BAMcast
BAMcast
Deconstructing the Archetype
The idea of archetypes goes back to before recorded history. You can find them, feel them, in every fable and myth from cultures all over the world. The system of archetypes draws straight from our collective unconscious - it is the same for everyone. They are used by everyone and belong to no one. The potency of the archetype shows up in how you use them.
However, YOUR archetypal mix is unique. While there are 12 archetypes within all of us - each archetype manifests depending on situations, contexts, and other present archetypes - your archetypal mix is made of the traits of only a few of these characters.
Misuse an archetype, and it becomes a burden on your brand. Use them well, and you can find yourself with the kind of clarity business owners pay millions for.
So welcome to the 13th episode of our monthly podcast or BAMcast, as we like to call it. This month we're mixing things up and going live within our BAM community. If you've joined us for this broadcast, thanks for being here, and if you're watching us on our replay, be sure to watch the community live event space for upcoming activities. We'll be keeping the format of a discussion around brand related topics with myself, Joel and Mike. We still aim to keep it under 20 minutes. This month's topic is a big one and it, I believe it's pretty close to Joel's heart. And that is deconstructing the archetype. Joel, I'm gonna throw this
Joel Kelly - normal:over to you. So the idea of archetypes goes back before recorded history. You can find them, feel them in every fable myth from cultures and all over the world. The system of archetypes draws straight from our collective unconscious. It is the same for everyone. They are used by everyone and belong to no one. That's important. The potency of archetype shows up in how you use them. However, your archetypal mix is unique and while there are 12 archetypes within all of us, each archetype manifests depending on situations, context and other present archetypes. Your archetype will mix is made of the traits of only a few of these characters. Misuse, an archetype, and it becomes a burden on your brand. Use them well, and you can find yourself with the kind of clarity business owners pay millions. Before we deconstruct what this all means. Let me tell you what BAMcast is all about. BAMcast is a monthly podcast dedicated to recalibrating your brand audience and message. All resources, support and topics will be around brand recalibration to give you the confidence and clarity on the right path for your brand's vision. I am Joel Kelly co-founder of BAM Align,BAM Academy, and the BAM Fam.
André Gagiano:And I'm Andrea Gagiano, the RAD, the relationship alignment director here at BAM, and also the owner of Strike North Branding Company, which leverages the BAM frameworks and systems.
Joel Kelly - normal:Yeah. We've spent 20 plus years recalibrating brands and educating business owners on how to communicate to those who are already looking for what they, as a brand are uniquely offering.
André Gagiano:And we want to teach you the lessons we've learned from our successes and failures to share the wisdom we've gained along the way. We didn't follow our passion. We followed the opportunity, which led to our passion.
Joel Kelly - normal:If you wanna build a legacy and live the life you've always dreamed of, but just need a little guidance to get there, we are here to help. This month's topic is deconstructing archetype. We'll be discussing three things during this podcast. Archetype defined, archetype variance, and archetype maturity.
André Gagiano:Joel, let's begin with a brief definition of an archetype.
Joel Kelly - normal:An archetype is a universally familiar character or situation that transcends time, place, culture, gender, and aid. It represents an eternal truth. The outset, there are 12 universally known the archetypes that were. Aware of, or that were shared in the Yonggi and archetypes, but within each archetype, there are a set of variables that determine how it's structure itself for the rest of the collective unconscious, for instance, like the quadrants and the variance. Every archetype is built from one of the four quadrants, their relation to the others, and the variants are within the archetypes, which is the spectrum. For this to be useful to a brand, each piece is considered in tandem at the same time with others. This can be quite complex, but we are going to do our best to walk you through this. And again, it is we're explaining or we've represented a 2d model, but it's multidimensional. And so that's, you have to understand that they're just as complicated as we are. So we're very complex in our systems. There's lots of systems that are in systems and systems invested in systems and archetypes are the same way. So just keep that in mind.
