I wrote before tools for personal mythology -but now I am talking about metaphysics. What is mythology? Stories with symbolic (multilayered/infinite meaning) that ground meaning – ie explain the world.
What is metaphysics? It describes or posits the nature of reality – of the world. Metaphysics is theoretical. Theory comes from the greek word for view. So there is something about metaphysics that is about a point of view. We are empiricists or realists – these are different metaphysical theories.
What is mythology? Mythology for me is concrete. It a story to describe the way things are the way things are. It can be interpreted in different ways. Mythology comes from the world mythos – the greek word for speech. So there is something about mythology that is about communication and about utterance.
Metaphysics is about sight, Mythology is about sound. A mythology can produce multiple metaphysics. A metaphysic can provide an impetus to create a mythology.
I go back to what does the spleen produce, what does the heart? Or even the olfactory sense? Here we have ears and eyes. I just imagined Titus Andronicus. Lavinia’s hands and tongue is removed… but she communicates eventually by holding a stick in her hand and drawing in the dirt.
Is mythology about talking or listening?
In tools for my personal metaphysics – I am thinking about the point of view, I am thinking about the structure of the thing, the scaffolding. How to bring things to life… so this is what I am doing as I compile my book of X of the past year.
- reflection: photographing parts of my journals
- reading: screenshots of pdfs / readings from the past year
- music (download spotify played songs)
- film (kino, amzn, netflix, youtube, vimeo)
- relationships (zoom converstions, discord conversations, emails, signal, telegraph, calendar)
As I write this I think of all the things left out, puzzles with kids, dishes made, intentions unrealized, fleeting moments, feelings, emotions, weather, plants, laying on the beach with a friend holding hands waving good bye to summer. But I am sure this is still there… The medium of a book imposes its own parameters.