The Thread is everywhere.

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​Our human history is filled with stories of all kinds. But those that stand out most are the tales of heroes. Fantastic journeys filled with courage and adventure. Stories that sometimes inspire our own acts of bravery or pilgrimages of self-actualization.
 
But the hero’s journey is not a rare as you might think. The truth is, we all tell stories with our lives. And we are the heroes in all of them.

​But I am getting ahead of myself. Let me back up a few thousand years.
 
The Greeks were fabled storytellers. According to Greek myth, on the island of Crete there was a fabled labyrinth that was the home of a great monster called the Minotaur.
 
The labyrinth was known to be unnavigable. And anyone who entered would inevitably be eaten by the Minotaur when they couldn’t find a way out. Theseus volunteered to do what had never been done, to successfully navigate the labyrinth and kill the Minotaur who lived at its center.
 
Princess Ariadne befriended Theseus on his way to his questionable fate, and she gave him a ball of red thread to help him find his way out of the labyrinth.

Theseus tied one end of the thread to the entrance of the labyrinth and then was able to follow it back out later, after he killed the Minotaur. (Which apparently was barely difficult enough to mention, compared to the deadly maze.)

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Both Ariadne’s and Theseus’s stories are examples of the hero’s journey. Your story, too, is a hero’s journey. Whether you know it or not right now. Because that’s what everyone’s really is. We are all on the hero’s journey.
 
And everyone is looking for the Ariadne thread. But the truth is the thread is everywhere, and it connects everything and everyone. You just have to pick it up somewhere and start following where it leads.
 
This is one of the themes of my new novel, Painted Oxen. Everything is connected. We all carry the thread. And that thread is ancient. The hero’s story is ancient. Your DNA is ancient, and it holds countless stories that must be unraveled. 
 
The thread is everywhere. Reach down and pick it up. From anywhere. And follow it. Just start walking.

​Let the adventure show you where you need to be. Let the thread take you to who you are supposed to meet. And then start to tell a new story of your own.
 
If you want to pick up the thread that starts with Painted Oxen, you can follow one of the links below to order the novel. Go ahead. Begin the journey.
 
https://homeboundpublications.com/product/painted-oxen-by-thomas-lloyd-qualls/
 
https://www.amazon.com/Painted-Oxen-Thomas-Lloyd-Qualls/dp/1947003364
 
See you out there.
 
TQ

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(lead photo by Julian Mora @ unsplash)