#THIS EVENT IS REVITALIZING ME IMMENSELY | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

chille-tid-universe · 5 years ago

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Obligatory Beach Episode

The quiet night pulsed with evaporated tension, like blood rushing to the ears after a great exertion. Piles of dead orcs and devils offered an odd juxtaposition to the rejoicing and merriment around the clearing.The handful of villagers who had survived the ordeal seemed simply relieved, though perhaps shock offered a barrier to the gruesome scene around them. In the middle of the ritual site, the charred remains of family members, loved ones, and strangers still smoked.

Removed from the huddling villagers, heroes and adventurers were being introduced. Brienne accepted her heavy plate mail from Robyn and clasped her arm, nodding appreciatively as she slipped her ornate silver diadem over her temples. As the metal band settled onto her head, her eyes closed, and after a deep breath, her lids parted to reveal sharper eyes that peered into the world around her. “It’s good to be back,” the fighter mumbled, smiling at the half-elf. As the two leaders began pointing out their team members, the others mingled.

Nissa was dragging Pock over to Oskar, looking the dwarf up and down before commenting, “That’s a lot of big-folk you got with you. How do you stand them all?” Oskar guffawed good-naturedly and leaned in to confide, “Plenty of mead.” Pock merely nodded sagely, glancing about at the other newcomers. Isolde rode by on Icthuarrux, sniffing and saying something about the end times.

Nula and Uzza were being cornered by Wun Way. The bard had found a scrap of paper from somewhere in the pile of clothes returned to her, and was grilling the half-orc and tiefling for details on all the heroic adventures which had led them to this clearing. Her questions were interspersed with sly smiles at the tiefling cleric.

Idu and Charlot, the youngest of Robyn’s crew, were chatting with Ciri, discussing home, adventure, and basically anything to avoid bringing up the carnage surrounding them. They had each been through much in their journeys, but tonight was more than they could bear to think of, at least for now. Ciri was explaining to Charlot that, no, she didn’t have servants growing up, and, no, that didn’t mean she had been poor. The cleric was trying to wrap his head around this concept as Idu laughed by his side.

Before long, Pel’s curiosity overcame her shock, and she took hesitant steps toward the wonderfully clad individuals who had saved her. Nissa noticed her first, and hurried over to the young girl, taking her hands and gently guiding her away from the battleground. Though Pel was a small child, she was only barely shorter than the gnome. As Pel’s eyes continued to be drawn to the burning ritual circle behind her, Nissa reached into her pockets and pulled out the first thing she found. “Here, kid, would you like a…” She glanced at her palm. “... a gold button?” Pel’s eyes lit up at the sparkling item, how it twinkled in the firelight, and reached for it, mumbling her thanks.

Melpomene sauntered up to Brienne, interrupting Robyn mid-sentence. “So who’s the ranger?” the aasimar asked, head tilting to where Ravain was inspecting the fallen devils.

Brienne followed her gesture. “Who, Ravain? We must have mentioned him before. He helped us out immensely during our time in Orlane. I doubt we’d have been able to-”

Ravain appeared suddenly on the other side of Brienne, interrupting her. “Who is this?” he asked in gravelly tones, his cold eyes drilling into Melpomene’s laughing ones.

Brienne sighed. “This is Melpomene, an aasimar who we’ve been working with since we got to Daggerford.”

“And she can be trusted?” Ravain asked, eyes narrowing, seeming to peer through the beautiful veil around the woman.

Melpomene cut Brienne off. “Sugar, I can be whatever you want me to be.” Shadow solidified behind the aasimar, and faint outlines of skeletal wings flickered against the darkness. The fallen angel’s eyes became pools of dried blood, and her pale complexion darkened to an ashen grey. Ravain’s hand dropped to his pommels.

Brienne stepped between the two, placing a hand on either’s shoulder. “Melpomene, he’s with us. Don’t antagonize him.” She looked over to the scowling ranger. “I can vouch for her. She has risked her life for us several times.” Ravain made a face, but removed his hand from his sword as Melpomene returned to her still-enchanting but less-menacing form.

Robyn coughed, and winced as the ranger and bard shot her intense looks. “It’s been an incorrigible night, and I’m sure we could all use a good meal.” As their expressions softened, Robyn clapped her hands together. “Unfortunately, all you have is me! I do make a mean gestapo, though.”

Melpomene raised an eyebrow at Brienne, who started to ask something before Ravain lightly pressed his hand to her shoulder, barely shaking his head.

Just then, Isolde rode up to the four and asked, “So who owns the talking rock?”

Wun Way’s voice called out from behind, “It’s an egg!”

Ravain suggested the group of adventurers and survivors head back to the now-abandoned orc camp. There, Robyn made generous portions of stew using the more palatable ingredients from the orcish stores. With full bellies, even the shaken villagers began to converse, and before the group collapsed from exhaustion, color had returned to each ashen face.

Ravain returned from his stalking surveillance of the surrounding woods shortly after the survivors had taken to bed, reassuring the assembled adventurers that there were no threats left alive in the area. Brienne insisted that a watch be kept, and Robyn quickly echoed the sentiment. The previously imprisoned members of the group reluctantly admitted that a full rest would be quite beneficial, and several of the newcomers were assigned watches covering the remainder of the night. As the five settled onto beds of blankets (the more acceptable sleeping kits had been allocated for the villagers) Oskar could be heard grumbling about needing to keep watch, after missing the totality of the fighting.

The following morning, Brienne and her group were surprised to learn the orcs had brought them back in the direction of Daggerford; the camp they had awoken in was no more than a half-day’s journey from the city. As they ate a slow breakfast in the late morning, plans were discussed. Melpomene was certain the guard force of Daggerford would be willing to help escort the surviving members of the orcs’ prisoners back to their hamlets and villages. The rest of the group agreed, more for the simplicity of the plan than any other reason. Hell had been quite literally visited upon each person gathered there; some other do-gooders could stand to help see the end of the villagers’ stories.

Though breakfast ended before noon, the sun had reached its zenith before the group headed into the Misty Forest. After a night of rest and a morning of rediscovering their wounds, several of the survivors required assistance in the trek to civilization; splints and crutches were fashioned from fences and tents, and the worst off of the survivors needed a sled constructed, which Icthuarrux graciously pulled. Finally, as the sun began its descent, the group set their feet on the path to Daggerford.

The remainder of the day passed slowly. For Robyn’s crew, the march seemed slow; injured survivors of a massacre the previous night do not move briskly as bruises and fractures make themselves known. For those who had been taken by the orcs, however, the sights of the sunlit forest and the open plains beyond were wonderful. After weeks or months of confinement, the simple pleasure of birdsong and a gentle breeze lifted many heavy hearts.

Along the road, discussions arose, experiences shared, and the band walked into the open gates of Daggerford closer for the journey. After a quick trip to the constable of the city, the survivors were entrusted into the care of the city guards, and at long last, Brienne, Pock, Nissa, Wun Way, and Melpomene returned to the castle of Daggerford. After a brief delay, the castle guards brought the large party to the wizard of Daggerford.

Ondabarl was pleasantly surprised to see the return of the band of adventurers, and spent only a moment’s glance on the extra members with whom they had returned. Brienne reached into the bag of holding and, with no little flourish, produced the spellbook of Haesten and the famed Yellowknife. As she handed the items over to the wizard, Nissa spoke up. “You wouldn’t believe what we’ve been through to bring you these.”

Ondabarl stopped, his hand stretched out over the dagger and book. “Well, that’s what you do, isn’t it? I send out group after group of adventurers until one of you finally completes the job.” Wun Way shot a look at Nissa to silence her response. “Now that I take a closer look, though,” the wizard said, stroking his beard, “you do look a little worse for wear. Tell you what, there’s something that is sure to help revitalize your weary companions. In two days’ time, a wondrous event shall happen on the nearby shore.” He paused for a moment, grinning at the party. “The annual dance of the aquatic flumphs!”

Isolde clapped her hands together. “Beach episode!”

In the end, Pel refused to separate from the strange gnome who had befriended her. Unwilling to leave the last person she knew, Loran had no choice but to follow along with her rescuers on their well-earned vacation. As the group left Daggerford, Nissa walked beside the child. “Have you ever been to the beach, Pel?” she asked.

“What’s a beach?” the girl responded, tilting her head.

The gnome paused a moment before responding, “It’s like a big lake, I think.”

Pel’s eyes lit up. “Gran taught me how to swim!”

Two days later, the gang arrived at the beach of the aquatic flumphs. They had made good time, however, and reached the shore just after noon. With not much to do before the flumphs appeared, the group decided to prepare for the night. After minimal arguing, they separated into three teams: Oskar, Nissa, Pel, Brienne, and Robyn would work together to prepare a fire; they would need to set up camp for after the dance of the flumphs, which Pock, Charlot, Idu, Melpomene, and Loran would take care of; and, of course, they would need dinner, which Uzza, Wun Way, Nula, and Isolde offered to fetch. As Nissa and Pel walked down the beach to gather stones to line a fire pit, Nissa said, “Alright, Pel, we want some rocks about that size,” pointing to the coatl egg in Wun Way’s sling. The half-elf bard clutched the sling tighter and glared at the gnome.

As the groups headed off, Ravain and Ciri were left standing on the beach. The young girl knelt down and began scooping handfuls of sand. “I think Pel would like a sand castle to return to, Ravain.”

The grizzled monster hunter stared at his ward with dead eyes.

Ciri returned the look.

“Alright, alright,” Ravain sighed as he sat on the sand.

Down the shore, Oskar was huddled over a clump of beach grasses, pulling up fistfuls of stalks and grunting in approval at how brittle and dry it was - perfect for kindling. An illuminated arrow whizzed by the dwarf’s head, drawing a long string of curses from him. He glanced back and saw Robyn smiling and pointing beyond him - a dozen paces away, the arrow had imbedded itself near a larger bed of grasses.

Oskar shook his head and turned to Pel to ask her for help pulling the grasses, but she was down by the water chasing a crab. Nissa glanced toward the young child from the small pile of rocks she had gathered and ran after her, calling, “Pel, wait up! Be careful near the waves!”

Further down, Brienne walked along the lapping waves. Growing up on the shores of Tarth, she had enjoyed combing the wave-abandoned detritus from the sea for slabs of driftwood with which to play at swords and shields. Now, she put her childhood searching skills to work in the pursuit of firewood.

Having collected an armful of grasses, Oskar returned to the area of the beach where Ciri and Ravain were building a tall sandcastle. He raised an eyebrow at the stoic ranger, who distinctly avoided his gaze as he began chiseling faux-brickwork into the towers with a twig. The dwarf muttered something about surface dwellers and building abilities before he began shoveling a shallow pit in the dry sand.

As Oskar began digging with his bare hands, Robyn walked up behind him. “That’s not how you acquire fire. Have you ever seen me dig for my cooking?”

Without looking back, Oskar replied, “Have you ever built a fire in the sand?”

“Point taken,” Robyn said, squatting down to help.

Down by the water, a brief shriek pierced the air. Pel was clutching her finger, where a tiny crab hung by its pincer. As Nissa ran up to the girl, she stiffened her pouty lower lip and hastily threw her hand behind her back. Unsure of how to address the injured child, Nissa put on a smile. “Good job, Pel, you really almost caught that crab!”

The girl frowned and mumbled, “It got me instead.”

Glancing around at the beach around them, Nissa asked, “Wanna find some more rocks? Sometimes, there are sparkly bits inside.” At this, Pel’s tear streaked cheeks lit up, and she crouched over the lapping waves, fumbling through the sliding sand.

A second later, Nissa held up a spiral-etched stone triumphantly - oddly, it was slightly squishy on the underside. Immediately, a seagull swooped down with a ferocious screech, right at her upraised hand. In her surprise, Nissa popped the odd stone into her mouth, immediately regretting her decision as it began squelching along her tongue. Barely suppressing her urge to retch, Nissa spat the snail back onto her hand and, shuddering, threw it at the seagull. “Ugh… Pel, don’t put these rocks into your mouth.”

