Dismem-Boar-Ment page 31

This is the next page of one of my ongoing projects which has a tendency to get put aside in favor of more current projects. This page in particular has lingered in the back of my brain for awhile because it is a sort of segue between 'chapters,' so, for a long time it floated around, refusing to come completely into focus, because it lacked the same energy that drives the actual telling of a story. 

Still, I was getting itchy to finish this series which was in its final stages of being finished, which required looking directly at the challenge without looking away - or at least looking directly at my journal, which held the unfolding narratives of this project, without flinching - and this page is the result.

To read the rest of the individual story which this page concludes, please click on the "Birdman" label below, and to catch up on the entire series thus far, please click on the "Dismem-Boar-Ment" label. As always, thank you so much for reading, and I hope you enjoy it!

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Dismem-Boar-Ment page 29 & 30

Just like the rest of my life, I have a number of things actively in progress when it comes to my comic projects. Though I have had no lack of material for chronicling my daily life and current challenges, I'm trying to make sure I'm not letting other series languish for too long. And so, here are the next two pages from my "Dismem-boar-ment" series concerning my experiences from a vision quest a few years ago. 

For obvious reasons, I drew these two pages together.

 

Below is how the two pages would appear together, if I can work out how to make sure they're positioned side by side. I may have to add another page somewhere along the way to make it happen, but the resulting effect is definitely worth the effort.

And then, just to bring it all full circle, I wanted to see what it actually looked like together as one image, and with color...

To read the rest of this series thus far, please click on the "Dismem-boar-ment" label below. To read just this particular chapter, please click on the "Birdman" label below. To remain up to date with my latest comics, please follow my blog, and thank you so much for reading!💖

Cutting A-Cord-ingly

My life is in the midst of major, major changes, and as such comes the important priority of keeping myself energetically clean and pure, in large part by releasing the cords and ties to anything that has not and does not actively support my path and who it is that I am in the process of becoming.

And one of the beautiful parts of this path is when your guides step in unexpectedly and give you an entirely new method of doing things that you've been doing for years, such as cutting cords.

Our Guest Today Is…

Things have been a little crazy lately, so it’s been tricky finding the time and energy to post anything, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been working on my comics. 

Here are my three latest, random pages that I have finished in the past couple months. The interesting commonality between them is that they each have a different celebrity guest star - Tarzan, Mary Tyler Moore, and Mr Rogers! 

Enjoy, and thank you for reading! ❤️

 

Dismem-Boar-Ment page 28

I present this page in the spirit of Divine Timing. This particular page, the latest in my "Dismem-boar-ment" series, has stumped me for a year and a half. For whatever reason, I could not get a clear picture on how I wanted this page to look, despite countless pages and thumbnails exploring dozens of possibilities. Then suddenly last night, as I was sitting here just recovering from oral surgery, it all just clicked and this was the result. 

So with the relief and joy that accompanies the flow of the Spring melt and the initial running of the sap in the Vernal quickening of creative juices, please enjoy this page with the anticipation of more to follow. 

To read entire series so far click on the "Dismem-boar-ment" label below, and to see just this latest chapter thus far, click on the "Birdman" label. And as always, please follow my blog to stay up to date with my latest comics, thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy them as much as I do!

 

Blanket Statement

There are two comic artists who really influenced and inspired the direction of my own comics, demonstrating for me the joy, growth, and healing of turning my cartoonist's pencil toward myself, drawing my own life as a comic. They are Craig Thompson, author/illustrator of Blankets, and James Kochalka, author/illustrator of American Elf. 

A few weeks ago, Craig was doing a book signing in Portland and, because of his importance to me, a three hour drive seemed a worthwhile investment to meet him. Though my intuition was on overdrive to get me down there, things did not turn out the way I'd hoped.

The following comic is the result of this seeming wild goose chase. Because I didn't get to meet him in person, the plan is to send him the comic to connect with him and to thank him for being such a huge turning point in my personal approach to my comics. Stay tuned for possible updates! 

 

Pipe Song

Another episode from my adventure attending my first Sundance this past summer.

 

Smoke and Mirrors page 1

There's an issue that is never far away from my conscious mind that I've been dealing with since the beginning of the pandemic, which I find necessary to revisit from time to time in order to maintain my integrity around it in what I call my "Golden Lasso" moments. That issue is the videoing of sacred ceremonies, namely the Sacred Pipe Ceremony, which, if not outright forbidden by tradition, is definitely frowned upon.

I don't want to say too much about it at this point because this blog is largely about utilizing my cartooning skills to work things out. I'll just say that recently I've had a couple people, one indigenous and one not, requesting I stop because they felt that according to tradition it was disrespectful. This comic series is not to explain or justify myself, but to honestly look at what I do and why, and to find the balance, as well as the strength and courage, to continue forward when the guidance on my Shamanic path says one thing while traditions tell me something else. 

I have written about and drawn other comics on this subject, and to see those comics you can click on the White Buffalo Calf Woman label below. Please stay tuned for the unfolding of this comic series, and, as always, thank you for reading and for sharing this journey with me! <3    

 

All Dogs Go To Heaven

It took me a long time to draw this comic through the heartbreak and grief, but one of the perks of cartooning your life is that it affords you another avenue of healing - to bring things out into the light of day rather than letting them fester unseen in the shadows, not to mention the therapeutic magick of transmuting pain into beauty. 

