When I first arrived in San Francisco in 1996, the city welcomed me with open arms, immediately providing me with a job, a place to live, and most importantly, a tribe. It’s a city for artists, counter-culture, and performance—a place where diversity is not just tolerated, but celebrated. I love it here.
In a Mythic interview, depth psychologist Craig Chalquist introduced me to a new term, terrapsychology–the psychoanalysis of a place. He proposed that the dominant mythic figure of San Francisco is Dionysus, the genderqueer Greek god of theatre, wine, altered states, and madness.
Yup. Sounds about right.
San Francisco has such a big personality that it makes a great subject for exploring this line of thinking. What mythic patterns or images are present in your hometown or the place you’ve come to call home?
If this sounds your cup of tea, it’s the subject of my latest podcast episode, which is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Audible, and wherever else you get your podcasts. Or you can listen to it here:
The Heart of Dionysus Beats in San Francisco
To give you a taste, here are a couple of quotes from the episode:
“I’m always curious about which mythological presences are strong in particular places. And it tends to be one plus a whole story that they’re embedded in.”
“The phoenix burns itself up, but then it does so that it can rise again. So that’s the kind of thing I think about when I see all these apocalyptic happenings in the world that we’re in the descent phase, but what will the rise look like? “