#15 The Tree of Life and the search for the "True Self"

How Lisle's Story in "The Six Swan Brothers", reflects the need some may feel to find some whole-some parenting- at any age...

In Britain, the Celtic festival of Lammas- on 1st August- marks the coming of Early Autumn to the Land. I shiver to the thrill of the chill in the early morning and, on those days when Summer reappears in her beautifully bedraggled dress, I’m out, feeling the touch of mild breezes and warming rays, scratched as I pick the sweetest bramble fruits, stung by aging angry nettles and hungry horse flies.

Oh, the seasons pass so quickly and there comes a familiar melancholy in me as the perky youthful leaves brown at their edges and bright flowers droop heavy with seed. Perhaps this year it feels a little more pertinent, since I notice how I too, am fast going to seed…

Yet, from the seeds of a lifetime’s growth and flowering, Creations are coming and so, as I best I can, I am nurturing and bringing in my own Creative harvest here and off screen too...

Among the trees I stand, leaves withering, yet still dappling welcome shade in these dwindling heated days. There, the great, strong Beech, Oak and Chestnut remind me of that gateway symbol of the True or Complete Self- seen in Kabbala, Shamanic, Biblical and Apocryphal belief- the Tree of Life.

The Tree of Life also represents the Safety of the Mother, embodied for instance in Holy Asherah, who appears as a Fertility Goddess in the Bible and was worshipped in pre-Judeo-christian times, through trees and wooden totem poles.

So, this month, I am moved to explore the diverse Mother Figures in my featured story recording (below), “The Six Swan Brothers”. The heroine, Lisle, grows up with adopted parents who are wise Wildlanders; she finds the way to redeem her life; she lives in a tree and transforms into a Wild Woman, who is called by the humans who meet her thereafter, the “Queen of the Trees.”

Before I get to the Grimm’s Story, a little more of my personal Autumn Story...

The compulsion to share my Creative Harvest is very strong and I find myself learning so much from the process of creation, which I hope bears some fruit for my subscribers too. As I venture deeper, I am gathering an inner Harvest. I am having to weigh what serves me and leave behind what does not. As I separate wheat from chaff, so to speak, I meet psychological chaff, which needs to be shed.

To the fore for me, is, what some therapists call, the “Mother Wound”*: the psychological trauma resulting from the mother not being present emotionally to a developing child, because they are too absorbed in their own emotional needs. The child does not feel safe because the Mother is in crisis, often piling their emotional needs on their child and guilt-tripping them, when they don’t fulfil them.

The “Internal Family Systems” therapeutic system suggests a part of the psyche which may grow to adapt to the "Mother Wound”, is a Lost Child, terrified to be alone, not knowing how to be in the world.

My Lost Child ran my Life a lot of the time, taking me on a series of missions, unable to say “No! I can’t do all that stuff!” Even second guessing, doing or saying things which they thought people wanted them to, but had never been asked to.

I became a people-pleaser who periodically “over-did it” and then “lost it“ or “hit a wall” and then collapsed with physical and mental fatigue and insidious debilitating illness.

I have so much support from my partner, family, therapists and friends and learnt so much from other Wildlander connections, to help me along on this inner journey. Recently, I travelled very deep, into the heart of the woods of my psyche and there I found her- my Inner Mother, my Tree of Life; that inner compass that sets me right, in the direction of self-nurture, teaching me how to parent myself. So I begin the work of learning to set healthy boundaries, finding and using the resources I need to thrive and yes- I hope- become a whole-some person.

Always the woods offer me safe refuge, where I can tune in, using the Nature-based meditation practices I have learnt along the way. There I find that centre of calm, imagine my tree-spine within me, strong as the mighty oak but bendy in the wind like the hazel…

From this daily “tuning in” I find my “Tree of Life” grows ever stronger, helping me support myself through Life’s challenges. I just need to remember to take a few moments… and breathe…

Here’s a short poem which came to me. It tells of one of those days when I was feeling overwhelmed by life, but there in the woods, I found her…

Woodland Mother

Lost and alone, I take to my place among the trees;

On mouldering leaves, held in the tangle of life, tears come.

I hold myself tight. and become my own Mother, murmuring softly, safely

“It’s alright, little one. Come to Earth!”

I am small in spirit then, a fragile seed puff, floating, falling on a failing gust.

I land upon the Red Earth, feel the welcome damp, after rain.

“It’s alright, little one. Lay here. No need to do a thing…”

In good time my seed-spirit sprouts, a feeler, a root, finds solid ground,

And all around the gentle air washes my face of care.

“Nowhere to go now, just be here,”

Murmurs Mother-in-me.

