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I recommend The Soul's Code: In Search of Character and Calling to general readers and to students. It is an excellent resource for presentations and papers concerning personal myths and individuation processes.
The Soul's Code is about finding one's particular path, fulfilling one's singular calling, and realizing one's own destiny. Hillman postulates that our innate nature is like an acorn and our individual character will evolve just as the distinctive oak tree does. As Hillman states, ‘In a nutshell, this book is about calling, about character, about inner image. Together they make up the “acorn theory”’. Hillman uses the following terms for one's ‘acorn’: calling, genius, soul, daimon, spirit, destiny, fate, and character.
Although Hillman says that psychology is stumped when it comes to accounting for the spark of individual uniqueness, Carl Jung, Viktor Frankl, and Abraham Maslow have each contributed important theories about individuation, personal meaning, and self-actualization, respectively. Hillman states that this book champions children and that the acorn theory means that ‘every child is a gifted child’. This premise is one