The Ceryneian Hind

After slaying the Hydra, King Eurystheus gives Heracles what seems like a far less dangerous assignment.

For his 3rd Labor, the king commands Heracles to capture the Ceryneian Hind and bring it back to him alive.

At first glance, it almost sounds easy.

Or at least, a challenge less likely to result in his gruesome death.

For those of us who aren’t in the know, a hind is essentially a deer.

This particular hind was said to be enormous—some stories describing it as being as large as an elephant—and, its gigantic size aside, this is no ordinary deer.

The Ceryneian Hind is sacred to the goddess Artemis.

Ancient historians describe the Hind as extraordinarily beautiful, with golden antlers and bronze hooves that flashed in the sunlight.

It could outrun an arrow in flight and was said to have been one of five magical hinds Artemis captured while they were grazing beside the river Anauros.

She kept four to pull her chariot, but the one Heracles was sent to capture was the crafty one who wasn’t interested in a life harnessed to other deer to haul some lady’s chariot.

So, the Hind escaped and fled into the forests around Ceryneia, where it remained under her protection.

There’s no gender assigned to the Ceryneian Hind, but as I’m a counselor who works with women and this is MY interpretation, this hind is female.

So from here forward, she’s a she.

Now, Heracles doesn't catch the Hind in an afternoon.

He chases her for an entire year.

Over mountains, through forests, across burning deserts, rivers, some versions say the hunt took him as far north as the land of the Hyperboreans, a mythical paradise beyond the reach of winter.

Eventually, the Hind pauses to drink from a spring or slows from exhaustion—different ancient authors tell it differently—and Heracles finally captures her.

As Heracles begins leading the Hind back to Mycenae, Artemis appears.

In some versions, she's accompanied by her twin brother, Apollo, but in every story, Artemis is PISSED.

The Hind is one of her sacred animals, and this guy—never mind that he’s her half-brother—is taking it.

Heracles is an honest man, so he tells Artemis he’s been commanded to complete this labor and promises that once he’s shown the Hind to Eurystheus, he will return her unharmed.

Reluctantly, Artemis accepts Heracles is a man of his word and allows him to continue.

When Heracles finally reaches Mycenae, Eurystheus eagerly sends his servants forward to claim the beautiful golden Hind.

Instead, Heracles asks Eurystheus to come get her himself.

As Eurystheus reaches for the animal, Heracles releases her.

The Hind immediately bounds away and heads back to her forest in Ceryneia.

Heracles completes the labor exactly as instructed, without betraying his promise to Artemis.

Perhaps a mythic example of malicious compliance?

I think so.

When I was young and first learned about the Ceryneian Hind, I only ever cheered for Heracles because he finally caught her.

It was a tale of victory to me.

The mighty hero defies the odds and completes another labor.

Older now, with plenty of journeys that took so many years... I've sat with this labor and find myself wondering whether the Hind isn't something far more elusive.

Peace.

Or at least the version of ourselves that existed before we became convinced we needed fixing.

I know I hunted healing and spirituality and THE THING that would give my life meaning with dogged determination.

With the belief that if I could capture THE THING, aka The Hind, then I’d finally have the answers I needed.

If you’re anything like me, one book becomes five.

A meditation practice turns into breathwork, then somatic exercises, then nervous system regulation, then the latest modality everyone's just discovered that will absolutely change your life, but in reality it’s literally a 2,000-year-old practice that shaped monarchies, repackaged and rebranded to fit in with the needs of society today…

Before long, you've got a bookshelf full of travel guides on how to get to the same destination through a thousand different roads, a journal full of half-finished exercises, and enough supplements in the kitchen cupboard to open your own apothecary, and every new thing arrives carrying the same quiet hope:

Maybe this is the one.

Maybe this is finally the thing that brings me home.

And then you wake up one morning still grieving, still anxious, still tired, still unable to figure out what the hell it means to ‘regulate your nervous system,’ because you’ve tried all these things you were told would work, and they worked for other people, but they did NOT work for YOU.

And the power of positive thinking? HA!

Some days, it’s all you can do to brush your goddamn teeth.

But you do it, and then after accomplishing what feels like the proverbial Herculean task, you remember you’re supposed to be practicing gratitude.

