The Lair of the Beast
Week 24
The sweet aromas of The Kiss quickly dissipated. The cleanliness of my body and the peace of my mind slowly transformed into something much more grimy and oily as soon as I began walking down a fiery corridor to what I knew to be my final test of these depths. With each step that I took alongside my ass the air grew denser and more impossible to walk through. The air was thick of soot and smoke and dust. I was walking toward my own personal Inferno. As a super fan of Dante Alighieri, and having just gone through the colosseum of the mind via his guidance, I was thrilled and terrified that I was going to need to face my own equivalent of Satan…or something like that? My sword of Truth was glowing a perfect pink. I knew some sort of confrontation was ahead, though I was in no rush at all.
As I came to an opening, I watched the fog that had concealed the rock faces fall sharply off of a ledge and in the distance heard footsteps of an ancient beast. I couldn’t see it yet, but I could hear the stomps and the moans and the gurgling that could only stem from a most wicked monster. I hid my Self in the darkness of the cave I had walked through and awaited this beast carefully. I noticed that before I had even laid eyes on this entity that the grasp of fear had already begun taking hold. I was having all sorts of ideas of what the beast was going to look like, and how I was going to feel in it’s presence, and also how I was supposed to defeat it. These were all conventional and sheepish ideas that I had either read in books or seen in movies. None of the projections of my mind were creative or flexible. I tried desperately to stop thinking like a follower. I tried desperately to stop thinking like a lamb.
The stress that arose in me in waiting was a similar type of stress that I was used to while I followed updates on the war, or celebrity, or social media. It was a low frequency hum or constant anxiety and it was eating away at me and making me, embarrassingly enough, beg for access to my phone. All I wanted to do was to take a break and not have to deal with this right now. I wanted to go back to the women and to the distractions. I wanted to continue my ambitious climb to the top of the hierarchy of art and music. People really should know my name, I thought. I wanted to take a selfie in this towering inferno and send it to some of my friends so they could picture to themselves how brave and courageous I was. I needed other people to envision me as someone who has defeated the beast, though I had yet to be in the presence of it. I wanted to focus on my wants and desires and passions. I wanted and wished so much not to have to face whatever was lurking beneath the magma. I knew it would have the power to break me and to kill my mind. I knew that each moment I chose to underestimate this monster was a moment that could be turned immediately against me and could ultimately be the definitive moment of my death. I am a lover, not a fighter! War? I didn’t want to do it and I didn’t think I was strong enough…
Until I saw it’s horns rise from the depths. I stood in the darkness and watched it rise ever so slowly. This was my time. Holy Shit, this is my time!
