How To Write Stories That Change The World - Pamela Jaye Smith [MYTH MASTERCLASS]

So thank you very much to Karen and David for having me. I met them a couple of years ago at one of the story conferences when they were interviewing several of the speakers and they really had good questions and I really enjoyed visiting them and then We did another one when my romantic comedy book came out and once again you know how hmm, You know how sometimes you watch interviews and you're like, what are you thinking why did you ask that? But that's not the case with them, they always ask wonderful and wonderful questions. Let's get right to what is so useful for those of us who are creating content, so tonight's topic is

myth

ic challenges, creating

stories

that

change

the

world

, so first I want to know a little more about you so I can do some comments.

It's more relevant to what you're doing, so let's go with how many of you are

write

rs, okay, big producers, directors, actors now actors, or no one admits it. I see, I see, I actually taught a group of actors last week who were here from Denmark to learn about acting in Hollywood show business, etc. and that was quite interesting. How many of you have a specific cause that you stand behind with some type of involvement, whether it's equality, social justice, ecology, does anyone have a favorite? Okay, great, thanks Malaysia is not a lot of money. today and I guess most of us are here tonight because of two or three things, we realize that we are in a big mess here on this planet and we want to do something about it and make positive

change

s and there is an interest in

myth

ology and the classic tools of storytelling and how we can put together all those short

stories

about mythical challenges back in 2011 I was at a conference about the future of stories and the global challenges facing the

world

and there's an organization called the Millennium Project and I think Several places are referenced in the brochure and they, along with the United Nations, identified 15 global challenges that we all face now and on one of the pages of the brochures there is a list of those 15 and when you go to their website you will find links to all types of research and organizations that deal specifically with those for storytellers.

You know, the bad news is that we have a lot of problems. The good news is that there are a wide range of problems, one of them is international. organized crime, so if you're writing a crime or espionage thriller, you could throw it in there. It is a global challenge. Its a big problem. The gap between rich and poor because everyone bought their Mega Millions ticket. Talk about your gap between rich and poor. Let's do another one. one percent is fine and certainly social justice and women's rights education range from murderous MMD military dictatorships or countries ruled by demagogues to democracies.

Oh, there's such a wide range of these challenges, which is why some colleagues and I were at this conference about this here in Los Angeles and my partner. -The founding partner said, Hey, I have an idea, so we met for a little bit and then he stood up and said we had decided to form an organization that helps people who want to address the challenges to do so with storytelling. Yes, everyone thought it was a great idea. Our pilot project was at a high school in Reseda and they had a really good film communications department and they had a sister school in a couple of sister schools in Afghanistan, so we designed the class like you do.

We're going to get there tonight, but it wasn't really hands-on with the kids because they were just learning some of these concepts and they each picked one of the challenges and then one of the mythical themes to follow and they learned. about the five are able or their cleric, scientist, magician and lover to put their characters into one of those categories or another and then how to use symbolism to tell their stories so that they worked together with their fellow students in Afghanistan through from the State Department and you know, Facebook videos, etc., and they came up with some really good shows, one of them is only two minutes long, another I think is about eighteen minutes long and these projects that the kids did, we were winning awards , so we saw that it really worked. even with young people, especially young people, because you know they have a great interest in improving the future, so you can go to our website, go to the video section and watch some of theirs.

In fact, I urge you to just laugh and see how effective this can be, look at the one about water, it's not a game or water, it's not a contest, it only lasts two minutes, it's very cute and you don't know. They pronounce words, but it conveys the idea that you can use these tools. and you can address these issues in any style you want in any genre you want to get your point across, so how many of you have an interest in mythology? Before I get here, does anyone have a particular favorite kingdom? myth like Greco-Roman or Polynesian or anything in particular or is it a more generic interest okay, that's good because what you find when you get into comparative mythology is that let me back up and say what myths are, myths are not only the old and dusty ones The stories of the Greeks and Romans nor are myths other people's religion nor, as a primary school child once said, a myth is a female moth, you know, myths are the stories we tell ourselves. ourselves to explain the world around us and within us, that's all, the stories we tell. ourselves to explain the world around us and the world within us and as a side note to both to justify the worlds we have created and one of the examples I use for that is the Aeneid, this epic poem by a Trojan prince who He leaves the burning ruins of Troy after they were defeated by the Greeks, crossing the Mediterranean, having all kinds of adventures, including a very tragic love affair with the queen of Carthage and finally arriving at the kingdom because that is his destiny. according to the gods and him. founds the good kingdom, that's a good story, it was commissioned by the emperor Augustus and Augustus told the poet Virgil that we need a founding myth, we need to justify our existence and we want to be one of the Greeks, so Virgil this wonderful wonderful poem and It's called undead and it's a fabulous journey with all kinds of adventures and monsters and trips to the underworld and really interesting things, very heroic and you know, part of the point was that yes, you Greeks thought you would defeat us at Troy, but we are back and we are right next door and we will be better than you and you know how to see more in history so the myths of the founding are important the myths of the journey are important the myths of self-discovery one of which we will talk about as a mythical topic tonight is the wake up call.

Now let me say that as we move forward in this, we need heroes, we absolutely need more heroes today and I'm using gender neutral hero. Keep in mind that, by definition, a hero is someone who stands his ground. above the rest of the crowd and who says, wow, this isn't working, let's do something about it and then lead a movement for change, but think of this just in its symbolism of them stepping forward, the hero rises above the crowd, this can also be dangerous. because then you are a target you know you see more in the assassinations of people who are trying to bring about change and the establishment doesn't like it if you know once again about ancient Rome and the nutty brothers who have been compared to the Kennedy brothers who were killed for the same reason, so we find many echoes in history and myths of what is happening today.

How many of you have any hope that we can change any of these problems we face? Yes, once again, self-selected audience. That's why you're here and we know we can. I want to plant a seed in your minds. We've seen a lot of returns lately. There's just been a lot more dystopian movies than I think we need. Post-apocalyptic stories. Enough of the gloom, every once in a while you want to watch them, I mean, it can be entertaining, you know, Ferry Road, okay, 30 minutes of story, two hours of great visual adventure, okay, and we like this stuff, but there has been a lot of that.

