If people tell you, who they are, trust them, they say. Remember albeit, that you have more senses than your ears and that they are not limited to the physical ones.
 
You have a tongue to taste, a nose to smell, your skin to feel and eyes to observe. Yes, to observe, not to see. The seeing is done with another part of your body.
 
When the Emperor strutted in in the nude and his lackeys were complementing him on his attire in Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, everyone was told to please him and his ego in as to not make him go ballistic. 
 
Others were threatened by his position and power over them and need not be reminded, the enthralled ones were illusioning themselves about the illusion, the chess players in the court chose whatever suited their agenda best, the ones depending on the emperor's gold for mere survival bowed their head and applauded the charade, only the innocent child spoke, about what everyone was observing and no-one chose to see or dared to speak:
 
​“He is naked!” like a deus ex machina, a forgotten and discarded chess piece re-entering the game.

In Greenlandic tales the “piniartoq”, the hunter, is out to hunt and collect a “qussuk”, a swan. He gets taken in by a plain bird, a “kussuk”, a witch, disguising herself by wearing what you would call “galdrar” in Northern mythology, illusions meant to deceive the eye and spark lust and greed, blinding the hunter to the truth. The word “kussuk” also means “witch”, the evil kind with a heart of stone. The script is flipped and the prey turns into the hunter who himself has unbeknownst to him become the unsuspecting and willing prey. A “kussuk” wears the feathers of others, the swan’s for example, as her own, to enthrall others. Without them there is only the illusion of power. 
 
While I was working on a project in Germany, the head of the project tasked me with reporting my observations and what I noticed about every single project member including him and me, to help further the collaboration and understanding of the different ways of the members of the team. Two other members of the project group were present, when I accepted the task. When I reported to him, that there was foul play in the background and he himself was the target of one of the plots, he looked straight at me and said, “I know. I am ignoring it.” Then he let his mask fall and looked me in the eyes, “I have never collected a swan.” He became an incredible mentor after that. 

In a Celtic tale the wren outsmarts the mighty eagle who thinks of himself as the king of birds. When the birds hold a contest to find out, who could fly the highest, the eagle is sure of himself and loses in the end. The wren had taken a piggy back ride to success and left the eagle behind looking like the jester’s fool and not the king, showing him that arrogance blinds. 

In Stephen King’s “IT”, it is the children and the innocent in the bodies of grown-ups that are Pennywise the Clown's prey.

They have not lost their imagination and ability to dream, but are open to the illusion used to camouflage the predator, who in the dull world of the adult part of Derry, the town the storyline of “IT” is settled in, is simply called Robert ‘Bob’ Gray, a colorless man with depth akin to a cardboard cutout.
 
In his clown costume albeit, he turned into each and every child’s dream and desire and after having them lured into his arms, their worst nightmare. He fed on their emotions, capturing them in his web, leaving them in a catatonic shutdown state.
 
In the physical world outside the realm created by Stephen King, it is the hungry ghost’s and soulthief's, the narcissist’s, modus operandi: Study the prey, feed their imagination, create a shared fantasy and then feed on their dreams and fears, suck them dry, discard them and leave them behind like a spider leaves behind the dried husk of its prey, unable to speak of the emotional and psychological abuse they have endured, shutdown by malevolent gossip or smearing campaigns and being provoked into a meltdown and self-harm by conscious re-traumatization.  

I was asked once, if I liked a specific scent, I replied, “I do not like perfume, it makes monsters smell like roses.” Have you ever been told to trust your nose? Do it, but take other factors into account. ​
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One of my professors at university in Vienna told the following story. A colleague of his was reeking. Yes, his words. Instead of getting better, it got worse little by little, day by day. As it was winter at that time, opening the windows only helped for a bit, so he and the other members of the staff chose an approach that might seem comical, but is passive aggressive at its core to solve the olfactorial problem, when they could not bear the suffering anymore. They gifted him shower gels and soap, in the hopes that he would take the hint. He did not. 
 
Alas, spring came and with it the dawn of a new time. All of a sudden, the smell was gone. There was one person who realized what it had been. The other professor had worn the same Norwegian pullover every day during winter time. It had been the pullover, soaking up the sweat for months, not the man.
 
And yes, they could have simply asked him, instead of judging him by the nose and fear of his reaction. 
 
Things are not always, what they seem to be and at times you will not get the full story until much later, either by seeing it for yourself, while sorting your experiences, or by someone reaching out to you telling you, that they lied to you or manipulated a situation by omitting details in the hopes, you would never find out. 
 
