Chthonia Expanded: Living the Dream

Images from the Antarean Oracle by Brigid Burke

The struggle is real.

Many of us aren’t doing what we really want to be doing. We may or may not hate our day jobs, but sometimes you reach a point where you wonder if you’re not just wasting your time. Income is certainly a consideration; many of us stay in jobs because we don’t think we have any other options for keeping food on the table and a roof over our heads.

The COVID-19 lockdowns changed our world in many ways; one of the most important impacts was on the job market. The United States now has about 580,000 available jobs, and there are supply chain issues in the U.S. and elsewhere because companies can’t find people to do those jobs. We all panicked about the economy at the beginning of the pandemic, and many businesses found creative ways to work in a largely virtual or socially distanced space. It also showed many people who were either on furlough or working from home that there’s more to life than driving to the office for an eight-hour workday.

After a year and a half of working from home, I was suddenly thrust back into the daily grind of driving an hour each way on a daily basis to my job. I had developed a work routine that I was comfortable with, so I was not happy. I already had anxiety issues with driving that I had dutifully “sucked up” in order to continue working. In July, I had three major panic attacks by the end of my first week back to work, and I could barely drive to the grocery store.

I may have “sucked it up” before, but my body was not having it anymore. I talked to my boss, who was sympathetic, but couldn’t get approval for continuing to work at home. After a few weeks of soul searching, talking with friends, and examining my options—I quit. I was able to get health insurance through my part-time university job because I had a pension with the State, and I had enough money in savings to keep things afloat. Chthonia became my full time job. I’ve always wanted to live in England, so I’m making that happen; I just came back from a month in Kent, and will be in Devon for six months in 2022. It has been both exhilarating and terrifying at the same time.

Those of you who remember the Chthonia podcast, which is now hosted on Spreaker after a couple of years of Metapsychosis very kindly giving me bandwidth for the project, may notice that I’ve moved beyond just the podcast if you’ve kept up. Chthonia.net includes my publications, a new personal development school called Scholars of the Borderland, and another site where I provide tools for individual guidance and healing called Liminal Reiki. The podcast still appears bi-weekly, and the 2022 schedule will be posted soon.

During the lockdown I also designed my own oracle deck, the Antarean Oracle. I spent a lot of time in intense meditations while I was at home, and ended up creating a series of watercolors based on images I saw in meditation, which I connected with the Antares Red Giant star, and the black hole that it undoubtedly is at this point. You can read the story of how the deck was developed on my Kickstarter page, and if oracle decks are your thing, I would greatly appreciate your support.

I’ve always loved the creative spirit of Cosmos and Metapsychosis, and I am staying on as an editor to help out in whatever way I’m needed. Our Submissions page is now open, and all the editors look forward to seeing the creative output of those both inside and outside of our community. To those of you who might feel the way I did this past summer: there’s a brave new world out there, and while there are a lot of scary things, there’s also a lot of possibility. Often we have more possibilities than we allow ourselves to think about, and not all of them are pipe dreams. Allow yourself to think outside the box.