The publishing house was buzzing. The rush was intense to get a few books launched before the end of November, in time to enter them for the Brazilian Academy of Letters awards and to take advantage of the Christmas sales momentum. Otherwise, we would close the season with a negative balance in our bank account. Proofreaders, layout designers, illustrators, translators, and editors were all striving to meet deadlines and targets without compromising the quality of the works. Despite the hurry, the enthusiasm and joy filled the old mansion that housed the publishing house. We knew those books had the power to equip readers on their personal journeys, while also remembering that art is merely the lighthouse. The navigation is personal. Knowledge doesn’t transform; it merely offers tools for evolutionary movement. Tool and construction are interconnected, but they are not the same.
One of the illustrators, Rafaela, or simply Rafa, as everyone called her, was a professional of rare talent. We had worked together since the advertising agency days. Without giving up her relaxed and humorous nature, she approached her tasks with extreme seriousness and competence. She was a beautiful woman, with hair that changed colour and cut as often as the phases of the moon, as if the constant changes to her face were indispensable to her restless, renewing, and creative spirit. A hallmark of her personality and identity. Around forty years old, she was the mother of Clara and married to João, a mechanical engineer, her first and only boyfriend. During all this time, spanning the agency and the publishing house, I had met her husband only a few times. Even at the events where Rafa received awards for her beautiful work, he was never present. She had won many awards. That year, her illustrations fell short of her recognized talent. Her smile and eyes weren’t as bright either, as if a dull varnish blocked the original shine that always defined her. Even her hair seemed neglected, like a photograph of a soul in disarray. The editor responsible for one of the projects, a collection of books set in a fictional and fantastical universe inhabited by anthropomorphic beings, had rejected her cover illustration three times. They really weren’t good. This had never happened before. I became concerned. Our professional relationship had built a solid friendship, though I knew little about some aspects of her life. Rafaela liked to talk about Clara but was very reserved when it came to João. I invited her for a coffee at a cozy pastry shop near the publishing house, with tables in a leafy open-air courtyard at the back of the store.
Comfortably seated under the shade of a large, century-old mango tree, I went straight to the point. There was a sadness or worry that she couldn’t hide, to the point that it was affecting her work, as if the creative spark that had always enchanted everyone was now blocked by a wall of suffering. It was necessary to break down that wall so that life could flow again with intensity, lightness, and joy. Rafa took a sip of coffee, looked at me for a few moments, as if weighing whether she was willing to continue with that conversation, and murmured that the reason she was feeling bad was João. I asked if it was a health or job issue. She said no. It was about their relationship. Her husband was a good man, but she was not happy. I asked how long she had felt this way. So long that she could no longer say, she revealed. It wasn’t a sudden pain but suffering that had built up over the years. A rebellious tear escaped to confess the repressed pain she could no longer contain. I told her she needed to let it out, cry and talk until she drained the feelings that were suffocating her. To listen to oneself is the first step to knowing oneself better. We were friends, and I was willing to help. Rafaela looked at me again and shook her head. Because I was a friend, she said, my view lacked neutrality. That wasn’t the only reason. With honesty, she said that despite my goodwill, she didn’t consider me fit for the task. But yes, she needed help. I suggested Heitor, a psychoanalyst friend who was also a monk of the EOMM. Then I remembered he was on vacation in Buenos Aires, where his family lived. I sensed that Rafaela couldn’t wait any longer. Her eyes revealed the urgency of the situation. I suggested some other people who could help. One by one, she dismissed them. At the end of the list, Rafa revealed who she wanted to talk to. Cléo, the witch. She admitted she had always wanted to meet her. The time was right. I deflected. I said she was nothing more than an urban legend. The texts about the witch were just the imagination of a writer. Rafaela said she knew it wasn’t quite like that. Creativity has the limit of not straying too far from reality, or it risks becoming implausible or absurdly empty. She insisted a lot. After several refusals, I ended up giving in. However, I warned her of the risk of the unpredictable. I hadn’t always been able to find her when I looked. The choice was never mine, always Cléo’s.
