“Every time you are willing to say, “yes” to everything on your path, you express the hero inside of you.” Joseph Campbell
Most of my childhood was spent listening to my Irish uncles telling powerful myths of ancient gods and ageless heroes; of men of magic and women of bravery. I was terrified of some gods, in love with courageous warriors, fearful of monstrous Cyclops, and I always dreamed of being a heroine of great beauty and mystery.
Myths and Stories are the oldest schools for humankind. Genuine stories offer a living school where the only entry requirements are an active imagination, some capacity to feel one’s own feelings and the willingness to approach the world as a place of mystery and revelation.
Myths are not a part of the past, but a way to see universal truths playing out in the present. Myths are the inside story that makes meaning of the outside world. People feel more whole when listening to a story and feel most lost when out of touch with their own story.
When I think back to the myths told to me of the hero’s journey, I realize now that the accomplishments of the heroes took place in the outer world. But as the story of our world becomes less clear, as we all find ourselves living in a cosmic turn, it is the unfolding of the inner life of the soul that provides the best way to proceed. In order to move forward in a deep and meaningful way, we must find the hero within each of us. Somewhere deep inside each of us lives the soul of a hero. It’s not something we bring to the world, rather something that brings us to the world. We must discover the hero within because we are all heroes of our own myths.
We discover the hero within by doing the inner work of determining what meaning and purpose this world holds for us, and for the future that awaits us. We can learn to see with more clarity how we each have a unique role to play; how we each have our own way to make a difference in the lives of others. It is up to us to give our own life the meaning and vitality we need to make it through and to be of service to others.
We need a path that allows us to bear the trials of living, the ordeals of our present time and circumstance, and the suffering inherent to life’s harsh realities. Discovering the hero within means waking up to the realization that the necessary conditions are being created for us to recognize our unique place in the universe, the particular gifts that we have to bring forth, and to serve a purpose greater than ourselves. Now is the time to help sustain and revitalize the world around us.
We need to learn how to tolerate dynamic tension if we are to embark on a worthwhile inner adventure. As we develop and grow, we cross points of no return. Once we cross over to new experiences of conscious awakening, and once we’ve committed ourselves to a path of awareness, we will no longer be the same. Our old identity begins to shed its skin. We come across threshold guardians – daemons that block the way, attempting to ward us off. They are like the gargoyles entrenched above archways and entrances to shrines and cathedrals. These guardians are manifestations of our deepest fears. They also guard the way to our deepest longings. We cannot go on a genuine, soulful adventure without bringing along your authentic doubts and fears, as well as our strongest desires and longings – for, without them, it would not be a hero’s journey.
But the one simple truth of discovering the hero within is just to be ourselves – that’s the real job of a hero.
Friday, February 16th, China will celebrate the beginning of its New Year. Each Chinese year is given its name from the Chinese zodiac and each year is characterized by an animal as well as an element, and this year is the year of the earth dog!
Start the New Year out by thoroughly cleaning your house. This process is called, “sweeping the dust, and is symbolic in that it represents putting away old things and leaving the past behind.
This is a lucky year full of harmonious relationships. Success will be achieved through the quality of communication between people and learning that being selfless and generous can bring the promise of a more generous harvest in return.
The year of the earth dog is a good time to make lifestyle changes. If you smoke – quit even though you have tried before in the year of the earth dog you will succeed. It’s a wonderful year to start something new like a business or buy a new home.
The dog is the symbol of intelligence and protection, and this is a year to demand radical changes to our life conditions and to preserve the future of our children.
Famous people born as an earth dog are Michael Jackson and Madonna both who represent the characteristics of being serious and deliberate in their work and in their successes. And always masters at being able to communicate their talent to all of us.
Chinese New Year is an opportunity to celebrate a new start! Happy New Year!
With so many of us downsizing and moving into smaller spaces, here are nine Feng Shui tips to help you in your small spaces.
1. Use The Front Door:
The front door is the entryway to bring in good chi (life energy), balance and harmony. Make sure the area is clutter free. Place a well-maintained doormat at the front door welcoming the chi. Make sure this area is well lit and honor this space by using the front door every day.
