Burning Away the Toxic Ego
A draft chapter of a workbook by Thomas Balistrieri, Ed.D. and Ma Xiaolian, B.S.
What follows is the first draft, our initial ideas, concerning Zed’s pilgrimage toward becoming a balanced man of character and integrity. Your thoughts and suggestions appreciated. Remember, the book is a ‘workbook’ type conversation led by a teacher or counselor. Each chapter read in class and the concepts involved discussed with young men. The hope is to educate men about the feminine, about the feminine as portrayed in other cultures, to help men understand their own thoughts and behaviors relative to the feminine, to women, to two-spirited, and Mother Nature herself.
Burning Away the Toxic Ego
“Little Sweet Tara cannot help you boy. You are mine now. Time to burn away your sickness. Come here. Enter the flames. Come sit with me.”
There on a red-hot burning pyre of wood, in amongst the flames, was a most terrifying spectacle. A wild-eyed woman. Her skin black as night. Wearing a necklace of skulls with sword in hand.
Zed stood motionless before the woman. Sweat pouring from his body. Unable to move though every remaining instinct telling him to run. His eyes fixed upon this woman he found the courage to say, “Gracious elder. My name is Zed. Thank you for taking the time to teach me. I am here to listen and learn.”
The man lying on his back with the woman’s foot on his chest called out, “This is Mother Kali Ma, Goddess of Birth and Death, Darkness and Light, Destroyer of Self-Loathing and Conceit. Zed, step into the flames and let her burn away that which no longer serves all things feminine. Don’t be afraid. The skulls, taken from other men, are all that remain of their anger, greed, violence, need for control, woundedness, conceit, shame, selfishness, and self-loathing.
Zed closed his eyes. The fire burned so intensely he could feel his skin burning beneath his. clothing. Yet Zed stood asking Kali Ma to please help him become a good man. “Please Kali Ma, help me. I don’t wish to be a thief, a liar, a sadist, a sociopath, nor driven by the desire
to control others. I don’t ever wish to harm another woman again. I don’t wish to harm myself or anyone else ever again. Please help me.”
Through the roar of the fire he heard Mother Kali Ma ask, “What do you wish for then Zed?” His eyes still closed, terrorized by the images before him, “I wish to be a decent man. And I wish for you to teach me how to be a decent man. It doesn’t matter what I want to be if no one shows me the way.”
Zed felt a pressure on his chest. Upon opening his eyes, he saw that he was now laying naked in the fire, Kali Ma standing over him, holding his severed head in her hands. Zed screamed in horror. Kali Ma looked at him with her fanatical smile and said, “I have taken from you that which no longer serves you nor anyone else. Pulled from your body and burned here in the flames. You are cleansed and ready to learn a new way of being in the world. Now go.”
Zed felt his world go dark. When he opened his eyes again he was lying on the grass outside of the flaming pyre. Kali Ma, Mother, had changed her appearance to yet another form or iteration of herself. She looked down at Zed, now with kindness and empathy. ‘We must continue on our way. Get up. Let’s move on Zed.
illustration copyright 2024, Ma Xiaolian
Amazing!!! Writing and images are captivating. Both the pictures and the story bring life to Kali Ma and her iterations. I love how the story started in depicting the beauty and sweetness of the woman (and how that was not what was needed) and then went into the fierceness of the Mother, than back to the beauty and peacefulness of the woman. Now go away! I don’t think men surrender this easily though. What brought him to surrender? Was it the implied aspect of Zed to surrender to his feminine side? Good job!!! Leaves me (the reader) reading it through a few times to sequester the layers of understanding and asking deeper questions of myself. The pictures are beyond beauty!!!!