Many of our most astonishing powers are the polar compliments of madness. If we will not brave madness? They shall remain buried. This does not require we invoke or seek it; rather, that we gird and stand ready for the onset of the storm — for within we shall be tested, empowered, destroyed… and shriven our our petty preferences. Or, simply… destroyed.

Preparation and discernment matter. Discipline is a powerful ally in such engagements. But they can be won, and they are, more often — with fine allies and adequate preparation. Too often, however, driven to extremes by pain, fear, injury and circumstance… we take the ‘gifts’ of madness for our allies. They are too expensive, however.

We must set them down and take their compliments, which have no cost and are abundance itself, the true ‘treasures of the storm’… so rarely won, except by the mother who suddenly overcomes her worst moment, the child who has braved his own tantrum, or the sage who has taken themselves beyond human culture and personal culture entirely in a bid to discover what was hiding beneath.

But the secret hides in plain sight: a mother is all three of those. And, truly, has little choice in such matters — for this, indeed, is a root of the meaning of ‘mother’.

And there is, indeed, ‘a little mother’ inside all of us.