# 170 - The Mind Behind the Myth: Penelope’s Psychology

In this episode of The Lemon Tree Coaching Podcast, Dr. Allison Sucamele explores the psychology of Penelope from Homer’s The Odyssey. Often remembered as the faithful wife who waited for Odysseus, Penelope is far more than a symbol of patience. Together, we examine her intelligence, resilience, emotional regulation, and strategic thinking, revealing how she maintained agency during years of uncertainty. 

What can Penelope teach us about trust, boundaries, endurance, and navigating life's long periods of waiting? Join us as we uncover the psychological depth of one of literature's most enduring women.

Disclaimer: The Lemon Tree Coaching Podcast is intended for educational and informational purposes only and is not a substitute for therapy, mental health treatment, medical advice, or professional counseling.

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Connect with The Lemon Tree Coaching Podcast on Instagram at @thelemontreecoaching for podcast updates, reflections, journal prompts, and resources to support your journey inward.

Transcript

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Welcome back to the Lemon Tree Coaching Podcast, where we explore several branches of psychology in connection with legendary characters from literature, mythology, and much more that we can apply to everyday life. I'm your host, Dr. Allison Sukamelli, and in today's episode, we're going to unravel the mind of one of ancient literature's most fascinating characters, Penelope, the wife of Odysseus. She is often seen as the epitome of loyalty and patience, but how does her psychology really work? What makes Penelope not just a symbol of waiting, but a character who actively shapes her fate? But first, if you're enjoying the Lemon Tree Coaching podcast, connect with the pod on Instagram at the Lemon TreeCoaching. I share reflections, podcast updates, journal prompts, and resources to support your journey inward. You can find a direct link in the episode bio. For example, in my savory reader stack this week, I have The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath and Walden by Henry David Thoreau. And if you find yourself on a lake or out in nature somewhere, take a second to read Walden, even if it's just a paragraph or one page at a time. It makes for a nice experience. And kind reminder: this podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not a substitute for therapy, mental health treatment, medical advice, or professional counseling. Please take what resonates and leave what doesn't. And if you're experiencing a mental health crisis, having thoughts of self-harm, or need immediate support, call or text 988-The Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, available 24 hours a day in the United States. And if you are outside of the United States, please contact your local emergency or crisis support services. Okay, now let's take a breath, settle in, and let's begin. Penelope is such a compelling and nuanced character in the Odyssey. As we know, she is often portrayed as the archetype of the faithful wife, spending 20 years waiting for her husband, Odysseus, to return from the Trojan War. But as we'll explore today, there's a lot more going on with her. And I think the first thing to acknowledge is that Penelope isn't just passively waiting for Odysseus to come back. There's a psychological depth to her character that's often overlooked, and we should start by recognizing this extreme uncertainty that she faces. And in a previous episode, we discussed the psychology of waiting through the lens of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot. And waiting is rarely just about time, it is often about uncertainty. Psychologically, waiting activates the brain's prediction systems, causing us to imagine possible outcomes, rehearse conversations, and search for signs of what comes next. And the less control we feel over the situation, the longer the wait tends to feel, even when only a short amount of time has passed. And in the epic, Odysseus has been gone for 20 years, and we're told that Penelope is besieged by suitors or men who want to take Odysseus' place as ruler of Ithaca. And this creates a deeply stressful situation for her. On one hand, there's the emotional weight of not knowing whether Odysseus is alive or dead. On the other hand, there's the pressure of having to navigate her domestic and political role in a society that expects her to remarry. And that uncertainty seems like it would have a profound psychological impact. And it's not just waiting in the passive sense, but a kind of psychological limbo, right? And if you've ever been in a psychological limbo, you know how excruciating this can feel. And psychological limbo occurs when a chapter of life has ended, but the next one has not yet fully begun. Since not all of us are waiting for our war hero husbands to return to our palace from a faraway land, here are some other examples of when psychological limbo may occur. Waiting to hear whether you got a job after an interview. I hate that one since there's usually so much writing on the decision. A whole new life, perhaps. Going through a divorce would be another example, and not yet knowing what life will look like afterwards. This may be one of the hardest