The other night I dreamed that I was wearing a pasta strainer on my head as a hat. I hadn’t put the pasta strainer on myself. It was placed on my head. And I knew how ridiculous it was and yet everyone was insisting I had such a beautiful crown.
I was persistently asking to take it off, I was trying to explain that this was not a proper crown, it wasn’t even a hat! It was a PASTA STRAINER!
It was in fact the blue plastic one from my furnished apartment here in Tuscany. It wasn’t even my own pasta strainer but something borrowed.
“Oh but it’s so beautiful” the people cooed.
“Oh but it suits you just perfectly!” they fawned.
“What do you mean it’s a pasta strainer? Silly girl what are you going on about? It’s such a lovely crown.” They said.
But I knew.
I knew what was sitting upon my head and I was not amused I was troubled.
The blue pasta strainer, acting as a hat was a very poor replacement for something I knew was rightfully mine. It was a shoddy replacement for something my soul was craving, for something that I knew I was meant to have.
It was such an absurd falsity, such a shoddy imitation and I was not only troubled that I was being told to wear it but I was troubled by the delusion of everyone around me trying to convince me that it was “just fine” and “would do perfectly” and that it was “enough.”
I woke up with a clarity in my heart and a story on my mind.
I’ve been sitting with a particular body of stories for many many months. I’ve been asking them before I speak to tell me what they want me to know. I’ve been pulling on their threads and waiting in hopeful expectation. I’ve pled my fidelity and given them the silence to speak.
And this story Valemon the Bear was alive for me the morning after this “pasta strainer as a hat” foolish dream.
Valemon the White Bear is a story about human longing. It is a story about divine birth right. It is a tale about what happens when you encounter the “Oneness” or “Presence” with a capital P and how after you’ve been in that particular arena there’s no going back to the status quo.
This old wonder tale is a reminder that have the fullness of life we seek will demand an inner marriage an union with shadowy parts of ourselves. And that life will demand something of us in return if we’re to move closer to this “self-actualization.”
When we are young we encounter the divine more easily. We are regularly and often awestruck. The miracle of life itself is not lost on us and there is a sense that something otherworldly and magical is always afoot.
Our young minds move easily between worlds. And symbolic language which is our “mother tongue” (Clarissa Pinkola Èstes) slips more easily from our lips.
We have a more easeful relationship with the wild side of the universe. Something wholly untamed remains and dances with the rational self that is still being formed.
We stand as beings with one foot in the forest and one in the village tossing a golden ball to and fro with a piece of ourselves that can never be made completely sophisticated and demure, a popular word these days.
Somewhere along the way the ball is dropped into a deep well and lost. Somewhere along the way in our careers, the business of family life, or after years of socialization that teaches us that dream language and story is for the birds and only rationalism will do, the candle is dimmed, we leave our relationship with the wild and divine side, we repress our wild twin, and we end up wandering the earthly plane of our existence in our ordinary lives feeling limited, starved, aching with longing, and dulled.
This is when life becomes dreary.
The light in the hermit’s hut goes out in the earthly church” -Hafiz
This is often we find ourselves trying to lose ourselves in the bottle, in a myriad of distractions, in anything that can make us feel that central aliveness again.
Sometimes we try to fulfill that ancient longing in another body and for a moment it can feel like we’re again touching that divine “thing,” but it is never permanent.
This story is a reminder to never be satisfied with the pasta strainer crown but to persist in your pursuit of what you know to be true.
To hold the illuminating moment close in times of trouble. And to be willing to do what you need to do to climb the glass mountain.
I could write a small book on this story alone. On the lifted candle, a chapter on the glass mountain, on the horned one that is also you. But for now, for this time and place I want to let the story do its revealing and reveling in you. And for you to ask your own very good questions.
And may you not receive “answers” but perhaps only an inkling to ask an even better question.
This story was recorded live on a retreat in Tuscany The Mythic Heart. There may be a swear word or two. Sometimes when it’s a very big story I get a little excited. But I hope you enjoy this live telling and the sounds of Italy in the background.
Please enjoy the story. And next week I will provide some further commentary and another story deeply connected to this one.
With all my love,
Selena
Beautiful!!