On this episode, Michael Meade revives two ancient myths about the origins of death in order to consider the core mysteries of life on earth. “Little deaths occur throughout the course of life; attending to them and learning from them adds to the vitality of one's own soul, but also to the vitality of the world. The presence of death is a tactic of life, and a little death is needed whenever life would grow greater.
The world is a mystery trying to be revealed. How we solve the mystery of the world and how we solve the mystery of our own lives matters. And each matters more at the end of an era, when all aspects of life and come into question. It's as if we need an ecology of both life and death in order to help sustain the delicate balance that allows both great nature and human culture to continue.”
Thank you for listening to and supporting Living Myth. You can further support this podcast by becoming a member of Living Myth Premium. Members receive bonus episodes each month, access to the full archives of over 430 episodes and a 30% discount on all events, courses and book and audio titles.
Learn more and join this community of listeners at patreon.com/livingmyth.
As always, we appreciate you leaving a review wherever you listen to this podcast and sharing it with your friends. On behalf of Michael Meade and the whole Mosaic staff, we wish you well during this challenging and uncertain times and thank you for your support of our work.
This episode of Living Myth begins with the fragmentation and breakdown of political parties and social lives currently happening in countries around the world. Michael Meade then takes the issues of upheaval in both nature and human culture to the deeper levels of psyche and soul where archetypal energies of transformation and healing try to enter the world though each of us.
In accepting that we are in the midst of a great turnaround that involves a shift of the underlying archetypes of life, we become more able to tolerate and understand the tragic events that threaten both nature and human culture. The question becomes whether the pattern of collapse and renewal takes place simply through the raw energies of the unconscious or does a transformation of life on earth develop with the conscious awareness and assistance of people living at this time.
Thank you for listening to and supporting Living Myth. You can hear Michael Meade live by joining his new online series “Finding Stories to Live With” that begins on Thursday, July 21. Register and learn more at mosaicvoices.org/events.
You can save 30% on this series and further support the podcast by becoming a member of Living Myth Premium. Members receive bonus episodes each month, access to the full archives of over 430 episodes and a 30% discount on all events, courses and book and audio titles.
Learn more and join this growing community of listeners at patreon.com/livingmyth.
As always, we appreciate you leaving a review on wherever you listen to this podcast and sharing it with your friends. On behalf of Michael Meade and the whole Mosaic staff, we wish you well during this challenging and uncertain times and thank you for your support of our work.
On this episode, Michael Meade draws upon a story about the fall of the earth into darkness that is thousands of years old, yet strangely parallels and can help illuminate the worldwide crises that currently trouble all of our lives. Churning the Milk Ocean is a vast myth depicting how beauty, meaning and wisdom become drained from the world as all levels of life become more divided and chaotic.
The story focuses upon two important things that become lost and cause the earth to diminish and the world to grow dark. On one hand Lakshmi, the goddess of wisdom, beauty and abundance has disappeared from the earth. On the other hand, “amrit,” the eternal elixir and source of all healing has fallen to the bottom of the ocean of existence.
Churning the ocean is a surprising tale of lost and found on a cosmological scale, intended to remind us how the most important things can disappear, yet not be completely lost. It is an eternal drama in which only a strange cooperation between the opposing forces of dark and light can bring back the lost powers of creation and the medicine needed to sustain both nature and culture.
It's a grand tale about the struggle between the forces of dark and light at a cosmic level. It involves a pantheon of ancient gods and a horde of demons, as all levels of life become caught in a struggle to find again, and sustain, the balance of creation.
Thank you for listening to and supporting Living Myth. You can hear Michael Meade live by joining his new online series “Finding Stories to Live With” that begins on Thursday, July 21.
Register and learn more at mosaicvoices.org/events.
You can save 30% on this series and further support the podcast by becoming a member of Living Myth Premium. Members receive bonus episodes each month, access to the full archives of over 430 episodes and a 30% discount on all events, courses and book and audio titles.
Learn more and join this growing community of listeners at patreon.com/livingmyth.
As always, we appreciate you leaving a review on wherever you listen to this podcast and sharing it with your friends. On behalf of Michael Meade and the whole Mosaic staff, we wish you well during this challenging and uncertain times and thank you for your support of our work.
This replay of a popular episode of Living Myth begins with a consideration of how contemporary patterns of polarization can lead people to feel discouraged and defeated when it comes to meaningful change. Although “the twin offspring of this age of polarization may be radical uncertainty and rampant absolutism,” Michael Meade approaches the problem, not by trying to reduce it, but by making it bigger in order to better understand it.
“Back at the beginning of creation, the original polarization was between cosmos and chaos. And in some sense, each occasion of polarization is connected to that original tension of opposites. Understanding it at any level requires understanding it at that original level. Rather than seeming like the impending end of life, the tension of opposites secretly hints at a hidden third that not only relieves the tension but also renews life at a meaningful level.”
The hidden third or middle way that can shift the tension of opposites to a creative level is not the same as notions of a middle path that avoids excess and extremes by following reason and moderation in all things. Nor is it simply the path of negotiation, bi-partisanship and compromise. The old imagination of a middle way involves a living center, a moving middle and golden mean that can loosen the restrictions of time and place and opens us to moments of wholeness and renewal.
“While the two poles of a polarity may seem to be irreconcilable opposites, they are secretly parts of a hidden unity. Existence itself is an essential unity appearing as a duality, and thus genuine change and transformation are the secret aims of the tensions inside the opposites and inside life itself.”
Thank you for listening to and supporting Living Myth. You can hear Michael Meade live by joining his new online series “Finding Stories to Live With” that begins on Thursday, July 21. Register and learn more at mosaicvoices.org/events.
You can save 30% on this series and further support the podcast by becoming a member of Living Myth Premium. Members receive bonus episodes each month, access to the full archives of over 425 episodes and a 30% discount on all events, courses and book and audio titles.
Learn more and join this growing community of listeners at patreon.com/livingmyth.
As always, we appreciate you leaving a review on wherever you listen to this podcast and sharing it with your friends. On behalf of Michael Meade and the whole Mosaic staff, we wish you well during this challenging and uncertain times and thank you for your support of our work.