So you take a breath and force yourself to smile and feel grateful to have toothpaste, teeth, clean water, a bathroom... but those bills aren’t going anywhere and working, peopleing… that’s why you’ve been doing all these things to feel good enough to handle life.

At some point, when it’s a struggle to stay positive, to stay the course, to keep going even though what we desire or need is beyond our reach, we quietly decide we must be doing the healing thing wrong, because nothing has changed.

Now you’re here, still trying, because hopefully what I’ve got to say has piqued your curiosity.

And I’m here, proposing that perhaps Heracles’ third labor offers another perspective.

Before we get to it, let’s briefly recap the first two labors.

The Nemean Lion

Heracles' belief: "I'll defeat this the way I've always defeated everything."

The truth: Old tools don't work forever. Sometimes the answer is hidden within the very thing we're fighting.

The Lernaean Hydra

Heracles' belief: "If I just keep trying harder, eventually I'll win."

The truth: Not every battle is won through effort. Some require wisdom, relationship, and a completely different strategy.

Now, chasing the Hind, this hero—who, like you, has slain his share of monsters—is spending an entire year pursuing an animal he can’t catch, can’t trap, and can’t kill to make things easier.

He has to bring her back alive, but every day, the Hind eludes him.

As he passes through villages asking for directions or rumors of sightings, there are probably strangers who know nothing about Heracles as a person, who have no idea what he’s done or what he’s capable of, telling him to give up because it just can’t be done.

I wonder if Heracles looked at those people, teeth clenched, exhausted and trying to make a valiant effort to smile, and said, “Well, I don’t have another choice. I have to get this Hind to complete my labors.”

The longer the hunt goes on, the less evidence there is that progress is actually being made.

I imagine at some point on the journey, Heracles started hyping himself up the same way we do when we tell ourselves it will all work out if we just keep trying, keep hunting, if we keep asking for directions, if we just keep believing.

And I wonder if he started to feel the burn.

The resentment as the Hind led him down another path, or back the way he came, across the desert for three months where he was dying of thirst, only to run him through a river ten miles wide.

I can hear the echo of my past self now…

I’ve already been here.

I tried that, it didn’t work!

No, I have that supplement already, I’m still waking up in the middle of the night.

What do you mean I have to climb up ANOTHER MOUNTAIN!?

But if I do this, it’ll be worth it, right?

You promise?

Okay, I believe you because you look like YOU have your life together…

What do you mean you’re still ‘figuring it out?’

Okay, yes, all that resonates and I feel called out, so it means there’s a wound there I need to deal with, right?

Wait, how much is that course?

Uh, no, I’ll just do it myself, thanks.’

I think about the resentment of trying something new after you’ve been burned. Believing you need to do something if you want things to change, but doubting it will actually work.

Still, you’ve come this far and spent too much money, so at some point, it almost becomes a point of pride.

Then a new voice enters the chat, and we say to ourselves—

This book better have what I need.

If this therapist turns out like the last one, I’m done with therapy.

This meditation/certification/course/retreat, is definitely going to change my life because it worked for that person who’s now working remote and traveling and living the life I desire. If they can do it, so can I.

I've spent $4,000. This HAS to be it, because it wouldn’t be so expensive if it didn’t work.

We often judge a healing modality by whether it "worked."

We invest, we hope, we dig in deep, and we believe it will work if we put in enough effort, if we believe we’re doing the right thing.

Then...

The teacher disappoints you.

Maybe the community that initially made you feel so safe and seen turns down a path that feels... culty.

Or they reveal themselves to not be as inclusive, or as enlightened, or as knowledgeable as they claimed.

Maybe the promises of health, wealth, and abundance don't materialize despite following the method or system to the letter.

You see that Live, Laugh, Love sign, and it actually makes you angry, because who the hell can live, laugh, love in these conditions?

Now you're grieving the original wound and the hope you placed in the cure.

Desperation arises.

You tell yourself you need to make this work because you want to feel better.

You fear it will never get better. That this is simply the way life is for you.

The pressure to perform sets in because you were very vocal about following this new, incredible person.

You bought all their merch, went on the trip, invested in their method, told your friends and family what a great book that was, but now you just want to chuck it in the fire pit and pee on the ashes in defiance of that teacher, their method, their crackpot theories, and can’t believe it took you this long to realize how that system was never about healing.