It seems to permeate consciousness and some people say it produces a feeling of hopelessness, but sometimes you have to explore the darkness to change it and rise above it, so it's not totally useless to know what's going on there with the stories of devolution. There are mainly cautionary tales, like Greek tragedies, that tell you what not to do because that's how things can go horribly wrong, then you have the revolution and if any of you have studied history or just watch the news or read anything . You don't see at all that revolutions happen again and again throughout history and in almost every place on the planet the problem with the revolution is your only revolution it's like a pig on a spit they've been cooking your belly you have a revolution now you're cooking the back, guess what's going to keep doing counterrevolutionary spins and see more about the caravan of people coming from Central America, some say part of the reason is that, although there are certainly a lot of local problems, but part of it It was because they got caught up in the counter-revolutions of the '80s and '90s that the United States was a part of, so it's like I'm cynically saying it's like it's the Empire Strikes Back, you know, you go out and colonize, what do you think?

This will happen eventually and this is seen time and time again in history and the fall of empires, so revolutions are not necessarily a great idea for lasting change. Evolution is where we want to go, so we want to move instead of doing it in the cyclical way we want. Moving forward we want to get back to that heroic point of view and this is what I urge all of you to do as

write

rs, even if you are writing about someone who doesn't make it, at least show us what they should. seems fine, so we need heroes.

I hope you write them for us and I suggest you take a look at these 15 global challenges and maybe you're already writing a story that specifically addresses one of these or maybe you can work it in as a subplot or maybe you could even have a character, there's a party and everyone is doing party things and then someone comes in and everyone says yes and someone says okay. Why are you so depressed and can you give a little speech and have you placed it in your story? And just making us all more aware will help wake up more people and we need that to be able to create stories that change the world, but it doesn't have to be the whole story about that particular issue, so anywhere in that spectrum of a mention that's what the story is about, so let's talk about three things here in terms of mythic tools, the main mythic. tools, as I see it, our mythical themes, archetypes and symbols, and this is what you will find in all the best stories, is that they will have a specific theme and what makes it a mythical theme is a theme that continues to be told a and again.

Over and over again, again, with comparative mythology you find the same stories appearing, whether it's in New Zealand with the Maori or in Northwest America or Korea or the Egyptian Teutonic myths, etc. We keep telling the same stories because the human experience is quite similar. The good news for you is that it is quite global, so just by touching on these mythical themes you are going to reach something very deep within all of us as human beings and that is the great news for storytellers: oh, and there is an article and I think it's in my last newsletter and maybe the last one, but your brain in history, there's a lot of neuroscience going on that shows us how history works and how it affects the brain, also in case you don't know yet. different from other people, the creative brain is physiologically different from the muggle brain, so you know you can sit a little straighter, you know you have a great brain and you really are different, so we just want to use it for the best. possible outcomes, so let's take a look first, then at the mythical themes and then we'll look at the capacitive archetypes and then we'll look at the symbols.

Now we'll do a Q&A at the end, but if there's any place here, if I say something you don't understand. I haven't said it clearly enough or defined it well enough. Please raise your hand and make sure you do. Then we'll try to leave the questions for the end so we can keep moving forward, but I want to make sure everyone understands and sometimes you know it's just the way you make a statement that's not entirely clear, so that's okay, They are mythical themes and there are dozens of them, as you can see. They are in your brochure and range from the very personal.

My life is not going well. I need to make some changes. What I am going to do? The wake-up call. I really want to be in love. I want to look for the soul mate. I have to leave this place, embark on the search for the promised land and many, many, many more now, when you alone go through this, I have listed a series of storiesboth in myths and in the media you can then follow along and add your own and start this collection if you start thinking this way what I would like us all to be better at is recognizing patterns and that's what storytellers do also: they work with patterns, if we become more aware of it, then we become more aware of it. better storytellers so watching this and reading is oh yeah I've seen that one yeah I see that one well and maybe you'll rewatch a couple of movies in each of these categories and you'll start to recognize the patterns and then you'll probably figure out. that you personally have more affinity for a couple of them than the others and you'll say yes, that's the kind of story.

I mean when we talk about topics appropriate for these 15 global challenges, well, again, almost any topic can include it, but some of the ones that are quite appropriate are these: don't ask, don't... Tell him or as I've started to call it now: it's the secret identity that is now hiding, hiding in plain sight, hiding under the cloak of camouflage, my nose or whatever, but it's one of my army friends who's in intelligence used to say oh, I'm not Don't listen to me, I'm just a rat in the pipes, so they don't even notice I'm there, but I'm there, well, okay, tell me more, I can't, okay, but the secret identity, so you have someone.

Who can infiltrate? Think about whistleblowers or people who are investigative journalists. You know, we used to have that in the old days. Real journalists went out and investigated and made allegations and it was real, verified news. It is a concept that is not. So the secret identity there are some wonderful stories about this and part of the story arc goes from someone going undercover and then how he is discovered or not discovered and how he discovers what he needs to know and the dangers that he faces. As in any heroic action, it is heroic because there is resistance.

One of the laws of physics and metaphysics is that form resists change. It is one of Newton's three laws. A body at rest tends to remain at rest. A body in motion tends to remain. in motion so you will always encounter resistance and you will hear this over and over again in story workshops. You will read it in books. You will observe it in what you write and in your own life. For there to be drama, I have to do it. you have conflict and the conflict can come from the environment, from a specific antagonistic group of antagonists, your society, your culture, your own weaknesses, but again, the hero is the person who fights against that and rises above it, even if it's just for a glimpse, but often because you know for longer and it really makes things happen, so Don't Ask Don't Tell is now one of my favorites and if you haven't seen it it's a lot of fun Galaxy Quest yeah, isn't it cool?

It's a group of actors. parody of the Star Trek series and a group of actors are taken into space by a group of aliens who think it's real, they think the show is real and the captain is a real captain and the ship is a real ship and they have built, they have built the ship on their own from there, like alien fans and they have built the entire ship. The actors realize that they have to pretend to be their characters to achieve the objectives that have been set for them. about them, so it's a really fun story about that theme with some very touching moments and moments and a lot of good character development, the characters arc and change, it's really good, very well written, you can check it out and it's very entertaining and there's also there's a lot of great lines, yeah, never give up, never give up, yeah, and there's also a lot of love stories in Don't Ask, Don't Tell, so another good one and I think this is probably the iconic mythic theme. steal fire from heaven prometheus was one of the ancient gods one of the ancient greek gods this is what happens over and over again in mythology: you have war in heaven where a group of gods take control with which they fight and take the control of the other, you know, see more in countries, empires, cultures, yes, galaxies, universes, this is what happens when you steal fire from the sky.

