Trust Yourself

Experiencing a Myth Gives You Power

 

When we actually experience a myth, we find power to radically change our lives for the better. Trusting yourself—your instincts, observations, hunches, and musings—is a doorway into mythic realms, making myths not just ideas or stories in the intellect but also visceral experiences.

 

I had a wonderful incident about self-trust and living in myth. It made me so happy that I just have to tell you about it. It also is an example of what I mean by "experiencing myth."

 

My new book is Baba Yaga’s Apprentice: A Faerie Tale Ritual, which you can find at http://stardrenched.com/2017/02/28/baba-yagas-apprentice/

 

The story is about a character I created, whose name is Amanda. Amanda makes wagons—beautiful caravans.

 

I'd wanted to add Baba Yaga to the story. I got to thinking about traditional lore, in which Baba Yaga has two amazing traveling homes. One is a hut on chicken legs, and the other is a mortar and pestle with which she flies through the air. Don't you think that would make her a perfect mentor for someone who builds caravans? So I decided to make Amanda her apprentice.

 

After outlining the story and painting most of the art for the book, I went online to see if there was already a book titled Baba Yaga’s Apprentice. Not that titles can have a copyright, but authors and publishers like to know if any books with the same title as their own exist. It was then that I had a huge, delighted shock: 

 

I found out there is traditional lore about Baba Yaga accepting apprentices. I'd had no idea that Baba Yaga having apprentices is part of the Baba Yaga myth! 

 

It made me so happy! I love love love when we go deeply into ourselves, trust what we find there so let our creativity flow, and later discover we have, by this process, found a universally recognized myth. I think that's so cool! Plus, when this happens, we own the myth in a way we might not have, had someone handed it to us in the first place. And that visceral experience is deep and jubilant.

 

When we own a myth, we find its fullness. It lives and breathes in us, infusing us with joy, vitality, and power. We become more capable of living fully and reaching goals that are important to us.

 

When we honor what we find in ourselves, we touch immense magic and the foundations of reality—for myth is at the core of reality and magic.

 

Reinventing the wheel when it comes to a beautiful myth is not the only way we can own that myth through experiencing it. But self-trust is always in the picture. For example, you might read a myth that calls to your depths. If you trust what you're experiencing at that point, you own that myth! 

 

Another example: I might research a myth a lot. If so, I try to trust the magic and wonder that rises in me in response. Confidence in that magic and wonder allows me to run with them, ritually and creatively. I also try to trust my gut if it says the myth is a bastardization of an earlier version, and that the rewrite was constructed to hide truth(s) that would free us from oppression.

 

Third example: I do little research if I intuit that what I'd learn from research would obscure any traces of what's rising from deep within me about the myth in question. Self-trust plays an important part in that decision to honor my experience. And I figure I can always add mega-research to my process later.

 

I hope to facilitate self-trust, both when I write and when I teach Faerie shamanism in oral tradition. I want you to honor what you find in yourself, so you enjoy maximum power, joy, and beauty. The book will help you do that. Check it out: http://stardrenched.com/2017/02/28/baba-yagas-apprentice/