A little over 9 weeks ago I finished watching Yu Yu Hakusho, a show I had started watching over 15 years ago. A week or two later I put together the above video talking about the show in a compact, but thorough fashion. I put a couple of hours work into it and kept tweaking various elements on the margins until it felt just right. I uploaded it and was all ready to publish it by August 10, 2018. But I sat on it for almost 2 months. I needed a break from all I was doing.
I am back and actively blogging again, but I am also living a life with my family. We are busy people. There are classes to attend, friends to visit, events to go to. Work has to come before those things so we can afford everything, anything really. I am doing a lot right now to better myself as a writer. I am doing a lot right now. I had honestly forgotten that this latest Shadow Font (a show wherein I analyze a piece of media that has impacted me, so I can emulate the good and avoid the bad from it in my own writing) was scheduled. I am a bit nervous about it because as of the time of this writing it is already out there. I haven’t reviewed it in over a month and I think a lot has changed for me since I wrote the script for it. From silly stuff to discrepancies in style and packaging to more serious things like my outlook on life. I am likely concerned over nothing. I will be surprised if more than a few dozen people watch the video, or even see this post. That seems about right for the time of this writing. I have no audience or base and honestly that isn’t why I am doing this at this point. I would appreciate feedback and I want to have my words seen and heard by people, but I am not sure my current level of output really warrants attention.
Mentioning levels reminds me of the fact that in Yu Yu Hakusho, large swathes of time or skipped over during which the characters train and learn new things. Early on in the show, I think it is after the first arc is really completed, Yusuke spends 6 months training with an expert. She is a hard teacher and really pushes him. I have had no one pushing me except for myself. I have not had the ability to dedicate months at a time, even a week at a time to any one goal or discipline of my own. I have to cut out, carve and squeeze in every extra bit to accomplish the things I want only for myself. That’s OK for now. I am not a boy like Yusuke. I am not being forced into something bigger than me or beyond my control. I am choosing the life I want to live. I am choosing to stretch myself and I am choosing to be open about it.
As I was nearing the end of Yu Yu Hakusho, I found out about this book I have yet to finish. The book is called King, Warrior, Magician, Lover and it is about the male psyche. I heard about it on an interlude episode of Rav Mike’s The Jewish Story and was really stricken with it when I read the introduction. The introduction alone, was so powerful that it shook me. I have had a hard time reading it honestly. It feels simultaneously empowering and draining. How does this relate to Yu Yu Hakusho? It made me view the show in a different light. The video touches on that, but basically it helped me see it as one of the best coming of age or Hero’s Journey stories I have ever seen. The title of the book names the four archetypes of the mature masculine psyche: the King, the Warrior, the Magician and the Lover. I won’t go into detail about them here, but in short the King is the highest form of the male psyche. A man can shift in manifesting these different archetype, but basically the King is the master of all in that he has the might of the Warrior, the tenderness of the Lover and the creativity and charm of the Magician. When a man is at his peak, he is the best person he can be, he exercises restraint, acts courageously, demonstrates wisdom has an openness to the world. That basically describes Yusuke at the end of the show and the fool is 18 years old. Twelve, almost thirteen years my junior. I know, he’s a cartoon. He is a mythic figure, not real. Here’s the thing, he did his job. I don’t know what Togashi knows about mythic storytelling, but he did an amazing job with it in Yu Yu Hakusho. I find the show truly inspiring.
Maybe the reason I took two months off and have been changing so much of my approach to things is because I decided to really take hold of my own destiny. I have always wanted to be a storyteller, but only recently have a begun to actively pursue it. I dabbled before. I have made proclamations, but now I am working towards it. I have made a schedule, I have set up training for myself and I am actively doing it. Even as I look to take on other non-writing activities I am keeping my focus. There are myriad distractions, but I know what I want. I see the path before me and for now all I have to do is take it one step at a time.
MJ Muñoz 