Prometheus, who's one of the old gods, he's one of the titans, he looks down, he sees the humans and we're stumbling around and you know, learning. things and but it's a little desolate and it's a little cold if you're not in the tropics and when the sun goes down you do too because it's dark and he says you know what these people need fire, just think about what they could do with fire. Well the problem with that is that you're not supposed to take things from heaven and give them to earthlings, it's like the Prime Directive and Star Trek, don't mess with their progress, let them figure it out for themselves, but Prometheus has a soft at heart, he is very idealistic and wants to help these people, he wants to help them improve their lives, that is a very heroic stance, but he is not supposed to do it, he knows it could be a problem if it is discovered, but he chooses to do it anyway ways and this is one of those turning points in your story where he is reminded that that is against the law in this pantheon, you are not supposed to do that and he does it anyway, he realizes that he may suffer for what he's going to do, but he does it anyway.

Also one thing your Prometheus-type hero may run into is that some of the people you're trying to help don't want your help or don't trust you, you know, like the old line from the '60s movie and 70s, liberal limousine like Oh, you rich people will come here to our neighborhood and help us. Oh well, thank you very much, we don't need you, so there is often resistance from the group you are going to help, they don't trust you. You come from outside. What is your real agenda? What are you really trying to get at here?

Even more opposition, even more drama and conflict for your character, so Prometheus does it anyway, he steals the fire, brings it to the humans and voila, you've got it. light at night you have barbecue you have you can you know burn fields burn forests and plant fields and all the things that fire brings us is great for humans well this does not go unnoticed and so the gods go prometheus come here and Say you knew what you were doing, you knew there was going to be yeah, yeah, I know, but they really needed it and look how well they're doing, and then you can have someone say we didn't want them to do well. you're trying to keep them enslaved, what were you thinking or something?

And here again, especially if you have whistleblowing situations, Prometheus's punishment was chained to a rock in the Caucasus, the great Rocky Mountains, at the eastern end of the Mediterranean. and every day an eagle would come down and rip out his liver and then every night it would grow back and the next day the eagle would come back and rip out his liver again daily, endless eternal pain and hopelessness really tragic, so there is There are few versions of this myth in which Prometheus is unleashed. Hercules comes and saves him and there are some poems and stories written about that even in more modern times, so check out Prometheus Unleashed if you're working on that kind of story and sometimes, depending on the point you want to make, let's just do this division, you have drama and you have drama that has a happy ending and drama that has a tragic ending hey, greek tragedies once again are cautionary tales so make sure if you are doing a neri tail cost and it doesn't end well for your hero and what they are trying to do at least show us what victory would have been like.

We need to know what they lost. It's like you know Moses standing and looking. to the Promised Land but he can't go there or Kevin Costner on the sailboat in Waterworld knowing he's not going to go and land and be on land and it's really hard to compare Kevin Costner in Waterworld to Moses and you know but still, and that search for the Promised Land, you want to show us what victory would be like, so we are very sad when it doesn't happen and how this can work for your stories of creatures that change the world and then the people in your audience.

Maybe everything will turn out well. I see why it didn't work. I'll try. I'll do it another way. I know what not to do. There are probably a lot of other things that could go wrong, but I'm inspired to do it. take that staff to carry out that mission so that even a tragedy can inspire other people to move forward, so you're stealing fire from heaven now, one of the movies that the high school kids made, they took the theme of stealing fire from heaven and like one of the kids said when he was talking like that today, he says sir, that's like Robin Hood, right, yeah, that's the story of Robin Hood, he steals from the rich, the gods give to the poor. , humans, whether to learn, you know, the teacher comes and helps. children learn and education is one of the challenges okay like Dead Poets Society stealing fire from heaven is the story of Robin Hood and they made a really effective and compelling drama about it so once again watch his video if you have the chance, so another one.

It's the wake-up call you find in a lot of stories, it's something we presumably all do at various points in our lives anyway, so it's more of a psychological story thing because I mean, just think about whether any of you have children or grandchildren. or were you ever a child you know that there are points throughout your development where things change you start to realize oh, it's not just me that's here you know around age 2 2 to 3 years you start to realize that there are a world around you that isn't you and isn't it mommy and then you hit puberty and it's a completely different wake-up call?

You know, oh gosh, what's going on? What is all this? Then you enter higher education or the world of work or romance and a profession and hopefully you're always waking up to these next steps and that can be a very good close drama now it can also be for the individual character and how they leave what that they used to do, the problems inherent in a story like that. your old habits come back and try to pull you back in, so it's that inertia again and the problem with that and when I was studying wonderful classes on the physics of metaphysics and there was a lot of physics there and the professor said now you I just got Realize this when you decide to change and not do something anymore, so let's say maybe you've been working as an assistant director and you say, but I really want to be a line producer and I'm not going to do any more advertising, he said. look and see, there will usually be three tempting offers to come back and do the first advertising job again and you have to stand your ground and say: I'm not doing that anymore.

I'm a line producer sir, unless of course you really need the money and then you take the job, but usually there will be, even if a friend of mine says we were at a party and this handsome guy was chatting to her and The party ended and I said: well, Paula, what do you think of George? be interested in you and there was a long pause and she said oh yeah, he's handsome, he's smart, he's smart, he's funny, it's the kind of mistake I used to make, yeah, yeah, so your character on the topic of The wake-up call will be to go back to old habits or just think about how hard it is to break a habit, so you're supposed to exercise 30 minutes a day and you do it for a couple of days and then on the third and fourth day you're done. is not that much.

