The call to adventure is the task or quest that the hero has to achieve. Every hero has companions and supernatural guides that help them along their journey with information, weapons, or magical happenings. The initiation comes next where they enter a new world and is their first challenge during the long journey to come. Soon after they usually have more obstacles or courses that they have to face up until the final battle which is the biggest challenge of them all. Once the final battle is over they continue to a transformation into a new and usually better person then they were before, where the death and rebirth come in returning home to their family and friends with a boon, or a gift. The hero journey is very cyclical and can happen more then once before it is finally over.

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Definitions of Words

A myth is a story of how or why something is what it is. There are different stories for different cultures on why and how things became to be the way they are. One example of a myth like this is Pandora's Box, in this myth it explains why we have bad things and diseases in the world.

A hero is a founder of something new and is unique and always have a major flaw. Also hero's usually have a boon, or gift, to bring home with them. Hercules is a good example for hero because he saves many people but also has a bad temper.

The hero journey includes a call to adventure, some companions and super natural guides, the initiation, the road of trials, battles, and obstacles, the final battle, the transformation, death/rebirth, and finally the boon.

Universal is representative of everyman. "one-size-fits-all". Stories of creation are universally known, every culture has its own image of the myths known around the world.

Archetype is the original model of something, or some idea, like the creation myths of the egg, the void or the water. In the Chinese myth of the egg splitting into earth and sky.

Cyclical is a recurring cycle of something. The hero journey is very cyclical because it is repetitive and the cycle keeps going.

Duality is separation in place of oneness, light = heaven, dark = earth, black and white, male and female. In the Greek myths there are the heaven and the underworld, light and dark.

Creation is the beginning of life, limitless expanse, the egg, the water, and the void are some examples of creation myths.

Life from Death is like gods, man, animals, sacrificial. in the Chinese myth Pan Gu's death results in the creation of the world.

Matriarchal means mother rules and the foundation of female power such as mother earth. The Greek myth of Rhea is one example of matriarchal myth because she outsmarted Cronus when Zeus was born.

Patriarchal means father rules and the foundation of male power such as father sky. A very patriarchal myth is the Egyptian myth of Osiris and Isis.

Sacrifice means something is being given up for the greater god.

Interp on Demeter,Persephone, and Hades

The Tale of Demeter and Persephone

“This story is told only in a very early poem, one of the earliest of the Homeric Hymns, dating from the eighth or the beginning of the seventh century. The original has the marks of early Greek poetry, great simplicity and directness and delight in the beautiful world.”

Demeter is the mother of Persephone, the goddess of spring and beginning. She was young and innocent when Hades, the god of the underworld, took her away from Demeter. He took her down into his layer and raped her. Persephone stayed there for months on end. Demeter was so depressed, everything died with out the happiness of Demeter and Persephone. Finally Zeus has Hermes, the messenger god, go down to Hades and get Persephone back, before Persephone left she ate a pomegranate seed. After eating the seed she realized that she was trapped. Hades says that now every year she has to come down for four months and stay with him. This is what we call winter season, when everything dies.

There are three levels of interpretation while reading a myth. Natural, social, psychological levels. Natural is all about the physical meaning, the way the myth ties into the world you live in. Social is about community and how it ties into the way your community and it’s values, and finally the psychological level, the way that it links to you personally. The spiritual and personal levels that you have to do with the psychological levels.