Brienne walked back with a bundle of driftwood strapped across her back just as Nissa and Pel were placing the last of their stones around the firepit. Nissa was trying to crack open a clam, for some reason, as Robyn doused the kindling generously from her flask. Brienne raised an eyebrow as Robyn downed the remaining contents, and Oskar muttered a phrase, sending a lick of flame from his outstretched finger to the prepared bonfire.

Back at the campsite, Charlot gathered the other four around him as he unraveled his lavish tent. “Alright, listen up, all. My tent is the most complicated to set up, and there are a few steps that need to be followed…” Over the next five minutes, he laid out how each part of the fabric and wooden poles needed to be arranged.

At first, Melpomene and Loran snickered behind their hands, but Idu rolled his eyes and began setting up another tent. After the first minute, however, Melpomene whispered to Loran, “Wait, is he serious?” When Charlot took a breath, Melpomene stepped forward to cut him off. Loran had already retreated to help Idu with another tent.

“Quite a laundry list of steps you got there, kid,” Melpomene said.

“I’ve found that others follow my instructions best when they know exactly what is required of them,” Charlot responded, brow furrowing as he noticed that Idu and Loran had stepped away to work on other tents. Pock was poking at the Charlot’s laid out construction with interest.

Melpomene wrapped an arm across the boy’s shoulder, pulling him closer. “I’ll bet I can get your friend over there to take care of this tent for you,” she said, nodding in Idu’s direction. “Watch and learn.”

The aasimar sauntered over to the youth, drawing her enchanting magic from the core of her being into her vocal chords. Idu looked up from the partially-constructed tent as she stepped closer. “Greetings, Idu,” she said in Celestial. She had heard the boy talking to his pet snake in Celestial along the journey to the beach. “I saw you working over here and thought I’d check in on you. Wouldn’t want to exclude anyone.” Melpomene gave Idu a knowing wink.

“So you struck up a conversation in a language that only two people speak?” Idu asked, raising an eyebrow.

Melpomene smiled and continued as if she hadn’t heard him. “How’s your snake, Idu?”

“Around my arm,” Idu replied with a deadpan expression - as deadpan as was possible while speaking Celestial, at least. Melpomene’s smile faltered a fraction.

“Why do you both sound like you have windchimes in your mouths?” asked Loran, who had been listening with interest to the strange dialect.

Without missing a beat, Melpomene cried, “Because we do!” and turned around, executing some skillful illusion magic to conjure a windchime dangling from her open mouth. As she waggled her tongue, dainty chimes filled the air. Loran snorted as she held back a laugh, and turned to the next unfinished tent.

Melpomene turned back to Idu. “Where did you learn Celestial?” Each word was layered with complimenting chiming sounds, as she had left the illusory windchime in her mouth.

Idu absently reached for the snake around his upper arm and stroked its head. “You pick up a lot of things on the street.”

Melpomene threw a hand over her mouth in horror. “The street is no place for a young man.”

Idu shrugged. “Didn’t have much of a choice.”

The aasimar placed a hand on his shoulder and fixed him with a patronizing half-smile. “We always have a choice.”

Idu stared up into her luminescent eyes. “I didn’t really have one when my parents died.”

The luminescent eyes grew wider, and the windchime fell out of Melpomene’s open mouth. “Ah. I, uh, one second.” She turned her head away and opened her mouth, creating discordant windchime sounds.

Charlot, who had been trying to follow the foreign conversation through body language alone and wasn’t certain whether Melpomene was propositioning the boy or trying to convince him to get a windchime piercing on his tongue, looked around to find that Pock had been silently constructing the large tent while he had been distracted. It looked better than it ever had when Charlot built it himself. “Tent’s done,” Pock said simply, snapping the last piece into place.

Across the circle of tents, Loran noticed the gnome’s handiwork and called out, “Hey, Pock, if you’re done over there, do you want to come help me with these?”

Isolde had discovered a small delta where seaweed and kelp washed up, and was humming to herself as she gathered bundles into her arms. She gave a gasp as she lifted a strand of seaweed to reveal a green tuberous object in the shallow waters. “A sea cucumber!” she cried triumphantly in her singsong voice.

Nula looked up from the makeshift fishing rod she had been carving. “You really don’t want to eat that,” she warned, knowing she would not be heeded. As the paladin tucked the sea cucumber into her satchel and carried on along her hunt for vegan alternatives, Nula sighed and affixed one of the ubiquitous snails to the end of her line. A few minutes later, Nula was walking back to camp with a pair of large fish hanging from a line.

Uzza and Wun Way walked along the shore together, keeping an eye out for anything edible. “It would be nice to catch some small game,” Uzza remarked, peering into the grasses by the sand.

“You think so?” Wun Way asked, peering up into the sky just in time to see a seagull get hit by a flying snail. A split second later, her hand crossbow was out, and Wun Way’s bolt found its mark. As the seagull fell, Uzza and Wun Way heard a scream from Pel.

Isolde walked by with a pile of kelp and seaweed in her arms and complained, “The bird was only minding its business.”

Back at camp, an elaborate sand castle had been built, which Pel loved. The adventurers milled about and talked, and easy laughter filled the air. For some reason, there were two Idu’s walking around, and whenever one of them opened its mouth, chiming sounds filled the air.

As everyone relaxed, Nissa huddled near where the bags had been deposited. Checking one last time that Brienne was engrossed in one of Robyn’s stories, the gnome reached for a bag and gently opened it. Within, countless plants and plant-parts were stored, from leaves and flowers to roots and stalks, some dried, some still wet, all odorous. Beneath a pile of vines, Nissa finally found a small purse with a handful of coins. After helping herself to a majority of those coins, she gingerly replaced the purse and closed the bag.

The various discussions were interrupted by a call from down the beach. As everyone turned to look, Nula ran up over a dune, carrying an inflated pig’s bladder. The half-orc waved over the rest of the party, and they found an area of relatively flat beach with a rectangle marked in the sand, separated by a net of kelp held up by two long pieces of driftwood.

“I’ve got a pirate game we can play,” she announced proudly. “Volleybladder!”

Most of the group agreed enthusiastically - Ravain sat out the game, looking sullen in the hot sun, while Loran helped Pel build her own sand castle down by the water. Ciri joined Robyn’s crew on one side of the net, while the heroes of Orlane gathered on the other side with the chime-sounding Idu.

Thus began the game. Nissa made an early point, jumping higher than Robyn’s crew would have thought possible to spike the ball down past Robyn. Wun Way followed up with a gentle bump over the net, causing the ball to fall just in front of Robyn’s outstretched arms. Brienne then served into the corner of the court, but it was returned by a quick dive from Isolde. As the ball flew through the air, Nissa jumped as if to spike again, angling her body instead for a longer strike. Idu (on Robyn’s side) noticed the change, however, and was perfectly positioned to return the hit when it came.

As the ball fell to the sand Wun Way sang out a little ditty about large hands and ungainly feet, causing several of her opponents to become disheartened. While they glanced uneasily at their limbs, the offending bard easily slammed the ball into the sand on the other side. In the next play, Nissa fell awkwardly on her ankle, twisting it. The others called to Ravain to relieve her, but the ranger simply shook his head. Instead, Pock knelt beside his fellow gnome and laid his hand on her leg, pressing healing magic into the limb. A moment later, Nissa was hopping up and returning a quick serve.

After a scuffle for the ball as it bounced off the top of the kelp net, both of the Idu’s ended up on Robyn’s side of the court. They locked eyes, and one of them pointed and accused, “Melpomene, get back on your side of the court!”

The other Idu looked bewildered and shook his head. “But I’m Idu! You’re Melpomene!” A short yelling match later, one of the Idu’s stormed back to Brienne’s side, still fuming that he was the real Idu. Teams reformed, the ball was served again.

As the ball fell to Wun Way, she grinned at Nissa and called for her to set up a bump. Charlot, however, noticed the half-elf’s stance and prepared to answer the duplicitous spike. Sure enough, the bard jumped at the last second and hammered the ball down to the beach. Charlot shouted triumphantly as he tensed to dive, when a sickening dread filled his body.

In the middle of the court, Idu was changing. He grew taller, taller even than Brienne, and his scruffy hair flowed out to whip about in the non-existent wind. His skin lightened, then turned a horrible ashen color, and his clothing faded into star-dotted robes. Skeletal wings brightened in a darkening aura around the revealed aasimar, and every one of Robyn’s team dove away from her. With Charlot cowering by the driftwood post, the ball smacked into the sand.

The silence that followed was broken by Nissa shouting, “We won!” as the Idu next to her grumbled, “Told you I was the real Idu.”

As Melpomene ducked under the kelp netting to rejoin her team, she winked at Idu. “I learned some things on the streets, too.”

After the game, the group enjoyed a hearty meal of fish and fowl (Isolde quietly ate her salad of boiled kelp and even ate the sea cucumber as the rest of the group looked on in horror) and then prepared to relax and observe the fabled dance of the aquatic flumphs. In the distance, all along the shore, they saw other groups arriving to the shore and setting up portable seats.

Finally, the indicated hour came, but nothing happened.

“They should be coming out of the sea, right?” Pock asked, glancing behind to the distant trees but still not finding any flumphs.

“I’m gonna kill that Ondabarl!” Nissa erupted, gripping a piece of driftwood. “Making us trek out here for nothing!”

“Let’s go check with the locals,” Brienne offered, nodding to the nearest collection of observers, “see if this is unusual.”

They spoke with a handful of groups, from gatherings of a dozen people to small families of three or four. Everyone they talked to gave the same answer: The flumphs always rose on the last full moon in the season, and they had never known them to be this late. A self-proclaimed flumph expert bent their ears for an extra ten minutes, pontificating on the common theories on why the flumphs rose, to where they drifted off, and for what purpose. When they finally broke free from his lecture, they walked closer to the water, hoping perhaps that they might stumble upon the flumphs waiting somewhere in the waves.

The moon was high and full, and shone brilliantly upon the beach, draping everything in an azure veil. As they searched, they saw a handful of children around Pel’s age shrieking and splashing in the water, the disappointment of the missing flumphs forgotten in the opportunity for late-night fun. Pel began tugging on Loran’s hand and dragging her to the playing children. “I suppose we’ll cover more ground in two groups,” Brienne conceded, and the group split; Robyn’s crew, along with Pel, Loran, Ciri, and Ravain heading further down the beach to the playing children, while Brienne and her team headed back to where rocky outcroppings broke the skyline.

An hour of investigation later, as the damp rocks grew larger, the group heard a child’s cry. Down by the water, a small girl was sobbing, calling for help, crying that her sisters were trapped in the sea caves where they had been playing. There was no time to go back for the others. Brienne asked the little girl to show where this cave was, even as Nissa tried to caution her, and minutes later they arrived to a shallow sea cave, a wide mouthlike opening in the craggy face of an ocean cliff. Within, as their vision adjusted, they could make out a pile of kelp by the entrance and several large rocks strewn throughout the cave.

An older girl, presumably the young girl’s sister, stood by one of those rocks, and her face lit up as she took note of their arrival. “You brought us help!” she cried, clapping her hands together.

“Delicious help!” the pile of kelp replied. It rose on mottled green legs and straightened its horrifying body. The green hag reached out a kelp-wrapped arm, and tendrils of emerald magic drifted across the five adventurers. Each of them stiffened in fear of her terrifying ugliness, and flashbacks of their imprisonment in that awful ritual circle gripped them.

As their hearts began to hammer, the two girls shed off their mortal forms and revealed themselves to be a sea hag and night hag. The sea hag by the rock cackled and cried out, “Swim, my pretties!” Water rose to fill a foot of the cavern, and a trio of giant octopuses swam out from behind the rocks to accost the frightened adventurers.

Wun Way jabbed at the approaching octopuses and concentrated on sending a shockwave of force right in the middle of the group, but as she spoke the incantation, the night hag in their midst let out a piercing laugh, and the words died on the half-elf’s lips.

“Time for a taste of your own medicine,” Melpomene shouted at the green hag, and began muttering silent whispers, which wound their way into the ear of the kelp-clad witch. The hag looked upon the aasimar as she truly was, and gave an angry growl as she began to back away unwillingly.

