What is in a tattoo?
If you are a mystic, you may understand the power of symbology and the power of piecing words together and spelling. From a young age, I was quite drawn to piercings and tattoos, I always knew I would be a proud bearer of many. My first tattoo was when I turned 18 years old. At that time, I was a careless, ruthless, wild young thing with a rebellious demeanor and an intense pain body. An emo, a punk, a headbanger, and an underground raver; something raw, like a wound picked at too many times, filled with angst from a broken home. You can imagine the tattoos that I got at that time reflected this, and truthfully I am quite glad I only got a few at this age. This isn't a story about those tattoos though, this is about my favorite tattoo.
Around the age of 19, my cousin had picked up a tattoo gun and was practicing. Of course, silly young me allowed her inexperienced hand to brand me. I was describing what I wanted to her, and she said to me, "Oh, you're one of those people who want meaning in your tattoos". Repeating these words in my head I scoff at the remark. Of course I am "one of those people". Why would I permanently inscribe pointless things on to myself? Even the tattoos I have that no longer really appeal to my more matured outlook have a meaning attached to them. I've always been a poet, an artist, a singer, a dancer,a lover, and a fighter with spider like insight knowing all is connected in the web of life.
Along my path, I began my healing journey. This started after my most painful heartbreak. I put myself into yoga teacher school, because yoga was the only thing that had soothed my open wounds prior to flying the coop. It is here, I started to soften those rough edges. Where I began to heal. It is here I found inspiration for my most prized tattoo currently adorning my body. It is a lotus. I used to think the lotus was quite stereotypical and overplayed, younger me would have never imagined a flower on me. However, there was a story around it that I'll never forget. "The lotus emerges from muddy waters, and yet when it blooms it doesn't have a speck of dirt on it". The lotus is a symbol for purity. There is also yoga mudra (a symbolic hand gesture that facilitates the flow of energy in the body), called the "Lotus Mudra" it is known as a heart opening mudra. My lotus piece is tattooed below my heart on my sternum. I remember how much the lotus resonated; I felt like that flower, that came from muddy dark waters, that knew the depths and the dirt. Prior to my healing journey I had never felt "pure", my innocence was taken from a very young age. I didn't even know I could feel "pure". It was through healing that I realized, regardless of all of the scars, all pain that had been caused to me, the self-inflicted pain, and the pain I had caused to others, through it all, deep in my heart there was purity. Purity that no one could ever diminish or destroy. It is true purity, true innocence, it is love. A light that will never be put out, that will flicker even in the darkest of places. It is the purity of the human spirit, of the great spirit, of true unconditional love. Nothing, and I mean nothing can taint that, nothing can kill that. My romantic spirit believes, we all have this. We all have this diamond in the rough buried in our rib cage, waiting to be unearthed. We all have the ability to dive into the depths of our souls to find this. We all have the capacity to forgive ourselves and others, to heal.
Summer of 2018 I got my lotus. Behind my lotus is sacred geometry. The flower of life; which symbolizes creation. It reminds us of unity because we are all built from the same blueprint. It is said to be the basic template for everything and all geometric shapes can be found in it. Now, I am no mathematician, I am more of a right-brained creative; so I will not try to describe sacred geometry in depth. Interesting enough, math was actually one thing I was always good at, and even after reading books on sacred geometry my mind only somewhat grasps the concepts. I will tell you this though; all plants, cells, and even a fetus in the womb, have geometry. Cells replicate in patterns and geometric forms. I highly recommend doing your own research if this sparks any curiosity.
Naturally, as a lover of art, I am always dreaming of more tattoos and concepts, and I foresee cover ups on some of my less aligned tattoos. I'd like to leave you with this thought; as a magician and a mystic, we know that all things are connected, all words and symbols have power and meaning. When one marks themselves with anything it becomes a part of their energetic field. Everything in the universe is energy. Like attracts like, as you may have heard, which also correlates to the law of attraction. When we take responsibility for our role in what we create in our life, we realize that every thought, feeling, and emotion is a creation. We are no longer victims of circumstance, we are now conscious creators. We may not be able to change the past, the circumstances we came from, or the family we were born into, but we always have the power to rewrite our story. We can turn the most painful memories, into success stories. This is the power of magick, of alchemy.
So what is the reality you wish to create? How would you permanently adorn your body knowing this?
About the Creator
Aluna Dragon
Mystic~
Keep reading
More stories from writers in Motivation and other communities.
