Tag: archetypes

The Poop And The Magician, Archetypes and You

Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
The Poop And The Magician, Archetypes and You
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Over the past couple of months, we’ve been talking a lot about archetypes and how you can use them in writing and life, but we’ve failed to discuss where all this talk stems from. 

It’s all from Carl Jung who is an old, dead, psychology pioneer who didn’t agree with another old dead guy, Sigmund Freud. 

Jung was about the ‘collective unconsciousness.’ And he thought that in humanity’s collective unconsciousness there were basically twelve archetypes of character. We define this in our last podcast and this week, we’re finishing up with those twelve archetypes as they relate to finding poop in your driveway because we’re weird like that. 

THE REMAINING ARCHETYPES!

7. The Magician

It’s all about growing and evolving but the crankier magicians are not revolutionaries who lift up others. Instead, they are cranky buttfaces who turn positives into negatives and their attitude is contagious. A magician will see poop in the driveway and potentially think of a way to make it an energy source that will reduce carbon emissions. Or they might just tweet, “Poop in driveway. Angst. Everything completely sucks. What is the point? 

8. The Hero

Ah. Power. The hero likes it. The hero is vital and all about battling for honor or power. They do not like to lose. They do not give up. They find that poop and loft it at the doghouse of the enemy. They tweet a photo of poop smeared, “I protect my own. Consider yourself warned.” 

They then make a neighborhood watch for pooping dogs, create some HOA rules, call the police, and try to control the situation with some outdoor spy cameras. Remember. They do not lose. They like to control situations. They can sometimes be a little too controlling and ambitious. 

9. The Rebel

There is poop in the rebel’s driveway. They probably put it there. They don’t care if people have opinions about this poop. They should all mind their own business and stop pressuring the rebel. 

The rebel does not use social media because social media is all about other people’s opinions and the rebel could care less. Poop is definitely in their driveway and the rebel does not care. 

10. The Lover

Poop? Poop is in the lover’s driveway? But the lover is all about love and loving others and feeling loved and this? This poop is not pleasing. It is not about love. It is a blob of yuck. 

The lover cries and tweets and asks for uplifting sayings and photos. People send memes and photos of their kittens. One comes and takes care of the poop for them. The lover feels #blessed. 

11. The Jester

POOP! OMG! Poop is in the driveway! Hahahahaha! The jester gets the joke. And the joke isn’t just poop. It’s life. Crap happens. You might as well make it funny. 

The jester tweets something terribly lewd about the poop. They get Twitter banned for a day. The next day they do it again and start a 120-day spree of poop tweets. It goes viral. They get a podcast. 

12. The Orphan

Our last one is so sad. It is the orphan. The orphan is already a sad little human who feels like they are basically a walking wound. And here? Here is someone putting poop on their wound. Well, really on their driveway, but it’s kind of the same thing, isn’t it? It’s all about disappointment and betrayal and hurt and pain.

The orphan quickly manipulates all of Twitter into a GoFundMe to help them survive the trauma of the dog poop. They ask someone else to set up and be in charge of this Twitter so they can maintain their innocent brand. 

Since this is the 564th GoFundMe they’ve been a part of in the last four months, they only raise four dollars. The innocent is disappointed that nobody is helping or taking charge of their life. They go out and poop on their driveway themselves again. Maybe this time it will work? The orphan hopes so. 

Writing Tip of the Pod

Be original in your writing. Hook into those archetypes, but don’t have your characters just be an archetype.

Dog Tip For Life

Don’t stop moving. Live your life now while you have one.

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

Continue reading “The Poop And The Magician, Archetypes and You”

Poop, Hate, Dentists, Flavored Booze and Jungian Archetypes

Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Poop, Hate, Dentists, Flavored Booze and Jungian Archetypes
/

Over the past couple of months, we’ve been talking a lot about archetypes and how you can use them in writing and life, but we’ve failed to discuss where all this talk stems from. 

It’s all from Carl Jung who is an old, dead, psychology pioneer who didn’t agree with another old dead guy, Sigmund Freud. 

Jung was about the ‘collective unconsciousness.’ And he thought that in humanity’s collective unconsciousness there were basically twelve archetypes of character. It’s like if we are all part of a video game and the programmer only made twelve basic characters. 

According to “Exploring Your Mind,” 

To define his 12 archetypes of personality, Jung studied the symbols and myths of many different cultures. These archetypes represent behavior patterns that make up different ways of being. They’re also cultural symbols and images that exist in the collective unconscious.

