Where does the story begin? How myths, archetypes and stories came to be part of our lives

Devine – English 11

Stories started 200,000 years ago

In the history of humans, out nearest extinct ancestors are the Neanderthals, who lived between about 200,000 and 28,000 years ago. Their brains were as large as ours. They made sophisticated tools, used fire, lived in shelters, made clothing, and were skilled hunters of large animals. They were also the first humans who left clear evidence that they believed in something beyond the physical world. When you look at their burial mounds you can see, for example, that some people were buried in the fetal position, which implies they viewed death as a kind of rebirth – a birth into another land.

This life feeds that other life

A ritual is a way of participating in the story. Broadly speaking, ritual is any repetitive act which is meant to align you with a certain quality, concept or state of being. It connects you with specific powers.

There were also sacrifices – evidence of the idea that this life we live in now somehow feeds that other life, the one after death. With sacrifice (which means “to make blessed”) comes ritual. Sacrifice always occurs within the context (the framework) of ritual.

Calling in the powers of the story… When you engage in ritual, you are calling in the powers of the story – the parts that the ritual refers to. Around the world, people use religions to re-enact the pieces of their story that bring them feelings of goodness and empowerment. That is one reason why religions are inspiring. They tell the parts of the story that make the people feel strong, inspired, and in alignment with Divine will.

Something is Out There…

Here again, we have the idea that there is something Out There. There is something larger than our mere physical selves on this planet of trees and deserts and oceans and stars.

Seen vs. UnseenAnother key thing to know is that in relating these two worlds – the physical, seen world and the dark, mysterious unseen world – these early humans, and almost everyone since them, saw that there was some kind of a balance between these two worlds, that there were things in one that corresponded to the things in the other.

So the names (thousands of years old) of the stars and constellations are the same names our ancestors gave to their original stories thousands of years ago.

The study of the mind/soulThose names were later used by researchers trying to understand human madness and health. These research people were named “Studiers of the Soul.”

Following the Greek tradition of scientific naming, we have “ology” which means the study of and we have “psyche,” which translates to both mind and soul. When you put them together – psyche + ology – you get psychology. You get the study of the mind/soul.

The story is the keyAnd they way you study all of it is through the story. When you study this story, you read the story of all of humanity. You put a boat on a river that flows from the most profound depths of the past through the complex present moment and into a thousand and one potential futures. The story is the key. For a story to exist, something has to happen. And for something to happen there have to be actors to make it happen, even if they are, say, the wind or the sun. There is some kind of character taking some kind of action.

Archetypes: original charactersBut who is the original character – what is her name? Who was the first one who ever gave birth, who ever danced? Who had the first fight, or told the first lie or first gave his life to save his brothers? These are called Archetypes, which can be loosely translated to the original models.

Primordial personality patterns

• They are primordial personality patterns. King, Thief, Trickster, Mother, Lover, Warrior, Magician, Prophet, Peacekeeper. These are their names, in the most stripped down form. That is to say, this is as close as language can get to identifying them. Primordial means the very first. So, the archetypes are the Original Characters of the Universe – at least, according to us humans they are. (The animals may have their own. Who knows? But the humans have already claimed the animal powers.)

The myth is the story’s framework

You can’t have a hero just standing in the mountains doing nothing. No story. Boring. But, if the mountains lead to a dragon’s lair, where a massive life-or-death battle takes place, then you have a story. That’s Beowulf. Or St. George. Or the Grail Legend. Or maybe even The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, among about a 1000 other possibilities. (Humans are into dragons.)

So, now we have a story and we have the characters – the archetypes. Now we need a setting for the story. That setting is myth. Myth-ology is (you guessed it) the study of Myth. The myth (which contains much truth) is the framework for the story.

How much you can relate to the characters?

So now we have it all – story, characters, framework. We just have to sit back and watch the thing unfold. Is the story any good? Does it get to you? That depends on how much you can relate to the characters and to what they are going through. Maybe you can identify with some of what’s going on in The Lord of the Rings – the struggle of good against evil, the battles the individuals must fight, or the relative simplicity of their world.

The too-human heroOn the other hand, maybe that kind of fantasy does not spark your interest. Maybe The Hunger Games is more to your liking. A 17-year-old girl is just trying to feed her family, in the absence of her dead father, when she gets caught up in a system which, because of her own sincerity, ends up propelling her into the national spotlight and into great danger in a post-apocalyptic North America.

She is not the hero type. She is way too human, but she does incredible things anyway, because she has to. And she’s only 17. (But most 17-year-olds are capable of far more than older people think they are, anyway.)

Mythology as blueprint

Both The Lord of the Rings (written between 1937 and 1948) and The Hunger Games follow a mythological blueprint. There is a pattern behind the action and the characters. The characters follow along the lines of the archetypes (Hero, Warrior, Magician, Faithful Companion, Earth Mother) and the stories themselves follow the mythological blueprint known as The Hero’s Journey.

The mythical dimensions of modern day life

Professor Joseph Campbell, the great American mythologist, was able to see the mythical dimensions of modern day life and use them to his advantage. The more you, as the reader, connect to the story, the more you get from it.

You begin to see the truth behind all things, by seeing the truth that lies behind one thing – that one thing that speaks to you most clearly.

The individual must find…"The individual has to find an aspect of myth that relates to his own life,” Campbell said. “Myth opens the world to the dimension of mystery, to the realization of the mystery that underlies all forms. If you lose that, you don't have a mythology."

Image Sources• • Babies and bellies: http://sarahkatebutterworth.com/kala • • Tan Stone mother: http://tripwow.tripadvisor.com/slideshow-photo/ancient-cretan-fertility-goddess-by-travelpod-member-lraleigh-palaiokhora-greece.html?sid=12299492&fid=tp-15• • Green Stone mother: https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/3481/Fertility_Figurine• • Greek warrior: http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4150/5020010548_164ec909bd_b.jpg• • Faerie Queen: http://thelife-krystyna.blogspot.com/2010/04/queen-krysia-and-linen-forest.html• • The Fool tarot card: http://blog.needsupply.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/tarot20-20220tarot20cards20image.jpg• • The Devil tarot card: http://lovedovetarot.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/moocher.jpg• • Neanderthal Burial: http://www.scilogs.eu/en/blog/biology-of-religion/2009-10-17/the-burials-of-neanderthals-religion-evolved-at-least-two-times• • Neanderthal Man: http://i1-news.softpedia-static.com/images/news2/How-to-hunt-a-Neanderthal-2.jpg• • Neanderthal Horses: http://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/paleoanthropology/conversations/topics/18210• • The Venus of Monterey Dagger: http://americanneanderthals.blogspot.com/• • Man looking beyond world: http://www.theminimalists.com/beyond/• • Shadow lady: www.razmus06.deviantart.com

• Dancers around the tree: www.jupiterjenkins.com• • The Moon: http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/wiredscience/2011/11/moonpic.jpg• • Fuseli’s nightmare: http://heavenastrolabe.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/fuseli_nightmare.jpg• • Native shaman: http://indianinthemachine.wordpress.com/• • Beowulf fights Grendel: http://theyreadhappilyeverafter.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/beowulf_alive_05-1.jpg• • Gandalf Smoking http://collider.com/lord-of-the-rings-extended-edition-blu-ray-review/• • Katniss Everdean: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katniss_Everdeen• • Charon on the river Styx: http://ferrebeekeeper.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/crossing_the_river_styx.jpg