The meaning of ThanatosEros
Thanatos Eeros was conceived by the Melbourne Death Avenger’s Collective in 2025 as a wisdom commons for those of us seeking insight, inspiration or solace in connection with our end of life journey. Thanatos is one of the great psychopomps of Greek mythology, the guide of the human souls responsible for escorting the newly deceased from this life into the afterlife.
Sigmund Freud takes Thanatos to be the personification of death to explain what he believed to be an innate drive to annihilation in human beings, which was opposite to the human drive represented by Eros, the Greek god of love. In his essay, Beyond the Pleasure Principle, he represents Eros as the life force that regulates the human libido in opposition to Thanatos. According to Freud, these opposing psychological drives are in constant struggle as creativity and harmony counterbalance the forces of self-destruction.
This digital space was seeded by the idea that life can be experienced as an oscillation between light and darkness, and that we are all moved by the yearning to unravel the mystery of life and death. This is not a morbid curiosity, but rather a universal human desire to make sense of this life, while not knowing when it is going to be taken away, or as Leonardo Da Vinci reflected, ‘While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die’.
Thanatos Eros welcomes all wisdom traditions, into the shining light of death’s eternal mysteries.
ThanatosEros values
Click inside the middle of the Cosmic Egg to highlight each of the TE value statements
Death and dying is a natural part of life.
We live fully when we are curious about mortality and are willing to be alive to our own death.
The end-of-life journey teaches us, and these teachings can be embraced through discussion, gatherings, art, innovation, and community action.
Death is sacred, and families, loved ones and friends are empowered to care for their loved ones as the dying person would wish.
The laws that govern death, dying and end-of-life care serve us well when a person’s wishes are honoured, regardless of their sexuality, gender, race, or religion.
Death is embraced with sensitivity to the needs, values and traditions of the community and the natural world that contains all life.
Our open, honest advocacy around death helps us all to connect to the wisdom of our ancestors so we remember how to enter into the universal home of our own being.