2. Declutter:
Small spaces can develop clutter quickly. Be mindful of any objects on the floor that do not belong such as boxes or books, these objects will stagnant the energy flow. Closets represent hidden areas in your life so clean those out in order to bring clarity to all aspects of your life.
3. Clean Under the Bed:
To ensure a restful sleep clear out anything that is under your bed. Storing items under the bed will block the energy flow and can represent blocks in your relationships.
4. Live Plants:
Bring in healthy, live plants into your small space. These plants enhance the wood element and symbolize new beginnings and enhance family relationships.
5. Clean and Replace Light Bulbs:
Light blubs represent passion, the fire element so make sure they are clean and working. Turing on light bulbs can light the way for love or new business opportunities.
6. Use the Burners on Your Stove Daily:
No matter how small your kitchen might be it represents health and abundance. The preparation of food is a sacred act and the stove represents life force and nourishment, but it is also an energy generator. Use all the burners every day. Only using one or two burners may suggest that you are not activating the full potential of abundance available to you.
7. Place a Bowl of Nine Oranges in Your Kitchen:
Oranges stimulate the mind and improve your mood. Symbolically the orange represents gold and will improve your cash flow.
8. Move Nine Objects Around:
Nine is an auspicious number in Feng Shui, so moving nine objects in your small space will stir up the chi in your home. There is not an object too small or big to move, and just moving an object slightly will make a difference.
9. Space Clearing:
The air in small spaces tends to become stagnant. Open up all the windows and doors and burn incense or sage throughout the house. The fresh air will clear out any stress and negativity.
Have any Feng Shui questions? Feel free to contact me at michelle@michellecromer.com and sign up for your Power Color.
It seems to be our mutual fate to be living during a time of great upheaval and sweeping crisis. The glue that once held our society together is dissolving. Many of us are stranded, trying to fathom what our lives mean after all the difficulties we have gone through. We are left standing in the rubble after a hurricane or trying to pick up the pieces after a divorce. We are not able to control the forces or people that cause suffering, but we can determine what the pain and suffering do to us and what we become because of it. The answers are within us, not outside of us, and those answers will give us insight into what’s next for us and give us the hope to go on.
All shamans, mystics, Buddha, yogis and saints have said the same thing: answers to our questions come from looking within and in our stillness we find hope.
But hope is just a starting point. It’s where we dialog with the Muses and wonder about what could be and what if. Hope is a magical ingredient that stirs up and animates the impossible in our lives.
Developing a relationship with the impossible requires effort and energy. Once connected to the impossible, an emotional and psychic bond is formed with that reality. It’s like any meaningful personal relationship; it’s intimate and alive, and nourishing to your inner senses. A dialogue between you and the impossible is the merging of a unique vision and it is the same thing as having a download of grace rush through your system. In an instant, it penetrates into your intellect, your emotions, your mind and your vocabulary. This new symbolic content shifts your understanding of the cosmos. You can feel the power of the impossible take hold of you as it runs through your blood like a new drug, making it’s way to your neurology. The download is complete and it’s yours and you are on a high that is unexplainable to anyone who has never been swept away by the thrill of contact with the realm of the impossible. This is a love affair unlike anything on earth because it isn’t of the earth. But soon it will be – that becomes the task, as you are the vessel for the impossible. But as this container, you need to be someone who can handle being misunderstood or be able to keep your own company because others cannot see or comprehend the impossible. You need to be strong enough to believe something only you can see or understand – for a long, long time. Most people cannot stand alone in the demanding realm of the impossible. So, they live in the lesser world of fantasies and musings and unfulfilled hopeful wishes. And that is the hard truth of life.
Understand that you form a working relationship to the impossible, and just wishing and hoping is not enough. You have to act. You have to bring forth the impossible and give it life. The impossible requires vigilance and dedicated attention and constant courageous choices as well as a willingness to allow your life to change in impossible directions. People continually approach life with habitual attitudes while expecting outcomes to be different. Changing your relationship to the impossible means awakening to some other way of being. Not simply doing things differently, but becoming a different person, both more aware and more alert in life. Such an individual awakening doesn’t just happen; an immersion of sorts is required as well as a genuine reflection that allows the possibility of the impossible to rise to the surface. The baptism takes place under the water and no one actually sees the change that occurs.