In her place, the sea hag and her octopuses ran at the group. As tentacles flailed, the sea hag stared into Brienne’s eyes. The fighter felt a repulsion toward the hideous creature, but other than that, nothing happened, and the hag’s hair began roiling in agitation. Pock ran away from the frightening hag, trying to make a break for the rocks, but tentacles wrapped themselves around his short frame and held him fast.

The sea hag pulled away from the occupied heroes and pointed a finger at Wun Way, chanting a lilting spell. As the last syllable faded, the bard disappeared, and a newt crawled quickly out of the water where she had been standing. As the newt scampered away, the night hag cursed at her sister for “turning the pretty one,” and then lashed out at Melpomene.

With curling tentacles around her, Brienne found no easy way to get at the hags. Instead, she gripped Mjolnir by the base of its handle and spun it once around her head, letting loose at the sea hag. The hammer struck true, and then immediately flew back into Brienne’s waiting hand, where she spun it once more and struck again. Grimacing, the hag continued to keep her eyes on the crawling newt as Nissa’s bolts struck her.

The green hag, from across the room, called out, “Sisters! This will be our greatest feast yet!” There was a pulse in the water, felt against each leg, and then the three hags became invisible. The adventurers continued to scuffle with the many limbs of the octopuses, and all of a sudden Nissa fell to the ground. Brienne called out her name, and the sea hag reappeared near the adventurers, cackling madly. Brienne began to move towards the sea hag when the green witch appeared in the pile of kelp once more and pointed a crooked finger. A bolt of lightning lanced from the finger and struck from Melpomene to Brienne to Pock.

The last hag reappeared by the rocks and opened a palm, sending half a dozen missiles of light arcing through the air towards Brienne. As they shattered against her body, Brienne turned to the nearest octopus and brought her hammer down on its body, sending a violent shiver through its many legs before they settled on the floor of the cave. She then turned to the sea hag and smacked her with a backhand blow, sending her reeling and finally breaking her concentration on the spell. With a popping sound, Wun Way reappeared halfway up the cave wall, and with a swallowed yelp she fell, splashing into the water. She quickly climbed to her feet and dove for Nissa’ body, showering it with healing spells while she whipped out her rapier and skewered one of the octopuses. Melpomene slashed out with her sword and split the final octopus in two.

Pock shrugged off the limp octopus tentacles and darted for the sea hag, bringing his weapon down on the monster. The green hag raised her hand to lay an enchantment on Brienne, but the fighter took the moment of preparation and slammed hard, pulling from the might of the hammer to cast a lightning-wreathed spell around the weapon. As it struck, a loud CLAP reverberated inside the small cave, and shards of rock fell from the ceiling even as the hag fell backwards into the water, dead.

Nissa coughed up seawater as she pulled herself up, but gathered herself quickly and fired off quick shots, one, two, into the torso of the night hag. Pock slammed his weapon into the sea hag’s side as he shouted, “What did you do to the flumphs?!” He did not receive an answer, though, as the witch crumpled under his blow and sank beneath the choppy waters.

The party moved to surround the final hag, but she grinned an awful, pointy smile and lifted a stone in the shape of a heart. As they watched, taken aback, the stone heart appeared to beat once, and then the night hag disappeared.

The cave began to drain, revealing the broken forms of the two hags and three octopuses, and suddenly a popping sound filled the air. Dozens of flumphs materialized, spectral jellyfish-like beings with long eyestalks gently waving above their cores. They floated through the air, crowding around their saviors and passing their eyestalks over them inquisitively. As each second passed, more and more flumphs popped into existence, and soon they were pushed out of the cave and drifted across the lapping waves. As they drifted away, an aura of intense gratitude settled over the party.

Back on the beach, locals and foreigners alike turned awe-filled eyes to the sea, where, inexplicably, the flumphs had returned - later than any year in living memory, but with such an energetic enthusiasm that even the flumph expert was not disappointed. Fathers and mothers brought their children in close, whispering fables and legends of the flumphs or prompting the young ones to wish on the rising flumphs, while others simply sat back, alone or with loved ones, and watched with a viral joy as the undulating flumphs spun and danced around each other, rising ever higher into the moon filled sky. Finally, the highest flumphs reached the apex of their ascent, and in a series of multicolored flashes, they vanished. Over the next half hour, the multitudinous beings continued to rise, bursting out of existence with colorful displays, following each other into whatever realm awaited them, and the night settled into an easy peace.

#dnd stories

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thepurplewombat · 2 years ago

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I've filed Smallville in my 'tragic media' folder, for things that could have been great if the créatives had had like, one ball.

Like yes what happens in the show is tragic, but what's even more tragic is that it could have been amazing. It could have been a whole-ass revitalization of Superman as a True Hero who turned Lex Luthor away from the Dark Side with the intense power of his pure fucking goodness. A friendship for the ages, truly the stuff of legends. And just think if they had spent those ten seasons queerbaiting us with this totally intense friendship we saw the seeds of in the first few seasons. The fandom would have been immense, it would have been a landmark show for the ages.

Instead they made Clark Kent a lying hypocrite who wouldn't know the truth if it bit him in the ass, and turned Lex into a tragic villain.

I mean, at least Magneto (my other favourite comic book villain) had legitimate differences with Professor X's philosophy and he wasn't entirely wrong either. Like, he is tragic because he was shaped by the horrible events in his past and their relationship is tragic because they could work so well together if only one of them would bend, but Magneto is on the other side from X because they have a fundamental difference in their approach to the whole humans vs mutants question.

At least he wasn't pushed headfirst into villainy by the supposed 'hero' of the story.

At least he didn't essentially give up and say 'well, nobody is going to let me be a good guy or cut me one single ounce of slack so you know what, fuck'em. Might as well be hanged for the sheep, right?'

Clark & Lex | “Shattered”

#lex luthor #Magneto #Got a little sidetracked by magneto #As I am wont to do #Just let them be friends 😭

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beautiful-lusamine-blog · 7 years ago

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What’s up with the Pokémon RPC?

This post is not at all intended to be negativity, as I do not take any sides in this post when I discuss the events that occurred and I don’t spend too much time on them. There is, inevitably, some negativity because I’m talking about the issues with this RPC, but it is not negativity directed at any person or groups of people. I do not blame anyone for these issues, it’s a community-wide problem. Please consider reblogging, because the message at the end is something I think we all need to here.

I am by no stretch of the imagination an active RPer once again (and therefore I’m kind of a hypocrite for pointing this out), but I was looking through my following list, and... Like... People are just dead.

I don’t know what it is, but the whole RPC feels dead.

A certain blog had over 1,000 followers which is fucking insane and now I can’t seem to find a trace of it... It’s just suddenly gone. You probably know which one I’m referencing, and I won’t take sides because I wasn’t around to witness the nuclear explosion that went off and me picking a side would be unfair, but I will say that, from what I’ve heard, the drama that ensued broke the community for a good little while. Again, I don’t really know or want to know who started it and refuse to have an opinion on the issue. Several little RP “Groups” that are referenced in text posts by larger RPers have broken up. A lot of blogs, myself included, are on extended hiatuses. We had drama over the skin tone in a Hala Rper’s icons. And I get why people complained about that, my issue is the fact that it went from being an issue with one blog to suddenly a flame-war in the entire god damn fandom. We’ve also had ship-shaming wars for really no reason. There was, as far as I’m aware, no Winter event this year, and I don’t know why. It’s almost as if the release of USUM, which should have revitalized the community, was the final nail in our coffin. I mean USUM was a bad story that delegitimized the Aether family’s storyline but whatever that’s just my opinion

And I know there are still RPers out there!! There are still a lot of energetic, excited RPers that are keeping things drama-free as best as they can. But the thing is, the majority of the Pokemon RPC just feels really, really... It kind of feels like we’ve had SO MUCH DRAMA that we literally just... Got tired and went into hibernation until the next Pokemon games with new characters come out.

And I get that it’s common for that to happen - We had new games! A new region! New characters! So, naturally, it would stir up the community, but things would go stale after a while. And I get that. But at the same time... We fell so hard. I mean, it’s not just Sun/Moon muses, the whole community is broken in the wake of all of the drama we had.

I don’t know why we always seem to just draw the drama to us like we lure it in, but this RPC... Has always had drama issues. And yet the RPC has been great! It’s been really fantastic a lot of the time! There’s been immense creativity from a lot of people, and I’ve met many wonderful friends through this. It’s just that we get the drama about as often as we get the good shit, as wonderful as the good shit is.

So the real question is... What do we do about it?

Because when the new Pokemon games hit, whenever that is, I don’t want this same thing to happen to us again. I don’t think we need to have some weird-ass, like, certification committee or anything that reviews muns or something to ensure they won’t cause drama, and we just sort of blow a bubble and try to get people to only interact with certified blogs within that bubble. That’s not fun, that steals away creativity, would be a ton of work, etc. It’s just not the right attitude. RPCs shouldn’t be, like, unofficially moderated, it’s against the whole point of RPCs, which is making friends and being creative. If it were moderated, it would be a group that would, despite best intentions, undeniably become elitist royalty by the time it’s over. We need some kind of solution, though. We need this to not happen again.

And, yeah, sometimes people just go inactive, and that’s okay and fully their choice, and that’s not preventable. What is preventable is what happened to us this time: The whole RPC just sort of shuts down because we drowned in drama.

We need some way to make sure we stay afloat when the new games come out because every time Pokémon games come out, the RPC blows up bigger and bigger like a bubble. And, like a bubble, it eventually reaches a point where it bursts - And it’s always really ugly when it does.

This community has brought me and many others so much joy and friendship, but also so much drama :( I really hope things go better next time around because almost all of the people here are so amazing and deserve better.

#signal boost #pokemon rp #pokemon roleplay #pokemon rpc #pokemon roleplay community #OOC #tw negativity

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techcrunchappcom · 4 years ago

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New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/applying-ai-to-bring-a-better-you-to-video-meetings-tech-buzz/

Applying AI to Bring a 'Better You' to Video Meetings | Tech Buzz

Last week had presentations from three of the significant processor companies, each planning to revolutionize the PC market. This revolution was an immense change from just a couple of years ago when everyone and their brother seemed to think that PCs were dead.

One of the few positive impacts from this pandemic is that PCs have nearly sold out everywhere, resulting in unprecedented demand for a class of products that had gone into decline as a result of insufficient marketing.

Let’s talk about improvements in how we appear on videoconferences this week, and we’ll close with my product of the week — the updated Ooler water-cooled mattress pad that’s been helping me sleep during this pandemic.

The Cause of the PC Decline

There is a common segment that I understand is in most college marketing programs and was undoubtedly in mine, which talks about the problem with marketing. That problem is that operational executives don’t understand it and will cut marketing costs to save money, not realizing that the lagging impact will be sharply reduced sales.

My lesson happened far earlier than in college, when I was a child speaking with my grandfather who was a CEO in the petrochemical industry. He told me the story of a train trip where William Wrigley Jr., the founder and CEO of the Wrigley Company (of chewing gum and candy fame), was riding with a young intern.

The Intern asked why Wrigley spent so much on marketing, given that his company was the segment leader, and sales were impressively high. Wrigley replied by asking “since the train was already traveling at 60 mph, why don’t they stop shoveling in coal because the train is going fast enough?” The answer is that the train will eventually run out of steam and stop, and that is exactly what happens in business.

Ironically, Wrigley, which was dominant when I was a child, is almost unknown today because the company stopped marketing. That’s what happened to the PC market.

In the 1990s, we had tech TV shows. The companies had commercials and were marketing heavily, ergo buyers were far more likely to prioritize buying a new PC. When the PC companies cut back on marketing to focus on price competition, the shows died, demand dwindled, and the result was a declining market which now has been revitalized by the pandemic.

However, without demand generation, this good news will turn bad because we’ve now saturated the market with new laptops — meaning it could be 5 to 8 years before the majority of folks want to replace them — unless the PC firms go back to creating and marketing compelling offers.

This problem isn’t an easy fix because, thanks to streaming, folks aren’t watching TV commercials as much as they used to, and Google and Facebook have made marketing and advertising far more difficult in terms of large-scale awareness. Although they have made it a ton easier to target, so done right this problem could be mitigated.