It was an October Monday, with a blue sky and a pleasant ocean breeze. Pedra Bonita, a large granite massif leaning over the Atlantic, from where much of Rio de Janeiro can be seen, anchors an unusual energy. A wonderful place to think, pray, and meditate. It was the only place where I had ever met the mythical Carioca witch, whom the whole city had heard about, but very few had met in person. Hence the legend. We left the car near the hang-gliding ramp and walked up to the plateau in a steep fifteen-minute hike. There was no one at the top. I liked to sit facing the ocean and the prophet’s face carved by wind, salt, and sun over centuries in the mountain ahead ,Pedra da Gávea. As we approached, to my surprise, a brown-skinned woman with long black hair, wearing a flowing multi-coloured dress, awaited us at the edge of the cliff with open arms. Rafaela looked at me briefly, as if to ask whether it was who she thought. I nodded yes. She ran toward her and was embraced in a long and comforting hug. There were many tears, loaded with the painful feelings of someone who could no longer suppress them. If she didn’t release them, she would either explode in rage or implode in sadness. That’s what denied or contained pain does; that’s why it must be addressed before it destroys us. After the crying, Cléo remarked:
“Old sorrows must leave to make room for new feelings. Pain is like that rude guest who spreads out inside our home without asking permission or using any measure of restraint or respect. It rummages through drawers, leaves everything messy; eats what’s in the fridge without caring if we’ll go hungry; sleeps in our bed and forces us to lie on the floor. It throws out the clothes in the closet so that we start wearing suffering as if it were an inevitable outfit. Pain distances us from who we are, it deforms us, brings out the worst in us, to the point of making us lose faith in goodness. Since each person lives within themselves, we end up feeling like intruders and unwanted in our own home. After a while, we come to believe that this is just how it is, that living with pain is normal and unsolvable. A common and devastating mistake. Never live under the shadow of that belief. When the eyes are good, the whole universe is light. Every suffering reveals a mistake in how an experience was processed. The dismantling of agony happens by reprocessing old situations through a different understanding, stemming from new knowledge and a more refined perception and sensitivity. The past is either a school or a prison, depending on the clarity one has achieved in their vision. When we manage to look at an event from a more enlightened perspective, the palette of choices begins to offer colours previously unimagined. That way, we can apply extraordinary tones and unbelievable brushstrokes capable of permanently altering reality. Love blossoms to heal pain.”
The witch asked Rafaela if she was willing to undertake an important journey, during which she would meet a part of herself that she had, by her own choice, left behind in the drawer of an ordinary day. She furrowed her brow and warned her: “It’s not possible to forget or abandon who we are.” Then she added: “It’s as if you were standing on a boarding platform. If you don’t feel ready, you have the right to postpone the journey. Nothing is stopping you from remaining where you are.” The illustrator assured her that she was willing to make the journey. That was the reason she was there. Cléo warned her: “The path to the soul is almost never fast or easy. It’s a journey full of harsh landscapes and unpleasant encounters. It’s not a trip for tourists, but an adventure for explorers. You’ll have to revisit situations and people you’d rather have forgotten, face fears and pains that scare you and disturb your sacred sleep at night. In the end, you’ll have to deal with pivotal choices.” Rafaela’s expression revealed three fundamental virtues for the journey: willpower, courage, and self-love. The witch smiled in satisfaction upon noticing them and said: “You must bring the pain to the surface, so that no fraction remains hidden from your eyes, so you can observe it fully, from countless angles, and understand it from an unusual perspective, becoming able to dismantle it with your own hands. No one will do this for you. It’s a deeply personal task, and therefore impossible to delegate. When immersed in the darkness of a room without windows to life, everything and everyone seems frightening.” And she warned again: “Let the light in. Never be afraid to enter the arena of truth to face your pain. Otherwise, it will devour you.”
Rafaela asked what weapons would make her able to deal with such pain. The witch was succinct: “Only one is enough: love for yourself. Nothing else can defeat pain. Nor is any suffering immune to love.” Then she warned: “Love has nuances and layers of depth. You’ll have to find within yourself a kind of love you never imagined you possessed. But never doubt. It exists. It’s merely waiting as a seed. For it to blossom, you’ll have to awaken a gardener named soul. Within her lies the essence of your power. That is the other you, still unknown to you within yourself. Your best part, capable of radiating the light that will forever disperse the darkness of pain.”
