The Mountain Is You: Transforming Self-Sabotage Into Self-Mastery

The theme of Mythological Frameworks permeates these chapters. The necessity to “face every ounce of darkness within you” clearly refers to one of the oldest themes in human storytelling (165): the mythic hero’s descent into the underworld to find and achieve transformation. This journey is here used figuratively, as a psychological analogy. Wiest compares it to a method of engaging with emotional trauma—a descent that often demands a confrontation with one’s shadow self to facilitate personal transformation. Greek myths like the journey of Orpheus into the underworld and Persephone’s seasonal descent into Hades and the Hindu epic of Rama’s journey to Lanka to face the demon king Ravana (among many other examples) all involve a descent into darkness that leads to a kind of transformation or retrieval.

From a psychological standpoint, descent myths align closely with the journey toward psychological maturity and personal responsibility. For Orpheus, venturing into the underworld means protecting his love, Eurydice; his eventual failure echoes the dire consequences of impulsivity and recklessness. Similarly, Persephone’s seasonal descent into Hades captures the cyclical nature of emotional states, a concept deeply embedded in psychological theories of mood and affect regulation. These stories also provide metaphors for The Quest for Inner Peace—the focus of much of The Mountain Is You. Rama’s battle with the demon king Ravana symbolizes our inner war against our own demons—anger, jealousy, and other destructive emotions. The resolution of such conflicts leads to a balanced, peaceful inner state, presenting a pathway to tranquility and harmony.

This mythological collective framework serves a dual purpose. Firstly, it lends the narrative an air of universality, situating the personal experience of trauma and healing within the larger human story—a story that has been told in multiple ways across various cultures across time. This universality moves away from the isolation often associated with trauma, showing that the path to healing is a journey everyone is capable of undertaking. Secondly, by drawing on these mythological parallels, trauma is situated within a collective understanding that helps to destigmatize it. Trauma is thus a universal human experience that has been grappled with for millennia. Reframing the discussion in this way widens the topic to a broader spectrum of human experience that includes psychology, mythology, spirituality, and cultural narrative.

These chapters also reflect the theme of The Quest for Inner Peace when discussing authentic change and self-acceptance. Wiest argues that “[m]ost of the problems that exist in our lives are distractions from the real problem, which is that we are not comfortable in the present moment, as we are, here and now” (148). Issues like money, body image, or relationships are not the root problems; rather, they are symptoms of an underlying discomfort with the self. This cycle of chasing after external markers of success or happiness leaves one in a constant state of unease: “Once we master all the things we care about, we start at the beginning, we try to level up, to change, to fix, to identify a problem that is any problem but the actual problem at hand” (148). Instead of searching for contentment, we pursue happiness, which is necessarily an iterative and thus unsustainable goal.

The transformative power of authenticity is in showing up “exactly as you are” (147). Authenticity leads to enriched life experience: As an authentic self, “[y]ou start receiving authentic love. You start doing your best and most profitable and effortless work. You start laughing; you start enjoying things again” (149). Notably, authenticity is imperfect: “Nature depends on imperfection. Fault lines make mountains, star implosions become supernovas” (150). Wiest presents imperfection as an innate facet of reality rather than something to be corrected. The presence of imperfections or “fault lines” is necessary for personal and universal growth—a philosophy that takes the opposite view of dominant modern culture, which often valorizes perfection. Perfection implies stagnation, a sealing off of possibilities, whereas imperfection implies a perpetually open door.

Seeking perfection strips experiences of “spontaneity, curiosity, and awe” (150). This triple description of ideal life connects back to Mythological Frameworks, particularly Joseph Campbell’s idea that the first function of mythology is to reconcile consciousness to the mystery of life. Campbell borrows the concept of the mysterium tremendum, which originates from the work of Rudolf Otto, a German Lutheran theologian and religious scholar. Otto introduced this term in his seminal 1917 work Das Heilige (The Idea of the Holy), which analyzed the unique qualities that make a concept, experience, or entity “holy” in the eyes of religious practitioners and in the context of religious experience. The mysterium tremendum, Latin for “awe-inspiring mystery,” is one facet of what Otto called “the numinous”—a sense of a greater, otherworldly power.

Otto argued that the mysterium tremendum is not a construct of cultural or religious interpretations but an innate category of experience. He posited that all religions, in various ways, aim to bring the individual into an encounter with this overwhelming mystery. In subsequent years, Otto’s idea has been utilized and expanded upon in various fields outside of religious studies, including psychology, anthropology, and the arts. Joseph Campbell adapted Otto’s idea to describe the awe-inspiring and transformative experiences that myths evoke, experiences that awaken the human spirit to the myriad possibilities for growth and transformation. In The Mountain Is You, the focus on “spontaneity, curiosity, and awe” as essential qualities for growth serves as a modern gateway to the archetypal experience of the mysterium tremendum. These qualities open the many potentialities of life, connecting a purely psychological paradigm to the mythological, spiritual, and metaphysical.