Neurology / myth
The mythic occupies an enormous space in our collective unconscious.
From fairy tales and comic books, to social media and even the way we conceptualize others, without often being named, the mythic is prominent.
I don't think anyone argues against a moderate amount of use-value for myth, as archives of ancient creativity, teaching tools, and even paradigms for self-discovery.
Yet myth, as it is considered by the culture at large both popular and academic, is still relegated, for the most part, to the arena of fiction. Myth is a “lie.”
What is still emerging, and what the Destiny Types course unpacks in real, lived experience, is:
both the deep-rooted, a-priori neurological mechanics behind mythic comprehension
and the indispensability of mythic cognition on the path of self-realization.
Neuroscience was formalized at M.I.T. in 1962.
Yet over the past 60 some odd years, neuroscience has been phenomenally useful in the worlds of medicine, psychiatry, and even meditation.
It is through neuroscience that we know:
The various specialized regions of the brain work cooperatively to receive, synthesize and make practical use of incoming information.
The neocortex does not function in complete isolation from the other brain regions.
The interbrain, the amygdala (autonomic emotional responses), hippocampus (deep memory), and basal ganglia (emotional processing), is not a reflexive leftover from an earlier evolutionary time, but actually delivers critically functional data to the neocortex for total experience and comprehension.
I.e. All parts of the brain work together synergistically. You cannot fully isolate one part from another.
This functionality of the brain becomes critical when we look at myth and how it impacts the human experience.
I believe that self-realization is actually the foundation of the hierarchy of needs.Realizing infinity is not “optional.” So says the Outsider…
But realizing infinity has been amorphous, challenging and rare.
Mantra, breath, body postures, teachers and more have all been used to illicit the infinite experience.
Myth and archetype are also indispensable to this process.
Through symbolism and elementary character archetype, myth first penetrates the amygdala and hippocampus of the interbrain.
The emotion/memory functions of the interbrain release an experience of the primordial.
Through the primordial, one understands what it means to exist beyond space, time, form or concept.
This is how the primordial feeling is a gateway into the eternal experience.
By the fundamental, scientifically established functional mechanics of the brain, these interbrain experiences are re-intergrated into the cognition of the neocortex.
Thus a gnosis (real, deep inner knowing without logic) of infinity is achieved.
Myth and archetype are not ornamental curios of the collegiate humanities department. They are neurologically inseparable from the way that humans interpret the themselves and the world around them.
The Destiny Types course has already completed, but it's not too late to join. We've only just begun to unlock the power of the archetypes.