As much as it is difficult to change patterns and this is something your character and a wake up call have to face now the wake up call is a wonderful start too for a hero and just look at some of the examples of Arthur with the sword in the stone , he thought he was just a simple peasant who, you know, lived with Sir Guy's family and then he finds out he's the King, or Luke Skywalker doesn't know who he really is, so he finds out who he really is. We are and it is often said that the world and our lives would be a very different place if we all recognized and were brave enough to begin to live who we really are, the vast potentials within each of us, the ability, particularly as artists, to take advantage of those higher levels. realms of creativity and inspiration and tearing them down, that's your job, by the way, as creative people you are naturally programmed to pick up the creative, inspiring, some would say, spiritual realms and bring it down through your unique and specific personality and then interpret those ideas. and put them. to show them to the rest of the world receptive to the higher causing the lower, that is your job as creative people and particularly as storytellers, so along with the theme of the call for attention, this type of thing can play out very well in your story and show how a person's range of perception goes from it's just about me to you know this is a pretty good group and we're doing well here together and then the reason we're all here at this meeting is because We also have a broader perspective on the global challenges in the world, so show your characters change from the close to the farthest to the global and you will really inspire us like Luke Skywalker inspired us, like we were inspired or at least amazed by the special effects in Matrix.

Well, that was a very, very good wake-up call story wheredo you think you think you're actually, ah, no, oh, now I just started working as a consultant in virtual reality and wow, that's pretty amazing and offers very effective methodologies that affects you physiologically even more than the screen ratio of one to ten 100, where it's one foot away when it's your smartphone, two feet away when it's your computer screen, five feet or rather ten feet away if you're watching TV from your couch and then if you're in a theater you could be 50 or 100 feet away and you experience the narration and the visuals differently depending on where the screen is playing and as storytellers keep this in mind one of my favorite movies.

Lawrence of Arabia and when people started being able to watch movies on their cell phones and they wondered why would you do that? I mean, you're going to lose half of it, there's just going to be little ants down there, you're not going to get it, so if you're doing it in a web series, you're going to compose your shots differently than if you were doing something in 70 millimeters, that's obvious. , and now virtual reality and I recommend that if you haven't experienced it yet, you try the glasses because It's going to require a different type of storytelling simply because the way you can do, the way you can't do cuts and the way that you have to make the flow of the images.

You have a question? It's a good question and I think I'll do more research on that, but the answer to what we're finding is yes: many of the virtual reality experiences now have built into the system a way for the glasses to know where you're looking. . then they can move important images to that place and there is a well, it is that every day there are new developments in technology and in this narrative, but yes, it is much more, I think you are right, much more theatrical than filmic because they do not have the cuts and the same way they do it otherwise, but I'm still exploring it so we'll talk more about that and certainly if any of you have some good suggestions on where to learn more about that, I would.

You'll be interested to hear because there's a lot out there, but it's a developing art form and it's very exciting. Well, now another really effective mythical theme is that of twins. It's okay to have both sides of a situation or a conflict, so, for example, if you're doing the let's say the gap between rich and poor has a and they don't have to be obviously, you know, physically related twins, but that whole concept of the good ones like in the dark night was a very good example of the concept of twins in it works well and also the warmth of the film that is with De Niro and the other boy that is the other boy in it Pacino thank you very much yes Pacino and De Niro and it's a story about twins and this can be really effective in bringing out the dialogue and In the places where your characters experience differences, you know that one of them lives in a castle, the other lives in a peasant hut and, However, they represent two sides of a story conflict, so you can really use it a lot and it is effective.

What happens in your story arcs is where you have, let's say, what at the beginning of the story, let's see, suits you, the beginning of the story, one character here and the others here throughout the course of the story that intersect and take opposite positions and that can be really interesting where the good boy becomes corrupted and the bad girl becomes enlightened, so you can do a lot with the twins theme and then you also know that within us we have at least another personality more similar to many. More likely, but the twin theme can also be internal and external and gives you a very good opportunity to raise questions about climate change or technology or the question of boundaries, and because the dramas conflict, if you have some twins there, you have a good opportunity for conflict now also note that I should mention that you don't necessarily have a single issue unless it's a short film for a longer story and certainly, if you get into a television series, you can have your main theme and then your subplot theme and then a theme for romance or again if it's a television series, depending on how long it is, you can work many themes under your main theme, but there will be an overarching theme, Well, twins is a good search. the promised land, we've talked a little bit about that before and this tends to be a much larger scope story because it's not just about one individual but it's about a group of people who, as you know, see more in immigration around the world in this moment.

There are several reasons why people are being displaced and have to find another place to be for pure survival and sometimes it is for economic advantages and sometimes just for adventure now, as we are often reminded that the United States is a young country and all of us who were It wasn't here when the Europeans started coming, they are immigrants, so you know, have a perspective on this with the immigrant issue because most of us have met them at one time or another and many times it was simply for the adventure then the search for the Promised Land can be a journey of a group of people for various reasons and then they achieve it, right?

How many of them achieve it? what are the results and along the way you can put many barriers, conflicts and challenges for them, so it is a great opportunity and it also offers you many opportunities to use symbols and think again about Mad Max Fury Road and you know the open spaces and They lead to what once was. a green and fertile land and when they get there there is nothing there and that symbol of that open wasteland seer there is just no hope, there is no hope and they had to turn around and go back, which is kind of a twist in the search for the Promised land. theme didn't end like most of them in that sense they really played with that theme and I think they did a good job of saying what do you do if when you get there it's not there anymore and it's quite dramatic, so you look at it in a way like because it's like they have to go back to where they started and I feel like the Wizard of Oz is the idea that there's no place like home so it's weird to just be searching for something that you actually started with that you know that's a good one question, um right away, I would say not exactly, because well, even though she was forced to get lost, being an immigrant, being an explorer because of the tornado, okay, definitely, we'll write this down and think. about that, a little bit more, thank you and that's a wake-up call story, particularly because there were three fellows who realized, oh, they had it all inside them all the time, okay, another one is the war in heaven , so a lot of what's happening behind these global challenges.

