I share self-portraits I took on my last Friday as a 39 year old.
For You;
“We are the hero-s of our own life stories.” Joseph Campbell
I see that in life too.
There are many people I'd like to save,
but unfortunately people can only save their own selves.
I've had to save my self.
and found I was the only one who could.
Others helped,
but most of it was up to me.
“The first step in the Hero’s Journey is what he describes as the call to adventure. Somewhere inside all of us there is a longing for something more, a knowing that your soul’s path is calling out to you and once you recognize that feeling and heed that call, your life, which is your adventure, truly begins.” Joseph Campbell
I left the convent many years ago.
As a nun?
No! God, no......as a secretary to the Finance Department. Which was bad enough. But where I met my husband. I was his secretary. :) but i wasn't the other woman.
anyways,
what sealed my leaving was a quote from a Coelho book - Veronika decides to die
I don't recall the exact words, but something about.....
"there are people out there waiting for me, and i don't know them and they don't know me, but I feel I can be of use. And the danger of an adventure is worth a thousand days of ease and comfort."
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I didn't realize the people I was going to meet were all the past me's
who were so sad in their life.
I thought I'd have this group of friends,
who would be my family.
instead, they were all past me's
and I've let them tell me their stories
because it was important for them to.
for them
and for me.
I don't feel bad for them Any More
because they live here with me now,
in this Garden of Eden.
What's to feel bad about?
I followed the advice I received from Bishop T.D. Jakes this morning.
“When you acknowledge your critics, you give them your power. They are not important until you respond. Learn what you can from them. Eat the meat, throw away the bones. But God didn’t send you here to argue with critics. He sent you here to get something done with your life. Let her have that problem by herself. Pray for her. Ask God to help him, but go after what he promised you.”
so I changed my mind and didn't mention what 'my critic' said to me because that would be mentioning them.
but didn't you just mention them?
yeah, but to celebrate the victory of learning something,
it's worth it.
Besides, This is me 'going after it.'
Oprah said, “Even if I fail, I still have to go because if I stay here, I’m going to be smothered. Which is exactly what he (Joseph Campbell) says in The Hero’s Journey, if you don’t accept the yearning, then you end up dying inside.”
I've never been much for goals,
but one thing I never wanted to do was
To
Die
Inside.
and back then,
back there,
I was.
But I did my best while I was there
and I tried to follow what i thought was my heart,
but for awhile,
it turned out I was just following my own stupidity.
Ha.
that makes me laugh.
but it's SO freaking true!
Makes me sad to think of people who are dead inside.
Some people think they are dead inside.
Here's how you know:
If you're still feeling pain,
you're not dead inside.
Yet!
But if you care about any-one or any-thing,
you'd better heed the warning that pain is bringing you
and stop blaming whoever is responsible and just change your life.
You'll have plenty of time to be mad at them later.
believe me. :)
Jean Houston said, “She arrives in Oz and everything in technicolor and the little people recognize her and then she is sent on the road of spiritual power. And who did she meet? She met the dis-empowered parts of herself: The dis-empowered mind - the scarecrow, the dis-empowered heart and feeling - the tin man, The dis-empowered courage - the cowardly lion.”
Yep......those are the parts of My Self I met.
because those are All the parts of ourselves that we All meet on a spiritual journey.
I knew this was A Heroine's Journey many, many years ago.
But you always think you know yourself,
and it always turns out that you don't.
You think you're operating at full capacity
with your flux-capacitor fluxing,
and you're just not.
Mostly because the thing is jammed up with layers of emotional and mental trauma.....
all the things that make us 'dis-empowered.'
Bishop T.D. Jakes also said, "You need the kind of prayer that sets the room on fire.”
i like that.
a spiritual fire.....not a real one, thank you.
("I don't want a zombie turkey. I don't want to turn into a turkey myself....." Homer Simpson)
“To have a deep appreciation of the life that One is given and the life of Others and then to act accordingly in the depths of that appreciation." Jean Houston
That's what makes me apologize to bugs when I have to kill them.
One of my gifts in life is my youthful appearance.
When I was 18 people always asked me if I was 12.
I hated it,
but they said, "You're gonna love it when you're older."
Guess that time is now.
I may look 20 Something,
but let me tell you Something,
this body has 40 years of wisdom in it,
and I’m not as easily fooled as I used to be.
“Throughout my life and my opportunities that I have seen to interact with exceptional people who’ve done exceptional things, their exceptionalism is often incubated in the womb of adversity. That great leaders come from bad times. People who have the passion that is necessary to be expended to have great accomplishment that that passion is often birthed in a process of pain. That God brings greatness out of weakness. That He brings strength out of tribulation and adversity. That the more we are afflicted some kind of way, the more we grow.” Bishop T. D. Jakes
I think our society wants to act like it knows that, but that's when we're talking about the suffering of others......when it comes to our own suffering for greatness......we want instant success.
I've heard this said many places in regards to very famous people and less famous, yet successful people who seemed to 'make it over-night':
They've put in countless hours that we never saw before we saw them.
How could we have? We'd never heard of them before most everyone else had. So, to us, they seem to be 'over-night successes' when really what they are is:
Receiving the return on all the hard work they put into whatever their field is.
I want You to know that You can be happy.
You can live a life that you love.
Perhaps the kind of life where you can sit on the floor of your art studio, typing encouragement to unknown others, while it snows outside your cottage window with music from Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone making the entire scene seem like a wondrous fantasy.
Shoot,
if I made it to happiness.....
You can make it too.
Your happiness is Yours and is suited to your tastes, whatever they be.
I love cats,
always have,
so how fitting is it that I have some of them snuggled up on a snowy day?
It’s not meant for everyone,
it’s meant for me.
I'm glad it's meant for me,
because I find the value in it.
Bishop T.D. Jakes said, “I challenge you to be able to see that just because something isn’t working right doesn’t mean that everything isn’t working right. In fact, I want to give you some instruction to start thanking God for what IS working while you’re waiting on Him to fix what isn’t working. If you can thank Him for what you’ve got rather than worry about what you lack, you’d be surprised how God will move.”
it's true. it's so true.
Man, if I listened to every voice in my head that told me something negative about me and/or my work.
I wouldn't be here right now saying this.
and I wouldn't have bothered to mark the last Friday of my 30's.
I would not have been able to see the value in it.
But instead,
I DO see the value in it
and now,
It's a gift I gave myself.
and even more so,
one I shared with You.
“The privledge of a lifetime is being Who You Are.” Joseph Campbell
I marked the end of my 20's by getting a tattoo.
I marked this one with Art,
my own art.....
not someone else's.
What do you think that means?
I think it means:
I am becoming more and more ME.
My wish for you is to become more Your-self.
You'll be so much more happier doing that than being whoever you're pretending to be.
that is,
unless pretending is part of the fun.....
and, in that case, I wanna be Kristie McNichol in The Pirate Movie.
~magick~
Meliss
