Joseph Campbell is awful

[benny]

Honestly, I've never read such insufferable prose in all my life. It takes careful deciphering of Campbell's word salads to extract very simple (albeit powerful) lessons about the human journey.

 

He's so pompous and self-indulgent that I actually get angry at him when reading his supposed magnum opus, The Hero With a Thousand Faces. It makes me want to resurrect him so I can punch him in his stupid face and tell him what a god awful writer he is.

 

The end.

[Average Investor]

I finished the whole book and didn't find it all that great. There was a pretty good layout for the heros journey though. I extracted a few good nuggets of wisdom for sure. 

[longusername12345]

Hahaha yeah I never finished that book. 

Pro Tip: If you stop vibing with a book, stop reading it

And paradoxically, I actually enjoyed it. It felt like a confusing labyrinth of words that sometimes takes you to a magical place with a few insights here and there. The main thing to take a way from Joseph Campbell is to follow your bliss. It sounds cheesy but this motherfucker is a badass because he did it. He wanted to study myths and shit all day so he did and he got good success for it but wayyyy more important is that when you watch interviews with him, he has a joyful childlike glow to him and everything he does. It's quite beautiful whether your moral compass (your judger) agrees with him or nah. 

So I mean you could turn this into a learning experience and try for 24 hours to do only that which you enjoy (a challenge proposed by Osho, who is a dude I'm super curious if you'd vibe with). 

But yeah that's my petty 2 cents but man it seems like you wasted a SHITLOAD of time with this Joseph Campbell dude.

[RuthLew]

A very specific book, which I started with size five, if not more. I read it to the end with difficulty.

[longusername12345]

On 7/23/2021 at 4:38 AM, RuthLew said:

A very specific book, which I started with size five, if not more. I read it to the end with difficulty.

Bro i didn't even finish it, its a dense fucking book haha

[Zigzag Idiot]

On 7/7/2021 at 10:07 PM, benny said:

He's so pompous and self-indulgent that I actually get angry at him when reading his supposed magnum opus, The Hero With a Thousand Faces. It makes me want to resurrect him so I can punch him in his stupid face and tell him what a god awful writer he is.

Trust me,

you don’t want to do this.

I had a friend who punched the corpse of another friend of mine over a personal issue and it did not help matters at all.

[RuthLew]

16 hours ago, longusername12345 said:

Bro i didn't even finish it, its a dense fucking book haha

I try to overpower myself in relation to any books. If taken, then read.
 

[AtheisticNonduality]

On 7/27/2021 at 10:37 PM, Zigzag Idiot said:

Trust me,

you don’t want to do this.

I had a friend who punched the corpse of another friend of mine over a personal issue and it did not help matters at all.

Context?

[Osaid]

On 7/27/2021 at 8:37 PM, Zigzag Idiot said:

Trust me,

you don’t want to do this.

I had a friend who punched the corpse of another friend of mine over a personal issue and it did not help matters at all.

Yeah that doesn't seem like a sustainable solution to me either

[RickyFitts]

It's such a scathing review that I'm tempted to check it out, just to see if it really is as hard to decipher as you suggest it is. Doubt I'd make it through a paragraph though.  

[B3N]

I personally love Campbell. For anyone who is interested: I highly recommend reading a bit of Jung first to really get the most out of HwaTF. 

[Jodistrict]

I’m glad to hear somebody agrees with me that Campbell is awful.  I was once in a spiritual men’s group, and everyone was gushing about how wonderful Campbell was and how he has revealed the beauty of metaphor in ancient stories and beliefs.   I asked them if they realized that some of the stories they thought were beautiful involved people actually being sacrificed.  That people were killed.  That those who followed these beliefs didn’t see them as metaphors but as actual fact.   They wouldn’t talk to me anymore.

[Oeaohoo]

Campbell was quite a mediocre thinker but I don't find him to be pompous, he is actually quite down to earth and fatherly. If it was simply the style of writing you didn't like, many of his other books are transcripts of various talks that he gave and are thus less dense and easier to follow. As far as it being hard to decipher, most authors of the past spoke in a more complex language because they were speaking to a better educated audience. You could also try reading a book with a very similar theme and published in the same year called The Origins and History of Consciousness by Erich Neumann. Both suffer from the same problems, however. Like Jung and the other psychoanalysts they contaminate the metaphysical nature of world mythology with the "collective unconscious" and the inverted pantheon of "archetypes", pulling everything down to the human and even subhuman levels.

