Person, Place or Thing? #226

Our words may hold the shading effect of our experiences, but we are not limited to what has been living there nor how it has felt. A part of changing ourselves is found in transforming how we have viewed our terms as they relate to and reflect what we believe about ourselves. For example, flowers can be the symbol for the wins in our lives while weeds can be the example for what hasn’t gone right, or a tree can be an individual while a forest is a family, friends and or a community. The idea of those items helps us to visualize ourselves as well as our moments and just as their rides take them through the processes of becoming, fading and moving again, the reverberations of our encounters do the same thing depending upon what we keep our focus on as well as what our expectations of just right are. What makes epic tales grand is the characters and their adventures along the way but if we removed the specific details and the symbolism that provides the imagery, those narratives would still be the stories of the kind of lives where individuals are experiencing failures and wins on their journeys, just like us, although without the exciting presence of mystical creatures. It’s that authenticity of the characters that we understand, connect to and love even when a storyline involves fantastically made-up things. After all, a dragon in an account could actually be the representation of the power of emotions like fear or anger and our need to defeat the control either has on us, or it could be the example of the strength that addiction has and how impossible it feels to overcome it in another. In other words, our dreaded “f” moments that feel like the weight of the world and feed the hell in us can be viewed as weeds in a different truth, where they are an important part of the process leading to positive outcomes that are not always just right and rarely in the time that we would like. In the picture with the blog today, do you see a person, place or thing? Are you able to see something other than what you initially thought of? Could it be an example of a sometime warrior in the weeds? Or are you only focused on what you believe is failed in the illustration? Words matter in the telling of epic tales because of what they invoke in us just as they do in our very own storylines. The limitations that we set on defining what has been for us prevents our movement on our journeys, exactly what we don’t want, but we can expand our field of view and encourage hope as a feeling to keep us going towards whatever goals we need to get to. How would you feel if your favorite character sat down, refusing to go on, after not slaying a mystical beast on the first try or if it took longer than he or she wanted it to or there were still more to overcome? When you think about what you believe about yourself, what person, place or thing best represents your imagery? What would you then use as an example of your moments? This is me and in my particularly fantastic narrative there have been falls, tricky substances, cliff hanging, “flipping out” as well as death and anyone of those things could be depicted as mystical beasts or darkness or trees or flowers along my journey. To some however, in a limited view of my story, it has seemed as if I have simply been in the weeds when I could have chosen to change locations rather than stay there. Epic tales, though, are always about rides where failure is a part of success, courage walks hand in hand with fear, love and safety evolve through the storyline and a loss is still a win although its form isn’t what was hoped for. Have the best day POSSIBLE for you and when you tell your story, make sure you don’t limit your narrative especially when you say it to yourself. Love Always, Heavell