They are battles of ideals and agendas and if it is like in the Cold War communism versus capitalism or if it is like the Peloponnesian wars with Sparta versus Athens two different lifestyles the Athenians were very, it was something like Beverly Hills versus a countryside of training yes, because Sparta was all austere and it is the question of the warrior and we are tough and yes, but it changed the course of history, that war lasted 23 years and changed everything, in military language it has been compared to a battle between a whale and an elephant because one of them had a big army, the other one had a big navy, and so, you know, this war in the sky was wandering all over the place geologically, so we're seeing that in a way in the politics today, not just here but around the world, where different people's vision of how the world should be is being tested and battle lines are being drawn no, I think it should be like this and this is how everyone should act and this is what should happen well, no, it should be this way and this is how everyone should act and this is how it should happen and you have that dichotomy, that conflict, once again your hero rises above the conflict, he arrives to a position where you can see the concept and that's where you can start to make changes, yes you need people to fight in the trenches it is absolutely necessary that people register if they can and go out and vote the way they choose, but We will get changes when we overcome the conflict and are not trapped in it and can see the concepts. and then start making changes that way from that different perspective, another is the one who goes native.

Now this is kind of a reversal of the wake-up call, but not really, but you have an individual who enters a culture that they are not. familiar with it, but eventually they become part of it, so the opportunity for you when you talk about stories that can change the world is that this new person in the situation has to learn about that culture, so you have a perfect opportunity, think about avatar and I think why it was so popular is one of these underlying mythic themes of going native, you know, you have Jake, who comes from the military arm of a system of extractive capitalism and enters into an interconnectedness where everything is gained and we are with nature. system and it's explained to him and it's shown to him and he experiences it and as we watch it we learn, so putting your character in a unique stranger in a strange Earth situation and a lot of science fiction stories are about this because it's a perfect setup. for showing us a system and showing us how people can adapt or not adapt or make changes, so take a look at some of these stories listed there under the title native and you can see how you can use this to your advantage in a story that you want address, let's say maybe, the technology, so you have someone who doesn't know anything about the technology coming into a system and as they learn about it, as it's explained to them, they'll be able to see. more fallen than people who drank the kool-aid or plugged into technology or whatever, so once again you have the opportunity to have an outside perspective and then that person, depending on how you're setting up your story, that person may be a change by going native like Jake was in Avatar or they can go in and change the system by incorporating something new.

Yeah, sorry, I just want to make sure going native isn't in the brochure rates. thank you, it's not in the one that you would have, oh, that's okay and certainly if any of you want to grab some of the additional booklets, if you have other people who would like the information, feel free to do so, yeah, now one last. thing and then we will take a little break in the search for the Holy Grail in a sense, that is what you are doing, you are searching for answers that will solve the problems of the kingdom, the Holy Grail serves the kingdom or let's say the group. the Empire whatever and in his pursuit of that we are told that our job is to be like Parsifal and he was the knight who really wanted to find the Holy Grail and he wanted to be a better person than he was and he wanted to serve and all the knights They came out but along with him was Galahad who was a very young and innocent Knight and he was looking for light and purity and he was pure and the third one was gala hey um Gawain and he was a party animal and it's like, okay, adventure, okay, do some winching and fighting dragons, drink a little and it will be a lot of fun.

Oh, and if we find the Holy Grail, that's good too, so they go out and have all their adventures. What is interesting for us as storytellers is at the end of his quest, the Grail now appears to Galahad because he is pure, he is brought to the light. Gawain can't even see the light, he probably has a bad hangover and that's what, uh, I don't understand. Parsifal sees. the light of the Grail but he is still from the earth so he will not be brought to the light his job is to be the door and that is our job as artists that is his job as storytellers is to be the door because many people can't see the light , but they can see you and you are that pivot point, that door that is once again receptive to the higher causal to the lower.

You are at that point where you can see it and you can point it out and you can explain it to people and then the hope is in the myth and in our own work, then others will start to see it too and of course we should be humble about it and not think that We have the only answer and the only clear one, but that is the mythical position of the narrator is to be part of everything, so in that sense we will take a little break and then we will come back and talk about the ways of the ark and about the symbolism and then we will have questions and answers, okay, thank you, so we've talked about mythic themes and now I want to tell you something about something important that you should have in your story and that is mythical statements and there is a page there in your booklets for mythical statements and yes, the subtext It's absolutely important, you don't want your dialogue to be on the nose, however, there are three moments in a story where you need someone to say specifically what's going on and those three mythic statements are the thematic statement.

What is the story about the mission statement? What is the hero and lesson statement supposed to do? What does the hero learn? So the thematic statement, the mission statement, and the lesson statement, now you know you're supposed to write the beginning of your story. a hologram of the story so we know quickly if it's a comedy, a drama, it's science fiction, how are we supposed tothink about it? I think the best example of that for me is the first Star Wars movie and I mean the first one that came out, forget about that other confusing numbering system, so you're sitting there and there's a big field of stars and the writing It goes by and there is this little boat, you don't know how big it is, but the boat comes flying. come in and it's going to come in and out and you go, okay, we're in space, okay, I got it and then the theater starts booming and surround sound shakes the place and behind you, to the right, comes the bow of a ship and it goes and gets bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger and it goes after that little one and at that moment you know, ah, David and Goliath in space, the brilliantly done holographic aperture tells you what the story from the beginning, yes, I certainly will and I will give you some examples, yes, the three things are the myth, the thematic statement, what the story is about and that usually appears in the first act and quite early so that we know what It's about history because we've all seen a lot. we have read a lot we know a lot we are exposed to so many things you need to focus immediately on your story the second is the mission statement what the hero is supposed to do now that will usually also appear in the first you know, it is used as using these strict page number paradigms, it's like page 10, okay, when the hero gets the quest, ah, now I have to go and do XYZ and then that's what sets him off on the course and then on the third.

It's the Epiphany lesson statement, when the hero learns what he was really meant to learn, and it's often not the same as the mission statement, it's usually something internal and it's something we're supposed to apply personally to ourselves as well. , the magic statement is the The big theme, the mission statement is the goal, the mission and then the lesson statement is the Epiphany or the lesson that the hero learns in the course of the story, whether his protagonist Whether you win or not again, you should still receive the lesson, even if you didn't achieve victory even if you couldn't accomplish your mission, so the lesson usually appears at the end of the story.

However, my favorite movie of all time is Apocalypse. Now it is exceptionally mythical and they mix everything up. and it all happens at the beginning of the story and we first hear from Captain Willard about what he learned and he says that everyone gets everything they asked for. I asked for a mission and for my sins they gave me one and he says it's no accident that I was the keeper of Colonel Kurtz's story because telling his story is telling my story, so from the beginning, like, wait, now, what's going to happen and then we get the mission and he goes to the trailer where the general is and the CIA guy in Harrison Ford is there and he has his mission and his mission is to go upriver and find Colonel Kurtz who is acting more beyond all reasonable human responsibility, he has become a god, it's like everything has to end, so his mission is to end the Colonel's command ends with extreme prejudice, go eliminate him, so the thematic statement is gives immediately after and the general says that there is a conflict in every heart between the rational and the irrational and that good does not always win, sometimes the dark side wins what Lincoln called.

