Story Medicine
Story Medicine: Ancient Tales and Their Medicine for Modern Life
Ancient fairy tales, myths, and legends contain profound wisdom for modern life.
Psychotherapist Joe Summerfield explores traditional stories from cultures worldwide - Greek myths, Grimm's fairy tales, Norse legends, Indigenous tales, African folklore, and more - revealing the medicine encoded within them.
Each episode offers three parts: a story told in full, an analysis uncovering symbolic meaning and contemporary relevance, and practical integration exercises to help you embody the medicine.
Use it your way:
Let these stories accompany your morning coffee, evening wind-down, or household pottering. These tales make perfect companions for quiet moments.
Or engage more deeply: the weekly integration practices form a structured personal development course. Over time, this consistent work can significantly shift your experience of life... and it's entirely free.
Perfect for:
Adults seeking psychological depth, young people exploring life's questions, parents sharing wisdom with children, therapists and educators, mythology enthusiasts, and anyone curious about the collective unconscious and archetypal patterns shaping our lives.
Topics explored:
Jungian psychology, fairy tale analysis, mythology, depth psychology, personal transformation, archetypal patterns, shadow work, individuation, collective unconscious, traditional wisdom, therapeutic storytelling.
New episodes weekly.
Hosted by Joe Summerfield, psychotherapist, relational therapist, and creator of Connected State Therapy. Drawing on Jungian psychology and over 20 years of therapeutic experience, Joe bridges ancient wisdom and modern application. From shadow work to individuation, from grief to wholeness, each story offers medicine for navigating the human experience.
Story Medicine
S1E4 - Iron John: The Journey from Boy to Man
In this episode of Story Medicine, we explore "Iron John" from the Grimm Brothers' collection - a tale about masculine rite of passage, initiation, service, and the integration of wildness with cultivation.
A boy frees a wild man from a cage, leaves home on the wild man's shoulders, and enters the world to learn what poverty means. Through stages of humble service, fierce battles, and finally recognition, he discovers that becoming whole requires both the capacity for wildness and the discipline of cultivation. The wild man turns out to be an enchanted king, waiting for someone pure of heart to free him.
This story speaks to anyone who has felt parts of themselves caged away, anyone learning through humble service while their gifts remain hidden, and anyone discovering that true strength comes from integrating rather than choosing between fierce and gentle, wild and cultivated. It is a classic in men's work also.
The episode includes the complete story told in full, depth psychology analysis revealing the archetypal patterns and symbolic meaning, and four practical integration exercises to help you embody the medicine.
Learn more about Joe's therapeutic work: www.joesummerfield.co.uk
Connect on Instagram: @joe.therapies