It was about capitalizing on your fear, on your feelings of being untethered, chasing after that sacred thing, desperate to capture it, because if you do, then your impossible labor will finally be completed.

I remember having a conversation with my therapist about how here I went again, trying something new without finishing the last thing because the HD got lost to the AD, and I found the Squirrel of Tism to lead me down a new rabbit hole coated in puppy breath scented dopamine.

I was really upset about that, voicing this pattern I had noticed: how I never finish what I start once it no longer makes me feel the way I wanted or needed it to.

More upset about how I would be perceived by peers and clients, imagining they’d think I was a wishy-washy flake who couldn’t finish projects, always on the hunt for the next best thing.

We talked about what it meant to be someone who doesn’t naturally produce dopamine, how that becomes my Ceryneian Hind, and my personal chase to catch it.

This wise, hilarious, clever, accomplished, wild woman with a Ph.D. whom I adore said:

"What if you think of it like dating?"

And I was like, "Whaaaat?"

Because we were talking about study and practice and healing, not romantic relationships.

But I went with it because I could see where she was going, and the perspective shift was intriguing enough to follow.

It became a permission slip, if you will, to stop being so hard on myself for trying new things.

The purpose of dating someone is to get to know them better, right?

To find out if you share the same interests.

If they actually look like their profile picture.

If being with them makes you laugh, or if their political views on gender and equality make you want to gag.

You decide if spending time with them feels good.

If you like them as a person. If you’ve got chemistry or if it’s just hormones.

If they fulfill you, or if you feel drained after spending five minutes in their presence.

If they’re curious about you, or only want to talk about themselves.

If they remember your drink order, or take you to the sushi place after you explicitly said you hate fish.

If they’re someone who’s polite to waitstaff, or if they’re the type of person who snaps their fingers at the bartender.

We date to find out if it’s good, or not good.

And if it’s not good, we date someone else with, hopefully, having gathered more data about what does not spark joy and how we can recognize those signs before we go and shave our legs.

Sometimes, the next date is tomorrow.

Sometimes, we don’t try again for months.

Years.

But when we break it down to the brass tacks, it’s a hunt.

A long journey toward ultimately deciding whether you are or are not safe with someone.

Whether they’re a potential spouse, a long-term relationship, or just someone you call when you want to get drinks with another human you’re attracted to.

So what if all those healing modalities we tried were "dates"?

What if—in a world of pre-packaged products sent to a social media influencer to promote and sell— we dated all those things to learn more about what does and does not feel like peace and wholeness for US,?

What if we went to that retreat where a perfumed priestess sent us out into her metaphorical petting zoo to find the Dodo of Discernment.

The Emu of Embodiment.

The Armadillo of Abundance.

The Hippo of Happiness.

The Walrus of Wholeness.

The Pachyderm of Peace.

The Capybara of Creativity.

The Sloth of Self-Awareness.

The Manatee of Mindfulness.

The Goldfish of Gratitude.

The Wildebeest of Wisdom.

The Catahoula of Calm.

And before you go out there to collect them all, she explains which treats you need to feed all of them to make them come over to you so you can take them home.

But then when you get home, they run right back to her, because taking them home and keeping them are two different master classes.

So what if all of those things aren’t meant to be hunted and captured?

Healing doesn’t happen in accordance with the availability on our schedules.

It doesn’t care that we want to be "better" by this time.

It doesn’t respond well to being chased or cornered, exactly the same way a frightened deer doesn’t come closer because we run after it faster.

It comes closer when it senses safety.

Now, this is less literal and more of a sensory myth comparison, because yes, a wild deer isn’t about to come over and let us pet them just because we project peace and calm.

Although...

I have seen that guy who holds seeds in his hands and sits so still and is so calm that squirrels hop into his hand, and he patiently moves one little bit at a time with pliers to pick ticks off them.

So it’s possible.

But we’re in the land of myths and legends here.

M’kay?

If any of this feels true, I wonder if maybe healing practices deserve the same consideration as our views on dating.

We don't have to find THE ONE on the first try.

In fact, most everyone would be shocked if you did.

True, it does happen, but it’s about as rare as a frog named Schrödinger with ginger-striped fur these days.

We can walk with a book, a meditation practice, a therapist, or a philosophy for a season, receive what it genuinely offers, thank it for the distance we traveled together, integrate all that made us feel good and safe and happy, and, when it's time, continue the journey with something else.

