ERWIN ROUSSELLE. A CHINESE TALE:
“ The Chinese - and in this he has remained true to his heritage of age-old wisdom - has never forgotten the fearful aspect of everything that is truly great, and in tales and legends the magnificent primordial monster rises again and again to his consciousness. There is, for example, the story of the dragon-like spirit of Stallion Mountain: 13
A peasant has dallied at the market and is a little tipsy as he starts on his ride homeward. As he approaches the ridge of Stallion Mountain, he suddenly sees a monster sitting by the brook, lapping up water. Its enormous face is blue; its eyes bulge out of its head like those of a crab. Its mouth gapes from ear to ear and has the aspect of a vat full of blood. Its fangs, growing in irregular clumps, are two or three inches long. The peasant is terrified, but the monster does not look up. Profiting by this, the peasant starts on a wide detour around the terrible ridge.
As he rounds a bend, he meets the son of a neighbor, who calls to him. The peasant tells him briefly that he has just seen the monster nearby, and the neighbor’s son asks leave to ride with him. The peasant, eager to carry him as fast as possible from this awful place, lets him mount behind him. As they are riding along, the neighbor’s son asks him in a crafty voice: "What exactly did the monster look like?" The peasant feels ill at ease and replies beseechingly: "I'll tell you everything when we get home." But the other persists and says: "Turn around; perhaps I look like the monster." A cold shiver runs through the peasant and he cries out: "Don't make evil jokes. A man is not a spirit." But the other jeers and repeats: "Turn around." The peasant refuses and the other pulls him around by the arm. And the peasant looks into the face of the monster and falls unconscious from his saddle.”
Thus suddenly, beneath the mask of everyday, the mask of the neighbor’s son, the horror which lies at the primal source of being - the monster by the stream - suddenly confronts man. He tries to escape but cannot. He carries the monster with him; it attacks him from behind, and in the dread of recognition man loses his senses, falls headlong into the depths.”
FROM: Erwin Rousselle, Dragon and Mare - Figures of Primordial Chinese Mythology, [1934] Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks.: Eranos 6. The Mystic Vision, Edited by Joseph Campbell, p. 107.
TWO QUOTES FROM PEMA CHODRON:
“Trying to run away is never the answer to being a fully human being. Running away from the immediacy of your experience is like preferring death to life.”
"If we run a hundred miles an hour to the other end of the continent in order to get away from the obstacle, we find the very same problem waiting for us when we arrive."
