Thar Be Beasties!

“Aye! Ya canna go there,” the grizzled, old mariner said. “Ya sail west you’ll find beasties that’ll eet ya!”

We smile when we read about the myth of the flat Earth with monsters at the edge awaiting some hapless ship. How quaint and, well, ignorant.

It’s kind of interesting that we tend to mythologize things that we are ignorant about. I read that there were actually people in the early days of space exploration who wondered whether or not we would actually find Heaven.

Until we explore, the unknown can become a larger-than-life Beastie waiting to consume and destroy.

The unknown doesn’t need to be “somewhere out there”; over the rainbow. It can hide deep within. Somewhere in the dark crevasses of our heart there linger creatures with sharp, knife-like teeth and 6″ claws waiting to rip us apart and discard our hearts like so much refuse.

At least, that’s what it can feel like.

Emotions and passions steam and roil like liquid in a witch’s cauldron. “Eye of newt, tongue of bat, and a drop of virgin’s blood.” Ha ha ha!!!

What would happen, though, if we actually set our rudder Inward? Rather than searching the heavens or travelling to the edge of the world to find truth, we set a course for the deepest recesses of our own heart? Would we find beasties there just waiting to rip us apart? Would we find some kind of Heaven with angelic choruses singing Beethoven?

Or, would we find a light? Gentle as a child who needs to be held and honored and cherished? Please don’t misunderstand me. I’m not advocating for that ‘Inner Child,’ New Age stuff. But, I am calling for an interior reckoning that so few of us undertake.

My own recent experiences with emotional upheaval, (more like 9.2 quake followed by 50 ft. tsunami), bears some of this out. I am beginning to understand that as much as I really need a person in whom I can confide and share my thoughts and feelings with, I am also required to do the hard and necessary interior explorations.

Yeah, there may be beasties in there. I need to confront those and deal with them. But, who knows? Maybe in the end I’ll find the lurking dragons more like “Puff” than Godzilla.