Dear Soul Artist,

Once and Forever

I am out to dinner with my new friend James, the Physicist. It is Tuesday. We’re relaxed and chatty at a table laden with $2 tacos. Casually, he tells me that he understands how we came into existence. The “origin of the universe” is something he has studied with scientific rigor. I am always impressed and try to keep up while he explains things like The Drake Equation and The Law of Large Numbers. He knows how it all happened and how it works. He is also pretty sure how everything will end. I wipe the salsa from my lip and lean in with a smile. “You know how,” I offer willingly, “but do you know why?”

That is the one question for which he has no answer. He tells me that it makes his brilliant head hurt to wonder why. Enter Mythology. Our ancestors approached the existential mysteries of the universe – of life – with story and symbol. Creation Mythology plays the question, “Why?” like a tribal symphony – like a Grateful Dead jam – with melodies swirling, spiralling through the chaos and glory of the cosmos. We dance barefoot to the meaning inside of the not-knowing. The dance is sacred medicine. It makes the headache go away.

Poetic oral traditions weave their curiosity through generations. They move human consciousness from the dark primordial waters to the womb of the archetypal Mother. There, the great cosmic egg – the seed of potential – germinates. Eventually, desire is born from an impulse. From desire, a sound. The Word: naming and forming the myriad thoughts and expressions of creation. Then the chorus slides into a silent dissolution, where everything folds back into the question. There, a new seed grows from a single syllable into a mantra. It rises into an echoing refrain. The ecstatic dance resumes. The music never stopped.

In this issue, you can find blaring evidence and secret intimations that define our place in the cosmos. Sacred spaces that invite you to wonder. You will find people who remember. Those who return to their roots, breathe, move, paint and make music for personal healing and global connection. And you might find meaning.

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Once and forever, there are dragons and circles and archetypal deities.

Nature is revered as our Mother, the womb and tomb of all things. Kashmir Tantra presents an origin story of emanation, whereby all things proceed from one infinite reality: the cosmic dance of Shiva (auspicious stillness) and Shakti(manifesting power).

Meanwhile a Navajo creation myth, Diné Bahaneʼ spans mystical worlds, invokes numerous spirits and celebrates multiple symbolic events. It tells the human story – one of emergence, transformation and the perpetual quest for hózhó (beauty and harmony).

Every story has a beginning.

This is ours.

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Once and Forever

ORIGINS