START HERE: Welcome to Ten Thousand Journeys
Hello, welcome to Ten Thousand Journeys, a newsletter exploring journeys {physical, mythical, archetypal} as a metaphor for personal transformation.
You are in the right place if you wonder what it means to leave home, how to make friends with the dragons you meet on your journeys, and return home with the magical elixir.
“No dragon can resist the fascination of riddling talk and of wasting time trying to understand it.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit
You can read more about the newsletter on the ABOUT page.
Table of Contents:
Currently, posts are divided into two broad categories:
A. Essays about different stages of the hero’s journey arc.
B. Postcards from the journey : This is the writing that emerges as a way for me to alchemize life’s experiences and journeys, part yearning and part meaning-making. I write about late blooming, invitations, mustering courage, thresholds of change, on uncertainty, growth, belonging, and homecoming. These posts feature more whimsy, fantasy, and lots of imagery.
A. The Hero’s Journey
🦋 The journeys we'll go on
I didn’t hear about Joseph Campbell until sometime in my early forties. My older son was in high school at that time, and one of his classes discussed the concept of the hero’s journey. He talked about it when he came home from school, and something about the description made me look it up online, and then head to the library the same evening to borrow …
Ordinary World and the Call to Adventure
🦋 Once Upon A Time
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Some journeys are physical, some metaphorical, or both. There might be more types of journeys. Not all are long or arduous or teach us something, though those are the ones that get written about. Many people are excited about journeys, and not everyone is plagued by uncertainty, analysis paralysis, or procrastination. Because of the difference in indivi…
Crossing the threshold:
🦋 On thresholds, Part 1
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In any new journey, there is a threshold-a line, a border or edge, a gate, a doorway, a bridge, a passageway, a span of time, or set of behaviors- that lies between the old, familiar, known world and the new, unknown world. Because thresholds are the first step into the unknown, they can evoke fear, doubt and anxiety.
🦋 Honoring thresholds
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A few months ago, as a small experiment, I decided to count the thresholds I pass through on an average day. When I did this the first time, I realized I was counting only the physical/ structural spaces like doorways or stairs. So, the next time, I counted all kinds of
Threshold Guardians:
🦋 Halt! Who goes there?
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We are discussing the stages of Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey. Campbell proposed a monomyth, a universal story arc called the hero’s journey, that he said was found in myths and stories from cultures around the world. The hero sets forth on an adventure (departure), faces obstacles and trials (initiation), is victorious over them, and returns with bo…
Refusal of the call:
🦋 Saying No
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We are discussing the stages of Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey. Campbell proposed a monomyth, a universal story arc called the hero’s journey, that he said was found in myths and stories from cultures around the world. The hero sets forth on an adventure (departure), faces obstacles and trials (initiation), is victorious over them, and returns with bo…
The Belly of the Whale:
🦋 The Belly Of The Whale
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We are discussing the stages of Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey. Campbell proposed a monomyth, a universal story arc called the hero’s journey, that he said was found in myths and stories from cultures around the world. The hero sets forth on an adventure (departure), faces obstacles and trials (initiation), is victorious over them, and returns with bo…
The Road of Trials
🦋The road of trials
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We are discussing the stages of Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey through personal essays and storytelling. Campbell proposed a monomyth, a universal story arc called the hero’s journey, that he said was found in myths and stories from cultures around the world. The hero sets forth on an adventure (departure), faces obstacles and trials (initiation), is …
Meeting with the Goddess:
🦋 Meeting With The Goddess
We were in the back room of an old art shop in a small city in southern India. The room was crowded, with wood, metal, and stone sculptures and stacks of glass-fronted paintings leaning against the walls. We walked carefully through the makeshift aisle, pausing occasionally to admire. This visit was a momentary respite grabbed in the middle of a turbule…
A Dragon Encounter
A Dragon Encounter
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I journal daily in the Notes app on my phone. As I drink my morning cup of hot ginger and black peppercorn chai, I write a line or two about what I'm grateful for. If I've had a vivid dream, I write it down before I forget the details. I started doing this because some of the dreams had such crazy, fantastic elements, and I thought I could use them in m…
Both/And
Both/And
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Hello! It’s been some time since I wrote about why I think the patterns of our journeys are important and since there are many new subscribers, here’s a recap of what got me interested and why I think it’s relevant to all of us. I grew up partly in India and partly in the Persian Gulf region, and until age 24 (when I moved to the US), I primarily read I…
Return with the elixir
Coming home
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Dear Reader, I’m writing this while looking out over a banana field beyond which is a makeshift maidan where some young boys are playing cricket. I’m in southern India for a few weeks. The February sun is warm and picks out the hazy outline of distant blue mount…
Kintsugi for people