Use all of your senses to take in, what is going on, use your mind to solve the puzzle and then open your heart to see. 

("On Trusting your Senses Or Opening your Heart to see" written in 2024, revised in 2026)

"White Seadevil Anglerfish", white pastels, Kristin Raphaela Otti (2024, Hotel, Café & Konditorei Hecher, Wolfsberg)

Sometimes following the light does not lead you to the promised land. When in darkness and its light aspect unhealed, the seadevil anglerfish is a master manipulator abusing spirituality posing as the one self-sacrificing for others, while luring them right into their abyss and his stomach. Beware for those especially, who have taken names, declaring themselves “white”, instead of having walked their abyss. Turning “white” or “black” has a specific meaning in spirituality. In hierarchical structures manipulators use it to place themselves above others or smear those they perceive as threats to their image and fake persona, in sacred circles there is a different understanding of it. 

"Antha", coloured pencils, Kristin Raphaela Otti (2002, a character for a forum-based online role-playing game)

Dare to take a look beneath the surface or the cloak someone is wearing, you might get surprised. 

“Orion the Chessboard Magician”, coloured pencils, Kristin Raphaela Otti (2002, A character for a forum-based online role-playing game)

Integrating light and shadow aspects and healing them, helps in understanding two sides of the coin and to get to know oneself better. Orion was a character, who was a master in playing both sides. 

"White Panda", white pastels, Kristin Raphaela Otti (2024, Café de L'Europe, Vienna)

When in darkness with its light aspect unhealed, gluttony, taking and consuming without stop and thus becoming a Hungry Ghost is part of being in Panda energy. If the Panda dares to walk its abyss, it will find patience, balance and harmony instead. 

The worst nightmare of a bully is a person who embraces themselves, has realized that an ending and a beginning are the same and starts laughing with themselves instead of at themselves embracing who they are to the fullest.
 
I am a floorball goaltender. The first thing, I tell young goalies I mentor is, that no matter how good you are, the opposing team will score on you. You can do everything right and still, the ball will find its way into the net on occasion. It is not about you being perfect, it is about you embracing the game in all of its aspects and becoming in love with it.  

They score and leave the rink as the victor? You reflect, go through every moment one more time, visualize. Would you have been able to make a save? No? Let it go. Did you make a mistake, was your conditioning not good enough, do you have to build more strength, resilience or flexibility? You can work on that step by step. The goal they scored? Let it go now.
 
By making the decision to grow instead of belittling yourself or putting other players down, you become a victor. You have just won over yourself and that is a victory no-one can take from you. 
 
There will be times albeit, when you have to let others walk in your shoes for a while, so they are able to recognize the gift you are, what you bring to the table or what it is you are battling through on a daily basis. Do it smiling gently.
 
More than twenty years ago, our team did interviews with “25 – Das Magazin”. The camera man made fun of us goalies telling us that the shots we were facing were nothing. He got the ingenious idea to shoot a scene while lying in goal having the players shoot at him, no protective gear necessary. 

​One of our players back then was a former NHL prospect. He let go of a slapshot and hit the camera man directly in the balls. The camera man sang a different tune after that, likening being hit by a floorball to being hit by a machine gun which is an exaggeration. He and his colleagues showed their sense of humor, too. That scene is in the final cut they aired, original sound and all. 
 
Right before an important match I got injured and could not play. One of our forwards stepped forward and said, that she would play in goal free willingly that match because she did not want to run that day. I said nothing. About two minutes in, there was the first whistle. She came to the bench with a look of horror on her face and said to me, “I am done physically. How are you able to do that?” “Who do you think the best conditioned player on a floorball team is?” “The goalie?!” After the next whistle, she approached me again. “I am done both mentally and physically. How are you able to do that?” “Years of training.”
 
Embrace imperfection. In doing that lies the ultimate victory. Rise and grow. In your own time. On your own unique path. Laughing with yourself, embracing life and its cycles. 

There are two sides to every page in a book. Only reading the odd-numbered pages never gives you the full story. 
 
Dare to read both and go beyond the cover. 
 
Dare to use your eyes to observe the letters, not someone else’s reading glasses but your own, your own mind to put them together into words and your heart to see and feel the story through the lense of your own experience and truth.

