Archetypes of Resistance
What is your role?
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There is no way to capture how awful the last week has been for democracy, humanity, and very basic human decency. I’m worried about literally millions of immigrants, millions of federal employees, women in the military, Anthony Fauci, and, gosh, all of us.
I hope you’re okay. Whether you are in the direct line of fire at this moment or just seeing it unfold in the news, there is no container big enough to process all this cruelty.
I find that as I attempt to metabolize the news and feelings, I’m in a rapid alchemical process, morphing a bit like this, trying to uphold my daily responsibilities and rise to the moment all at once. At the root of this awkward inner morphing seems to be a question of my best role in these times. Where am I needed? How can I best serve?
This is a long-haul battle we’re all in. It will ask each of us to mature in ways I don’t think we can yet imagine. We will each be called to rise to the challenge of finding that intersection between self and society that best reflects who we are. My goal is to stay out of fear, stay present with my loved ones and in my work, and also contribute to protecting our country and its people—lawful citizens or not.
In trying to make sense of my best role, I’ve been pondering something I’m calling the Archetypes of Resistance: What are the ancient roles that go into the enduring work of transformation, peace, equality, and freedom?
No one role is better or more important than the others. Each person has a part to play in the larger work. But by seeing these archetypes individually, we might get a better sense of how our skills and personalities can best contribute to the whole. Rather than dissociate in overwhelm or dive in over our heads, these archetypes are one way to explore how we can individually get to work.
See the list I’ve begun below, and feel free to add to it in the comments. I have a feeling I’ll be refining this over time. Keep in mind that the examples I offer are just a few of the countless people doing incredible work today, in history, or modeling for us in our myths and stories. (Some of the examples are also organizations: very little of the work we do is done alone.)
What is your role? Which two of these archetypes most speak to you and the work you’re called to do?
Twenty Archetypes of Resistance
The Healer: Whether offering therapy to people in need, serving on the front lines as a medic, providing abortions for women in dangerous locations, or defending our public health, the Healer protects us in body and spirit, bringing their skills and training to help ease suffering and ensure survival. Examples: Ma Linn Ni Zho, Paul Farmer, Dixon Chibanda, Mahmoud Abu Nujaila, Anthony Fauci, Laura Kaplan.
The Musician: Emma Goldman didn’t quite say “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution,” but what she actually said expressed it more clearly: movements for a better world must also contain joy. The Musician may help us process emotions and celebrate, or lift the spirits of a neighborhood amid devastation when all else seems to be lost. Or, they translate the pain into something we all need to hear and create a rallying cry to motivate change. The Musician helps to remind us of life beyond grief and human creativity in the worst of times. Examples: Vedran Smailović, Nina Simone, Joan Baez, and every musician who inspires you.
The Cook: Without physical and spiritual nourishment, we all whither. The Cook is a person in the community at any scale, in a refugee camp, a restaurant, a church basement, or a home, providing food to sustain bodies and beings. The Cook brings their talents in the kitchen into the dining space as well, knowing that alongside a shared meal is community and connection. Examples: Jose Andrés, Black Panthers’ Free Breakfast Program, Soup & Bread, and every bakery, small restaurant, and home cook who you love.
The Neighbor: Sometimes, the most important role in any of our lives is that of the Neighbor, a person who helps to hold the community together and is available to offer a cup of tea, an ear, a meal, or even a bed in times of need. The Neighbor is often an underappreciated hero, but one who is remembered deeply in the hearts of the people they touch. Examples: Mister Rogers, the person whose door you could knock on growing up, the person nearby who you trust today.
The Observer: Systemic change rarely happens quickly, and it takes incredible courage to observe suffering and share it with others so that it doesn’t happen in the dark. The Observer brings to bear their capacity for presence by witnessing what is unfolding and recording it for the rest of us. In this role, they serve to document events and lives for the present and for the future. Examples: The Marshall Project, ProPublica,
, and honestly, so many people I don’t know where to begin.The Civil Servant: While democracy is under attack, some of the most courageous people are those on the front lines of politics day after day, speaking truth to power and working hard to defend our institutions even in the most dire of circumstances. Not only do they protect what laws and services they can, they also offer hopeful reminders of leadership and courage for all of us. Some of them are quite public; others are working silently within the halls of bureaucracy. Examples: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Vaclav Havel, Justin Jones, and so many more.
