Goddesses in Everywoman

in ourselves and need to develop, or qualities we see in people
around us and do not understand. I learned from Hestia’s contem-
plative way of going about daily chores, for instance, that they can
be an ordering and sorting of priorities when viewed in a more
symbolic and spiritual way. I envied Athena and Artemis for their
focused consciousness, and felt more understanding of the many
men who have learned not to “notice” or illuminate many things on
the periphery of vision. I learned from the example of those two in-
dependent goddesses that conflict and hostility may be necessary,
even positive, and should not be taken personally.
The author’s sensitive analysis of archetypes takes them out of
their patriarchal framework of simple exploits and gives them back
to us as larger-than-life but believable, real women.
From now on, for instance, when I am longing for one of those
magical, spontaneous conversations in which the whole becomes
far more than the sum of its parts, with each person improvising as
in music, I might think of the qualities of Aphrodite. When I need
to retreat to the hearth and contemplation, Hestia could lead the
way. When I lack the courage to face conflict on behalf of myself or
other women, Artemis is a good woman to remember.
It no longer matters which comes first, the reality or the imagining
of reality. As Jean Houston writes in The Possible Human, “I have al-
ways thought of a myth as something that never was but is always
happening.”
As we lead ourselves out of unequal societies, gods and goddesses
may become one and the same. In the meantime, this book offers us
new paths to take: new ways to see and to become.
You may find a myth that will evoke the reality in you.
—GLORIA STEINEM

xiv

Goddesses in Everywoman