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Archetypal Psychology
There were two things about archetypal psychology that I found deeply compelling. First
was the notion that the ancient myths could be understood as psychological parables, that
they mirrored the basic structures of our consciousness. Stories about the gods and god-
desses and their interactions could be read as stories about our styles of awareness and their
attendant gifts and liabilities. So, for example, when we appreciate gold in a lover's neck-
lace, we're seeing through one archetypal perspective (Venus); when we buy and sell gold
and track its market value, we're seeing gold through other eyes (Saturn). When we learn
about gold in our chemistry class as an element of the periodic table, we're somewhere else
again. In any given context, one perspective or another always dominates, and the best de-
lineation of these diverse perspectives is to be found in the mythic tales of the gods: in their
loves and hatreds, their passions and obsessions. As Hillman puts it somewhere so beauti-
fully: the interplay among the various perspectives is The Divine Comedy; their collisions,
along with the attendant suffering that ensues, are the human tragedy.
The second insight of archetypal psychology that captivated me is, perhaps, subtler and
harder to convey. It was the insistent assertion that there is no place to stand outside of the
mythswelivein.Atanygiventime wearealways standing within onearchetypal perspect-
ive or another, and there is no privileged vantage point outside ourselves from which to
observe or know in an absolute way. If we remain habitually within one perspective, it be-
comes normal for us—just as the perspectives that others live become normative for them.
In case you made it through the last two paragraphs and are still here for the ride, let me
try to explain what that meant to me and why I found it so powerfully engaging. By the
time I was in my early thirties, I had lived in several countries and traveled in many oth-
ers, worked in colleges and sawmills, and socialized with many different kinds of people.
It was clear to me that people lived in many different worlds where what was obvious and
true for them differed fundamentally from what was obvious and true for others elsewhere.
When I pondered these differences and tried to find ways to put them into words, I often
thought in terms of “bubbles”.
In northern California in the seventies there were New Age hippies who were trying to
open themselves to the Light; there were bikers who enjoyed getting into fist-fights; there
were cowboys who went down to The Buckeye on Friday night to hear the local band play
“Big Eight Wheels” and “Put Your Sweet Lips a Little Closer to the Phone” and get shit-
faced drunk; there were folks who held nine-to-five jobs and looked askance at those who
didn't. And there were college kids who had once believed that academic learning was the
supremely privileged perspective that encompassed all others—but no longer did.
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