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Dear Reader, To prove that life is an ever-evolving mystery that I have very little hope of understanding, a strange and wonderful thing happened last year. Poet and author Reena Kapoor, who writes Arrivals and Departures, announced via her newsletter that her play was being read by a theater group, and she invited loc…
B. Postcards from the journey:
On invitations, rituals, home, belonging, transformation, uncertainty, journeying,
🏞 Holding the tension of opposites
Tension of opposites It’s been a month since I joined Substack. During that time, I started a weekly newsletter and have gotten glimpses of the writing community here. It’s been a great experience. It’s a leap from the start of the year when I felt paralyzed by indecision. Should I start writing on Substack and join a writing community? Or should I first…
🏞 The telescoping nature of home
I am traveling next week. It is for less than a fortnight, but I will be traveling across the world. I am leaving home. But I’m also going home. And it doesn’t matter which direction I’m traveling in, which home I am leaving, because with both, I will leave chunks of my heart behind. So I dread these melancholic cusps, these times just before my departu…
🦋 Ten thousand journeys
Starting this Substack was hard enough that I didn’t give too much thought to what I would write about. I had a vague idea of writing essays on different topics of interest and seeing if I could serialize my novel once I finished it. But, three months in, someone pointed out a theme to all my posts. Without being aware of it, every post I have written i…
🏞 Making space for dragons
I celebrated my birthday earlier this month, and my husband and I went oceanside for the occasion. I’ve lived within an hour of an ocean or a sea most of my life, and periodically visiting the water feels like a necessary pilgrimage. My husband went into the water for a swim, and I lay back on the warm sand and contemplated the blue sky. I used to think…
🏞 Bougainvillea over the wall
Dear Reader, hello! I’m excited to share with you a new group of posts on Ten Thousand Journeys. I’m calling it Postcards. It’s the writing that emerges as a way for me to alchemize life’s experiences and journeys. It’s part yearning and part meaning-making, and I hope these short posts add something beautiful to your day.
🏞 Coming Full Circle
Dear Reader, I’ve been unable to send out a newsletter for the last few weeks because of some urgent family-related travel and commitments. I wasn’t able to write even though there was much to inspire: unexpected kindnesses, peacock calls against pencil-thin outlines of distant blue hills, butterflies the size of tiny birds weaving doggedly in and out of…
🏞 Hello, Moon
Last week, I read in an online article that the Moon is drifting away from the Earth at the approximate rate of 3.8 cms/day. I immediately felt bereft, as though I would still be standing here, at my open window, searching the empty sky, while the moon wandered alone somewhere far away. So, I decided to write a letter. This is part 1.
Once upon a teatime
Hello, Reader. I’m typing this on my phone as I stand in the early morning December gloom of the kitchen. Now that the persimmon tree between our houses has lost its leaves, the pale yellow glow of the lights in the neighbors’ house reaches me, and I can discern the shape of the pot in the drawer. I fill it with water (about two cups of water for two cup…
Constellating A Personal Ritual
Dear Reader, It’s a cold, gray morning, a day after the winter solstice, as I start this letter to you. Outside the windows, red-orange leaves float down lazily from the tree on the side of the road. Where they land on the tar road, the leaves look like bright stars that have tumbled down from the sky. The quiet morning after the longest night, the cont…
What is calling you?
Dear Reader, I hope all is well with you. This morning, when I opened the living room curtains, the sky was a pale pink near the sloping roofs of the neighboring homes and a lovely blue where it was visible between the bare branches of the mulberry tree. I lingered at the window for a little longer, admiring the view wondering if an invisible hand arrang…
On the way
Dear Reader, As with most letters to you, this one too starts early in the morning. I’m sitting on the yoga mat in the living room, between the fireplace on my right and the coffee table on my left. I’m facing the window…
Invitations
Dear Reader, This is a longer newsletter than I normally send out, but there’s an invitation to an adventure at the end that I would love for you to participate in. But, first, today’s newsletter:
Saying goodbye
Hello, this is Priya Iyer. Welcome to Ten Thousand Journeys, where I explore the themes and stages of archetypal journeys through personal essays, poems, and books. If you’re reading this in an email, I hope you’ll also visit the website to take part in the community conversation and to dip into the archives. Thanks!
Making room for unlived life
Hello, this is Priya Iyer. Welcome to Ten Thousand Journeys where I explore the themes and stages of archetypal journeys through personal essays, poems, and books. If you’re reading this in an email, I hope you’ll also visit the website to take part in the community conversation and to dip into the archives. If you are not already subscribed, you can su…
Am I late?
Dear Reader, I consider myself a late bloomer. A few years ago, I read a book by Rich Karlgaard called Late Bloomers, The Power of Patience In A World Obsessed With Early Achievement. Merriam-Webster describes late bloomers as “someone who becomes successful, attractive, etc., at a later time in life than other people.” Apparently, a surprising number of…
How to know when you’ve arrived
Dear Reader, I am at an interesting point in my writing journey. I am writing more than I’ve ever written- a weekly newsletter here, weekly serial chapters for the fantasy novel I’m writing, as well as working on a few essays and short stories that I’d like to submit to literary journals. I haven’t submitted anything yet, but I can feel myself gearing up…
I love this idea - framing your posts around the ten thousand journeys. Look forward to diving into your words. 💜
A wonderful introduction piece for any new comers, Priya, very well organised :)