ANPU – The weight of the heart is heavy

There is a figure in my painting who kneels with one hand pressed gently to the heart. The gesture is quiet, deliberate and full of meaning. It is not just a pose. It is a prayer.

This piece is titled ANPU, named after the ancient Egyptian deity and a pose in kemetic yoga, physically it It is said to open the cervical vertebrae, which can help with neck mobility. Symbolically kneeling represents yielding the ego, and the hand on the heart symbolises pure thoughts. 

Ma’at both a cosmic principle and a goddess balances light and dark. Anpu was the god of funerary rites, responsible for the protection of graves and the embalming process. He sits at the crossroads of life and death and weighs the heart of the recently departed against the feather of Ma’at.

I have made this an ideal state for myself. A place I return to when the noise of the world grows too loud. I ask myself—have I done enough good to get into heaven. Have I lived well. Have I honoured my time on earth.

There is anxiety in that question. A quiet ache. The fear that I have not done enough. That I am not enough.

But in painting this figure I found a kind of peace. Not certainty, but presence. A moment of stillness where the heart is held gently and the ego bows.

ANPU is not just a god. He is a guide. A reminder that the measure of a life is not perfection but intention. Not performance but truth.