Do you paint your myth into clouds?
Do you find your myth on the ground?
Do you search for your myth in love?
Do you clean up writings on the wall because you weighed life on scales and found it wanting?
Is your myth in the process of being sculpted?
Are your myths about debunking clichés?
Are you shaping your myth into the future?
Are you the eternal traveller – like me?
This post was inspired by a writer friend I exchanged a few emails with. And I found myself expressing a thought in this vein … Writers and artists are like archaeologists; they dig, uncover and re-shape a personal myth until the myth takes wings and becomes universal, though many writers would deny this. And yet – think about it – the myths we live and re-shape give meaning to our lives and entice readers to explore theirs.
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And who do we share our myths with?
A listener like this chap does wonders for one’s confidence 🙂
Course of Mirrors 
In many ways, I think we are our own myths in the making.
Each one of us is a work in progress, constantly changing, transitory in nature, subtle, shallow, thoughtful, thoughtless, at peace, at war, walking contradictions all of us.
We are the stuff of our own imaginings, our own dreams in the making.
Sometimes our dreams our myths are made manifest, sometimes we find ourselves constantly striving to achieve them.
The myths of man and womankind, just look into a mirror and you shall see your myths and dreams dancing in you own eyes. 😀
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… We are the stuff of our own imaginings, our own dreams in the making …
And each of us has a theme that shines through whatever is expressed.
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😀 xx
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food for thought indeed. I often ponder the many strings that must tangle and entwine to bring me to a certain point in life and maybe they are the threads of my personal myth – hmm I wonder.
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Well, Diane, you have a fascination with the murky underside of life, and the ability to enter the perception of dark characters and their victims, combined with cliffhanger tension that draws the reader in. Is redemption a theme? I don’t know. I think we all have a mythical theme to our life. And it shines through our writing.
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I worry that in a past life I was either a nefarious character or a victim. I don’t know where the dark stuff comes from I really don’t and it surprises me every time.
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We may not know what it’s all about, why we’re drawn to write stories about certain characters. It’s not necessary to know – something is worked out in the process of writing, and reading. That’s the beauty of creativity.
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Is myth the same as memory, real, collective or inherited? Probably. There is nothing new under the sun, just unique angles on it, fragments of life, lived or imagined that come out different depending who is retelling them.
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I agree Jane. Nothing new in the cosmic soup, so true, and yet, the unique angles seem to re-shuffle the way we perceive or taste things. Like you give 10 cooks the same recipe and not one dish turns out the same. There are so many variables beyond basic ingredients, it’s magical.
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Memythopoeia.
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Memythopoia – like the definition of a new malaise 🙂 Certainly a transmission of a kind. I value (in Tolkiens’s words) my own small golden sceptre to work on my sub-creation, the mythology of a single child, employing the themes of mirrors and labyrinths, especially in my sequel to Cabal of Mirrors.
There are Philomythos (myth-lovers) and Misomythos (myth-haters) but in truth, we all create our own myths, and the more whole-heartedly we do it, the more these sub-creations resonate universally.
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The labyrinth one of the great themes of all time. Borges made much of the labyrinth and labyrinths. How to navigate the labyrinth becomes a kind of plot. We might say the me in the labyrinth is the beginning of myth, the telling of the experience the poetics that lights the way back out. Or something like that.
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… the telling of the experience the poetics that lights the way back out … That’s it 🙂
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Ashen: Yes, I’ve been thinking more about this, one’s poetics, like one’s myth, and poetry can take so many forms. By the way, I also very much liked all of these photos, and it’s a great kind of photo essay. I had thought my myth would not be sky (but water, ocean), but I love the cloud photo. But another favorite is the sixth one down, but what what’s going on there, with the feather? And the mirror toward the bottom is an interesting set. Anyway, this was a very thought provoking and artistic and cool post. Love the guy washing off the wall – the erasure. Reminds me of the box of writing in the basement for years and I finally threw the whole thing out. Lost for a time in a labyrinth without a poetics to light my way back out. Not that I have the light now, but I wish I had the box back. Cheers to you, Ashen, and happy spring, too!
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I love the photos – especially the last one, with the little boy and the teddy bear. It speaks volumes.
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I knew a Swiss therapist who told all her clients to buy a teddy bear. I’m sure she’s jobless by now 🙂
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There’s a story there…
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Interesting. I’d never thought of each individual person having a myth before. Thanks for sharing this with us.
bidelia78@yahoo.com
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Thanks for visiting, Kitty. I’m happy the post was of interest to you. And congratulations for the launch of your book. Best success.
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Thank you. I enjoyed your post. 🙂
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