The Power Within the Mind
In the quiet town of Riverbend lived a young man named Adam who believed his greatest enemy lived inside his own head. From the outside, his life looked ordinary—he worked at a small printing shop, greeted customers politely, and returned each evening to a modest apartment overlooking the river. But inside Adam’s mind, there was constant noise: worries about the future, regrets about the past, and a steady stream of negative thoughts that told him he was never good enough. Adam’s thoughts controlled his emotions, and his emotions controlled his actions. When he thought he would fail, he avoided trying. When he imagined rejection, he withdrew from people. Slowly, his world became smaller—not because of circumstances, but because of the thoughts he allowed to rule him. One rainy afternoon, while delivering a stack of printed flyers, Adam took shelter in an old bookstore he had passed many times but never entered. The bell above the door chimed softly as he stepped inside. The smell of aged paper and ink filled the air, strangely comforting. Behind the counter sat an elderly man with calm eyes and silver hair, reading as though time itself had paused. “Looking for something?” the man asked gently. “I’m just waiting for the rain to stop,” Adam replied. The old man smiled. “Sometimes we walk into places for reasons we don’t yet understand.” Adam wandered through the narrow aisles until one book caught his attention. Its cover was plain, with a single line written across it: You Are Not Your Thoughts. Curious, Adam brought it to the counter. “That one finds the reader,” the old man said. “Not the other way around.” Adam hesitated. “What does that even mean?” “It means thoughts are like clouds,” the man replied. “They pass through the sky of your mind, but they are not the sky.” Adam bought the book and left as the rain eased. That night, he opened it expecting complex theories, but the writing was simple and clear. It spoke about awareness, about observing thoughts instead of obeying them, and about the hidden power that comes from choosing where to place attention. One line struck him deeply: You cannot always control what appears in your mind, but you can control what you believe and act upon. The next morning, Adam decided to experiment. As he prepared for work, a familiar thought appeared: You’ll mess up today. Normally, he would accept it as truth. This time, he paused. “That’s just a thought,” he said quietly. It felt strange, almost uncomfortable, but also freeing. The thought lost some of its weight. At work, when a customer complained, Adam noticed his mind shouting, You’re useless. Instead of reacting, he took a breath and watched the thought pass. He responded calmly, solved the issue, and realized something remarkable—his day didn’t collapse because he didn’t let his thoughts control his actions. Days turned into weeks, and Adam practiced daily. Not perfectly—some days the old patterns returned strongly—but he was learning. He began to understand that the mind was like a wild horse. If left unchecked, it would run anywhere. But with patience and practice, it could be guided. One evening, Adam returned to the bookstore to thank the old man, but the shop was gone. In its place stood an empty building with a “For Rent” sign. Confused, Adam asked a nearby shopkeeper. “That bookstore?” the shopkeeper said. “Closed years ago.” Adam felt a chill, but instead of fear, he felt clarity. The lesson mattered more than the messenger. As Adam’s control over his thoughts grew, so did his life. He applied for a better position at work—something he would have never dared before. When fear whispered, You’re not ready, he answered, I can learn. When doubt said, You’ll fail, he replied, Maybe—but I’ll try. He didn’t eliminate negative thoughts; he changed his relationship with them. They became signals, not commands. Adam also noticed how his thoughts shaped his relationships. When he assumed others judged him, he acted distant, which pushed people away. When he chose thoughts of openness and curiosity instead, connections formed naturally. His world expanded again. One day, Adam met a young boy sitting alone by the river, staring into the water with heavy eyes. “What are you thinking about?” Adam asked. The boy shrugged. “That I’m not smart. My teacher said I’m slow.” Adam sat beside him. “Thoughts can lie,” he said gently. “Just because a thought shows up doesn’t mean it’s true.” The boy looked up, surprised. “Really?” “Really,” Adam said, smiling. As the sun set, Adam realized how far he had come. The power he once searched for outside—confidence, peace, control—had always been within him. It was hidden behind layers of unchecked thoughts, waiting to be discovered. He understood now that controlling thoughts didn’t mean fighting them or forcing positivity. It meant awareness. Choice. Direction. And in that quiet awareness, Adam found freedom—not from thoughts, but from being ruled by them. From that day on, whenever life felt heavy, Adam returned to one simple truth: I am the thinker, not the thought. And that made all the difference.
By The best writer 3 days ago in Motivation
My New Book is Finally Here
My poetry collection Beautiful and Brutal Things is done. It's actually done and finally published over 270 pages. Over a year of my life went into this book. More than a year, really. Long days at my computer, sometimes seven days a week because I couldn't stop even when I probably should have. Then two months of editing that felt harder than the writing itself. But it's finished, and I'm still standing, and the book is real.
By Tim Carmichael5 days ago in BookClub
Comments
There are no comments for this story
Be the first to respond and start the conversation.