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| Artist Unknown (would like to remedy that!) |
For myself, Guides and Guardians have always appeared in animal form, which makes sense given my strong feelings toward and connection with Nature, as well as the environment in which I was raised. I have said before, and undoubtedly will say again, that I strongly believe that our individual interpretations of the Astral and the Divine are shaped in many ways by our mortal experiences, learnings and beliefs, as that is where the base of our understanding comes from. What builds on top of that, well... that depends upon the individual and the Spirit.
In the interest of trying not to ramble off on befuddling and disorganised tangents (though that might happen anyway), I’m going to begin with Guides.
Over the course of my life, I’ve had several different Guides, each offering a different lesson or needed reminder. They have included Mouse, Turtle, Bear, Hawk, Dolphin, Shark, and Snake. Some stayed with me for months, a couple for years, or in some cases a mere matter of weeks. Now, again, what these animals represent often depends upon the interpretations of a given culture, so when researched, one can find slightly differing, or even completely contradictory meanings, reasons for appearing, and spiritual powers ascribed to them.
Some of these Guides have come at points in my life that are not things I’m willing (yet) to share in a public forum. There are two in particular, however, that I will touch on.
Mouse first started appearing during my early teens, and stayed with me for roughly three-ish years. At the time, I wasn’t consciously involved in or actively studying any form of Paganism; I reacted to Mouse on a purely instinctual and subconscious level. It wasn’t until years later, as I began my conscious journey into exploring the many different facets of Pagan and Native beliefs, that I realised why Mouse had come to me at that particular time. The main thing that seems to be agreed upon about Mouse is a reminder to pay attention to trivial, but necessary and important things in life, and to not get lost in larger events or in trying to see the bigger picture. My own personal addition to that is that along with general life details, it can also be a reminder to not take for granted the things that, when compared to the big picture, seem rather small but are in fact quite important. Like everyday gestures of kindness from friends whose presence you’ve begun to take for granted and yet actually, the fact that they’re still staunchly by your side while you’re in the middle of an epic break-down and feel like you’re going completely batshit insane is really, really huge.
Hawk, appropriately enough, came into my life at around the same time that I made the conscious decision to study Paganism. To put it simply, an opening of awareness, enlightenment, and being guided toward a Path you’re meant to follow or purpose you’re meant to fulfill are commonly agreed upon interpretations of Hawk’s appearance. I was guided to meeting J, my Ha’shin and spirit brother, and thus ended my confused bumbling around as he and certain friends he introduced me to gently helped me begin a more structured approach and also helped me to understand things that until I had people to actually discuss them with, had only confused me. Through J, I also gained an awareness and understanding of aspects of the world and people that I’d never even been aware of before. While Hawk is no longer with me, I try to live by the lesson brought to me; to be aware of the world beyond my own little bubble, and always open to new learning.
When it comes to Guardians, at this point in my life I have three. They have names¹, which I will share, but please don’t ask me how I know them. I just do.
Dmitri has been with me the longest. I think quite possibly since I was hatched². For the longest time, all I really knew was that he was a big cat, possibly a leopard or a tiger. I was never really sure because he’s never appeared in any kind of solid (figuratively speaking) form. He’s always an ethereal, shifting silvery-white cat-shape. It’s taken many years for me to properly identify him as a snow leopard.
I think I had on some level always felt his presence, but the first time he fully revealed himself to me was when I was four. I was being stupid with some friends, as young children are wont to be. Somehow one of them had discovered that the angled wooden doors that led down to the cellar were bouncy, almost like a trampoline. So naturally, we made a game out of taking turns to run up, jump on the doors and see how far we could launch ourselves with the springy recoil. If you’re thinking something bad happened, you’re right.
It was my turn, and I made my run up to the doors, jumped... and the world disappeared. I can’t even remember the sound of the doors breaking, though I’m sure there was a crack or crash of some sort, nor the sensation of falling or even landing. Just that one moment there was resistance beneath my feet as I completed my jump, and then blackness. What happened is that the doors had given way, falling open inward and dropping me several feet down onto the cement stairs. I was definitely being looked out for on that day, because I really should have ended up with a busted open skull. Instead, my head bounced off an empty plastic bucket and my body was snapped forward in such a way that I somehow broke my four front teeth off. We assume I hit the edge of a stair. Barring some scrapes and bruises and fat lips, that was the worst injury I suffered from the experience. Anyway.
