Yesterday we had an assignment in class to create a mask that represented an archetype. I had already done some reflection and research and chosen a phoenix as my archetype.
Currently in analysis I've found different patterns and themes emerging. I wanted the subject I chose for my mask to honor those themes. I am no longer the vulnerable child, the victim, the martyr, or the wanderer. The phoenix spoke to the gathering of competency, vitality, and the work I'm currently adding to the momentum in my life.
Last night I attended the first Dream Patterning class from the Assisi Institute that I've attended in over a year. I took more notes had more new thoughts than I have had in a very long time. That's really saying something considering I'm in full-time graduate school right now. I felt ashes alight. I felt fire in the head.
Today I was pondering my future education and career and came across this bit of poetry on a Jungian website:
Hunting the Phoenix
Leaf through discolored manuscripts,
make sure no words
lie thirsting, bleeding
waiting for rescue. No:
old loves half-
articulated, moments forced
out of the stream of perception
to play 'statue',
and never released-
they had no blood to shed.
you must seek
the ashy nest itself
if you hope to find
charred feather, smouldering flightbones,
and a twist of singing flame
rekindling.
~ Denise Levertov,
Breathing the Water 1987
