Persuasion of the mind

Once upon a time there was a little girl.

This little girl had a beautiful mind.

Her mind was very active, filled with wonderful stories,

sparkly, shiny gears of thought twisted and turned in ecstatic motion every day.

She loved imagining stories, animals and all kinds of things.

Her imagination took her to wonderful places.

After some time, the girl, living happily in her world of imagination and stories, began to notice an amazing wonder.

Her hands were filled with wonderful light.

Every where she went, she was able to improve things by at least 10 to 20 percent, using this wonderful glowing light coming out of her hands.

Pretty soon people began to notice that she was able to improve people places and things using her fingers. They began to come to her with their problems, even their bad hair cuts. She touched the bad hair cuts, and the mis-shapen craft projects and the emotion wounds, and she improved them all by 20 percent.

After some time, the little girl wished to go back to her room and continue imagining wonderful stories. But, she found something had happened in her town. People had heard about her wonderful magic hands and they wanted healing, they wanted soothing.

They began to come to the house at all times of the night. Some wanted solutions which her hands could not improve. They brought their diseased, their sick and their weary. Some brought male patterned balding, others brought undercooked fishsticks. Still others brought friends, relatives or even employees or employers suffering from pains, trauma, emotional pains, health issues, the list of laments was very long.

But the little girl could only improve people by 20 percent, and her gift was only from imagining. Through her imagining, she brought so much light into her body and the planet, that it became and overflow, and that overflow was the light, but it could only do so much.

The people needed healing on so many levels, she could not do very much for most of them.

She began to feel concerned, for in fact, she never knew there were so many hurting people in the world. One day, she was sitting by a river where she had gone to avoid the long line of people who came to her door every day. A wise woman with long hair and a basket approached her.

Hello my dear, said the wise woman. I see you are weary and concerned.

"I cannot heal them all", said the girl, and she poked disheartened at the grass.

The medicine woman looked sad for her, but not hopeless. She had a sparkle in her eye.

Come to my house and I will show you how to heal. But I don't want to heal said the little girl. I just want to enjoy my stories and my imaginings.

Come to my house and we can discuss that. The girl went to the healers house at sundown. Inside was a beautiful oven burning a fire. the medicine woman smiled and welcomed the girl.

You are a shaman, said the woman. If you resist the call, life will become more difficult for you.

The girl was very sad. But I only want to write stories, I do not want to heal and I do not want to grow.

I'm sorry my child, said the medicine woman. The call has been planted on your life. I can see it above your head, the seal of the Shaman.

Shiloh sighed and hung her head. She knew shaman training was very painful and difficult. She knew the underworld and the overworld were filled with dryness, personal misery and demons.

She knew that many in shaman training had to die repeatedly while in the underworld and over world.

But the woman had been clear-the call was on her life and there was no choice.

You have been chosen in the lineage of your family said the medicine woman. You have come from a long line of medicine people leading up to your training. Your imagination is your gift, never forget that, but you must descend in order to complete the mission placed on your life.

The girl did not cry, but she went solemnly back to her home, and went to sleep without dreams that night. She thought of no stories in the morning, she only drank her water and ate some porridge before she headed towards the medicine woman's tent.

Medicine woman was waiting for her there.

Hello dear, said medicine woman.

Come closer, the medicine woman smiled, her face was always friendly and her heart always seemed to envelop Shiloh in a beautiful warm hug. But as Shiloh moved closer to the medicine woman, she saw something, with her inner eye. The medicine woman was not actually a woman-but a skeleton filled with blue smoke.

Shiloh stumbled backwards, and ran out of the hut.

Medicine woman did not run after her.

Shiloh ran home and hid under her covers that night. In the morning however, she felt the "call" drawing her towards the hut again. She found that her arms and legs would not move in any other direction, and her imagination would not work as it usually did, imagining happy stories.

She said goodbye to her parents again and ambled towards the medicine hut. Medicine woman was waiting for her by the fire again.

I see you have come back, said medicine woman. I am sorry to give you a start yesterday. You have seen my true form with your inner sight.

But, you are so beautiful, why is your true form a skeleton?

I am not long for this world, said medicine woman. You have seen my fate, which is the fate of all people, and as a medicine woman I am doomed to burn in the blue smoke of purgatory.

Why? said Shiloh, she felt a desperate feeling, of love for the medicine woman. Why must you burn in purgatory??

It is pre-ordained, the woman said and looked wistfully into the fire...

She did not give any other details. Shiloh felt there must be more to the story, but she didn't want to ask.

We must start your training now, said the woman. If I have trained you well, it will go towards my deliverance in the afterlife.

Shiloh nodded. The medicine woman held out her hand, and the blue smoke around her grew, it grew larger and larger until it enveloped Shiloh, and her sight went black, suddenly she was in the under world.

Everywhere was blue sand, the sky was a dull aqua gray, and the woman held out her hand to Shiloh through the mist.

Keep hold of my hand she said. If you get lost here, you will not be able to go back without me. You are not strong enough to traverse between worlds.

Shiloh held the medicine woman's hand tightly, it was warm, like the beauty, but Shiloh thought of the burning skeleton.

She kept this image in the back of her mind.

They walked for what seemed like 30 days and 30 nights, but was in fact only a few hours. Time in the overworld was felt not quantified. However one felt-becomes the feeling of time.

Finally they came to a black looking hut, very similar to the wood hut from the Earth world, the door was filled with red light. The windows were filled with soot. Blue sand whipped around them like ice snaps. Shiloh felt the sand on her face, whip , whip, whip.

They arrived at the black hut and pressed a small door bell on the left side. The sound was like a beautiful bell, but instead of hearing it outside, Shiloh felt it inside her mind's eye again.

An ogre type man came to the door and ushered them inside. Inside the cabin/castle it was dry and the horrible wind was not there to whip their faces. The house was filled with ornate rugs of every color, especially red. The fire burned and the smoke was blue like on the outside.

The ogre left them to warm on an ornate velvet couch by the fire. Finally after what felt like many long hours, Shiloh could no longer tell how time was flowing, a tall figure with a black linen coat appeared. The woman was like a facsimile of medicine woman, but everything about her was dark. Her hair was brittle and gray and held up in a tall cone on her head. Her dress was a flat black linen. Some of the threads were coming off, but it did not take away from her elegance and power.

She stood before them and regarded them. So you have brought me another child. She said. Yes, said medicine woman.

This one can truly be the one to break this curse.

The woman in black shook her head in disbelief. We shall see. You have brought me many before who could not break this family's curse.

Shiloh did not like the sound of that. How many other children had this woman cast into this role?

How many other people had tried and failed at this mission?