The Orator: In dark times, we all need inspiration and guidance. Countless great speeches throughout history have offered us a light towards which to walk and much-needed hope in humanity when all feels lost. Orators provide clarity for the mission and encouragement in the labor. Examples: Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde, Frederick Douglass, Sojourner Truth, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr.
The Benefactor: All movements require money and reliable financial support; sometimes, that money comes in the form of crowd-funding, and sometimes, it comes from very wealthy donors who are aligned with the cause, even placing themselves at risk to get resources where they need to go. There are times when this is a public role, and times when the benefactor themselves is hidden in the resistance. Examples: Queen Marie-José, Mon Mothma.
The Keeper of Law: At their best, the structures of justice exist to protect the most vulnerable among us. People who protect the law in times of resistance exist at every level of the system, from defending voting rights, to courageous judges standing up to unconstitutional rulings, to lawyers defending immigrants and law clerks laboring in the background. Examples: Washington Attorney General Nick Brown, Anthony D. Romero, and so many more who have shown up in force over the last eight years to protect the rule of law.
The Prophet: Often, the one who can tell the future is gathering information from what is right in front of all of us, putting the pieces together that the rest of us can’t see. Sometimes, they’re receiving information and guidance from someplace else entirely. Because they so often think differently, we tend to think they’re crazy until the final moment when we realize they were right all along—it’s hard to know who knows and who just purports to know. The Prophet is always watching out for the rest of us and protecting things for the future. Examples: Cassandra, Octavia Butler, Detective Spooner, Deborah.
The Wisdom Keeper: While so much is being destroyed, it’s critical that whatever wisdom and culture can be protected, be protected. The Wisdom Keeper protects our books, languages, and cultural treasures for the future, as well as for needed inspiration, information, and orientation in the moment. The Wisdom Keeper may work as a librarian, archivist, or oral storyteller; they are the sages sharing the highest lessons with those who can receive them. Examples: Abdel Kader Haidara, Joseph Bruchac, Ayana Jamieson, Mustafa Jahić, Sonnet Kekilia Coggins, and all the librarians in our communities and schools fighting book bans and protecting access.
The Leader: When you’re lost in the woods, it is a great comfort to know that someone up ahead has a flashlight and a compass and feels comfortable being in the lead. A true leader is not invested in leadership for the sake of fame or prestige; they take on the role because they’re able to orient towards integrity and morality in the scariest of times, and model that orientation for the rest of us. The danger for all of us is expecting them to be perfect; the best leaders are humans alongside us. Examples: Alexei Navalny, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Greta Thunberg, Judy Heumann, Harvey Milk.
The Writer: On every level, communication is critical in times of resistance, whether to convey facts and information or inspire through poetry and storytelling. The Writer shares the news as clearly and factually as possible, provides inspiration to keep the people’s souls afloat, and distributes needed intel. They help us stay oriented to reality, as well as to the deeper callings at the root of change. Examples: James Baldwin, Hannah Arendt, Audre Lorde,
, Sonia Sanchez, White Rose.The Defender: Not all protectors carry weapons, but some certainly do. The Defender may be a soldier or an officer protecting our institutions and communities in some of the scariest moments, possibly putting their life on the line. They can be our saviors when the side we’re up against has all the weapons—the danger is in knowing when to put the guns back down. Examples: Michael Fanone, Eugene Goodman, Chani.
The Seed Keeper: Some people are oriented to fighting back in the moment, and others are thinking far into the future, anticipating what will be destroyed and protecting what needs to be protected. The Seed Keeper may be saving actual seeds for future harvest, or they may be acting like seeds themselves, going deep underground—or away from society—to protect knowledge, artifacts, or life for another time. They tried to bury us, they didn't know we were seeds. Examples: Rahibai Soma Popere, The Indigenous Seed Keepers Network, The Altadena Seed Library, Yoda.
