Mahanth is Editor

I stumble clumsily through the entrance of a long, dark, and frightening tunnel.

Lying eagerly in wait just for me deep inside the musty pitch-black morass is a large dragon, at once somehow fiercely ugly and stunningly beautiful. The scaly winged creature in the cave is way too real, more than a figment of my imagination, existing beyond the realm of lucid dreams and hallucinations, outlandish as that sounds. This particular dragon is not just another fictional supernatural fantasy on a screen. The organism lives and breathes as surely as I do.

It’s not a film unfolding in front of me, it’s my life. The menacing lair this thing calls home I find myself in is just as real as its tenant. I look over my shoulder. There is no turning back, because the mouth of the cave is now closed off behind me. Only one option remains, and that’s to trudge forward, alone. The time has come to muster enough courage to go deeper inside and face the beast where it crouches impatiently.

Strong doses of fear and anxiety infuse the mind.

Fear of the unknown.

Anxiety about what could go wrong, and that list is not a short one.

Many would say these feelings are entirely justifiable, and exactly how just about any human in this situation is supposed to feel based on the survival instincts embedded deep in our DNA through millions of years of evolution surrounded by persistent threats throughout. My eyes adjust to the darkness and I squint further inside while marching forward. Now the glowing reptilian eyes are coming into focus and beyond those I can barely make out a small, faint circle of pure white light behind the dragon. The light at the end of the tunnel. The only goal that matters is getting across the cave to that promising light on the other end, to reach that next chapter of my life in one piece, which will require setting aside other endeavors in order to concentrate exclusively on the task at hand.

Unfortunately the way is blocked by that powerful dragon: fire-breathing and menacing. Death beckons if this pass isn’t handled right. When I hear the low growl echoing towards me it confirms I have perturbed the beast in its own home, and I must find a way to get past this displeased dragon for any hope of emerging from the far side of this tunnel alive. There is no other path; no going over, under, or around the beast nor any tool of technology, sorcery or chicanery to call upon. Freezing in place is not viable as the dragon will simply initiate contact. The only way forward is straight through the dragon courageously.

But how? I assess my limited options as I keep walking toward my fate slowly.

Slay the Dragon. The primal animal impulse to slay is the default setting for the majority of humanity, including usindiamonitor. For most of my life I viewed obstacles or opponents blocking my way in terms of conquest and winning, metaphorically speaking. Since childhood I primed myself, and achieved some success by aspiring to compete hard to defeat any rivals, objects or problems in my way using physical feats or strategic outmaneuvering to achieve the objective. Often these conflicts became zero sum games, where I was either winning or losing, like GPA, SAT scores, Spelling Bees, Science Olympiads, Academic Decathlons, the hundreds of tennis matches I played in high school with perhaps excessive passion. I mostly won, and could not stand losing. Dominant victory is the longtime model that animates business, educational institutions, Hollywood, Bollywood, books, video games, multibillion dollar sports leagues, domestic and international politics, and various other distillations of toxic aggression, which men and women both can display. Society raised me to believe that the best way past the dragon was with sword drawn for glorious close quarter combat between Man and Beast. Win or go home. Home = Death. Channeling the killer instinct that we collectively worship. And why not? The dragon for its part stands in the darkness gnashing its teeth, itching to fight, welcoming my embattled mindset. Fighting just might succeed with concentration and skill. But is this the best way to reach the light? Could this choice prove to be foolish as well as fatal?

Befriend the Dragon, and the dragon might allow me to pass willingly without a fight. This gambit involves keeping one’s sword sheathed and attempting to communicate with the dragon diplomatically towards a mutually acceptable outcome where nobody gets hurt, no harm no foul. Hands raised in an optimistic show of peace. Avoiding violence is after all a win-win outcome. Friendship is a beautiful thing. First the dragon might require some convincing that I am not a tasty treat to be barbecued with dragon fire and unceremoniously devoured. Diplomacy can also be a risky move, but maybe a more palatable one to my sensibilities than brandishing the sword in search of bloodshed.