He defined the 12 Jungian archetypes as an innate tendency to generate images with intense emotional meaning that express the relational primacy of human life. They’re imprints that are buried in our unconscious. These terms define the particular traits that we all have.

Exploring Your Mind

So here’s the basic rundown of those twelve as related to poop found in the middle of the driveway because how else can you take a new spin on this? Every single psych major has blogged about archetypes. We’re going to do the first six in this podcast and the next six next week. Cool right? It’s like a cliffhanger. 

Let’s start. Get ready for poop talk.

The Sage

It’s all about being smart and thinking. If someone poops, the sage is going to want to examine the poop, analyze the poop, and probably create a witty yet analytical tweet about the poop.

The Innocent

The innocent is optimistic that the poop randomly sitting in the middle of their driveway is meant for good. They will be happy that someone was capable of pooping out in the open like that. They will tweet about the goodness of pleasing others and possibly create a self-help book about poop or at least look for one which they will not download illegally but instead buy from a nice local independent bookstore. They might even put up a sign that says, “Feel free to come inside and use the bathroom next time, but no judgement.” 

The Explorer

This person is all about adventure and new things. They see the poop on the driveway and think, “Maybe I should try this.” They tweet asking people about the strangest places they’ve pooped. They are unsatisfied with their own pooping experiences and now on the quest for the perfect poop place. They create an entirely new profile about it and call it “POOPING INTO THE UNKNOWN.” They immediately have 2.5 million followers. 

The Ruler/Tyrant

The ruler leads. The poop is disorder. It is on their driveway! This is unstable. This is totally not excellent. The ruler calls a minion to remove the poop and immediately tweets, “Listen. To. Me. Whoever pooped on my driveway, the most amazing driveway anywhere ever, is totally going to pay.” 

The Creator/Artist

So, yeah. They see the poop. They want to transform the poop. They make an art piece about it. They tweet a joke. They think about making an art piece for longer time than they spend actually creating it. Eventually, they remove the poop but only after taking and posting images of its decay for 365 days. The New York Times ends up featuring it on its art page and declaring it’s symbolic of the state of the country. 

The Caregiver/Martyr

The caregiver is all about big feelings and love. The caregiver sees the poop in their driveway and wants to keep everyone else from being traumatized by the poop. They quickly clean up the poop, spray the entire driveway with bleach so nobody can get sick. They have sacrificed their entire Saturday morning keeping everyone safe. They do not tweet directly about the poop but instead say something like, “It’s so hard to keep those you love safe in this word of defecation, but you just have to keep doing it. Be kind and be sanitary, loved ones. I am rooting for you.” 

Writing Tip of the Pod

It’s okay to take regurgitated crap and put a new spin on it. But also think about how your characters would react to things, not just how you react to things. 

Dog Tip for Life

Poop happens. How you react to that poop is up to you. 

Random Thought

To hear about the dentist, flavored alcohol and hate-videos, you have to listen to our podcast and the opening random thought section.

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

WHERE TO FIND OUR PODCAST, DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE.

The podcast link if you don’t see it above. Plus, it’s everywhere like Apple Music, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, and more. Just google, “DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE” then like and subscribe.

Join the 251,000 people who have downloaded episodes and marveled at our raw weirdness. You can subscribe pretty much anywhere.

LAST WEEK’S EPISODE about slug bait, sages and archetypes. 

Last week’s bonus podcast with Jessica Burkhart! 

A link to our podcast about fatal errors, scenes, and ghost reaper sauce

COME WRITE WITH ME! 

I coach, have a class, and edit things. Find out more here. 

NEW BOOK OF AWESOME- THE PLACES WE HIDE

I have a new book out!!!!!! It’s an adult mystery set in the town where we live, which is Bar Harbor, Maine. You can order it here. And you totally should. 

And if you click through to this link, you can read the first chapter! 

And click here to learn about the book’s inspiration and what I learned about myself when I was writing it.

Slug Bait Or Sage

Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Slug Bait Or Sage
/

The Sage

It’s not the herb; it’s the archetype in writing and maybe in life, although they don’t seem all that common in the real world. Super common in the tarot and astrology and numerology emails Carrie gets. 

So, what’s a sage? It’s a smarty pants. But it’s also a bit more. 

According to the individualogist.com,

“Unlike other archetypes, the Sage archetype’s education doesn’t cease after graduation. They’re constantly applying themselves and enriching themselves throughout their entire lives.

