Been reading a lot of personality theory recently, partly because one book always leads to another, but also because I am currently writing a novel where one of my primary concerns is to create as real a character as I possibly can, I use these books not to create a character, but to understand the character that has already strolled into my head. I also tend to approach much psychology –n- that with scepticism, as there is no squishier, more subjective 'science' than psychology. However these books do tend to provide useful tools and approaches to thinking about people, especially the fictional sort.
At the moment I am reading 'The Stories We Live By – Personal Myths and the Making of the Self' by Dan McAdams. I chose it because I have often used the phrase 'personal mythology' to describe the main focus in my writing. By which, I meant the coherent narrative we make of our lives, and the way our narrative contrasts with other people's, and the narratives people create together. There is a negative element to my conception of the personal myth, the requirements of story can make that myth hide actual reality, and also with everyone being the hero of their own myth, but something else in other people's there are clashes.
This Dan man has a different idea of a personal myth. His theory is that this myth *is* a person's identity. That the core of a person through all of their roles is the person that emerges from this personal myth and the tone, voice and values of the myth are that of a person. He also thinks that to know a person intimately is to know this person's myth. It's an idea I can chime with.
The first part of the book describes how preschool children take images and ideas, that they will later build their myths out of. That these ideas are taken out of context and manipulated in a way an adult doesn't do, because an adult has already gathered and shaped the materials from their own childhood into the creation of the myth.
'This is how preschool children play and, to a certain extent, how they think. They appropriate images from their culture to suit their immediate wishes and desires. They make the image do what they want it to do, even in ways that see strange and illogical to adults.'
He then goes on to provide examples, of Snow White going to flying on a broomstick to the shops to buy a grapefruit to stick on the head of Oz's Wicked Witch of the West and melt her.
I dunno about the rest of you, but my mind works like this. He describes the preschool years as the years of gathering symbols and images to work into the stable life story a person tells about them. I've given myself the name Pica Pica here, the European m->-bleeped-<-ie. The insatiable collector, the constant forager for images, ideas and such to continue feeding in to the matrices of my brain, to feed the fire of my heart and general offal and to push through the sausage machine of my conscious and unconscious till it comes out as whatever it becomes.
I have often seen myself as red-riding hood, wandering the woods picking flowers for grandmother, half-knowing that I will never reach her warmth because there is an even perfect-er flower just over there that I need to pick first.
I always have this feeling that I am incomplete and that I am constantly preparing for something. Part of me thinks that all this busy, busy bumbling will emerge in my writing, that this drive to collect experience and image and such is all unconscious research. Another part of me feels that this creation will never be completed and the collections will never come of anything.
Anyone else have a similar thing? Maybe the non-linear qualities and childlike qualities displayed are because we are forever in this collecting phase of a self story.
The guy also says that children's play changes as children grow because their world views have a huge change from the egocentric to a more objective third person idea.
'(Play) becomes divorced from one's private symbolism. The private image of the moment gives way to the public sequence of public events.'
Not for Pica's it doesn't. Almost everything in life is another thing to codified in my private (and not always conscious) symbolism. All moments are private images...only made as part of a public event by conscious act. I have to translate all the time, as if I were speaking a second language....
Now are these common experiences, or are these ones just me? :)
They're totally you. Maybe you'll be red ridinghood forever. It is just what kids do - collect data until they have a collage of who they'd like to be which ultimately becomes who we are. you're stuck looking for pretty things. you haven't put it all together yet.
tis the way it feels, maybe the collecting is me. it's not you then?
no. my full 'personal myth' is all there and has been for a long time. Everything I am is set.
this 'personal myth' we create for ourselves is not unlike the image NPDs create for themselves. shrinks would have us believe our personal myths are unhealthy. they are not. they are only unhealthy to the NPD whose myth is immutable. our myths while 'set' can grow and adapt to our circumstances.
It is me. I collect everything I can get my hands on, from symbols and pop culture to every subject under the sun to different people and how interesting they are just to watch. I'm insatiably curious and with mad delusions of gaining cosmic power in the long run.
Mina.
