Law 1: Never Outshine the Master Many believe that flaunting your talents to your superiors is a good idea. But this is grave mistake. Masters and people who have ascended to positions of power, are not much different from the kings and queens of antiquity. They have fragile egos, and nothing could provoke their wrath … Read more
The Role of Myths Myths are a mechanism we can use to find out who we are, and what we value implicitly. It teaches us about the stages of life, and how to pass through them successfully – while avoiding the psychological dangers along the way. In this post, I discuss the role of myths … Read more
What are Myths? In The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Campbell shows us what the myths of the past have in common. He identifies an archetypal story structure that explains the patterns most great myths and folk stories follow. He describes the role of the archetypal characters within the story and what they symbolize. The … Read more
Epilogue: Myth and Society 1. The Shapeshifter Campbell concludes by commenting on the relevance of myths today, how myths are viewed and how you can make use of them in your own life. It is important to remember that there is no system for interpretation myths. If you seek to understand them, then you must … Read more
Part Two: The Cosmogonic Cycle Chapter 4: Dissolutions 1. End of the Microcosm In this chapter, Campbell discusses the final part of the hero journey, death. There are two types of deaths that mythologies describe, the first is personal, and the second is universal. “The End of the Microcosm” is the personal death of the … Read more
Part Two: The Cosmogonic Cycle Chapter 3: Transformations of the Hero 1. The Primordial Hero and the Human This chapter is about how the cosmogonic cycle is carried out by mortal heroes rather than gods and stories about children, who are predestined to become the heroes of their culture and the founders of new cities. … Read more
Part Two: The Cosmogonic Cycle Chapter 2: The Virgin Birth 1. Mother Universe Some mythologies emphasize the maternal rather than paternal aspect of the creator, and she plays the roles that are traditionally assigned to males. She’s also a virgin, because her husband is the Invisible Unknown. 3. The Virgin Birth Here Campbell tells us … Read more
The Tricks of Sisyphus The myth of Sisyphus has become analogous to working futilely at an arduous task forever. But how are we to interpret to the punishment he received from the gods? Many have reached different conclusions of what the punishment of pushing a rock up a hill eternally means, and some are more … Read more
Part Two: The Cosmogonic Cycle Chapter 1: Emanations 1. From Psychology to Metaphysics Myths resemble dreams, they are both manifestations of the unconscious. Symbols represent unconscious desires, fears, and tensions. “Mythology, in other words, is psychology misread as biography; history, and cosmology.” But myths are not the same as dreams although they come from the … Read more
Part I: The Adventure of the Hero Chapter 4: The Keys “The Keys” was a commentary on how myths have become watered down in many different traditions today. But the poetry of mythology is ruined when one considers these texts as scientific or historical – as it is easy to invalidate mythology under those frameworks. … Read more