What Stories Are You Living?: Discover Your Archetypes - Transform Your Life! Paperback – 23 Mar. 2021

As much as we have been taught by our culture about being a rugged individualist, there is within the human soul, a desire to belong. Even the individual acknowledgement of one's "I am-ness," cannot be without a community that has forged the one to belong. Dr. Carol S. Pearson's timely work "What Stories are You listening? Discover Your Archetypes - Transform your Life!," invites the reader to discover the story they live by so that can discover they belong to something more than themselves. Each of the 12 archetypes encourage the reader to identify their deep "I am-ness." When asked what I thought of myself as a creative caregiver and lover, my response was immediate, "This is who I AM!" As a mythologist, compassionate guide, and educator, Carol's desire to assist humankind in addressing the Soul's deep desire to be part of, to belong, becomes real in this work, a complication of her life's work. I recommend this book highly. I am a better person because of this read. Dr. Edward M Smink, author of "The Soul of Caregiving, A Caregiver's Guide to Healing and Transformation."

As soon as I received the book I went online and took the assessment. The results were similar to what I anticipated, as I'm somewhat familiar with these 12 archetypes. What was particularly moving though -- the intelligent and compassionate descriptions in that assessment, elaborated upon in the first chapters of the book. Looking ahead I see that there are ways to incorporate the gifts of the most and the least expressed archetypes into our lives, including their shadow side, and to watch for those dynamics at play in our relationships. A clue in a chapter heading: "Deepening Conversations and Transforming Your World." I'm savoring its rich evocative vocabulary. The author's background, contributors, advisors and research may have you thinking that this could be a dry tome. Nope. It's a comprehensive, warmhearted, invaluable resource for deep personal understanding, to accompany us on our heroic journey of life.

Dr. Pearson opens the world of archetypes through the truest ways of our sharing with each other: storytelling. I found elements of myself as I read her work. I welcome the insights, perspectives, and new lenses for considering who and how I am in the world. It informs my stance as a coaching supervisor, as an executive coach, and as an aunt, grandmother, friend, and colleague. I look forward to offering this work to my clients, as we uncover their narratives, understand them, consider their usefulness and challenge the ability to shape our stories going forward. In her first Chapter, Dr. Pearson promises “In this new book, I’ve harvested much that I’ve learned and prepared it as a meal for your mind to fortify you for living the journey that is yours to take.” She delivers spectacularly! I highly recommend you grab this book, and sit in the wonder of your stories.

Understanding our stories is fundamental to ur development as adults and Carol Pearson's latest book allows us to gain an archetypal perspective relative to our stories. She does it with such deftness and makes it accessible to those tutored in this domain and those learning. Pearson's early discussion of the necessity of 'narrative intelligence' is a powerful introduction and a compelling reason take this book seriously. Take the PMAI assessment, get the report and deepen one's view of the stories that shape us.

I haven't read the book yet. It seems full of good information and I'm not sure what updates have been added. I just wanted to point out that the older edition contains the test, the newer edition only gives one time free access to the test online. If I had it to do over again I'd buy the older edition.