We had a relationship with those practices.

We learned important, meaningful things.

But none of them came with a contract stating those relationships had to last forever in order for them to be meaningful.

The truth is, every practice that teaches us greater compassion, every conversation that helps us understand ourselves, every guide who carries a torch for a little while, every path that reminds us we aren't alone, every journey we take, changes us.

Not because we've finally discovered the magic key, but because we've become the peace we needed all along.

With every “date” of a new modality, we learn to be just a little more patient with ourselves.

A little more compassionate, and a little less afraid.

Some of us read the myth of the Ceryneian Hind and will imagine ourselves as the Hind, running away from the emotions and monsters chasing us.

Away from pain, shame, anxiety, from the past, from people, from the woulds and the shoulds that roar like lions.

But maybe we're Heracles, too. Chasing after something shiny and beautiful through every forest, stream, and desert that looks appealing because we hope we’re going to eventually catch what we’re chasing, and eventually, it’ll lead us to the right place.

The safe place where we can finally rest.

I think Heracles represents the part of us that’s strong enough to wake up every morning determined to create the peace we didn’t have growing up.

The part determined to become whole by undertaking the journey to find the version of ourselves we dream of becoming that’s somewhere just beyond the next book, the next breakthrough, the next retreat, the next therapist, the next meditation app.

It all matters, even if we don’t know how or why yet.

Imagine what the Hind saw when Heracles burst into the sacred forest.

A big mountain of a man wearing the skin of the Nemean Lion, wearing the head like a helmet, probably smelling like a dirty beast…

I mean, really, the Hind reacted the way any sane person would if a lion started running toward them.

The myth says the Hind finally stops because she’s too tired to run anymore, or because she finally arrives at that stream with the crispy filtered water she likes.

That river that was ten miles wide? Tap water.

But what if, after a year of being chased by what she perceives to be a lion, the Hind finally realizes it’s just a really big guy who sorta looks like Dwayne Johnson wearing a lion hat, and he’s actually the mighty Heracles who’s got this whole gentle, determined stalker vibe going for him?

Something to think about…

Anyway, the Nemean Lion taught us that sometimes the thing we’re trying to defeat isn’t something we can overpower with weapons.

Sometimes the strength we need comes from walking into the cave where the thing we fear lives, discovering what it’s made of, taking the time to try something new in order to defeat it, and realizing that the very thing we thought would destroy us may become the source of our protection.

The Lernaean Hydra showed us that not every battle is won by trying harder.

Some wounds grow more heads as we’re trying to heal them.

It asks us to recognize when we need a different strategy, when we need another person beside us, and when the truth beneath the pain deserves to be honored rather than destroyed

So now, before we leave Mycenae once again to undertake another labor, I have to ask...

What if the thing you’ve been chasing is more like a frightened, sacred creature that’s survived all this time because it trusted its primal survival instinct that says, WE RUN FROM LIONS!

And what if that sacred creature thinks you’re the lion?

What if you’ve been chasing it so relentlessly that it’s forgotten what it feels like to be approached with gentleness?

What if the lion was never actually a lion, but just a belief, or a fear, wearing a lion shaped hat?

What if Heracles’ 3rd labor is offering us myth and metaphor to teach us how to approach ourselves with enough patience, compassion, and gentleness—even if that journey takes a year, or longer— so that the parts of us who have been running for all this time, finally realize they’re safe enough to come home?

How would that change the way you approach yourself?

Here, I invite you to consider both parts of this myth.

Imagine yourself preparing for a date.

You’re the mighty hero in a lion costume giving the ol’ flex in the mirror to show off those guns you’ve worked so hard for. You’re brave enough to keep showing up, determined enough to keep searching, even when the path is long and the dating apps feel like wading through that Hydra’s boggy, nasty, stinky swamp.

But you’re ALSO the shining Hind, gold highlights, fresh outta the pedi chair, claws and paws a gorgeous copper color, just a sacred creature who needs some good water and a place to finally rest.

What would that date with You and Yourself look like?

I sure would like to be a fly on the wall to see how it plays out!

So here we are, friends. The Hind has returned to Artemis, and the forest is quiet again, but there’s another creature with a hella nasty temper just around the corner.

Come on, bring your water; the Erymanthian Boar is waiting.