André Gagiano:So all four of these components, you've got the shadow, the animus, self or ego and persona work behind the scenes of the archetype. They are designed out of sight and implemented seamlessly through the avenues or personas your brand develops. So where BAM present the archetypes in a circle to show how they are pieces to a complete universe, but the archetypes exist on a spectrum within the circle. There is no hard and fast border between archetypes. The blend from one to the next, as each representation manifests certain traits. The 12 primary archetypes are the center of their respective spectrums of four variants. Each variant is influenced by neighboring archetypes. Joel, could you give us an example?
Joel Kelly - normal:Every archetype is defined by the four components. So you have the shadow, you have the anima, and animus and you have the self and ego, and then you have the personas. Now, each of these components speaks to the other Jungian concepts like the unconscious design we approach the unconscious design in previous works, if the archetype is the nail, the unconscious design is the hammer that drives it. So to to say it in, in just a a brief summary of what that means. The shadows the dark side that has your biases prejudices. So a lot of people, when they start a brand they tend to start off by going through it with their shadow. And the anima and animus is the spectrum in which the male has the feminine side and the feminine side is called the anima. So all males have anima. So that's their spectrum of femininity and it can be great, can be small. And all females have animus, the spectrum of animus, so masculinity and the spectrum is sliding or whatever. So it could be it could be stronger or it can be whatever. And so you're gonna, I'm not gonna get into the identity politics here or whatever, but I believe that specifically is where a lot of, that's where that classification of identity comes from, which is psychological. And then the self and ego is of one's self true self, and then the persona is the mask.
André Gagiano:If we look at how the magician is a key archetype to the variance of the alchemist, scientist, innovate and engineer. So can we just delve into the, the edges of the magician variant spectrum?
Joel Kelly - normal:If you're wanting to talk to about the variance So you have the Alchemist, which is, I identify as scientist, innovator, and engineer. And so imagine it's like you have, the magician is in the middle, and so that one is the one that covers both of them, but then the variance is two on each side, and so depending on where you slide over what you're closer, you'll also have the influence of the other archetype. Again, like we said, it's not straightforward, it's complex. And so that's your variant. So you have the, if you get the quadrant, that's great, and a lot of people, if you just get the quadrant at right with your brand, that's gonna be a great thing. If you get the if you get the archetype right on, your archetype will mix, that's also really good, and if you get your variant, that means you've taken it to a whole nother level. And your variant is the spectrum. So you're, if you're, for example, because outlaws on one side of the magician and Paragon or hero in other ways is known on the other side. So have much more chaos on one side and order on another. And so are you more order or are you more chaos? And for me I'm more chaos, within the magician type, I'm still order. So I help delineate the chaos for other people to bring order, and that's what I do. So they come into me with all their stuff, and then I'm able to translate that chaos into a workable solution or something, a path that works for them, their own chemistry, if you will. So we just play with the outcome here or whatever, and that sort of thing.
André Gagiano:So as an example, so we've got the magicians variant, and then you've got the outlaw and the Paragon. So when the outlaw influences the magician, you get an Alchemist. I think you mentioned that, somebody works with their own set of rules to create something. Meanwhile, the magicians creations gain exacting credibility when they're pulled towards the Paragon.
Joel Kelly - normal:Yeah, exactly. A hundred percent because that they're more like they're both cause based, but they're the order one is to maintain order, and the other one is to be a catalyst of chaos. And so they both have their ways and instruments and as far as being used, we're just using this as an example within magician It obviously is very, depending on what quadrant we're in, because we have to understand the quadrants for the different motivations because there's motivations for different quadrants. And then the archetype has its own individual motivations, communication styles, and tones. And then the variance also has its own type of thing. So as you can see, it's very complex, and that's why a lot of people have gotten this wrong is that they don't understand the complexities. They're trying to present a multidimensional model of Carl Jung and most of them probably I'm just gonna call it straight out as it is. Most of'em haven't read the, his books at all. Like they're just, they're reading like the hero and the outlaw and probably doing something with the archetypes or whatever, some book and that's it. They've read on the surface, but they don't understand how how potent archetypes are and how important they are to the unconscious design
André Gagiano:and with BAM we've we've just, Include this later on again, but we've got a system we've got this archetype quiz, which gives you the, both the intrinsic and the environmental. It's a pretty thorough thorough questionnaire.
