Myth and Trauma: Higher Self, Ancient Wisdom, and their Enemies - Paperback

by David Warner Mathisen (Author)

Explore the ancient wisdom of the world's myths as it applies to one of the most common and most serious problems in the modern world: the separation from who we are.

Unresolved psychological trauma can lead to anxiety, depression, addiction, self-sabotage, and even serious physical illness. Forward-thinking doctors, psychologists and healers have in recent decades gained greater understanding of the central role that trauma can play in our lives, and how it can impact our lives without our even realizing what is going on. Many leading doctors in this field describe the effect of trauma as causing us to separate from ourselves -- to suppress important aspects of who we are, even to suppress our essential or authentic self.

Although the use of the term trauma in a psychological sense is relatively new, the world's ancient myths can be shown to be dealing with this very subject: note for instance the amazing prevalence of twins in ancient myths from around the world. These twinned pairs do not actually represent two different individuals: they are actually about the very split that takes place when we separate from our own essential self, from whom we can become alienated and whose existence we often bury and suppress, often without even realizing that we are doing so.

When we realize that these stories can be conclusively shown to be metaphor, we can begin to see that they are not about ancient figures and events external to ourselves: they are in fact about us. And one of the central truths they want to convey has to do with the effects of trauma, the ways it can separate us from who we are, and most importantly that path towards recovering our lost and suppressed essential self.

Myth and Trauma explores the evidence which shows that the world's ancient myths are built on a foundation of celestial metaphor in which characters and events correspond to specific constellations and heavenly cycles, a system which actually underlies the ancient myths of cultures around the globe, on every inhabited continent and island -- and a system which appears to have been designed to impart profound truths we need in our own lives, even in this present day, right where we are.