Liminal Guides with their Gifts of Magical Tools

How are you to traverse the aqueous or prickly domain of the ‘belly of the whale’ during your liminal descent as you assume the full import of the rest of your Adventure ahead? You will find, if you but care to ask, a Helper is standing by, ready to guide you through the morass. S/he will bestow upon you some device, a Tool that can help you face your internal dragons and illuminate pitfalls and opportunities along YOUR Path ahead.

Mentors, Masters, Wizards, Teachers, and Guides: all are role models who have already achieved the goals of the Quest you are set upon to realize your most noble Purpose.  They can show you the Way as they know from experience what ordeals you must face, but it is YOU who must walk the Path and learn the Lessons set out before you. It would not help you for your Guide to make your decisions for you or to simply transport you immediately to your destination. For this Journey you are on, this Glorious Quest, is your road of trials that prepares you by letting you develop your talents and your wisdom, so you can become a Master in your own right (and time); so that you may become a Guide to other acolytes seeking their own purposeful goals, down the Road.

images are from pixabay.com

Your Inner (and/or Outer) Guide will bestow upon you devices appropriate to every stage of your journey; Tools you can utilize to traverse the terrain of the specific segment of the adventure you are ready to engage.  It may be a device to illuminate the Darkness (Lumos!) or a weapon to defend against your most dangerous foes. Luke Skywalker, for example, receives a light sabre that lets him focus and direct his positive force of energy as needed; Frodo wears the ring of invisibility that protects him (while at the same time exposing him as he wears it) from the negative Eye of Sauron, Evil incarnate.

All you must do is to be open and accepting, to recognize your Teacher (as they often appear in disguise).   Remember, as the wise adage states: When the aspirant is ready, the Teacher Appears.

I welcome YOUR Comments and Story.

Better Beginnings

I have written much for this blog about ‘better endings.’ Yet what about better BEGINNINGS? As you set out to realize your goals or to Live Your Dream, how shall you properly prepare to Answer the Call to new adventure?

Last week when I asked students in an anthropology class to write about a favorite Hero Cycle tale, six of 33 of them independently selected Tolkein’s Lord of the Rings.  This fantasy trilogy has a very strong opening in Fellowship of the Ring, which follows after the prequel story of The Hobbit has set the stage.

Frodo, at home in his 2^nd uncle-once-removed Bilbo’s earthlodge within the Shire, receives a mysterious visitor, the Wizard Gandalf the Grey. Gandalf bestows upon Bilbo’s heir a magical object, the One Ring, which comes with a sacred responsibility and a definite Call to Adventure.

Frodo is to be the Bearer of the Ring, to convey it far away through dangerous territory to the cave of Mordor so to destroy it, once and for all!  For a young hobbit who has never ventured outside the Shire, this is an astounding Call. Hobbits, after all, are not known to be adventurous with the singular exception of Bilbo himself, who had never yet returned from his own last departure.

Gandalf entrusts Frodo with the Ring even more than himself. Frodo is an Innocent, untainted by greed, unaffected by war, at the beginning. Yet already as Frodo reads Bilbo’s unfinished diary and contemplates his own Call, Dark Forces approach the Shire, aiming to take the Ring for the evil Sauron.

Invisibility is a great device for one who must Depart in order to fulfill a mission so deep and so foreboding that it requires the Removal of the hero in order to draw out the hidden qualities of his/her own spiritual nature. Thus Bilbo disappeared for his final adventure after having briefly returned to the Shire; and thus Frodo must vanish from his home community (ultimately with three compatriot Allies).

Frodo must depart to discover his true qualities of Soul, to fulfill the Quest that only he is innately worthy to accomplish.

Darkness arrives. Frodo, followed and then joined by his Allies, Departs to fulfill their Quest.

         

images are from pixabay.com

Now what of you? What Adventure are you being called to?  How best can you prepare to embark?

