Homing: Returning to oneself

There is a human time and there is a wild time. (Pinkola, 1992)

There is a tale, that is captured in the book Women Who Run with the Wolves, that came to me just at the right time, in the right place.

It is a magical tale. About a seal-woman, half-seal and half-woman.

"... atop the mighty rock danced a small group of women, naked as the first day they lay upon their mothers´ bellies... The women were like beings mad of moon milk, and their skin shimmered with little P

silver dots like those on the salmon in

Photo: Lovis Somer, Algarve

springtime and the women´s feet and hands were long and graceful."

The lonely man, the lonely watcher, then stole one woman´s sealskin, before she could dive back into the ocean, back into the underworld, where she belonged. He insists she marries him and asks for seven summers before her sealskin would return.

But he was selfish, and his intentions went ill, for he wanted to keep her for himself.

She partakes in life on land and grows more sorrowful each year. They have a son, named Ooruk, who one day, discovers her seal-skin and finds it in his heart, to give it to his mother. She is ecstatic and returns back to the underworld, back to her kin, back where she belongs, and never returns.

Her son travels back and forth, from land to sea, from sea to land. For he can be in both worlds, but never too long in either.

Being back in this industrial world, where the flowers only grow in cracks of the sidewalks, has affected my spirit deeply. I have let myself be swallowed by it, the unnatural cycles of this society. For the past year, I have lost a sense of who I truly am, trying to fit in the boxes this old world has created for us. When all I have ever done, was get myself out of it. But this time, this time was different. My head was spinning from the tasks I had to accomplish, the relationships I had to maintain, my health that was asking for my attention, and I had a future I had to plan out. I had to build something, a house, a hub, a career. And if I could have, I would have had my life planned out down to the minute over the next five years.

And I lost my appetite for life. Very eat, pray, love, I know. But it happened. I had lost my sense of self and for the first time, I didn´t have any clue how to get her back.

I then, as a last resource, picked up my old book again, and began reading the chapter "Homing: returning to oneself".

I have lost my sealskin, my soul-skin. The skin that connects me back to the underworld, the wild world. "The soul-skin vanishes when we fail to pay attention to what we are really doing, and particularly its cost... We lose it, by becoming too involved with ego, by being too exacting, and perfectionistic. A blind ambition and being dissatisfied, doing nothing about it.", the book says. photo: Lovis Somer

She explains that, like in the tale, the lonely hunter who steals the seal-skin, it is not exactly the rightness of a person or a thing or its wrongness that causes the theft of our soulskins, it is the cost of these things to us.

"It is what it costs us in time, energy, observation, attention, hovering... These motions of the psyche are like cash withdrawals from the psychic savings account. It is being overdrawn that causes the loss of the skin. It is the lack of further deposits of energy, knowledge, ideas, and excitement that cause a woman she is psychically dying."

I, and I think like many other women, have overdrawn from my psychic savings account. Always on the get-go, forcing myself to be in the winner's lane. The only thing on my mind was, "how do I succeed?". How do I succeed in this life? And the fear crept through me, like a deadly virus eating up my psyche. When I was trying more to be like them, and less like me.

Deep down, I knew something was far off. Deep down, I knew, I did not belong here, in this corporate world, where they teach you how to be a good servant of the system. I felt like I was drowning and I wanted to go back home. But where is home? And how do I get there? Back with my kin, back in the underworld, where she comes home at the end of the tale.

That´s where I wanted to be.

"Nothing makes the light, the wonder, the treasure stand out so well as in darkness." Pinkola (1992)

But I needed it to be so dark so that I could learn how to switch on the light again. Pinkola writes, that there are many ways to come back home.

"Many are mundane, some are divine. Rereading passages of books and single poems that have touched them. Spending even a few minutes near a river, a stream, a creek. Lying on the ground in dappled light. Being with a loved one. Sitting on the porch shelling something, knitting something, peeling something. Walking or driving for an hour, in any direction, then returning. Praying. A special friend. Sitting down by a window and writing. Sitting in a circle of trees. Beholding beauty, grace, the touching frailty of human beings."

During my re-reading of this chapter, I decided to retailor my time and energy, so that it would nourish my creative fire again. So, that I come back to life again. So, that I can give from a cup overflowing, not leaking out. Traveling to the ocean, to the mountains,

photo: Sarah Olsonss

writing poetry, reading my favorite books, meditating, yoga, photography, filmmaking, and creating art. That is where I am home.

Even though my journey is different from all other women, we have these things in common. We sometimes forget, to come back home. Whatever that means to each and every single one of us. To take the time for ourselves and really go deep down inside, where the wild woman awaits. And she is singing our songs and hearing our prayers. For only there, our next steps can be revealed. Only there, we can come back home.