Rafaela admitted that, despite her willingness to go forward, she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to face her own suffering. It was great and old. She suspected she had grown accustomed to living with it. Maybe suffering was her fate, she said with resignation. A statement that revealed the usual difficulty of breaking free from patterns of imprisonment maintained by the fear that change might bring even greater pain or regret. As if fear were saying: leave me with these pains, at least I already know them. With time, I’ll get used to them. Cléo furrowed her brow and corrected her firmly: “Never get used to suffering, nor believe you are too small to face it. You are bigger than your biggest suffering. We all are. Never see them as punishment or eternal penalty; there is no trap more dangerous. Don’t deal with suffering as if facing an enemy, that is a common mistake. See yourself before a master willing to teach you something you don’t yet know about yourself, like in mythological stories where extraordinary women must face powerful adversaries to conquer the most extraordinary of all powers: to become the mistress of their own will and destiny, a prerequisite for genuine freedom. On the journey that leads us to the soul, the victories lie in harmonizing unbalanced emotions that corrode joy and consume our days. It is necessary to understand how we misprocess lived experiences, giving rise to suffering and allowing it to dominate us. Dismantling each pain and fear through an increasingly clear and refined perception sums up the essential work of building inner peace.” Then she concluded: “The experience remains unfinished as long as there is even the slightest trace of pain.”
The witch went on: “Who we are doesn’t always reflect who we could be. We don’t fit in the tiny boxes others try to place us in. They’re too small for our size. It’s not a delusion, the clear feeling of being squeezed. It’s real. Dreams and the soul are too big to be placed in and forgotten inside just any box.” She made a hand gesture, as if to say “be careful,” and reminded her: “Don’t be mistaken, sometimes we are squeezed in boxes we ourselves chose to enter and stay in.”
Then she asked: “What makes you suffer so much?” The illustrator explained that she was married to a good man. João was honest, hardworking, and never let anything lack at home ,at least in the material sense. He was also a caring and attentive father to Clara. However, when it came to Rafaela’s personal needs or professional life, he was indifferent. Always had been. To João, those aspects of Rafaela’s identity were non-existent. Her worries and achievements were of little importance to her husband. At home or with friends, he talked about his projects and ambitions as if he were the captain of a ship, and she a mere passenger with no say over the route that also defined her life. She described some facts and events, both old and recent, that illustrated this behaviour. In short, her life, desires, interests, and victories seemed meaningless to her husband. Over the years, she had annulled herself to the point of becoming invisible to João. Cléo interrupted her to correct the flawed perception: “To feel invisible to yourself. There’s nothing we can do if someone refuses to look at us. But refusing to look at yourself is a choice. It is to give up a power, to renounce self-care, an act of lovelessness. There is no room for complaints from someone who abandons or cancels themselves. You can’t expect from anyone what you refuse to do for yourself.” She paused before finishing the observation: “You are exactly where you placed yourself. The heart of the matter is not what you allowed others to do to you, but what you refused to do for yourself. That is the root of so much pain.”
Rafa broke into tears. They were heartfelt tears, from someone who misses the best of herself, a part locked away in a forbidden drawer for fear of facing an undesirable situation or uncomfortable truth. As if it were possible to stop being who we are, to let our light go out so someone else could shine alone, and still feel happy. One light never puts out another. Together, they shine farther and illuminate more clearly the path chosen together. Cléo explained: “That understanding is the foundation of a union. Otherwise, it’s just two people under the same roof sharing expenses and chores, never forming a couple in the noble and sacred sense of the concept and the word. Sharing joys and mutual achievements is the foundation of common happiness. Taking care of yourself and being committed to the other’s needs maintains individuality without giving in to selfishness. Adding without needing to cancel oneself is the essence of shared growth. There is no happiness without the indispensable inner prosperity. It’s useless to be surrounded by the most beautiful flowers if the soul lives in a desert of personal achievements. On the other hand, when the soul dwells in a garden, all the surrounding aridity softens or disappears.” Rafaela said she was a very successful professional. The witch shrugged and asked: “If that’s enough, why so much suffering and sadness?” The illustrator closed her eyes, for she knew the exact answer. One part of her was blooming, while another was rotting. For a time, that one part sustained the other. Now, the rotting part was contaminating the blooming one. That explained why her illustrations had been falling short of her well-known talent. No one can thrive being only a fraction of themselves. Far from the search for wholeness, anyone will eventually fall into the abyss they’ve thrown themselves into.
