I think the word "myth" is too often used to describe a falsehood, a fantasy, an untruth. Misunderstanding and misusing the word that addresses the most fundamental discoveries, expressions, connections and meanings of life is one of our first clues to the limited and limiting human condition these days. But the words falsehood, fantasy and untruth only describe the death of myth. The truths of a living myth are intense revelations and reflections of divine image.
I've learned how to conceive of a living myth from several different sources. They each describe the power of myth as clues to our deepest potential; as our souls and bodies being composed of individual elements which were already present in the ranks of our ancestors; as turning inward and getting the message of the symbols; as the natural and indispensable intermediate stage of cognition between conscious (ego) and the collective unconscious (the deeper SELF); as opening our eyes to the kingdom spread-out before us; as the center being everywhere; as always and everywhere having a divine link with the infinite Guest we often call soul; as embodying an essential and finding meaning in life via what we each already embody; as welcoming the sacrifice; as a way to make sure that beyond our deaths we leave behind psychological remains that continue to serve love; as kindling a light in the darkness of mere being; as becoming fully human in this spiritual experience of being alive. Myth is an attempt to describe the divine image within each one of us and surrounding each one of us; to realize (make real) and then bring forth one's genuine discoveries of potential, expressions of relationship, connections to experience and meaningful perceptions of it all; to find atonement (at-one-ment) between conscious information and the daily glimpses of the collective unconscious; to give form and the power of transformation to our most natural ability - imagination.
In this age, however, I think we've lost the necessary imagination for how a living and meaningful myth guides us in our daily psychological birth. Sure, we have all kinds of religions that are founded on myth. But too often religion becomes rigidly dogmatic and is then utilized to judge and justify beliefs and behaviors relative to some exclusive after-life instead of guiding the relationships to all life right Now. I also think the historical and collective practices of too many religions have resulted in the sacred mysteries of the Earth being viciously reduced to expendable resources in a manipulative "holier than thou" quest to carry-out delusions of the "chosen" group. Add to this the reality that the Earth is no longer the center of the solar system and much more ancient than many religions want to believe. This scientific fact coupled with the lack of a living myth threatens to psychologically reduce our planet and the experience of being alive to mere interstellar good luck in an ever expanding cosmos. And this boxed-in psychological perspective then leans perilously close to completely denying the relationships that define our role as stewards of the Earth's consciousness. Consequently, without a living myth the spirit of the age has mostly failed to move beyond the poverty of dependence and independence toward more responsible and sustainable realities of interdependence and intra-dependence (Internity). The externally focused egotistical pedagogy of it all then becomes even more rooted in oppression, addiction, trauma and shame while righteously running-off at the mouth and tripping over the emotional baggage between its legs. Without a meaningful and living myth our psychological birth becomes instead a chronic limitation of human potential, relationship, experience and perception. Without the divine revelations of a living myth the discoveries, expressions, connections and meaning of "How I Am: Being Human" forget how to look beyond the symbols, losing the beauty and intensity of our most important gift - imagination.
I think the poet Kabir says it best:
To be a Slave of Intensity
Friend, hope for the guest while you are alive.
Jump into experience while you are alive!
Think...and think...while you are alive.
What you call 'salvation' belongs to the time before death.
If you don't break your ropes while you're alive,
do you think
ghosts will do it after?
The idea that the soul will join with the ecstatic
Just because the body is rotten -
that is all fantasy.
What is found now is found then.
If you find nothing now,
you will simply end up with an apartment in the City of Death.
If you make love with the divine now, in the next life you will have the face of satisfied desire.
So plunge into the truth, find out who the Teacher is,
Believe in the Great Sound!
Kabir says this: When the guest is being searched for, it is the intensity of the longing for the Guest that does all the work.
Look at me, and you will see a slave of that intensity.
Jump into experience while you are alive!
Think...and think...while you are alive.
What you call 'salvation' belongs to the time before death.
If you don't break your ropes while you're alive,
do you think
ghosts will do it after?
The idea that the soul will join with the ecstatic
Just because the body is rotten -
that is all fantasy.
What is found now is found then.
If you find nothing now,
you will simply end up with an apartment in the City of Death.
If you make love with the divine now, in the next life you will have the face of satisfied desire.
So plunge into the truth, find out who the Teacher is,
Believe in the Great Sound!
Kabir says this: When the guest is being searched for, it is the intensity of the longing for the Guest that does all the work.
Look at me, and you will see a slave of that intensity.
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