How can our hands reveal mythological archetypes and why is this useful? Hands show how the brain is wired, and surprisingly the basic patterns are the same as the archetypes of ancient Greek and Roman mythology. Each of the gods and goddesses had a different role to play in the grand scheme of things. Knowing which type you are associated with goes a long way to helping you figure out your place in the world. It's also useful to know that all archetypes have both light and dark sides. You can express your strengths positively or negatively. Knowing this helps you shift towards a more positive expression of your natural strengths. (Note: most of the archetypes have two names, one Greek and one Roman. Greek names are used so the types aren't confused with the planets and astrology.) How can you tell which god or goddess you are associated with? A quick look at your own hands can help you figure out your dominant type. We'll start by looking at an average hand, with no dominant types, and then we'll compare our own hands while looking for obvious differences. Notice where the lines are drawn on figure 1. On an average hand, the index finger and ring finger are both the same length, both being slightly shorter than the middle finger and each reaching midway up the top section of the middle finger. I've drawn a line indicating average length of the ring and index fingers – notice on figure 1 that the ring finger is much longer than average and the index is shorter and how the ring finger extends above the line, marking the average length. This means that, in this example, the ring finger is the dominant finger, and the archetype associated with that finger is Apollo, and is the dominant archetype. had the vision of an eagle and could throw thunderbolts at anyone who made him angry, and so on. If you are a Zeus type you don't like other people telling you what to do and you need to be in control of your own world. Zeus types make natural leaders but they don't always like to be in the spotlight. Often they are behind the scenes running the show. Jupiter qualities: power, influence, leadership, ambition, independence, respect, territory, status, vision. There are several subsets of this type depending on your overall hand shape. Such as, master of my domain, big ideas/visionary types, red queen/demanding choreographer and man or woman of action. Shadow side: Inappropriate thunderbolts. For example, the archetype of the red queen who chops off people's head on a whim.
From left: Figure 1 – where the ring finger is longer than the index finger this indicates that Apollo is the dominant archetype • Figure 2 – where the index finger is much longer than the ring finger, it indicates the Zeus type.
Saturn/Cronus Types
Zeus Types
The middle finger is usually longer than the index and ring fingers but if your middle finger is much longer than average, then Saturn is your dominant archetype. Saturn was the old god who ate his children, goes the myth. He In figure 2, note how the index finger is much longer than the ring finger. This shows that Zeus (also called Jupiter) is the dominant archetype. Zeus was king of the gods and ruled the heavens. He was also god of agriculture: 'As you sow so you reap'. Saturn energy is all about value: time, detail, money, systems, structure, responsibility, and consequences. It's also about security and on the shadow side, pessimism.
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