This has the ringing of a form of autism. Which is not a bad thing. I am considered a High function Autistic person. Autistic people are often very intelligent. Expressing that can be difficult at times to say the least. So sure, keep up with your writings and make everyday wonderful For you and everyone around you :) Then again I could be wrong. Maybe your a sadistic murderous psycho who likes giving tours - Just kidding - I'm sure your just fine. Your a nice, good person. Right? That's all that really matters
Quote from: Virginia Marie on January 24, 2009, 10:41:26 AM
This has the ringing of a form of autism. Which is not a bad thing. I am considered a High function Autistic person. Autistic people are often very intelligent. Expressing that can be difficult at times to say the least. So sure, keep up with your writings and make everyday wonderful For you and everyone around you :) Then again I could be wrong. Maybe your a sadistic murderous psycho who likes giving tours - Just kidding - I'm sure your just fine. Your a nice, good person. Right? That's all that really matters
Doesn't sound autistic to me.
I did say I could be wrong
Virginia runs to hide
don't worry, from what I remember the sadistic, murderous psycho takes the form of a large, upholstered cushion. ;D
Virginia is still hiding and prob. needs some sleep. Insomnia takes it's toll :laugh:
I am a sponge. I absorb/collect everything. Don't know if that really answers any question or helps at all thoguh.
I always have this feeling that I am incomplete and that I am constantly preparing for something.
I, too, feel like I'm incomplete. I'm just about 40 and feel like I've never grown up. In fact, I have difficult identifying with others my age because they seem so adult to me. My own boss is younter than me, but seems more like an adult figure.
I'm searching for anything that makes sence and I do collect simbols everything in my life is simbolic or pratical or both all of my art is very symbolic I do gether stuff to make sence of who I am so I can relate to some of what you speak of
You guys remind me of 'the collector' from 'everything is illuminated.'
I'm not a collector. In fact I feel distinctly grown up, though definitly I feel that I think in similar ways to a lot of you. I just feel like I have grown in a different direction to most people, like I found a crack in the glasshouse. I can see what's going on in the glasshouse and have my roots in it, but my world is totlaly different on the otherside of the glass.
I just feel that I have built my myth, and while it is still growing I already have the foundation.
Now that I have a child I can see that I am not childlike at all. My 'childlikeness' is really a 'not-like-other-adults-ness". There is a alien componant to it. I can relate somewhat to the logic of chilldren but it is not my logic. I think their logic comes from their minds making sense of limited experience. My logic is based on lots of experience.
I need to do some more thinking on this. I don't know If I totally get what Pica is talking about.
I guess I can't relate to this at all. In my teen years my family went thru a rather unfortunate financial situation and I had to grow up real fast. No time for dreams, just a lot of hard work running the family business (which eventually failed). I feel that this experience has colored me, and I am a relatively serious about most things now.
I do think that it would be cool to be a dreamer, but, alas, its not in the cards for me. One of my daughters is a dreamer, and we encourage that.
Youth is all about searching. I'm glad it's behind me.
If you want to know about the place personal myths have in our lives, you need to read Carl Jung.
I'm not sure I have childlike innocence. Maybe a kind of lack of guile. But not innocence. Not after the things I've witnessed and done.
I'm sticking with my trickster persona.
I do believe that there is something in me that can never mature, but I don't know what it is exactly.
It was more a thought blurge than a constructive idea. Been interesting for me though
It was an interesting blurge and it does seem to have triggered something in a lot of us.
My we are becomming a serious lot lately. I blame Nero ;D
I'm in no way innocent either. Far from it. I am starting to think this childlikeness we describe is really a kind of an unbounded creativity.
No way innocent in what way, Nicky? :)
Quote from: Nero on January 25, 2009, 08:57:42 PM
No way innocent in what way, Nicky? :)
What way would you like?
I don't have much innocence left regarding sex, violence, human nature, mental illness, love, lust, fetish behaviour, bad language, music, sub-culture, substance abuse, slaughter of animals for fun, horror, war, religion, politics.
mmm fetish behavior. what kind? >:-)
What kind do you like :P
I don't have a fetish but I'm not innocent in regard to it's existance.
ah darn. ;D
I think all people use myths and symbols because the World is too complex for anyone to understand, to get a grip on, to control. I don't think we ever outgrow that need. We do not see the world with the same wonder as a two-year old (one of the beauties of having children is the opportunity to re-experience and re-capture some of the wonder). And our belief in Santa Claus, for example, differs, perhaps becoming more sophisticated, than that of a pre-teen.
