Demeter is the goddess of the harvest and agriculture, who presided over grains and the fertility of the earth. As an instinct in women, the Demeter Instinct, therefore, represents fertility in the sense of satisfaction that a woman enjoys in "producing results." The "can-do" goddess in all women, who can deliver what she promises, and in having a daughter, Persephone, over whom she guards, is symbolically guarding the fruits of her artistic labors as a woman, and feeling the ecstatic excitement of so doing.
She is often described simply as the goddess of the harvest, she presided also over the sacred law, and the cycle of life and death.
Demeter's virgin daughter Persephone was abducted to the underworld by Hades. Demeter searched for her ceaselessly, preoccupied with her loss and her grief. The seasons halted; living things ceased their growth, then began to die. Faced with the extinction of all life on earth, Zeus sent his messenger Hermes to the underworld to bring Persephone back. Hades agreed to release her if she had eaten nothing while in his realm, but Persephone had eaten a small number of pomegranate seeds. This bound her to Hades and the underworld for certain months of every year, either the dry Mediterranean summer, when plant life is threatened by drought, or the autumn and winter. There are several variations on the basic myth. Hecate assists in the search and later becomes Persephone's underworld attendant. In another, Persephone willingly and secretly eats the pomegranate seeds, thinking to deceive Hades, but is discovered and made to stay. Contrary to popular perception, Persephone's time in the underworld does not correspond with the unfruitful seasons of the ancient Greek calendar, nor her return to the world of the living, with springtime.
The myth not only shows the devotion of a mother to a daughter in the devotion of a woman for her "life's purpose," but shows a lesson in avoiding selfishness in a woman needing to share her vision with the world at large. The tale recommends that "two thirds" of one's investment in promoting and publishing one's ideas and vision to the world at large, and keeping "one third" of the passion an enjoyment for one's self. This may remind us of the role of Interdependence in the "shared reality" of intimacy in a relationship, where approximately one-third of one's resources ought to be toward the relationships, and approximately two-thirds of one's invested psychological resources ought to be toward the self.