Public transcript

How to Grow Your Soul (Michael Meade)

By: Pulling The Thread with Elise Loehnen
Length: 1 h 0 min
Published: 15 January 2026
Language: English
Text from: the audio
Transcribed: 12 October 2026

Read the full transcript Open on Spotify

Notes in English.

Summary

Elise Loehnen talks with mythologist Michael Meade about the crisis of masculinity, the manosphere, and what he sees as the root cultural diagnosis: a lack of soul. Meade argues that the hero's journey has been misused as the only story, that Trump is a destructive, unconscious trickster rather than a healer, and that the world changes when individuals grow their own souls. He also describes how the Catholic Church removed the soul as a third force at a council in Constantinople in 869, which he sees as the origin of modern polarization. The path forward, he says, is each person awakening their innate genius and following what they love.

Key points

Meade diagnoses the crisis of masculinity and the manosphere as fundamentally a lack of soul, with men avoiding the inner descent and their own woundedness.
He argues the hero's journey is not a monomyth and has been misapplied, keeping people looking outward when the antidote and medicine are in the soul.
Initiation historically took young men out of gangs into individual descent to find their natural gifts and begin healing their wounds.
Meade says Trump is an utterly unconscious, destructive trickster, not a healer, and that his reign could prolong darkness like a new Middle Ages.
The individual soul is connected to the soul of the world; enough awakened souls revitalize the world from the bottom up, as in the Renaissance.
Meade claims the Catholic Church removed the soul from the spirit-body-soul ternary at a council in Constantinople in 869, enabling control and polarization.
Descartes' mind-body split, rooted in his own unheld childhood, deepened the loss of soul and the alienation of modern culture.
Growing the soul means self-forgiveness, loving what we love, and following our innate genius; what we love is the cure.
Polarization cannot be escaped by rationalization; imagination, the power of the soul, is the only way out.
Chaos is the beginning of creation in all myths, so the current darkness places us closer to a possible renewal.

Questions it answers

00:00The crisis of masculinity

What does Michael Meade see behind the manosphere and crisis of masculinity?

He says it is fundamentally a lack of soul. Men who avoid soul work become more isolated, inflated, dissociated, and anti-world, and he calls the manosphere more accurately an adolescent sphere.

Soul is the missing ingredient in the manosphere.
Those on top don't need a movement — they need a breakdown and a descent.
To be a man is to know one's wounds, not deny them.

05:52Hero's journey fallacy

Why does Meade reject the hero's journey as the monomyth?

He says it is one good mythological style, not the only story, and its literal, masculine application reverses awakening. The antidote is not out there — going out is necessary because you get defeated, and that drives you inward to the soul.

Pixar creators have asked him for stories beyond the hero's journey.
The genius myth says genius is already inside everyone.
Diversity is the life of nature; monoculture drains color and strength.

11:43Initiation and wounds

What was initiation for, and why do men avoid the inner journey?

Initiation was a culturally created descent that took young men out of gangs to find their natural gifts and begin healing their wounds. Men's woundedness is internal and can be denied, unlike women's menses, which is external and tied to the moon.

Initiation served to find one's gifts and heal one's wounds.
The manosphere is really an adolescent-o-sphere.
Maturity requires roots going down as well as branches going out.

20:06Trump as trickster

Is Trump playing a healing trickster role in this moment?

Meade says no. The healthy trickster disturbs in order to heal and make whole, but Trump is an utterly unconscious, destructive trickster — a destroyer, not a creator — and his reign could prolong darkness rather than trigger renewal.

Underneath the true trickster is the healer.
There is no guarantee that destruction provokes collective healing.
We could face a new Middle Ages before a Renaissance.

35:06Growing the soul

How does the world change, according to Meade?

The individual soul is connected to the soul of the world, and enough awakened souls revitalize it from the bottom up — like the Renaissance, it doesn't require a 51 percent vote. Change the soul, change the world.

Each person waking up affects those nearby.
Polarization diminishes as souls awaken.
The soul is the light hidden in darkness.

40:46The soul removed in 869

What happened at the council of Constantinople in 869?

Catholic bishops and cardinals removed the soul from the spirit-body-soul ternary because it was too feminine and too connective, undermining their project of separating heaven and earth, good and bad. Descartes later deepened the split with the mind-body division.

It was always three — spirit, body, and soul.
Removing the soul enabled control and polarization.
Descartes' personal unheld childhood fed the Cartesian split.

48:58How to become more soulful

What can an individual do to grow their soul?

What we love is the cure. Follow what you genuinely love — music, rivers, knowledge, animals — practice self-forgiveness, and awaken your innate genius. Imagination, the power of the soul, is the only way out of polarization.

Forgiving oneself for not being perfect is soulful work.
Loving knowledge is a sacred path, like jnana yoga.
The soul can imagine the unseen and unpredictable.

Notes

The Diagnosis: Lack of Soul

Meade says the crisis of masculinity is not "more masculinity" but a lack of soul; without soul work, men become isolated, inflated, dissociated, and anti-world.
Spirit rises toward the light and oneness; soul descends into multiplicity and diversity. Monoculture is the symptom of soul's absence.
He cites a South American study where bees in monoculture forests lose their color, becoming gray or tan — nature's warning about abandoning diversity.

The Hero's Journey and the Genius Myth

Meade rejects Joseph Campbell's framing of the hero's journey as a monomyth; it is one style of story, not the only story.
The antidote and medicine are not "out there" — going out is necessary because you get defeated, which drives you inward to the soul.
Pixar creators have asked him for stories other than the hero's journey because all their writers keep repeating it.
The genius myth: genius is already inside everyone, by nature multiple and diverse.

Initiation and Wounds

Initiation was the culturally created descent that took young men out of gangs to find their natural gifts and begin healing their wounds.
Women's menses is an external, bodily initiation tied to the moon; men's "menses" is internal and can be denied — hence the manosphere, which Meade says is really an "adolescent-o-sphere."
To be a man is to know one's wounds, not deny them.

Trump as the Destructive Trickster

The healthy trickster disturbs in order to heal and make whole; Trump is the utterly unconscious, destructive side — a destroyer, not a creator.
Meade rejects the hope that Trump's destructiveness will automatically provoke collective healing: "No guarantee." His reign could prolong darkness like a new Middle Ages before a Renaissance.
Meade favors knowledge over the optimism/pessimism binary — what the Greeks called dark knowledge, a knowledge of light and dark.

The Soul Removed in 869

At a council in Constantinople in 869, Catholic bishops and cardinals removed the soul from the spirit-body-soul ternary.
The soul was too feminine, too connective — it kept connecting the divine and the human, heaven and earth, masculine and feminine, undermining control and polarization.
Descartes later deepened the split with "I think, therefore I am," which Meade links to Descartes' own unheld, orphaned childhood.

How to Grow the Soul

What we love is the cure; who we love is how we grow the soul. Following what you genuinely love — music, rivers, knowledge, animals — grows your soul.
Self-forgiveness is essential: forgiving oneself for not being what we were told we should be.
The individual soul is connected to the soul of the world; enough awakened souls renew the world from the bottom up, without needing a 51 percent vote.
Imagination is the power of the soul and the only way out of polarization.

Transcribed automatically from the audio. Summary and notes written by AI from the transcript, so check anything important against the recording.