Dreams can save us

“We tell ourselves stories in order to live,” wrote Joan Didion. She was referring to our conscious selves, during waking hours, but our unconscious minds also tell us stories so that we can live. This involuntary, instinctive, subconscious storytelling occurs …

The rise of castration anxiety

Little is known about the ecstatic rites of Cybele, a pre-Hellenic goddess associated with nature and wildness. Shrines have been found throughout Europe, though she was originally from Mesopotamia. And numerous sources describe her mendicant priesthood: castrated men who bleached …