What steps are you taking to cultivate deep listening and understanding of the symbolic language of spirits or deities?

Jessica Howard, an author and a mentor who has been a practicing witch for over 20 years, joins Lian to explore the experience of feeling a call from a particular spirit, element, deity, or being and the mythical journey it can take you on. Jessica shares her personal journey with water and how she was called to work with the element, and Lian shares her own with the Oak and Rose.

I watched the film ‘Otto Baxter: Not a F***ing Horror Story’ last night – a documentary that follows a film-maker with Down’s syndrome as he makes an autobiographical horror film.

The film he makes is called The Puppet Asylum - it is a reimagining of his own life, from birth as an unwanted, deformed, horned child “The Monster”, through his years in captivity in the ‘Puppet Asylum’ at the mercy of “The Master”, to eventually becoming his own master.

As Jonathan Wilkinson and I were planning the opening ceremony of UNIO, we were looking at our Life’s Work Gene Keys - which is one of the many magical ways we’ll be journeying into the Great Work with our students this month.

One of the tells of an Old Soul that Jonathan and I have noticed is neurodivergence - such as autism, ADHD, dyslexia, and dyspraxia - it’s not always present but it is more often than not (and when seems it’s not, it’s usually just that it hasn’t been discovered yet).

1. Focusing on searching for new clients rather than whole-heartedly serving the precious clients you already have. 👁️
2. Treating your soul business like a hobby and prioritising everything else in your life over it, and yet, still expecting it to bring the results of a business. 💼

Humans are designed to be endlessly fascinated with and moved by stories… something that this crazy modern world knows and uses to maleficent effect.

Unless we become focused on, even obsessed with, and ultimately devoted to our own story, we will be forever pulled into the stories of a world that is hell bent upon eating itself…

Those who know Jonathan and I at all will know that very little of what we do is on a whim… the curse and blessing of bringing two souls together who are both said to be “over-thinkers” (a description which is often a misunderstanding of the vital deep inner workings of old souls but that’s a story for another time.

The way my daughter moves from voraciously reading (currently the Throne of Glass series of fantasy novels) to devotionally creating from that inspiration is a beautiful reminder of how natural and necessary those cycles of receiving and giving, consuming and creating, are for humans if we are to be in right relationship with ourselves and the world around us, human and otherwise.

An old soul is an individual whose depth and wisdom seems to transcend their chronological age and life experiences.

Recognising yourself as one helps to shine a light on the particular gifts and challenges of being an old soul in this new world and understand the right path for you.

Yesterday, I was thinking of my great uncle George and how unusual interracial marriages were back then in the 40s.

I asked Chris Tyler-Humm if he could find any photos in my mother’s photo albums and bless him, he went rummaging through the albums and sent over some precious photos, as well as an old letter he’d found.

As acclaimed mythologist and author, Michael Meade, said on our recent podcast “Your calling keeps calling.” (Link below.)

I can attest to the truth of that… in two ways:

Firstly, that as much as we might try to dismiss the call to a deeper, more spiritual, more magical, more mythical way of being and working, it will keep calling, for a lifetime if needed, and in ways that are harder and harder to ignore.

It was 6 years ago today that I had the operation that restored enough of my hearing that I can now manage without hearing aids (not that I managed particularly well with them).

It’s easy to take even miracles for granted after a while but I do my best not to

I was with a client this morning supporting her with integrating a deep, difficult plant medicine journey.

I drew a tarot card for her which mirrored symbols that had both shown up in her journey and in a message she’d received when visiting her special tree a few days before.

Hello beautiful soul,

It’s my first day back at work since before Christmas, it’s been a while since I’ve written something like this and there’s been many (many!) changes, within and without, since the last one, and so it felt like it was time to (re-)introduce myself and the work I do.

You’re already doing work that on your best days, you feel fortunate to be doing.

And it’s certainly much better than what you used to do.

But secretly you know… it’s not quite right.

It’s sort of the right direction, it’s sort of the right kind of clients, it’s sort of using your gifts.

As we (Jonathan, the whole team, and I) journey into the evolution of Be Mythical, we have been deep in conversation and contemplation of those words and what we mean by them.

There’s a shadow of both words that we are called to be conscious of, intimate with and responsible for…

(Even and especially if you dismiss the notion of wounds OR feel you’ve already healed)

If you’re a coach, therapist, or practitioner of transformative, healing or spiritual work and…

🩸Despite thinking you’ve already escaped the rat race and are doing your soul work (certainly compared to friends and family, or your past self), you’re still feeling constrained by someone else’s ideas of how to do what you do… maybe your industry’s, coach’s, teacher’s, parents’, or culture’s.

If you dare to follow a winding path through an ancient forest that is overflowing with fae folk if you know how to see them, you will come to a clearing in which there’s an oak door carved with symbols that are strangely familiar though you haven’t seen them before in this life... The door is the enchanted portal to Medicine ‘24, and unseen hands have flung it open.

One of my past teachers once shared a story (which I’ve probably misremembered to some extent - but that’s the way of stories and dreams and how they work through us) of a group of westerners in ceremony with an indigenous shaman, at the end of their time together, the group were bright-eyed, feeling full of power and love, and ready to make a big difference.

This is not something I ever intended to write - the wounded healer is the archetype I’ve spent a lifetime attempting to deny, even just accepting the role of healer has been an excruciating journey, requiring me to let go of everything I had clung to for security and to open to everything I had pushed away for sanity’s sake.