Last week, Qualcomm, Intel, and Nvidia may have showcased the way to do this by focusing much of their new offerings on making you look better; and looking better, because it’s connected to status, could be an excellent foundation for driving demand.

Qualcomm, Intel and Nvidia: Making You Feel Pretty

There is a song from the musical West Side Story called I Feel Pretty that’s running through my head right now. The fact is that people tend to judge us by our appearance, and for a lot of folks on calls, that appearance has degraded sharply this year. Wrinkled clothing, no makeup, partial beards, the hair on men down to their shoulders, and work locations that are sloppy, dingy, dark and unattractive are all everyday experiences in large Microsoft Teams and Zoom events (these two offerings are trending to become new standards).

Also, because of where the camera is situated on monitors and laptops, we never seem to be looking at the people to whom we are speaking. (In-screen cameras are on the way and will arrive on smartphones shortly, but haven’t been announced yet for PCs yet.)

These appearance degradations subtly or overtly devalue what colleagues think of us — from vendors, to co-workers, to managers and executives. This is undoubtedly changing our promotion and raise opportunities for the worse, and making us look unprofessional. While we don’t necessarily need to feel as pretty as Julie Andrews did in that linked song, our appearance does reflect on our confidence; and knowing we look our best should improve not only how others perceive our competence, but our own confidence as well.

All three vendors showcased technology that would improve how people see you. Nvidia seemed to go the farthest but has not yet focused all of their technology on the problem.

The 8cx platform from Qualcomm has a unique AI feature that adjusts your eyes in real time, so to the remote participant it appears that you are looking directly at them. It’s critically important to look people in the eye. I trained in negotiation, and one of the rules is that you want to look people in the eye to be taken as sincere; if you aren’t doing that, you appear untrustworthy. Our current camera placement makes it almost impossible to look someone in the eye, and athat subtly makes people mistrust you as a result.

Qualcomm also had sound improvements that should make it easier for the parties to understand each other. It’s interesting to note that Qualcomm’s approach is focused on helping you hear better, while the others are focused on helping others better hear you.

Intel, with its Tiger Lake and Evo platforms, is integrating artificial backgrounds into their solution, along with vastly improved noise cancellation which eliminates the annoying sounds that tend to drift into meetings from home offices. This combination should make you appear more professional during these meetings; and as the technology advances, may convince buyers to cycle their PCs faster and thus help prevent another sharp decline in future sales.

Nvidia had a similar approach to Intel with its powerful GeForce RTX 30 launch. The company packaged its solution under a Broadcast app designed to not only help with video calls, but to assist podcasts, and capabilities that allow your camera to track you better so that your head stays in the center of the frame — which should help manifest professionalism during video conference calls.

But where Nvidia potentially took it to the next level is Omniverse Machinima, where you can use game assets to create a movie and automatically animate digital avatars. If this technology were applied, which I expect it eventually will be, you could create 3D scans of yourself dressed for business, and then use your camera to sync them with your body. Then you’d never again have to dress, put on makeup, or even get out of bed for a meeting — while still appearing well dressed and groomed.

Personal Presentation the New Battleground

I do not doubt that Intel, Nvidia, and Qualcomm will not only continue to advance their technologies to make you look better on video calls, but they will emulate each other’s tech features to create parity.

For now, on paper, Nvidia is out in front. But this is anyone’s race, and since appearance is essential to all of us, this could be a race that returns faster churn to the PC market to create an arms race on virtual physical improvements. It also suggests that, once this matures, there will be a ton of folks who you’ll be unable to talk into coming back to the office because their actual appearance will have significantly drifted from what you’ve seen on the screen.

Lastly, a related aside: Video dating will increasingly lead to in-person disappointment. Though, I think it would be fun to create a 3D avatar of my 23-pound Maine Coon cat and have him virtually attend meetings with my voice. At my age, I’m more interested in having fun than getting that next promotion.

I’ve made the chiliPAD and its follow-on the Ooler (around US$699 for one person, $1,399 to 1,499 for two) my product of the week a few times now. But one of the problems has been the pad, which tends to stain and is hard to clean. It also didn’t breathe well, resulting in it being hot when the Ooler wasn’t on.

Well, the folks at Chili Technology just did a partial refresh and sent me the new pad. It is incredible in that while it still has one side similar to the old pad, if you flip it, the other side resists stains and breaths far better. So if you, like me, tend to be hot at night, it’s more effective at lowering how warm you feel.

OOLER Sleep System

One of the things I like about the Ooler (costs about $200 more than the chiliPAD) over the chiliPAD is that you can set a script where it’s cool at night but toasty in the morning, so you wake up to being warm rather than an alarm.

I like to sleep with the window open at night, and, even on a warm night, the Ooler makes this possible. It uses water as the heat transfer mechanism, similar to how race drivers and astronauts cool their suits. I should point out that you need to use distilled water, or the minerals in the water will build up in the system and cause it to fail.

The new pad is an excellent improvement to the Ooler, so I thought I’d refresh it as my product of the week. Oh, and as a side note, it is kind of cool that my gaming systems and my bed are both water-cooled.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ECT News Network.

Rob Enderle has been an ECT News Network columnist since 2003. His areas of interest include AI, autonomous driving, drones, personal technology, emerging technology, regulation, litigation, M&E, and technology in politics. He has an MBA in human resources, marketing and computer science. He is also a certified management accountant. Enderle currently is president and principal analyst of the Enderle Group, a consultancy that serves the technology industry. He formerly served as a senior research fellow at Giga Information Group and Forrester. Email Rob.

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#applying #better #bring #meetings #video #Technology

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people-of-iwate · 7 years ago

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Sioned Huws of Sumita Town (originally from Wales) Ms. Huws is a dancer and choreographer who has been in Japan for around a decade to research and study traditional folk dances. After the 2011 tsunami, she joined Rikuzentakata’s Artist in Residency program, where she also learned of next-door Sumita Town and its rich cultural history of Shishi Odori (Deer Dance). Living in a beautiful wooden house in the mountains of Sumita, Ms. Huws enjoys being a part of a living, breathing culture that has been hidden from the world. (All photos supplied by Ms. Huws)

“In 2013, I first came to do the Artist in Residency program, which was set up in 2011 after the tsunami and the earthquake to find ways to regenerate and revitalize the area. I do think arts and culture generate a sense of purpose and gives people a reason to live. To sing and dance - it helps people in such devastating circumstances. And through dance, I connected very quickly with people. I was completely changed with I came to the area – the people are so kind and have so much energy and time to give. They'll do anything to help you. We were eating together, drinking together, dancing and singing together. The dancers in Sumita even found me a house to live in. Within a week I had water coming in. They brought in the pipe down the mountain to get running water into the house. That’s the way they are here as a community. There’s an incredible amount of culture here, of local performing arts especially. The thing is, it’s not a 'performance' – it’s a part of their everyday life. This is what special here.”

Rehearsing the “Deer Dance (Shishi Odori)” in Sumita

“With my research, I believe in going out, going to lunch, have the local people tell you something. That’s how I came across Sumita. I was out to lunch at a restaurant and asking some people what dances they knew. Then they did an ondo dance - just got up in the restaurant and danced! They invited me to an event where I saw the Kakinaizawa Shishi Odori Deer Dance, and I was so touched by this dance. I could just read a whole story in the pure movement. So, that’s the next part of my research – where are they from and how can we meet with them? Well, an acquaintance knew somebody else and before we know it, we're driving up to Sumita, up the mountain, to a small practice room, and all the dancers were there! And I was falling more and more in love. Firstly, with this place in the mountains and the building, and then also with their immense generosity. So I asked, please, can I come study with you? I stayed with them for five weeks and danced with them. And then I just kept coming again and again – it’s been three years now. It’s been fantastic training for me as a dancer working with them.”

Learn more! Sumita Town Odori Dawns Dance (Ms. Huws’ online resource about Japanese folk performing arts) Rikuzentakata Artist in Residency Program

#Sumita #Rikuzentakata #Iwate #Japan #2011.3.11 #dance #folk arts #shishi odori #deer dance #community

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lsgingasblog · 7 years ago

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Of Happy Coincidences and Fated Connections Chapter 6

Act 6

‘The best is yet to come’. Yeah right!

I wake up all hazy, my head is lightheaded and my vision is blurry. People are clamoring around me and I try to get up. My vision is returning, but clearly I am having some bizarre dream in a dream because Diana, Sucy, Amanda, Lotte, Hannah, Barbara are wearing strange clothing, like fantasy rpg clothing.

Wait….Luluco is here too…..wait….hold up…..shit this might not be a dream. I pass out again.

Luluco. Galactic patrol luluco, she works for galactic organization that goes around stopping crime all over space. Sucy met her over a year back and she’s stopped by a few times. If this is really not a dream than I believe this will be the 3rd time I’ve met with her. She always brings trouble. Roll your eyes all you want because that would be hypocritical of me to say knowing my track heard. No really her troubles are on a much bigger scale.

Shit my head hurts. Ooh now I’m starting to remember………so we recovered fine at Cavendish mansion and Andrew, Diana & I hung out and went out too. It was all very pleasant. Even the first 2 days at the summer house went by without much trouble and we caught up what everyone else did for the last 2 weeks.

Despite dispute and gambles going on between Amanda, constanze, sucy & surprisingly Hannah with the Appleton boys, we had an eventful time gaming, movie watching and going hiking and having sleepovers. So we are literally running on 3-4 hours per day of sleep.

Today in particular we were planning to just do a BBQ and go swimming, because surprisingly we have only done that a bit the first day.

Everything was going smoothly until……until what? Shit my memory is hazy.

‘Akko look out’ Diana jumps in front of me for a blast meant for me and she is out. Wait what….

Professor Ursula was fighting this gigantic weird mushrooms creature…..wait! did sucy bring some weird mushrooms or something.

Why is my memory so jumbled up. Grrrr. Ooh right croix sensei is down, wait so is sucy….hmmm right! It wasn’t an ordinary mushroom thing. Well apart from being sentient apparently it had an immense resistance for magic. Physical blows were the anything that worked. Hence why you see a few mushrooms minions knocked out around Professor Ursula.

Ooh right I was helping her, but we were having a hard time. Professor Ursula got a good hit and so did I but the main boss wasn’t happy and it spread its spores. Professor Ursula shields me.

With the masks on I hardly think that would be necessary and then the creature sends a blast as well and my last assist was down. I went back to Diana. Begging her to wake up, just when I thought it was all over Luluco shows up.

First thing she says after beaming away with her gun a few mushrooms minions is sorry followed by ‘hey akko, it would be nice to finally meet in better circumstances’ I’m inclined to agree.

So that’s an alien. Huh. See I wasn’t lying. She’s trouble. At a possibly bigger proportion than me.

Really nice girl though when you get to know her and there’s never a dull moment with her, but my life is hectic enough as it is. Also having been in one life or death experience with my girlfriend like literally less than 2 weeks ago is good enough for a lifetime, although with my luck at least 1 year to 2 shouldn’t be too much to ask for alas.

I see Luluco frantically running back to me. Ooh right I should help. She shakes her head and jumps towards me there’s another spore field and this one is much denser. I see how badly she injured the gigantic mushroom boss. Ooh god, he’s angry. She shields me with this weird force-field thing, but the force-field did not close completely around luluco and we both black out anyway.

Right that’s what happened. Wait. Who are those diana, sucy, lotter and the rest?

Ok try to remember……ooh right we’re in final fantasy game.

We-meaning Luluco and I- woke up in Mi’hen High road. I saw a chocobo and rode on one too! They’re cute as heck.

Luluco informed me the creature was a galactic creature that is immensely dangerous due to the amazing dream realities that suck you in. She gave a whole complicated explanation of them being possibly multi verse and my head was hurting. This is even worse than when she told me last summer break about alternate universes and how there were some universes I wasn’t with Diana at all. Preposterous.