 Romp In Peace dear Bunny, Salama, and Teddy. ❤️

 

Winging It

A while ago I performed a Soul Retrieval for a client which turned into a Faery Doctoring session when we found out that the soul part I was retrieving also needed to have retrieved for her, the wings that she'd left in the Faery realm when she decided to incarnate as a human this time around. As an energy exchange for my part in bringing those wings from their world to ours, the Fae requested that I draw a comic about the experience - The two page comic below. I originally drew it after the session and only just finished inking it.

If none of the above makes sense to you and you're wondering what the heck I'm talking about, here are a couple links to my Perching Wolf Studios website where you can find information about Soul Retrieval and about Faery Doctoring. Meanwhile, please enjoy the comic below! 

 

If I Could Talk To The Animals...

I just started taking this class, for the second time, where we go to the various area zoos to communicate with the animal ambassadors, collect their prayers, and then do fire ceremony to release their prayers for them. We had our first session the other night where we did a shamanic journey to connect with an animal spirit guide to ask for guidance on how we can better connect with animals. This was my experience...

 

M-O-U-S-E

 I've been going through a lot of changes, and a lot of tears, lately. One of the things coming up again and again is my dreams of a cartooning career. I've been so focused on getting my Shaman practice going I haven't really been moving in the direction of my comics, at least professionally. So I've been pivoting slightly to learn how to bring my comics more into focus as a profession alongside my shamanic business. 

Then I watched a documentary on Mickey Mouse. Tears welled up in my eyes as parts of me started waking up that I'd forgotten. Looking beyond the sleek corporation empirical image, I once again was able to touch the innocence and magick I knew as a boy. The excitement returned that I once felt with every new Disney movie or cartoon for the new worlds I'd explore and the new friends I would meet. Through tears the realization dawned on how absolutely influential Walt Disney was on me. Pretty much everything about who I am today, from my whimsical, dreamer heart, and my belief in magick and wishing on stars, to my optimism and my spiritual outlook I owe in large part to Walt Disney.

“Remember, it all started with a mouse.”

Dismem-Boar-Ment page21

Page 21 of my chronicle of last year's Vision Quest, and the first page of the next mini-chapter within the whole narrative, concerning my meeting with Herne the Hunter. Stay tuned!...

Dismem-Boar-Ment page 6

So a funny thing happened on the way to the dismemberment. As this page says, after I finished the last 5 pages of this comic series, I suddenly realized that I wasn't sure how the experience had ended, and then having a vision quest to prepare for I didn't have the extra time to try to figure it out. And so our comic changes gears, to move in a different direction to find its conclusion. Stay tuned!! 

To read all the pages in this series, please click on the "Dismem-boar-ment" label below.

Dismem-Boar-ment page 5

We have a special "Two-fer" for today! Because I have had absolutely no one show up for a card reading today, I've been able to finish and post a whole nother page the same day I posted the previous one.

Please click on the Dismem-boar-ment label below to read all the previous pages!

Dismem-Boar-ment page 4

Here is the 4th page of my 'dismem-boar-ment' experience with my Matron Goddess, Artemis. To read all the pages thus far, please click on the Dismem-boar-ment label below!

 

Dismem-Boar-ment page 3

Page 3 of my recent dismemberment journey with Artemis.

 

Though it may seem like a gruesome prospect, dismemberment is a very healing, and painless, process for expanding beyond the ego and deepening your awareness of your connection with the Divine. That is why I included the quote from Sandra Ingerman on the last page in order to give some context and purpose to something which, to our civilized minds, might appear punitive and/or destructive, but which actually frees us, safely and sacredly, from the bonds that hold us captive to a more limited perspective of reality, and separates us from our own innate, Divine nature. 

From Walking In Light: The Everyday Empowerment of a Shamanic Life by Sandra Ingerman

Click on the Dismem-boar-ment label below to see all the published pages thus far.

Dismem-Boar-ment p2

Page 2! Click on the Dismem-boar-ment label below to see all pages of this comic so far!

 

Dismem-Boar-ment p1

 And thus beginneth another multi-page comic on a recent shamanic adventure...

Click on the Dismem-boar-ment label below to see all pages of this comic so far!

My Faery Lady

I recently did a Faery Doctoring session with a client. This is similar to the Soul Retrievals I perform, working with specific spirit guides in a Shamanic ceremony to retrieve portions of a person's soul or psyche that were 'lost' or dissociated because of trauma. But sometimes, rather than just floating out there somewhere for self-preservation, these soul parts are adopted and nurtured by the Faery folk as a way to balance the energy between their world and ours. 

For such cases I have a Faery liaison named Alandria who helps me find and return those soul parts to their original person, but to keep the energies balanced between our two worlds both my client and I need to give something back to the Fae. Usually this is a creative endeavor which ends up being beneficial for all parties, in this case my client having to dance at least once a day for a certain number of days and my having to draw one comic page every day for six days (You'll notice below that I overshot that by one day). 

When I started I had no idea that I would end up in the ER during part of it, but that also demonstrates the healing support that comes from drawing my comics. Here are the seven pages that resulted from that session, and I'm hoping Alandria enjoyed them.