Speaking Symbols With Gorgons

In March of 2024 my husband and I took a trip of a lifetime – a 14-day tour of Greece. We made our reservations early and gleefully imagined the trip for almost a year. We read and reread the fantastic itinerary which took us to Athens, Delphi, Olympia, and other rural Greek wonders and ancient healing sites.  We imagined exploring the Acropolis, and walking around the Mani Peninsula. I practiced basic Greek phrases with Youtube videos. This is how Rick and I love to travel. A joyful year of anticipation, then the trip, and then years of grateful remembering. I couldn’t foresee that this trip was going to be different for us. It was going to change my life forever.   

I had asked to go to Greece. It was the birthplace of all my passions - my work in the theatre, my studies of psychology and mythology. After many decades, these passions were finally coming together for me. In my twenties I debated between becoming a therapist or pursuing work in the theatre. Madam Theatre won but I couldn’t give up psychology. I continued to study, formally and informally, for the next 3 decades. I read books of lectures meant for psychoanalysts (including all the books by Jung’s colleague Marie Louise Von Franz - Jung himself was too difficult). For many years I only understood about half of what I read, but I was dreaming more and new insights kept popping into my mind. I would suddenly recognize the source of old struggles between Rick and me. Or I would suddenly see an area of aggression in myself. Then Von Franz’ discussion of “the Shadow” started to make more sense. One dream showed me, a “dancing wolf.” Working on it I realized, with a shock, that this was how I might be perceived at work. This disturbing insight gave me empathy for my coworkers and led me toward changes in behavior. 

Studying Jung’s work brought me healing. In gratitude I began to spend most of my time making short stop motion films in homage to Von Franz. Von Franz had shown how fairy tales offered genuine guidance and stories as medicine for the psyche. Now, for vacation, we were going to the place where many of these stories began. I was thrilled to go to the source of the language of symbols. 

Even though I had studied symbolic language for many years, I was hardly fluent. Still, I studied daily: in mythology Twitter groups, through journaling about my nighttime dreams, in reading psychological interpretations, and in living with a fairy tale for many months while I made a stop motion film. Often, it was only after many months (or years) that I would understand deeper meanings of a film I had made. But my fluency in the language of symbols was improving. On our last overseas trip, I not only recognized much more when we visited museums, but also, while walking the streets of Naples, I gasped, realizing that I was reading the symbols in street graffiti and storefront windows. I recognized Pulcinella emerging from a giant popover, in front of a bakery. I saw him everywhere, with his lucky red horn. I knew that this 17th century commedia del arte character could be traced to even older tricksters. Like all good symbols, he was complex– fierce and funny, scheming and generous. 

So, Greece was the perfect destination. On the airplane, as I said a prayer for our flight and trip, I decided to pick a tarot card. I opened my tarot app on my phone and uncovered…. The Tower. The Tower?! One of the scariest images of the Tarot- a flaming tower collapses as two poor souls dive from the top. Uh…. Ok. I’d picked the Tower card before. It didn’t have to be a big deal. I would probably learn some inner lessons during this trip. Of course I would. 

After great sleep on the plane, we arrived in glorious Greece. It was early March but the weather was unseasonably warm and sunny. Miraculously, we had no jet lag. Instead of 60-year-olds celebrating our 25th anniversary, Rick and I felt like teenagers in love. We scampered around the ancient sites and used the Rick Steeves guide to locate hidden gastronomic wonders. 

At the Acropolis Museum, I gravitated toward the ancient female gorgons. There was something beautiful in their fierceness. They challenged me, with their gaping mouths, outstretched tongue, and wide, bulging eyes. Historically, these bronze and marble images were meant to be a warning. Of what? Female power? And protection against the evil eye. Of all the photos I took that day, most were of this Gorgon figure, also known as Medusa. 

These first few days in Athens were glorious. Now we readied ourselves to join our 14-day tour. We had loved our previous two tours with RS. At breakfast we met a few of our tour mates. They were interesting and friendly. That evening we met our guide. I’ll call her Vivi. 

Vivi was scary. She smiled broadly but it was a brittle smile. She wanted us to be a “nice” group, not like other groups she had “hated.” She quickly set to grooming our very polite collection of Americans. She warned us that she didn’t like getting up early and we wouldn’t see her at breakfasts. While she said we could “ask her anything,” she disappeared as often as she could. She gave us her many directions at a pace too rapid to decipher. We felt so much passive aggression in Vivi that Rick and I were dumbfounded. But no one else seemed to notice or care. Or was it because the tour had a “no grumps” philosophy and our group was abiding by this edict?

We knew the RS touring style. We knew of the early morning packing and departures. These had felt grueling but they had allowed us to see so many spectacular sites. It was with a heavy heart that we noticed that Vivi set our departure time to Delphi at 8:30am. The day before another RS group had left for Delphi at 7:45am. 

