“In exile, we must do as the goddess Innana did, surrendering layer after layer of armour and adornment, until we are bare. We must then undergo a symbolic death of the old life in order to be reborn with greater resilience and a holy assignment to carry forward.
The initiated adult has learned to withstand uncertainty, has paid a debt to the gods through his loss and his grief, and has decided to make beauty with his life as the future ancestor that he is.”
Excerpt from Belonging: Remembering Ourselves Home by Toko-pa Turner
The real aim of any pilgrimage is to arrive at the place of the deep self and soul. And all those holy places outside us are at some level symbolic of the holy place inside ourselves that we are intended to find on this strange journey of life. There may be a great…