“What drives the Sage archetype is their goal of knowing the truth behind everything. For that reason, majority of the conversations that they have revolve around their questions. This can be disadvantageous for them as they’ll take any form of misinformation as a form of deception. With that being said, they take lies very personally and feel emotionally affected when they discover that what they learned or believed in turns out to be wrong.”

 individualogist.com

According to a page on Masterclass, the sage is: 

“A wise figure with knowledge for those who inquire. The mother figure or mentor is often based on this archetype.”

Masterclass

They are smart, curious; they learn their whole life, use their intuition and are sort of addicted to information.

Weakness: These people think they know more than the rest of us and they often do and that makes them stubborn in their ideas and a little condescending sometimes. 

Their challenges? According to the individualogist again,

“The Sage archetype needs to confront their fear and hatred for ignorance. It’s important for this archetype to realize that not everyone is able to learn at the pace and with the passion that they possess…. The Sage archetype needs to exercise humility and alter their perceptions of people in general.”

They are bit slow to act. 

The Masterclass site gives examples as:  “Athena (The Odyssey), Obi-Wan Kenobi (Star Wars), Hannibal Lecter (The Silence of the Lambs), The Oracle (The Matrix).”

Do you have a Hannibal in your life?

WRITING TIP OF THE POD:

Use the familiarity of archetypes or subvert them to draw your reader into your story.

DOG TIP FOR LIFE: 

Don’t be a condescending bastard. 

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

Continue reading “Slug Bait Or Sage”

Creators, Dirty Feet, and Archetypes

Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Creators, Dirty Feet, and Archetypes
/

For the past few weeks, we’ve been talking about writing archetypes for our characters and how they also apply to the real life humans we used to meet and interact with before Covid-19.

There are lists out there all over the place about this. Most have slight variations on the number of archetypes or the names of the archetypes. 

Oh! If you haven’t heard in our past episodes, an archetype is according to MasterClass:  

An archetype is an emotion, character type, or event that is notably recurrent across the human experience. In the arts, an archetype creates an immediate sense of familiarity, allowing an audience member to relate to an event or character without having to necessarily ponder why they relate. Thanks to our instincts and life experiences, we’re able to recognize archetypes without any need for explanation.

MasterClass People

Last week we talked about the seducers, the week before we talked about the misfits and mavericks. This week, we’re going easy on you with the creator. 

According to MasterClass, the creator is, “A motivated visionary who creates art or structures during the narrative.”

They make things! Like writers! They usually have willpower. They are sometimes self-involved. Or they suck at practical things. 

Over on ArielHudnel.com, it says (all bold their emphasis), 

“Also known as the artist, innovator, inventor, architect, musician, and dreamer, the Creator is solely focused on examining the boundaries or our reality and perception. As a character, they often take the position of the well-meaning scientist, or savant artist.

The Creator carries an inexhaustible imagination, often excelling at their chosen vocation. When presenting as a mortal character in a reality-based world, he is often portrayed as a man ahead of his time. There are often better examples of this archetype in the real world (Galileo, Einstein, Mozart, Steve Jobs) than in fiction!

Mediocrity is the Creator’s worst fear. Whether this result comes from concept or execution doesn’t matter. The creator wishes to be an authentic voice in a world of white noise. They gain rivals easily, answering those challenges with innovation in their work, and their personal outlook.”

ArielHudnel

Zeus. Dr. Frankenstein. Iron Man. All creators. 

Phoebe in Friends. Jo in Little Women. Creators. 

The Issue

All of these characters are white. When researching this, we were overwhelmed by the lack of examples of BIPOC. It’s another glaring example of a lack of diversity in books and movies. And it’s super frustrating. 

Over on the Character Therapist, they list the creator’s goals and fears:

LIKELY GOALS

To create things of enduring value
To see a vision realized 
To hone artistic control and skill
To create culture through self-expression  

LIKELY FEARS

To have a mediocre vision 
To only execute a vision half-way
To believe all is an illusion
To remain unchanged/unmoved by beauty 

Writing Tip of the Pod

We need all types of stories. When you create, think about who your archetypes are. If you are creating and expressing yourself, are you doing so in a way that is beautiful, clear, and fair to the rest of the world? 

Dog Tip for Life

Single minded obsession is never good unless it’s about making bacon. 

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

DOG INSPIRATION

Every weekday, our dogs have inspirational or motivating tweets on Carrie’s Twitter. Go check it out and be her Twitter friend.

The kittens felt left out.

WHERE TO FIND OUR PODCAST, DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE.

The podcast link if you don’t see it above. Plus, it’s everywhere like Apple Music, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, and more. Just google, “DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE” then like and subscribe.

