The White Snake Spirit: a reminder of the power of love and prayer -(transcript)

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Full show notes here.

Episode Transcript:

Lian (00:00)

How might prayer, offered day after day, reshape the very fabric of reality? Hello, my beautiful mythical old souls and a huge warm welcome back. In this episode, I tell the tale of the white snake spirit, a story of prayer healing and a love that endures across lifetimes.

Each month I share a mythical tale, as spell, as memory, as invitation to be felt, stirred and remembered as magical doorways into your own soul.

This story one of the oldest ways ancestral wisdom has been carried down to us, a living inheritance that continues to speak when we meet them with reverence. I first told this one live with our beloved community in Yunio, our Academy of the Soul, where we continue to journey with it more deeply through a month long quest.

So if after listening, you found this story soul-stirring and you'd like to join us for the next one, I Tell and the guided journey for you to enter the story more deeply and then the mythical quest that follows. can find out more at bemythical.com slash unio.

The Tale of the White Snake Spirit is one of the most beloved and enduring stories in Chinese folklore.

Here we meet a humble herbalist facing plague and despair, a wife who reveals her hidden power and a devotion tested through death, deception and decades of prayer. Passed from tongue to tongue across generations, this myth carries not only a love story, but the deep ancestral knowing that prayer itself is a living force able to heal, protect and transform.

Through this myth, we are offered a mirror of prayer that carries across lifetimes, of love that cannot be broken, and of stories as vessels of ancestral wisdom that still work their medicine within us today. Are you ready to look into that mirror? Then let's dive in.

Lian (02:11)

So as ever, ⁓ I would suggest you make yourself comfortable.

As I often say, stories in all of our blood and bones is an ancestral birthright that's been handed down to us how to tell stories, how to listen stories, how to allow them to enter us. And yet, because this is something that we have lost touch with to some extent over recent generations, it's really helpful to be intentional about the way that we meet a story.

And so my invitation to you is to create that space for yourself now and that can be physically, it can be laying down if you're not someone that has the risk of falling asleep or sitting very comfortably. Making sure you're in a place that feels quiet and safe and really allow yourself to go into that story space. It's very special space. It's… different this everyday world. And again, this is something that we all know, innately know, and yet need to follow that invitation back inwards to listen to that ancestral wisdom that tells us that stories have magic and power and healing and allow ourselves to meet a story in that way.

Once you have your space as a story space, just allow yourself to create that inner story space. Just settle down into your body. Notice your breath slowing and deepening. go of anything that's not needed in this moment.

White Snake Spirit.

Once upon a time, in the lakeside city of Hangzhou, there lived a herbalist named Xu Xian.

He had recently set up shop on his own. He had little money, little custom at this point, but he was already loved for his honesty and his compassion and his real talent for healing.

Xu Xian lived with his wife. Bai Suzhen A woman who was beautiful and wise. Their home was peaceful. It was filled with the scent of herbs, shared laughter, soft glances, kisses and hugs, they were very happy together.

So Xu Xian was gradually building up his business little by little. Word of mouth was spreading that this was a man who really cared and was good at healing.

But then one day, a terrible plague swept through the village. People were collapsing in the streets. Everyone was affected, mothers, children, elders. It was becoming desperate and there was no cure. Xu Xian was trying desperately to help. He tried everything that he had, powders and boiled roots. Even those rarer esoteric ancient cures nothing was working.

And then to make matters worse, his old employer, Out of resentment, sold him some stock, but it turned out to be spoiled. These were rotten herbs. So now he didn't even have access to those fresh, good herbs. And the villagers continued to die. Xu Xian blamed himself.

He wept daily over his workbench. He worked ceaselessly into the night trying to find a way to

deal with this plight that him and his village had found themselves in. He could barely bear the weight of it.

His wife saw his anguish. She knew that if she didn't help, it would all be over for them and for the villagers.

So she tuned deep inside to an ancient memory, something almost forgotten, a secret method that could transform the spoiled herbs into medicine. So that night under candlelight Bai Suzhen ground those herbs by hand and as she did so she chanted softly.

(quiet chanting)

As she ground, the scent of those herbs changed. It became fragrant, smoky and alive, pungent.

The next morning, she gave it to her husband and he began to give it to the villagers. Their fevers broke, their breath returned. Little by little, they began to heal. Even his old employer, the one who had caused it all with the rotten herbs, came crawling to him in shame, begging for help and was healed.

Now of course word of this miracle spread fast. It was a very unusual thing to have happened and this reached the ears of Fa Hai a monk from a nearby temple.

For I believe that Bai Suzhen was not a woman, but a demon spirit. He warned that warned Xu Xian, there is something in your home that is not of this world. Xu Xian laughed. Surely that's not true. His home was a place of love and beauty and laughter. And yet the monk insisted. Your wife is a demon.

And Fahai continued to insist and he gave Xu Xian a flask of Rialga wine and said, on the fifth day of the fifth month, demons lose their strength. If you give her this wine and she's human, nothing will happen. But if she's not, you'll see the truth.

