Storybook Plan

 *Note: Storybook site image header is a work in process. Nothing feels quite right yet*


Current plan is to tell one story each about Parvati, Lakshmi, and Saraswati. I feel like those are my 'big three' and have the most to work with and explore.

 

Also kicking around the idea of some sort of wrap up story to tie it all together/revisit the intro. 

 

I think I will need to write with some sort of narrator introducing each story, and telling my intro, setting up sort of a story within a story. It could function as three independent stories but for a Storybook exploring the idea of Devi/Many Goddesses as one that doesn't feel quite right.  

 

THIS is why my google site image is a work in process. I need something like this, only not Lego. :)

Source: "The Many Faces of Unikitty" by Oky - Space Ranger is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Topic Research: Reincarnation

 I'm stuck. I've been all over wikipedia, done some general googling for stoires, checked sacred texts. I don't know what I'm doing!

So I was looking at the Matrikas. They sound interesting, but hten when I go further into them, some of them are incarnations/aspects/etc of Parvati, Lakshmi, Saraswati. Which is a whole other thought/idea. 

Everyone individually has a LOT going on and I am not sure at this point how to hone in on where to go. Parvati alone leads me off into all her aspects (Mahavidya) which then pulls in Kali. Lakshmi and Saraswati bring their own incarnations to the party and if this was indoors in the season of COVID we'd be well beyond our numbers for safe social distancing.

Right now I am absolutely flummoxed on what 3 stories I might like to tell. I am definitely digging the all the goddesses. And I know I can edit, edit, edit no matter what I do. I may just end up leaning into the confusion and uncertainty at this point. I feel actually like with reincarnation and aspects and avatars there may be a story in that! Pick a goddess and have a fun story of uncertainty about what aspect is needed?

So perhaps I've typed my way into at least one story idea and can grow from there? That's one of the benefits of blog posting in a stream of consciousness style - sometimes things start to work themselves out. 

If I'm remembering correctly from the wikipedia rabbit hole I got myself into, Parvati, Lakshmi and Saraswati sort of go together. And all have aspects. They could all have a story along those lines. Or even a retelling of a story about how they 'got' an aspect in the first place!! For instance the origin of Kali. That would basically be a retelling but I am sure there are some fabulous ideas that could come out of that. 

From the Matrikas, Brahmini is an aspect of Saraswati. So this is now less reincarnation and more alternate personalities, but that is okay! I've also got Pratyangira and Vaishnavi as aspects of Lakshmi. I'll have to think some more on how this would work, but I actually feel more like I have somewhere to go now. :)

"That is the Question" by cogdogblog is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Topic Brainstorm

 My first possible topic right away is reincarnation. I was tossing that idea around last semester before I ended up on volcanoes. (How? I don't know - okay well, volcanoes are sort of like a reincarnation of rocks but that's beside the point!) There's the project topic page on reincarnation, which is nice, and one of the other pages actually pointed me towards a Wikipedia page on Saṃsāra - meaning world and the concept of rebirth, cyclical nature.

So related to reincarnation is birth - usually you can't be reincarnated if you aren't born at some point, right? It comes back to that whole cycle thing. Shashthi - goddess of childbirth

And the other side of the cycle? Death. But I know I don't want to tell just death stories, but I need the death aspect of the stories, I need them to come back! It's a cycle.

(And going along with birth, death and reincarnation is that you could be an avatar of a god. This is not something I am super familiar with and isn't really true reincarnation, but more reincarnation adjacent?) 

There's a piece I'm missing here I feel like - overall is reincarnation/rebirth/return a cycle. This feels like pieces of one topic, which is my fault because I am overall focused on the cyclical idea of reincarnation/rebirth I think. I don't know what particular stories I would want to retell just yet - if there are enough tales about about one person..and I think there might be...it might be interesting to do a storybook that follows someone through multiple reincarnations. 

A decidedly western/European take on rebirth - into the cauldron! 

"Rebirth" by ξωαŋ ThΦt (slowly back...) is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0