Artificial Mythologization As A Psychological Resource

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

We all know what an important role a psychological resource plays in a person's life. It is an inner core that gives confidence in one's abilities, a sense of stability and security. Psychological resources are a key factor in both self-regulation and rehabilitation in extreme conditions. And, of course, the most powerful resource for every person is their family name. Every person creating a family genogram or a family tree was faced with the sensation of a powerful energy flow emanating from a seemingly simple piece of Whatman paper. But the power and strength of the huge stone wall behind our back is capable of working miracles. A person, having visualized his own kind, changes beyond recognition. From him comes strength, confidence. Indeed, when we have such support, we are knee-deep in the sea.

Unfortunately, not every client can create such a tree. Today our memory is getting shorter, and many surnames are losing touch with their family, and we no longer know the names of our great-grandmothers. So how, in this case, to create a generic resource for the client, the feeling of belonging to something powerful and significant, which is necessary for each of us like air. This is where the creation of a family myth comes to the rescue. Yes, it’s an artificial creation, writing a fairy tale. After all, what is a myth in its essence? Plato defined myth as fiction that society considers to be fact. Family myths, legends passed down from grandmothers to grandchildren from generation to generation are the foundation on which a powerful structure of family values and traditions is being built. The significance of the process of mythologization has been known since ancient times, and great importance was attached to it at the state level as well. Wars, characters, and entire historical epochs have gone through the process of mythologization. Peter 1 rewrote history, creating new myths and legends, and now the devil himself will not understand whether there was an invasion of the Tatars or Genghis Khan was a Russian prince, and there was an ordinary civil war.

Today, the times are ironic when almost every child born out of wedlock had his own story about his father, a polar explorer or a submariner, or, at worst, a pilot who died under heroic circumstances. I do not believe that lying will help a child become happy. A lie is a wall of incomprehension, a wall between the child and the mother, built by her. But, in those days, mothers felt at the level of intuition that the legend she created about her father would become a life-saving ring for the child, a pivot on which he could string self-respect, identification of himself as a full member of society. Of course, today, when society has become tolerant, there is no need to invent such stories. But there are situations when mythologizing parenting is necessary. This concerns the traumatic circumstances of the birth of a child. These are children born as a result of rape and incest. At the same time, I am sincerely convinced that it is important for every person to know about the true circumstances of his birth, even about such tragic and terrible ones. Without this, it will not be possible to improve relations with the mother, because a person not knowing the truth, not knowing what his mother had to go through, will not be able to understand her actions, her attitude towards herself, which was formed under the influence of these circumstances. But the truth is that until a certain age a child is unable to understand and accept the situation, and this is where the myth is very important. The myth, which will become the foundation and support, will become a haven for a person to which he can always return in the most difficult moments of life. This support will give strength to cope with the true circumstances of your birth, at the moment of their realization. It will allow you to accept them and experience them.

By the way, in my parental family there is also a myth about the origin of the surname. My maiden name is Varshavskaya, inherited from the grandmother of a purebred Jewish woman. The myth says that her grandfather studied tailoring in Warsaw. Upon arrival from there, he hung a sign "Tailor from Warsaw" on the doors of his workshop, so they began to call him the Warsaw Tailor, later it became a surname. I don’t know how much truth there is in this myth, but as a child I really liked this story. I shared it with great pleasure both with friends and with teachers. My children also loved very much first to listen to it, and then to tell it.