The Code Maker: There are code breakers, and there are code makers. When communication becomes dangerous and public information networks can’t be trusted, resistance movements need people who can communicate without the risk of being heard. This may mean hand signals, morse code, or a spoken language that very few people know; it may also mean mastery of digital spaces that can’t be hacked. Code Makers help protect lives and resources by passing information along that cannot be easily known by others outside. Examples: Navajo Code Talkers, The Bene Gesserit, Signal.
The Artist: The Artist helps us to see things we can’t otherwise see, and face things we can’t otherwise face, they help to metabolize the pain in the world and turn it into beauty, or use art to protest in ways that marching alone can’t do. The Artist may work in any medium but uses their work to serve the soul, transform grief, and create in the face of destruction. Examples: Nina Bunjevac, Maria Alyokhina, Augusta Savage, Rae Davis, and the artists throughout history who have most deeply inspired you.
The Organizer: Even when we’re ready to dive in, not all of us are equipped to gather the community together to get to work. The Organizer is skilled at knowing what needs to get done, is tapped into the networks of care and support, and helps us get educated and, well, organized. They are advocates working on the ground in our neighborhoods, or they’re heading up organizations to provide needs institutionally. Examples: Stacey Abrams, Sonya Passi,
, Ai-jen Poo, Alice Wong, Alicia Roth Weigel.The Underground Guide: Much of the labor in resistance movements is invisible by default, but its lack of visibility doesn’t reflect its level of importance. Being an Underground Guide means protecting vulnerable people, creatures, and resources from danger without ever being known or seen; it means taking risks and knowing how to play one role above ground and another at night or in the shadows. Underground Guides need to build networks, knowing who they can trust, and how to communicate to keep people safe and connected to the resources they need. Examples: Harriet Tubman, Jane, Miep Gies.
The Soul-Tender: Every movement needs places for soul-tending, gathering spaces that help to replenish the sense of depletion and hopelessness, with leaders to remind us of our integrity and the larger story of creation and destruction unfolding over time. The Soul-Tender may be a religious leader or secular guide who isn’t afraid to tap into the spiritual and non-rational spaces to convey hope, without losing connection to the here and now. Examples: Michael Meade, Sharon Bros, Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, Richard Rohr, Chani Nicholas, and your faith communities and soulful spaces.
What is your role? Which two of these archetypes most speak to you and the work you’re called to do? What archetypes need to be added to the list? Who has most inspired you to do the work you do? Leave a comment below.
Related:
I’m Satya Doyle Byock, psychotherapist, author of Quarterlife: The Search for Self in Early Adulthood, director of The Salome Institute of Jungian Studies, and co-host of a podcast on Jung’s Red Book. My work has been featured in The New York Times, The Guardian, Oprah Daily, NPR, The BBC, Literary Hub, The Tamron Hall Show, and on podcasts such as Apple News in Conversation and The Joseph Campbell Foundation Podcast. All links can be found here.
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I have no idea what my role will be, but I am beginning to find some clarity in this time of great upheaval. Perhaps this is the first step. I wake up daily, writing a short collect for my day. Yesterday, I wrote:
Watching the trampling of the Constitution is devastating... Watching the trampling of humanity is devastating... Watching the trampling of Institutions is devastating. Watching, watching, watching is devastating. BUT... It's like a car wreck; I can't take my eyes off it. I will always care about the victims, the disadvantaged, and the disenfranchised. In just six days, so many of us have been dehumanized and officially classified as less than.
These short prayers seem to be a statement to myself, of who I am, what I feel, and who I want to be.
Bishop Budde reminded me a time in my past that I had become disillusioned. Bishop Shelby Spong is to the Episcopal Church as Richard Rohr is to... My adolescent Episcopal Priest was in Minneapolis with Bishop Budde for a time and when we communicated this week said that she was always speaking her truth.
There are good people with megaphones. I need to keep my ears and eyes open and not become to depressed or cynical or worse - Hopeless.
This is just brilliant. I’m sharing widely, with the basic note that “such times force/invite/require us to strip away the noise and discover/reveal who we really are. Even when we thought we knew. I thought I was [these] but I’m thinking no, maybe not. Maybe that’s an old version of me.” Such a fertile and orienting inquiry, like markers on a tree as we hike through an unknown woods. Thank you so much.