When you know the myths, you don’t even have to know everything to see how they are still played out today in human behaviour. Take Amiel’s life for example:
The mother of his children gave birth to them, but she has turned into the Devouring Mother. She has been so protective towards them that she saw their father as a threat and moved heaven and earth to push him out of their life.
Amiel, as the male, had to leave the marriage in order to keep his self- worth intact and rescue his role as a father. Had he stayed he would have been trampled on in every way except physically, which would have left him as a shell of a Man and even less of a father figure.
Amiel’s second wife, Heidi, is also a mother (though not of his children). The father of her children was dominating, manipulative and violent, the Tyrannical and Toxic Male. She, as the female, had to stay to protect the children by first tolerating intolerable behaviour towards her knowing that the best way to keep them safe was to stay until they were old enough for her to leave safely while still allowing them to be with their father without her. Even though this was partly forced upon her it still takes inner strength to go through with it. It also resulted in her realizing that the best way to protect her girls was teaching them how to protect themselves.
Heidi’s girls come from an extended home environment of strong females who learned to survive in an environment that was very much formed and set by males (that is how I see growing up in Australia, particularly Qld!). It was a constant navigating a male world, problem solving in the best interest of the children, yet still coming out on top; femininity intact and a deep sense of who they are as a person.
Susan, mother of Amiel’s children, comes from a so called cultured family environment, populated with university educated characters; doctors, scientist, successful businessmen and the like. The women were ‘taken care of’; they didn’t need to go out to work. They could spend the money their men folk made. These women became the opposite number of the toxic male; they became the Toxic Females and Devouring Mothers. These are the Archetypes.
