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What I offer is not a list of characteristics but a narrative of change of how I have known myself through the Fire Rabbit and been changed by this knowledge. When I received this sign.. I was immediately struck by the contradiction inherent in it.. The Rabbit is soft.. methodical and reserved.. while Fire is agitated.. devouring and relentless. These forces seem to be in conflict but they are not. They represent not conflict but tension. It is in that tension that I have learned about myself. I am the Rabbit.. cautious.. always watching before I stepped.. listening before I speak.. trusting only when it was given.. as I now know that it is not weakness but instinct that has been sharpened by time. I see what others do not.. not because I am wiser but because I hesitate long enough to see it and in so doing I have been protected but also isolated. This revelation forced me to confront the times I have confused caution with isolation. But I do not fully embody the Rabbit's gentleness. And sometimes Fire gets the better of me. Where patience is spent and I act with a sharpness that catches me by surprise. In these moments I am not the graceful creature of poise that the scroll describes but something else entirely.. something more volatile. I might have denied that side of me, hidden it under the mask of serenity. But now I know that the Fire does not contradict the Rabbit. It shows what is hidden beneath stillness. My Fire is not consistent but it is intense. It comes in the form of a drive to do.. to make.. to shake things up when they get stagnant.. which is why complacency sometimes feels unsettling to me even though I have been guilty of being complacent at times. The Rabbit can get too comfortable even a bit vain with its peace but Fire will not allow that comfort to last indefinitely. It disrupts. It creates movement. So I live in a cycle.. stillness.. then ignition.. reflection.. then action. This has changed how I act in small but meaningful ways. I no longer resist my more passionate urges but I question them. Is this Fire destructive? Is it needed? Am I acting out of impatience? Am I acting out of a need to create something new? I do not try to put out the fire but I ask it what it is trying to do.. I have started to challenge my own inaction. When I allow myself to withdraw too far into the Rabbit's safety.. I push myself to remember that change does not happen in stasis. The most significant lesson is this.. Fire cannot be ungrounded. It needs structure.. purpose.. something solid to anchor it. If there is nothing there it burns and disappears. Now I know that my "wood" is discipline. Without it, my bursts of passion go nowhere but with it. They become something that endures. So I walk forward as both, Rabbit and Fire.. knowing that I am not really either one or the other but a constant ebb and flow between the two. Learning when to rest and when to ignite.. when to watch and when to move. To the Divine Order.. I say that the self I have come to know does not bring me peace but clarity and clarity is a much harsher mistress. It requires that I make something of my stillness and my flame that deserves the path I follow. In this way.. the Fire Rabbit has transformed me not because it defined me but because it refused to let me continue to be unaware of it. -Yoonji | |