Joel Kelly - normal:Yeah. The archetype quiz is done a little bit differently. It's done from the perspective of what's your brand but realistically, what it's supposed to help you understand. It's meant to not get you to think about yourself, and even though it is a questionnaire that deep and digs about yourself, it's really to get you to stop thinking about yourself. So I want, we have prejudice like our shadow prejudices and biases, and it's meant to counteract those so that you wouldn't be able to rely on those for those questions. That's the way that it's been set up and it's methodically been set up that way. And a lot of time and energy went into creating those questions.
André Gagiano:We will definitely refer back to that for the viewers. Sure. Just as people trust maturity in the conscious world, the maturity of your archetypes and they're in your brand correlates directly to your level of influence and authenticity.
Joel Kelly - normal:Yep. Yeah so most people like when it comes to maturity levels, right? Yeah. You need to think of it as processing forward. So when you're first maturing out and everything you're going, you're just like this you're just all over the place. You might hit be on, you might be in frequency or you might be in tune, let's just save for that matter. Let's just use sound. So you might be in tune for just like a brief moment, but not really. And then you get to level two and level two is you're starting to become a little bit more consistent with understanding. So in regards to what your archetype is you're starting to understand who you are as your archetypes. You're starting to get a flow. You're starting to understand your communication style and tone. You're moving for it authentically in a way that works for you and has been designed for you. And then you're hitting a lot more every once in a while in, in tune, and then you get to the third and now you have a better idea. Notice, I didn't say it's like the final but you have a better idea of how to hit, to be in tune and the alignment and what works for you and what works for your audience. And you can explore that infinitely in that direction, and so again, those three levels, how I would describe'em as more like wave lengths. And as you get more in tune, it becomes a lot more gradual, less chaotic, less unknown variables. There's still unknown variables that you have to work out obviously, but it just becomes a little easier to understand.
André Gagiano:Would you say it's more order?
Joel Kelly - normal:It's a balance of order and chaos. If you really wanna be honest the thing is that there, you can't go too far so side to the order side because too much order is a bad thing and too much chaos is a bad thing. Yeah. But the balance of order ordering chaos in your own life is actually really good. And so you have to see that you understand you're able to handle the chaos and bring order back to it to keep it within the spectrum. And so that's more or less how I would probably describe it. I know that probably doesn't make a lot of sense to most people who are probably listening and it seems pretty abstract, but you have to understand that it's not one or the other, it's not nurture and nature. It's both. And that great psychological thing where everyone's debating, nurture and nature and blah, blah, blah, blah, and which one's better and all this stuff, they're both. It is. It is. Yes. The answer is yes. In, yes, both apply.