After a lovely ride through the Greek countryside, we arrived at Delphi. Our local guide, Penny was brilliant. She helped us understand the world of this ancient oracle site. She was funny and kept composure even though Vivi had gotten us there so late. Immediately, as Penny finished our formal tour of the grounds and museum, we were told that the museum was closing. (It seemed that they had stayed open for us.) We did not have a moment to linger. We also didn’t have time for anything except a rushed and frantic lunch. As a group we were determined not to grump but several of us quietly voiced our disappointment at missing the chance to explore the museum. 

The trip continued. I had to admit that our growing anger toward Vivi seemed bigger than her selfishness. There was something symbolic, something mythic in the way she triggered Rick and me. On the fourth evening of the tour, as we wandered in an old Greek cemetery, we realized that Vivi reminded us, in deep ways, of our mothers. We both had controlling mothers who smiled and were “nice.”  It had taken us decades to become free of our childhood struggles. Apparently, we were not yet free. 

But I was tired of holding the anger against Vivi. I had written a few notes in my phone, preparing for the review I would give the Rick Steves folks. I had hoped that writing it down would allow me to let it all go. But that wasn’t working. I realized that I needed to say something. 

That night at dinner Vivi began her announcements while waiters passed dishes. The room was loud and it was hard to follow her words. But she wasn’t going to stay with us at dinner and there was no way to get further clarification because, yet again, she had a “sudden zoom meeting” and couldn’t stay with us. She asked if there were any questions. Like Oliver in the movie, asking for more gruel, I slowly raised my hand.

“Could we leave earlier in the morning?” I asked. I wasn’t angry or even upset. I didn’t expect her to change her plans. I just knew that asking the question would help me let go of my frustration. 

The room was silent. Vivi handled it well, simply asking, “Why?”

“So we could spend more time at the ancient sites,” I replied simply.

Vivi smoothly told an obvious lie about not having the tickets we needed to get in earlier. (She had them with her the following day). I knew it was a lie but it didn’t matter. I hadn’t wanted to speak in front of the group but Vivi had set it up that way. Now at least it was on the record. At least one of the guests wanted to spend less time in bed and more time at the sites.

Dinner resumed. I tried not to feel like a pariah in the group. Maybe some of the others wanted to sleep in? Not everyone was as crazy about mythology as I was. I tried to let the whole thing go. The room was loud and my table-mate, Veronica, and I began an exciting discussion of her work in education and my work with teachers and films. And then suddenly I felt very strange. I couldn’t seem to form my words correctly. Was it the wine? The party swirled around me but I got quiet. Something was wrong with me. 

Back in our hotel room I saw that I couldn’t smile. The right side of my face had collapsed. My eye wouldn’t close all the way. That side of my mouth couldn’t move. We were in a remote, mountainous town in Greece 5 hours from any large city. It was 9pm. It would be impossible to leave, even if I could get ahold of Vivi. Rick and I looked at each other. Was I having a stroke? Was this how I was going to die? But then we researched my symptoms and remembered my father. I wasn’t having a stroke; I was having an attack of the same ailment that had paralyzed my father’s face early in his life, Bell’s Palsy. 

I didn’t sleep well that night. My brain circled around the past 48 hours. This illness felt especially symbolic and I was determined to decode what was happening. First, there was my father. He had been gone since 2017 and his birthday was in two days. I had been thinking about him throughout the trip, and felt his presence. An hour before the attack, as Rick and I walked through the tiny cemetery, we talked about my dad. How he’d been dominated by my mother all his life. How, in the past year I had struggled to stand up to my mom. We wondered, if I worked on this issue in my family system, could it also help him - wherever he was? Now I was struck with the same illness as my dad. His face had become paralyzed with Bell’s Palsy a month before his wedding to my mom. 

Then there was Vivi as a symbol of our mothers. We were in a foreign country, in the middle of nowhere, where we didn’t speak the language. We were “dependent” on her. Hours before the attack, I had prayed that I would “learn what I needed to learn here.” Was this the answer to my prayer??

Vivi had talked about cursing one of her previous groups, she certainly seemed capable of cursing me. (Literally!) But I didn’t like the arc of that story -painting myself as a victim. It also didn’t jibe with my studies in psychology. I decided to think of the events as if they were a dream and then it was clear! Gorgon/Medusa, my fascination on the trip – the creature that was known to paralyze those who looked at her- she had paid me a visit. I had looked directly at Vivi/my mother and a part of me had been turned to stone. In the middle of the night, I googled and found an amazing article by the Jungian analyst, Marion Woodman. Woodman wrote about our inner Death Mother. Had that part been triggered in me? Had that unleashed the palsy? 

Woodman described the Death Mother archetype through the story of Medusa. Woodman wrote that, for some of us, our early childhood experiences of ambivalent or hostile mothering stay, like a virus, inside of us, ready to erupt in physical or psychological symptoms. (Modern medicine’s current hypothesis is that Bell’s is caused by a latent virus.)

