Everything Changes When We See Ourselves

Everything Changes When We See Ourselves

When I was young, I wanted nothing more than to be Merlin, the magician. Our weekly trips into town to visit the library from our rural Ohio farm allowed me to fill my imagination with epic fantasy stories and romantic Arthurian legends. I could almost see the mists of Avalon opening before me when the fog settled on the fields, making the grasses glisten in the early morning sun, as it often did in early Summer. I had the benefit of lots of free time, and 80 acres of wild forest to explore. My favorite moment was falling asleep in the branches of my favorite tree, confident it would hold me safe, until I awoke again.

Now, I wonder if I ever woke up from that tree. The world continues to surprise and delight me, being full of fantastic people and things and experiences. Miracles happen all around me everyday. They get so little fanfare however you’d barely notice they happened, but they’re there. It’s amazing how little we see of what we don’t expect to see.

A crevasse of my own making

I didn’t always see life from rose-colored glasses though. There were years where I was hiding so no one would see me. I developed elaborate ruses and games to elude anyone really trying to know me at all. I was a master obscurer, but what I didn’t realize was that I was only tricking myself. While I left others confused, I was in an even deeper crevasse of my own making. I couldn’t access my strengths and gifts, because I separated myself from their power. I didn’t want anyone to know my true powers, my true gifts. I didn’t want anyone to SEE ME!

I hated expectations, I feared assumptions, I definitely did not want to be put in a box. I was allowing others to imprison me in my own mind. They were just trying to ‘get’ me, I was too busy running away to see that.

It wasn’t until I leaned into my discomfort, and got really uncomfortable, that I started to see what was going on. My third grade teacher taught me the benefits of discomfort when I cried my way through a book report presentation in front of the whole class. Surprisingly, I’m not afraid of public speaking today. Another time I felt a lot of discomfort was pretty ironic when you think about it: I was admitting the truth of my sexual desires to my partner. He’s still around, haha!

It’s amazing how the most true things about us, deep down inside, can be the source of so much fear.

What happens when you encounter fear is that geometries of thought and emotion get thrown into your aura as you try to make sense of the new information. But they don’t stay there forever. They do muck you up for a time, but depending on the strength of your energetic systems they either get pulled back into your system and re-assimilated, providing a new puzzle for you to solve, or they get pushed out of your system and recycled back into the universal symphony, interminably singing it’s glory all around us. Remember, everything is energy and energy is vibration. Who doesn’t like to listen to music?

I like to listen

Eventually I had help. I found a path, the initiatory path, the path of of my soul’s progression, and I began walking down it to see what I would find. I didn’t just happen on the information in the above paragraph. I sought it out. After moments of intense desire and prayer, I started to get little hints. Later I realized I was guided, and thus I got there a lot faster than many of my peers. And now I see what’s happening and I have tools to handle it because that guidance helped me resolve and release what was holding me back in life. That way I could get back into the game, winning life one step at a time. It ain’t always easy, but it’s a helluva ride!

I think at this point, you’re probably pretty convinced there’s a higher power helping out, guiding your life, assisting you in times of need. I believe that too. And whether it’s true or not is not really what I want to get into, but even if you just pretended for a moment that it was true, how would that change your life? How would you act differently? And even if you didn’t believe in some invisible force that can’t be truly understood or measured, what if you heard some good advice from a spiritual friend? Would it change your what you do at all? Would you listen?

I think the answer is ‘yes,’ because the more assured you feel, the more confidence you have, the more risks you’re going to take on this crazy trip called life. And there’s nothing truly great achieved in life without taking risks. The worst that can happen here is that you don’t get the result you’ve been looking for. But if I told you people have been walking this path of thousands of years because it works for them, do you think it’d work for you too?

If you’re curious, come learn more at my upcoming lecture on “Upgrading your Energy Body with a DNA Life Activation” Jan 29th at 7pm at Incite Healing Center. I promise the information will only help you on your path. It did when I heard it six years ago, and my life continues to accelerate in the most beautiful ways.

I pray you have peace, and joy, and I pray I get to see you soon so we can drop into some conversation over tea. Life begets life, how will you live yours? Covered up like I was for many years, hiding from the Light, or will you come out and play to discover where the seat of your joy lies?

The invitation is open to you.

