Women Who Run with the Wolves Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype

by Estés, Clarissa Pinkola

• ISBN13: 9780345396815
• ISBN10: 0345396812
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1995-08-22
• Publisher: Ballantine Books

Summary

"A deeply spiritual book...She honors what is tough, smart and untamed in women. She venerates the female soul." --The Washington Post Book World Within every woman there lives a powerful force, filled with good instincts, passionate creativity, and ageless knowing. She is the Wild Woman, who represents the instinctual nature of women. But she is an endangered species. For though the gifts of wildish nature belong to us at birth, society's attempt to "civilize" us into rigid roles has muffled the deep, life-giving messages of our own souls. In Women Who Run with the Wolves, Dr. Estes unfolds rich intercultural myths, fairy tales, folk tales, and stories, many from her own traditions, in order to help women reconnect with the fierce, healthy, visionary attributes of this instinctual nature. Through the stories and commentaries in this remarkable book, we retrieve, examine, love, and understand the Wild Woman, and hold her against our deep psyches as one who is both magic and medicine. Dr. Estes has created a new lexicon for describing the female psyche. Fertile and life-giving, it is a psychology of women in the truest sense, a knowing of the soul. "The work of Clarissa Pinkola Estes, rooted in old and deep family rites and in archetypal psychology, recognizes that the soul is not lost, but has been put to sleep....This volume reminds us that we are nature for all our sophistication, that we are still wild, and the recovery of that vitality will itself set us right in the world." --Thomas Moore Author of Care of the Soul

Author Biography

Clarissa Pinkola Estés is an American poet, author, and spoken word artist.

Table of Contents

The Bounty of Wild Woman
Foreword	p. xvii
Introduction: Singing Over the Bones	p. 1
The Stories
The Howl: Resurrection of the Wild Woman	p. 21
La Loba, The Wolf Woman
The Four Rabbinim
Stalking the Intruder: the Beginning Initiation	p. 35
Bluebeard
The Natural Predator of the Psyche
Naive Women as Prey
The Key to Knowing: The Importance of Snuffling
The Animal Groom
Blood Scent
Backtracking and Looping
Giving the Cry
The Sin-eaters
The Dark Man in Women's Dreams
Nosing Out the Facts: the Retrieval of Intuition as Initiation	p. 70
The Doll in Her Pocket: Vasalisa the Wise
Allowing the Too-Good Mother to Die
Exposing the Crude Shadow
Navigating in the Dark
Facing the Wild Hag
Serving the Non-Rational
Separating This from That
Asking the Mysteries
Standing on All Fours
Recasting the Shadow
The Mate: Union with the Other	p. 111
Hymn for the Wild Man: Manawee
The Dual Nature of Women
The Power of Two
The Power of Name
The Tenacious Dog Nature
Creeping Seductive Appetite
Achieving Fierceness
The Interior Woman
Hunting: When the Heart is a Lonely Hunter	p. 127
Skeleton Woman: Facing the Life/Death/Life Nature of Love
Death in the House of Love
The First Phases of Love
The Accidental Finding of Treasure
The Chase and the Hiding
Untangling the Skeleton
The Sleep of Trust
Giving the Tear
The Later Phases of Love
Heart as Drum and Singing Up
The Dance of Body and Soul
Finding One's Pack: Belonging as Blessing	p. 164
The Ugly Duckling
Exile of the Unmatched Child
Kinds of Mothers
The Ambivalent Mother
The Collapsed Mother
The Child Mother and the Unmothered Mother
The Strong Mother, The Strong Child
Bad Company
Not Looking Right
Frozen Feeling, Frozen Creativity
The Passing Stranger
Exile as Boon
The Uncombed Cats and Cross-Eyed Hens of the World
Remembrance and Continuance No Matter What
Love for the Soul
The Mistaken Zygote
Joyous Body: the Wild Flesh	p. 197
Body Talk
The Body in Fairy Tales
The Power of the Haunches
La Mariposa, Butterfly Woman
Self-Preservation: Identifying Leg Traps, Cages, and Poisoned Batt	p. 213
The Feral Woman
The Red Shoes
Brutal Loss in Fairy Tales
The Handmade Red Shoes
The Traps
The Gilded Carriage, the Devalued Life
The Dry Old Woman, the Senescent Force
Burning the Treasure, Hambre del Alma, Soul Famine
Injury to Basic Instinct, the Consequence of Capture
Trying to Sneak a Secret Life, Split in Two
Cringing Before the Collective, Shadow Rebellion
Faking It, Trying to be Good, Normalizing the Abnormal
Dancing Out of Control, Obsession and Addiction
Addiction
At the Executioner's House
Trying to Take Shoes Off, Too Late
Returning to Life Made by Hand, Healing Injured Instincts
Homing: Returning to Oneself	p. 255
Sealskin, Soulskin
Loss of Sense of Soul as Initiation
Losing One's Pelt
The Lonely Man
The Spirit Child
Drying Out and Crippling
Hearing the Old One's Call
Staying Overlong
Cutting Loose, Diving In
The Medial Woman: Breathing Under Water
Surfacing
The Practice of Intentional Solitude
Women's Innate Ecology
Clear Water: Nourishing the Creative Life	p. 297
La Llorona
The Pollution of the Wild Soul
Poison in the River
Fire on the River
The Man on the River
Taking Back the River
Focus and the Fantasy Mill
The Little Match Girl
Staving Off Creative Fantasy
Renewing the Creative Fire
The Three Gold Hairs
Heat: Retrieving a Sacred Sexuality	p. 334
The Dirty Goddesses
Baubo: The Belly Goddess
Coyote Dick
A Trip to Rwanda
Marking Territory: the Boundaries of Rage and Forgiveness	p. 346
The Crescent Moon Bear
Rage as Teacher
Bringing in the Healer: Climbing the Mountain
The Spirit Bear
The Transformative Fire and Right Action
Righteous Rage
The Withered Trees
Descansos
Injured Instinct and Rage
Collective Rage
Stuck in Old Rage
Four Stages of Forgiveness
Battle Scars: Membership in the Scar Clan	p. 374
Secrets as Slayers
The Dead Zone
The Woman With Hair of Gold
The Scapecoat
La Selva Subterranea: Initiation in the Underground Forest	p. 387
The Handless Maiden
The Bargain Without Knowing
The Dismemberment
The Wandering
Finding Love in the Underworld
The Harrowing of the Soul
The Realm of the Wild Woman
The Wild Bride and Bridegroom
Shadowing: Canto Hondo, the Deep Song	p. 456
The Wolf's Eyelash	p. 462
Afterword: Story as Medicine	p. 466
Addendum	p. 474
Notes	p. 479
Education of a Young Wolf: A Bibliography	p. 507
Acknowledgments	p. 514
Index	p. 519
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.