​Snakes shed their skin, leaving behind what they have outgrown without looking back. The skin shed becomes one with Mother Earth again, nourishment to the plants, and the snake enters a new cycle of growth, experiencing her world with eyes that are older and wiser, her body albeit young once more and shining. 
​

​To me, snakes are mentors that teach us about forgiveness and letting go, instead of striking and biting back, and the choice of leaving a situation or an old you behind that is slowly taking your breath away, suffocating your heart. 
 
Forgiveness is a letting go of the resentment and the blaming of yourself for not knowing better, the what ifs and the should have beens. It is the shedding of the old skin and the growing of a new you.
 
Forgiveness means giving yourself the closure someone else or a situation never offered to you, allowing yourself the freedom to heal, to find your peace and to set out on your path again with renewed hope and trust in yourself and in your heart. 

Forgiveness is an internal process, not an external one. It is not an inviting back in of old energies, a reunion with others or the return to a place or into a situation, where trauma occurred or was inflicted. It is opening up to life again step by step, inviting healing and fresh energies in.
 
Forgiveness does not mean offering the other cheek if someone has slapped you in the face and let them hit you once more. Forgiveness sometimes means acknowledging that trust has been shattered, a pattern recognized, setting a boundary and walking away, keeping the peace instead. 
 
It is not cowardice. 
 
It is the courage to protect your heart, your soul, your mind and your spirit. 
 
The wisdom you gathered through your experience and the one you will share with others by allowing yourself to walk away, will bring healing to your world and the ones you meet on your future path, when you decide to share your stories with them.

Gossip is the silent killer.
 
In smear campaigns and monkey business, gossip, spreading rumours and lies behind the back of others, are part of the weapons of choice of toxic congregations and the jealous playing their games. 

They will always have someone who will – their reasons and agenda being solely their own – state, that they have “heard” the same or are “in the know” pretending that you have been friends or close associates by using your nickname or private information. 
 
Gossip plants a seed of doubt in the minds of others and if they did not like you from the start or they are working on past wounding, that seed will sprout eventually. 
 
It is part of the psychological, mental and emotional warfare abusers wage. It happens behind your back, unbeknownst to you.
 
Your joy and self-confidence in doing things will suddenly be called arrogance and superiority.
 
You being open and helping others will be painted as you scheming and being calculating. 
 ​
​You shining your light and showing your talents openly, because you love what you are doing? If they no longer profit from you or want to harm you, they will paint you as arrogant and prideful. 
 

​The reason why I love them so much is, that they are hard as hell in the beginning. “Bloodborne” for example was deemed so difficult, that Sony sent an electronic gift to everyone who succeeded in platting it. ​

​The games also have a lot of humor, dark one that is. In “Dark Souls II”, one of the very first trophies you are going to unlock on your way to the Platinum trophy is “This is Dark Souls”. All that is required to achieve it, is to die for the first time. 

Yes, for the first time. 

The challenge to me was, not to get it as the first trophy. I succeeded. Naturally, I had to fail better that time around, too, eventually.

Soulsborne games do not take you by the hand and if you want to find out more about the lore, you have to take a closer look at the items you are collecting and the NPC’s you will meet on the way while playing. ​

Swans are the Guardians of the Gates and teach us about our roles as guardians in our lives, as custodians on Mother Earth and the Sea of Stars. They tell the stories of their own metamorphosis and transformation, like Hans Christian Andersen did in his fairy tale “The Ugly Duckling”. Swans do not know their own beauty, they shine unbeknownst to them.
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​As cygnets they are unassuming, brown and black. They radiate their beauty from within, but their surroundings are blind to it. In the fairy tale, a cygnet was adopted by a family of ducks. It was ridiculed and made fun of, because it did not look like they did. The cygnet albeit stayed true to its heart and transformed into its beautiful adult swan self, never belittling those that had belittled it, but becoming a beacon of hope and resilience embracing others with love unconditional.  

Gliding gently across the Sea of Emotions, Swan says, “Be gentle and compassionate, when going deep within and when touching the souls of other beings. Breathe calmness into your heart. Calm waters reflect your beauty, the light within your heart, a raging sea casts shadows and tears your world apart.”

​The Swan listens to all stories alike, for there is none that cannot be told. Our shadows are nothing to be afraid of, but they are to be seen, acknowledged, honored and loved. 

They have formed out of remnants of our wounds, protecting us and defending us their way. The moment we look at them, befriend them, ask them, what their needs are, they turn into gifts and aspects of ours we thought we did not possess or talents we only saw in others. 

