We have within us wild places -- frontiers of our psyche that are little explored, and also woodlands and marshes we have been to time and again, yet never managed to tame. The mind is a place rampant with growth, where our conscious thoughts are the only domesticated residents.
When we focus our consciousness outward, to deal with the people and things around us, we live in a civilized realm, or at least one that puts on a mask of civilization.
But inside, we have passions and memories and reflexes that do not answer to civilized notions.
If we shun those wild places -- if we look only outward, live only for the external events and pressures and stimuli that we encounter -- then our interior frontiers can only grow more wild, more dangerous. Sooner or later, we may be forced to venture into them, and if we have never prepared ourselves to do so, they may consume us.
But whatever the perils of our untrammeled wildlands, they have richness and beauty too. And if we seek their safer quarters, if we explore and search with the right preparation, well equipped for pushing in through trackless, thorny depths, then we can learn how to be safe and even comfortable in their fabulous and natural glory.
There is wildness inside you. Put on your boots and take up your walking stick. Make sure you have matches and a pocketknife with you.
Find the green glade splashed with sunlight where no one has ever been.
Look up at the vast blue sky.
Let yourself quiver a little at the distant growling that echoes from the shadowy undergrowth nearby.
And know that it is all you.
Do this often enough, and carefully enough, and you will eventually learn which paths through the wilderness of your soul are safest, and which fruits you can carry out of the woods to share with those beyond.
Thank you, goddess of love, for the forests of thought and instinct and, yes, metaphor within us.
Lovingly yours,
A devotee
6 comments:
Oh, I love this post, Devo-ness.
I do, I do, I do.
I guess it is kind of how I look at my life a lot most days.
But, my problem has been figuring out how to take what I learn in the forest out into civilization.
It's all about balance, I guess.
I guess my problem is that I'd rather just stay in the forest.
It's way more fun and happy to be there.
But, you know...the forest is only a metaphor.
It's not tangible.
Whereas, civilization is right outside my window.
And, frankly, there are days where I much prefer to just stay inside.
But, yes, if I can only learn to figure out how to delve into the forest with my walking stick and take what I learn there into what's outside my window...perhaps then, perhaps then I could feel more at ease in the world.
It's the figuring out how to do that that's the hard part for me.
Reading your blog sure does help though.
And, yeah,
I thank the Goddess for that forest.
I thank her so much.
I love my forest.
I love it a lot.
One of the things I like about this post is that I don't entirely know what it means.
Because of that, I think its call for exploration is even more intriguing.
Glad you liked it!
Love,
Devotee
You know what, Devo?
It's call for exploration IS intriguing.
It is.
I re-read it a few times, and it makes me want to explore.
I mean, I always want to explore.
I just have to do it more.
xoxo
Thank you, Devo.
Thank you.
xo
You are perpetually welcome, Strumpet.
I adore the way your blog makes me pause for thought, Devo.
That was a perfect touch.
xoxo, and hope you are having a fantabulous weekend, Trekster friend.
I am off tomorrow, maybe I will try to rent Trekkies, among the other 1001 things I must do with my day off.
But, renting that is high up on the list, so it might actually get accomplished!
Yay for accomplishing things!
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