Courage (6)
Aug. 1st, 2008 10:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
So, 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.