There are the subtleties and surprises on any path and only after traveling far can we hear and understand. At the far end of our waking and walking, of our worrying and working, when we realize that there are no shortcuts, it is in the willingness to surrender that allows the pilgrimage to the self to being and the willingness to be vulnerable that allows the impossible to be reached. The impossible happens on the level of the gesture. It’s one person doing one thing differently than he or she did before. It’s the man who opts not to invite his abusive mother to his wedding; the woman who decides to spend her Saturday mornings in a drawing class instead of scrubbing toilets at home; the parent who takes a deep breath instead of throwing a plate. The impossible is there. It’s our task. Doing the impossible will give us clarity and strength. It will bring us closer to whom we hope to be.
Developing a relationship to the impossible kicked my butt five ways from Sunday. But when the troubles get deep enough, when the problems become greater than us, when the weight of the world is on our shoulders, the impossible can offer more ways to proceed that the more narrow paths of logic and reason. For there is thought in the heart and it is connected to the deeper power of humanity, the power of the impossible.
The zombie apocalypse is imminent. Or so it seems since we have already had earthquakes, hurricanes, melting ice caps, famine and pestilence and that is just what happened recently!
It appears to be our entire mutual fate to be living during a time of great upheaval and sweeping change. When the story of the world becomes less clear it is the unfolding of the inner life that might provide the best way to proceed. The telling of myths, folk tales and fairy tales became a source in my Scot Irish family as a way to face great obstacles and impossible tasks because the examples of the heroines and heroes and the hope they seemed to always have. In every case, something goes terribly wrong – but something even bigger goes right.
The origin myth of Pandora’s box, written by Hesiod in about 800 B.C., is one of my favorites because it was one way to explain how all the evils came about in the world. Zeus gives a wedding present, a box, to Pandora, the first mortal woman on earth. Zeus does not tell Pandora what is in the box, but gives her strict instructions not to open it. What a set up! Somehow Pandora manages to wait a year, at which point her curiosity gets the best of her, and she opens the box. The lid flies open and all the evils and miseries of the world bolt out: hate, violence, sorrow, ignorance, jealousy, and sadness. Pandora manages to shut the box, leaving only Hope who is hiding under the lid. This old myth teaches us that all the ills and ailments, all the scandals and betrayals and the rampant dishonesty must be faced before the hidden hope of life can be found again. It’s as if things must become hopeless before a deeper sense of hope can return from the depths of the human heart. This level of hope includes a darker knowledge of the world and a sharper insight into one’s own soul.
Hope is found, not by clinging to old dreams or by denying despair, but by surviving it. When life becomes darkest the eye of the soul begins to see. “Hope springs eternal” when people begin to see beyond the parade of facts and the litanies of ideologies and learn to trust the deeper values of individual life as well as the underlying truths of human culture. Great crises are not solved by simply conserving assets, but by finding inner resources that are hidden from sight.
All shamans, mystics, Buddha, yogis and saints have said the same thing: answers to our questions come from looking within and in our stillness we find hope.
Hope is a bright star in a hopelessly dark universe. Through light years of distance, the brightness fills our inner selves. Hope is not just an emotion; it is a promise that smiling and laughter are just around the corner. When the fighter has been laid on the canvas by a well placed right to the jaw, hope is there saying, “Get up. Take a nine count if you must, but be ready to stand, and have the ref dust off your gloves. You’re going to win this match.” Hope is drawn to the person who sees beyond the present defeat, beyond the moment of being cast down, beyond the loss of the job, and beyond the negative words of hopeless voices. There is that voice from the “bright star” telling us to look beyond the darkness – to the bright light of hope.
In the end, Pandora hears a faint voice in the box and when she lifts the lid she finds hope, releasing it into the world. And everywhere evil goes, hope goes too. And all that is touched by evil – so too is touched by hope.
It seems to be our mutual fate to be living during a time of great upheaval and sweeping crisis. The glue that once held our society together is dissolving. Many of us are stranded, trying to fathom what our lives mean after all the difficulties we have gone through. We are left standing in the rubble after a hurricane or trying to pick up the pieces after a divorce. We are not able to control the forces or people that cause suffering, but we can determine what the pain and suffering do to us and what we become because of it. The answers are within us, not outside of us, and those answers will give us insight into what’s next for us and give us the hope to go on.
