Prepare

Create a comfortable quiet space for yourself and put a large sheet of paper before.  Have your favorite journal by your side.  Use a gratifying writing instrument, be it a sharpie, an ink pen, a paint pen, a pencil, or even a collection of colored markers.  I have a favorite ink pen that feels wonderful to write with and it makes such a difference in the quality and fluidity of my writing.  Take a moment to close your eyes or soften your gaze and breathe deeply.  Settle yourself, longer exhales naturally relax the body.  We are going to invite your imagination to guide you in hearing and unfolding your own myth, your own symbolic story.

Experience

Take a few moments to write out your responses to the following questions on the sheet of paper before you.  Write freely and take space wherever you feel moved to write on the page.  Trust your imagination , your inner world, to bring forth images and responses.

What was your favorite story, fable, or myth when you were young?

Was it one that you read, watched, or created yourself?

Was there a special animal, character, object, or location you connected with?

(maybe a place in nature like a special tree, a heroine, a magical power or a stuffed animal that felt absolutely real?)

What experience in the story was most compelling for you?  What caught the light of your imagination, of your young wisdom?

(Feel free to combine elements of more than one story if you find that you were drawn to different moments in different stories.)

Explore

Now take a walk around your room, your home, or your personal space as if you were an explorer. Notice what you see, what you’ve naturally surrounded yourself with.  Notice the images, colors, textures, objects, symbols, views, faces, music, and books.  Write down or draw symbols for these observations on your paper.  Look with the curiosity of an anthropologist trying to know the story of the person who dwells here.  Take your time.  When you feel complete, sit in front of your paper which by now may be filling up with words and/or images.  This is the raw material for your unfolding myth, fable, fairytale or story.

Unfold

Open your journal and begin arranging the pieces before you into a story of your own.  Trust yourself and try not to judge whether your story is good or bad, let yourself be guided, play more than think.  Mythology and fairytales carry the darkness and the light, obstacles and accomplishments, moments of impasse and reunion, relationships along the way and solitude.  There is a journey that usually includes a leaving of home to come home to oneself.  You can even begin with “Once upon a time…”

*If you would like more guidance for story writing you can check out Juliet Bruce’s Story Medicine  http://www.julietbruce.com/Story_Medicine.html

“Your sacred space is where you can find yourself again and again”

Joseph Campbell