Join the 239,000 people who have downloaded episodes and marveled at our raw weirdness. You can subscribe pretty much anywhere.

Another episode about archetypes and if your sex life was a hashtag. Cough.

Last week’s episode about archetypes and falling out of cars. 

A bonus episode with Vivian Garcia Rodriguez about cosplay, book boyfriends, and being brave enough to get rid of people who hurt you. 

A bonus episode about being a cop’s daughter in Maine and a dance mom in Pennsylvania with Alyson Pelletier Seegmueller.

And this week’s episode link if you’re reading this via email.

COME WRITE WITH ME! 

I coach, have a class, and edit things. Find out more here. 

NEW BOOK OF AWESOME- THE PLACES WE HIDE

I have a new book out!!!!!! It’s an adult mystery set in the town where we live, which is Bar Harbor, Maine. You can order it here. And you totally should. 

And if you click through to this link, you can read the first chapter! 

And click here to learn about the book’s inspiration and what I learned about myself when I was writing it.

Are You a Seducer or Do You Fall Out of Cars?

Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Are You a Seducer or Do You Fall Out of Cars?
/

Ah, yes, the archetype. Last week we talked about the misfits and the mavericks because they are sexy as hell. 

Again, Merriam-Webster says archetype are: 

“The original pattern or model of which all things of the same type are representations or copies.” 

Good ole Merriam-Webster

Archetypes, according to Tami Nantz, help us understand what makes our characters tick. She says to ask:

What does he fear?

What motivates him? 

What does he care about most? 

Tami Nantz

And while I’m afraid to talk about this on the podcast with Shaun because his mind goes . . . places, this week we’re talking about the seductress. 

Over on the Reedsy blog, the seductress is explained pretty well.  

“I’ll give you whatever you want,” is the refrain of the seductress — a character that comes in all shapes, sizes, and genders. They might offer power, sex, love, money, or influence but remember, these things always come with strings attached. If a seductress is involved, the moral of the tale is almost always, “Don’t believe anything that’s too good to be true.”

Strengths: Allure, charisma, lack of morals.

Weaknesses: The emptiness of their promises.

Desires: Control.

Examples: Mephistopheles in Faust, Delilah from Samson and Delilah, 90% of the female characters in The Odyssey.

Reedsy blog

Some more examples would be Mystique in X-Men and Meg in Hercules.

Valeria Black, writing for The Writing Cooperative had a very definite take on the Seductress, which seems a wee bit reductive. She said,

The Seductress cares deeply about being in the spotlight. She loves attention and the way people fall head-over-heels for her.

But most of all, she loves being the most admired woman in the room.

Valeria Black

Why?

Because, if you dig deep enough, she is a child and a dreamer at heart who craves constant stimulation in the quest for her one true love.

This hidden quest for lasting love is the main reason why it seems like she strings people along. But in reality it’s because she just gets bored quickly.

And this is so cool to think about if you have one of these characters or one of these people in your life. And I think we all know one of these seducer or seductresses, the person who is all about the sexual and physical validation, and doesn’t know what to do without it. Their self-worth comes from capturing as many admiring looks or hearts as possible. They are dependent on other people’s affection and attention. And that makes it hard sometimes for both them and their friends. Their dark side is like the femme fatale like Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct, right? 

That same Reedsy blog has some really great advice about archetypes:  

For authors, character archetypes are a useful concept to understand — if only to save you from tying yourself in knots, trying to create stories and characters completely unlike anything that’s come before. Every story has already been told, so focus on what matters most to readers: creating rich, specific worlds populated by people living specific lives, whose struggles are so grounded in realistic human behavior that their stories become universal — no matter where the reader is from.

But the thing is that this is true about life, too. When you understand those three questions we talked about in the beginning, you can understand your friends, family, and enemies a lot more. What motivates the people you love? 

Also, Shaun is totally not cool with the gender bias implicit in this archetype, which gets him bonus points from me. 

Sparty is worried about archetypes

Writing Tip of the Pod

Think about the motivations of your characters. Is there a seducer in your story? Maybe there should be. 

Dog Tip for Life

Living for other people’s validation is a really hard way to live. When you are all about capturing as many people’s affections for your own self-worth, what do you do when you are rejected? For many of us, being sexy only lasts so long, right? 

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

DOG INSPIRATION

Every weekday, our dogs have inspirational or motivating tweets on Carrie’s Twitter. Go check it out and be her Twitter friend.

WHERE TO FIND OUR PODCAST, DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE.

The podcast link if you don’t see it above. Plus, it’s everywhere like Apple Music, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, and more. Just google, “DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE” then like and subscribe.