The better angels of our nature, every man has the breaking point of him and that is your thematic statement. You know it's a battle between light and dark and it happens here and there now. I suggest you read the mythical statements. from The Lord of the Rings and on that example page, if we were showing clips, I would show the clip but then we would all cry, it's so fabulous, but it's about the story and the darkness and again the mission of the storytellers, it's just brilliant, so it's about themes, well let's talk about characters and character arcs, now you're okay, everyone is familiar with the archetypes, we have some young mentions here and archetypes, many of them, many of them, you already know the orphan . the lover the martyr the mother the king the warrior that that the other is good and that is very good that is great in the deepest aspects of many various spiritual systems what are called the paths to enlightenment the five calves of enlightenment and Those five paths are the path of the warrior the path of the clergy the path of the scientist the magician and the lover and any archetype can be under any of those paths so you can have a martyr lover you can have the orphan scientist, etc. but these are major overreaches and I call them ARCA paths and they are much more.

I find it more efficient. It's not as unwieldy as all the different archetypes because it gives you a clear and concise way to create your characters to take them through changes and have dramatic conflicts between characters. Now I am going to explain to you using the war your ARCA path and then the conceptual explanations will be applied to the other four as well and then you will have information in your booklets about the various aspects that is useful for us as storytellers. that each of the paths has three levels and this is really consistent in most cultures, your initiative systems, Freemasonry, you have the entered apprentice and then you have the adept and then the master, you have the primary school, the school high school, high school.

Okay, you have a bachelor's degree, a master's degree, a doctorate. The steps of three are pretty typical and another one of those numbers that comes up a lot, so check out the warrior, the steps are the soldier, the warrior and the monarch. What you're interested in here when you're building your characters is the effect: think of an inverted pyramid and the first step is that lowest rung and think of the soldier or even with the clergy, the rookie, okay, you don't know much. you're just starting out, you're taking orders, you're not thinking for yourself and you don't have a really big influence on the world around you, you're on this little lower level here and that's where you start to build your rake the rocks, you're doing the exercises, you're learning how to use your weapons, etc., it's about learning and hopefully it's also about dedicating yourself to moving up, so that's a great opportunity for your character to learn things and then move up if you want to the next level, that mid level is where most will live and the second level because not everyone makes it to the top level, it's rarer but there is a broader effect on the world around them, so where is the soldier level?

The level of the warrior does not have much influence, yes, and the warrior is a leader, they are there at the forefront of the charge. They are the ones who can evaluate the battlefield, make decisions at that very moment, what should we do? There the people on the front lines of the protests are the ones who are strategizing and making all the plans for what is going to happen and this also applies across the board with the other ARCA pass and they know what they are doing and they excite the rust. I, I know, yes, I know what I'm doing, I'm trained, I'm a trained professional, okay, and the next step is more rarefied and that is the monarch, the ruler, the general, the empress, the deity that is in command of the armies.

You know a lot of the ones in Egyptian mythology, you see that hierarchy and well, almost everywhere, so what you have to remember is that they also have a wide range of influence on the world below and around them, so what? how would you do it? Visualize that in your stories it is as simple as if I were at the soldier level and so are all of you, we could be two separate groups, small companies and then when we are at the warrior level there will be more people and then at the warrior level monarch. level where you are looking down on the large crowd, so think about it in terms of the extent of your blocking of a scene, if it's close, it's medium, it's a wide shot and the influence that people have on them is very good. example of a character on the path of the warrior who when rising in the fall has a fall first, is what we see and that is in Gladiator because at the beginning of that story Russell Crowe is a general and will probably be an emperor, but so he is at the top right but when he is captured he plummets to the bottom and the rest of the story is about him getting back into the levels and that can be really very effective so wherever you place your characters at the beginning of the story Do they strive to move up?

Are they at level two and are they really satisfied and are they tempted or hit? Maybe they will become refugees. They have been doctors on the scientific path then and the war comes to their country. Now there is a refugee. Now they are nothing, how do they get back up well in Gladiator? Russell Crowe used his talents and his determination and the help of some friends he made along the way and he makes it back and in his last actions he does something. That's a very high level, he makes a personal sacrifice for the good of the Republic, the Empire, so when you talk about character change and growth, he thinks about moving through those levels.

Furthermore, each of the paths has three focuses: the emotional, the mental and the. It synthesized and I really saw this in action when I was on a think tank for the military and several of us who were working on the warrior ethos and bringing mythology to the military, etc., this was during the Clinton administration, right after the The fall of the wall was a peace dividend and everyone was, you know, wow, let's see what else we can do with the military because we're not fighting the Cold War anymore, well, that was fine for a while, but during that time it was interesting. to see which of the Warriors and these were mostly officers were more inclined towards the emotional, passionate and idealistic and which were more inclined towards the rational, the analytical, the strategic and yet they were all on the warrior path and which were synthesized and which ones were Usually the generals and some of the better known ones are high ranking because that's how you get there, being able to synthesize both paths, so that's another sticking point for you.

You have characters, let's say one who is at the top. one who is deep down they disagree with each other someone is on the emotional path someone else is on the rational path they disagree with each other and then how do you resolve that throughout your story keeping in mind that we are talking about stories that can change the world, you know, make sure you give them some of those speeches, some of those positions and conflicts, a wonderful cauldron to put different ingredients in and stir them, and the heat comes and, wow, you can get some.

