Welcome to Life Works! It's the old-style new year, and last night was a full moon: seems like an auspicious day to start writing. The winter hours make it harder to wake in the morning, but also make it feasible for me to be up before dawn. At first light, the sky was filled with streaks of plum and apricot - probably due to high-level aircraft pollution, but astonishingly beautiful anyway. For me, this is the best time of day to work. The street outside is empty; a cat curls around my ankles seeking warmth; my mug of tea sends frail wisps of steam into the air. It's time outside time, waiting for the world to wake.
Some of you know me from groups and workshops; others are 'friends waiting to be found'. I study myth, using a combination of anthropological approaches and psychological insights. At the moment, I'm working on how we use stories to construct our lives. This involves looking at the traditional tales we call 'myths', and the archetypal figures who enact and re-enact them. Each of us works with this narrative material to compose our very own, personalized life story. My forthcoming book examines this process in more detail. Follow this blog to find out when it hits the shops!
Life Works is an ad hoc, alternative and occasionally aspirational approach to everyday life. Drawing on a combination of sense, sensibility and ancient wisdom it shows the relevance of mythic themes and archetypal figures to the modern world. Jane Bailey Bain teaches mythology in West London. Her book 'LifeWorks' was published in January 2012. For more information and further postings, visit the main LifeWorks site at http://janebaileybain.wordpress.com/