I care less about trying to understand the whole complications around that though. Basically the bottom point we have to make it to Zanarkand and beat the mushroom entity to get out of here. Good thing dream time is much quicker than real time so we should go in a brisk pace, but it’s possible to make it before our friends gets sucked into the dream reality and never to return again. Those minion mushrooms are actually lost souls in that dream reality. Creepy.

On our adventure we swiftly beat chocobo eater with the help of a healer and summoner Diana that came to help us. She’s so beautiful I could cry, but she’s not my Diana. This is a Diana that grew up in those final fantasy world or final fantasy multiverse dream, you know what screw it. We’re here let’s just make sure we accomplish our goals.

She was accompanied by Hannah & Barbara which were Samurai and Gunner respectively.

Diana was charmed by me. Ooh no is this technically cheating…..

In any case we ended up joining them in their pilgrimage and it was such a hectic ride we lotte the trainer class traveler and then sucy the black mage. I was the warrior and luluco the berserker.

Then we met our thief Amanda and she also had the lady luck dress as well to change into.

We had briefly been accompanied by the alchemist Constanze and the dark mage Jasminke, but they had previous engagements.

Chariot was apparently did since she was the previous summoner who used the final summoning so that makes sin Croix…..great….well the mushroom creature now….this is so confusing.

I can’t believe it though from mi’hen highroad we walked all the way to mushroom rock road, watch croix/ mushroom creature destroy all those soldiers actually after that whole fiasco we met Amanda in Moonflow when she washed ashore. She recognized me so I guess some parts of the story stayed the same.

Thunder Plains sucked although it would seem to fear of thunder did not get carried over by Rikku to Amanda so I was the one shaking in my boots. Good thing I didn’t have to woe this Diana.

Macalania Woods in particular was both pretty and eerie and it’s around here that things become blurry.

Luluco warned about the dangers of staying in this world for long and not telling yourself constantly it’s a game, but it would seem Luluco is also losing herself in this game. This is bad. However then arranged marriages and abductions were happening and even though this wasn’t my diana and the I was more worried that the lines between reality and this world were beginning to blur I will rescue her.

It would seem travelling a desert, while almost dying of thirst would do the trick in completely having forgotten this was not real. So my memory is a bit hazy all I know that there was a fire at home base of the al bhed and we got the airship and it dropped us off before calm lands.

Where……oh god…….I kissed this world’s Diana under water! It’s not cheating if it’s not real right?

Calm lands was peaceful and beautiful, however it has some pretty crazy monsters and then there was cold. We found out the lie of the final summoning and we killed Dianalesca. Huh. I guess they changed that.

So where are we now? Ooh right. We’re searching for celestial weapons for our party members. We had just found the last one at omega ruins. Which has the scariest monster around and a thorn berry showed up.

Ooh right this is how I ended up here. I remembered what happened back to Diana and I and the thorn berry like creature and that was my tether to bring me back to who I was and what I had to do. I had to save Diana and my other friends out there in the real world. Lest they become mushrooms minions.

Goodness. I snap my eyes open.

“You remembered as well?”

I nod my head.

It was luluco. She apparently touched a memory crystal and was reminded of Nova and why she had to go back. Also seeing me stabbed and killed by a Thornberry was fairly uncomfortable to watch for her apparently. Luckily we have revive here or phoenix down or varies other revitalizing moves. My diana would love some of them or maybe she already has a few equivalent? I have to ask her more specifically.

So we decided we have to go now. We made it all the way to the end and after a lots of effort and having died over again a few times I almost lost myself but the Taurus zodiac card of Diana protected me and gave me strength when I was at my low point and along with my team, including luluco we finally beat Croix/Sin/whatsermushroomface.

Of course like the final fantasy game luluco and I were the dream people. The irony a dream in a dream. This seems like that movie inception we saw yesterday. Grrr. Does the toll stop or not. God.

This version Diana is sad and I give her one last kiss. This isn’t cheating ok. It’s still Diana.

Luluco also leaves and we bask in being heroes. We wake up and the mushroom monster is in a trance, probably tired of having been defeated and we deal the finishing blow and right on time, because my friends were starting to resemble more mushroom than people.

Good. Luluco gives me a few potions to give to them since the after effects of having been in a multiverse/ dream space takes its toll on the psyche and your energy. Luluco goes about cleaning the minion remains and a few other stuff left behind or affected by the pollen of the whatserface mushroom.

Professor Ursula is waking up first, so I give it to her and give her a few to give to others.

I noticed Diana waking up and as I went to her. She was still out of it and yelled out expelliarmus while pointing her wand at me.

I burst out laughing. Omg. Marathoning Harry Potter those 2 days we were on bed rest had a stronger effect that I thought and that’s when she said some of the things were untrue or silly. She liked it after all. Goodness I will never let her live this down.

Diana despite her weak state was a flustered mess. “Don’t say anything”

“What’s in it for me?”

“For goodness sake Akko”

“Here drink this, but don’t think for a moment I will forget you shouting out that spell”

She scowls, but drinks the potion.

She softens up though and gives me a big kiss “I knew you could do it, akko”

I’m a blushing mess once again and I wanted to tell her about the protection and strength her Taurus card game me during my journey in Final Fantasy world.

When I hear Amanda arguing with an Appleton boy that just woke up. Diana and I had towards the commotion.

“No, No way. I had the coolest dream. I was a gosh darn jedi!”

Ooh it was that rude boy that wanted to torture us when we arrived to Appleton. I mean I don’t care for most of the Appleton guys if I’m honest, but Andrew said the changed quite a lot and even Appleton became less mean-spirited towards witches. That’s good to hear.

“Yeah well were you a girl, passing of as a male knight and a vigilante during the night?”

“I had light sabers!”

“Professor Ursula can make light sabers too in our world big whoop!”

Yeah that’s right. I should ask her about how she makes em. They’re pretty cool.

“Well did you travel in space?”

“Who cares about space when you get girls every night, can you say the same little jedi virgin?”

“Wh-what! How is that relevant?!”

“So you admit you lost!”

“No!”

And luckily Andrew and Professor Ursula ended up mediating that argument.

I’m starving. That means multiverse dream food does not fill you up either once you’re outside of it.

I see food on the table and without thinking I took a bit.

I hear screams of ‘No!’ even from Luluco. Ahh…..I might’ve screwed up. She didn’t finish clearing the table with the food covered in spores.

“Luluco, hello nice to see you again.” She greets her “Anything we can do?” Diana frantically asks

Luluco shakes her head although she gives me half the potion. Ewww it’s gross and that’s the last thing I remember before I pass well that and Diana catching me.

“Honestly akko” Diana moved Akko to an outside bench and put Akko’s face on her lap while she’s petting Akko’s hair.

Amanda comes to tease Diana for being all lovey-dovey but instead gets something even better.

“Minchino……I choose you!”

Amanda breaks out into uncontrolled laughter.

Diana is amused she has something to hold over Akko as well.

Luluco stays for the BBQ and beach time before she has to go back to her duties.

Honestly akko never a dull moment with you or the people you meet and Diana drifts of as well leaning on the wall behind the outside chair and the last thing she hears is Amanda’s booming voice, Professor Ursula telling everyone to calm down and Sucy yellow that mushroom ruled world would truly be the best.

#DianakkoWeek #Dianakko #Diakko

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drthomasmaples · 7 years ago

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The History between Hermann Hesse and Carl Jung

The psychological theories of Carl Gustav Jung share a common history with the writing of Siddhartha. Hesse (2002) began work on this story in 1919 and completed the first portion of the story by 1920. He then underwent a period of severe writer’s block from which he sought analytical treatment from Dr. Jung; after a brief stint of analytical treatment lasting only a few weeks, Hesse was able to complete the Indian legend in 1922. This period in the author’s life coincided with a 17 year self-experimental journey Dr. Jung undertook to shed light on the nature of his unconscious, which became the subject matter of Liber Novus: The Red Book (Jung, 2009); it was during the time of Hesse’s writers block that Jung worked on an experimental psychological treatment modality called active imagination, exploring ways to make unconscious themes conscious through artistic expressions of imagination.

In the case of Siddhartha, literary expressions of archetypal themes are present throughout the work. Hermann Hesse often makes emotional appeals that “are strange and mysterious to the logical mind” (Maier, 1999, p. 1). This is why Maier (1999) believed that Hesse’s work needs clarification by referencing the theories of Carl Jung’s psychology. The story Siddhartha speaks to the collective journey we undergo to make sense of our personal ontology and storyline. By utilizing a writing method similar to those used to create fairy-tales, Hesse’s writing appeals to the archetypal foundation of the collective unconscious, which allows his works to assume a collective perspective that works rationale and logic, emotions and thought. Maier (1999) stated that his works “affect the reader whether he is conscious of them or not” (p. 1). The heroic themes present in Hesse’s plots had an immense effect on multiple generations from various cultures around the world (Morris, 2002), including myself during a time when I was searching to make sense of my own emergent life story.

Hesse wrote Siddhartha at a time when scientific objectivity became the predominant means by which European people viewed the external world. Hesse wrote the following words in 1920:

We are seeing a religious wave rising in almost all of Europe, a wave of religious need and despair, a searching and a profound malaise, and many are speaking of… a new religion to come… Europe is beginning to sense… that the overblown one-sidedness of its intellectual culture (most clearly expressed in scientific specialization) is in need of a correction, a revitalization coming from the opposite pole. This widespread yearning is not for a new ethics or a new way of thinking, but for a culture of spiritual function that our intellectual approach to life has not been able to provide. This is a general yearning not so much for a Buddha or a Laotze but for a yogic capability. We have learned that humanity can cultivate its intellect to an astonishing level of accomplishment without becoming master of its soul. (Hesse, 2002, p. vii)

A growing sentiment to repress all instincts plagued the European attitude of the 19th century. This attitude is apparent in Hesse’s citation. Descartes created a philosophical premise that allowed the mind to exist separately from the body; science utilized this philosophical premise to create a method by which one could study an entity without taking part in its subjective presence. Scientific objectivity became a method utilized to understand the environment from a removed perspective; this led to a denial of subjective presence within research and mitigated the validity of scientific claims to the way consciousness can remain objectively separate from that which it studies (Romanyshyn, 2001). This reminds me of the famous citation by Friedrich Nietzsche (1882/1974):

God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it? (para. 125)

Our quest to formulate meaning about the environment from a removed perspective of objectivity allowed us to cultivate a superior knowledge base at the expense of removing ourselves from the life-giving essence of soul that nourishes our existence. As I compare the citation Hesse wrote in 1920 to the citation Nietzsche wrote nearly fifty years earlier, it becomes clear that Europe felt the full effects of what objectifying the world and denying the presence of social responsibility, ethics, and the presence of God entails. Hesse’s words appear to answer the ethical dilemma proposed by Nietzsche nearly half a century before.

The countercultural spiritual movement that Hesse foretold occurred decades later in America with the birth of the baby-boomer generation and the hippie movement. In the introduction to Hesse’s novel Siddhartha, Paul W. Morris (2002) wrote:

When New Directions decided to publish the first English translation of Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha in 1951, it could not have foreseen the enormous impact it would have on American culture. The novel’s ostensibly simple narrative – the story of a young, accomplished brahmin. Siddhartha, who defies his father’s tradition in favor of wandering India in search of enlightenment – appealed to the restless drifter, the alienated youth, and the political anarchist alike. Its many motifs include the outcast from society, rejection of authority, communion with nature, recalcitrance toward schooling, and the idea of an imminent God. Published in the United States during the Cold War, Siddhartha addressed a perennial unrest and provided a new set of values for a generation of people disenchanted with their parent’s conservatism. (pp. xiii-xiv)

During the 1960s, America was ready to promote the spiritual awakening that Hesse had foretold during the 1920s. The philosophical ideology behind personal spiritual enlightenment also stands as a theoretical undercurrent of analytical, humanistic, and transpersonal models of psychology (Taylor, 1999). While Hesse was never a part of these movements, nor was he involved in the field of psychology, he seems to have foretold the paradigmatic shift that was responsible for their creation and was well aware of the psychology of Dr. Carl Jung through his own analysis with the Jungian trained analyst Dr. Josef B. Lang and Dr. Carl Jung himself.