Still, they could be useful in helping someone escape from the denatured and desecrated postmodern worldview.

2 hours ago, Jodistrict said:

I asked them if they realized that some of the stories they thought were beautiful involved people actually being sacrificed. That people were killed. That those who followed these beliefs didn’t see them as metaphors but as actual fact. They wouldn’t talk to me anymore.

Millions of people today are killed over the most absurd -isms and schisms! I would much rather be sacrificed to Odin than to the false idols of modern ideology. Death and sacrifice must be integrated because they are intrinsic to existence. The real question is: how successfully does a society integrate them? Also, the distinction between metaphor and “actual fact” is a modern one. The idea of an "actual fact" implies the setting up of a supposedly neutral vantage point from which to inspect existence in a purely empirical and detached manner, which only emerged with the methods of modern "science". The people who said Vincit omnia Veritas certainly understood all of this!

[AtheisticNonduality]

@Oeaohoo ????? You again with your Stage Blue undevelopments . . . ???????????? Well, how do I put this? The gods aren't real. They exist archetypically and in the collective unconscious. THEY ARE NOT REAL.

3 hours ago, Oeaohoo said:

Millions of people today are killed over the most absurd -isms and schisms! I would much rather be sacrificed to Odin than to the false idols of modern ideology.

To what modern ideologies are you referring, and how are they more incorrect than mythological beings?

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Death and sacrifice must be integrated because they are intrinsic to existence. The real question is: how successfully does a society integrate them?

Through understanding the gods are not real, at least the gods you refer to. There are beings out there though. And in here.

Quote

Also, the distinction between metaphor and “actual fact” is a modern one. The idea of an "actual fact" implies the setting up of a supposedly neutral vantage point from which to inspect existence in a purely empirical and detached manner, which only emerged with the methods of modern "science". The people who said Vincit omnia Veritas certainly understood all of this!

And you were criticizing postmodernism in this post???? The denial of truth and the modern conception of "actual fact" is a postmodernist obfuscating factor of abstraction with present day rampancy. You are Stage Green parroting the multiplicity and cultural foundations of Stage Blue myths and civilizational ideologies. And how does the modernity of metaphorical and factual actuality become illegitimate through the discovery that it is modern, rather than based in pre-logical absurdity.

[AtheisticNonduality]

6 hours ago, Jodistrict said:

I’m glad to hear somebody agrees with me that Campbell is awful.  I was once in a spiritual men’s group, and everyone was gushing about how wonderful Campbell was and how he has revealed the beauty of metaphor in ancient stories and beliefs.   I asked them if they realized that some of the stories they thought were beautiful involved people actually being sacrificed.  That people were killed.  That those who followed these beliefs didn’t see them as metaphors but as actual fact.   They wouldn’t talk to me anymore.

They serve a function of actual fact for "primitive" people but are metaphorical for modern people, so the archetypes may be misinterpreted by the primitives for sure since they have no need to understand the display their minds are met with.

[Oeaohoo]

9 hours ago, AtheisticNonduality said:

@Oeaohoo ????? You again with your Stage Blue undevelopments . . . ????????????

What “stage” do you reckon yourself? You don’t seem very understanding of alternative perspectives so I would say “stage blue” at best… Don’t facepalm so much or you might give yourself brain damage; if you haven’t got it already, that is!

9 hours ago, AtheisticNonduality said:

Well, how do I put this. The gods aren't real. They exist archetypically and in the collective unconscious. THEY ARE NOT REAL.

I never said the gods were real: the only real thing is God, the rest is just a dream. I only spoke of the “metaphysical nature of world mythology”, by which I mean that mythology was a means for people to understand existence metaphysically, not just to “integrate themselves into society” or “individuate their egos” as Jung and company would have it, to say nothing of it all as a projection of “libido” and “Eros/Thanatos”. Doesn’t mean there can’t be gods within the dream though.

