The Pioneer is called to discover and explore new lands, whether that territory is external or internal. The passion to explore the South Pole is as much a pioneering endeavor as the passion to explore medicine or spiritual practice. Even initiating new fashions, art, music, or literature may qualify as expressions of this archetype.
The core ingredient is innovation—doing and creating what has not been done before. To seriously consider this archetype as one of your twelve, your life must be characterized by a need to step on fresh and undiscovered territory in at least one realm. The Explorer is somewhat different from the Pioneer. Explorers chart territory in unknown lands while the goal of the Pioneer involves research. We do not say we are going to pioneer in space; physical space is something to be explored. There is a fantasy aspect to the Explorer and there is no fantasy aspect to the Pioneer. The Pioneer is grounded and practical, whereas the Explorer evokes imagery about the wild and the unknown. The Pioneer has a known quality to it; you know the field you are going into and you just want to see how much you can find that is new.
The shadow Pioneer manifests as a compulsive need to abandon one’s past and move on, just as the Don Juan or Femme Fatale “pioneer” ever new conquests. However, those who are forced out of their homeland and made into unwilling Pioneers—the Jews of the Diaspora, Africans bound into slavery, Tibetan Buddhists, or Native Americans—should not be included under the shadow.
Film Reference: Debbie Reinolds in 'How The West was Won'
The core ingredient is innovation—doing and creating what has not been done before. To seriously consider this archetype as one of your twelve, your life must be characterized by a need to step on fresh and undiscovered territory in at least one realm. The Explorer is somewhat different from the Pioneer. Explorers chart territory in unknown lands while the goal of the Pioneer involves research. We do not say we are going to pioneer in space; physical space is something to be explored. There is a fantasy aspect to the Explorer and there is no fantasy aspect to the Pioneer. The Pioneer is grounded and practical, whereas the Explorer evokes imagery about the wild and the unknown. The Pioneer has a known quality to it; you know the field you are going into and you just want to see how much you can find that is new.
The shadow Pioneer manifests as a compulsive need to abandon one’s past and move on, just as the Don Juan or Femme Fatale “pioneer” ever new conquests. However, those who are forced out of their homeland and made into unwilling Pioneers—the Jews of the Diaspora, Africans bound into slavery, Tibetan Buddhists, or Native Americans—should not be included under the shadow.
Film Reference: Debbie Reinolds in 'How The West was Won'