There are amazing things happening, so make sure you stay conflicted and also keep in mind that one of the reasons we have these problems is because people have different agendas, whether it's the gap between rich and poor, whether it's international crime And even education, who receives? Educated not, people have different agendas, so you can have those agendas come out in those three levels or in the three paths and you know, hopefully, your characters, your protagonists and some of the others synthesize and come in to to say the upper limit between the second level and that higher level yes question, there are many antiheroes, right, our workers, great, well, good question, you must have a straight path for the protagonist because many antiheroes, for example, are in the army. a lot of them are warriors, yeah, that's the nature of your question, yeah, I think especially nowadays, in my opinion, a lot of the most compelling stories are, like you, you don't want them to win, but you want it somehow. way because they get emotionally attached to it, so I guess I'm just trying to understand how it would be okay for an antihero to still be a hero, but they go against the system, right, they are against the system, that's what makes them anti , they are rebels and that's where many of your heroes come from.

They are from the rebel side, those who once again go outside or go outside the established way of doing things. Absolutely anti-heroes, I think they are really very important and particularly today because if we don't do anything, if we're not rebelling in some way against the status quo against what's happening we're not going to change anything so we probably need more antiheroes which is interesting and some of us were discussing this recently and someone said well the antihero often does the doing the right thing unintentionally and then what happens to them when suddenly they've done the right thing and they've spent all their time trying to be the resistance to be the rebel?

And? To be able to give them a real opportunity. emotional dilemma when that happens and again keeping in mind that principle that even if it doesn't happen to the protagonist or the antagonist, we need to know what could happen, so we always want to know what that goal is, what heaven would be like. Which one would win and who can be your antihero? I think it's really effective in pointing out the flaws in a system they have. They have carte blanche to do it. That's your job as an antihero is to say: what are you guys thinking?

Do you have any idea what you want? I'm doing it, they can be very effective in highlighting the theme and lessons of a story and you're right, they are usually the most interesting. One of my favorite antiheroes is in an old movieWalter. hill and it's called Streets of Fire Diane Lane is in it and it came out I think in '82 maybe it's a rock and roll fable Willem Dafoe Diane Lane is fabulous we watch it twice a year and we know all the lines and it's oh, It's a lot of fun Streets of Fire, check it out and Michael Perret is the anti-hero because he has this wonderful line where he says yeah, something like "I'm not a hero, I'm the kind of person that others can do jobs like this." perfect antihero so what you should also keep in mind with your ARCA pass is the keyword and his mission and once again this is in your booklets but I'll just go over the Warriors one because I think it's very important once again if We are working on making stories that can change the world.

The work of the Warriors, and this has become as distorted lately as it does cyclically throughout history, but the mission of the Warriors is to protect and defend the weak and the innocent, not the stupid and the lazy, but the to protect and defend the weak and the innocent and also promote the good, the true and the beautiful, to go out and fight for it and then also promote it and recover the path of the warrior at its ideal, brave and honorable core, it would be something wonderful to see and we certainly need it and certainly a lot of people who are officially in the military are very idealistic and they are trying to do these things and they are often up against a corrupt system and you know, they see more of reality and of course a lot of movies, like that that as you go down these other paths, keep in mind that you want your characters to really identify with the mission, so also the keywords, the keyword for the warrior is purpose, they have a goal, they have a mission and they have than to stay.

By the way, the path of the clergy is about separating yourself from matter, it is about disconnecting from the material world and the key word there is purity and it is about doing fasts, living in a cave in Hamas for a month straight and eating cold rice. and yak. butter, okay, it's the austerities, right, it's the sacrifices, now the clergy path, like every path, there is a spectrum and it can go wrong and part of the downside of the clergy path is that you can engage in a lot of self-sacrifice and self flagellation and then decide everyone else.

It should increase too and if you don't live up to my inner ideal, maybe you shouldn't live as if everything in the past could go wrong, but the path of the clergy has a tendency to improve, since Monty Python says that no one waits for the Spanish. Inquisition, but there it is, so you have to note that I find the scientist path really interesting because the upper level of the scientific path of curious students wants to know everything. Scientists are very expert at what they do, they are coding, they are exploring. the seas are breaking down the genomes, but the top level of the scientific path is the philosopher because you are taking that innate curiosity and that tendency to look for patterns and cause and effect and try it and just think. from some of the wonderful books written or seen by Neil deGrasse Tyson, true, he is a philosopher and many of those advanced scientists are interested in consciousness, the cosmos is its intelligence in other places, the big questions and the path of scientists it's about the process if you're writing code and you don't have absolutely all the commas and all the quotes in the right place it's not going to work the process has to be exact and so when I teach actors it's okay if you're a scientist.

Along the way you need everything to be very orderly and aligned and the process is really important, so they act differently and if you're doing novels you can go deeper into that, but certainly your characters can be given some dialogue and direction that will help. in that performance the magician once again all of you are magicians because you are storytellers the definition of a magician is someone who sees patterns that others cannot see and creates patterns where they did not exist sees patterns that others cannot see creates patterns where they did not exist that is a magician by the very act of writing you are creating patterns that didn't exist now you may be following old patterns like a mythical theme and using our unique Bie capable, you know, unless you are a pirate writer or hired to be a bit of a cheat for this project, that's fine, but it will always come out through your unique personality and you know, if you've taken any writing courses where you're given an assignment, you know, write about your first pet, everyone's stories are different, even If everyone had one. calico cat the stories are going to be different because it's coming through you so you're creating patterns that didn't exist before and that's your job and the key word for the magician is performance because normally, if someone is a magician, it's very open. and spacious, extravagant and ornate and you won't be wearing capes or exotic jewelry and you might have, wait a minute, Harry Potter.

You can learn a lot about magicians just by reading and watching those movies, but it's all about the performance of the magicians and their The goal is to gain control of the scene and the unseen forces, so the fifth of these paths is the Lubber path. I find this one interesting, of course, the key word is passion, what else would be right on the first level, do you have the admirer or? the fan and he's alone, your character wants to be in love, he longs to be in love, but he's alone and that impulse drives him, that longing drives him through the story, so the first level is about wanting to want the dark side of that. stalkers, okay, it's on the lover's path, but it's that lower level dark side on the second level on the lover's path, you have relationships, so first you have a single and then you have relationships, whether it's two people or you.

