Eating Our Own Tails

The ouroboros is a known symbol of cycles and the blending of opposites—love and hate, birth and death, light and shadow. It’s also a symbol within Jungian psychology, representing the unconscious, and an alchemical symbol for the process of becoming whole.

The ouroboros has been on my mind this week (admittedly sparked by reading adult fantasy), but also because of what it represents in the healing arts—I include therapy in that category.

During a recent session, a client was met with a hard reality while examining her personal patterns within interpersonal relationships, as well as the world around her. Back in July, I wrote about personal accountability in therapy in “A Hard Truth,” and I saw a similar dynamic here worth expanding on. A bonus that I get to nerd out by bringing in symbolism. It was easy—understandably so—for this client to place the responsibility for her healing outside of herself after all she had endured in life at the hands of others.

After that session, I returned to my own quiet space to process. That’s when the image came to me: a golden snake consuming its own tail, forming an unbroken circle.

I used to fear snakes—partly because they grossed me out, the way they slither and coil, but more so due to spiritual trauma that taught me snakes bring evil. A few years ago, I might have seen that image as something dark or ominous. But healing from that spiritual trauma has changed the way I relate to what once felt threatening. Instead of turning away, I’ve learned to look more closely and even sit with the discomfort of what unnerves me—to ask what something means, rather than assume what it is.

And that’s the work.

I thought about my client. I thought about the “Stories as Medicine” talk I gave at New Jersey City University in March, where I spoke about how the narratives we tell ourselves can make or break us.

Because they do.

The ouroboros is not just a symbol of endless cycles—it’s a symbol of participation in those cycles. The snake is not trapped. It is actively consuming itself—or continuing itself, depending on how you choose to look at it. In the same way, the stories we tell ourselves can keep us bound in repetition—or move us toward transformation.

As a therapist and reiki practitioner, my role is to help you turn toward what you’ve been taught to avoid—the shadow, the pain, the parts of yourself you may have learned to reject. Not to get stuck there, but to understand and integrate it.

Because what we don’t face doesn’t disappear—it repeats.

It shows up in relationships, in our sense of self-worth, in the way we interact with the world around us. Again and again, like the ouroboros, we return to the same place until something shifts.

And often, that shift begins with language.

During my chakra training at Lake Atitlán with Transcendental Yoga Collective, a tarot reader once told me, “You can either use your thoughts to destroy or to create.” Whether or not tarot is part of your belief system, the truth in that lands.

The words you attach to your experiences matter. The meaning you make out of your pain matters.

If your inner narrative says, I am broken, the cycle continues, consuming you.
If your narrative says, I am learning, I am surviving, I am becoming, something else becomes possible.

This is where shadow work and narrative meet.

Healing isn’t about cutting parts of yourself away. It’s about turning toward them, understanding them, and integrating them—so the cycle is no longer unconscious.

So you are no longer being consumed by the story, but consciously reshaping it.

The ouroboros is not just a symbol of repetition—it’s a symbol of choice.

What you continue, and what you’re ready to change.