André Gagiano:Interesting enough, in terms of surf, when you have you have the periods, which is the short of the period, it's all waves are generated by wind, but you get the short wind swells which come in and they're very chaotic and they're all over the place. Whereas the longer the longer you have in terms of your periods, the more order the chaos is in, I can imagine it that way. So your waves are exactly more powerful and the order is containing that chaos in an orderly way. That's how I would
Joel Kelly - normal:relate to it. That is a hundred percent correct. Yeah. Yeah. A hundred percent. And that's, and the ocean is a great way and surfing is obviously an impressive analogy when it comes to understanding the maturity level when it comes to archetypes or just in general, there is a lot of applications of life we can learn from just from surfing. So yeah. No it's absolutely amazing. It's a beautiful, it seems it's mysterious. It's powerful, but it's also dangerous, right? And that's the other thing. Archetypes are dangerous if you understand, and you can really manipulate someone if you understand their archetypes and you understand their different things. And so you've gotta be a good character, not to be able to do that. They are dangerous. You absolutely can get people to do because you're not talking to their cognitive their conscious you're talking to their unconscious. You're talking to the way, the essence of who they are. And if you talk to them and get them without them realizing to do what you need to do, which some people and some groups have done, recently and for a while it will trigger a response whether you know it or not, and get you influenced to do a certain behavior or action, which is not what we teach here at BAM and never ever will as long as I live will be doing that sort of thing. And very rarely will I ever say never, but that's a never. We will not ever manipulate anyone into or teach them the way to manipulate other people. We are open handed, we present an option, an opportunity if you want it great, if you don't, that's fine. We'll move on to someone who needs what we have to offer. And that's another thing. With archetypes, it is so cool because when people are starting to communicate out of them, there's just, it's easier to recognize what solution is really good for them as well. For instance, we were talking yesterday, Andre, and you were asking specific some stuff, and I had to put on the glasses of your archetypal mix before I would respond. Because if I wasn't to put on your archetypal mix, before we had our conversation, I would be operating within my shadow, my prejudice and my bias, which is not always a very good thing to do. Because it's it works for me, but it doesn't necessarily mean it's a solution that will work for you. And so what we had to do is find something that worked within your style and then when I said something, you were like, Ooh, that deeply. Wow. That, wow. That really connected with me that resonated with me. Yeah. Remember and that's an example of communicating to the unconscious design or the what their archetypal mixes is. They feel heard, they feel, understand, imagine an audience. Imagine an audience, and I'm going a little bit on a tangent here, but I think it's really important that people understand. Imagine an audience that actually feels and knows like they feel on the inside that they're actually impacted by you understanding what their problem is and that you in giving'em hope that you have a solution for them. Imagine the difference that would be. And I think that, that in itself is so powerful. You are actually able to help them a lot better because now you can package a solution that actually is something that is what they need. It's not what they consciously think they need, because everyone's oh yeah, I need to get my grass mode so I guess I need a landscaper, whatever. But it's it's the details in, what is that landscaper going to do? What insecurity or what what is the reason why you wanna hire a landscaper? It's probably because you don't want everyone to think you're a lazy piece of arse in in your neighborhood or whatever. Now that could be on insecurities and a bunch of other things and based on persona. We won't dive into all the details of that. We do have a course for that's coming out. But but the idea is that you understand how to communicate to your audience. You understand what their needs, and it's just not selling a service or whatever, but you're selling a solution to their internal pain point. And the archetype mix and the unconscious design Gerald Saltman in 2003 came to a conclusion in a study, and he was a Harvard professor that said 95%. I'm gonna bastardize this a little bit, but 95% of our buying decisions are unconscious or subconscious, same thing. So the so we are making decisions somewhere else not he not just here. So this is being influenced by our unconscious design. And when I studied that way back in the day, that put me really on the path of saying, okay, if that's what matters, then why are we so focused on all these conscious elements and why aren't we focused on the unconscious and communicating effectively to the unconscious design. And that's what I started focusing on. And so now the reason I'm coming out and I'm being a lot more forward with about archetypes is because it's been so misused. You cannot put an archetype on. You cannot wear it like it's a piece of clothing. You cannot decide I'm going to be this archetype. You can't, you don't get to decide. You have a specific intrinsic and environmental mix archetypal mix that is you. You don't get to choose. I'm sorry, which you get to play with the hands that are dealt with you.
André Gagiano:Yeah. Which I was gonna mention that because obviously there's 2, 2, 2 sides. You mention the fact that the archetypes can be used to manipulate people, but also, yeah, on the flip side, if you do not, if you just pick an archetype, your business pretty much is doomed to fail Yeah, exactly. They, you, I mean that overused word as well, but the authenticity just won't be
Joel Kelly - normal:there. Of course not because you truly can't demonstrate from a place of authenticity because you're not, it you're a fraud. You're an imposter. You're following someone else's path. So
André Gagiano:the other thing as well, which we've discussed, but for the benefit of the listeners, the beauty about the structure or the framework that BAM uses, it's not just for one owner. You can use it for several owners, which we've covered a few times before, but I'm just gonna recap that anyways. So Joel just very quickly just for the audience. Sure. How would you use if you have four different owners who are all who all have a voice within the company? How would the archetypes work with them because obviously everybody's different. No, one's a hundred percent the same.
