The Feather

Egyptians believed every person at the end of their lives faced a "Trial by Heart Ceremony". Once a person had died, their hearts were weighed before the Court of the Dead. We can see, from the hieroglyphics of the time, that the departed's heart was balanced on a scale against an ostrich feather, which symbolized truth. How much the heart weighed in relation to the feather was an important assessment of whether the person would be able to reside with the gods.
The Egyptians believed that everlasting peace came from a balanced and open heart. If the heart was heavier or lighter than the feather, the deceased could not enter into the presence of all that is eternal.

If the heart was lighter than the feather of truth, it was believed that the heart had not experienced enough; had not participated fully enough in the journey to glimpse or understand the timeless truths. If heavier than the feather, it was believed that the heart had harbored too much of its experience; not surrendering enough, but churning too much with its backlog of envies, and ledgers of wrongs and misfortunes.

"As I explore my own trial of heart, I realize how much I struggle with this each day. I find myself trying to discern just how much I shy away from life and how much of my experience I am clinging to. It is an endless practice. And so I find myself involved in learning how to love it and not to fight it.

One quiet and powerful thing I've learned is that letting go is not just about putting things down. On a deeper place, letting go is about letting your heart crumble, about letting yourself be rearranged by the journey of being alive. For the more we tense and harden ourselves, the more painful and bumpy our ride through existence. This is why grief expressed is freeing and grief held only makes us want to join the dead. So often, in trying to protect ourselves, we hurt ourselves further.
To soften and crumble is not to die."

Mark Nepo