Dearest dancing monks, artists, and pilgrims,
Easter blessings my friends!
We are in the midst of extraordinarily difficult and cruel times and it is essential we do not bypass the profound sacred grief and holy rage we feel. Easter is not about denying these realities. Easter also celebrates how in the midst of our struggles and losses, sometimes life has a way of breaking us open to something new. It calls us to hold fast to life in the midst of so much death.
Easter invites us to cling tightly to kindness and empathy in the midst of cruelty, to inhabit hope when despair and cynicism is thick in the air, to reach toward others when we feel isolated and alone, to find moments of joy and pleasure when your heart is overwhelmed.
The practice of resurrection means to keep community, friendship, and radical hospitality central and to cherish life in all of its beauty and delight that still erupts around us when we pay attention. The contemplative path is one lived in resistance to the dominant paradigm, slowing down and valuing ourselves and others not according to our productivity but to our Divine belovedness, lavishing our full attention on another person, being present to the beauty of a flock of birds moving across the sky, these are essential always, but especially now. We must cultivate joy, which is different than the fleeting nature of happiness. Joy is deeply rooted in a sense of trust that the Beloved desires this for us and has given us life to wonder at creation and make sure all bodies and beings have access to joy. Joy does not deny pain, it helps us to endure life’s difficulties.
I have had ongoing health challenges all of my adult life which intensified for the last few years after I entered menopause. I found myself drained by pain and fatigue. My joy was diminished by the burden of it.
Two winters ago, out of the womb of fertile darkness, a fairy tale emerged. First it was just the skeleton of a story about the journey to retrieve joy. It had a troll and a dragon, a medicine woman and a wise one, a canine companion, and the protagonist, Sophia. These characters began to dance in my heart.
Over a few months and into the following summer, the story grew. I take baths most mornings and in that warm cocoon of rest, I would go on journeys in my imagination which worked their way into the story. Even in the midst of illness, I could go on inner adventures and these journeys always delivered me back to joy. The creation of the story about retrieving joy, brought me so much joy in writing it.
I consider myself primarily a poet and writer of nonfiction. So when the fairy tale arrived it surprised me. And yet I have loved fairy tales for many years, finding in them such depth of wisdom when I take time to really inhabit their worlds.
I told the story to friends, and they would have tears in their eyes as I reached the end. It felt like there was something here for more than just me.
I had been following Domenique Serftonein’s work at The Maiden Moose on Instagram for a while. She is an illustrator based in Ireland and I felt she would be perfect to illuminate this story. I was so delighted when she said yes. Over this past winter, each week she would send me sketches and then full color versions of each of the images. More joy came with each email and file opened.
Fairy tales are about transformation. The protagonist is in a different situation by the end of the story from where they started. Stories can act as metaphors for the things we are struggling with. Fairy tales offer us hope and give us maps to transform from victim of our lives, to empowered sovereign of our stories.
Now, Journey to Joy is published and I can share the joy with you!
This isn’t explicitly an Easter story per se, but it is a story about the journey to resurrection in the midst of challenging circumstances.
Fairy tales have a decidedly spiritual function because they enable us to embody new ways to live and interact with a world that is beyond us. Fairy tales are about transformation and teach us to never give up hope in impossible situations. They invite us in through their simplicity and symbolism, so we can project ourselves onto the story, and help us to be transformed as well.
My hope in sharing this story is that you read it with an open heart and find yourself in its midst. Sophia, the main character, goes on journeys shaped by the four seasons to claim her song, her power, her wholeness, and her ancestral wisdom.
My deepest desire is for you to go on the initiations Sophia has to endure so that you might find ways to welcome more joy back into your life.
You can order the book on Amazon. We eventually hope to have it available on other booksellers and know that Amazon has lots of issues, but for self- and on demand publishing it is one of the easiest ways to release your work into the world.
I will also be leading a Journey to Joy online mini-retreat over the summer solstice and will be joined by the delightful Te Martin who will be creating songs for this journey.
Joyful blessings!
With great and growing love,
Christine
Christine Valters Paintner, OblSB, PhD, REACE
