Painting the Hero-ine's Journey in 5 Steps - Stage 2 - Trials, Tests, Allies and enemies

This morning I started layer two of my painting of the Hero-ine's Journey in 5 steps. The painting is mine and the heroine is me.  The journey is mine - all is me.

"If you are not the hero of your own story, then you're missing the whole point of your humanity.” 

― Steve Maraboli

At the same time I am a child of the universe no less than the sea and the stars.  And I am the sea and the stars, I came out of the waters of my mother's womb and I am made of star dust.  So this painting about me is also a painting about the universe.

Chris Olson says Stage 2  of the Hero-ine's Journey is about  "being transported to an alien environment, where many trials are faced and endured."

Vogel writes "having crossed the threshold, the Hero faces Tests, encounter Allies, confronts Enemies and learns the rules of this special world,"

Here is stage 1 

I think this stage of my painting may be about how many paths there are to chose from.  Who do you know which path to take.  There are so many dead ends and wrong turns.  My dad used to love this poem by Robert Frost "The Road Not Taken"

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

 My painting reminds me of the basketry I used to do where the layers are all interwoven to make a beautiful geometric form.

One of my favorite baskets to make was an Appalchian Egg basket

The colors in this painting remind me of Emil Nolde, a painter I have loved since my youth.

I wasn't careful with the paint.  I didn't tighten up the forms.  I accepted this was just a layer in the journey to the next layer.  A layer that would be covered soon.  So I decided it was more about the energy and the form, not precision.

I put my foot prints at the bottom left corner of this layer to symbolize the path.  If you believe in intuition as I do then logically it follows that acceptance of whatever path you take will be the right path for you.  u The main footprints I remember in art are the footprints of the Buddha

"The footprints of the Buddha (Buddhapada) are one of the early representations of the Buddha in the anticonic (no statues) stage of Buddhist art. The Buddhapada are highly revered in all Buddhist countries, especially in Sri Lanka and Thailand.

Symbolizing the grounding of the transcendent, feet have been objects of respect in India long before Buddhism. According to Buddhist legend, after the Buddha attained enlightenment, his feet made an imprint in the stone where he stepped."