"The deepest core of life is poetry and symbol." - Dane Rudhyar
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Tag Archives: life
Symbolism of the River
“I do not know much about gods, but I think that the river is a strong brown god,” so begins the third of T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. The divinity of rivers has been recognized by all mythologies since the beginning … Continue reading
Posted in The River
Tagged ancient Egypt, archetypes, banks, Buddhism, C.G. Jung, Christianity, death, Four Rivers of Paradise, Ganga, Hapi, Hinduism, Kumbh Mela, life, myth, mythology, Nile, nirvana, paradise, rebirth, religion, Rene Guenon, river, Shiva, Source, symbolism, symbols, Upanishads, World Axis
13 Comments
The Holiness of Trees
“Trees in particular were mysterious and seemed to me direct embodiments of the incomprehensible meaning of life. For that reason the woods were the place where I felt closest to its deepest meaning and to its awe-inspiring workings.” C.G. Jung, … Continue reading
Posted in trees, Uncategorized
Tagged C.G. Jung, communication, environment, life, nature, Peter Wohlleben, psychology, Soul, symbolism, Tree of Knowledge, Tree of Life, trees
43 Comments
Like the Rainbow on the Waterfall: the Mystical Aura of Consumption
While the fourteenth century was ravaged by the Black Death, the nineteenth century belonged to tuberculosis, or the White Death, a disease much more insidious and widespread. John Keats died of it at the age of twenty-six, and so did … Continue reading
Posted in Tuberculosis
Tagged art, consumption, Davos, death, disease, Edgar AllanPoe, Hans Castorp, illness, John Keats, life, literature, Magic Mountain, myth, Romanticism, sanatorium, symbolism, TB, Thomas Mann, Tuberculosis, White Death
6 Comments
Two Different Kinds of Soul
I. “The dual fate of Heracles after death, dwelling simultaneously on high with the gods and below in Hades, reflects the Greek notion that we have two different kinds of soul. Thymos is warm, emotional and red-blooded; while psyche is … Continue reading
Posted in Psyche
Tagged Ancient Greece, archetypes, death, depth psychology, Dionysus, Greek myth, Greek mythology, Hades, life, Pluto, psukhe, psyche, reality, Soul, symbols, thumos
13 Comments
“Light Breaks Where No Sun Shines” by Dylan Thomas
“Light breaks where no sun shines; Where no sea runs, the waters of the heart Push in their tides; And, broken ghosts with glow-worms in their heads, The things of light File through the flesh where no flesh decks the … Continue reading
Posted in Poetry
Tagged alchemy, archetypes, blood, body, darkness, death, Dylan Thomas, life, light, Light breaks where no sun shines, poetry, rebirth, symbolism, symbols
16 Comments
Dragons and Princesses
Fear of the Inexplicable But fear of the inexplicable has not alone impoverished the existence of the individual; the relationship between one human being and another has also been cramped by it, as though it had been lifted out of … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Fear of the Inexplicable, inspiration, life, poetry, Reiner Maria Rilke
24 Comments
The Fountain or Death as the Road to Awe
The Fountain by Darren Aronofsky is by far the most powerful symbolic movie I have seen in the last few years. Watching it is always like being transported into another reality; the music, the powerful images and the three interwoven … Continue reading
