Here is our annual travel brochure for the Holy Nights’ Journey 2024.
Sign up here for this remarkable journey
Explore the map by clicking the pins for more details, enlarge with the expand icon on the right
Hercules starts out in the Peloponnesos in Greece. There is a place called Nemea, now known for its very drinkable wine. But in the days of Hercules, according to Greek historian Herodotus 900 years before his own time, 1300 BCE, so that would be 2200 years before Christ, there was a big Lion roaming around. He was invincible, until he met Heroic Heracles. Our first task on this spiritual journey is to make sure we do not nurture our own, often over inflated ego. It’s not that we have to shrink ourselves, no we have to cover ourselves into the protective skin of the Lion, to defend what we believe is right for the community we are part of.
The first six labors take place around this area of the Peloponnese. In the second labor Hercules manages to stop the Hydra, a monster nurtured by Hera just to kill him, from growing new heads. We have to make sure we are not overtaken by our own addictive habits. Our pleasure should not become a hell for our loved ones. Hercules dips all of his arrows into the deadly poison of the Hydra.
The Third labor requires Hercules to appreciate the good that patience can bring to a soul. He waits for a full year to capture Artemis her favorite pet: the Cerynian Hind: a doe with golden horns and bronze hooves.
The Fourth labor requires Hercules to capture the Erymanthian Boar. By accident he causes his friends the Centaurs Pholus and Chiron to suffer from his poisoned arrows, and learns how to handle his inner pain in the process.
On the the Fifth Holy Night Hercules cleans out the shit caused by an incompetent ruler, without getting his own hands dirty. It’s a good time to contemplate about the shit in your own life right now and how the water of the unconscious can help you clear away the mess.
On Holy Night Six Hercules must kill the Stymphalian Birds, veracious creatures that eat human beings. He gets by with a little help from his friends Athena and Zeus… In this night we learn not to sink away in a stream of negative thoughts.
In Holy Night Seven we leave the Peloponnesos and go to the place where Greece had its first big moments: on the isle of Crete. It’s there where the big White Bull of Poseidon still roams the street. Hercules teaches us to jump at the right time, between the horns of the Big Bull and balance between its two horns. If we don’t jump, we will regret it for the rest of our lives.
Holy Night Eight will teach us to tame our inner horses. The spirit of live that wants to go forward needs direction and purpose. Otherwise it will eat us alive.
Night Nine will take us to one of the earliest clothing ensembles to be found on Amazon: the Girdle of Hippolyte. We all need one in. our wardrobe: the girdle that guards and guides our loins.
In Night Ten Hercules will teach us to guard our innate cattle behaviors and he teaches us to be good herders of our own thoughts.
Workshop of Cranach the elder
In Night Eleven Hercules has to travel to a realm outside human existence: the garden of the Hesperides, the nymphs of the west. He reaches for the apples of eternal live but accepts his own fate and gives them away.
Art Nidhodge
And on the twelfth and last Holy Night, Hercules goes deep into the darkness off the realm of Hades to catch his spotted watch dog Cerberus.
Ready to join? Sign up now!
