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Dancing Hearts and The Laughter of Daisies
The night was so very still that one should have been able to hear the whisper of roses in blossom — the laughter of daisies — the piping of grasses — many sweet sounds, all tangled up together. The beauty of moonlight on familiar fields irradiated the world.
— L.M. Montgomery
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Anthropologists describe a condition among “primitive” peoples called “loss of soul.” In this condition a man is out of himself, unable to find either the outer connection between humans or the innerconnection to himself. He is unable to take part in his society, its rituals, and traditions. They are dead to him, he to them. His connection to family, totem, nature, is gone. Until he regains his soul he is not a true human. He is “not there.” It is as if he had never been initiated, been given a name, come into real being…Without this soul, he has lost the sense of belonging and the sense of being in communion with the powers and the gods. They no longer reach him; he cannot pray, nor sacrifice, nor dance. His personal myth and his connection to the larger myth of his people, as raison d’etre, is lost…He may even die…
Hillman, A Blue Fire
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Our job is not to comprehend or control everything, but to learn which story we are in and which of the many things calling out in…
