ReMything the World Anew

 James Hollis' Tracking the Gods: The Place of Myth in Modern Life

We are called to reread the world around us, and this includes the daily dance of images provided by the newspaper, by television and by pop culture. The gods are never far away. When we begin to read the world anew, we see that there are spiritual currents in all things, even the most banal. There are energies which, coming from below, drive and distort the culture. Using the Jungian principle of compensation, we can often see the pathologies of our time, both personal and collective, as the outer compensation for the inner wound. We may then understand our wounded comrades rather than judge them. And we will find that the world is a very rich place. (147)

We are required to accept that there is no parent to lead the way, no guru, no ideology to save us from the complexity and ambiguity of life. The measure of our personal development will hinge on two factors: our willingness to accept responsibility for finding our own myth, and our ability to sustain the ambiguity that always precedes a new experience of meaning. This task is critical for the health of both individual and society. (147)