As my inaugural blog for my author website, I brainstormed a list of possible topics under the theme of self-help and personal success. The one that jumped out at me, perhaps in an anticlimactic fashion, was all about ancient Greek characters–posing the question, which one have YOU been? (Or feel like you are presently?)
Yes, seemingly anticlimactic, because I am first and foremost a non-fiction writer. But those who have seen my writing know that I occasionally like to intertwine fictional examples from pop culture and the mythos of way, wayyy back, to keep it more light-hearted and engaging. My daughters love reading Rick Riordan books (Percy Jackson and the Olympians), and I admit that I’ve read some of them too. So let’s see what kind of characters of ancient Greek myth may resonate with some, and give you cause to reflect on past trials and tribulations.
Sisyphus
Seriously, who did you think I was going to start with?? The epitome of futility. When you just know that you need to abandon that task of pushing a metaphorical rock up a hill, but you can’t hesitate lest you feel that it will come crashing down on you. This fine fellow is masochism personified; I hope your moments in feeling like him have been minimal. (If you’ve seen Fargo season 3, you might have felt the angst of a certain character within…but I won’t spoil that if you haven’t.)
Some of you may have heard of “The Myth of Sisyphus” written by the twentieth century French philosopher Albert Camus. This is looking at it through a rather extreme lens, though; Camus contemplates the futility of existence by using Sisyphus as a metaphor where he keeps pushing but the universe doesn’t respond. So let’s dilute that just a tad, and say that we as humans need recognition for our tasks (not just money), and it doesn’t have to be from “the universe” but from other humans.
So what do you do, or what should you have done, when you felt like Sisyphus? Once you realize that it’s a hopeless case, your best approach would be to gradually move downwards with the “boulder”, until you’re at the bottom of the hill, and then get the hell away. Dare I say that you might feel, ahem, bolder afterwards… somewhat ironically. Sunk cost fallacy, I banish thee too.
Cassandra
Another not-so-shining example of condemnation; in this case, the curse of not being believed. Did you ever have one of those moments where you were SURE that you had the right answer to something, or that a decided course of action was very ill-advised – you just KNEW, in your gut and in your soul, that it was condemned to fail yet you were condemned to the whims of skeptics? The old adage of “speaking truth to power” that persists now and then in certain cultures and contexts may snap to mind here.
The original Cassandra was a Trojan princess who ran afoul of Apollo, who revenged himself by ordaining that her prophecies should never be believed. So when she predicted the fall of Troy and the death of Agamemnon, nobody believed her.
In my book Diamond Min(e)d, I mention the example of Harry Markopolos, an American former securities industry executive and a forensic accounting and financial fraud investigator ,who was condemned to not be believed after reporting irregularities in the dealings of…none other than Bernie Madoff. His bestselling book is aptly titled No One Would Listen. He was in essence a modern-day Cassandra. Regrettably, many a whistleblower has been vilified as such, as being a “jealous vindictive whiner” or whatever dismissive label, when going up against a charlatan authority.
Prometheus
Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you wanted to illuminate the minds of many, but you were in a siloed or constrained type of culture that would forbid it? The ancient figure Prometheus was
a Titan who defied the gods by stealing fire from them; he was a supreme trickster (like the Norse god Loki) who was also given the task of “moulding mankind out of clay”. But he went too far, in his desire to bring fire to the masses, and his punishment was being bound with chains and having an eagle eat his immortal (and regrowing) liver every night. Pretty revolting stuff. I think we can leave that part out of any analogy/anecdote you may have.
Prometheus is generally regarded as a hero, for being defiant, almost a sort of vanguard against the status quo. So perhaps you have felt you wanted to be like him at some point, or you actually were like him, and may have suffered a setback – or, more hopefully, you were more fortunate than him and your efforts were applauded in the end.
Theseus
Have you ever felt that you were navigating a labyrinth of some sort? Like a very Byzantine bureaucracy? And maybe some horrible beast reared its ugly head at some point?
Well, metaphorically, you experienced what our mythological friend Theseus went through. He entered the labyrinth, rescued prisoners, and slew the Minotaur.
To extend the personification further, if you’ve ever had to retrace your steps on something…be it a decision that went south, or web editing, or reverting steps in an experiment, you may have wished that you’d documented your steps, like a “breadcrumbs trail”. Just like Theseus who unraveled a magical ball of red string from the moment he entered the labyrinth, so that he’d know which way he traversed thus far. So, always take care to have a string or breadcrumbs so that you don’t end up spinning your wheels or getting into panic mode.
Icarus
Well, hopefully you’ve never been in his shoes…or his wings, so to speak, stuck together with wax that melted when he flew too close to the sun. In a metaphorical sense, you may have felt yourself soaring in your career, but then reached a point where you felt like your wings were coming off and you were headed for a fall. (I guess that might be best described as burnout, not necessarily a calamity that befell you and the organization.) More facetiously, the management guru Peter Drucker was quoted as saying, “Every individual rises to his or her level of incompetence.” This came to be known as the Peter principle.
That’s about it for now! I will just mention that in Diamond Min(e)d, you’ll find one powerful Greek myth reference: in chapter 4 (The Dance Between Analogy and Anecdote), there’s “Plato’s chariot”, which has two horses, one symbolizing reason and restraint, and the other one passion and irrational desires.
Please contact me and ask what other topics you’d like me to blog on. And please avail yourself of my sign-up form for my quarterly newsletter to be released on May 31st, so stay tuned…
Thanks for sharing. Amusing stories and interesting interpretations.
In the end, Camus concluded that one must find meaning in the absurd (there is actually a branch of philosophy called “absurdism” – life is absurd). Someone sent me this quote when a certain project at work got cancelled and I felt like Sisyphus (only I didn’t know it) – from Camus:
I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain. One always finds one’s burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night-filled mountain, in itself, forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.