Warrior Ally Protectors

Archetypal Warrior Allies often serve in epic narratives to protect the heroes as they fulfill their Epic Quest that benefits humanity or the Good. Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring of course is all about this. Strider and the elves and dwarves form a Warrior cadre to accompany the diminutive hero Frodo and his companions as Frodo pursues his noble quest to destroy the One Ring that could cause massive destruction in the wrong hands.

The various Warriors protecting Frodo on his journey fight Orks and the Dark Forces that threaten to destroy all humanity. They are pledged to the worthy cause of maintaining the forces of Light and Balance.  Gandalf, the Wizard (a MYSTIC archetype Ally himself), leads the expedition with his wisdom as long as he is able, but it is Strider (a rightful heir to his father’s royal throne as well as a Warrior archetype) who  maintans the balance and fights valiantly to uphold Frodo’s selfless cause.

So, the story of The Fellowship of the Ring is of itself an Archetypal story. It is the story of Warrior protectors who uphold the Good and preserve a noble Way. Why do you believe these stories exist?

I would say these stories reveal something about our own inner potentials. There are times when our own Inner Warrior must stand up to uphold and protect a noble Cause we aim deeply to fulfill.

Can you relate? On Friday I will ask you to Tell YOUR Story of a time when your own archetypal Warrior Allies (outwardly or inwardly) have stepped forth to protect and enhance your capacity to thrive or to accomplish a noble objective.

I welcome and invite your story.

Follow Your Heart to Embark on Your Greatest Adventure

 

How might your inner Teacher help you benefit from understanding that “life is but a dream”? To find out, I invite you to simply open a conversation! You can do this by journaling (as below) or through direct, active imagination and then write about it or otherwise represent what you gain from this later.

I’ll share an excerpt from an archetype dialogue with my Teacher part of self:

Self: I call upon my Teacher persona. Are you there?

Teacher: Always, yes.

S:  How would you like to be addressed?

T:  It depends on your reason for calling me; what is it you need?

S: Just to chat, for a blog topic about the metaphor “Life is a Dream”.

T: Okay then, call me Coach.

S: Okay then. Why Coach?

T: To realize the potentials of manifesting your Dream, a life coach can help you expose your goals.

S: That could be helpful. What would you suggest then?

   {Synchronicity (aside): As I am in the process of engaging this dialogue, Tolkien’s Return of the King is on TV. I had forgotten that Frodo and Bilbo Baggins both depart with Gandalf at the story’s finale, on an elvish boat that heads out to unknown and indescribable Adventure.}

T: How could it be otherwise? Bilbo and Frodo are Adventurers by their deepest nature.

S: How does this relate to living life as a Dream?

T: You must follow your dreams. To do this, listen to your heart, then act accordingly.

S: My heart aches lately. I long to embark on the next phase of my great adventure, too. But I wish I could do this, when I go, with fellows such as Frodo has; true friends of the Soul.

T: Follow your heart then.

S: I don’t know what you mean. 

T: You are never alone, not when you realize HOW Life is a Dream. Your fellows are right beside you, and within, always.

S: Thank You. I begin to perceive what you are teaching me.  Separation is an Illusion. 

T: Trust the process. The law of spiritual economy ensures that everything is interconnected; nothing is wasted…

I gain from this encounter that since Life is But a Dream, there are no limitations except for those we choose to accept for purposes of learning life’s lessons. There is a freedom to ACT in the direction that accords with our own deepest nature.   A dream is malleable; it can be redirected according to the will of the Dreamer. This does, however, require (and reward!) an exercise of mindful awareness.

On another level, as someone reminded me this week, we can also think of God or Higher Wisdom itself as “the Divine Dreamer”. In this sense, mine or your dream-life is neither accidental nor random.  Remember to ask of any life situation: “Whose Dream IS this, really?”

I welcome your comments and stories. I invite you to engage in Archetype Dialogue with your own Inner Teacher persona!