Xu Xian again dismissed it, but over time, curiosity overtook him. And when the festival day, the fifth day of the fifth month arrived, he decided to just try, just to know the truth.

He really did it just to not be living in this doubt about his wife. He didn't really believe that she was anything other than his beautiful wife. But he poured a small cup and handed it to Bai Suzhen She took it and she raised it to her lips and she drank.

Within moments, she went pale. Her body began to shake and she fled to the bedroom collapsing the curtain. Xu Xian rushed into the room and as he entered, he found not his wife, but a massive white snake coiled and trembling.

Her eyes were wide with sorrow. He collapsed, dead with shock.

Bai Suzhen came to him back as a human, held his body and sobbed and sobbed and sobbed.

And then she rose, she knew she had to act quickly.

There was one hope, a sacred herb hidden in the peaks of the nearby mountains. It was said to restore life, but it was guarded by the old man of the South Pole. Bai Suzhen soared on a cloud towards the mountains. She crossed silver bridges and stone arches until she reached a gateway marked beyond mortals. Two disciples stood guard.

She disguised herself as a monk. I have come to invite the old man to a gathering of the gods, she said. While they turned to the old man to deliver the message, Bai Suzhen slipped into the garden and plucked the herb. The disciples returned and they chased her. She coughed up a glowing pearl and she flung it at one of them. But as the second one closed in, She tucked the herb beneath her tongue, hoping to protect him. But that magic forced them both into their true forms, a gleaming white snake and a great crane.

The crane gripped her in its beak, but then the old man appeared. He came with such presence, such power, that they immediately stopped and he asked, why would an immortal steal my herb?

Bai Suzhen answered, because the man I love is dead. Even if he hates me now, even if he rejects me now, he's seen my true form, I cannot bear to let him go.

She told the old man a secret. Long ago, when I was a small snake, many, many centuries ago, a beggar tried to kill me. A kind man stopped him. That man was Xu Xian, my husband in a past life.

That bound us together karmically. We have loved each other through lifetimes.

The old man was moved. Very well, he said. Take the herb.

Bai Suzhen returned to Hangzhou, she placed the herb on Xu Xian's tongue. He immediately opened his eyes and his first word was her name.

He was so glad to be reunited with her. He completely accepted her as she was. But the peace did not last. The monk Fa Hai enraged by her return, captured Bai Suzhen in battle and imprisoned her beneath the pagoda he had just built. This beautiful, impressive pagoda.

she was trapped underneath.

Xu Xian was heartbroken. Every day he went to the pagoda and dropped to his knees to pray. In rain, in snow, in wind, in beating sun, he never missed a day.

He grew thin, he grew tired, but he never gave up hope. Day after day, he returned and prayed at the pagoda. Prayed for her freedom, prayed for her return.

The story spread of this man praying day after day at the pagoda and pilgrims began to journey to join him.

They came and they bring incense, water, flowers, prayers. Years past, decades past.

He grew older. but he still did not give up hope.

One day, as the clouds gathered over Westlake, thunder cracked through the sky, the ground shook, and in a moment, the pagoda collapsed.

Bai Suzhen stepped out, tears in her eyes, love in her heart. Xu Xian ran to her and the two were reunited at last.

They lived out their final years together quietly, walking the lakeside paths, tending herbs.

living as though the trials had never happened but the villagers remembered and they told the story again and again a love that defied death and prayers that even the heavens could hear. The story of their love, tested, devoted and eternal, is passed even now from tongue to tongue across the mountains and lakes of China and beyond. teaching us, reminding us of the power of prayer.

And they all lived happily ever after.

Lian (17:35)

So that's the end of this month's myth. I hope you enjoyed this mythical tale and that it's shown you something of your own soul. Here's what spoke to me. Xu Xian's decades of prayer at the Pagoda remind us how steady daily offerings can move heaven and earth quite literally. This story reveals prayer as a living current of devotion, something that can heal, restore and call miracles into being.

The white snake spirit carries ancestral wisdom, showing us how stories themselves can be medicine, teaching us about love, prayer and transformation in ways that can still touch our lives today. As I said at the beginning,

I first shared this tale live with our beloved community in Unio, our Academy of the Soul, where we continue to journey with it more deeply through a month long quest.

So if you found this story soul-stirring and you'd like to join us for the next one I tell, the guided journey for you to enter it more deeply and the mythical quest that follows, you can find out more at bemythical.com slash unio.

If you'd like to hop on over to the show notes for the links, they're at bemythical.com slash podcast slash five one five.

And if you don't want to miss out on next week's episode, head on over to your podcasting app or platform of choice, including YouTube and hit that subscribe or follow button. That way you'll get each episode delivered straight to device automagically as soon as it's released.

Thank you so much for listening. You've been wonderful. I'm sending you all my love. I'll catch you again next week and until then go be mythical.

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