Joel Kelly - normal:Sure. So you take mainly focus on the visionaries. And the visionaries of the company. And then if there's more than one visionary or two or three or four, and let's say there's four, which is quite complicated. But what you do is you take the common denominator of them and you'll find a common denominator thread between them. They will be closer on spectrum than the others, and you average out the median and it ends being their archetypal mix. And so both of'em are still, even though it's not perfect authenticity, as far as that there's authenticity congruency from all different sides. And so that you're able to understand that this is the dominant one. And then this one is more of the, I guess you could say recessive. So intrinsic would be the dominant and environmental would be the recessive in this case. In the whole of single environmental and intrinsic play, both roles and they balance each other out right. Environment as far as is chaos and intrinsic would represent order if that makes any sense.
André Gagiano:Yeah. Put that in there. And I, what I'm really looking forward to is discussing with you For instance, Apple and how that we won't discuss that today, but where you had Steve Jobs and then you get somebody else coming in and how that all fits in.
Joel Kelly - normal:We let's touch on that because I think it's important and I get, we are going over 20 minutes, but listen when Steve jobs handed over, he didn't want another, Steve Jobs. He handed it over to Tim Cook because he was gonna take it to a place where Steve Jobs knew he wasn't capable of taking it. And he was passing the torch to the vison, and it was because he had that congruency of what was necessary. But it can still go this direction and still be in the right direction. So that's the other thing about like visionaries and that consistency, it can have consistency, but in their own expression and what that is. And if you look at what Steve Jobs laid the foundation for something impressive, and now it's allowed Apple to be able to experiment and go about a bunch of different markets. Some of'em they're going outside their markets. Some of them, they are doing very well about leveraging their markets. And the multiplicative alignment layers, which is makes'em so successful. Their one item does like 15 things at once for their company financially. And so it's that layered level that we we didn't discuss this, but I discussed this with Britton that when you when you have an asset, you wanna basically be able to leverage it out as much as possible. So the support the setup cost and then the monthly or whatever. And so that's just an example of three ways to leverage out a single asset and it's just smart as much as you can leverage and as much as you can create those different layers I think that's important, but Steve Jobs did not want another Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs wanted to hand it to someone else. So the archetypal mix can shift a slightly or whatever, but it doesn't lose the overall core vision of what Apple started off with. And I think that's really the important that the nucleus still stays the same. just becomes a different expression of that if you will.
André Gagiano:We've done that within BAM so even recently it feels like recently, but yeah, very interesting. So you saw the unconscious world as something infinite and without bounds, right? No limits, no rules. Yeah. Full of your pure desire. Knowing the unconscious world is to see the patterns and find the structures that make them possible and where you fit among them. Consider your dreams. Anything can happen when you're asleep. It is almost an injustice to then take the archetypes, these manifestations of the unconscious and apply structure to them. The best we can do is show that every archetype is made up of components that move in different directions in tandem.