I had blacked out, though I’m not certain for how long. It can’t have been very long, because my friends above were still caught in that shocked ‘What just happened?!’ silence. It was dark and cool, as you’d expect a cellar to be. Certainly a frightening place for a four year old. But I felt no fear, nor even pain. I attribute some of this to shock, but not all, and I’m sure the skeptics will pass off what I’m about to relate as an hallucination from my brains just having been scrambled by the fall and bouncing off of things.
Dmitri was there. This softly glowing, absolutely gigantic cat crouched down with his tail curled up along one haunch, filling almost the whole cellar. Our gazes met and locked and I have never felt as safe, as protected, and as certain that everything was going to be alright as I was in that moment. It felt like it lasted forever, though it can’t have been much more than a single second. He seemed to nod at me, just once, and then faded from my vision. And that’s when the pain and fear set in and I started screaming my head off, getting the attention of the adults and being whisked off to hospital.
Shadovar was the second Guardian to come to me, but those circumstances are far too personal and painful to share, and not only for myself. He is a Western dragon, pitch black with ivory horns and red-yellow eyes. He is cloaked in shadow, and when he unfurls his wings it seems almost as if thunderstorms exist beneath their folds, clouds roiling and lightning snapping, his roar the thunder. He’s usually asleep, which is a very good thing, because he is an embodiment of rage. It took me far too long to realise that he’s not only a Guardian against outside forces, but also there to protect me -- and others -- from myself; from my rage. For several years I was out of control, my temper lashing out unpredictably and often violently. Eventually, after many struggles and trails, I learned that I could use Shadovar as a kind of siphon. I can channel that rage and violence into him, and he is strong enough to keep it contained and eventually neutralise it so it doesn’t get sent out into the world. I’m not saying that there aren’t times when my temper still gets the better of me and I go off like a super-volcano. But thanks to Shadovar’s presence in my life, I’m not nearly as volatile nor producing nearly as much negative energies as I used to.
Third and most recent is Khanyar, my golden gryphon. While Dmitri and Shadovar both revealed themselves to me, I had to be made aware of Khanyar through outside influence. Given the state I was in mentally and emotionally at the time, I’m not at all surprised that I needed help in realising he was there. He came to me after I got out of a particularly nasty abusive relationship. The mental and emotional abuse this guy had heaped on me had come very close to breaking me. I felt fragile, like cracked porcelain that might shatter at any moment, with just the tiniest of touches. I had come to doubt nearly everything I believed and everyone I loved. I was also silently suffering with having been raped. I was young and naive and honestly believed the bullshit idea that a person can’t be raped by their significant other, so I felt that if I ever tried to tell anyone what had happened -- be it the authorities or just someone I trusted -- I’d be the one held to blame because I’d had consensual sex in the past with the guy.
Khanyar is a constant reminder of my strength, my fortitude, my self-worth -- all things that I had forgotten I had and that the gentle support and love of friends helped me find again. He’s also a terribly vain creature, but this helps balance out my own frequent lack of confidence.
Finally that brings us to Fox. I’m not entirely sure that Totem or Spirit Animal are appropriate terms for him, but I can’t find any other that applies. Fox, for me, is much more than just a symbol or an embodiment of traits that I share. (If you really want to get technical, I share more traits with Kitsune than Fox, but I definitely don’t feel anything like a Kitsune. I’m without a doubt a Red Fox.) I’ve never really been able to find words to properly describe the relationship, and it seems I still can’t. But I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is neither Guide nor Guardian. It’s very simple, and yet extraordinarily complex -- we are two separate Entities who are one and the same. I am Fox, but I am also me. Fox is me, but also very much himself.
1. Lowercase intentional, and most certainly not to be confused with Names of Power.
2. Short version: I was born via C-section, and also when I was very young my mother would tell me she found me hatched out of a dragon’s egg. The term stuck, because we’re weird and like it that way. :-)
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