Existential Narrative
A Existential Narrative (a.k.a. Sacred Narrative) is a Narrative with existential themes, like human origin, purpose, and destiny, or the meaning of life and death.[1] Existential Narratives provide answers to Big Questions.
Narrative Types
Narrative > Elite Narrative, Existential Narrative, Functional Narrative, Master Narrative, Mundane Narrative
Syncretic Terms
Creation Template > Comprehensive Framework, Discourse, Existential Narrative, Existential Paradigm, Functional Narrative, Master Narrative, Master Story, Meaning Structure, Ruling Ideology
Types of Functional Narratives
Functional Narrative > Existential Narrative
Related LP Terms
Existential Narrative > Archetype Cards, Archetype System, Archetypes, Creation Template, Mechanisms of Compliance, Symbol, System Architect
Non-LP Related Terms
Existential Narrative > Narrative
Notes
We may also refer to existential narratives as Creation Templates because the are often created with the intent to manipulate and shape reality.
Some examples of sacred stories include
- The "Adam and Ave" story of the Christian Bible
- The "Star Wars" story of modern Hollywood.
- The Masonic "master architect" story.
- The evolutionary story
Sacred narratives are, for better or worse, the vehicles by which old and new energy Archetypes are delivered.
A sacred narrative is an oft-repeated story that provides explicit or implicit answers to the Big Questions of existence, thereby creating what I call the Creation Template for this planet. Through repetitive telling by traditional storytellers (or Hollywood movie directors), sacred stories embed themselves deeply into the Collective Consciousness of this planet. From there the "metaphoric representations" that are constitutive of the Creation Template then determine, according to principle As above in consciousness, so below in matter, the manifestation of reality on this planet.
By their very nature, sacred stories become powerful stories. Because of their power to create what we might call the creative Meta-Conditions for manifestation of the human world, the form and content of sacred stories is viciously protected by those in control of the human world. Various mechanisms are used to control the shape and form of sacred stories. In medieval Catholic Europe, for example, only hand-selected monks were given the authority to copy sacred texts. Gutenberg complicated control, nevertheless, control was quickly reasserted through simple physical ownership (i.e., eventually only the rich could own printing presses and Hollywood movie studios) and conceptual enclosures (for example teaching that sacred stories were "handed down" from some authoritative spiritual source and therefore above question and modification).
The Internet, coupled with the manifestation of the World Wide Web and the rapid evolution of printing and digital technologies, has (thankfully) made central control and administration of this world's sacred stories impossible and there will be no return to previous spiritual conditions. Extrapolating into the future we see the rapid collapse of this world's "traditional" sacred stories (and the institutions which protect them) and their replacement with heterogeneously expressed, but globally unified, sacred stories wrapped around the core truth of our Shared Divinity.==Footnotes==
- ↑ Das, Enny, Kovie van Krieken, Anja Kalch, and Guan Soon Khoo. “Editorial: Existential Narratives: Increasing Psychological Wellbeing through Story.” Frontiers in Communication 7 (2022). https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fcomm.2022.1113441/full.