Getting struck with Bell’s Palsy felt like seeing the hand of God in a tornado. (And like a tornado, the aftermath of this initial paralysis would take far longer to “clean up” than I imagined that night.) That night I was in awe of a power beyond me and within me. And an illness that felt full of symbolic meanings.

The trip continued. In photos I could only look very angry. Was I being asked to embrace what was monstrous in myself? On the one hand the Gorgon could be a symbol of the dangerous energy in me (the Death Mother). On the other hand, I sensed that I needed some of that fierce energy. I often collapsed inside when family members attacked me. I needed to have some Medusa strength in me. Now her face was my face. (In the myth of Medusa, the warrior Goddess Athena eventually places Medusa’s head on her shield, as protection. I had taken many photos of this too.)

Aside from self-consciousness and struggles with my eye, I fully participated in the trip. But the first day home was very hard. In Greece my palsy had felt like part of the mythic nature of the place. Now I would see neighbors and friends. I sank into a new level of despair. I felt disorientated. My old smiling persona didn’t work anymore. My identity had dissolved and I was living without it.  I prayed for recovery, took Chinese herbs, and relentless researched the internet. I had a fear that the ailment would leave me before I learned it’s lessons. I needn’t have worried! As each month passed, I hoped it would be my last.

After 3 months, while still praying for my facial nerves to work again, Rick and I took a trip to help some family members. Three times during that trip I rescued a caterpillar. The first was walking on a sidewalk, the second was in the street, and the third was on a hotel balcony. In all three cases I moved the creature to a small area of greenery, within the concrete world. I worked on this symbol as if it was a dream. In this family trip I would take myself out of harm’s way. And like the caterpillar, I was entering a dormant phase. I would need to stay in a chrysalis state for a while, allowing my old self to dissolve while the new one was formed. This metaphor has helped me stay patient in this process and give myself permission to rest more. Marion Woodman also speaks about the chrysalis state as a vital phase of healing. 

These days, I work at getting my face “back” every day. I spend time slowly practicing a tiny pucker and work to keep my eye relaxed so that it won’t build a bad habit. So much “wasted time.” But these many months of rest and facial exercises have pulled me off my perfectionist treadmill. I was the project manager of so many plans! But now I’ve surrendered. In the tug of war between my Ego and my Higher Self, my Ego has given up. For now.

I’ve always been willful, even as a child. My parents tried to break me of my willfulness but they only accomplished this part way, and left me with a psyche filled with fear and guilt. In the rebuilding of the Tower of my Self, I’m starting from scratch. The old me knew how to organize, synthesize, progress. The new me waits for instructions – from my dreams and hunches. I don’t expect as much of myself. I realize that I cannot make all my dream projects come true. I’m only one person. I live in a body. I can only do what I can do. 

I am surprisingly grateful. I look at my face in the mirror and I smile at myself with love. My face is doing the best it can. 

In many of the fairy tales that I study and animate, the hero is put under a spell. Von Franz interprets these spells as symbols of neurosis. Bell’s Palsy is helping me begin to break the spells I’ve been under – my perpetual drives for achievement and perfection. 

“Suffering that is not understood is hard to bear, while on the other hand, it is often astounding to see how much a person can endure when he understands the why and wherefore.”

Carl Jung, CW 18, Para 1578

After 8 months my smile has come back 50%, and my eye finally closes. Still, after months of physical therapy and continual facial massage much of my right side still hardly moves. This is a master class in learning patience. As I struggle to recover well from the complications of long-term Bell’s (an eye that seems to shrink, an eye that wants to close when I smile) I am grateful for the lessons I’m learning. And I’m grateful to practice the language of symbols. It is such a difficult language! And most people in our culture don’t seem to recognize or value it. But to me, it is the most vital language to learn. To discover a possible “Death Mother” within me is sobering but also empowering. The story of Medusa can give me guidance in my soul’s work. And if my suffering isn’t random, but part of my soul’s growth and transformation, I can more easily bear it, work with it, and even appreciate it. I can rest in the knowledge that Higher purposes may be at work. 

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Feral cats roam everywhere throughout Greece. One night, as I walked to dinner wearing an eye patch, a one –eyed cat came up to me and stood before me. Same eye. Later at dinner another cat sat near us and I observed him. Then the image cracked open, like a helpful dream. Could I become more like a cat from this event? More free, independent, and less anxious? I am grateful for this image and the symbolic medicine it offers. 

Laura Lewis-Barr was a graduate student in clinical psychology but eventually switched majors and earned her M.A in theatre. She is a published poet and award-winning dramatist, screenwriter, and stop-motion filmmaker. Laura’s deep study of Jungian psychology has led to her passion for studying symbols –through her films on fairy tales and her new podcast “Laughing Mystics” which explores the Bible through a Jungian lens. Laura's art focuses on mythic stories for personal and collective transformation. Her films are made in her basement in Chicago and her screening events are filled with heart and questions for the soul.   For more info visit: https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/thelaughingmystics/

and https://psychescinema.com/

Image credit: Kelly Wright via Midjourney, Ideogram, Krea, and Canva.