Long long ago, when wishes were horses, there lived a beautiful princess. She was so beautiful even the sun blushed when it shone on her face.
Now, like in many kingdoms, there was a dark forest behind the king’s castle. The beautiful princess used to venture to the forest and spend time playing with her golden ball beside a cool spring.
One day, it is so happened that the golden ball, her favorite toy, slipped through her delicate fingers and disappeared into the deep waters of the spring.
The little damsel was in distress for losing her favorite plaything. As she cried, she had a voice asking her what was the matter. The voice was from an ugly frog.
The frog promised to get her the golden ball if she promised to allow him to be her companion. She promised nonchalantly. The frog kept his end of the bargain. But the princess forgot about the promise as soon as she got her ball.
Of course, the frog, like the irritant he is, followed the princess to the palace and kept bothering her to keep her promise. You know how the story ends, the princess kissed the frog and voila! the frog turned into a charming prince, they got married and lived happily ever after.
The same thing happened to Eve, the heavenly princess. In her innocent walk at the garden of Eden she comes across the serpent who, like the crafty frog, encourages her to partake of the forbidden fruit. Long story short. Eve and her clueless husband were banished from the palace and lived sadly ever after.
The frog and serpent represent our unconscious that comes to the fore as we mature. Our deep, unexplored, unadmitted, unrecognized, underdeveloped elements of existence. Our desires and curiosities that make us to start noticing things. In his magnum opus, The Hero with a thousand faces, Joseph Campbell calls it the call to adventure.
The announcer of the call to adventure is the ugly frog, the evil serpent that upsets the status quo. It is the animal in us. Our instinctual fecundity. The dark spirit that may lead us to see things we cannot unsee. To realize that we are naked. To take away the innocence of the beautiful princess.
The call comes when we are a little distracted in our usual affairs. When we wonder a little bit from the protective fences around us. Like the dull and washed-out fishermen who received the higher vivifying calling of becoming fishers of men. We all get the call to adventure. The call to go beyond the norm, beyond the societal expectations and protective hedges around us. Destiny summons us.
Whenever we hear that call, we always have a choice to make. Either to heed the call or refuse the call.
Heeding the call means that we will experience bliss like the little princess or misery like Eve and Adam.
Refusing the call, means that we will never find out.
Life is life.
Fabio