Many of Hesse’s characters are traceable to the analytical sessions he had with Dr. Josef B. Lang, a psychiatrist and disciple of Carl Jung, who treated Hesse during the time period between 1916 and 1919 when Hesse was writing the novel Demian (Hesse, 1919); Hesse and Lang remained lifelong friends after his treatment, and his involvement with Lang would eventually lead to a stint of analysis with Dr. Jung himself. In 1921, after suffering a period of writer’s block, Hesse sought a brief analysis from Carl Jung, which would last only a couple of weeks. Hesse ended this treatment abruptly after the writer’s block lifted (Freedman, 1999), freeing him to complete the second half of his story.

Hesse wrote Siddhartha in a fashion that honored collective themes; the presence of these collective themes become clear when one reads the story from a psychological perspective. Beyond its use of Jung’s idea about ascertaining an individuated sense of consciousness, Siddhartha presents as an eclectic blend of Buddhist, Hindu, and Taoist concepts integrated with a burgeoning knowledge of Western models of psychoanalytically based psychologies. Hesse’s novel is also a biographical account of the author’s personal quest to individuate and rebel against the social structures, mores, and the ethics common to the European continent during the early 20th century.

Until then, Hesse’s entire life had been a series of rebellions, from his dropping out of school at the age of thirteen, to his break with the tradition of his Protestant parents and their hope that he follow their missionary ambitions, to his fierce opposition to the global conflict of World War I. (Morris, 2002, p. xvii)

As a protagonist, Siddhartha, reconciles his rebellious nature much as Hesse sought to “reconcile his family’s missionary tradition with his own rebellious spirit” (Morris, 2002, p. xvii). For Hesse, this rebellious spirit, combined with later nervous breakdowns and subsequent psychoanalyses by Dr. Josef B. Lang and Dr. Carl Jung, expressed itself in two of the stories he wrote.

Siddhartha has enjoyed a warm and extensive reception since its original publication in 1922. This is partially due to the way the story touches upon collective themes that drive human nature and our search to make meaning of the life we are afforded. While Hesse wrote the story Siddhartha about a real character, Gautama the Buddha, he wrote the story in such a way that the main character can represent any person that reads its rich, symbolic content. The history behind the production of this book also suggests that Hesse could not finish the plot the protagonist undertook (individuation) without first understanding about how this journey unfolded in his own personal development. Therefore, Hesse’s work represents a fictitious biography of the Buddha, an autobiographical account of the journey the author undertook, and an archetypal story that shows a symbolic path an exemplar took to become enlightened and understand the true nature of Self.

A Developmental Perspective of Archetypal Individuation.

People seek to make meaning within their lives by formulating conscious understanding of their internal and external worlds. At a young age, the conscious splits environmental events into increasingly complex systems of understanding that rely on the ability to perceive events as being either positive or negative to the quest the Self has to realize its true nature. The Self perpetuates its own life cycle; this life cycle unfolds upon itself in a natural order of events as life eventually gives way to death. Our ability to form conscious representations of environmental events allows us to develop greater understanding of the Self as it interacts with increasingly larger environments. Carl Jung (1954/1969b) spent his life creating a theory that viewed developmental experiences as being a “natural course of life – a life in which the individual becomes what he always was” (p. 40). The natural course of life unfolds from a-priori archetypal constructs that govern the sequence by which development occurs.

Archetypes form the foundation of the collective unconscious, from which consciousness emerges. Archetypal themes also foster development at specific periods during the life sequence. Upon initial review, the archetypal themes that appear to perpetuate the developmental sequence are the divine child, the Self, the shadow, the personae, the anima and animus syzygy, a concept of divinity (God), the wise man, and the underlying sequences that assure consciousness arises and is able to mend itself.

Carl Jung (1968) viewed that uniting the polarities of the psyche constituted the fundamental process that drives human development. The maturation of consciousness assures that the psyche develops a polarized perspective that judges entities as similar or different, good or bad. While many paths can occur during the life cycle, each individual path branches like the limbs of a tree towards the heavens and the sun, which allows life to exist on this planet in the first place. Life strives towards its end regardless if a person chooses to act in a positive or negative manner. For each opposite apparent in the psyche, a binding agent helps mend the tension within the psyche to perpetuate individuated development. Jung (1946/1993) wrote:

Hunted for centuries and never found, the prima materia or lapis philosophorum is, as a few alchemists rightly suspected, to be discovered in man himself. But it seems that this content can never be found and integrated directly, but only by the circuitous route of projection… The difficulties of our psychotherapeutic work teach us to take truth, goodness, and beauty where we find them. They are not always found where we look for them: often they are hidden in the dirt or are in the keeping of the dragon. “In stercore invenitur” (it is found in filth) runs an alchemical dictum – nor is it any the less valuable on that account. But, it does not transfigure the dirt and does not diminish the evil, any more than these lessen God’s gifts. The contrast is painful and the paradox is bewildering. Statements like Heaven above, Heaven below… all that is above, all is below, Grasp this, And rejoice are too optimistic and superficial; they forget the moral torment occasioned by the opposites, and the importance of ethical values. (pp. 518-520)

Ambiguity occurs as the psyche attempts to make sense of the positive and negative poles common to consciousness. Only individuals who transcend the moral torment that accompanies the polarities common to consciousness can partake in the alchemical goal of the “prima materia” or “lapis philosophorum.” This is why Jung (1946/1993) stated, “It seems that this content can never be found and integrated directly, but only by the circuitous route of projection” (p. 518). From a Jungian perspective, one can only transcend the inherent split of consciousness by uniting the positive and negative poles of each archetype with the Self.

A key construct of Jungian theory lies in its use of symbolism to explain the human condition. In Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self, Jung (1969) provided a comprehensive review of the archetypes that directly affect the individuating Self. Jungian theory proposes that each archetype acts as a governing body that helps the psyche to emerge. Each archetype consists of polarities, and through individuation, a person learns to integrate the poles common to each archetype with the emergent Self concept. By mending the polarities common to an archetype, a person can transcend consciousness and realize the Self in its individuated form.

The Jungian analyst Michael Fordham (1969) developed a theoretical model about how the psyche individuates. He believed the psyche deintegrates and reintegrates to perpetuate its development. Other Jungian theorists, such as Stien (1983, 1998, & 2006) and Whitmont (1969) have touched upon developmental themes from a Jungian perspective, but have not provided a detailed description from which the psyche individuates during the lifespan. While the development of consciousness is explored within the context of all three author’s works, neither author explores a developmental sequence by which individuation of consciousness occurs.

The development of consciousness is a theme common to the Judaeo Christian foundation underlying European philosophy. It forms the basic theme explored in the book of Genesis. Adam and Eve became conscious of their naked bodies after partaking of the forbidden fruit of the “Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil” (Gen. 2-3), thus falling into a paradoxical awareness, knowing good and evil only as God does, and thus are expelled into the world, knowing shame. Author and Jungian Analyst Robert Johnson (1993) used the term simple consciousness to explain the initial state of naked bliss that all individuals partake in during their childhood development. However, simple consciousness must give way to ego development and increasingly complex systems by which the individual learns to relate with others in their environment, if a normed developmental sequence is to occur. Carl Jung (1971) believed that with personal maturity came the development of “ad hoc adopted attitude[s]” (p. 465); a person develops these attitudes in conjunction with outside social pressures. Freud called the social attitudes that one develops to deal with the environment the ego; Jung adopted the Latin word persona to explain this process. Jung (1921/1993) wrote:

He is an individual, of course, like every being; but an unconscious one. Though his more or less complete identification with the attitude of the moment, he at least deceives others, and also often himself, as to his real character. He puts on a mask, which he knows corresponds with his conscious intentions, while it also meets with the requirements and opinions of his environment, so that first one motive then the other is in the ascendant… A man who is identified with this mask I would call ‘personal’ (as opposed to ‘individual’). Both the attitudes of the case considered above are collective personalities, which may be simply summed up under the name ‘persona’ or ‘personae.’ I have already suggested above that the real individuality is different from both. (p. 340)

The personae are reactions to ego formation and not Self-development. Jung believed that the masks a person presents to the world are different from the Self. In this work, I will explore the concept of the persona in more depth in my dealings with the adolescent developmental sequence.

Masquerade – Phantom of the Opera Mask on Ivy Wall

closeup portrait of sexy woman in violet party mask for desire concept

Jung’s concept of the persona mirrors Erikson’s (1956; 1959; 1963; 1982; 1987) psychosocial concept of identity development. During adolescence and young adult life, a person experiments with an array of personality types. By experimenting with personality structures, a young adult develops a set ego from which he or she can function within the world, which allows them to develop the ability to relate with others “objects” in the outside world. This is the underlying concept of object relations’ theory (Bion, 1959, 1977; Klein 1920, 1948, 1959, 1964, 1975, 1975a – c, & 1994; Ogden, 1986 & 1989; Segal 1957, 1973, & 1989), and commonly occurs during the first half of life as the emerging ego develops the ability to form object attachments (Ainsworth, 1973 &1985; Ainsworth & Blehar, 1978; Bowlby, 1969, 1973, 1980, & 1988). However, during the second half of life a person needs to learn how to relate to the Self, as it exists separate from the personae developed as a means to deal with the environment. Because the persona is the conscious projection of the ego, it also represents one component of the shadow, which represents the “dark aspects of the personality” (Jung, 1969a, p. 8) development that may or may not be readily available to consciousness.

Carl Jung (1969) labeled the dark aspects of personality the shadow. The shadow archetype is the most easily accessible archetype to the ego because its content is personal. For Jung (1969), the shadow represented a “moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality, for no one can become conscious of the shadow without a considerable moral effort” (p. 8). While the shadow represents all that is dark within the personality, it also has positive qualities that drive individuation. Jung (1934/1968) wrote:

The meeting with oneself is, at first, the meeting with one’s own shadow. The shadow is a tight passage, a narrow door, whose painful constriction no one is spared who goes down to the deep well. But one must learn to know oneself in order to know who one is. For what comes after the door is, surprisingly enough, a boundless expanse full of unprecedented uncertainty, with apparently no inside and no outside, no above and no below, no here and no there, no mine and no thine, no good and no bad. It is the world of water, where all life floats in suspension: where the realm of the sympathetic system, the soul of everything living, begins; where I am indivisibly this and that; where I experience the other in myself and the other-than-myself experiences me. (pp. 21-22)

A child is born to the world through a narrow opening from which the Self emerges. The shadow constricts the Self through events that include, but are not limited to parental and social expectations, physiological, environmental, and psychological traumas, one’s genetic and psychological strengths and weaknesses, and the attitudes one adopts towards the life sequence. Individuation occurs when a person transcends the polarized nature of consciousness these and other paradoxes entail. While Jung believed the first half of life consisted of developing an acceptable personality in which to deal with the social environment, he viewed that the second half of life consisted of integrating the shadow into one’s overall personality, allowing more access to the Self to occur. The citation above shows that an individual has to make sense of the shadow during the second half of life to become explicitly aware of the internal and external processes that promote individuated development. While the way a person perceives internal and external events is reliant on consciousness, internal and external events coalesce with these internal views and perpetuate Self-development.

From a Jungian perspective, the period associated with the second half of life also consists of integrating the anima archetype for men and the animus archetype for women to develop a more rounded sense of personality that perpetuates Self-development. The anima is the feminine compensatory element that lies at the foundation of a man’s psyche (Jung, 1969, p. 14). The animus is the masculine compensatory element that lies at the foundation of a woman’s psyche. The anima archetype is complimentary to the masculine model of Self development, and provides man with a sense of femininity to help balance their emergent personality by counteracting the ego related personae a man creates to deal with environmental influences (Jung, 1921/1971). The animus is complimentary to the feminine model of Self development, and provides a woman with masculine traits that help balance the emergent female personality traits.

