Stripped: On the Necessity of the Dark

Initiation. I have been hearing this word used so frequently in conversations, on social media, and in the circles of those on the path of spirituality and healing work. We talk about having initiatory experiences, overcoming a challenge, or a moment when we feel things change in our lives, and we say 'it was such an initiation.' And yes, initiations can take so many forms. Yet I can't help but notice that the heart of the experience of initiation is one that many people seem to want to bypass, in the constant bombardment of love-and-light spirituality, rise-above-it positive mentality thought work, and all the voices saying you 'really can have everything you want.' We forget about the power of the darkness. The necessity of the moment of descent. The way that the map of initiation always includes a place of not knowing, fumbling around in the unformed middle, confusion, doubt, and yes, despair. There's an old saying: 'If you do not bring back gifts for your people, the initiation was not complete.' So as we, as Westerners, hold the word initiation in our mouths and turn it over with our tongues, and talk about the importance of becoming initiated adults, I suggest that we take it a little deeper. That we pull back the curtain of time and look at the mythological map left for us by our ancestors. Most cultures, maybe all of them, have stories and myths of women entering the underworld. These old stories, set aside as no longer relevant, closed up behind the doors of insignificance through the branding of 'fairy tale,' stripped of their power by our lack of reverence, have so much to tell us. One of the oldest recorded stories is the myth of Inanna, from ancient Mesopotamia. Inanna is the Queen of Heaven and Earth. She has everything one could ever desire, except for one thing: one person, her sister Ereshkigal. Inanna decides to defy the will of her father and her husband and willingly go through the doors of hell to the underworld. She must pass through seven gates on her journey, and at each gate, something precious to her is taken. Her crown, her scepter, her jewels, her breastplate: each one of these items signifies the loss of the orienting reality around which she knows herself and her power. At each gate, she has the same response to the loss of her precious objects: 'What's this?!' She feels the absolute surprise of being stripped, of losing her sense of orientation. Do you know this feeling? Have you been stripped of everything you once knew yourself to be? Have you walked alone on the road to hell with only your sense of knowing that there is something waiting for you, someone waiting for you... So now I'm speaking in metaphor. Now I am leaning in to whisper in your ear that the one who is waiting for you past all the gates of initiation and fear isyou. Seeds of the Sacred is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. How is it, beyond all wonders of wonders, that we, as twenty-first-century women living in the West, in the wreckage of disconnection from our ancestral wisdom, in the shrapnel yard of late-stage capitalism, can hear a story four thousand years old or more and know that it is about us? You see, this is the thing about myth. It is ageless and timeless, and when received in the right moment by the one with open, listening ears, it rings true in the heart like the sweetest bell, whose sound is so pure and true that it can break all the gates of calcification that have formed around your heart, and leave you gasping, hands clenched to your chest, afraid that your heart may just decide to hop out of your body and do some kind of wild, erotic dance of the seven veils. I've been tracking stories for a long time. I am the daughter of a storyteller, and I consider that among one of the greatest fortunes of my life. I spent my childhood in a nest of stories, not only the stories of my father, but of his many storyteller friends and a community who taught me, without ever using words to tell me this, that stories matter. In the old way of carrying stories, it was believed that they are living, sentient beings, to be held and treasured like kin, like a loved one. We feed the stories by telling them, by keeping them alive, never forgetting that they are the wisdom keepers of our culture. The stories seem to know when they are needed, and enter into our lives at the right place and the right time to bring their good medicine into our hearts and minds. The story of Inanna's descent is living proof of that truth in my life. This was not a story I heard in my childhood, though I knew of it from my teenage years of dabbling in goddess lore and witchcraft — child of the '90s here, thank you,The Craft. But Inanna's story of descent and rising came into my world like a lightning bolt at one of the darkest times of my life. You see, I was descending. My marriage had ended in horrific, brutal betrayal and trauma. I was in my late thirties, never having lived alone, never having been unpartnered. And to thicken the plot, I was drinking again after years of continuous sobriety. My daughter had moved out on her own for the first time, and I found myself stripped, utterly broken open. All the waypoints I had relied on to tell me who I am and what my worth in the world is seemed to suddenly disappear in one night. And then, rising out of the tides of history, this story landed in my hands in the form of Carly Mountain's book,Descent and Rising, at a time I truly did not know if I would ever rise again. So I told you that Inanna descends to hell. I told you that she does this of her own free will, and that she is stripped of everything she knows in the process. What I didn't tell you yet, though many of you may know the story already, is that Inanna is not welcomed by her sister. Inanna is killed and hung on a meat hook in the deepest realms of hell for three days. This, my friends, isinitiation. There is so much more to the story. I highly suggest reading Carly Mountain'sDescent and Risingif your interest is piqued by this article, and perhaps I'll revisit this territory at a later date. Inanna does not get off the hook by herself. She does not make it out of there on her own. She is saved by her handmaiden, who summons help from beyond to go down there and set her free. This, too, weaves itself so gently and truly into the arc and fold of story. When we descend into the dark woods, the valley of the shadow, we must be brave enough to walk the territory to its completion. But the truth is, we are not going to get out of there alone. In intact cultures that still practice initiatory rites, and in well-held initiation happening in the West, there is always an element of community. The seeker leaves community to go out into the dark forest of initiation, and the seeker is received back by that community, carrying gifts to share with the world. Our descent into the underworld is not only for us. It is for our people. And it is this truth, that each one of us must enter into our own territory of descent, and through that be made whole as the one we were born to be. We are then returned to life carrying the gifts that only we can carry; that is the driving force underneath all of the work that I do in this world. It is the driving force because it is what we are here for. It is what I experienced in my own life, and after all, that is the only story I really have to share. I am a woman who walked the road to hell, was lost in the darkness, initiated into wholeness, and came up through those dark gates back to the land of the sun, carrying the gifts that I can carry, to give to the world. What dark shadows have you walked through? What gifts are you carrying to give the world? Where in the story do you find yourself? If you've made it this far, thank you so much for traveling with me through this rather long and wordy article. I wrote this piece while walking my mother's dog underneath a canopy of big-leaf maples, seeing the largest wasp nest I've ever seen in my life, and being utterly besotted by the smell of the forest after rainfall. As I spoke these words into my phone, I thought of you. Maybe not you individually, because I may not know you, but I thought of you who also has this very human longing to live a life filled with purpose and richness. And a smile comes to my face as I think of you. I know we are all woven together into this wild ride we call life, our own personal descents and risings, and I'm grateful to know you're there. I'm grateful for the web of kinship that holds us together. I'm so grateful that you are here, reading these words. If something in this article touched something in you, I would ask that you please take the time to leave a comment or a like, or send this to a loved one. This work is an offering from my heart, and my heart wants it to be shared with the world, and you, my friend, could make that dream come true today. So bless you in your way of being. Bless you as you walk this road of life. Holding a lamp in my heart for you, friends. Holding a lamp in my heart. I offer individual Depth Coaching and Soul Guidance work for women. Explore links here if you feel a call to go deeper in to your own story of descent and rising. Explore the Spiral Path Begin with a Threshold Session Seeds of the Sacred is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.