So, in my own time I grow towards the light.

No fears now to crush me low.

“It is safe here, up you grow!”

by Laura Sky

*If you want to find out more about the Mother Wound, you could start here… https://www.counselling-directory.org.uk/memberarticles/what-is-the-mother-wound

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So what of the Mother archetypes in Lisle’s adventure? I explore this below, but first here is an excerpt from Part 2 of “The Six Swan Brothers”.

As usual the full recording is below the paywall with more writings on Lisle’s adventures and the “Mother Wound” theme for paid subscribers. Click on the recording here and it will probably take you to the website newsletter. Scroll down and click on this excerpt again (or all the way to the bottom if you pay.)

In Part 1 of “Six Swan Brothers”, Lisle loses her good Birth Mother, when she is small and then the shadowy figure of the stone-hearted Queen appears, binding Lisle’s Father, the King, with dark magic and forcing him into a miserable marriage.

So the good, but over-powered Father, seeks advice from the Hen-wife, who represents an aspect of the“Good Mother”. She wishes to protect the children and so arranges for the Father to take Lisle and her brothers away from their Home-castle, where they are no longer safe, and take refuge with some Woodlanders, deep in the heart of the wood. Here they find whole-someness, simplicity and a loving and nature-connected Mother who gives them the safety they need.

Yes life is raw, with changing weather; red in tooth and claw, with wild animals roaming in their shared woodland home, yet the Woodlanders can guide Lisle and her brothers to thrive and become Wildlanders.

The King-Father is glad his children are far from the manipulations of the Bad Queen-Mother, but so hidden are they that the Hen-wife must give the King a magical means- a golden thread- to show him the way through the wood to the place where his children await- happy and rosy cheeked. Happy children- a Good Father’s heart’s delight! And they are happy because they are being loved and nurtured, seen and appreciated by their adopted parents. They receive Good Mothering and Fathering- are parented well.

Part of good parenting is giving the children resources and acceptance so they can “individuate”- become their own True Selves- and so go out into the world and make their own ways. The Woodlanders offer this loving acceptance and resource the seven children by teaching them the Woodland Way, teaching them the ways of all the creatures and plants, the foods to forage and woodland crafts of the wood, including how to weave fabric nettles a skill which becomes most significant to the story.

Woodland life is active and whole-some; the children gather all the knowledge they need to survive in the wild and as they breathe oxygen-rich air, eat wild foods, full of nutrition, they grow up strong, with a sense of connection to the other-than human world- a contrast from the machinations of Court Life.

But the Stone-hearted Queen, always seeking ways to hurt her husband the King, follows him one time, when he rolls out the golden thread, all the way to the secret safe haven in the wood and discovers six of the seven secret children. Filled with spite and jealousy, she creates a spell which transforms Lisle’s brothers into swans, casting a shadow over her life, as they fly away and leave her to decide on a plan.

So, of course, Lisle is given an opportunity for growth; she sets out on her “Heroine’s Journey”, to break the enchantment. Without the loving nurture and the wild knowledge that her adopted Woodlander Mother and Father gave her, she may not have been able to fulfil the tasks ahead.

Just as Joseph Campbell and Robert Bly described the ‘Hero’s Journey’, Dr Sharon Blackie (here’s her Substack)

discusses the ‘Heroine’s Journey’.**

All women will embark on some kind of “Heroine’s Journey” in their lives- inner or outer obstacles arising, finding resilience and resources to overcome them, allies to support them on the way.

Walking for days, Lisle comes, at last, to a lake where she finds her Six Swan Brothers. During the twilight hour, they return to their human forms and explain how she may release them from enchantment: to weave six shirts from the fragile stems of the starwort, to take no more, nor less than seven years and in that time to utter no sound nor speech, nor write any message.

With true intent, Lisle sets about her task, living deep in the woods, far from other humans, but not alone for she finds companionship and support in the waters, the trees and all the “other-than-human” beings which surround her…

Lisle has found her true-hearted intent with the support of good parents, this is what leads her from an early age onto the Path to wholeness- the path to her “True Self”.

So she has the Wisdom, the instinct to know what to do to survive. She makes a nest in a strong and welcoming old tree and there grows deeper and deeper into her a Wildlander self, utterly immersed in the realm of the trees… As she finds an external home in the tree, she can grow her Tree of Life, her strong and nurturing Mother-within. She is no “Lost Child”- no, she is found!

Part 2 of the recording tells us of Lisle’s return to the Realm of the Humans and the machinations which ensue…

More of this and my own “Heroine’s Journey” below for Paid Subscribers…