Joel Kelly - normal:Yeah. They have a synchronicity about'em for sure. So it going back to. Going back to just how to, how things fit in the infinite spectrum and here is I guess, some of the places, or they would say here's your identity and figure it out. Archetypes is like a compass, right? It points you in the right direction, but it's limitless. Okay. So it points you in the right direction that works for your path or whatnot, but it doesn't tell you all the variables that are necessary to make that successful. That's something that you have to walk out and that's exciting. And so one thing I wanna understand is yes it helps bring clarity to your identity, but it isn't your identity because that journey that has yet to be manifested, that process has yet to be walked out. And so just understand that the archetypal mix is more like your boundaries in which you can stay in so that you can be limitless and for a brand, that means that there's infinite amount of possibilities. Imagine it being like, like a fingerprint it's very unique to you and you walk out in that success path. There's nobody else for the most part that can copy genuinely what you do. Imagine that, just imagine just get that through your head. It simply that you can go in the direction that you want, even if you're in the same industry. So that means your competition and different things or whatever you will do it a little bit differently that works for you, but because you're generating your, you're doing it out of authenticity, you engage the law of attraction and the law of attraction it starts bringing in the right type of clients into different things. Because not everybody wants not everybody wants like all the whole world or whatever. It's oh, my solution will solve the whole world. That may be the case, but there is a group a niche, if you will, but not in the way we've defined niche of people who that's for. And that's okay. And there's different levels in that where you'll only help'em to a certain level and that's all they'll need. You'll help these other people to a certain level. That's all they need. And then some people will be long term. Those will be rare and far between, but those are options and those are things that will help out as well. And again, it depends on your product or service and a myriad of things. But that's where we're at. So archetypes is amazing and deconstructing and understanding them, just pick up one of the Carl Jung's book and start reading it. Start understanding what he was saying and how he was addressing the individuation and the collective unconscious. If you're really serious about getting into archetypes and you're wanting to use it and leverage it or whatever, and read about it. And don't just read a book of someone's perception that they thought about because they did some research or whatever. There is a couple books out there that are really well known in this space that are absolutely not at all what he said. What Carl Jung said. And I think we need to be careful about what we, and I know we like to put things in boxes because we like control and we wanna say, yeah, this is what it is. And this is how it's defined, but that's not how Carl Jung thought, and that's not how his process works. So it is a boundaries, there's a lot of variables involved there's spectrum, and we need to be aware of that when we're dealing with the archetypes. Even though we've gone into so much detail and a lot, and this definitely was more chaos than order it, it was it's necessary to poke holes in the reality of what archetypes is and isn't. And so if you're out there and you're giving misinformation again what I said, the archetypes can be dangerous if in the wrong hands. And if you're willynilly slinging these things around, you can cause some, you can cause some damage. And so we have to take note of that and understand, and again, remember it is not a, this is what you are, this is your identity. It's a part of your identity to give a framework for your identity, for you to have limitless possibilities. And that's what archetypes is. So if we go with that in our brand, it'll be amazing and unique and the solutions we present and how we uniquely get to that solution to solve that specific issue, which is what we're in business for to begin with. And that's the fascinating part. So I don't know that's where I'm at, and that's my rant.
André Gagiano:No, I like that. I think that's a good closer there. And if anybody would like to know more, I would suggest by starting off, reaching out to us and starting off with the archetypal quiz. There's several of us are happy to work through that with you. So yeah, I would say that's a good starting point. I have my Carl Jung I'm yet to read it. It gives me a headache just looking at the cover So thanks. Thanks for your time, Joel. It was good to see you out in the six and that concludes this month's BAMcast And if you would like to be a guest on our podcast, you can email clarity@bamalign.com with the subject line, I would like to be a guest on BAMcast. And I, or we strongly recommend you start by understanding your brand architypal mix, just as we've just discussed and take the free quiz, which will be the link will be into description and you can also join our BAMFAM community dedicated to aligning your brand. And we have free alignment resources there as well. The link will also be in the description. Joel closing
Joel Kelly - normal:words. Yeah. So finally, if you find yourself in guidance and you need some brand alignment and brand recalibration, we have our BAM Academy link will be in the description and our frameworks to help you find that. I would start with the Big BAM Process. That is our brand strategy framework that we have led thousands of people through and our clients and we have a self-guided option as well, and a group one. Thanks again for listening and hope you can understand the importance and authenticity attracts your aligned audience and the fact that your archetypes is what engages that authenticity. Food for thought. Thanks for joining us.
André Gagiano:Thanks Joel until the next time.