The illustrator asked if the best thing to do would be to divorce João. Cléo shook her head and warned: “I have no idea. Staying or leaving is a decision that belongs to you alone. It’s not up to anyone else. As long as you don’t know what to do, just let the decision ripen. Don’t rush. To mature doesn’t mean to sit still waiting for life to solve your problems. That won’t happen. Maturing is an internal movement of understanding the decision and the step. You lose the fruit when you pick it from the tree too early. On the other hand, stay alert so the fruit doesn’t fall and burst on the ground for not being harvested at the right time.” Then she suggested: “Don’t fall into the trap of victimhood. Just like everyone else, you are responsible for your feelings and choices. If your life is in someone else’s hands, it’s because you allowed it. Living together doesn’t mean renouncing your own essence, identity, and personality. No one adds anything to anyone by subtracting from themselves. That’s just handing over control and accepting the role of passenger. There’s no room for complaints if the trip turns out unpleasant.”
The witch advised: “Call João for a conversation. Many conflicts arise from noise or lack of communication. Assuming someone understands is replacing truth with a convenient version. We can’t blame anyone for a need we never clearly expressed. Some people can read our eyes and gestures; others still need words. Express your anguish and needs calmly and clearly. Only through a sincere and loving dialogue will it be possible to understand whether the one by your side is a priceless partner or just a mere companion. Then you’ll have the tools to make the best choice. Just like everyone, you have the right to define your own path and destiny.”
Rafaela let her thoughts drift beyond the Atlantic waves, past where her eyes could reach. Cléo brought her back as if she could guess the unspoken words: “João blames you for Clara’s unplanned pregnancy, for getting married too young, while his friends were still out having carefree adventures. He feels robbed of the time and experiences he supposedly missed. He punishes you with the harsh sentence of disinterest, as if you had stolen a precious part of the life he didn’t live.” With teary eyes, the illustrator nodded a simple yes. The witch commented: “He wastes the gold in his hands by lamenting the silver that slipped away.” She shrugged and added: “There’s no reasoning with someone who refuses to understand their own mistakes.” The illustrator said she had expressed to her husband the desire to divorce. He hadn’t said yes or no. Only that if she wanted to go, then she should go. He wouldn’t help with anything, nor would he stay involved with their daughter. It would be a complete break , both the husband and the father would disappear entirely. Rafaela said she didn’t want to hurt Clara. She loved her daughter deeply. She already slept in a separate room from João, but still couldn’t leave. Cléo gestured with her hand, as if pointing out the obvious, and asked: “Do you believe that witnessing this kind of relationship is healthy for Clara?” The witch didn’t wait for an answer but kept her moving: “You’re no longer João’s woman, but you also haven’t stopped being his wife. The hearts are no longer aligned, but the lives are still entangled. In short, you’re neither one nor the other.” Cléo looked deeply at her and warned: “The worst of all worlds is to be imprisoned between two worlds.”
The illustrator didn’t say a word. She closed her eyes and surrendered to the silence and stillness of the place so that those thoughts could find a place to settle within her and help her tidy up the house. Not the one she lived in with João and Clara, but the one she lived in inside herself. That’s the one that keeps the other in peace. After some time , I can’t say how much , Rafaela opened her eyes and, as if startled by a discovered treasure, whispered in surprise at her own voice: “Pain is a place that doesn’t exist. In truth, pain is an invented place.” The witch smiled, satisfied.
A flock of seagulls approached and surrounded the witch, who spun in rhythm with the birds. Her flowing dress confused my eyes, making me believe they were wings. Cléo danced atop the granite outcrop, spinning away until she vanished.
I looked at Rafaela as if to ask: and now? The illustrator gave me a smile I hadn’t seen in a long time. There was energy and joy on her face. The pain had been evicted. We deconstruct our suffering by understanding the irrational fears that sustain it. In the light of her girlhood, the illustrator said she needed to change her haircut and colour. We laughed. I understood something had shifted. A new Rafaela was blooming in the enchantment of that day. With all the readiness and beauty of someone who knows where they want to go. And goes.
Translated by Cazmilian Zórdic.