9 hours ago, AtheisticNonduality said:

Through understanding the gods are not real, at least the gods you refer to. There are beings out there though. And in here.

You’re willing to accept that there are other beings, but none of the Gods of the past could possibly have been one of them? Seems like a very biased perspective. Very similar to the argument St. Augustine made against paganism in The City of God; maybe it’s your blue side showing again!

9 hours ago, AtheisticNonduality said:

To what modern ideologies are you referring, and how are they more incorrect than mythological beings?

Do I really need to to do this? It seems so obvious. Fascism, communism, liberal democracy, and all their multifarious permutations, when it isn’t just a matter of brute power and finance. They are more incorrect because they lack a metaphysical component, except occasionally as a peculiar inverted parody of true metaphysics (like the Marxist historiography of “progress” or the Fascist exaltation of the State as a sort of god).

9 hours ago, AtheisticNonduality said:

And you were criticizing postmodernism in this post???? The denial of truth and the modern conception of "actual fact" is a postmodernist obfuscating factor of abstraction with present day rampancy. You are Stage Green parroting the multiplicity and cultural foundations of Stage Blue myths and civilizational ideologies. And how does the modernity of metaphorical and factual actuality become illegitimate through the discovery that it is modern, rather than based in pre-logical absurdity.

I was simply pointing out that the distinction between actual fact and metaphor was not nearly as tightly defined in the past. For example, Roman history showed very little regard for what “actually happened” except as a means to interpret and motivate action in the present.

Your mentioning of postmodernism highlights the confusion that I see as being rampant in these spaces. There is a similarity between the traditional (I don’t mean this in the merely conformist sense) view of the world and postmodernism but only because the latter is a radical negation of the former.

God contains all distinctions and thus all distinctions dissolve in God; postmodernism denies all distinctions and thus are there no distinctions in postmodernism. They look similar but they are absolutely antithetical, in the same way that early morning is close to late evening on a clock face!

Edited June 6, 2022 by Oeaohoo

[AtheisticNonduality]

14 hours ago, Oeaohoo said:

What “stage” do you reckon yourself? You don’t seem very understanding of alternative perspectives so I would say “stage blue” at best… Don’t facepalm so much or you might give yourself brain damage; if you haven’t got it already, that is!

You are Stage Green that has unhealthily integrated Blue due to your copious multifariousness of mind, whereas I have different lines developed in multiplicitous fashion; however I could surmise it like this: I have attained "Indigo" transpersonal waves, have a sense of Turquoise as a whole force of one's perception, though am often lost in Teal systematizations. I also have properly integrated Green understanding of other perspectives (while not pathologically worshipping them and refusing to hierarchize them competently), an Orange success / objective achievement as a drive, a Blue deontology, a Red aggressiveness, and a Purple fascination with lost aspects of reality and occult backgrounds. Facepalming does not induce brain damage, but the act, the cause which spawns the effect of the facepalm, also causes facepalming. This means facepalming and brain damage are siblings, both under the creation of reading your posts.

Quote

I never said the gods were real: the only real thing is God, the rest is just a dream. I only spoke of the “metaphysical nature of world mythology”, by which I mean that mythology was a means for people to understand existence metaphysically, not just to “integrate themselves into society” or “individuate their egos” as Jung and company would have it, to say nothing of it all as a projection of “libido” and “Eros/Thanatos”. Doesn’t mean there can’t be gods within the dream though.

The metaphysicality of it was purely a conscious elaboration; the individuation of their egos had unconscious elements to it. It also did integrate them into societies. These are actions that actually happened, even if the unconsciousness of more primitive peoples would not allow for it. Also, there are no gods.

Quote

You’re willing to accept that there are other beings, but none of the Gods of the past could possibly have been one of them? Seems like a very biased perspective. Very similar to the argument St. Augustine made against paganism in The City of God; maybe it’s your blue side showing again!

There are beings out there and in here, but none of them are gods. It's strange you can't understand this; wait, actually it's not. I apologize. Actually. Not sarcastically. Really.

