I Run Because I Am Afraid

This session of creative writing is focused on writing from the energy of the seven muses. Christopher Vogler writes, “Archetypes/Muses are part of the universal language of storytelling and command of their ENERGY is as essential to the writer as breathing.” Each week I will pick a muse and write from its energy. These are the seven muses: Child, Virgin/Maiden, Mother, Siren/Seductress/Whore, Huntress, Crone/Hag/Witch, and Medusa. Can you guess which muse is this week’s?

Long-running strides, rushing through the foliage of life. I feel the beat of my heart. I breathe the air deep into my lungs. They are filled to capacity. The blood is coursing through my veins pumping oxygen to every cell of my being. I love my strength. I love my suppleness. I love my body. I push it hard. I am demanding of it. It serves me well. I feel at home in it, testing the limits of my physical capacity. Reveling in what is possible when I challenge myself.

I love the feeling of being spent. All consumed. Nothing left. There is a quiet peace in that space that I can sparingly tolerate. Glimpses of the gap that takes me out of my physicality and into realms that I don’t understand and don’t want to know. I like the concrete and the surface. I find safety in the physical form as transient as it is and as fragile as it may be.

I face the dangers of life head-on, but not the mystery. Give me a challenge that I can conquer, not one that I cannot know. I play in the sun, dance with the stars, run with the clouds, and frolic with the creatures. Flowers adorn my skin as the sun soaks into the already brown layers burnishing them further until a sweet aroma of honey and oak permeates the air. I enjoy the sensual pleasures of feeling my feet on the warm soft loamy soil full of worms, ants, termites, and millipedes. I am not opposed to an insect snack. Berries are my love and honeycomb is a delight.

I am blessed with the invincibility that lives in my mind. It keeps me corralled in my zone of safety seemingly challenged by the harshness of survival, but never pushing myself to go beyond what is known. I stay in the familiar where I am dominant. I choose to face the danger of death any day over the quietness of within.

There is a territory that I do not go to. It is not my domain. I inhabit the earth and the flesh. I make peace with mortality, mine and those I devour, but I have my limits. My courage takes me to the edge and then it fails me. It takes me to the abyss but never propels me over. It allows me to see where the division lies, but then it fails.

That would require more than courage. It would require madness, and I am not available for that. I like the comfort of my illusion and will live in the sanity of limitation rather than the insanity of freedom. I let my pragmatism lead the way and am always ready for more as long as it fits within the purview of my senses and doesn’t take me into the abyss. I know one day I will make that crossing, but not without a fight, and not without offering the sacrifice of anyone or anything to give me one more day. I am afraid of the dark night. I am afraid of the soul. I am afraid of what is invisible. I am afraid of what is intangible. I am afraid and that is why I run.

If you would like to listen to the Rewilding Love Podcast, it comes out in serial format. Start with Episode 1 for context. Click here to listen. And, if you would like to dive deeper into the understanding I share along with additional support please check out the Rewilding Community.

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Rohini Ross is co-founder of “The Rewilders.” Listen to her podcast, with her partner Angus Ross, Rewilding Love. They believe too many good relationships fall apart because couples give up thinking their relationship problems can’t be solved. In this season of the Rewilding Love Podcast, Rohini and Angus help a couple on the brink of divorce due to conflict. Angus and Rohini also co-facilitate private couples' intensives that rewild relationships back to their natural state of love. Rohini is also the author of the ebook Marriage, and she and Angus are co-founders of The 29-Day Rewilding Experience and The Rewilding Community. You can follow Rohini on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. To learn more about her work and subscribe to her blog visit: TheRewilders.org.