How to Steal Power from the Gods: Myths of Trickery, Fire and Divine Paradox

How to Steal Power from the Gods: Myths of Trickery, Fire and Divine Paradox

Let’s take a quick step into cultural mythology.  One of my favorite myths is the story of sacred thieves or tricksters.  Lewis Hyde calls tricksters beings that “violate principles of social and natural order, playfully disrupting normal life and then re-establishing it on a new basis.”  It’s a really cool trope: most often a being neither man nor God sees the potential to take something, does so, humanity benefits, the gods are enraged and punish the trickster, but humanity is left to enjoy the spoils.  Every story has variations, so the ones I’m reviewing are but quick examples of these myths, but there are some really strange underlying premises in most of these stories.  Trickster myths often hash out the relationship between cosmos, divinity, humanity, and all that runs in between.  Tricksters aren’t unified in identity or symbols but they are the actors of big-time transgression: they’re cosmic plot devices.

The Myth of the Raven

There’s the story of Raven, who stole the sun. Most variations of the the story involve the world being originally dark, sad, and generally inhospitable. Raven makes their way into the household of the gods, where the sun rests in a box.  Some tales say Raven uses transformative powers to change its guise to get himself re-birthed as a child of the Gods. At some point Raven catches sight of a box with a brilliant object (the sun), and employs wiles such as throwing tantrums for gifts and gets his hands on the box.  Once he gets his hands on the sun, he transforms back to its original form and flies out into the sky with the sun.  Some tales say that before the theft of the sun Raven was pure white, and holding it in his beak turned Raven completely dark.  From one perspective, this is a story about hubris: a being neither divine nor ordinary steals something extraordinary and is permanently changed for their transgression.  What’s curious about is the fact that the creator Gods are portrayed as mankind, and the world’s emissary (Raven) is but an animal.   

The Myth of Prometheus

There’s the story of Prometheus.  While a Titan, he pitied mankind’s lack of fire, stole from the Gods, was promptly punished to spend the rest of existence having his liver torn out by an eagle each day (only to regrow a new one).  Like Raven, each iteration of the myth is told slightly differently with different lessons.  What’s unified across each telling is the fact that Prometheus remains a Titan, parent to the rulers of Olympus.  Hesiod’s telling begins with Prometheus tricking Zeus on a sacrifice day to take a pile of bones wrapped in fat (because it was pretty) over a pile of meat wrapped in entrails (not so pretty).  Some tellings say Zeus deliberately picked the meatless, superficial sacrifice because he was deceived, in other tellings Zeus does this so he has an excuse to confiscate fire from humanity.  In all tellings, Prometheus steals fire and gifts it to humanity and is tortured by Zeus.  There is some really weird cross-generational stuff here.  The titans are effectively the grandparents to humanity (the Olympians created humanity).

The Myth of Chang’e

There’s the myth of Chang’e.  In one telling, she was husband to Hou-Yi, legendary archer who shot down 9 of the 10 suns out of the sky, preventing the oceans from boiling.  Hou-Yi was awarded an elixir of immortality, decided to not immediately drink it.  While out hunting, somebody breaks into their home and attempts to force Chang’e to hand over the elixir. One thing leads to another and Chang’e drinks it herself, flies to the moon and takes residence there, breaking her husband’s heart in the process.  In another telling, Hou-Yi is promptly crowned the Emperor (thus a mortal God) after shooting down the suns and grows cruel and corrupt.  Hou-Yi, fearing death and loving his power, commissions an elixir of immortality.  Chang’e upon hearing this steals the elixir.  In some tellings, she does this for fear that Hou-Yi becomes unkillable, thus saving mankind from an evil, immortal king.  In some tellings, Chang’e takes the elixir for herself because immortality is a pretty big deal.  Also, she doesn’t always willfully take residence on the moon: sometimes a side effect of the elixir is an unbearable lightness that floats her to her domain or the Emperor confines her to the rock.  This provides a really weird contrast to the Mid-Autumn (i.e. Moon) festival which is regarded as an important family reunion.

Paradox

There’s something strange about the fact that in each case, a power is concealed from humanity and is sprung out of the boundaries of the divine.  While each thing stolen helped humanity, tricksters can be seldom attributed to deliberate goodwill toward humanity.  In some takes, Prometheus takes sympathy upon humanity, or is it just for the hell of it?  Chang’e steals the Emperor’s elixir sometimes for herself, in other times, it’s for the sake of stemming the tide of eternal tyranny.   In some tellings, after Raven steals the sun the only reason it’s in the sky is because it gets so hot he drops it.  Each of these stories exist in extremely different cultural backgrounds with diverse contexts of what purpose is, these characters make choices that cross boundaries and upend what’s supposed to be.  As cosmic plot devices, the tricks tricksters turn are ultimately for furthering the plot of the sacred drama the universe has in store of us!

Resources

Source 1: Lewis Hyde, Trickster Makes World

Source 2:Yang Lemei, China’s Mid-Autumn Day

Source 3: Theft of fire

Source 4: The story of Raven