Free Clarissa Pincola Estes - Women Who Run With The Wolves - Myths And Storie by the Wild Woman Archetype by Clarissa Pincola Estes Page B

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    Bluebeard forbids the young woman to use the one key that would bring her to consciousness. To forbid a woman to use the key to conscious self knowledge strips away her intuitive nature, her natural instinct for curiosity that leads her to discover “what lies underneath” and beyond the obvious. Without this knowing, the woman is without proper protection. If she attempts to obey Bluebeard’s command not to use the key, she chooses death for her spirit. By choosing to open the door to the ghastly secret room, she chooses life.
    In the tale her sisters come to visit and “they were, as all souls are, very curious.” The wife gaily tells them, “We can do anything, except for one thing.” The sisters decide to make a game out of finding which door the little key fits. They again have the proper impulse toward consciousness.
    Some psychological thinkers, including Freud and Bettelheim, have interpreted episodes such as those found in the Bluebeard tale as psychological punishments for women’s sexual curiosity. 4 Early in the formulation of classical psychology women’s curiosity was given quite a negative connotation, whereas men with the same attribute were called investigative. Women were called nosy, whereas men were called inquiring. In reality, the trivialization of women’s curiosity so that it seems like nothing more than irksome snooping denies women’s insight, hunches, intuitions. It denies all her senses. It attempts to attack her most fundamental powers: differentiation and determination.
    So, considering that women who have not yet opened the
    forbidden door tend to be the same women who walk right into the Bluebeard’s arms, it is fortuitous that the older sisters have the proper wildish instincts for curiosity intact. These are the shadow- women of the individual woman’s psyche, the tics and nudges in the back of a woman’s mind that re-mind her, put her back in her right mind about what is important. Finding the little door is important, disobeying the predator’s order is important, and finding out what is so special about this one room is essential.
    For centuries, doors have been made both of stone and wood. In certain cultures, the spirit of the stone or wood was thought to be retained in the door, and it too was called upon to act as guardian of the room. Long ago there were more doors to tombs than to homes, and the very image of door meant something Of spiritual value was within, or that there was something within which must be kept contained.
    The door in the tale is portrayed as a psychic barrier, as a kind of sentry that is placed in front of the secret. This guard reminds us again of the predator’s reputation as a mage—a psychic force that twists and tangles us up as though by magic, keeping us from knowing what we know. Women strengthen this barrier or door when they discourage themselves or one another from thinking or diving too deeply, for “you may get more than you bargained for.” In order to breach this barrier, a proper counter-magic must be employed. And the fitting magic is found in the symbol of the key.
    Asking the proper question is the central action of transformation—in fairy tales, in analysis, and in individuation. The key question causes germination of consciousness. The properly shaped question always emanates from an essential curiosity about what stands behind. Questions are the keys that cause the secret doors of the psyche to swing open.
    Though the sisters know not whether treasure or travesty lies beyond the door, they summon their goodly instincts to ask the precise psychological question, “Where do you think that door is, and what might lie beyond it?”
    It is at this point that the naive nature begins to mature, to question, “What is behind the visible? What is it which causes that shadow to loom upon the wall?” The youthful naive nature begins to understand that if there is a secret something, if there is a
    shadow something, if there