Courage (6)
Aug. 1st, 2008 10:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
netpositiveSo, I attended a ceremony last night.
It was the first event of its kind where
I honestly felt or perceived some sort of
"difference" during the experience.
During the meditation, we were encouraged to
encounter a golden man in a field of grain,
and there to receive a message and a gift.
And then my brain instantly said,
"But it's not a man. It's a deer."
I'm still deciphering the full message but
it involves paths and validation. There's
a lot of difference between the following:
"You are on the right path now."
"You are on the right path."
"You are on the path."
and
"You are the path."
My gift, though, was clear and three-fold.
When the deer fell over, shot through
with a silver arrow for the renewal, first
there was a hide, laid out flat, minus head.
The hide then disappeared, to reveal a
still-beating heart, garish red and blue in
its animation, invisibly connected in mid-air.
Before I could pick it up, the heart also
disappeared, and there beneath it rested a
fragment of antler, which was mine to keep.
The antler?
Grows, branches, falls off, and regenerates.
Changes composition during annual cycle.
Differs even between base and tip.
Is used as part of fighting by males, but
caribou and reindeer females also have them.
Represents the essence of deer in our minds.
Thank you for all my gifts, seen and unseen.
It was the first event of its kind where
I honestly felt or perceived some sort of
"difference" during the experience.
During the meditation, we were encouraged to
encounter a golden man in a field of grain,
and there to receive a message and a gift.
And then my brain instantly said,
"But it's not a man. It's a deer."
I'm still deciphering the full message but
it involves paths and validation. There's
a lot of difference between the following:
"You are on the right path now."
"You are on the right path."
"You are on the path."
and
"You are the path."
My gift, though, was clear and three-fold.
When the deer fell over, shot through
with a silver arrow for the renewal, first
there was a hide, laid out flat, minus head.
The hide then disappeared, to reveal a
still-beating heart, garish red and blue in
its animation, invisibly connected in mid-air.
Before I could pick it up, the heart also
disappeared, and there beneath it rested a
fragment of antler, which was mine to keep.
The antler?
Grows, branches, falls off, and regenerates.
Changes composition during annual cycle.
Differs even between base and tip.
Is used as part of fighting by males, but
caribou and reindeer females also have them.
Represents the essence of deer in our minds.
Thank you for all my gifts, seen and unseen.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-08-01 03:10 pm (UTC)And blessed Lughnasa.
no subject
Date: 2008-08-01 04:11 pm (UTC)To date, I've generally found my spiritual home by myself, but I am trying to see what else is out there because I know I'm at a standstill right now. So far I've been to a couple other "neopagany" events which didn't speak to me at all. :/ This one... didn't quite feel "right", but it felt "something" and that feeling didn't feel "wrong", if that makes any sense?
[So that's one reason I feel like why the interpretation of the message is kinda important, if only in the emphasis I choose to put on it at this time?
Or, maybe the point for now is that the choice does not matter so much as making a choice. Which would also make sense.
Strangely, I have no doubt that if clarification is needed, it will arrive, and very soon. But that still wouldn't absolve me of getting ready for it.]
Flippant answer which nonetheless actually feels the most true:
Why did the chicken cross the road?
To get to the other side.
Children's joke, or Zen koan? :)
no subject
Date: 2008-08-02 06:15 am (UTC)