psychological tasks of adulthood, grieving the life we thought we were going to have. We create stories about how relationships will unfold, what our careers will look like, who will walk beside us, and how our future will feel. When reality diverges from that vision, it can feel like a loss, even when nothing tangible has been taken away. Yet growth often begins when we stop clinging to a version of life that no longer exists. Sometimes the dream we are mourning was built on incomplete information, unrealistic expectations, or a version of ourselves that has since evolved. Letting go is not giving up. It is making room. And the life you deserve is often found on the other side of surrender. It is the life that honors who you are now rather than who you once thought you needed to be. It may not look exactly as planned, but it may offer something far more valuable: authenticity, peace, reciprocity, and the freedom to become fully yourself. And psychological limbo may occur when you are recovering from burnout while no longer able to function as you once did, but not yet feeling restored. Waiting for medical test results or a diagnosis. Knowing a relationship has changed, yet not having clarity about where it is headed. Finishing school and standing between the identity of student and whatever comes next. We spend so much time working toward a goal that we rarely stop to consider what happens when we actually reach it. And for a high school senior, graduation can bring excitement alongside uncertainty. For years, life has been structured by schedules, assignments, familiar hallways, and predictable milestones. Then suddenly the future opens wide. Friends scatter in different directions, identities begin to shift. The question is no longer what class do I have next, but who am I becoming? And the waiting period between what was and what will be can feel both exhilarating and unsettling. And college graduates often encounter a similar experience. After years of pursuing a degree, there can be an expectation that clarity will arrive the moment the diploma is received. Yet many graduates find themselves facing a new set of unknowns. The structure is gone again. The next path may not be obvious. The transition from student to professional is not simply a logistical change, it is an identity shift. The life imagined during college may not unfold exactly as expected, creating a period of adjustment and reorientation. And this experience can be even more complex for adults who return to school later in life. Perhaps they balance classes with careers, parenting, caregiving, or other responsibilities. Graduation may represent years of sacrifice and perseverance. Yet when the goal is finally achieved, they may discover they are no longer the same person who began the journey. The degree is complete, but the process of integrating that growth into everyday life is just beginning. They may find themselves asking, What do I do now? Or what comes next for me? Those questions are not signs of confusion, they are signs of transformation. And psychologically, again, these transitions often require us to let go of the life we thought we were going to have so we can embrace the life that is actually emerging. We grieve expectations, revise old narratives, and make peace with paths not taken. What feels like uncertainty is often the mind adjusting to a new reality. And the space between chapters can feel uncomfortable because it lacks the certainty of the past and the clarity of the future. Yet it is often in these in-between seasons that some of our most important growth occurs. We are no longer who we were, but we have not yet fully become who we are meant to be. The waiting is not a detour from the journey, it is part of the journey itself. And psychological limbo may also occur when deciding whether to move, retire, or make a major life change while feeling unable to commit to either path. Or leaving a familiar role, belief system, or community before discovering what will replace it. And we find Penelope caught in the same bind of waiting that has a psychological toll. This kind of prolonged uncertainty can lead to what we might call cognitive dissonance. She wants to remain loyal to Odysseus, but every day there's evidence that his return is less and less likely. And at the same time, the suitors are constantly reminding her of her duty to move on. This internal conflict between loyalty and the pressure to act must create a lot of emotional and cognitive tension for her. And for much of the Odyssey, Penelope is in a kind of psychological holding pattern. We don't see her taking a clear active role in shaping her own future. She's defined by waiting and maintaining control over the house and affects her sense of agency. Penelope's life comes to be defined by a kind of passive agency for much of the story. She actively resists the suitors and manages her household, but her primary actions are defensive, like keeping the suitors at bay, maintaining the household's integrity, and controlling what little space she has within her social role. She doesn't directly choose to take on leadership or control in a more traditional sense, but this restraint is actually where some of her psychological strengths lie. For instance, the famous trick she plays with her weaving. Penelope uses her