The river archetype is a powerful and widespread symbolic figure across much of the world's cultures, mythologies, and psychological frameworks.
It may symbolize life's journey, possessing a source (birth/beginning), moving along a path (life/experience), and emptying into the sea (reunion with the infinite). A metaphor for the journey of an individual life. Greek philosopher Heraclitus once said, "One can never step twice into the same river." The river is constantly changing, symbolizing the relentless flow of time, and the change experience brings within our lives. It may represent a powerful, often impersonal force of destiny, fate, or circumstance that carries everything before it.
Rivers commonly act as boundaries. To cross a river might symbolize a turning point, often one-way, transformation or shift in awareness. Due to its association with water, the river archetype is a strong symbol for rebirth, cleansing, and purification. For Jungian psychology, rivers often symbolize the unconscious or the collective unconscious.
The river itself is sometimes seen as the "river-bed" or form by which passes the stream of psychic existence and its archetypal forces, or aspects of the soul.
Journeying along or into the river can represent the process of individuation—the psychological development towards becoming an integrated, balanced individual.
Rivers provide vital water for crops and survival. They represent nourishment, vitality, and source energy which sustains life. The river archetype may represent creative power or artistic inspiration, a boundless flow of potentiality to be tapped.
(Image is of Bhagirathi River in India)