Shadows don’t destroy or devour us, they lead us deep into ourselves, where the seeds of light are hidden. When we embrace both our shadows and our light, we come into balance.

​We open our hearts unconditionally to those who answer our soul’s call with an equally open heart or set a firm boundary, become the guardian and the gate of our world and keep those that try to either come in telling lies, making compliments devoid of honesty or invade using violence out of our sanctuaries, our hearts. 

​We are both shadow and light, we are the in-between, the side of us that simply is, non-reactive, non-responsive, calm and filled with serene peace.

​Never however, threaten a swan or try to force your way into their heart: They will protect the gate that leads into their heart and those living within without mercy.

​„No.” is a full sentence.
 
“Enough.” is a sufficient reply. 
 
A dialog is not led by one.
 
A conversation is neither a battlefield nor a war to be won. 
 

​The polar opposite of a shaman who had consciously re-opened a wound and then watched over me, was another shaman who I walked with for quite a while. It was at a time, where I had just begun to go deep. He saw my wounding as well and he recognized my gifts and abilities during a time, in which I was blind to them as a result of my own mirror having been shattered. 
​

​He started to erode my self-confidence little by little by belittling me, making fun of me and my tools, and laughing at me, when I asked for advice and help, getting angry, confusing me by saying one thing one moment and the opposite only a while later.  

There were good days as well, which made it so confusing. He told me stories, he cracked jokes and when he was talking about his nephews and nieces his whole being lit up. His wounding was a mirror of mine. I had started to trust him, because I had felt seen and understood, so I was open to him. 

One day I called him and told him that I had cleansed and healed a stone. He laughed at me and told me that that was impossible. A few months later he showed me two crystals he had cleared and thus healed.

Another time he told me that he did not like metals and did not work with them, only to tell me to step onto a metal plate during a healing ceremony a while later.

Another day, he made fun of my drum bag, calling it too big for my drum, which is a smaller one. He then grabbed my drum and wanted to go on with his rant, but he froze for some reason, my drum in his hands staring at her with wide yes. He was standing there like that for more than a minute, until he exclaimed, “It is not cleansed.”, still wide-eyed.

When I was about to leave that same day and putting on my jacket, a thought hit me and I started to smile. He exploded and said, “Don’t pat yourself on your shoulder and smile. I tell you when you have done something well and when to smile.”

This happened long before, I met the other shaman who had told me to say "Thank you." whenever I was being put down or belittled, but what I replied to him, was “Thank you.”

​It made him stare at me in confusion and he said “Thank you.” in return.

​I never visited his house again after that. I talked to him one more time, when I was about to attend a weekend ceremony in Salzburg. He tried to talk me out of it, belittling me and telling me that the shaman who would be conducting the ceremony was darkness and evil. I told him that I would listen and trust, what my heart was telling me about that shaman, and not his voice.
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His making fun of me was not medicine. He went over the line again and again, when his own wounding flared up. One day, when he was angry, his masked slipped. He told me, that if someone hurt him, he played with them. That time he was talking about a former girlfriend of his. Another time he told me that he had been working on me energetically without permission, mocking me again. 

One day, when he had put me down again, called me a coward not willing to go deep and with whom he did not want to work, he knew that he had overdone it. He followed me, when I left his premises, talking about squirrels. His energy had changed completely. 

I made the conscious choice not to call or visit him again, after he had tried to talk me out of going to Salzburg, calling the shaman I would meet darkness.

It was not easy, because I loved him. Yes. Nothing ever happened, but he knew. He once tried to make me jealous by telling me on the phone that he had a new girlfriend. I told him that I was happy for him. He fell silent, told me that he had to go and hung up.

Loving someone means to be happy, if they become in love with someone else. It is not about possession. How could I not have been happy for a friend who had found a partner who made his heart beat faster?

I met him again by chance more than a year later. We had a conversation and I showed him one of my drawings. He made a remark about details not being right. I said, “Yes, I know. It is not about that.” He started laughing, but in a good way. 

Again, we spoke about the shaman I had met in Salzburg, again he called him dark and evil and again, I told him that I would follow my own heart in this and not his voice. There was learning to be done. We agreed to disagree.

Then someone else started to twist something I had said and to my surprise, the shaman came to my defense and told the young man in no uncertain terms about the power of words and the energy he had just called in on himself.

​When it was time to part ways, we looked at each other and I told him, that I trust my heart and follow my own path, doing things my way. He started to smile and said, “I know.”