You have a polyamorous situation or a menage tois whatever, but there is a relationship at the higher level again, although you have a more solitary position, that is where you find it, because remember this is the monarch level, the High Priestess level , the philosopher, that's where you'll find. find your goddesses and gods of compassion like Queen Isis of the Egyptian pantheon, Virgin Mary Quan Yin in Anna Cara, you know, just look at the mother goddesses above, they may have consorts, but it's not about them in relationship with an equal, it is about them in the relationship with all those whose lives encompass an influence, so on the path of the lover you go from a single to a relationship with a person alone but who influences and gathers within his area of influence many, many, many other people and once again think about these five paths, the three levels and the three approaches, and I realize that they are all opportunities for dramatic conflict and I often find that using the old three by five cards can be really useful and I know that the latest version of the final draft also has the card breakdown program, which can also be very effective depending on whether you want to manage the cards or see it on a screen, but think about the conflicts that you can generate simply by the very nature of the characters that you are creating and that those conflicts are wonderful opportunities again to spread your message about one of the global challenges or some other problem that you see and then what solutions could be found.

Now when it comes to symbolism, we are talking about a visual medium here and there are three levels. of simile, someone is the personal emotional level, look, it's another set of three and the next level is situational and then conceptual, so once again we go from close to further to the highest observer level and you will see there a list . from movies and details for each of these, just using avatar again on an emotional level for the symbolism, you have Jake in the wheelchair, he is immobilized to a certain extent and that wheelchair symbol also tells us about his psychological state , is not a complete person. he's emotionally disabled because of the losses and whether he knows the loss of his brother or the loss of his own mobility, self-confidence, so it's a great symbol for that emotional personal level, then on the situational level , has an avatar again.

We have the community of the Navi versus the community of the extraction capitalists who are there to rape the planet and the machines and the tools versus nature and that situation of nature versus the union created by man is the inherent conflict, that conflict situational and you see. that with the helicopters and the flying dragon creatures, okay, one is a symbol of nature, the other is a symbol of technology, it's very obvious, it's very effective and then on a conceptual level it's very well done with the cinematography and the art direction, I think it was the trees where we've been seeing the family trees, the trees of the village, but towards the end we see how deep the connection is with the trees and how complex the interconnection is and that interconnection is of a lifetime and ultimately, many would say, it is What we are trying to achieve in our own wake-up calls is one of the concepts that will help us address any of these global challenges.

They are global because they affect everyone because we are all interconnected, so the solutions also have to be global because we are all interconnected and I think one of the biggest challenges in challenges is how to get everyone to accept it. You have ten people and nine of them say, "Hey, that's a great idea, let's do it." that, but the tenth person is the one with the bank account, guess what's going to happen, what that tenth person wants to happen until you can have a revolution or a devolution, everything falls apart or our favorite approach is evolution, like this Let's get to that. that feeling of interconnectedness and once again remember that's what a hero does: they stand above the crowd and see things that other people didn't see patterns, they become magicians, they create patterns, they influence more people around them and, hopefully, they achieve very, very positive results. changes, so think about these three levels of emotions.

There is another movie that I suggest you watch if you haven't seen it and even if you have seen it for these symbolisms, and that is the Bertolucci movie, be complacent, it's brilliant, bear, Lucchese, brilliant, you can't go wrong there. but in the conformist the symbolism is used so exquisitely at every level and you will see examples in the booklet, but if you can get the conformist on the DVD, there is a wonderful special features section that could be available on streaming as well, but enter on symbolism there is a really good article on symbolism by Bertolucci and it is brilliantly done and as writers and filmmakers it can be very inspiring so now we have covered the need for heroism and hopefully all of you will be writing. wonderful heroes for us, how to use mythical themes and we have discussed some of them that may be particularly relevant to this type of storytelling that has a message and I do this and I suggest that you can do it too, just check out those 15 challenges and say well which mythic theme I think could fit very well into this which will give you once again and more ease in working with the mythic themes and recognizing patterns and starting to use them.

We talked about the mythical statements that every story needs. the thematic statement the mission statement and the lesson statement and then we take a look at our life able to stew in styles of interaction with life the path of the warrior the path of the clergy the path of the scientist of the magician and of the lover and how each of those has three levels and three focuses and how you can use those four story arcs and character arcs and internal and external conflict and then the symbolism of the three levels of the emotional, the situational and the conceptual and then how you can use them once again to reveal the problems that you are trying to address and show us possible solutions, so what we will do now is have a time for questions and answers and anyone has a particular question.

Yeah, so going back to your Holy Grail example, parts of every warrior from the youngest innocents among them and then the lover or the drunk gives right to this man and the batter just because he wanted to connect him to that story, so that It is basically the person who rises, the person who holds the door, the person who is in the shadow of the lover who loves alcohol. too well, yes, well done, yes, yes, Galahad is on the path of the clergy, he is the innocent, the purity, analyzes the ball, he is the warrior, he has a purpose and yes, the path of Gawain's lover, a little of the dark side of that passion, but seriously, you must have it. something funny, you are on a mission searching for the Grail.

Things are not always fun, but yes, where other comments, questions, yes and Patricia Clarkson are evaluated very well, and that's why I was wondering, apart from the gap between rich and poor, almost a A person is a widow and goes to a town to open a bookstore and change, this is as if the town was very curious about this child, she is older, she has two books and maybe I think she could have a better movie and then Mrs. Patricia. Clarkson is some kind of boss of the Arts Council, a rich woman, very charming, quite socially adept and she gets people to do her bidding and she doesn't want this woman there and she is a fascinating watch.someone is actually making the wake up call and we are the people who need to be woken up, but so is Pluto. cave, just the whole idea is like they came out of the cave and said, come on, let's be free and they're fighting against it, rights resist change, that's just the nature of reality and yeah, anyone who's trying to leave our comfortable spaces. and we fear change, it's a survival mechanism, we're supposed to fear change, it can kill you, but you're not going to progress unless you make some changes, and those who see it first are often feared.

I would also say because if that were true. so maybe we have to change and what that would look like so yeah, just at the top and just at the front, but that's your job as storytellers, to do that. Thank you very much to all. I really seem to have learned a lot, thank you and thank you. a lot to film courage for everything you do, it's a wonderful job and good luck to all of you and not to keep you informed about what you're working on. I would like to know how you are applying these wonderful old mythical classics. story tools for what you're doing and what problems you're addressing, so do it.

I'd be interested to know how everything is going. You are welcome. I enjoyed it from the beginning. Thanks, yes, I do queries for stories and also a personal myth. Consultation that helps people discover what their path is, what their arc path is, and how best to use it.