In The Eternal Drama - The Inner Meaning of Greek Mythology, Edward F. Edinger states:
- “As these myths describe it, the unconscious state is paradise and the birth of the ego is paid for by suffering”
- The psychological meaning of Prometheus has two aspects. “One is that consciousness is accompanied by suffering, and the other is that the ego does not have to do all the suffering. There is an archetypal advocate or benefactor that supports and assists the ego. Whether we call him the suffering servant of Isaiah or Prometheus or Christ, there is an advocate in the archetypal realm.”
- “The nature of psychological experience is that what we do and what we experience are constantly interpenetrated by these other powers, although as a rule consciousness is making so much noise, it doesn’t notice.”
- “As the ego looks in the direction of the Self, the transpersonal center of the psyche, it tends to experience the Self not as a unity (at least not at first) but as a multiplicity of archetypal factors that one can think of as Greek gods.”
The move from unconsciousness to the birth of the ego parallel’s The Fool’s journey, in which The Fool becomes aware of the world, forms its ego and persona, The Chariot, grapples with his unconscious from Strength through Temperance, then battles his shadow and returns to the world whole and unified with the Self, The World.
The suffering is similar to dukkha in Buddhism.
The Self parallels 道 the Dao, and I believe they refer to the same concept. This is prominently featured in Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic as ki. Thus, The Fool’s journey is a journey from ego to Self through the process of individualization, journeying from one to many to one again.