Jung split all psychological phenomena into polarities that battle for recognition within the individual psyche. He (1928/1966) believed that the anima represents the feminine nature of man and the animus represented the masculine nature of the woman. The image of one’s opposite gendered parent is the first representation of the anima and animus archetype until the maturation of the psyche allows the individual to separate that archetype from the parental image that originally held its presence. The anima holds the nurturing and devouring polarities common to the mother archetype (Jung, 1954/1969). The animus holds the moral commandment and prohibitive polarities common to the father archetype. From the positive archetypal pole, the anima provides a man with the ability to nurture, have affective response, and develop other positive feminine traits. The anima acts as a pathway into the nature of a man’s soul. The same hold true for the animus. The animus helps serve a woman by allowing her access to what Jung viewed as traditional masculine models of psychological being. By learning how to balance the nurturing and devouring poles common to the archetypal mother through the development of moral prohibitions through the development of value based ethics, a female can learn more about the nature of her soul. From a negative perspective, the anima archetype can possess a man through the development of labile emotional responses towards environmental stimuli, can cause an over-reliance on feeling rather than logic based states of awareness, and can cause men to become stuck within a psychological complex that does not allow masculinity to flourish. Likewise, the negative animus pole can cause a woman to become overly judgmental and seek to embody power through physicality rather than the act of nurturing. While these are but a few of a series of possible complexes that can arise in the process of severing the anima and animus syzygy from the initial parental archetypes, the process of separating these archetypes from their original image base allows men and women to develop further object relationships separate from the experiences they had with their parents (Jung, 1931/1969).

By relating to the feminine aspect of the soul, a man develops a holistic sense of self that is not reliant on the personae he creates. Likewise, when a woman relates to the masculine undertones of her psyche, she can develop a more holistic sense of self. When the polarities of the anima or animus become bound to the personality, a psychological rebirth can occur. In Jungian psychology, the archetypal symbols Mercury, Dionysus, and the hermaphrodite represents psychological development that can occur when the masculine and feminine traits combine within the anima and animus syzygy. Psychological rebirth also re-assures the emergence of the divine child archetype.

The death and rebirth process represents two polarities common to the divine child archetype. The divine child also represents the natural wholeness that occurs when someone enters a new developmental phase. Jung (1951/1969) wrote:

Myth, however, emphasizes… that the “child” is endowed with superior powers and, despite all dangers, will unexpectedly pull through. The “child” is born out of the womb of the unconscious, begotten out of the depths of human nature, or rather out of living Nature herself. It is a personification of vital forces quite outside the limited range of our conscious mind; of ways and possibilities of which our one-sided conscious mind knows nothing; a wholeness which embraces the very depths of Nature. It represents the strongest, the most ineluctable urge in every being, namely the urge to realize itself…The urge and compulsion to self-realization is a law of nature and thus of invincible power, even though its effect, at the start, is insignificant and improbable. Its power is revealed in the miraculous deeds of the child hero. (pp. 170-171)

The innocence associated with childhood is apparent within world mythologies, fairy tales, and stories of religion. Childhood represents a new beginning, a time when all possibilities are an option for the developing psyche to explore. Robert Bly (1990) that the loss of childhood innocence to develop adult forms of consciousness was a process of losing the “golden ball.” Bly showed how the divinity of childhood is a realized state of being. The Jungian analyst Robert Johnson (1993) believed that the time that a child takes part in the world without judgment was a form of simple consciousness. By developing adult consciousness, a child loses the original sense of integration common to a conscious that does not yet perceive the difference between paradoxes so common to consciousness. They have yet to learn of safe and non-safe events, the good and bad parts of life. The process of returning to the original state of innocent consciousness associated with the divine child archetypes leads to the realization of the Self through a means of developing a transcendent form of consciousness that is similar to childhood consciousness, but has the luxury of already knowing the polarized nature common to adult consciousness we all undertake. While individuation does not represent a return to childhood, it does represent a return to the perception so common to a child’s innocent state of inquisitiveness. Individuation allows the Self to realize its emergent nature.

Individuation means becoming an “in-dividual,: and, in so far as “individuality” embraces our innermost, last, and incomparable uniqueness, it also implies becoming one’s own self. We could therefore translate individuation as “coming to selfhood” or “self-realization.” (Jung, 1928/1966, p. 173)

In this author’s opinion, one of the greatest contributions that Carl Jung made to the field of psychology was to draw attention to the importance symbolism has on the development of pathological, non-pathological, and individuated forms of consciousness. While our existence is personal, natural laws also govern our life and death. In the essay entitled The Philosophical Tree, Carl Jung (1954/1967) showed how a symbol could represent the entire journey human beings undertake to individuate. Jung (1954/1967) wrote:

The psychoid form underlying any archetypal image retains its character at all stages of development, though empirically it is capable of endless variations. The outward form of the tree may change in the course of time, but the richness and vitality of a symbol are expressed more in its change of meaning… Taken on average, the commonest associations to its meaning are growth, life, unfolding of form in a physical and spiritual sense, development, growth from below upwards and from above downwards, the maternal aspect (protection, shade, shelter, nourishing fruits, source of life, solidity, permanence, firm-rootedness, but also being “rooted to the spot”), old age, personality, and finally death and rebirth. (p. 272)

“Growth from below upwards and from above downwards” (Jung, 1954/1967, p. 272) is similar to the Taoist concept of the Yin and Yang, which compliments each other from the same cardinal directions. Like the Yin and Yang, the tree symbol is a numinous symbol, capable of housing all polarities common to the Self-archetype. It is no surprise that Jung paid particular attention to the tree symbol as being representative of our human endeavor to individuate due to its long-standing history as a symbol of great importance to world religions and mythologies.

The archetypal tree is important to the development of the individuated Self because it transcends masculine and feminine constructs of the psyche and offers a representation of the numinous nature of the transcendent function. The tree is associated with the birth and transcendence of major figures within mythology and religion. This is not surprising since the oxygen produced by trees sustain life on this planet. Regarding the nurturing aspects of tree symbolism found throughout world religions, Jung (1954/1967) wrote:

As the seat of transformation and renewal, the tree has a feminine and maternal significance… In Pandora, the trunk of the tree is a crowned, naked woman holding a torch in each hand, with an eagle sitting in the branches on her head… Leto and Mary both gave birth under a palm, and Maya at the birth of the Buddha was shaded by the holy tree. Adam, “so the Hebrews say,” was created out of the “earth of the tree of life,” the “red Damascene earth…” According to this legend, Adam stood in the same relation to the tree of life as the Buddha to the Bodhi tree. (pp. 317-318)

The nurturing and birth giving characteristics of the mother are clear in this passage. The tree is rooted to “Mother Earth;” however, the tree also aspires upwards from the earth towards the realm of spirit, which links the tree symbol to the masculine characteristic of spiritual morality. Concerning the masculine aspects of tree symbolism, Jung (1954/1967) wrote:

Like the vision of Zarathustra, the dream of Nebuchadnezzar, and the report of Bardesanes (A.D. 154 – 222) on the god of the Indians, the old Rabbinic idea that the tree of paradise was a man exemplifies man’s relationship to the philosophical tree. According to the ancient tradition, men came from trees or plants. The tree is as it were an intermediate form of man, since on the one hand it springs from the Primordial Man and on the other hand it grows into a man. Naturally, the patristic conception of Christ as a tree or vine exerted a very great influence… In so far as the tree symbolizes the opus and the transformation process… it also signifies the life process in general… Since the opus is a life, death, and rebirth mystery, the tree as well acquires this significance and in addition, the quality of wisdom, as we have seen from the view of the Barbeliots reported in Irenaeus: “From man [=Anthropos] and gnosis is born the tree, which they also call gnosis.”(p. 337-339)

From this author’s personal interpretation, the tree roots to the Earth (feminine soul motif) and its bark houses the archetypal Self. This is not unlike the skin that houses our soul, as it seeks to make sense of the archetypal Self that perpetuates individuated development. As the tree ascends towards the sun and heavens (masculine spirit motif), it realizes that its nature is afloat and grounded at the same time; like human nature, the tree is steeped in the feminine aspect of soul and aspires towards the realm of masculine spirit associated to the heavens. People, like trees inhabit the Earth while they aspire towards their life giving force found in the heavens. The tree symbol is similar to Jung’s theory of the coniunctio, an archetypal image that mends the opposite symbols common to the psyche into a transcendent Self-representation.

The tree is representative of the transcendent function. DNA carries within its structure the information needed to assure that the genetic sequence unfolds upon itself in a manner that directs the functions of a living being. From a developmental perspective, the transcendent function shows that the psyche has built within its foundation the ability to mature and realize itself. The simple consciousness of childhood must give way to adult ways of consciousness to assure the continued survival of the organism. However, the ability to attain transcendent consciousness relies on an individual’s patience to sit with and work through the paradoxes common to adult consciousness.

Jung (1954/1967) believed the tree represents growth and life. The psychological growth associated with the tree occurs in its representation of the union that can occur if one unites the anima or animus archetypes with the archetypal Self. Many symbols throughout human history have shown how the union of opposites occurs, which include the Yin and Yang, the God Mercury, the hermaphrodite, and as was shown in this section, the tree of life. All of these symbols are archetypal conduits that promote individuated development.

In this author’s opinion, human development is a circular process in which a person wanders throughout the lifecycle searching to make meaning about his or her life. This is similar to the concentric rings that make up the developmental history of a tree. Just as the tree’s concentric rings are a-symmetrical and dependent on the amount of nourishment it receives during any given year, the human soul finds its nourishment in a non-symmetrical fashion that is dependent on mastering developmental milestones that lead to individuation. As developmental stages must end with the death motif, as winter gives way to the emergence of spring, new stages are born that lead a person ever closer to becoming an individuated being. Although the end-result of life, physical death remains the same for all living beings, the conscious choices that dictate how the journey of life will unfold can have many forms. Like the alchemical tree’s branches, life presents a person with many branches. However, like the branches of a tree that aspire towards its life giving force, the choices we make also affect our ability to reach the final goal of realizing our true potential as an individuated being – thus the age-old adage, “there are many roads to God.”

Jung’s focus on the individuation process produced a psychological theory that is rooted in understanding the transcendent function. However, Jung did not leave a detailed account of the developmental sequences that leads towards the realization of the Self in an individuated form of consciousness. While Jung (1950/1969) stated that “psychic experiences… have very different effects on a person’s development” (p. 351), he also stated, “no attempt will be made to describe the normal psychic occurrences within the various stages” (Jung, 1931/1969, p. 387). Jung’s predecessors have also left a legacy without a specific developmental sequence from which individuated consciousness arises. This is why Withers (2003) identified this as a major controversy in the field of analytical psychology. While Jung never produced a detailed account that differentiated between “normal psychic occurrences” that occur during the various stages, the statements made above show the developmental undertones found within the psychology of Carl Jung.

Why Siddhartha over other Literary Works about Individuation.

Siddhartha (Hesse, 2002), as a literary work, has greatly influenced my life. Not only does Hesse’s work form the foundation from which I delved into creating a theoretical discourse of individuated development based on a Jungian perspective, it also provided the means by which I made sense of my own journey to understand who I was becoming as a young man. I chose the novel Siddhartha (Hesse, 2002) in lieu of other works that focus on the individuation process due to the effects this novel had on my personal development. During my mid-twenties, when I first read the story, I was deeply entrenched in a depression that lasted for nearly a year. Within my own therapy experience, I traced this depression to a root cause of not understanding who I was becoming; as I sought my personal ontology, but had no examples amongst family and friends by which to gage the path I sought to undertake to become successful, I found myself lost, and without cause. Although I had known the theoretical tenets of Carl Jung’s psychology during this time, I did not know the ascetic path that the individuation journey entails. Siddhartha provided me with a means to make sense of the often-opposing themes that I found myself working on during this depression, mirroring the theoretical discourse Jung had written extensively about during his career to understand the dynamics by which psychological symbols prompt the individuation process. I approach the analysis of this story with a profound respect for the author and the protagonist he writes about within the story’s plot.

Siddhartha is a literary tale about a boy that sought to understand his personal nature. While Siddhartha haphazardly approached life from the perspective of an ascetic, he was eventually able to learn how to love, relate with other individuals, and achieve a transcendent level of consciousness. The Buddha achieved an enlightened sense of consciousness, and is an exemplar case of a person that was able to overcome his own difficulties, develop a transcendent form of consciousness, and understand the nature of the Self outside of the polarities common to consciousness.