We learn what it is to be human, and what it is to be a man or a woman from stories. I know I could give a list of some of the books and movies and, later, TV that have shaped my life. One of the things that has happened is I can question the logic within stories, and develop variant endings, sequels and spinoffs. I can see stories and life meet in irony. Pica's initial premise in this thread is tantalizing, and I don't quite know how to respond, but at least this is a place holder.
Mythologically yours,
S
maybe it's more of a purity, not in the saint-like sense (I mean, seriously, I've met you people >:-) HA!), but a purity of mind. Like...hmm...we're more open minded...not exactly the right wording, but something like that.
It's like we still see things in a pure way. We're not naive or anything, but we haven't closed ourselves off. There is an idea out there that children have a sixth sense that we begin to ignore as we get older (like knowing someone is bad just meeting them). It's like we still have that...it's not an obvious thing, but there's something subtle that we have and the only reason we know we have it is because of our wealth of experience. Or something...
"Not-like-other-adults-ness"...I like that, Nicky. I might have to use it... :-*
Quote from: Nero on January 25, 2009, 09:10:26 PM
mmm fetish behavior. what kind? >:-)
I have a fetish. The nape of the neck. I see that back of someone's neck and I want to lick it like a mother cat bathing her kittens :laugh: >:-) :laugh:
Quote from: Pica Pica on January 24, 2009, 09:42:20 AMI have often seen myself as red-riding hood, wandering the woods picking flowers for grandmother, half-knowing that I will never reach her warmth because there is an even perfect-er flower just over there that I need to pick first.
I always have this feeling that I am incomplete and that I am constantly preparing for something. Part of me thinks that all this busy, busy bumbling will emerge in my writing, that this drive to collect experience and image and such is all unconscious research. Another part of me feels that this creation will never be completed and the collections will never come of anything.
A thousand times yes.
My collection will never be complete, even when I am old, wrinkly and wiser than now, but I do feel like all this time spent on discovery will yield great results for myself.
I've always been a person prone to wanting and craving new experiences, to find new and different pieces to add to myself. I've never felt like I would be a 'set' individual and knew that there would be a great deal of self-discovery for the rest of my life, along with a great deal of pain because at times I cannot or do not have the means to reach out and grasp the things I want to experience.
I feel like I had more to say about this but it's late, I should be in bed but I'm troubled by things I can't stop thinking about and am unable to sleep. I'll come back to this if I think of more.
a video 'bout collecting.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHcK_lEjxBQ#noexternalembed (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHcK_lEjxBQ#noexternalembed)
The only thing I've ever collected was NES cartridges.
And stones, which I then proceeded to lose someway or other.
I sometimes like to pick up things on the street, garbage which looks interesting, I've found a bunch of pretty interesting or pretty pretty things, and I always give them to someone.
Quote from: Pica Pica on February 05, 2009, 06:49:11 PM
a video 'bout collecting.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHcK_lEjxBQ#noexternalembed (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHcK_lEjxBQ#noexternalembed)
Not bad. I'm the commenter pretending to be your mother.
Hi Mom!!!! Would you like some garbage? I think it looks pretty good. Don't know why it was thrown out :laugh: >:-) :laugh:
Virginia's humor is a bit off
Quote from: Virginia Marie on January 26, 2009, 03:23:13 AM
Quote from: Nero on January 25, 2009, 09:10:26 PM
mmm fetish behavior. what kind? >:-)
I have a fetish. The nape of the neck. I see that back of someone's neck and I want to lick it like a mother cat bathing her kittens :laugh: >:-) :laugh:
I agree with this. The neck is an incredible erogenous zone if handled properly.
Quote from: Virginia Marie on January 26, 2009, 03:23:13 AM
I have a fetish. The nape of the neck. I see that back of someone's neck and I want to lick it like a mother cat bathing her kittens :laugh: >:-) :laugh:
I can definitely relate to the nape of the neck being extremely sexy too, although I must admit I've never really thought of it as a fetish... nor in a feline context before.
However, since purchasing my new
ESMAG Kitty-KissTM hook-side Velcro Tongue Extender I have truly seen the light! Meow... ;D
I'm buying one