I first learned of the Ankh—long ago. Back then, being young and uneducated about anything, I didn’t fully understand it. To me, it looked like some sort of counter-culture emblem, a secret code worn by people who knew something I didn’t. It was intriguing, but it was for the cool kids who did the research that I wasn’t willing to do, and so it lived on the far edges of my awareness, like a symbol that didn’t yet belong to me. I never imagined that one day it would become the most personal, grounding, forward-moving symbol of my life.

Over time, I learned the simple definition: the key of life. A symbol of breath, of renewal, of continuity. But that was just the dictionary meaning. What it became for me was a compass—pointing me deeper into myself, and outward toward something much older and wiser than anything I had known.

And then, one day, the Ankh literally appeared beneath my feet.

When I first found my apartment in Denver, I stepped outside of my car and looked down at the flagstone near the front walkway. Embedded in the stone, worn by time and weather, was an unmistakable Ankh. No plaque. No explanation. Just there. Waiting. It felt like a message I wasn’t meant to decipher yet—but I couldn’t ignore it. It was as if the symbol had tapped me gently on the shoulder and whispered, Pay attention.

That whisper became louder. Not only did I take the Ankh’s advice and leased my lovely home, but before long I found myself in a tattoo parlor, offering my right forearm to carry the Ankh for the rest of my life. I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t intellectualize it. I just knew. And once the tattoo was there, I couldn’t stop drawing it. It showed up in my sketchbook, in my margins, in idle moments and intentional ones, until finally I surrendered and painted a full watercolor of it—my own offering to the symbol that kept calling me.

Then Egypt happened.

Eleven days that changed the way I see the world—and myself. As I traveled from Cairo to Luxor to Aswan, I didn’t just see the Ankh everywhere. I felt it. It became a conversation between me and the country itself—between the ancient Egypt of my imagination and the living Egypt that welcomed me with sounds, scents, colors, and heart. Every temple wall, every museum case, every quiet moment on the Nile seemed to echo the same message:

You are exactly where you’re supposed to be. Keep going.

The Ankh followed me, or maybe I followed it. Long ago, I placed an Ankh necklace around my neck—a simple piece of silver that now feels as essential as my pulse. I haven’t taken it off since, and I don’t plan to for the rest of my life. It’s on me in ink. It’s on me in paint. It’s on me in metal. And it’s in me—in the way I think, in the way I move forward, in the way I choose hope over fear. I wore my Ankh’s inside the Great Pyramid.

The Ankh began as something mysterious, something I misunderstood. Now it’s the clearest symbol I know. For me, it simply means:
Everything is okay. Keep moving forward.
And that message has carried me farther than I ever expected.

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