As was shown above, Hesse’s account of the path that Siddhartha undertook is relative to his personal journey. Hesse, like his protagonist, rebelled against social mores common to early 20th century Europe, sought to understand himself through the lens of Eastern philosophies, and rejected formal education to learn about his own propensity to individuate. This links the perspective in the story to the ability all people have to seek personal understanding within their lives. Like Hesse and the protagonist he wrote about, I have also sought my personal ontology. When I originally read Siddhartha, I found that many of the themes Hesse showed within the context of the story also correlated to the path I undertook during my early adult years. These themes brought me to an increasingly acute interest in developmental and Jungian models of psychology.

Carl Jung’s psychological vision constituted a radical revision to the traditionally reductive psychologies that preceded his works. While Carl Jung’s psychology remains controversial to this day, due in part to his dualistic methodology and exploration of concepts to transcend rational psychology in lieu of developing a psychology based upon spiritual attainment, he nevertheless approached his work empirically. Jung sought to understand the means by which the psyche realizes itself. This psyche is both subjective and objective in this sense, and Jung’s research into its nature takes into account both perspectives. While Jung’s psychological writings utilize arcane philosophical literature, religious, and early scientific sources that are more metaphysical than traditional psychological doctrine, he approached the development of his theory with the same objective lens scientists’ utilize to understand the nature of what they study.

In this theoretical work, I chose to analyze Siddhartha, written by Hermann Hesse (2002) because of the direct experience Hesse had undergoing psychoanalysis with Carl Jung and Jungian analyst J. B. Lang, as well as it’s literary portrayal of an exemplar’s individuation journey. Furthermore, I chose Hesse’s novel due to the profound respect I have for both the author and his work; Hesse produced a story that made psychological sense of a situation that my emerging adult psyche found difficult to bear.

In this work, I seek to explore the means by which the archetypes prompt individuation. Hesse’s novel presents a literary example of the Buddha’s quest to understand his personal ontology, and utilizes archetypal symbolism as a means to explain the developmental sequence we undertake to find meaning within our lives. This is most evident in the fact that Hesse wrote the novel in such a fashion that it was indicative of his personal quest to make meaning about his life. As I have also sought to understand my personal ontology; with hindsight, I understand that great psychological shifts had to occur as a means to perpetuate my psychological development forward. Therefore, by conducting an analysis of Siddhartha, I hope to show how individuation arises from one’s lifelong quest to mend the polarized nature of consciousness common to adult life, therefore allowing us to make meaning about our life.

Final Statements.

An extensive history existed between Carl Jung and Hermann Hesse. This qualifies Hesse’s (2002) story Siddhartha as being a viable research topic within the field of depth psychology. As an author, Hermann Hesse’s novels had a great influence on multiple generations who would rebel against their parents conservatism, and seek to make their own meaning about the life cycle unfolded (Morris, 2002). Furthermore, Hesse’s works continue to have merit as literary masterpieces and as tomes to the processes that occur when one psychologically individuates. Although Hesse was not a psychologist, his works are psychological in nature. In Siddhartha, Hesse produced a story that shows how common archetypal themes drive the individuation journey that fosters Self-development. The themes presented in Siddhartha ring strikingly similar to regular life events that any individual may undertake even though the events presented in the story occurred to an extraordinary individual who sought to realize his Self.

Developmental motifs underlie Carl Jung’s psychology, even though Jung never proposed a theory of human development. Analytical psychology has sorely ignored this subject until recently (Withers, 2003), when Merchant (2006) published an article that related archetypal theory to biological development. Although Jung spent his lifetime attempting to understand the symbols that drive the human psyche towards an individuated state, he did not discuss if particular symbols drive human development at particular stages of life. Jung only provided a broad developmental overview of the entirety of the developmental process (Jung, 1931/1969).

It must be well understood that no attempt will be made to describe the normal psychic occurrences within the various stages. We shall restrict ourselves, rather, to certain ‘problems,’ that is, to things that are difficult, questionable, or ambiguous; in a word, to questions which allow of more than one answer—and, moreover, answers that are always open to doubt. (Jung, 1931/1969, p. 387)

While authors of a Jungian persuasion have focused on specific developmental periods or the means by which archetypes affect specific developmental periods (Whitmont, 1969; Stien, 1983, 1998, 2006), no theorists has attempted to produce a comprehensive developmental theory that is based on the archetypes that drive the individuation of the Self. While the literature of Jungian psychology focuses on specific archetypes, specific developmental periods, or the overall process of individuation, I have shown in this literature review that a need exists to understand the framework from which the symbolic development of the psyche occurs. Therefore, in this research study, I will examine whether a pattern of archetypal development exists by way of a literary case study of Siddhartha, analyzing each developmental stage that the character underwent from a philosophical and alchemical hermeneutic perspective.

Archetypes affect the individuation process. However, Jung and subsequent analytical psychologists have sorely ignored producing a developmental theory that links archetypal theory to the overall human maturation process. While many analytical psychologists have focused on the way specific archetypes affect the development of normal and pathological psychological states, no comprehensive developmental theory exists that shows how archetypes manifest during specific developmental stages or how a Jungian sequence of development would correlate or diverge from existent developmental theories. In this work, I chose to write an outline of what a developmental sequence from a Jungian perspective entails by conducting a philosophical and alchemical hermeneutic case study of Siddhartha, a historical fiction of the Buddha’s life.

In this theoretical work on developmental and Jungian psychology, I will focus on three areas of concern:

What archetypes affect the individuation process during Siddhartha’s lifespan?

While I focus on the life of one individual, Siddhartha is an example of an individual that transcended his own consciousness and achieved an individuated state of being. If Jung was correct, and the collective unconscious exists, then collective themes drive our journey to realize our true nature. If developmental themes are present within the context of Hesse’s story, I will show how these themes are a collective representation of the journey all people undertake understand their true nature. Secondarily:

Can we discern a developmental pattern in the manifestation of archetypes that occurred in Siddhartha’s life?

If human maturation occurs in specific sequences, then a developmental pattern must be present within a story that examines the life of an exemplar that achieved an individuated state of consciousness. Furthermore, if the foundation of consciousness is built upon a collective storehouse of information, this developmental sequence must be accessible to all individuals. In this theoretical work, I will show how we all strive towards our ultimate developmental goals.

Finally, I will turn my attention to whether developmental theories and Jungian theories have common ground. In particular,

Do the developmental themes found in the novel Siddhartha correlate to developmental assumptions found in the Jungian literature and what relationship they have to the extant developmental literature?

Through conducting an analysis of Hermann Hesse’s story from a philosophical and alchemical hermeneutic perspective, I show how a developmental sequence is present within the context of Hesse’s story of the Buddha’s life and how this sequence correlates and diverges from existing developmental literature from a psychoanalytical perspective.

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Erikson, E. (1987). For Joseph Wheelwright, my Jungian friend. In S. Schlein (Ed.), A way of looking at things: Selected papers from 1930 to 1980 (pp. 713-715). New York, NY: Norton.

Freedman, R. (1997). Hermann Hesse, pilgrim of crisis: A biography. New York: Fromm International.

Hesse, H. (1919). Demian. Berlin: S. Fischer.

Hesse, H. (2002). Siddhartha: A new translation with an introduction by Paul W. Morris. (C. S. Kohn, Trans.) Boston, MA: Shambhala.

Fordham, F. (1969). Some views on individuation. The Journal of Analytical Psychology, 14 (1), 1-12.

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Jung, C. G. (1966). The relations between the ego and the unconscious. In H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler, & W. McGuire (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung (R. F. Hull, Trans., Vol 7, pp. 123-245). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published in 1928).

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Jung, C. G. (1969). The stages of life. In H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler, & W. McGuire (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung (R. F. Hull, Trans., Vol. 8, pp. 387-403). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1931)

Jung, C. G. (1969). The psychology of the child archetype. In H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler, & W. McGuire (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung (R. F. Hull, Trans., Vols. 9-1, pp. 151-181). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1951).

Jung, C. G. (1969). Archetypes of the collective unconscious. In H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler, & W. McGuire (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung (R. F. Hull, Trans., Vols. 9-1, pp. 3-41). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1954).

Jung, C. G. (1971). Psychological types. In H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler, & W. McGuire (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung (R. F. Hull, Trans., Vols. 6). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1921).

Jung, G. G. (1993a). Psychological Types. In The basic writings of C. G. Jung: Edited, with an introduction by Violet Staub de Laszlo (pp. 230-357). New York, NY: The Modern Library. (Original work published 1921).

Jung, G. G. (1993). Psychology of the transference. In The basic writings of C. G. Jung: Edited, with an introduction by Violet Staub de Laszlo (pp. 495-534). New York, NY: The Modern Library. (Original work published 1946)

Jung, C. G. (2009). The red book liber novus: Edited and Introduced by Sonu Shamdasani (M. Kyburz, J. Peck, S. Shamdasani, Trans.). New York: W. W. Norton & Company.

Klein, M. (1920). The writings of Melanie Klein. (Vol. 1). London, England: Hogarth.

Klein, M. (1948). The psychoanalysis of children. London: Hogarth.

Klein, M. (1959). Envy and gratitude and other works. New York, NY: Delacorte.

Klein, M. (1964). Contributions to psycho-analysis. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Klein, M. (1975a). Envy and gratitude and other works: 1946-1963. New York, NY: Delacourte.

Klein, M. (1975b). Love, guilt and reparation. New York, NY: Free Press.

Klein, M. (1975c). Collected works (Vol. 1): Collected works. London, England: Hogarth.

Klein, M. (1994). Some theoretical conclusions regarding the emotional life of the infant. In D. E. Scharff (Ed.), Object relations theory and practice (pp. 72-89). Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

Maier, E. (1999). The psychology of C.G. Jung in the works of Hermann Hesse. Retrieved from http://www.gss.ucsb.edu/projects/hesse/papers/maier.pdf.

Merchant, J. (2006). The developmental/emergent model of archetype, its implications and its application to shamanism. Journal of Analytical Psychology , 51 (1), 125-144.

Morris, P. (2002) Introduction: Siddhartha: A new translation with an introduction by Paul W. Morris. (C.S. Kohn, Trans.) Boston, MA: Shambhala.

Nietzsche, F. (1974). The gay science: With a prelude in rhymes and an appendix of songs (Walter Kaufmann, Trans.). New York: Vintage Books (Original work published 1882).

Ogden, T. H. (1986). The maatrix of the mind: Object relations and the psychoanalytic dialogue. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

Ogden, T. H. (1989). Primitive edge of experience. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

Romanyshyn, R. D. (2001). Mirror and metaphor: Images and stories of psychological life. Pittsburgh, PA: Trivium Publications.

Segal, H. (1957). Notes on symbol formation. International Journal of Psychoanalysis , 35, 391-397.

Segal, H. (1973). Introduction to the work of Melanie Klein. New York: Basic Books, Inc.

Segal, H. (1989). Klein. London: Karmic Books.

Stien, M. (1983). In midlife: A Jungian perspective (seminar series 15). Woodstock, CT: Spring Publications.

Stien, M. (1998). Transformation: Emergence of the self. College Station, TX: Texas A&M University Press.

Stien, M. (2006). The principle of individuation: Towards the development of human consciousness. New York, NY: Chiron Publications.

Taylor, E. (1999). Shadow culture: Psychology and spirituality in America. Washington D.C.: Counterpoint.

Whitmont, E. C. (1969). The symbolic quest: Basic concepts of analytical psychology. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Withers, R. (Ed.). (2003). Controversies in analytical psychology. London, England: Routledge.

Chapter Two: A Developmental Theory of Jungian Psychology The History between Hermann Hesse and Carl Jung The psychological theories of Carl Gustav Jung share a common history with the writing of Siddhartha.

#Analytical Psychology #archetype #Carl Jung #development #developmental psychology #Dr. Thomas Maples #Featured #Hermann Hesse #Jungian Developmental Psychology #Masculine Development #Masculine Psychology #personality development #Psychology #Self #Self Actualization #Siddhartha #unconscious

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