Join the 235,000 people who have downloaded episodes and marveled at our raw weirdness. You can subscribe pretty much anywhere.

Last week’s episode about archetypes and if your sex life was a hashtag. Cough.

This week’s episode about archetypes and falling out of cars.

This week’s bonus episode with Vivian Garcia Rodriguez about cosplay, book boyfriends, and being brave enough to get rid of people who hurt you. 

COME WRITE WITH ME! 

I coach, have a class, and edit things. Find out more here. 

NEW BOOK OF AWESOME- THE PLACES WE HIDE

I have a new book out!!!!!! It’s an adult mystery set in the town where we live, which is Bar Harbor, Maine. You can order it here. And you totally should. 

And if you click through to this link, you can read the first chapter! 

And click here to learn about the book’s inspiration and what I learned about myself when I was writing it.

Are You a Misfit? What’s Your Archetype, Baby?

Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation
Are You a Misfit? What's Your Archetype, Baby?
/

The Misfits and the Mavericks

A lot of writers use archetypes in their stories. Sometimes we don’t even realize that we’re doing it, actually.

There’s something really compelling about the heroes that don’t quite fit in especially the mavericks. The Huck Finns and Han Solos of the world and/or universe. 

For whatever reason, the mavericks have turned away from civilization. Maybe it’s to find out what happened to their missing mom. Maybe it’s because their own elite family oppressed them and their quirks. Maybe it’s because they are doing a Thoreau and they wanted to see what it was like to be Spartan and nonconformist in a society that stresses conformity above all else.

Literary critic, Northrop Frye wrote about mavericks as heroes in novels in the U.S. and said,

“Placed outside the structure of civilization and therefore represents the force of physical nature, amoral or ruthless, yet with a sense of power, and often leadership, that society has impoverished itself by rejecting.” 

Northrop Frye

To conform or to not conform has often been the question. Apologies to Shakespeare. And it’s been a question both in American society and in its books, right? 

How the main character fits into mainstream society is often the subject of some really good and compelling books like Gone With the Wind or To Kill a Mockingbird. They reject conforming. They strike out on their own. 

The maverick is a character archtype. 

Here’s the definition of an archetype from studiobinder.com

“An archetype is a consistent and typical version of a particular thing. It can be human, an object, or a particular set of behaviors, but the point is that it fits into a time-tested mold that embodies a pure form.”

studiobinder.com

Anyways, though that site is about scriptwriting, I think it has a lot of great information about writing characters.

It asks: 

“Why do character archetypes exist?

“Human beings tend to find their place within a group dynamic based around their strongest personality traits.

“You may have a group of friends with similar interests…

“But often one will be the “social butterfly” while another will be the “homebody.”

“Your friends will begin to identify each other by these consistent traits.  

“You’ve now defined yourself by a character archetype.”

studiobinder.com again.

The maverick archetype is obviously one of many, but what of their key motivations is the act of self-preservation. They break the rules to get their goals. Brave. Competent. Sometimes a bit snippy. Their temper is a bit fiery. 

That pull between convention and autonomy has the possibility of making a story truly stick out as something extraordinarily special. Don’t be afraid to lean into it. 

I (Carrie) am not a fan of Gone With The Wind because I couldn’t stand Scarlett and the racial tones that happen throughout, but the characters are iconic and are a good reference point for us writers when we think about maverick characters. 

Are you a maverick? Do you write them?  What’s your archetype? We’ll be looking at different ones the next few months. It’s fun.

Writing Tip of the Pod: 

Don’t make all your characters mavericks, but don’t avoid them either. Have you mixed up the archetypes in your story? 

Dog Tip For Life: 

It’s okay to cultivate your own inner maverick. 

Dog Tweets of Love
Dog Tweets of Love: Gabby and Sparty. Sparty is food focused. We’re sure you can’t tell.

WHERE TO FIND OUR PODCAST, DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE.

The podcast link if you don’t see it above. Plus, it’s everywhere like Apple Music, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, and more. Just google, “DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE” then like and subscribe.

Join the 230,000 people who have downloaded episodes and marveled at our raw weirdness. You can subscribe pretty much anywhere.

Last week’s episode.

This week’s episode link if you can’t see it above.

SHOUT OUT

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Night Owl” by Broke For Free.

Dog Inspiration

Every weekday, our dogs have inspirational or motivating tweets on Carrie’s Twitter. Go check it out and be her Twitter friend.

COME WRITE WITH Carrie! 

I coach, have a class, and edit things for you. It’s super fun. I promise.

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