Sex the Dragon, and the dragon just might willingly allow you to calmly walk by in its post-coital bliss, if the job gets completed to satisfaction. Enter the dragon for a good time in the service of emerging on the other side! This brand of inter-species carnal relations could be novel, interesting and even fun. A great story to tell your friends over a beer later. However electing to do the inter-species nasty inside the dark tunnel would require mutual consent as well as mutual pleasure, two hoops to jump through, neither of which is a given regardless of prior experience and skills on both sides. Additionally how does one communicate specific desires and preferences in such a situation? #DragonSex may be taking fantasy to a whole new depraved level.

While anxiously weighing which way to turn, it finally struck me like a cosmic blast that illuminated the tunnel for a split second. An epiphany. Suddenly I knew deep down inside that the optimal outcome requires traversing a radically different angle altogether.

The dragon is and was actually a part of me.

The dragon and I are one. I AM THE DRAGON.

Again the dragon is real; it is the incarnation of the latest major life problem you are dealing with. I was in the tunnel for an agonizingly long time recently grappling with a rare type of lymphoma, especially in 2024, the Chinese Zodiac’s Year of the Dragon. Of course cancer is very much a part of the human body, a manifestation of my own living cells gone rogue due to an imbalance in the system causing mutation. Fear and anxiety were the two glowing eyes of my dragon during that time. But I have managed to crawl closer to the light. I had plenty of support along the way but in the cave of the mind itself one must go the distance alone.

Or to be more precise, alone but together. I am not alone in facing the dragon though I face it by myself. How? No matter who or where you are, you too are at the mouth of your own pitch black tunnel populated by your own individual dragon. Like time, we cannot turn around and escape the same way we came. The quest to pass the dragon applies to individuals, families, organizations, tribes, cities, nations, all human society, Earth, and the universe as a whole, all levels facing down the great unknown in the darkness during times of terrifying change at breakneck speed and relentless uncertainty. Each of us must walk the tunnel for ourselves, by ourselves. If you are courageous enough to get through the tunnel, there will inevitably be another one eventually waiting down the road, and another, always a next tunnel to pass through after the light at the end of the current tunnel. That’s one of the few certainties. It is only a matter of time before we find ourselves in the tunnel again, for struggle never ends for anyone. Struggle is a baseline feature of our reality. Do not let the dragon bring you down (emotionally or physically) in the tunnel.

By no coincidence every glorious world culture from East to West has a historical heritage of dragon lore, including imaginative art (like this original Chinese painting procured in Hoi An, Vietnam hanging in my bedroom). That’s how we know the dragon has been real since ancient times. We all have dragons of various shapes and sizes and personalities lurking inside the series of caves that make up our consciousness (or group consciousness at the organizational levels mentioned) and the beasts breathe as long as we breathe. Ultimately we must accept that the dark tunnels represent an uncertain future in a world experiencing changes at breakneck speed, and *we* are the very dragons we are entangled with. The dragon may take form as a serious health or mental health problem, a dire financial situation, a broken relationship, a career crisis, local violence or international war. The dragon may rear its head as a failed business, broken community, corrupt system, collapsing nation-state, or an entire world order descending into terrifying chaos at accelerating pace. The dragon will sooner or later force us to confront our mortality and the temporal nature of all things. We know the end to every beginning is inevitable but that makes the prospect no less terrifying.

So now we know the dragon was born from the fear and anxiety we all feel, but we have the agency to flip the script by internalizing a deeper, more powerful and inspirational truth: the dragon is actually an invitation to embrace the fear and anxiety and get past it. There is no zero sum game, and no domination in getting through the tunnel.

Attacking the dragon like a hero regardless of skill is not a sustainable strategy because it wears and damages painfully over time, if not obviously bogged down by existential peril to start with. The sexual option you ostensibly recognized already as a joke regardless of skill. The best way to confront our harsh reality is to befriend the dragon, embrace the dragon, which equates to loving ourselves and all others. Keep moving forward, never give up. This approach is all we can do. Hopefully this is how we reach the light.