THE TITLE "Women Who Run With The Wolves, Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype" is one to which many women can intuitively relate.
Clarissa Pinkola Estés, the author, a Jungian analyst and cantadora (storyteller) contends that "healthy women and healthy wolves share certain psychic characteristics: keen sensing, playful spirit and a heightened capacity for devotion. Wolves and women are relational by nature, inquiring, possessing of great endurance and strength. They are experienced in adapting to constantly changing circumstances: they are fiercely stalwart and very brave."
Yet both wolves and women have fallen victim to predators who fear and misunderstand them. It was, in fact, Estés' study of wolves that led to the concept of the Wild Woman archetype. This does not reflect the pejorative sense meaning out of control, but is a metaphor for the instinctual nature of women, which has been smothered by restrictive patriarchal societies.
Feeding one's intuition, and developing a dialogue with one's soul, are vital pursuits for women reclaiming their natural selves. To this end and beyond, the book is inspirational and instructive.
"Women Who Run with the Wolves" is a rich collection of myths, folk stories, and fairytales from around the world, followed by Estes' interpretations. Illuminated by symbolism, the stories evoke laughter, tears and most importantly, a burning desire to sculpt your life after your dreams.
After spending almost a year on bestseller lists across America and Canada the classic-to-be has been riding in the number one position for the past month; it is presently being translated into four languages.
deeply scarred
Organised sequentially, the stories journey through the progressive stages of a woman's development. Beginning with "La Luba", (the Wolf Woman), a Spanish story about resurrecting the wild woman, we then meet "Bluebeard", a French and Eastern European initiation story. "Vasalisa the Wise", a Russian fairy tale about retrieving intuition, is then followed by "Manawee", an African-American story about the duality of women's nature. Later we unite with "The Dirty Goddesses", three stories that take a playful attitude toward sex. The cycle is completed with "The Handless Maiden", a folk tale from the old religion that initiates us into the underground forest.
The theme running through many of the stories is the Life/Death/Life force. For those unfamiliar with the cycle Estés explains, "In our culture we try to keep everything alive forever, whether it is good or bad for us. You see that in medicine: trying to keep people alive who are terminally ill, even though they are living a half-life and there's no joy in life any more. And in many ways the controversy about abortion has to do with not being able to say that some things have to die. These are the most extreme examples.
"In the layer above the fire of instinctual nature we are moved to create, to make things better, to live in harmony, to live in cycles: when it is time to do, when it is time to stop, when it is time to rest, when it is time to die, when it is time to give birth.
"This is enriching if we can allow the life and death cycle to be admitted to our lives: it is actually through the deaths, and through the decline, and through the entropy, that we begin to learn the things that are of the deepest nature.
"To stay up in the happy light all the time does not give us the opportunity to learn anything that has depth. So actually the people who have gone through the darkest dark and the deepest deep, tend to be the people who have the most to say about what the essence of life is all about, and what qualities of life we need to go forward."
"Going backward is sometimes the result when cultural conditions insist that a woman should act without consulting her soul. "In order for survival, a woman need qualities that are forbidden to her: vehemence, fearlessness and fearsomeness," Estés writes. So how does a woman ignore society's demands and retrieve the qualities necessary for a harmonious existence?
"She must insist upon them," says Estés. "In my generation, the middle of World War II, all the women are deeply scarred because those who refused to become obedient had to suffer everything from scrapes to deep lacerations to certain amputations in order to hold onto themselves. So in one respect, you would have to say the honest answer is that you have to be willing to hurt, and you have to be willing to go on anyway."
This is what Estés refers to as "the worthy journey", in which there is always something to be sacrificed. Often we must go through a descent that is torturous. But the reward if we do so, of a passionate and fulfilling life, is something we own, that we have literally died for. And at that point, no one can take it away from us.
long history
Transformations of this sort are commonly visible in creative people. Yet the lives of many of our role models of wild and artistic women ended tragically: Janis Joplin, Billie Holiday, Anne Sexton, Sylvia Plath, Judy Garland, Bessie Smith, Edith Piaf and Frida Kahlo . . . the list goes on.
So what have we to learn from these women?
"Do not give in, do not try to walk a tightrope between the creative life and a murderous life the culture holds out for women. Choose your own life," Estés insists. "The descent requires that you do all sorts of unusual things that are called to you at the moment, that may not be in concordance in any way, shape, or form with presenting a nice person to the public. One develops a kind of camouflage of preservation skills, so it becomes part of one's repertoire to act nice, because it is one's choice, rather than something you are railroaded into regardless of your best interests."
Estés states that literature on women's power says men are afraid of women's power. But she feels that many women are afraid of their own power. What advice does she have for these women?
"Get over it! It's sorely needed, this power that women have. If we were to say all that we know we would be immense, wise, centred and powerful guides in many aspects," Estés says. "But as you know, women are still trying to recover from a collective unconscious reaction to having been killed and burned from being powerful. Some women still carry that somewhere in their psyche, even as older people would hope to silence them.
"We have a very, very long history of being silenced by violence against our physical selves and I think in the collective unconscious we are all aware of that. But even that cannot stop us, even that cannot be a reason not to go forward. It may mean for us to go forward with some caution, and certainly some ideas of how to protect ourselves from those who attempt to destroy us. But one cannot be silent. To be silent is to die in a very, very negative way."