.

Identical Twins and Research

Identical twins spend their lives being compared for the benefit of science. They can assist psychologists in untangling the effects of nature versus nurture, or aid speech pathologists in understanding the causes of stuttering. As they share duplicate DNA, as well as the same upbringing, they are generally similar, if not exactly comparable, individuals.

October 2, 2017 0 comment

Mythos Nature Poetry

The earth is sick and in need of salvage

Sick Earth

The earth is sick, its lungs stuffed and
out of puff, its bones brittle near to break
cancer cells spreading throughout its crests
amid tumescent landfill dense as gas
Her womb’s barren as melting ice
all of this oblivious only to the unexamined life

August 21, 2017 2 comments

Mythos Poetry

Our Galactic Address: A Poem

Galactic Address

What are we doing here on this moving globe
Earth insects swimming in the Orion Way
far from the centre of the Galaxy
clinging to the cavity
of the Local Bubble
in this solar system called the Milky Way?

An insignificant metal ball,
trapped in motion,
endlessly, drawing
circles concentrically
around the fiery sphere,
mirrored in this movement
by sibling planets all
disciples of the father star?

As I look up into the night sky
from here, my galactic address,
the other planets are invisible
to the naked eye within the softly
gleaming ribbon arching there.
Better here, methinks, from where
I stand at the inner edge of this spiral
shaped confluence of gas and dust,
than in the Galactic Centre—
thought to be a large Black Hole!

Photo Credit: NASA found on Wikihow

August 16, 2017 2 comments