intelligence to navigate a very constrained situation. The weaving trick is one of the most powerful psychological strategies she employs. She tells the suitors that she'll choose one of them to marry once she finishes weaving a burial shroud for Odysseus' father, Laertes. But every night she secretly undoes the weaving. This act of creating an illusion of progress while buying herself time is brilliant. It's a manifestation of what psychologists might call cognitive reframing, or turning her limited options into a kind of strategy for survival and resistance. The shroud may also be seen as an image of time, a symbol of her psychological limbo. It's interesting to think of her as not just being passive, but actively manipulating the situation to her advantage. So she's not just waiting, she's controlling what she can, even if it's in subtle, indirect ways. And Penelope's intelligence and emotional resilience are central to her psychological makeup. There's also a deep psychological paradox here. She must maintain hope, but she can't fully hope for Odysseus's return without risking her own emotional and social collapse. And imagine, perhaps some of us don't have to imagine, how exhausting it must be to live in that limbo and never know if the person, and you can fill in the blank for yourself, if the person you love will ever come back, yet refusing to fully give up hope. That's a form of emotional labor that requires immense psychological strength. And it seems like Penelope's ability to manage that uncertainty and maintain hope is something we can relate to even in the modern world, even if we directly have not experienced something similar. But in an everyday sense, we're all faced with uncertainty in our lives in a variety of forms. Something we can reflect on later is how does Penelope's example help us understand how to cope with these kinds of emotional dilemmas. And that's a great connection to everyday life and how we respond to situations of uncertainty we are faced with. And Penelope embodies resilience in the face of uncertainty. She doesn't ignore the reality of her situation. Instead, she learns how to cope with it. And when we talk about resilience through a psychological lens, we are talking about the ability to adapt positively in the face of adversity. And Penelope shows this in spades or to a very great degree. Rather than surrendering to despair, she finds a way to keep her mind engaged and hope alive even as the world around her seems to be falling apart. Her psychological survival mechanism involves balancing hope with practical strategic thinking. She engages in what we might call controlled hope, in which she maintains enough hope to survive emotionally, but keeps it tempered with the reality that Odysseus might never come back. And it's fascinating how much psychological insight is embedded in her story, and we're merely skimming the surface in today's episode. And keep in mind it's not just about her own emotional survival, but the survival of Ithaca itself. She keeps the home intact, holds the political and social structures together, even when her role as a woman in ancient Greece would limit her authority. And Penelope's ability to preserve the social order and her family's legacy is a form of quiet leadership. She's holding the kingdom together by preventing chaos and by not allowing the suitors to take over. Her emotional intelligence, her ability to read people and manipulate situations is actually what allows her to protect her son, Telemachus, and her household. In a way, Penelope is a kind of unsung leader, whose psychological strength sustains the fabric of Ithaca through the darkest years of Odysseus's absence, which is a powerful way to look at it. So to wrap things up, Penelope really challenges our traditional ideas of what it means to be a hero. She's not the warrior or the conqueror, but she's definitely heroic in her own right. Penelope represents a different kind of heroism, one that is rooted in intelligence, emotional resilience, and the quiet strength that comes from holding fast to a sense of hope and purpose, even when all seems lost. She's a strong reminder that heroism can be found not just in grand gestures, but in the daily choices we make to persevere and protect what we care about. Again, there's so much more we could discuss in connection to Penelope, but my intention is not to write an epic today. But it was great to ponder such a rich and complex character. And hopefully the psychological angles I took today gave you some food for thought. If you have some free time, I recommend the 1997 TV miniseries The Odyssey with Armand Desant, Isabella Rossellini, and Greta Scotchi, who plays Penelope. And hopefully I pronounced all those names right. And of course, this summer we have the Matt Damon Odyssey coming out. And if you're listening to this episode of the Limitry Coaching podcast, close to its original release, that film is not out yet, but it's certainly on my list. Okay, so there you have it. Be sure to join us tomorrow for a short bonus episode on yet another psychological topic. And until next time, I'm Dr. Allison Sukamelli. Keep questioning, keep reflecting, and as always, keep thinking critically about the myths that shape our world and how we can apply those lessons to everyday life. See you next time.