Quote

Do I really need to to do this? It seems so obvious. Fascism, communism, liberal democracy, and all their multifarious permutations, when it isn’t just a matter of brute power and finance. They are more incorrect because they lack a metaphysical component, except occasionally as a peculiar inverted parody of true metaphysics (like the Marxist historiography of “progress” or the Fascist exaltation of the State as a sort of god).

Fascism, communism, liberal democracy, their variants, and brute power / finance are all superior to tribal warfare and imperial / dynastic / kingly battles in ancient or medieval times. This is just silly.

Quote

I was simply pointing out that the distinction between actual fact and metaphor was not nearly as tightly defined in the past. For example, Roman history showed very little regard for what “actually happened” except as a means to interpret and motivate action in the present.

So you were pointing it out for literally no reason, or for its own sake, rather than for cogency. This is unhealthy worship of false / less true perspectives.

Quote

Your mentioning of postmodernism highlights the confusion that I see as being rampant in these spaces. There is a similarity between the traditional (I don’t mean this in the merely conformist sense) view of the world and postmodernism but only because the latter is a radical negation of the former.

No, one is before modern and the other is after. That is their similarity. Their similarity does not arise as their difference because that is contradictory hogwash; their similarity and difference show up together because all things have similarities and differences. However, there is not a useful connection to be made here, except the one that you are a postmodernist parroting pre-modern beliefs because you are against modernity, which is based on similarity rather than the differentiation, abstracted from the similarly positioned differences as structures, postmodernism made.

Quote

God contains all distinctions and thus all distinctions dissolve in God; postmodernism denies all distinctions and thus are there no distinctions in postmodernism. They look similar but they are absolutely antithetical, in the same way that early morning is close to late evening on a clock face!

You are a postmodernist.

Edited June 6, 2022 by AtheisticNonduality

[Loba]

@AtheisticNonduality Is that unjustified bitchiness I smell?  How very projecting of you to be exactly the thing you describe someone else as.  You have a shadow of being a bit of a know it all.  I would look into that, blue boy.

Edited June 7, 2022 by Loba
Called me out for behaviour they commit - just wanted to point that out and see if they're smart enough to make a correction or not. Probably not.

[thisintegrated]

On 06/06/2022 at 0:15 AM, AtheisticNonduality said:

????? You again with your Stage Blue undevelopments . . . ???????????? Well, how do I put this? The gods aren't real. They exist archetypically and in the collective unconscious. THEY ARE NOT REAL.

Wait.. is that a @thisintegrated reference?  I swear this is exactly what you'd say if you were trying to mimic me?

Also.. ???

 

1 hour ago, AtheisticNonduality said:

have attained "Indigo" transpersonal waves, have a sense of Turquoise as a whole force of one's perception, though am often lost in Teal systematizations. I also have properly integrated Green understanding of other perspectives (while not pathologically worshipping them and refusing to hierarchize them competently), an Orange success / objective achievement as a drive, a Blue deontology, a Red aggressiveness, and a Purple fascination with lost aspects of reality and occult backgrounds. Facepalming does not induce brain damage, but the act, the cause which spawns the effect of the facepalm, also causes facepalming. This means facepalming and brain damage are siblings, both under the creation of reading your posts.

There are no real examples of anything above Turquoise.  Ken's chart should be taken with a grain of salt.  He's only like Low-Mid-Turquoise himself.  Jesus/Buddha/Ghandi weren't even Low-Turquoise.  They were like Green new-agers with bipolar.  Jesus had some serious fucking anger issue, from what I hear.  And Ghandi was a child molestor.

Would you say you're somewhere within Turquoise, in SD?

 

 

 

Edit:

5 minutes ago, AtheisticNonduality said:

 

Oh OH !! I know this one !!

CARL!!

Edited June 7, 2022 by thisintegrated

[AtheisticNonduality]

4 minutes ago, Loba said:

@AtheisticNonduality Is that unjustified bitchiness I smell?  How very projecting of you to be exactly the thing you describe someone else as.  You have a shadow of being a bit of a know it all.  I would look into that, blue boy.

 I thought I was supposed to be blocked!!!!!!!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! 

But it's okay. Anyway, I don't have anything against you. It's just that your style of communication can rub people the wrong way, meaning it's not coincidental that you have people arguing with you incessantly. You're an interesting person.